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Raft of Bitches
A podcast about women supporting women. Like otters.
Raft of Bitches
Sam Brown – I will never produce a PowerPoint presentation
With over two decades in startup/scale-up land and two unicorns (startup companies with a value of over $1 billion) under her belt, Sam loves nothing more than helping others shine.
Sam has a flair for building large resilient teams from the ground up, creating the people journey culture, implementing change management processes, streamlining operation processes, firefighting when the house is on fire and assisting companies set the foundations for successful growth.
Sam’s current major project (and hopefully next unicorn) is www.sapher.com – simple, effective, and affordable online security for everyday people. Help her get there by checking it out!
If you’d like to connect with Sam, she’d love to hear from you on LinkedIn or you can find her annually at the back of every session with a glass of champagne at West Tech Fest.
Hi Rafters, before this episode begins, we just want to warn you that, as usual, this episode contains adult language and concepts.
Kate Kirwin:For centuries, women have been taught that we are each other's worst enemies. But in our experience, women are more like otters than queen bees. Female otters... Bitches, if you will, join hands with each other to create rafts that stop them from drifting apart and losing each other while they're asleep. Just like a literal raft of bitches, our experience has been that thriving women often have a tight-knit community of other women who've helped them get there by providing information and support along the way and making sure that we all stay afloat. Welcome to the Raft of Bitches podcast. My co-host today is Ricki Barnes. Fun fact, she walks her cat with a leash.
Ricki Barnes:That's right, I absolutely do. Just the one though, I've got several others and there's only one that's allowed outside. My co-host today is Kate and a fun fact about Kate is that she once did a four kilometre walk while hooping a hula hoop to raise money for Zonta House.
Ricki Barnes:I did. We're very excited to have a guest with us today, the wonderful Sam Brown. Sam is the self-confessed queen of getting shit done. She's been part of so many start-ups and scale-ups over the last two decades of her career and describes herself as a bit of a unicorn hunter, having been part of two West Australian unicorns, and it's always on the lookout for more. Welcome to the podcast, Sam.
Sam Brown:Thanks for having me, Kate and Ricki.
Kate Kirwin:So we thought we'd kick off with a little bit of an icebreaker. I believe you have two truths and a lie for
Sam Brown:I do. And you get to pick.
Ricki Barnes:Y eah, we're excited to hear this one because we feel it's going to be quite difficult with Sam's, shall
Sam Brown:My varied background. So one fact is I have given mouth to gill resuscitation to a fish. One is I have been skydiving and one is I have been to culinary school.
Ricki Barnes:Oh, hell. I mean, I'm going to go out on a limb and say I reckon the fish one is true. I'm just starting there and I'm like, yep, true, definitely. Yeah. Yeah.
Sam Brown:It is true.
Ricki Barnes:Okay, all right. Now it's a 50-50. It is a 50-50. I reckon she hasn't been skydiving. Yeah, out of all those things, it's the most Sam thing to do and so therefore I feel like it's a bit of a little red herring. A little red herring, yeah.
Sam Brown:No, I have been skydiving. I have not been to culinary school.
Ricki Barnes:But is it on the list?
Sam Brown:It's on the bucket list.
Kate Kirwin:Great. Do you have a particular thing that you would study at culinary school if you went?
Sam Brown:Knife skills. I know that's weird. I'd like to learn how to chop
Kate Kirwin:Today we're going to explore a little bit about alternative pathways to success. I've known you, Sam, a long time now.
Sam Brown:It has been a while.
Kate Kirwin:Nine, ten years. Yeah. And I think that we were taught a lot that somehow our lives are supposed to be this super linear progression that we do school, university, job, accelerate through jobs, get to success. And there's this magical, you know, place at the end where you're a successful person. But I don't think life's like that. And so I'm really curious to hear a little bit about what your journey has been like, where you've gone, how you got to where you are.
Sam Brown:Hard work and determination. It's as simple as that. Common sense. I am not university qualified. I do have a certificate in aquaculture. So I am an aquaculturalist by trade and hence the mouth to gill.
Ricki Barnes:Of course, yes, that all makes sense.
Sam Brown:It happened to be our breeding stock of pink snapper that we had down at Fremantle TAFE and we had a power outage.
Ricki Barnes:Can I just ask, was the manoeuvre successful?
