The Entrepreneurship & Innovation Studio

Coloring Outside the Lines: Creativity in Business with Charlie Nguyen

• Stanislaus State • Season 2 • Episode 4

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Charlie Nguyen is a fascinating storyteller with a passion for building community through outreach and artistry. The chief advocate at the nonprofit organization Chalk Wild, Charlie and his team distribute clear-fronted canvas backpacks for children to create artwork on. Charlie advocates for the use of art as a motivator for children to help heal from trauma. His dedication to fostering a culture of innovation and inclusivity in the Central Valley stems from confronting and healing from his own trauma as a young adult. Charlie’s entrepreneurial spirit shines through his nonprofit work, demonstrating that true impact comes from empowering others.  

On this episode of Entrepreneurship & Innovation Studio, Dr. Pablo Paredes Romero and Charlie discuss how entrepreneurship is not only a journey — it's about diving into the profound impacts of personal experiences and the enduring influence of human connection. The two illuminate the intricate, colorful tapestry of life's challenges, resilience and the unwavering pursuit of creativity and innovation in shaping not only one's own narrative but also the lives of the community around them.

Co-produced by the Warrior Entrepreneurship and Innovation program and the Office of Strategic Communications and Marketing at Stanislaus State. The E&I Studio is edited and recorded in the KCSS studios on the campus of Stanislaus State.
The views expressed by guests on this podcast are not necessarily those of the University.

Welcome to the entrepreneurship and innovation studio, where we explore the passion and the purpose behind some of the amazing people in our community, and above all, their stories. I'm Doctor Pablo Paredes Romero, and all my career, I've been fascinated by entrepreneurship and innovation from the moment an idea is scribbled on a napkin, drawn on a tablet, whiteboarded, spoken out loud in the shower or in the car on the way to someone's nine to five. It's all about the work and the art behind the venture. Charlie Nguyen is an unassuming dude. I think that's what I thought when I first met him, and nothing's changed. His work has traversed research and development in multiple industries and multiple ventures until he arrived at a certain place. Sometimes the place itself, and being respectfully in its presence, is the holy grail of it all. He is chief advocate of Chalk Wild, a nonprofit dedicated to helping children unlock their creativity while bolstering their self esteem. And Charlie Humbly and authentically walks into every conversational room in the interest of sharing, more so than exhibiting. Today's guest is Charlie Nguyen of Chalk Wild. Hello, Charlie. Hello. Tell me about the community in which you grew up and what parts of that place are very prevalent, parts of. Your DNA, you know, I'll give a plug to alf here. So one of the first things we discussed in AlF is about community, and what does that mean to you? And we broke into groups, and it's interesting to hear different perspective of community. First, I could be part of the asian american community, right? And then I could be part of the asian american business owner community. Being able to identify with different communities, I think it helped strengthen me and my perspective. What part about the community that you grew up in would you say is really imprinted in who you are now or who you are today? So I grew up in Vietnam after the war. Thinking it back now, we didn't have electricity or water, but I. I have a lot of good memories. And so when I came to the US, I was a student at Davis High School, and I didn't have many friends there, but I was lucky. I belonged to a couple, like, international clubs, and I got a couple people, if I can say, white, and they're very helpful. They kind of took me under their wings and helped me. And when I came, I couldn't speak the language. I was able to write and read, but I couldn't communicate verbally with them, so a lot of them would help me correct me. And one of the lucky things about me is that I didn't take that personally, I said, please help me. I would say something wrong. They would say, hey, this is how you say it. So I would say that to be my community, and I have good memory from that. And I can see a lot of people that came to this country, from another country and join the gangs. You know, that's their communities, right. And I was lucky when I didn't resort to that. I have a lot of good help from people, so I was blessed, in a way. And I think that's kind of gave me the question about the imprint and DNA, is that it's, you know, I can see that we can be kind to one another, to help one another. I remember the two girls. I can't remember their names, but they were very helpful. So that's how I was able to kind of finished high school. You mentioned Davis. When did you come to the Central Valley? 1989. October 4, 1989. My family, just my mom, me and my brother. And for a while, we would celebrate that date. Like, October 4 is when we come to the US. I remember coming to San Francisco and see all the lights. We came out at night, and from their plane, just seeing all the lights, it's amazing. And into the central valley. My father picked us up, and then he brought us to, actually, San Jose. We stayed with her, with my father's aunt in Mopedes for a while. Within a few months, we moved to Modesto. That's another long story. Why Modesto? So I came to learn that my father had another family in San Jose. They had another wife and kids, so he had to take my family away from there. And the only reason he chose Modesto, because he had an acquaintance who owned a liquor store on Prescott, and he's a vietnamese american guy, and that's how I knew about Modesto. And it's about an hour and a half or so from San Jose, so it, you know, make it a little convenient for him to go back and forth, and he just drops off here, get us an apartment, and he'll be gone for weeks. And my mom would tell me, yeah, he has to work in San Jose. Until much later. I learned, like, man, he got another family. Talk about trauma. What then? The two. Two families. One in San Jose, one in Modesto. How did you end up staying here in Modesto? Well, because my father didn't want us to be anywhere near his other family, so that's why he ended up in Modesto. So it was that way. Okay. And we started going to school. My mom went to beauty school to become a cosmetologist and so a few years later, my mom blessed her heart. She still want to. To stay connected with him, even though he's like, you know, in definition, we're a deadbeat dad, right? And so she was trying to create opportunities for us children to be close with him. And so he had a pizza place in San Jose, in south San Jose. And my mom was like, you know, go up and help him. That's all she wanted. But the other woman thought that we up there because he wanted money from him. And so it turned kind of ugly. And, you know, she started calling my mom and threatened my mom. It was very hard for me to witness all that and, you know, to witness that your father, I want to say, his friends, like, people that come and, you know, buy pizza from him, you know, other vietnamese american people, they would say, who's that? You know, and he was like, in Vietnamese would be. It's. Vietnamese is kind of a fun language. It has a lot of double meanings. So there's a word. It means. It could mean, like your son. It could also mean your nephew. So he used that word. It's ambiguous. And to be there and witnessing that, it's painful. So I told my mom, like, I don't want to help him anymore, but my brother, younger brother, he's not as nice as I am, and he's more like a gangster type. And so he would call my father and that woman and have his few choice words, and they kind of stop, you know, calling and threatening my mom, but. But they still behind, you know, like, they