Sergey Lechshenko, Founder/CEO of Beverly English Career Coaching, a business he started in Kiev, Ukraine before the war. When the war started he had to adapt to find customers and continue growing his business. Listen to the story of an entrepreneur with a dream to serve customers around the world while helping his home country’s economy in a time of chaos.
Show Links
Links to First Customers episode #21 with Sergey Lechshenko:
Learn more about Sergey Lechshenko:
- Sergey’s Website: https://beverlyen.com/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sergey-leshchenko-81371198/
Show Transcript
Paris Vega (00:01.152)
all right welcome to the first customers podcast everybody today we have sara gay lesson co from k v ukraine he’s the founder in co of beverly english a career coaching business that he started in kiev and it’s been growing the business in ukraine during this whole war in chaos and craziness that’s broken out and he’s still there now working on his business so
Sergey (00:09.3)
m
Sergey (00:11.6)
yeah yeah
Paris Vega (00:31.332)
the first question is always you know how did you get your first customers but man how in the world are you in k v starting and growing a business because from the outside looking in it does not make any sense how that’s even possible at this point
Sergey (00:49.92)
but first of all thank you for having me as a pleasure of being here being able to talk to the world to your followers listeners well a long story short i didn’t have much much choice you know we are here especially man we have some restrictions on the ability to go outside the country but it’s not to say that i was going to
Paris Vega (00:55.792)
yeah
Paris Vega (00:58.672)
yeah
Sergey (01:19.84)
leave i’m kind of die hard ukrainian and i don’t want to leave my country especially when it needs people who do business and who create you know or places and this is our contribution to the society as business people our president always emphasizes the fact that we need you guys who need entrepreneurs especially who work with
Paris Vega (01:27.952)
sure
Sergey (01:50.3)
the people from from outside ukraine so we need the inflow of cash from from foreign countries and i’m trying to do just that trying to do just that so my first customers beverly english is my remote for now remote coaching business coaching service and help people usually international applicants who ned
Paris Vega (01:57.452)
yeah
Paris Vega (02:01.452)
wow
Sergey (02:20.66)
a new job they need to prepare for a job interview for example or people who need to close deals the like go around the world and try to close deals at different conferences and actually my first customer came as a result of my content trategy on tik tok and actulyyeah actually not even
Paris Vega (02:24.672)
hm
Paris Vega (02:47.352)
okay
Sergey (02:49.82)
content strategy i was just having fun there men i didn’t have i didn’t have much belief that something would transpire but then out of the blue i was just sharing my wisdom there sharing the knowledge that i have acquired over the years building businesses you know internationally and a lady
Sergey (03:19.86)
contact with me she said i’m a uranian now living in lisbon and particle and i want to go and visit this web summit that took place and may i guess and she asked can you can you teach me can you help me how do i do small talks how do i kind of make connections and how do i find investors because i have my experience working with investors
Sergey (03:49.9)
as well and off off we went so that was my first customer who i prepared specifically to close deals at the web summit in portugal
Paris Vega (03:51.172)
okay
Paris Vega (04:01.972)
okay all right so you’re kind of like a consultant for whatever kind of business goal someone has to advance their career
Sergey (04:11.7)
and on top of that i do this in english and help people to pick the right words because still you can learn foreign language and all all tire your life and still not be ready to communicate with people from specific industries especially as she she she’s got this gaming portal it’s called dash fight it’s wonderful portal for everyone who want to go check out
Paris Vega (04:25.212)
yeah
Paris Vega (04:30.092)
right
Sergey (04:42.26)
uh games like fighting fighting games right and yeah she was looking for for partners and i was so excited to help her and she and you know what my instantaneous desire was to help her basically free of charge because you know how it goes for the first customers you’re willing to do this in exchange for feedback oftentimes but yeah but
Paris Vega (04:45.252)
okay
Paris Vega (05:08.992)
okay
Sergey (05:11.46)
she paid me in full and that’s a really good lesson that you got to get paid for the energy that you give away otherwise yes it’s not a fair exchange on a metaphysical level
Paris Vega (05:21.252)
right
Paris Vega (05:26.072)
right for sure okay so that goes over the first customer that you got and did you continue just putting out tik tok content and getting more customers through social media or did you get referrals from there how did that lead to more customers
Sergey (05:45.undefined)
that’s a really good question so i thought at the time i was not familiar with the tiktok algorithm i thought that i’m golden that i would just continue producing vireos of the same kind and they would go wiral every single time and long behold didn’t happen so you got to you don’t know sparta principle does not apply here maybe out of one heart
