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TRANSCRIPTION WITH SPEAKERS
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[00:00] SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Canada's Podcast.
[00:06] SPEAKER_00: Hi everyone and Happy New Year.
[00:08] SPEAKER_00: I'm Phil Bliss, founder and CEO of Canada's Podcast,
[00:11] SPEAKER_00: coming to you today from Toronto.
[00:14] SPEAKER_00: For the past decade, Geoffrey Deset has been at the forefront of innovation
[00:18] SPEAKER_00: on the online job search and career wellness side of things.
[00:24] SPEAKER_00: Thrive is a career wellness platform that is transforming the way organizations manage
[00:29] SPEAKER_00: out placements and career transitions.
[00:33] SPEAKER_00: Thrive employees, employers, sorry, deposit tokens into an employee's account.
[00:40] SPEAKER_00: And employees redeem their tokens in a marketplace, build with contemporary
[00:44] SPEAKER_00: career career management services.
[00:47] SPEAKER_00: Once in 2019, Thrive now supports the outplace that needs a 400-plus
[00:53] SPEAKER_00: organizations globally.
[00:55] SPEAKER_00: Geoffrey now leads a team of passionate colleagues.
[00:58] SPEAKER_00: We're focused on building great software to help individuals advance their careers.
[01:05] SPEAKER_00: So Geoffrey, welcome to Canada's Podcast.
[01:08] SPEAKER_00: I know you've been here before, but most people won't,
[01:15] SPEAKER_00: either won't remember or maybe didn't listen to the podcast.
[01:21] SPEAKER_00: So, you know, and I think what's kind of interesting is,
[01:28] SPEAKER_00: even if they had, you know, it's been a big sort of gap in between.
[01:36] SPEAKER_00: So you can talk about, you can really talk deeply about, you know, building your business
[01:44] SPEAKER_00: significantly, which we touched on about earlier.
[01:46] SPEAKER_00: And, you know, doing it, you know, without any capital investment,
[01:54] SPEAKER_00: so that, which is probably still the norm for many entrepreneurs.
[02:01] SPEAKER_00: So it's kind of interesting.
[02:03] SPEAKER_00: But before we do that, because most of people don't know you, Geoffrey,
[02:07] SPEAKER_00: one of your skivers, you know, two or three minutes,
[02:16] SPEAKER_00: who is Geoffrey to set, why are you sitting in here in front of me as an entrepreneur?
[02:22] SPEAKER_00: Sure. Well, it's great to see you again.
[02:25] SPEAKER_02: You know, some of my names, Geoffrey, you said, I'm the CEO of a company located here in Toronto,
[02:31] SPEAKER_02: called Thrive's Career Wellness Platform.
[02:33] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, what we do is we build software to help individuals advance their career
[02:38] SPEAKER_02: when they're out of work and they're looking for their next job.
[02:41] SPEAKER_02: And so Thrive is a software platform that allows an individual to upload their resume,
[02:49] SPEAKER_02: you know, understand their existing skills set, compare their skills to labor market demand,
[02:55] SPEAKER_02: access, upskilling and retraining to move their career forward,
[03:00] SPEAKER_02: then apply to jobs and connect with employers.
[03:03] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, we offer our software to our customers and individuals in, you know, two distinct ways.
[03:10] SPEAKER_02: One is we make our software available to companies who are, you know,
[03:15] SPEAKER_02: unfortunately having to reduce headcount or having individuals departing their organization
[03:19] SPEAKER_02: through a layoff and traditional out placement services.
[03:24] SPEAKER_02: And so we support those individuals in fighting their next job
[03:27] SPEAKER_02: and support the employers in insisting individuals in departing their organization with grace.
[03:33] SPEAKER_02: And so the second way that, you know, we support individuals who have been, you know, a huge,
[03:40] SPEAKER_02: I think new initiative for us over the last couple of years is we sell our software to governments.