influenced them to do things. And so, yeah, it was an interesting few years in the US. At that point in your life, what community did you settle into saying, you know, this is where I want to be. This is what I want to do, study, etcetera. You know, I didn't have a sense of community. I hated Modesto. My allergy is really bad. I went to a doctor. I remember Doctor Davis, and he did the patch test, right? He said, man, you allergic to everything. And so I just, I hated, like, I want to get a modesto. So after high school, I went to JC for a couple years, and then I turned to UC Davis. And it's not that much better there either, as far as allergies, but it's, you know, it's a university town, and you got people age and partying, all that stuff. But even then, I didn't have to feel like I belong there. And I always trying to get out. And so my father wanted me to maybe to be a doctor. And so that's why I studied biochemistry. And when I learned that he had another family, right, I said, you know, f you. I'm not going to do what you want me to do. So I rebelled, and I took the MCAt. I got decent score, but I said, I want to go. I don't want to go medical school just because I didn't want to, you know, satisfy him. So I moved back here and worked at Gallo for a little while, and I was like, man, I still don't like this place. I need to get out. So I moved to Bay area and worked in biotech for a while. And then I started having friends and started having that, to have a sense of, you know, my tribe, my people. Just a very small group of people. Even there. I didn't stay very long either. You know, I was like, I want to go somewhere. I can feel like I'm happy. And so I met some friends up there, and one of my friend got dumped by his girlfriend after eight years or so. So he's heartbroken, and we say, let's go travel, man. We're still young. Let's go travel. We got to work until we die anyway. And so he quit his job at Cisco system, and I quit my job at the biotech company, and my other buddy quit his job at biotech company. So he's like, all right, let's go. Let's say sell some money and put some. Get a backpack. And so he spent almost two years in Southeast Asia just being a bum. Talk about risky. Risky stuff, man. It's alcohol. And we were young, we were stupid, and we were like, anything that sounded fun would do it. I spent some years working in Vietnam. Between 2007 and 2011, I got married there, and I moved back to the states, and I moved back to Modesto. Cause my mom is living in Modesto still, so I didn't wanna leave my mom by herself, and so I moved back here, and that's kind of when I made a conscious decision. She said, I wanna make Modesto my home, and then, like, figured out what I need to do to make it. And that's kind of when I started to have that sense of community. You know, I joined some boards and, you know, go to events, fundraiser, that kind of thing, and start meeting more people and meeting more people that have similarities, you know, in greater thinking. And so that's slowly become, you know, I have a community. Until now, I have, you know, belong to different communities. But it wasn't always like that. You know, I only started about maybe ten years ago when I have like a strong sense of community, the business. Community, the community in general, where do you see it all going in the future? You know, with the advance of technology in the net now that we don't have to be in Silicon Valley anymore before, if you want to high paying job, you go to bay area. And now with, because of the pandemic, it kind of sped up that whole process. And people can work from Spain, right? If you bring a laptop with reliable connection, you can be in Spain and do the same job unless your job required in person. Otherwise you can pretty much work anywhere. So I think because of that, a lot of talent will kind of come back. And so what you guys are doing here is one of those examples that encourage innovations and entrepreneurship and the willingness to do that. It's not easy at all. No, agreed. Absolutely agreed. What would be the single most important thing that you feel you could tell a young person compelled to start their own business in the Central Valley? There's a lot of good free resources. You know, tap into those resources and, you know, find yourself some mentors, not just one, but there are a lot of people that willing to mentor you. So just, you know, be willing to ask for help. Said, hey, I need help. You know, I'm 50, I still ask for help from people younger than I am. It doesn't diminish my value anyway, realizing that I think it helps me be more assertive in asking, say, hey Pablo, I need help with this, can you help me, right? Or even Frank here, I don't know this stuff, but I'm like, hey, can you show me how you do this? I have no problem doing that now. And so I think that's one of the things that being an entrepreneur, you have to be able to have that willingness to ask for help. Do you think that's something that we evolved into as a community to where we're breaking down those barriers to ask for help from each other? Or do you think it's something that the newer generation has brought to us in the past? People want to keep everything secret. They want to share with anyone because they were always afraid that, you know, someone will compete and take the clients. And I feel like that not so much more of that going on. People are willing to share, you know, their, their knowledge. So to answer your question, I think that's something we, we probably evolve into now with the advance of information. Like information is everywhere. So you can go online and google anything now or ask chat GPT right. And we'll tell you what you need to know. So I think, like, the more and more people are willing to help the younger generations, you know, to avoid certain mistakes, there are some people, they still kind of stubborn. They want to make their own mistake, which is fine. Some mistakes are pretty costly. So if you can avoid those costly mistakes, it's, you know, you really have the game. I have a fortunate opportunity with a guy named Tony Lam in silence yesterday. He's a vietnamese American. He came here when I was, like, a few months old. His family ended up here because of the benevolence of another family. It's a catholic family somewhere in the midwest that sponsored his family. Anyway, so Tony is a very successful businessman in the Bay area. I don't know how many companies he has, but he owns, like, five wingstops and a whole bunch of other business. He has an ice cream company, that number one seller in Costco, and a coffee company, and he owns a shipping company. And so I met with him. So we connect to Alf as well. So he Aolf, senior fellow in the Silicon Valley chapter, Great Valley chapter. So I reached out to him, and I went up there and met with him at his wing stop in San Jose. And we were supposed to talk for, like, an hour, and we started, we met at 430. I didn't leave that place until 710. And so we talk about all this kind of stuff, and it's amazing. And he's like, I'm willing to help people. I want to mentor people. If they come to me and ask me to like, hey, can they help me do that? And he don't have access to all their different distribution channel. So I said, if you come to me and say, hey, tony, I got this water, whatever that is, and can you help package it and distribute it, you know, and 100% or whatever percentage that will go to charity, I said, let's do it, and he can help you. He's like, I think he's like me now. I realize what my strengths and weaknesses are, and I know I'm a business development and sales guy, so I can go and talk with people and try to sell stuff, but you make me do market accounting or run a company. I suck at it. And Tony, he's like, yeah, I'm not good at those things. That's why I hire people to do all those things, right? And he's out there. He's the kind of face of the most companies can talk to people. And also working on a business model is called Andy's Cafe. His son