Paris Vega (06:07.632)
yeah
Sergey (06:14.94)
it tries you can get like one time and plus tik tok is not built is not built to serve like your followers base i mean the recommendation page that the pre that you see when you open the app is always for you and nine times out of ten you are not going to see the people that you’re that you’re following okay so their elgrelgorithm always
Paris Vega (06:19.352)
okay
Sergey (06:44.94)
show like wants you to show to see new new new new creators okay and therefore i slowly transition to instagram and realize that instagram is the way to go because this is the place similar to twitter right that is more popular in the united states not so popular here in ukraine but yeah that’s where it started growing my customer base
Sergey (07:15.56)
and they by following me checking my dates on on a daily basis they kind of started reaching out to me and asking me to help with our career business and negotiation needs
Sergey (07:32.36)
yeah
Paris Vega (07:32.872)
and is that still how you get most of your customers just through your social content
Sergey (07:38.undefined)
social content organic only so i never bought any any ads and never invested any money into advertising for now it’s just also not the best time right now for me being in ukraine i got to have you know some cash prepared for whatever happens but yeah but every new opportunity to
Paris Vega (07:50.092)
yeah
Paris Vega (07:56.032)
yeah
Paris Vega (08:01.532)
right
Sergey (08:08.1)
get additional exposure super i’m super appreciative that’s why like i’m super appreciate appreciative for the opportunity to be here yeah so i’m a big believer in the social currency and i believe that by spreading the word we can go places we can grow our business one step at a time
Paris Vega (08:22.932)
okay
Paris Vega (08:29.692)
yeah all right so that’s your current business t’s growing getting more customers putting the content out there totally organic um but what did you do before that to get the expertise you know that makes you qualified to help these other people talk a little bit about your background um that led to your current business
Sergey (08:39.679)
yeah
Sergey (08:57.56)
yeah
Sergey (09:00.06)
so the first thing that people asked me all the time how many times you’ve been to the united states and i say never not once never ever been to the united states but i’ve been always obsessed with the american culture for some reason i just liked it
Paris Vega (09:09.872)
funny
Sergey (09:22.38)
i played basket ball and from fifteen years old i started watching n b a because we got the access to the n b a before before that we couldn’t watch games and i would start watching games like crazy you know what i’m saying and that’s where my love for american pronunciation was born in fast forward
Paris Vega (09:24.072)
okay
Paris Vega (09:41.632)
yeah
Sergey (09:52.48)
this is where i first learned about in bound marketing and a company called hop spot in the marketing conferences that they done that they did and i were listening carefully and just absorbing as much as i can because for some reason i just picked my interest in a big way i just i felt like i will be doing business globally i will the english will be my language for doing bus
Paris Vega (09:59.192)
hm
Sergey (10:22.2)
is and my first job was a customer support representative i specifically was looking for a job that required speaking english with with americans and affiance found such a job and during the night we were working our our work was at night just like now pretty much we were serving customers of one company that
Paris Vega (10:37.132)
okay
Sergey (10:52.28)
was producing digital content for for americans for for not even americans for people who are studying in in american universities so it’s it’s sort of combination of tutoring and ghost writing won’t be digging deeper for the sake of this conversation if you don’t mind a right and
Paris Vega (11:07.152)
huh
Paris Vega (11:13.172)
okay
Paris Vega (11:18.792)
okay yeah yeah that’s fine
Sergey (11:22.1)
uh
Paris Vega (11:25.572)
ghost writing for college students okay that’s interesting
Sergey (11:27.86)
all right yeah it’s it’s walking a thin ice legally wise and yeah and my friend this was the place where i’ve gotten my experience talking to customers doing sales over the phone and stuff of this nature which then resulted into me and a dude who i wore
Paris Vega (11:30.992)
got it
Sergey (11:58.3)
they’re starting our own business in the same industry so this company called decks digital it had its onset it like beginning in two thousand fourteen and for the next seven years for the next two three years we were boots strapping on our own i would
Sergey (12:27.82)
ask money from my borrowed my borrowed money from a friend of mine who sold a garage for twelve thousand dollars to give give him give me the money and we were a yeah we’re just boot trapping grinding for three years traight before we realize that we can’t make our ends meat we need to pay salaries we had roughly seven people on board and
Sergey (12:58.08)
then we started looking for additional um sponsorship basically found adventure fund the grain into southern twelve it wasn’t it wasn’t a thing you could find on the class five you know like on it wasn’t something you can find easily these people investors were not pop
Paris Vega (13:24.612)
okay
Sergey (13:27.56)