[03:47] SPEAKER_02: And so governments, you know, all around the world, you know, offer support to individuals that are unemployed.
[03:53] SPEAKER_02: And that's through, you know, hearing Ontario, like employment Ontario, offer services to individuals
[03:59] SPEAKER_02: and governments, you know, after seeing the impact our software is having on individuals who have been laid off
[04:05] SPEAKER_02: have started buying our software to support their citizens that are unemployed.
[04:12] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, over the last, I think, four years since we've chatted, yeah, it's been a wild journey.
[04:18] SPEAKER_02: I think we've about five X in size, five X is ebbsized, grown from being, you know, a company that's operating primarily in Canada
[04:27] SPEAKER_02: to a company is to play our software in about 12 different countries around the world in a number of different ways.
[04:35] SPEAKER_02: And so, you know, it's been, it's been a good journey.
[04:37] SPEAKER_02: Got a lot of gray hair for someone in their early 30s, which is the testament to, I think, some of the things you go through
[04:43] SPEAKER_02: in building a company, but it's been a lot of fun.
[04:46] SPEAKER_00: But, I think, how do you manage to, you know, that's a five X in five years since we're taught.
[04:58] SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's a massive, you know, growth curve.
[05:04] SPEAKER_00: And you've done it, you know, really self-funding, which is still the dominant way for entrepreneurs.
[05:14] SPEAKER_00: So, maybe you can kind of give them a little bit of insight that you've learned in those five years as you've driven this thing forward.
[05:24] SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, we, like, it's challenging to grow a business.
[05:31] SPEAKER_02: And businesses, you know, require, you know, investment to grow their business.
[05:37] SPEAKER_02: And it doesn't really matter what you're selling it.
[05:39] SPEAKER_02: It can be really challenging to accelerate your past market without, you know, additional capital.
[05:46] SPEAKER_02: That being said, you know, I think what we've done a really good job of is aligning our needs and our requirements, you know, with what our customers are looking for.
[05:57] SPEAKER_02: And making, you know, sure that as a software company, we are executing in a very short cycle towards value creation for our customers.
[06:10] SPEAKER_02: So, I think what that means and what can be really challenging, you know, is being laser focus on what you can deliver to the market, you know, in three to six months cycles.
[06:23] SPEAKER_02: I think, you know, the other thing, what that also means, that what it can be more challenging for entrepreneurs, specifically like myself, is sometimes saying notifings, not pursuing specific opportunities.
[06:35] SPEAKER_02: If you haven't been able to completely understand, you know, how you're going to deliver value or how you're going to commercialize the product.
[06:43] SPEAKER_02: The second thing, you know, which I think has been a strong path to success for us, which has been a little bit unique is, you know, aligning herself sometimes with strategic partners.
[06:55] SPEAKER_02: So, what Thrive has done is if we're looking to sell our product in Australia or in Germany or in the United Kingdom or in another country where we don't potentially have the resources to spin up a sales team.
[07:08] SPEAKER_02: You know, plants are flagged in that geography is find a local partner who will, you know, sell the product on behalf of a pack that is a reseller willing to put some money on the table and, you know, investing, growing our product and brand in their local market.
[07:23] SPEAKER_02: So, you know, it's been, it has been easy. It's been challenging. It can be, you know, fairly stressful like managing the business on a cash basis, on a month to month basis.
[07:32] SPEAKER_02: But, you know, as you said, that's how most businesses grow.
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[07:45] SPEAKER_00: After a decade or so doing this, why are you still doing it? What's best about being an entrepreneur versus being an employee?
[07:57] SPEAKER_02: You know, I asked myself that some days because, you know, some days it's, you know, obvious you feel like you're on top of the world and I don't think anything, you know, in life has the, you know, ups and downs of entrepreneurship.
[08:13] SPEAKER_02: You know, you think it's never as good as it feels in the moment and it's also never as bad as it may feel in the moment.
[08:21] SPEAKER_02: For me, I think people are entrepreneurs for a number of different reasons and there's probably no right reason as to why you should start a company.
