The Exchanges

Q Yeah. When was the second break and when was the third break in which year?

A was the first break, 2012 was the second break, 2016 was the third break. So coincidentally, it happened a little bit coincidentally, but more also planned every three, four years of hitting stability in what I was doing and realizing that my growth was flattening out. That's when I would take a leap and like completely do something which was very like it was not a leap of relaxation. I would have very strong goals for that period of leap. Like in the yoga meditation year, for example, I was working very, very hard, right? I would wake up at like, in an ashram in South India, in Sevananda ashram, like they would wake you up at five o'clock in the morning, and you had to kind of keep doing your kind of discipline till 10 in the night, and then you had to kind of rinse and repeat every day, you had to do the same thing for months on end, right? So it was not about working, like chilling out, it was about taking a different goal that dramatically expands your mind in a different way, right? So it was writing or like writing a novel or The second goal was like really, uh, becoming a yoga teacher and knowing yoga very well. And the third time it was about, uh, like writing something very enduring, which would last in the world, um, uh, in, and get published in the U S right. And not just keep writing minor stuff in India. So the third time I really took a like full two year effort t…

AI assessment note: “2012 was the second break, 2016 was the third break.”

Q Can you share your first 12 months of execution and the metrics on the business? Yeah.

A So I had very strong metrics, uh, which we were tracking right from the beginning. Uh, we, I had defined that product market fit would be when, uh, Net Promoter Score hits 50. We were rigorously measured Net Promoter Score from the first day of the company. Uh, when Net Promoter Score would hit 50, renewals would hit 50 percentage, because I knew I would be able to, based on the business model, a renewal of 50% would make my business model work. And, uh, My trial conversion, which is from free trial to paid, there would be a conversion of a very, like I called it a fifty-fifty-fifty rule. 50% net promoter score, 50% renewal, and at least a 50% chance that I'm getting a predictable trial conversion of 10 to 12%, right? So, uh, that's how. So the, till then I kept a team very small. So six people in my house, right? Uh, and we built everything from there. The moment I hit that, I turn into a different animal altogether. I just blitz scale like nobody's business, right? I just scale like crazy. So to give you a sense, I did one crore of revenue in about, one crore per month of revenue in about the first nine months. With less than 20 people. One crore per month of revenue I hit, and after that I did a hundred crores of per month of revenue in six months. So every month I doubled after that. One crore, two crore, four crore, eight, 16, 32, 64, I went up to one 27 crores a month rou…

AI assessment note: “I did one crore per month of revenue in about the first nine months.”

Q And, and, uh, uh, how did you get to connect it to these VCs, both Nexus and Omidya?

A To be honest, I think, um, I would have been one degree of separation away because my batchmates were founders and, and, and stuff, but I reached out to them by a cold call on LinkedIn. So I just sent a message saying that, look, hey, I'm Karan Bajaj, I'm the CEO of Discovery, um, you know, like, I've, like, you know, I've, like, had a track record of, like, just seeing things through whatever I do them, whether that's writing a novel or, like, being a CEO and, um, you know, so I'm, I'm now gonna do a startup and I'm gonna see it through. So, like, it was a positive message saying that, look, I mean, I'm doing it and, you know, so, so I think people responded positively to that message.

AI assessment note: “I reached out to them by a cold call on LinkedIn.”

Q What, what are the side effects of you leading the marketing function for the company?

A The side effect is that it got no attention at all. Like, because obviously, I had no time at all, right? Like, in the end, the founder, uh, in a blitzscaling phase, will always be extinguishing fires, right? That's gonna be the nature of the blitzscaling phase, and, uh, the founder has to let some fires burn, obviously, always has to let some fires burn, because if you start extinguishing every fire, then that, again, is not the best use, uh, and, um, you know, these functions that you think you'll just do, because they're so easy, they, they get completely neglected. So, you know, every intern could just post on social media, whatever they wanted, like, it was a free for all, right? Marketing, like there was a bunch of 20, 30 interns doing whatever they wanted, because there was no oversight on them at all, right? So I think, yeah, I mean, we kind of, that was the consequence of that period. And during that retrospect, I think the founder strength will become the weakness of the company because the founder thinks that it's very easy and it becomes so easy that you never attack it. Right. Because you think that it's like, uh, like you think it's a solved problem because it's solved in your mind.