look right and yeah it took took us a lot of time to find them but over the next two years we worked with them and then i left and two years later after i left i left into southern nineteen two years later after i left the company was sold for one point five million to another corporation
Paris Vega (13:29.232)
okay
Paris Vega (13:51.852)
oh wow
Sergey (13:56.94)
yeah so it could could be seen as a as a success successful start up story when they say that on average like one out of thousand startups work i think that’s not s not far away from the truth
Paris Vega (14:03.472)
yeah
Paris Vega (14:11.632)
yeah
Paris Vega (14:15.492)
yeah no that’s great an any time you can get an exit you know get a company bought that’s great
Sergey (14:23.72)
yeah the stock my equity was not not not something that would like converting it not something not into something that i would feed me till the rest of my days but that was worth while experience yeah experience of a lifetime absolutely
Paris Vega (14:38.392)
right right you couldn’t stop working necessarily
Paris Vega (14:44.972)
yeah for sure okay so
Paris Vega (14:51.992)
been working had some success and then what is it twenty twenty one or twenty two when the war started over there and talk to us a little bit about what was going on you were doing business um and then you said you had to pivot so just talk to us about that transition of what it was like you know first hand experience durin
Sergey (15:03.98)
twenty twenty two
Paris Vega (15:21.892)
is historic moment
Sergey (15:25.98)
at the time i was
Sergey (15:30.6)
i actually started another thing in china in between of these two things so i’ll briefly mention this i went to china we started beveral english the name of my coaching center initially started out as as a online school for chinese kids you know we were going to teach them in english but that didn’t work but i still had my tik tok the
Paris Vega (15:36.232)
okay
Paris Vega (15:54.152)
okay
Sergey (15:59.88)
original chinese tik tok and i was kind as everything started go the way went and february i figured that my contribution or my mission here is to show chinese who were the
Paris Vega (16:03.012)
oh
Sergey (16:25.08)
ally of russia in a big way now i would show them what’s really going on because they saw a completely different picture from their main stream media you know what i’m saying and the number of people who were waiting for my up dates on the daily basis was mind blowing men some people told
Paris Vega (16:26.832)
oh okay
Paris Vega (16:33.652)
wow
Paris Vega (16:51.012)
really
Sergey (16:54.14)
like that they have friends in china who are waiting for this guy chris and chris is my nickname that i’ve been using for a while because when we first started the business we didn’t want people to know that we are creating an that’s a completely different story finding your identity but i’m finally surge chris but they were looking they were waiting for chris to go live to go to post the video
Paris Vega (17:01.732)
okay
Paris Vega (17:04.752)
okay
Paris Vega (17:15.012)
yeah
Sergey (17:24.04)
and just tell them what happened today and that was sort of just i couldn’t be unbelievable that was and i really like i really enjoyed the fact that not even enjoyed i appreciate it that there were people who ere sending the nations and who were super supportive even though the chinese government wasn’t so much
Paris Vega (17:27.032)
yeah
Paris Vega (17:35.212)
see
Paris Vega (17:54.272)
so before the show we’re having a quick chat and you’re like man it’s safe or relatively safe you know you get used to getting shelled and that kind of thing which sounds crazy to us over here in the u s and you know other places people listen to this show uh because you give us a little bit of that a little bit of insight into that like how do you adjust to the life style or or just the situation what’s that like adjusting to that or
Sergey (18:05.4)
yeah
Paris Vega (18:24.232)
it doesn’t affect your daily life you know just some kind of a picture into your world
Sergey (18:31.14)
i was just thinking about this a couple of days ago when i was crossing the road and all the cars for standing waiting for you to cross the role because the red light i think marched to thou than twenty two if some of your listeners ever played g t a where they are driving all across the city without any rules that was the situation for the first three months
Paris Vega (18:51.912)
yeah
Paris Vega (18:57.872)
hm
Paris Vega (19:01.212)
really
Sergey (19:01.32)
cars were just driving with no no one would follow the rules on the road that was just raising like an anarchy and n but that just just to illustrate a picture from like just something that your viewers your your listeners could picture like how it was just the magnitude of
Paris Vega (19:08.672)
okay so kind of some order yeah okay
Paris Vega (19:14.952)
crazy
Sergey (19:31.4)
chaos that took place and now we right now it’s a car few so we’re not allowed to leave our apartments um past eleven p m so you can where you want during the day time but by eleven p m like shut shut down the doors and you’re not leaving your apartment so the
Paris Vega (19:50.752)
okay
Sergey (20:01.2)
cars that have special documents that can
Sergey (20:08.64)
go but for like all people are staying put staying at home but right now we have military doing doing what they’re doing on the east coast and down down boss area there fierce fierce fights there and men are not forced to are not obligated to go to the army that
Paris Vega (20:29.472)
right
Sergey (20:38.52)