[08:31] SPEAKER_02: But for me, I would say that both myself and my co-founder are mission-oriented people.
[08:39] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, our company has gone through a number of twists and turns in its journey.
[08:45] SPEAKER_02: But for us, it's always come back to this like, North Star of being able to help people move their careers forward.
[08:51] SPEAKER_02: And I like to say, like, I think there's three really important things in someone's life.
[08:56] SPEAKER_02: They're physical and mental health. They're, you know, family and personal relationships.
[09:00] SPEAKER_02: And what they do for work because that makes up a large, when one of those things are off, it tends to impact the other too.
[09:12] SPEAKER_02: And so being able to work on improving that, on improving people's lives on a day-to-day basis through software is just such an important journey to be on.
[09:23] SPEAKER_02: And I think that in an organization that's our size, you know, if the people feels a lot larger than it was when we started, you know, your feedback cycle is so quick.
[09:34] SPEAKER_02: If you implement a new thing, you can see that tangentially impact someone's lives, you know, immediately. And that's just something that's just love working on.
[09:45] SPEAKER_03: So, would you choose something five years?
[09:52] SPEAKER_03: So, we have experienced a lot of growth in the last couple of years.
[09:58] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, I think that sometimes that is because of decisions you make, sometimes that because of market forces that are pulling you in specific directions.
[10:09] SPEAKER_02: And what is a lot different about thrive than a job board, like, you know, how is thrive different, you think someone using indeed or zippercrooter or another common hiring platform is our ability to upskill and re-skill and integrate training into your job search.
[10:29] SPEAKER_02: So, a lot of people that are out of work maybe are in an occupation that is in dwindling demand. Maybe they worked in an industry that there aren't as many jobs available for them as there used to be.
[10:41] SPEAKER_02: And we've shown with our software that being able to integrate training into our platform improves employment outcomes, which is totally makes sense.
[10:51] SPEAKER_02: If you're able to build a new skill, you open yourself up to new job opportunities. Now, you know, thinking about very serious self in five years, what we're experiencing is a lot of positive momentum as a company driven by, you know, the changing world of work.
[11:10] SPEAKER_02: So, you know, anyone that's been following the labor market, the economy, you know, the world in general knows that artificial intelligence is starting to have a huge impact on people's lives on a day-to-day basis.
[11:24] SPEAKER_02: And I believe that it's going to continue to dramatically impact how people work and how the labor market shapes out.
[11:31] SPEAKER_02: So, what's that mean for us as an organization? You know, we are going to continue to push deeper into providing stronger training ecosystems on our platform.
[11:43] SPEAKER_02: We're starting to build relationships with Canadian universities and colleges. You know, we, when I think about, you know, our business last year, we supported about 50,000 people that are out of work finding their next job.
[11:58] SPEAKER_02: You know, in five years, you know, I expect that number to be closer to half a million. And I expect us to continue to evolve outside of, you know, just job search into training, upskilling, re-skilling, and career exploration.
[12:12] SPEAKER_02: What we're also seeing is, you know, a lot more labor mobility among sporters. So, individuals that are looking to rot still in reskill while they're gainfully employed to move into new opportunities.
[12:26] SPEAKER_02: So, I guess that, you know, the short answer is, you know, keep working on what we're working on and continue to expand kind of our product offering and training ecosystem to meet the needs of where, you know, the market's heading.
[12:37] SPEAKER_00: So, what's your biggest challenge in the next couple of years, you think?
[12:46] SPEAKER_02: You know, I think one of the challenges is really directly related to what we just spoke about is that, you know, the world is changing and the world of work is changing size.
[13:03] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, being able to stay on top of changing technologies to meet our users needs, while also innovating at the pace that we're seeing technology companies start to innovate driven by AI's, you know, something, you know, I think about, you know, every day.