Sam Brown:Absolutely. Absolutely. Great work. It was great. She's a lifesaver. I was literally a lifesaver. I liked different things. So I spent a lot of time in automotive and insurance in my really early days of my career, just trying to work out who I am. I don't conform to large corporations. So people that know me will know that that's just not who I am. And that's how I naturally started to fall into the startup culture. It was one of my mother's group ladies. Her husband had a tech startup business that he was putting a house in Australia for a UK company, a development house. And he asked me to come in and do some testing. And I'm like, sure. Our babies were little, no problems. Come in and test some medical software for him. And that started my entire journey into tech. And I loved it. Absolutely loved it. Was with the company for quite a few years. Left that company when the GFC hit and we shut the Australian office down, rehomed all of my staff. We had 60 staff at the time. And one of the recruiters actually said to me, oh, could you do me a favour and do a six-week stint at Nearmap while their office manager is away just to give me a hand? And I'm like, sure, no problems. And that started my first unicorn, which was Nearmap. And I just progressed my way through there. Migrated the company to Sydney. Helped with the migration when they first started their operations in the US. And then it was time for me to move on. Rolled into VGW at Spacecube where the company was very, very, very young. And I came in just generally to help them with their operations. And that just led to a seven year crazy ride. That's become my second unicorn.
Ricki Barnes:Can we just quickly define, just in case people aren't familiar, what a unicorn is in this context?
Sam Brown:So a unicorn is a business that is worth a billion dollars. So when I first started at Nearmap, never in our wildest dreams did we think the company would become a billion dollar company. Same with VGW. All we wanted to do was make some money, make some customers happy. But it was a billion dollar company after I left. Both companies were a billion dollar company after I left. I come in specifically at Startup and Scale Up. Once the business is rocking as usual, I'm not your girl. It's time for somebody else to come in and run into that. What we're
Ricki Barnes:alternative pathways to success. You've already told us you didn't go to university. I would say... From my point of view, it seems like there is a huge focus on higher education in Australia. I think we're one of the most educated countries in the world. We have a particularly high number of women who have degrees in Australia. And I think sometimes it feels like, especially for young people, that is the only pathway to success, particularly in the kind of industries that you've ended up in. So maybe there are other options for more trades-based things. But I think for a lot of young people, it seems like university is the be all and end all. Yeah. What's your kind of take on that? As you say yourself, you'd never went
Sam Brown:to university. No. And I have encouraged my children not to go to university either. I believe if you have a Dedicated pathway. You want to become a doctor. Absolutely. The only way to do that is via university. I didn't ever want to be a doctor. I didn't know what I wanted to do. I still don't know what I want to do. I'm just going to be this woman that comes in and fixes chaos and fires and mayhem. That's what I want to do. There is nothing they can teach me in university to do that. It is common sense. It is a deep understanding of knowing what I can fix and what I can't fix and making sure that I surround myself with people that can fix what I can't. And once you've got that, once you've learnt that and you surround yourself with the right people, you can solve any problem out there. And how did you learn that? There's no right answer to that one, right? It's a lot of trial and error. It's a lot of saying yes when someone says we've got a problem, can you help me? Yes. Did I know that I could help them? Hell no. Still did it. Bumbled my way through. It was fake it till you make it. There was a lot of fake it till you make it. Literally walking in to do presentations and they're like, where are your slideshow? And I'm like, yeah, I don't do slideshows. 48-year-old woman, I have never produced a PowerPoint presentation. I will never produce a PowerPoint presentation. If only I could say the same. In my mind and the way that I roll, if I can't articulate to you what I'm trying to say without having a PowerPoint presentation, I don't know my content. Now, everybody rolls different. I am a very hands-on person. I'm a build you from the ground up. I surround myself with teams of smarter than me people and make sure that anybody that I hire has a heart and soul. And if you have a heart and soul and you genuinely care, I can teach you anything. I can't teach you to genuinely care. My focus has always been in the customer service operations space. So yes, I could go and get my MBA in business. And yes, I could go and become, you know, operational excellence. Or I can use some common sense, know that the customer is 99.5% of the time right, and listen to their feedback to make our products better or to make my service better or to genuinely make our business better. And that's what I've tended to have done. You
Kate Kirwin:touched on a lot there. One of the things that I really love about you, Sam, is how real and authentic you are and just tell it how it is and not get swept up in all of the way that it's supposed to be, the right way of doing things. In researching this, I was looking at some of the crazy titles that you've given yourself over the years. So I found Queen of Getting Shit Done, Culture Queen, Chief Awesome Officer, Chief Firefighter. Are there any more crazy titles you have?