not something our government does unlike rush that that i’m almost certain that if put in decides to steer the pot he will make it amendatory ship so that men just man will have to go there otherwise this is gonna be like you pick prison or you go to to a war we don’t have anything like that we have our crania arm
Paris Vega (20:41.812)
hm
Paris Vega (21:03.912)
wow
Sergey (21:08.72)
who’s qualified enough who had trainings with you know fire with the american army we have i know cases where our pilots are being trained above in denver training yeah so yeah man so uh what i learned about my nation in my military is that where more than capable of learning the role
Paris Vega (21:26.192)
really
Sergey (21:38.92)
of new technology even though we’re not giving a lot of technology as much as we wanted because we still don’t have our sky covered fully right but the system air rocket system works so i’m i feel eighty percent safe being in the downtown of the capital of k f eighty percent safe that rocket won’t hit my building that is going to be hit
Paris Vega (21:49.652)
m
Paris Vega (21:59.092)
okay
Sergey (22:09.06)
approaching my building right but still there is a risk that’s just the risk we’re taking and we can’t we can’t just live in fear we can’t be passive we should have active sense of life we should move we should do something and help bring the can and be back
Paris Vega (22:11.892)
yeah
Paris Vega (22:27.252)
yeah
Paris Vega (22:38.392)
yeah and so you were in china you were doing the beverly english as a like english teaching service and then war started and you’re like all right want to pivot to do something more local and that
Sergey (22:52.1)
so i was i wasn’t in china so i went there for few days so i was developing this thing so where where i was targeting chinese and i was going to give them some kind of lessons i don’t know why but i always wanted to work with foreign customers i don’t know what it is man something deeply ingrained in me that i always wanted to challenge this
Paris Vega (23:16.452)
m
Sergey (23:21.86)
tagusqua always wanted to do something really freakishly dif difficult you know while i first worked with americans that then i worked with chinese while at the same time i have amazing amazing nation just best people as far as i’m concerned being a ukrainian the best people on earth and i am super excited
Paris Vega (23:40.952)
hm
Sergey (23:51.96)
thrilled you know grateful for the opportunity to help them to spread their wings and pursue their career and develop their businesses worldwide so this is something that really feels like a perfect fit for me now
Paris Vega (24:09.992)
yeah so apparently you know there’s still a lot of people in kiev how many people are still there
Sergey (24:12.2)
oh
Sergey (24:20.92)
a lot my men a lot we have warsaw poland pol poland has been super hospitable wars of is like people call it the second key because so many citizens citizens of just like when there and they’re opening restaurants there opening you know is like were r a lot of a lot of people a lot of people a lot of people in canada
Sergey (24:51.5)
a lot in portugal specially in crypto um malta cyprus for yeah but still a lot of a lot of people well i can i can only engage it by the mere fact that we we still now we have the traffic jams again that’s the indication for me that you know we’re back we’re back on track
Paris Vega (24:58.272)
okay
Paris Vega (25:16.172)
okay
Sergey (25:20.98)
i see old familiar good old days traffic jams
Paris Vega (25:21.492)
yeah
Paris Vega (25:27.152)
yeah so you said most of the fighting are the most intense fightings in the don boss area and that’s more towards the eastern border uh and so but you said there’s also the risk i guess of shelling deeper into ukraine closer to kiev is that the kind of that twenty percent risk that you feel
Sergey (25:36.46)
yeah
Sergey (25:39.66)
yeah
Sergey (25:50.96)
ah they do have rockets that they shot from the crimea that reach they have the reach to get to ka and we haven’t been given rockets that could shut to the stand so that’s i think that’s a real where thoughtful decision coming from nero and the us that we’re not getting these rockets yet
Paris Vega (26:01.672)
got ya
Paris Vega (26:20.372)
okay got you
Sergey (26:22.36)
so we’re roly defending our country can you imagine if it was a full scale to direction to due treat and we’re like felling like let’s go man i mean like we feel like let’s go you know what i’m saying because our guys are ready they’re ready it’s just there is no politician political will for this quite yet
Paris Vega (26:28.992)
yeah
Paris Vega (26:31.492)
right
Paris Vega (26:41.852)
yeah and so
Sergey (26:50.78)
and we don’t want it we don’t want that we want them just to get the fuck out of our country and live in their third world country russia which will be like that now
Paris Vega (26:56.452)
yeah
Paris Vega (27:01.152)
m
Paris Vega (27:04.192)
yeah so you guys you were saying you’re kind of in more defense mode is that so you’re saying you do have some like surface to air defense is what you were saying about rockets coming in there is some defense against that but you don’t have the same kind of offensive weapons that they have
Sergey (27:14.1)
yeah
Sergey (27:18.12)
yeah surface to er
Sergey (27:23.undefined)
yeah we don’t have yeah so i don’t want to be giving false information but i’m saying like what i know from my friends talking to my friends everything i say is not be i don’t watch news i don’t watch news at all everything i say or i’ve told during this conversation coming from like first hand source