[13:20] SPEAKER_02: I think, you know, the second part of it is, you know, it's kind of coming back to, you know, capital requirements, you know, Canada is a small country in a really big world.
[13:31] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, one of the things that, you know, is a challenge or is something that we're spending a lot of time thinking about is, how do we take this product that, you know, is proven to work and localize it and evolve it to meet the needs of a number of strategic regions and geographies that we want to tackle.
[13:54] SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
[13:56] SPEAKER_00: Do you have a way of met, you know, we all hit challenges. Have you kind of worked out a way that you can handle them and overcome them that you use on, you know, as a process?
[14:09] SPEAKER_02: So, I think that, you know, one of my strengths is, I'm ruthlessly prioritizing what is the most important burning, you know, issue of the day of the week.
[14:31] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, one of the things that I think can be challenging in, you know, in an environment where you're meeting the needs of multiple stakeholders is, you know, context switching or changing our priorities, but you're here from the market.
[14:46] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, I kind of like to joke that I can barely plan my life more than two weeks at a time. It's something that, you know, can frustrate friends and family when it's difficult to give someone a clear answer on like if you're available for a holiday in six weeks or or six months even for that nature.
[15:07] SPEAKER_02: But for me, a lot of it comes back to like ruthless prioritization on a week to week basis. And, you know, it's it's as simple for me as, you know, starting work most weeks on Sunday and Sundays, kind of my, you know, after dinner, two to three hours of thinking about what I tackled last week.
[15:30] SPEAKER_02: And what I plan on tackling this week and you know, this ever evolving, changing kind of list of priorities and not being, you know, shy about, you know, changing them and evolving them really quickly.
[15:43] SPEAKER_02: And that typically means like, you know, one or two or three things that need to get done this week and five to 10 things that you might want to get to by you're okay, you know, dropping them.
[15:57] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, having fairly strong opinions that are loosely held about what you need to tackle next.
[16:05] SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
[16:08] SPEAKER_00: What advice would you give to someone that's just moving into, you know, an entrepreneurial role?
[16:17] SPEAKER_00: You know, but thinking all of it just started a business.
[16:23] SPEAKER_02: So, you know, it's something that, you know, I've, you know, so I guess, you know, kind of at that stage where, you know, entrepreneurs may reach out and start asking questions for advice, just like I did whenever I was starting my business.
[16:41] SPEAKER_02: And the advice I always give them is you need to fall in love with a problem and not a solution.
[16:53] SPEAKER_02: Okay. And what I mean by that is, you know, it's very rare that your first idea on how to tackle a problem is the right one.
[17:13] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, you know, no one is going to keep up with the like stress and challenges in building a business if they fell in love with their solution or the outcome or, you know, some financial goal, like you have to really love the problem.
[17:32] Speaker UNKNOWN: The second and be the one that you're going to be able to do is to get a job that you're going to be able to do.
[17:34] SPEAKER_02: And then you know, you know, you can't be like really vested in spending 10 to 15 to 20 years on your life working on that problem.
[17:40] SPEAKER_02: I think one of the challenges I see people face is you have to be really, you know, aggressive in building your company, but also extremely patient.
[17:51] SPEAKER_02: Like it takes a long time to gain enough information about a market to have some sort of competitive advantage.
[18:00] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, we've been at it for a while.
[18:03] SPEAKER_02: We started our company nearly a decade ago.
[18:06] SPEAKER_02: I say the first three to four years, we're barely a company.
[18:09] SPEAKER_02: You know, it was really in the last four to five that, you know, we started growing and building a sustainable business.
[18:15] SPEAKER_02: And it can feel like a really long time to people.
[18:19] SPEAKER_02: One of my favorite stats is that, you know, the average software company that goes public on, you know, the NASDAQ in America, you know, has reached a quarter billion dollars in revenue is like 18 years old.
[18:35] SPEAKER_02: That's the average.
[18:36] SPEAKER_02: It takes, you know, from inception to going public 20 years for a massive outcome, let alone.