is autistic, so he want to have a business where he only hired disabled people. The wingstop now he hired a lot of autistic people as well. So people like that willing to mentor other people, you know, like you guys are doing here. You probably connect people with mentors, with mentees. I know this whole thing started by the porteous family and they're one of the philanthropists here and I'm glad that they spent money on this trying to create more job, more business opportunities for Central Valley. What would you say has been the most powerful learning experience for you as a small business owner? Relationships. People do business with people they like so you could have something, you sell something, your products could be little more superior. But if the owner of that is, you know, it's not a nice person then people like choose not to do business with them versus you. If you're nice you know you're they like you then likely they will do business with you. So now as you know, been doing business I see more and more of that is relationship is very important because relationships I have with some other people they have opened so many doors for me and that's you know, invaluable. That's you know that's. That's something you cannot do without good relationship with people. Who or what has been your greatest teacher? I don't know if you can call him a teacher but I, in that job I worked with a guy named Gary Bowley and he always had so many interesting stories about his traveling days. So in the seventies he used to be a teacher. He would take off and travel through Europe, India, Russia, you know, on his bicycle. One thing I learned from him is he loved to read and one of the authors is that he loved to read which I read a lot. Pretty much all his books is Henry Miller and I think from then I just. I developed the love for reading. I don't think he ever intended to teach me anything but I learned from him about the adventure, the need for reading. So sometimes I read like two, three books because they are related. You know, one book help understand the other book. If you wanted to be a teacher what would you teach? I actually was a subjective teacher for a while when I was working for Gallo back in like late nineties I thought like do I want to be teachers? And so I, when I would work swing shift I would sub during the day.

So like 7:30 until about you know two 3-2:

30 and I would go to work at Gallo I realized I love subbing but not teaching because subbing is a lot more fun. You got to play with the kids right? This lesson plan was ready for you. Just do whatever the lesson plan says. Usually it's very minimal. I still have a stack of cards that kid drew on the paper, you know, for me, say thank you. And I remember those days the kids would ask me, like, are you Jackie Chan? Those. Yeah, those are good days. But, you know, it's. I'll answer that with. With the stories. So in Davis, I was a research assistant for a professor named. His name David. Doctor David cost. I think his name. This guy, he got two phds, an MD, and he's a world class violinist and plays some sport as well. You know, this guy is well rounded. And so I was part of his research team, and I remember when I did presentations, I make up something, and he caught it. He yelled at me. But at the end, he said something. I stuck in my mind to this day. I said, it's not about what you know. He said, if you want to know something, you go to the library, learn how to learn. So I think that if I could teach some people something, that's what I was telling. Like, learn how to learn, right. It's not about knowing something, but how to get the information. On the subject of research, what role do you believe research plays in your everyday life as a business person? In your everyday life as a business person? Entrepreneur needs a lot of data. Right. Whatever method research you're using. I remember the story I read, that's an american nonprofit that comes to Africa. Do you have this tribe plant things like farm? So I think they plant, say, tomato. Right after the tomato is grown, the hippo come up and eat all of them. And this nonprofit say, why do the hippo come up and eat the tomato? And the people in the tribe said, that's why I don't grow anything. Not because they don't have you grow stuff. Because hippo would eat all this crop. Right? So having the right intentions. Right. Without the data asking, what do you need? Why don't you grow? I need some stuff. I think that's really the good first step, or the, I think, required first steps before you decide how you can help the community, how to serve them. What do you find yourself enjoying researching? Like, what do you geek out on? Right now, my interest is in people's behavior, and that's why I try to read a lot of books on that. For some reason, I find this fascinating. And on the weekend, I listen to this radio on NPR. It's by. I can't remember the name of that show. Anyway, they always talk about certain behaviors of people, like, why do they behave this way? And that way, you know, like I was writing this book by last time, Cialdini, he wrote books about influencing people, right? And then. So what influenced us? He's not trying to help you influence other people, but his research is like, how people behave certain ways. What is the secretly coolest part of your job? Oh man, that just happened this morning. So I got a message from my Instagram, message as mom in Ceres, she wanted to buy her back, refer for a daughter. And she asked me if you could put her name on the backpack. So because she lived in Ceres you know, I have sometime this morning, I'll drop it off for you. So I brought it to her house and seen this beautiful girl jump up and down. Because Ceres Unified, they purchased 3000 backpacks from us for the after school program. So only gave it to the kids in the after school program. Her daughter wasn't, so she didn't get one. And she saw the other kids have the backpack, she wanted one. And so, you know, to bring that to her and see that smile, the enthusiasm on her face, it just made my day. What does the word innovation mean to you? Innovation, to me it means find a different way to do things better or come up different ways, brand new way of doing things. But you always try to find somehow to do it better, make it more convenient for people. You know, use our backpack example. It's innovations, right? It's not world changing, but just my son came with the idea of combining different things together, right? Using a backpack with a clear surface and the markers and the erasable markers. It's just a cool thing. And that innovation has a positive impact on people's lives. I think that to me, that's the important things of innovation, is that, you know, whatever it is you've got to come up with, but it got to have a good impact on people or society in general. What should the term innovation mean to us here in the Central Valley, do you think so? In the past, I would look at the Central valley as, it's not advanced, right? Not as smart or as creative as people in the area. And now I learned that's not true, right? We got very smart people here, very innovative people here. To me, I think if we can create an environment that encourages innovations and allow people to take risk, we can move our value forward. I listened briefly to Arnold Schwarzenegger the other day on one of his things. He said, he said he can call me Arnie, you can call me Schnitzel, whatever. Just don't call me a self made man. I'm not self made. There's a lot of people that help me to be here today, just like, what you guys are doing here, you know, give them the tools and, you know, the support. Take me back to a moment where you were part of an innovation yourself, and you knew it before most people did. What was it? And what about it made you draw a quicker breath? Like, you know, wow, we're on to something. If I may, It's not about me or my business, but I worked for a company in health therapeutic back in. Back in the nineties in the Bay area, and