AI assessment note: “The side effect is that it got no attention at all.”

Q And, uh, in 2008, when you took your first break, uh, that was a risk, right? What was going in your, in your mind that you.

A The first jump is very hard. I think the first jump is very hard because, uh, it was a particular, I was also, I was just turning 30. If I'm not wrong, I was like 29 years old and there was obviously all the family pressure to get married and settle down, buy a house and stuff. And I was, uh, you know, around thirties when Indians start to hit their, like some kind of stability in their career. Um, and yeah, it, it felt very foolish, right? Because I was like, not settled in any way. I did like, you know, didn't have a house, didn't have like, you know, wasn't married that time. So, um, you know, I was like leaving everything and going and, uh, without, uh, like, and I was also leaving a job. So obviously the kind of the, the public view, or at least the public view of friends, family, et cetera, was very negative. Um, and, and surprisingly enough, I think the, like a blessing in, in retrospect, but, uh, Actually, when I came back from the sabbatical, I really lived my worst case scenario, because what happened is that I left for my sabbatical in January, 2008. I came back in December, 2008. And that time Lehman Brothers had crashed in the US and there was no jobs at all. And I really didn't have a job and I'd actually taken all my savings and spent it on traveling. So when I came back, I came back with no money, no job prospects. And I was, uh, really on my living on my sister…

AI assessment note: “it felt very foolish, right? Because I was like, not settled in any way.”

Q Growth is never linear, right? Growth. When did you start to realize that?

A Growth is never linear? Yes. Uh, I started to realize that when I think it was a moment of time when I was like, uh, I accepted, right. I was 31 years old. I was sleeping on my sister's couch. Right. Uh, and everybody around me was like buying houses and sending pictures of their first kid. And I, I don't know. I think there was a realization that I was on that couch that look, um, like my destiny will be different. Right. And it's fine. I have to accept it that look, I can't be envious of people with the output, which I haven't, uh, Which I haven't valued and I haven't worked for. So it was very easy at that point of time to feel like, uh, the, like, you know, they were all my batchmates from like, uh, you know, from like, uh, engineering college and I am, and they were all reaching, uh, like milestones, right? That the world values. And I was like, uh, kind of nowhere close. And I think, I think I was just kind of at that point of time, quite, uh, clear that look, I'll have to like measure life by my own milestones.

AI assessment note: “I started to realize that... I was 31 years old. I was sleeping on my sister's couch.”

Q And, uh, on your blog, uh, you know, currentbajaj.com, I believe you share a lot of insights about publishing a book about distribution. What is the things about distribution and marketing you learned your first principles by doing your own experiments?

A The, it's a good question. So I, I haven't written in five years. So just like, I haven't written a blog in five years. So I think it's, it dates, maybe the world has changed overall, but, uh, I, I think that my, my biggest insight is One or two distribution mediums work. Once you figure out those one or two distribution mediums that work, you should go blitz scale on them and, and just let go, let go of everything else. So I think that like I, in, in my, in my writing days, I was, uh, like whenever I was like selling the novel, it became very clear that look, uh, Amazon advertising is working. And second thing, this is working, right? Or two things would work and I would just go and really spend my own money to scale them. Now it helped a lot in Whitehead Junior, for example, very early we figured out that Facebook was working. We built an entire hundred crores a month business just on Facebook advertising and referrals, right? People were referring Whitehead Junior and Facebook advertising was working and we did nothing else, right? We just did that and just did that and just did that and did more of that and more of that and more of that. And so I think with distribution, what I've seen is that every brand which is good will figure out one or two mediums that really hit a chord and then you should just scale them like crazy. Uh, versus, uh, like diversifying too much, you kn…

AI assessment note: “my biggest insight is One or two distribution mediums work.”