[18:44] SPEAKER_02: And most companies aren't even done then, right?
[18:48] SPEAKER_02: And so, you know, you're talking about if you're truly trying to see through a problem from start to finish and execute on a long tail, like a two to three decade journey.
[19:01] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, with what we are spoke about, like all the changes, technology changes, like you're never going to come to market with a solution.
[19:10] SPEAKER_02: You're going to focus on a problem and attack it from a number of different directions.
[19:14] SPEAKER_01: Discover the latest trends, strategies and success stories in the ever evolving world of business.
[19:21] SPEAKER_01: Canada's podcast.com subscribe now.
[19:24] SPEAKER_00: That was a great piece of mentorship.
[19:27] SPEAKER_00: But what's the best piece of advice that you've received?
[19:32] SPEAKER_00: You know, that you keep with you that Canada doesn't go away.
[19:45] SPEAKER_03: I'm trying to think through it.
[19:47] SPEAKER_03: Like, one is, so one of our investors, who I've had the great fortune of getting to know.
[19:58] SPEAKER_02: And I am still shocked whenever there's a couple times a year.
[20:03] SPEAKER_02: I need to pick up the phone and call him how fast he answers and how I get like 70 emails on a Saturday after I've called him about a problem.
[20:12] SPEAKER_02: Is is certary back.
[20:13] SPEAKER_02: So he was the founder of my tail.
[20:17] SPEAKER_00: New back in the day.
[20:18] SPEAKER_02: Yeah. So my tone, new bridge networks, you know, our largest private investor in our business.
[20:24] SPEAKER_02: And he supported, you know, Tristan and I, when we were basically at our inception.
[20:31] SPEAKER_02: And so he's kind of been with Wesley Clover.
[20:33] SPEAKER_02: His family office has been with us, you know, since the get go.
[20:37] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, Terry has this huge mantra around going global, like building global companies.
[20:47] SPEAKER_02: And that basically entrepreneurs in Canada wait way too long to try to go global and try to build their company outside of Canada.
[20:59] SPEAKER_02: And so, you know, since the get go, since we were doing like a couple hundred thousand dollars in revenue, we've been focused on trying to expand internationally.
[21:09] SPEAKER_02: And it's been hard to do.
[21:13] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, not gonna lie today, still like 80% of our revenue is in Canada and about 20% of it is global.
[21:21] SPEAKER_02: But there's a couple interesting learnings that have made us a really, like much more stable and mature company because of that device.
[21:30] SPEAKER_02: One is, you know, you really quickly start to learn as if you're working on a problem that has a global, you know, global need.
[21:40] SPEAKER_02: Right?
[21:40] SPEAKER_02: Two, you know, you learn a lot about the world that you didn't really understand.
[21:48] SPEAKER_02: And once you start doing commerce in other regions that I think positions you to like understand the need for your software.
[21:57] SPEAKER_02: And then three, like really pushes you outside of your comfort zone as an entrepreneur.
[22:02] SPEAKER_02: Like if you early on are walking into a sales meeting in Germany, trying to pitch, you know, some company that's probably never gonna buy from you at the stage you're at on your software when you're a three or five person company.
[22:18] SPEAKER_02: You're also like learning a lot of skills and understanding on how to do business development that, you know, really positively impacts your business.
[22:27] SPEAKER_02: And so, you know, one of the things that I think frustrates me about the Canadian technology ecosystem in general is a lack of ambition.
[22:37] SPEAKER_02: And to, you know, this neat, this kind of belief that you can't go global or you can't become an international company.
[22:47] SPEAKER_02: And you can't do business in other jurisdictions until you have, you know, $25 million in capital in the bank to allow yourself to start growing internationally.
[22:57] SPEAKER_02: And so that, that I think is something that he hammered over our head early on and we benefit a lot from it.
[23:03] SPEAKER_00: That's good.
[23:05] SPEAKER_00: Let's go do some, a little bit more fun questions.