they were trying to develop an insulin inhaler. So instead of japping you with a needle, they create inhaler. I left the company before, I think, there was bought out, and the product never went to market because. And I felt sad about that because I know it worked. It not didn't have the same efficacy as the FDA wanted. You know, I think they want, like, say, 90% or something like that, and the product only delivered, like, 88% efficacy. For me, that was the simple thing, because I've seen people like, you know, it's got needle. I'm afraid of needles. Like, you know, you got to jab yourself with the needle every day. Like, sometimes twice a day. I thought it was really cool. Innovations, that's too bad they never materialize. But I think for me, that moment is like, wow, this is really cool. And I was so happy to be part of that team. Something else. What does the word application mean to you in the context of a business education? And what do you think it should mean? Well, application, I think you take what you learn from your class, from whatever program, from your mentor, and use it. You know, the thing with AI nowadays, and AI has a lot of interesting tools, but how do you apply that to your work? Right? Like, for me, I use some. I use that. Just help me write posts for social media. If I might answer correctly, that's application. You take whatever you learn tool and then apply it to your. Whatever you're doing and tweak it to suit your needs. Tell me about a time when it all came together for you, when you applied things from all the different career experiences you've had and applied them in a way that made your career what it is now. I realized I have trauma. All this trauma was younger, so that's affected my early adulthood, you know, all this low self esteem, that kind of thing. So once I realized that I was able to proactively working to improve my self esteem and all those things with the backpack business, because its purpose is to give kids the tool to do art on it. And as a result, their self esteem get improved and social emotional well being, right, because they can relieve their anxiety when they start drawing on that. And so we've done a lot of scatter studies or pilot study, and then we know it's very helpful for kids. So for me, when I realized that, hey, I had trauma, right? So I was thinking, help those kids, that is from low income neighborhood, you know, family with single parents, crime, they experience trauma and go to school and help them, then we know if you do that regularly enough, they kind of see the improvement. And the trust relationship I built with ALF fellows, you know, and my classmates and other senior fellows as well, it all came together. And I can reach out to someone and say, hey, I need help with this. And they're, you know, super happy to help. They're eager to help and also be on top of that kind of a spiritual reckoning for me. And I was born and raised Catholic. It was never a good one, but when I had coffee with my friend, he said, catholic priest. And he said, charlie, what you're doing is helping kids, which is great, right? So in longer term, you're helping build a better society, but it's ultimately you're working for God. And my first thought, like, then, that sounds kind of cheesy, but after that, I thought about it, and that kind of makes sense. It's now giving me a higher sense of purpose. And now that I have a purpose, that become my mission, and all of a sudden, things just fall into place. I have people that offer help. You know, there are people I would have never met otherwise. Like, there's a gentleman named Doctor Don Shalvey, maybe you know of him, I guess people would say he's the godfather of charter school. So he approved the first charter school in California back in the nineties. And he and the, uh, the next Reed Hastings, they co-founded Aspire charter School. And they went to the state capitol to lobby to make law to allow more charter school to be built. And I met him through another friend who's ALF senior fellow. So we had a Zoom meeting, and he said, yeah, I love this man. I want to help. And he said, what can I do? I said, well, a few things. And first, I want you to be my mentor. And he's a former superintendent who've done various things, but it's one of his last job before he retired and moved back to Stockton area, he was a VP for the Gates foundations, overseeing KG education. So he has knowledge, he has contacts that could be very helpful for our cause. And so after that meeting, he's like, yeah, I'll do what I can to help. And he invited me to go to Lodi to meet with the new superintendent. So there's a group of leaders that will meet with the superintendent of Lodi Unified School district. He's a brand new superintendent. I think at the end of the month, he said, you know, I want you to be my guest. So things like that, if things didn't fall into place like that, you know, that kind of relationship would never happen. What would our students be best served to know about applying what they learn. Here with us, there's a guy named Sir Ken Robinson. He's a PhD, but he had a YouTube video. It's called do schools kill creativity? And it's one of the most viewed YouTube videos. But he's got to talk about is schools are set up like an assembly line, and they don't allow people to stray outside of the line, right. Because that's what they want people to be called and become a worker. And the school was built after the industrial revolution, so that's what it's built for. And now we into the innovations, right? So we need to allow people to take risk or teach them that, you know, risk is good, and failure is not something that will be on your head, but failure is a lesson, right. And so I think we can help them understand that it's okay to take risks. It's okay to fail and go back to drawing board, you know, and figure out how. What went wrong, you know, try different ways. Absolutely. What does the word leadership mean to you? You know, I used to think of leadership as someone, like, with the title, like, you know, CEO or the prime minister, that kind of thing. But now with a little more knowledge, I think leader is someone that we encourage other people to excel, to be themselves, to realize their best potentials. I think that's what leader means. Who is leader? Who most impressed Charlie Nguyen in his early years and why? I don't think I have one that I admire personally, but my mom was telling stories about some general during the Vietnam War, that he was honest and it was a brilliant strategist. And I think she worked for him, not directly, but whatever, in that division. And I would hear a lot of stories about how he leads his troops, right, and would defeat the VC's and. But hearing stories like that gave me that, wow, you know, that that guy looks good. And so in a way, he's kind of my hero. That in general, you know, trying to defeat so called the enemies back then and, and it was honest. He didn't take bribes because so many. One of the reason the South Vietnam fell because a lot of high ranking officials are not doing a good job of being a leader. They too busy, you know, taking bribes or hanging out with girls and do that kind of thing. So they're not focusing on their jobs. So hearing those stories and contrast to this guy in my mind then it's like, yeah, it's my hero. I want to be like him. Who's your hero now? My hero are the people that willing to put in the work whatever it takes to take care of the children. It's the single parents, you know, we idolize people that have a lot of money. Like billionaires, right? They just crazy. I think a lot of them are just lucky, you know, I don't think they just, that's much smaller than us. They just got lucky and, you know, doing business now, I think a lot of that has to do with luck as well. And they never self made like Arnold said, you know, they're not self made, right? So they all start with like some money or some, some advantage that they had. So I think my heroes are the parents that wake up every