Paris Vega (27:27.632)
crazy
Paris Vega (27:31.252)
yeah
Paris Vega (27:42.452)
m
Paris Vega (27:52.832)
yeah
Sergey (27:52.9)
basically my friends ere i got folks who figfighed i got a classmate who died recently he went he was drafted you know he he decided to go there and yeah so
Paris Vega (27:59.612)
man
Paris Vega (28:10.552)
sorry about that man i hate that war has to happen at all it seems like we’d be advanced enough at this point in history that it would be unnecessary to do such things
Paris Vega (28:23.452)
m
Sergey (28:25.66)
this is a political context and i hope the business is something that
Sergey (28:35.1)
can give us hope and there’s going to be time where it’s going to be a lot of investors and the capital that is brought from the outside to restore all the damage i’m looking forward to these times
Paris Vega (28:36.492)
yeah
Paris Vega (28:51.132)
yeah
Paris Vega (28:53.992)
yeah kind of the recovery process after all this is over with and settled and then it’s time to grow yeah that’s a good perspective
Sergey (28:58.7)
yeah
Sergey (29:01.32)
yeah i think the more new new entrepreneurs the new wend shirts we have the better it is because i feel an amazing amount of support
Sergey (29:14.76)
from people like you from from people all around the world who are just lending the hand you know and saying hey like be my guest and just because i’m a ukrainian i feel so much support and welcome to different podcast and that’s amazing that that helps me but it also helps me to tell how like about great people that we have that we are not third world country that we have a lot of entrepreneurs we have a lot of
Paris Vega (29:23.372)
yeah
Paris Vega (29:29.552)
m
Sergey (29:44.6)
a tech companies that serve people in the us in canada in the uk we create create startups that are known all over the world so it’s an opportunity for me to to just speak the truth about my country which has been in a shadow for russia for too long man i don’t know if you’ve heard about ukraine before the war started did you have you heard
Paris Vega (29:55.552)
yeah
Paris Vega (30:05.692)
yeah
Paris Vega (30:11.932)
i’ve heard of ukraine before yeah i just you i didn’t know as many of the details of the history and the kind of back and forth or you know the details of the relationship between russia and ukraine you know i didn’t know about that as much until you know everything has been the news non stop
Sergey (30:27.1)
in a way it helped us to gain our true independence in a way because you know if everything happens for a reason and everything does happen for a reason i believe that maybe this is something where we finally separated and we finally found our own identity
Paris Vega (30:48.992)
yeah interesting so wild man just getting a view into your world and the fact that you’ve been building a business throughout all this is amazing um
Paris Vega (31:06.532)
yeah it’s almost unbelievable just from my perspective watching the news and everything and you know if you’re scroll in social media you might see ten different clips that are all negative but you’re just seeing them over and over and over because that’s the only you know what i mean that’s the thing that gets the most views or something and so you’re just seeing some missile exploding or yeah or just yeah just some random war footage and it’s like so you
Sergey (31:12.2)
yeah yeah
Sergey (31:19.3)
yeah yeah
Sergey (31:27.1)
yeah
Sergey (31:29.78)
like a sensitive content
Paris Vega (31:36.252)
that kind of perspective that you develop of like the the war that’s going on over there it just looks like depending on what you’re seeing in your own feed on social media it can look like and it’s just pure non stop chaos and destruction over there because you know something of just a quiet street isn’t going to get any views you know on social media or just you know some people having coffee in a cafe or something that is not going to get any views but that’s probabl
Sergey (31:50.5)
m
Paris Vega (32:06.272)
going on there i mean you guys are doing business
Sergey (32:10.44)
meeting people doing dancing before before eleven p m so we get a go was supposed to lay i was supposed to go with our life just that you only you only do this till till midnight then you go home then we switched parting to to you now home our
Paris Vega (32:17.152)
m
Paris Vega (32:22.872)
yeah
Paris Vega (32:25.952)
for sure
Paris Vega (32:34.992)
yeah wow and so there wasn’t any curfewse or anything before this all happened
Sergey (32:37.86)
m
Sergey (32:42.82)
oh for sure no no like it’s only happened ah so it’s been a year so this february twenty fourth marked a year since everything started and when i read history books i was like jesus they had worked for like four years five years it was like why couldn’t they just decide everything not not like why do they need to go for such
Paris Vega (32:43.852)
yeah yeah
Paris Vega (32:49.672)
yeah
Paris Vega (33:08.912)
yeah
Sergey (33:12.58)
should have such a long time and that always been a year
Paris Vega (33:14.992)
yeah
Paris Vega (33:17.392)
wow
Paris Vega (33:20.172)
man well i hope everything gets cleared up as soon as possible and wishing you all the best luck and business growth and all that um what advice would you have for either other maybe entrepreneurs in ukraine or anywhere in the world what advice you have for people looking to start a business or get their first customers because you’ve done it in the midst of a crazy situation so if you can do it i mean i don’t think anybody has an excuse when it comes to starting a business and getting something go