[23:10] SPEAKER_00: Are you a morning or a night person?
[23:12] SPEAKER_03: Morning person.
[23:14] SPEAKER_02: You know, much more productive at 5 a.m. than like 6 p.m.
[23:19] SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
[23:21] SPEAKER_00: What do you, what do you look at you currently reading or podcast you listening to?
[23:26] SPEAKER_00: What, whatever?
[23:27] SPEAKER_00: Look you listening to?
[23:29] Speaker UNKNOWN: Yeah.
[23:30] SPEAKER_02: My, my partner got me a book for Christmas that I just started reading a project X about bringing technology that's about really how technology.
[23:41] SPEAKER_02: And is changing the world of defense in the United States and kind of how programs have been set up in the United States to encourage more venture capital and innovation in the defense and public safety sector.
[23:58] SPEAKER_02: Which I've read with great interest.
[24:00] SPEAKER_02: I've always been interested in public safety and geopolitics.
[24:03] SPEAKER_02: But as well, you know, has interesting learnings to our business given that, you know, we're starting a soldy government selling the government's hard.
[24:12] SPEAKER_02: And so that's what I'm reading right now.
[24:15] SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
[24:16] SPEAKER_00: If you had to pick one word to describe yourself, what would it be and why would you choose it?
[24:28] SPEAKER_03: I'd say transparent.
[24:31] SPEAKER_02: I think that for better or worse, you know, people tend to know what I'm thinking, how I'm thinking it, what I think about what's going on.
[24:41] SPEAKER_02: And, and, and that's sometimes gets me into some hot water.
[24:47] SPEAKER_02: But I think has served me really well in building relationships of an entrepreneur.
[24:55] SPEAKER_03: What's keeping you up at night?
[25:01] SPEAKER_03: You know, a lot of the, you know, day to day challenges we're facing as a company.
[25:07] SPEAKER_02: And I think when you go through, you go through different iterations as an entrepreneur.
[25:17] SPEAKER_02: And, you know, we are, and you kind of think that at every stage is going to get less, less hard, but it actually gets way harder.
[25:27] SPEAKER_02: And for us right now, our biggest challenge is execution risk.
[25:34] SPEAKER_02: We have a lot of opportunities in front of ourselves and we want to make, we want to execute on all of them at the same time.
[25:43] SPEAKER_02: And so, you know, spending, just spend a lot of time thinking about those things.
[25:48] SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
[25:50] SPEAKER_00: Good session.
[25:50] SPEAKER_00: Some really good, good stuff in there.
[25:55] SPEAKER_00: How can people, people listen to it or looking at it?
[25:59] SPEAKER_00: How can they get a hold of you, Jeffrey?
[26:02] SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
[26:03] SPEAKER_02: So, yeah, no, absolutely.
[26:05] SPEAKER_02: Like, you, the probably easiest way is to find me on LinkedIn.
[26:09] SPEAKER_02: Jeff, reduce that.
[26:11] SPEAKER_02: CEO, thrive career wellness platform.
[26:14] SPEAKER_02: You can email me directly at Jeffrey at thrivemycareer.com.
[26:19] SPEAKER_02: Or find me on Twitter or ex, I guess, is Jeffrey on your sport you said, but I don't really use that as much.
[26:29] SPEAKER_00: Jeffrey, great to see you again.
[26:31] SPEAKER_00: Thanks for coming on the show.
[26:33] SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much.
[26:35] SPEAKER_00: But in great session, there was some, I was super, good start to the year.
[26:40] SPEAKER_00: So, I'm Phil Bliss. Don't forget to subscribe to our newsletter on our website.
[26:44] SPEAKER_00: Subscribe to our YouTube channel as well.
[26:47] SPEAKER_00: Or subscribe on any one of the major podcast channels.
[26:51] SPEAKER_00: Thanks for following Canada's podcast where you meet the entrepreneurs that are driving Canada's economy.
[27:00] SPEAKER_00: See you soon.