day, you know, going to work with a hard job and still care about the kids and come home and make dinner and make sure their kids finish their homework. They have like 2 hours sleep per night. So those, I think my heroes. How have you seen things at Stan State evolve over the years? So again, as someone who never liked Modesto area, I didn't think much of Stan States. I had a lot of friends that went to Stan States. But over the years I've seen and heard about awards and, and there's students that come out of here that, you know, succeed. And I learned more and more about Stan states. And I think it's great that we have, you know, university, like Stan said, here in our backyard. And, you know, people from overseas, they want to come to the US to studies, right? And that requires a lot of money. And a lot of times people say, look, look at like Harvard or Yale and these things. But, you know, I'm willing to, to bet if it comes to stay in state, they get just the same high quality education as they would get somewhere else. And with all this affirmative action thing and now, you know, I've been thinking about this a little bit. My brain is not big enough thing, you know, thinking like big pictures like a lot of people. But I personally, I think it just all comes down to you as a person, you can come to state and state, or you can go to Harvard. Right. If you want to learn, want to study, you will excel, you will come out with knowledge. Right. I think the only difference with Harvard is that they have that connection with a lot of powerful people. I think that's the only thing they have difference. Because I know a lot of people, like, for example, from Vietnam or China, prime ministers or whatever, people, they will send the kids here and they're dumb as a break, but Harvard would take them because they know their dad and mom are like prime ministers or deputy prime minister of this, and they get a phone call away to have access to that. Right. For their, whatever, their alumni. So I think that's the only difference between that and if you want to get knowledge, stay in state. I think I would put up with Yale, Harvard, and other schools. What are your thoughts on the Warrior entrepreneurship and innovation initiative and its place in the region going forward? Oh, I absolutely love it. I think a lot of good things will come out of this, right? And it's just a lot of young people, they just need the knowledge, the encouragement. What you guys are doing is it's taking. People say, hey, you want to be entrepreneur? Like I said, a lot of times people don't know they want to be entrepreneurs until they get exposed to it, right? When I see one of my traveling days, I swear in a lot of kits, like selling stuff like books, trinkets, whatnot, I would consider them to be entrepreneurs because they're trying to sell something out of something else. Like they. They would fold a copy. Books, you know, it's illegal, but you can do that. And I don't know how much cop, but they're trying to sell it to you for a few bucks. Here, you pay for the book, like $20, but there you pay for that book for, like, say, $5, right? For an american, that's the deal. And when I see them, I saw them. But so, persistence, that's something that entrepreneurs, we need, is to be persistence, right? We don't want to give up too easily. I want to go back to Charlie in his early career. What was he like? Stupid, eager to please. And that kind of stemmed from, you know, having low self esteem is the result of trauma. I think I always been responsible worker. You know, I wouldn't have a job to do, and a friend come, hey, let's go do this. And it's like, you know, drop the what I'm doing and go do that. So I was. I think I was been kind of responsible. But, yeah, it wasn't too smart, not that I am now, but, yeah, it just took a lot of stupid risks, you know, and just kind of bumbling around, you know, what I want to do. I didn't have a clear choice of what I do with my career. And, you know, being an entrepreneur is like, it's by chance, it's not a conscious decision. It's like, I want to become an entrepreneur, but I think probably part of my DNA is like, I like to create things and do something a little different, something a little better. So my son came up with this idea, and I thought, well, that's cool. Let's start something. And then you started along the way, what to do, what not to do. Where did Charlie then see himself now? Do you recall, I think, that Charlie then would not. We have no clue what the charisma would look like. I didn't have directions in life when I was younger. It just became clear to me what I wanted to do and meant to do with just within the last few years, less than ten years before that, I was just like, whatever, you know, whatever came my way, you know, do get a job here, do this and do that. But one thing I remember I was enjoying doing is some sort of educations. And so through my career, if you can call that, I think education is a common thread. So I was not a teacher, but I was like, tutor, right? I see kids that need help, and I would tutor them, and it got satisfaction from seeing some improvement when I see that I could help them. I'll give a quick example. Some years ago, there's a lady from Oakdale, she called me and her granddaughter, I think, when she's eight or ten years old, and she said she needed a lot of help with math and some reading. So I went out and met with them. They live in a mobile home park right outside Oakdale on 108. And so her grandma told me a story about her granddaughter. She was in a car accident, torn out of the car, crack her head open. She got brain injuries. And on top of that, her parents going through a really nasty divorce. And I witnessed that one day we were at the open door library, and dad came in and they were starting screaming, yelling profanities. So the library called the cops. And so I could imagine, like, you know, the trauma that girl was going through. Her grandma said she needs, she's way behind math. She needed help with fractions and all the percentage, that kind of thing. And so I spent a couple days talking to her to learn about her interest and I learned that she loved cooking with her grandma, and she loved to sing. She wanted to be a singer. So I was thinking, like, okay, see if we can tie that with math somehow, right? So what I told, like, okay, if you become a famous singer and you make a million dollars a year, right, and you gotta pay your manager 20% and someone else 10%, right? So you gotta know, that way people steal money from you. And it didn't happen right away, but that clicked with her, and that's how we were to learn about percentage and fractions. Kind of same thing, you know, I link that with cooking. You cook your grandma, you put one third of this one, you know, teaspoon. And I think by linking that with what she was interested in, it helped her learn it. You're contextualizing it, right? So that's something. I think one of the common threads throughout my career is, like, I like to work with kids, and so with what I'm doing now, it just, you know, I didn't know what I wanted to do then, but it's kind of come back and. Okay, now, why I was doing that. Who were his earliest allies? I have to say my mom. It's like when I took off, you know, when I went backpack with my friends, I got a pretty good job working biotech, right? And I quit my job. And she didn't say, you're stupid, you know, last school, we ruined your career. You want to ruin your life. She never said anything like that. She was always encouraging whatever I do. So I think she's, you know, probably my best ally. What would Charlie now say to start a conversation with Charlie then? Let's go grab a beer. There you go. How do you see yourself now? That may be different from how you saw yourself then. Now I'm more accepting of me whatever flaws I have, and more honest, more vulnerable. In the past, I think I would want to hide whatever bad things about me. Like, that's why I buried that trauma of growing up, you