Sergey (33:30.08)
thanks
Paris Vega (33:49.992)
and taking that risk if you can do it in the idle of the war zone
Sergey (33:58.56)
say that we
Sergey (34:01.74)
i have to listen to ourselves if you got this something going on if you got this got feeling that there’s some there’s not enough for you and you deserve more you want more you have this ambition there are so many examples of people who have done it and one of the the wisest things i was i was taught is that we should start thinking that our case is you
Paris Vega (34:04.652)
m
Sergey (34:31.64)
neque because when we think that we are unique and no one and no one has ever experienced something that i experience we are being mistaken if we look around if we open b become open to you know the network of people that surround us and our opportunities we’re going to see that there are people who can help who can become your first customers even from
Sergey (35:01.68)
your friends right you just got to have this open mind mentality and just go for it and take one step at a time like this trajectory s trajecttrajectory where you always you take two steps for you take one back backwards and it go like that so you always
Paris Vega (35:03.452)
sure
Paris Vega (35:11.652)
m
Sergey (35:32.12)
grow like this it’s never like a steady growth you always kind of back batta ittle bit but you just have to keep pushing and yeah listen to your to your god i think that god is underestimated god feeling is so underestimated yeah so that’s that would be my advice
Paris Vega (35:33.792)
hm
Paris Vega (35:36.832)
yeah
Paris Vega (35:50.692)
m
Paris Vega (35:54.792)
that’s good and so what did that mean for you like listen to your gut is that that was kind of the reasoning for starting your current business it was just feeling so strongly that you wanted to do something to bring business back to ukraine that seemed like the clearest path to do that
Sergey (35:58.2)
oh
Sergey (36:03.8)
m
Sergey (36:13.3)
we like
Sergey (36:17.9)
when we listen when when we do something with we have we still get the reaction from the market so obviously if there is no market fit the best thing that you should do is to probably not persevere for so long because if you’re just you’re if you’re just rock hitting the rock bottom or like you’re not just getting an attraction you should probably also listen to
Paris Vega (36:35.852)
m
Paris Vega (36:48.332)
the results
Sergey (36:48.38)
maybe other people results absolutely so some people they just waste so much time
Paris Vega (36:51.232)
yeah yeah
Sergey (36:55.92)
following what they think are there calling or whatever their destiny but you got a still look objectively what’s going on and for me the instrumental moment took place when i was through through my entire life people around me would ask me where did you learn english man and where did you learn to communicate like this and
Paris Vega (37:01.512)
gotcha
Sergey (37:26.36)
and i never paid attention to this up till up until that moment where i decided that i will finally start helping these people and i will finally answer their call right because when there is a demand you just sometimes you just have to look look what on the opportunity that present presents themselves now i feel like it’s a perfect fit for me specially with so
Sergey (37:55.92)
ucranians looking for you know opportunities outside ukraine because because right now you
Paris Vega (38:02.412)
yeah
Paris Vega (38:04.992)
yeah
Paris Vega (38:07.252)
okay my curiosity is overtaking me now you mentioned that
Sergey (38:12.2)
oh yeah
Paris Vega (38:14.272)
when the war started there was a three month period of just anarchy kind of chaos so were you just like on your laptop trying to get work and looking out the window like it’s crazy out there but i’m gonna like can you walk us through a little bit of like because i remember the first night that it happened i stayed up all night on like twitter spaces or like clubhouse just listening to people like give reports on what was happening i was like what this is crazy so what was that first
Sergey (38:15.4)
y yes sir
Sergey (38:22.undefined)
yeah
Paris Vega (38:44.352)
like twenty four hours to three months like of actually living there
Sergey (38:51.08)
it was in towns we didn’t know what didn’t know what to expect a lot of people were fleeting leaving their houses you couldn’t buy food because people would stay in the line for like four or five six hours in the super markets total nonsense total chaos and i was not so much developing the business i would i would most vireos for chinese viewers
Paris Vega (39:06.172)
wow
Paris Vega (39:19.952)
that’s right
Sergey (39:21.14)
asking for donations because my business revenue are pretty much donations that i were able together to to yeah to arrange for my country and i would donate to our army that all the ucranians will do they would send money you know our army yeah but i was actually this the picture that you you have in your mind is it’s actually pretty close because
Paris Vega (39:43.012)
interesting
Sergey (39:51.14)
was i was also doing some freelance project had a friend who he’s an n f d has got business where they aggregate like an n f d calendar where they posed the latest drops and i and i distinctly remember how like sitting here read this spot with the windows being fully closed you know and just was making deals and i would