Q And now coming onto the White Hat Junior journey, right? Among all the ideas that you wanted to start with, what made you stick with White Hat Junior?

A I think it was very, very mission. I liked the mission a lot when I first came up with the idea. I think the whole idea was that, uh, very, very, Personal for me, like, I had my own kids, they were very young, four and two when Whitehead Junior, I started Whitehead Junior. The idea was, I had formed a clear framework that, like, my life changed after I started to build things. I wrote a novel and then, as I said, my creative well dipped, I added more to the creative well. So I, I always thought that the first act of creation, the earlier you do it in your life, the more your life will transform. I wish I'd done it in 18. I wish I'd tried to write my first novel at 18 or, So I, and then I read some research around how kids peak in creativity at age six. Then what happens is more and more rules and systems enter their lives and, uh, they keep getting more and more, uh, system oriented, if you will. Right. And creativity keeps going down. So it actually is very good research by George Land, Beth Jarman from NASA that kids actually, if you take a random group of people, kids would test at age six would test in the top 90th percentile of creativity. Right. Free forming associations, et cetera. And, uh, age 35, they test in the bottom two percent. Right. So what happens is that more and more as rules and systems enter your life, you become less and less creative and you become more a…

AI assessment note: “I liked the mission a lot when I first came up with the idea.”

Q And what was, uh, that desire that made you start writing and then take it seriously?

A Um, the first time it was like, not as much a desire for writing as much as it became a natural consequence of living what I thought was a very interesting adventure and experience that I thought that many people should do. Right. So for example, uh, like, uh, I, I felt like, uh, this idea that you could leave your job and travel for a year, uh, like, you know, for somebody who has, uh, Like, you know, a typical average person doesn't come to your mind. And I was like, you know, I also had the same path as everybody else. So like, I didn't have any family money or anything like that. So, but I found that that experience was incredibly rich and really transformed me, right? Made me think of the world as very boundaryless. I was traveling in, like in backpacking in Brazil and that time in India, like, you know, not too many Indians were traveling there and they hadn't met Indians and like, you know, I couldn't speak the language. I couldn't speak Portuguese at all, but I really, Found a very boundaryless, uh, kind of world emerge for me because of the travels. So I really liked that the first novel that I wrote was a consequence of that. And then after that did, uh, reasonably well, I wanted to write a second novel, but at that point of time, the surprising thing was that when I started to write a second novel, I realized that, uh, I had nothing to write about, right? So I think …

AI assessment note: “it became a natural consequence of living what I thought was a very interesting adventure”

Q Yeah. So, so at any point of time you became inconsistent or what kept you consistent during that journey?

A I would say reasonably consistent. Um, there was a period of time which was very deep during that period. I was living in an ashram, uh, that was quite deep and long. But after that, since I've been back into the world, it's been a very consistent to like 30 minutes in the morning, 30 minutes in the night as a pattern. And I think that pattern has almost continued throughout. Uh, helped a lot with other things because I, I valued that pattern so much that, for example, alcohol went out of my life because I knew that when I had drunk, like, uh, you know, when I was drinking, then, um, like the night meditation would not happen and the morning meditation would be very clouded. So a lot of things kind of like automatically happened because of that. Vegetarian, I became a vegetarian because, uh, I realized, like, I, I was more conscious of the, uh, effect on, of food on my body. So stuff like that, right, I became more conscious about what was happening in my body because of the meditation, apart from obviously the, the, like the mind being, like I'm, you know, like, yeah, like being, like being somewhat more tolerable to work with because, like I was able to channelize my energy better.

AI assessment note: “I would say reasonably consistent. Um, there was a period of time”

Q Yeah. And, uh, how was the acquisition experience? Like, like, were you open to that experience or were you saying that I'm already a hundred CR company? Why should I get it?