know, Vietnam, for the war. We weren't poor by choice, but, you know, because of the war. But still, they want people to know that, hey, you know, it came from, like, poverty, right, not having running water. Although my mom was, you know, before the war, they were considered to be upper middle class. And after war, they government took all the money. So my mom worked for the Marine Corps, and the US company built this condos area. It's in the peninsula. It's like a resort town. It's right outside of Saigon, and Saigon river surrounds it. And we have a four story condo. And mom bought a top floor because she got first dip, right. The beautiful view. You look out, you see, you know, conut trees and it's debris and it's just beautiful. And after the warm, besides taking the money, they take everything that of value. We have tile floor in the apartment or condo. They would come take those tile from us to sell on the black market to make money. And that's how, you know, like they try and bleach you dry. And there are people with high goals and stuff, you know, somewhere I want to have an image of someone who, like, you know, put together, right, come from a, you know, decent background. But now I'm at the point where, okay, it's part of me, it's my story, you know, it's part of my life. There's no need to deny to cover it up, you know, so that's why I was able to tell that story. I never share the story with my father. Having a family before in ALF America, that's when we, for whatever reason, I decided to be vulnerable. Vulnerability is a huge part of leadership, isn't it? Yeah, I think it is. You know, people need to see that, you know, you just like them, right?. What does it mean to you to, to be an asian american leader in the current business climate? I think I become more mindful of being an asian American in the past. I think for a period of time, I try to, I guess, try to be white, kind of blend in, you know, it's not going to happen, right? I don't have enough money to pour acid on my skin to make it white. So being mindful of that now, I just joined the California Asian American Chamber of Commerce, and I went to one of the events in Sacramento. There's a lot of asian american leaders up there. And so now that I'm mindful of the fact that there may not be overt, but this discrimination is still, you know, happening, right? We all guilty of that in one way or another. So knowing that we kind of need to help each other and kind of band together to just pick up, you know, to get our share, to get a seat at the table. So I become more mindful of that. So now, you know, I don't mind saying I'm asian American, right? Before, I think I didn't like that term Asian American, but now I accept that fully. And I just also used to be very self conscious of my accent. And my head will grow so big when people say, oh, you have no accent. Now I know they just say that, just make me happy. I don't let that bother me anymore. You know? It's the fact. But I don't let that define me anymore. It's amazing how people's journeys take them to places where they become more accepting of themselves. They become more aware of the things that used to matter that don't really as much anymore. You know, it frees me up. There's a part of the brain that was locked. Now you open that block, and I say, oh, that's a lot of cool things in there, right? And it's opened up a lot of opportunities, a lot of doors. And I'm able to go, and let's say we had a party or some event. I'm able to go up, someone, talk, have a conversation without having all these self doubt, like, oh, man, what should I say? I'm on this. I don't want to come across stupid. I want to come across needy. You know? I'm like, none of that now. I said, hey, how you doing? Hey, Pablo, how you doing? You know, who you know here, and how do you get here? How do you end up here? That kind of thing. We have a conversation. Conversation. If it stops, I go somewhere else. Also, something I very mindful of not doing is a lot of people doing. I'm talking to you at a party. I will do my best to, you know, not scan the room, say, like, hey, what's, you know, I want to talk like a frank. And people said it's rude. And so I consciously try not to do that. I'm still working on it. Sure. We're all works in progress, right? Adversity, being on the ropes. It's all part of our stories. Take me back to the first moment that you realized that you may not be able to deal with this challenge, whatever that challenge was. Tell me what that was like. It has nothing to do with business. Go back to the moments I realized my father had another family. I remember I was at UC Davis, and I think it's my junior year in Davis. When he was here and we were in Vietnam, we would get letters from him about all this promise, like, you know, it sounds so like a paradise here, you know, toys and all these cool things that, you know, they got to do. And when I realized that, my whole world just collapsed. So I went to see the shrink on campus, right? And remember, I only saw him once. I went there, and I think I told him, what's going on. And they said, you're sabotaging yourself. Right? Because I started partying more and not going to class didn't, you know, didn't get good grades. And my first thought in my mind is like, no shit, show off. That's why I come to see you. If I kept going, you know, maybe I got some help, but that's my thought. Like, that's why I come to see you. Don't let you tell me that that's my problem. Right. That was hard after that. That's very difficult. And my goal then was to go to medical school, become a doctor. And when that happened was, like, I didn't know what to do. I didn't have any other backup plan. I didn't have any, you know, things like ABC that I could do. So it took me the longest time to kind of figure out another thing I did until most, until recently. Like, now I know what. What I'm meant to do, you know, which is I'm doing now. And so that's why I don't. I don't think of this as work. Work and pleasure is all planted together, you know? So when I talk to people about what I do, it's like a conversation. It's like, you know, I'm hanging out with them. I don't think of this as work, you know, just like this, you know, a couple hours a day. But, you know, people will say, you gotta go, you know, work and get on podcasts. But I think this is fun for me. I don't think this is part of the work. What's it like to discover that at this stage of your career? I'm just super happy that I actually got to discover it. Right. There's some people lucky. They can know what they want when they're younger, and there are some people that could never discover what they want to do. And so I think even though I was late, but I'm just super happy and thankful and feel blessed that I got a chance to discover, you know, and. And, you know, 50 is like, you know, it's not half, you know, I don't know how much longer I'll live, but if they get to do this for another 10-20 years or so, I'll be happy. What role has family played throughout your journey, and how did it evolve? I think my. My family situation is not that much different from a lot of people. It's, I would say, a broken home, in a way. So I didn't have a lot of support from my father, you know, but my mom has always been my biggest supporter, and she encouraged me to pursue my dream, do what I want to do. Because of her encouragement, I was able to kind of step out of my comfort zone a bit, you know, try to explore different things. And I think because of her, I developed, like, a risk taking mindset. So I can take a little risk and see what happens, you know, if it didn't work out, and, you know, we'll try something else. Excellent. What book or film changed your life? Book. I must say, the Henry Mueller. I know it's a band author in the twenties, but back to the topic before. One of the guy I met when I worked in the Bay Area, Gary Bowley, introduced me to reading, and he read a lot of Henry Mueller. And so reading Henry Mueller, that's kind of gave me the adventurous