Paris Vega (40:00.532)
hm
Paris Vega (40:05.572)
okay
Sergey (40:21.34)
i was worked i would work and i would make sales that was that was incredible and i needed that so much and i actually appreciated the fact that people kept living because a lot of ucranians had sort of dubious feelings about other contrits for people who didn’t openly support us and we kind of took offense to other people who were just
Paris Vega (40:27.212)
wow
Paris Vega (40:36.032)
yeah
Sergey (40:51.26)
going on with their life but these feelings are now like because we were so so depressed man who are so angry at everyone was horrible and yeah and but right now psychologically we have grown men we now understand that it’s every person’s choice how to go around the thing some people are still checking news some people are still
Paris Vega (40:53.452)
yeah
Paris Vega (41:01.412)
right
Sergey (41:21.58)
like super super concerned about what’s going on and some people just go on with their lives i don’t say that i say oblivious to what’s going on but i decided that i could contribute much better if i go with my life make money create work spots and you know just send donations whenever i can and spread the truth
Paris Vega (41:34.392)
yeah
Paris Vega (41:38.952)
yeah
Paris Vega (41:43.592)
yeah be productive
Paris Vega (41:49.472)
wow yeah so were there moments when you were literally working and like an explosion would go off somewhere that you could hear like
Sergey (41:50.8)
kay
Sergey (41:59.1)
yeah so i had the corridor over here and i would i would stand between two walls because this is the the thickest place in my apartment and we would and we would kind o convince ourselves that if we stay between the thickest walls it would it would rescue us from the rockets that was that was insane because we got four fed up
Paris Vega (42:12.152)
yeah
Paris Vega (42:24.872)
wow yeah
Sergey (42:29.04)
were we spent nights in the in the sub way and there were people are filled like all over the place and i couldn’t spend this ship so i may be spent two nights subway and then yeah i would just stay with with my friend it’s a girl she she now lives in frankfort she never she spent a night at my place and in the morning and the
Paris Vega (42:33.452)
okay
Paris Vega (42:48.952)
yeah
Paris Vega (42:52.792)
m
Sergey (42:58.9)
stickly remember she turned out turns on the light at five a m and i got this lightning red red lightning you know i got different colors right and she turned and when you hit hit hit hit the turn button like random light would come o come out and she clicked she guessing what my room she hits hits the turn on and the red light pops up and she says the war has
Paris Vega (43:08.992)
okay
Sergey (43:28.98)
that that was the beginning of sucking
Sergey (43:36.22)
and i remember so much tension in the air i was already feeling that there’s something happening because it felt like something is wrong the air was super tense you know yeah man when things like that happened you can feel it on the metaphysical level it’s just fear an cergeincy when you it’s but it kind of helps your character
Paris Vega (43:48.652)
really
Paris Vega (43:51.512)
crazy
Paris Vega (43:56.612)
wow
Paris Vega (44:02.292)
crazy
Sergey (44:05.6)
oh
Paris Vega (44:06.672)
yeah for sure you know survive and gets stronger for sure wow okay so i guess like you mentioned that girl she’s moved to germany uh is that how it is like most of the women had to leave or chose to leave or is that
Sergey (44:26.7)
oh
Sergey (44:29.32)
most of the women chose to live some part i don’t know which part i belive the minority came back because the life it’s not for every want to you know adapt and just be okay with totally different culture and everything and yeah but women for the most part left
Paris Vega (44:41.472)
okay
Paris Vega (44:53.472)
sure leaving your home
Sergey (44:59.76)
you beautiful uranian ladies left but we still got a lot of ladies left so i’m good you don’t feel sorry
Paris Vega (44:59.892)
crazy
Paris Vega (45:08.492)
okay
Paris Vega (45:12.132)
we’re getting into the details of uranian life now this is crazy okay wow
Sergey (45:16.undefined)
oh
Paris Vega (45:22.132)
so from our perspective out here
Paris Vega (45:28.012)
that’s interesting to map what i was seeing to what you were going through and like where i live we have tornadoes like crazy storms and they can destroy houses so we have similar situations where we’ll be you know you go to the strongest part of your house like you were saying the strongest part of your apartment and we have to go there and you know hope that the tornado doesn’t hit our house because it will just you know destroy it and so in the south and the us that’s a common thing that you have to deal with every year during the certain
Sergey (45:37.7)
oh
Paris Vega (45:57.812)
seasons of the year um and so it’s nowhere near the level of the situation that you’re talking about but it is just interesting to me that i can see that parallel of that experience of just being in a little safe spot just hoping something yu have no control over you just hope well i hope the the paos doesn’t hit me today
Sergey (46:03.1)
oh
Sergey (46:10.5)
yeah
Sergey (46:18.62)
and in a way kind of like kind of like a phoenix you get your life back every single time when you start depreciating it and you start filing like what have i done like am i living my life and i living to my full potential right moments like this are super valuable that’s why the goal for my current business is too