A Uh, no, I think I was very open. I think there were multiple things, right? One is basically I was at a Stage of life where it was more about the mission than the, like, so I felt like, look, uh, Soon, uh, because I was really bit scaling then going like, and the plans were more courses, more countries. Uh, I will, I thought that 50% of my job would become fundraising. Right. Uh, and if I were to think of my mission in the world, is that the mission to kind of build my own company or was the mission, the kids becoming creative or like kids never losing their spark of creativity. And if that's the mission, then, you know, they, uh, Bejus is the, like, you know, they, they have the biggest reach and the biggest, uh, like, you know, they've, they built the biggest tech company. So I think. I'll just be able to focus on what I do very well. And, uh, and so it was very clear in my mind that anything I've wanted to do on my own, we would be able to do faster, better, stronger under the broader network. And I was at a phase of my life where I didn't care whose name was on the company or like, it doesn't matter, right? At all at that, like I was, I mean, not to say an arrogant, but I was reasonably accomplished in my other fields of life that I wasn't looking for this as my like only source of accomplishment. So that's why I was never hung up on that. And then second, I think in startu…

AI assessment note: “no, I think I was very open.”

Q After your second sabbatical, you grew leaps and bounds in your corporate career. Correct. What was the reason for that? Like what, how did your inputs in your corporate career change dramatically?

A See the thing is that, yeah, so the, so the year that I spent was heavily, like I had spent about six months in an ashram, three months, like I guess traveling from Europe to India and then three months. So I think the biggest thing that happened was, um, My life was very bare in that period, right? So very bare in the sense, uh, like when we traveled from Europe to India by road, we just chose the cheapest mode of transport, right? We didn't take any flights. So I was living in roads and hostels and stuff like that. In Ashram for six months, you are like, like living in a dorm room with 60 people. There's one bathroom, there's like cold showers, if at all, right? So it's very austere. So I think the austerity has been very good after that, right? Because I think, uh, with austerity, what happens is that there is this, um, Strong feeling that you have that you need very little to live, right? You, you have this very kind of like, it just gets established, right? Everybody knows that obviously in theory, but it just gets established that you need very little to live on, right? Because if I could live for months on, in an ashram with nothing really, I think that really liberated me. So I think when I came back to work, I was always just doing the right thing, right? I didn't care about my movement up in the world. Uh, I was just in the moment doing the right thing. And I think th…

AI assessment note: “when I came back to work, I was always just doing the right thing”

Q Yeah. Right. And once you started, like you mentioned about criticism, once you started Facing criticism, right? As a founder, how did you react at that moment? Did you say, you know, criticism happen in business? Let me focus on the business and scale it. Or were you mindful of that criticism and said, let me change.

A Very mindful. I think very mindful on, um, like, like we were like, like, obviously, you know, it was, uh, like, uh, the Beju's acquisition, huge limelight on the company. The company wasn't ready for that kind of limelight because it was really like, uh, it was true. Like it was 18 months old, a huge, like amount of limelight. Like, you know, a lot of, like, uh, holes in the, in the systems and processes, right? I think it just kind of came in droves, and I, I was like, just correcting one by one, one by one, like, looking at everything and saying, okay, fix this system, fix that system, fix that system. So I think, uh, you know, like, I think the, the thing was, you know, I, I would say, criticism, uh, was looked at to figure out how to make systems better. And second, I think, during all of this time, I just kept saying, Look, let's keep making the curriculum and the teacher quality better and better and better daily. That's the product that we have. Right. Uh, let's like, so I had always had a separate team working on learning experience and teacher quality, and let's keep making that better and better. So I said, okay, let's, even as we are fixing holes and plugging, I don't want the whole company to become about plugging holes. We should keep getting better at the same time. So I kind of kept, uh, like the, like I restructured very quickly, right. And restructured the com…

AI assessment note: “Very mindful... criticism, uh, was looked at to figure out how to make systems better.”