sense. So I want to be more adventurous, you know, that's why, that's one of the reason why I, when my friend got his heart broken, we said, oh, let's go, backpack. We're still young. Let's do it. And so I think that those Harry Mueller books and the books that I guess his friends are Anias Nin, and there's a kind of adult kind of literature, but it's very fascinating how he lived and how adventurous he was. And I just want to be like that. The song that you've heard in your life that made you say, wait, the singer or the musician or the band, that's my life. That's me that they're singing about. No, I don't think there's a song that elicit that feeling in me, but there are a couple songs that I get chill every time I hear it is the star spangled Banner, and I still get the cheer every time someone sings the song. Yeah, it's like it never fails. Every time someone sings that song, I get the chill. It got the goosebumps on me. And Ave Maria is another song. And, you know, like, that song hallelujah is another one. I just take my breath away. It's, it's, yeah, it's, it's. I don't know, whatever that is, it just, it touched the deepest part of me. I saw a documentary on him a couple weeks ago. I want to say it was excellent. It was excellent. I always love his, like, his, everybody knows that deep voice. Oh, yeah. Real cool. And that, I guess I'm like an old school and old soul, like, you know, him. And Nina Simone is another singer that. Oh, we can spend this until we can spend another podcast. Oh, yeah, for sure. Do you see yourself as a high achieving individual? I mean, do you see yourself in those terms? I strive to be better than yesterday. I don't think for me, it's ever stopped, right? I would probably do that until the day I die and I wake up and say, I want to be better than yesterday in whatever aspect, and the next day will be the same. It's a progress. I think, in my mind, if someone has a. An end goal, I don't have an end goal. How far? Like, you know, people like, I want to be presidents, right? That's the end goal. That's pretty. I don't have that. In terms of achievement, like, how does it. How does achievement reveal itself to you? Do you do something, accomplish something? Let's say secure a new client, create a new product? Is the achievement process. Do you process that is like, wow, I did this and now, or we did this as a team, and now it's time to move forward, because I really want to do this. Like, what's the space in between achievement to achievement feel like for you? You know, I think we're trying to set small goals. Let's just say, for example, I'll use the backpack as an example. Let's say, how can we improve its features, right? And how can we make it a little easier to use? So I would go back to research. I would go and observe kids using it, and I watch them use it, and I say, okay, so that cap requires extra steps. What if I could make it easier, limited steps, for example. So, for example, the backpack you can draw on and have you erase it, but you erase, you got to use either the wet wipe or the wet paper towel or cloth. And I've been thinking about, okay, should I supply a package of wet wipe along with a backpack or some kind of instructions to make it clear for the people, just so they know what to do when they need to erase it? You know, things like that I was thinking about. So if I say, okay, we need to make it easier to use, right. Eliminate this step, we figure that out. I think that will be an achievement, and then go to the next things. You're sort of removing barriers towards creativity. So at one point, in one way, the research is very. Is about streamlining and taking those barriers out of the way. So it's very mathematical, it's very compartmentalized, very methodical, I guess I want to say. And the art is everywhere, right? Children's imaginations are amazing. Oh, yeah, that's just plentiful. Yeah. You let kids be, they'll be just super creative. That's amazing. To what degree do you find that entrepreneurship is art, that it can be artistic? I think entrepreneurship requires a lot of creativity. I think there's a difference to me, and there's a difference between entrepreneurship, and then, you know, that's when you do the startup phase, right? You got an idea, you figure out, you make that happen, and then when it's become like a thriving business, then. Then you got to pass it on to someone else, someone who's expertise in running the company. I think I've read a lot about how analysis, about how a lot of companies fail, not because of the product idea, wasn't good, but because the entrepreneurs who started the company thought they could run the company as a CEO, and that's how they lost money. And then, you know, the company ended up going away. So you got to understand your strengths and your weaknesses, right? So a lot of entrepreneurs are not business people. So once you get that point, you got to have someone else doing the day to day business. You know, all the process, the accounting, all that stuff. You need someone else who know that better than you. What aspect of leadership came most naturally to you, do you feel? I think my ability to delegate and trust someone to do that. I mean, I've never had, like, a lot of employees, but even I work with other people, you know, subcontracts and whatnot. I think my ability to be okay, this is what I want. Give it to them and, you know, trust them to go do it instead of worrying about how they're gonna do it, you know, are they gonna get it done on time? That will just kill me. So I think it's my ability to be able to do that. I think it helped me tremendously as a person, as an entrepreneur, as we want to call a leader. Yeah, it's an important skill to have and then learn how to trust people. And that takes vulnerability. Back to your point about ALF and how through a couple of the different activities in leadership, you learned that vulnerability was such a huge difference maker. Complete this sentence. Recently, I've come to realize that the people with title do not have power over me. The power they have is when I give it to them. So I become mindful, let's say a judge, right? In the past, because of my background and because of as brought up as an asian child, we were taught to respect people with title. So a judge, whatever, you know. So now I learned that it could be a judge. And if that judge is not a nice person, I have no reason to like him or her or respect him or her. And the only time that person has half power with me is if I were in his courtroom. You know, he can decide. He can decide on my future, that I have the power of me. So I realized that it's the people. It's not a title. The longer I do what I do, the more I. The more clarity I have, the more passion I get. Just get out there and just do it. Childhood should be a time for fun. I think shows should be time for fun. There are always people who envy of. You and dislike you, so there's no need to worry about those people. Life has taught me to. You take everything as a grain of salt, not you taking everything seriously. My mantra is. My new mantra is just be me. Be yourself. Winning teaches you, I think winning teaches. Me how to be humble. It's not all a zero sum game. When you win, someone lose. And so if we can figure out a way to, we both can win. I would prefer that. It's remarkably difficult to teach that lesson to people or help people see it, I guess. But losing teaches you. Losing teaches me how to be persistent, persevere. Right. Not to give up so easily. Being a board member makes you more. Being a board member makes me more aware of a lot of difficulties organization is facing. Like, from the outside, you see organizations run, it's like, okay, you know, they're doing well, but beyond the board, when you see, you hear about things, okay, this is not going well, or we have this problem with that problem. So I think being on the board, it helped me see a lot of issues a lot of these organizations are facing, especially nonprofit. Being a father makes you, I