Paris Vega (46:26.792)
m right
Paris Vega (46:35.632)
sure
Paris Vega (46:40.452)
so what’s your goal for your current business
Sergey (46:49.24)
help i’m not a hare percent altruistic i want to make money i want to profit from this but i want this to be world like like a brand recognizable within business net works not on crane but in the us and help as many people as possible i’m not saying that that’s like the direction that i have chosen
Paris Vega (46:55.072)
sure
Paris Vega (46:58.212)
yeah
Sergey (47:19.06)
that will be the only one is going to be like educational services some people reach out to me asking for pronunciation courses so that’s being able you know i like leadership studies so much i’m following simon cynic this guy you got he’s an amazing and the way leadership is something that is being taught
Paris Vega (47:21.132)
yeah
Paris Vega (47:40.472)
hm
Sergey (47:49.32)
in the united states it’s not something that we got here it’s not we’re not quite there yet you know and i want our corporations in our managers learn what what it means to be empathetic leader means what you know how to give praise how to just now criticize people though so they’re not it’s all should i really like the this approach where you create organization
Paris Vega (48:04.452)
m
Sergey (48:19.4)
that where people want to come to work every single day and they’re not telling each other you like your job you’re so lucky i want people find the job that’s really truly fit them that’s why i help people to ask proper questions that’s where i dig deeper to understand what they really want and where if organization can facilitate that right so i think it’s so so it’s so fascinating
Paris Vega (48:23.232)
yeah
Paris Vega (48:44.972)
okay yeah
Sergey (48:49.46)
how we should like how how this find mid common ground can be achieved through just you know some some tips that i can give
Paris Vega (49:01.192)
yeah who’s your ideal target customer
Sergey (49:06.08)
so my ideal target customer is an individual who wants to work on international company as a middle senior executive and also i really want to work with more entrepreneurs who need to present their businesses to venture fans to just do
Sergey (49:35.88)
velo business all across the world and where they lagged the communication skills this is where i come on stage that would be perfect to two segments
Paris Vega (49:49.552)
and so it’s is it mostly people like who are not english speakers who are trying to okay
Sergey (49:56.1)
yes so yeah that’s a really good point i want to help more people feel confident because confidence is attained through
Sergey (50:08.34)
it’s easier said than done but i think that it’s a combination of things if you work on little things like your speech like your vocabulary how you listen all these things combine could make you a better communicator right so i find my application application of my knowledge both in like helping people to come across you know
Sergey (50:38.9)
so that other people could understand them and at the same time you know held their businesses like using using some specific terminology and stuff that i’ve learned over all these years yeah
Paris Vega (50:58.672)
okay cool um so this has been an amazing conversation um now it’s late there i appreciate the time you’ve spent with us already m why don’t you give just a quick pitch like if let’s say a group of your target customers they’re listening right now um what would you tell them to to show the value of your service or try to convince them to use you as a service provider
Sergey (51:00.7)
yes
Sergey (51:05.5)
oh yeah
Sergey (51:30.44)
so if you’re looking to nail a job high standing position amazon or any taggin for example if your developer if you’re highly qualified sor engineer and you can’t communicate your professional experience you can describe how good of how great of a professional you are this is where i can help can help you press
Sergey (52:00.26)
and yourself on the level that would really gain you the position that you re worth worthy off and if you are a team your recruit recording team har department or your support team working with english speaking customers and you want to understand how to make how to provide better assistance how to make repetitive sales i can also be of help
Sergey (52:30.24)
you’re a entrprener who goes somewhere pitch their business find strategic partners or investors and you don’t know how to present your business i can help you because i’ve been there my friend i’ve been i’ve solved the business i worked with strategic partners with people from asia from the united states from soria abe you name it
Paris Vega (52:47.492)
m hm
Sergey (53:00.96)
that’s why i feel like i’m qualified and i’ll be honored to help
Paris Vega (53:06.572)
awesome so if you land in any of those specific target audiences reach out to sarah gay let them help you get where you want to go um sara gay again thank you for taking the time to talk to us today that’s another episode of the first customers podcast we appreciate everybody listening if you got any questions don’t hesitate to hit us up on social media we’ll have links in the show notes to everything saragasism is
Sergey (53:07.76)
ye
Sergey (53:16.2)
oh
Paris Vega (53:36.272)
involved with h and we’ll see everybody next time thanks again sergey
Sergey (53:40.7)
thank you so much i thank you by guys
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