Q Yeah. And when, uh, parents criticize a white hat junior, not all like some fraction of them, do you think the, the, the, the value or the mission, uh, you, you set out to is getting accomplished or has the business taken over that value or the mission?

A I actually think, um, very, very few Whitehead Junior parents have, uh, like, and, and I would be very open and like, uh, would be very open to their criticism, but I would actually say the net promoter scores of Whitehead Junior are really unthinkable, right? I mean, I'm in my second year, uh, like full and scaled and right, uh, we've gone from 50 to 70. Typically with scale in a services model, you actually decline. And we've been so religiously following this NPS metric that there was only Kind of one month in the middle, we had fallen to 41 after all the, like, the negative backlashes and everything, and people weren't proud to be associated with the company, right? Uh, I would say I've never seen, like, I, like, we, we track it rigorously. I think we've, through all of the distraction, we've just kept focused on delivering a very, very good customer experience. The creativity of the curriculum, the, the teachers, empathy and compassion, right? I think we've kind of kept very faithful to that overall through all of this period, right? So I think in that way, um, I haven't had to worry about that contingent much because they, we've really delivered on that, on every promise we've made on that front. I track that as a KPI, almost, uh, NPS monthly class ratings, hourly, right? Uh, live dashboard that I look at every day, right? That, that commitment of a great class, uh, like …

AI assessment note: “I haven't had to worry about that contingent much because they, we've really delivered”

Q And, uh, During the phase of writing, right, it's a tough job. People, I think, don't relate to writers very much, but it's a tough job getting a book out, right? Publishing is way harder, but even writing a book day in, day out, what are the kind of self-doubts that you faced during that period that, was there any point of time?

A Similar to now that I've lived in, I would say, three creation industries very deeply, right? I've lived in, The writing world very deeply, right? Kind of started published a novel multiple times. I have in TV channels, in Discovery, I launched a TV channel from scratch, right? And like, you know, I saw the whole TV and media industry, and then obviously a startup I've seen from, like built from basically nobody to kind of creating a company. Then I think they all form the very similar pattern, which is by its nature, creation is very hard because Nobody's asking for it, right? Nobody in the world needs it, right? Nobody's saying I want a new TV channel, or I want a new book, or I want a new company. So, uh, by its nature, the barriers of really penetrating consciousness of people to, uh, like, you know, to, to even, uh, acknowledge, get acknowledged that there is a need for them for, for that particular thing is very high. So as a result, the success rates in all of these industries is very low, right? Uh, all of these industries I've seen is that they follow surprisingly a very similar pattern. Where 90% of will fail, uh, out of the remaining 10%, nine percent will be equal to doing a job, right? Uh, the, the payouts or the, kind of, the end outcomes will be very similar to doing a job, and one percent will succeed, right? And, uh, 90%, you are entering these activities witho…

AI assessment note: “I think I just knew, right? Like, that look, uh, 90%, this won't work”

Q And also, so one, the one, one last thing, you know, around the criticism aspect, right? Uh, you first, uh, you know, the white hat junior first, Um, did a case on Pradeep Punia for NTCR, and then took back that case. If you can share, uh, exactly.

A You know, I mean, like, I, I'd rather not share on too many stuff on the judiciary side. I think, uh, like, you know, I, I think that's the one area I would just say is because it's a, like, a judicial thing, I wouldn't want to, like, say something that gets misinterpreted overall. But in general, as I would say, like, you know, overall, if I were to look at the learnings of the whole, like, uh, experiences and stuff, I think You know, like, mistakes were made, mistakes were corrected, and, you know, and like, I think, yeah, like we are, like, I'm really positive about the next phase of the company. I feel fortunate that I lived through all of this because it's really a transformative experience as an individual in its own way, you know, yeah.

AI assessment note: “I'd rather not share on too many stuff on the judiciary side.”