think. Being a father make me happy. I gotta spend time with my children, you know, and watch them grow, but also a lot of worries. I worry a lot more now as a father, you know, because it's. You imagine the worst thing that could happen. The hardest thing about learning to trust your instincts or intuition is to doubt yourself. You say your instinct is not correct. Nine times out of ten, I think your instinct is correct for whatever reason. And that's going back to the question you asked me earlier about my interest. And I like to learn more about human behavior and why we behave a certain way. So I've tried to read a couple books, and I still don't comprehend all those things. But when our instinct tells us something, just because our experience and all these things we learned in the past, right, our subconscious mind tell us that's, that's, that's what it is. Our conscious mind would doubt ourselves. Like, I don't think you know what you're talking about. Your own story is my own story to me, to me, I think my own story is pretty cool. And now we come to the part where we go into random associations. You know the rules. Return. Root service, underserved people. Purpose driven. Leadership, servant. Collaboration is the only way to do it. Invention, it's always needed. Moments, it's precious. Commitment, it's a must. Self awareness is a must. Reinvention what we strive for. Completion, next step, world kindness, art. Super cool. Love is what drives us. Courage, it's hard. Retreat, adoption, change. Some must. And now for those of you who have been listening to us for the last few broadcasts, we come to the part where affectionately call the eleven originally a parlor game, appropriated or re appropriated by PvE, then re appropriated by Lipton and shamelessly pilfered by us at the WEI. So what is your favorite part of starting something new? The excitement of what's going to happen when you start something new. And with the new found personality, we can say that I think their excitement, I would be very excited to start something new and have faith is going to come to fruitions. What is your least favorite part of starting something new? The least favorite part? I can't think of a least favorite part. Every part of it. Starting new is exciting to do. What interests you the most? People. People is very interesting. What interests you the least? Also people. That's an interesting answer. This of course is a radio station. KCSS. What music artist, genre or song reminds you most of your early days in entrepreneurship and innovation? I guess I'm one of those people that don't have a song or music genre that relate to the early days of entrepreneurship. Although if I can say, if I listen to a lot of classical music, it's. For whatever reason, it's always been my go to music. When I listen to it, when I want to listen to music, that's my go to. And the second are those artists I mentioned earlier, Nina Simone. Very nice. Do you remember something perhaps playing in the background during that time, like a composer specifically of classical music is your go to? Probably listen to probably those time listening to a lot of Mozart. It's mellow and it's high energy at the same time. What food or beverage reminds you most of your memories of your first startup? When I have quite a few startups that never saw the light of day, I probably would say pho. It's vietnamese because in Vietnam there's a lot of pollution. But people wear face masks, right? This is before the pandemic and the face mask become a thing and everyone wore face masks, but it's fabric. And so I was like, you know, the fabric could not filter all this, you know, chemical in the air. So I tried to come up with a carbon activated filter so you can insert in between. And it worked. But. But I didn't have a lot of knowledge about marketing and all that stuff back then. And so it, you know, it, I made a prototype. People test it. I even have it tested at the so called whatever. It's like an FDA type here in Vietnam. And they said it effective and it never took off. But now everyone's wearing those kind of things, right? And just full disclosure, Pho is excellent. I am a huge pho fan, and I only learned to eat it. Pho. I learned to eat it coming to California. It wasn't very popular in the part of the country I was from. Love it. So, yeah, we gotta graph one of these days then. Oh, for sure, for sure. I think it's something in the star Anis. It just floors me. What profession, non entrepreneurial, do you admire. The most now, I always have to say lawyer. The reason why is I realize that our everyday lives revolves around, you know, laws, right? I know lawyers have a bad reputation. There's a lot of bad lawyers out there. But for people who use the legal knowledge for good, it's amazing. Like, I've seen people during the time when they have that kids, you know, came across from the border. I've seen friends who are immigration attorneys would go down there to the border, volunteer their time to help, you know, these kids and family navigate the legal system. And so I see the power of those things. Contract managers, everywhere you look, it's always some laws involved in someone one way or another of lives is governed by a lot of different laws. So. So that's one of the profession, I think it's. It's have a big impact, you know, if you use it for good. So I encourage my son to look into law. If he, you know, if he interested. I'm not going to push him, but I encourage him to look into it. What job, prior to entrepreneurship did you dislike the most and why? I think it goes back to that job as when I work as a lab, get research assistants. Where you got fired? That was bad memory. And, you know, I liked the work because it's interesting because I could see the positive impact those things. Like, for example, when I got job, where I got fired from, we worked on testing method for drugs. So let's say, you know, when people blow into that thing, whether cops got pulled over, breathalyzer. Breathalyzer or the pee test, they test if you have THC in it. So the company that I work for developed all these different tests, not for illegal and legal drug as well. So if you go to hospital and you were taking some drugs, they want to see what kind of level of drugs really have in your body before you put more of that drugs in. So all those different tests we worked with, our team worked on. On that. And so the work. The work was good, was rewarding. It just environment wasn't. I didn't like the environment. I, you know, it didn't fit in. I like people, so I want to talk to people. And in that lab environment, a lot of people like, they are very closed up. They don't want to talk to people. If you kind of want to say antisocial, that's, you know, that's kind of how they were. I didn't like that. So, yeah. And last but not least, if heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the pearly gates? Welcome immediately thereafter, what idea or innovation would you like to pitch to him her they it with the universe as your marketplace? I think I would ask God to expedite the process and skip all the middlemen. You know, all these prison or whatever these people, like, they think they have the power to allow you to heaven or not. All these past terrorism, I made all of them like direct sales right between God and the people you in or you're not. You know, there's no middle man. A celestial restructuring proposed by Charlie, our wonderful guest today on the WEI podcast. Thank you so much, Charlie, for joining us. Thank you. I think I'm pissed off some people, but. Thanks for listening to this episode of the entrepreneurship and Innovation Studio. This podcast is part of the Warrior Entrepreneurship and innovation program, affectionately known as the we. Our series is recorded on the campus of Stanislaw State at the KCSS radio station and produced by Frankie Tovar. Follow and subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform. I'm Doctor Pablo Parades Romero, wishing you the best of everything. Always.