Sam Brown:Mum. Um's a pretty crazy one. Yeah, Chief Wonder Woman. Chief Wonder Woman was in there. That was from my staff in the Philippines at VGW. And do you know what? It comes from the staff. To be fair, most of those titles I've been given, they're not ones that I've picked myself. I'm not the most professional person in the room. I will never be the most professional person in the room. It's just not who I am. This is why I am not cut out for big corporates. I don't like towing the line. I have a potty mouth. I really do, just in case anybody didn't know that about me. I totally do.
Kate Kirwin:You're on the right podcast.
Sam Brown:I'm on the right podcast. But for me, if I can't make sure that the culture within my team is one of safe space and constant progression of your path, I will move heaven and earth for you to progress in your role, then what am I doing as a leader?
Unknown:Yeah.
Sam Brown:So all of my staff have always been upskilled and uptrained. And I always promote from within before I go outside to give people a career path. And if they want to move from, I don't want to do operations anymore. I want to now be a tester. I will move you to a tester. I'll put you through the training. So I think those types of things genuinely start to make you a leader that gets titles like that.
Kate Kirwin:How do you show up with that kind of authenticity in your work?
Sam Brown:It's just who I am. It is just honestly who I wake up and that's just who I am. I'm a naturally bright and bubbly person anyway. I do like a lot of chaos, so I tend to attract chaos. I am epic under pressure. It's one thing I am very proud of. I am pretty good under pressure. I've had A lot of hard things happen in my life. It hasn't been an easy life. We talk about this linear path. My path is anything but linear. It was 10 steps backwards for three steps forward and then steps sideways. I have changed my field. I've always been operations and I've always been customer service, but I've been in automotive and in aerial imagery, in online gaming, in medical software, identity verification. Now I'm going back into cyber security. So it's been so varied, but the principles are fundamental. They don't change. Love your customer, love your team, be a nice human. If you can do those three things, you've nailed it.
Ricki Barnes:Can I ask, has there ever been a time that you've felt that you haven't been able to show up as yourself?
Sam Brown:Yep.
Ricki Barnes:And what did you do about that?
Sam Brown:I was really vocal, really vocal. So I would get on Slack and I'm like, guys, I'm having a really low day today. Nothing to do with anything here. I'm just not my normal self and it's okay. And we roll on through and then my staff would bring me cups of tea or They'd bring me fresh tea and flowers, like my two favourite things on the planet, and champagne. They would bring them. But then they're all so thankful that I can say it's okay to have a bad day because it is okay to have a bad day. And unfortunately we have a society now that has a lot of mental health problems and a lot of people are too scared to talk about it. I don't want you to be too scared to talk about it. If you're having a shit day, let me know. I'll do everything in my power to make it better. But some days I can't because I don't have it in me. I might not have slept very well. There might be a problem brewing that I don't have the immediate answer to. And so then I don't feel like I'm actually showing up as my true self. That's okay. But in a day or two's time, once I've worked through that, no, I'm back. And everyone knows I'm back and they can hear me coming down the street. So it's about being honest and real.
Kate Kirwin:You touched on before that it hasn't always been easy. I'd love to hear about some of the challenges along the way. I think we sugarcoat and look at the positives and the highlight reel, but for every highlight, there's a low light. Can you tell us about some of the challenges?
Sam Brown:Yeah. I had a medical episode at VGW. I'd been at VGW for about six years, five and a half, six years at this point. And we were going through a epically hard time. Our payment provider that our customers purchased packages through had given us notice and we had to bring in a new payment provider and the whole business was up in arms about it. And because my staff are front facing, my staff were all of the brunt of that. And I had a heart attack halfway through a transition period. It was really hard. I went to hospital. My mum was working for me at the time. She wanted to come to hospital. I'm like, I need you to go to work and stand up. You have to go to work. Dad will meet me at the hospital. It's okay. And I had to have six weeks off. And it was a stress-induced heart attack. But it did damage my heart. So I had to then be very careful about the stress levels. And that was one of the catalysts for the point for me where this is just a bit of business as usual now. Yes, that was a critical incident that happened. While I was handling the situation really well, it was so much pressure that I had put on myself to make sure that my team were protected and my body just said enough was enough. But I came back from it and I survived. You know, many people haven't. But it changed the way that I deal now with stressful situations. I had to start to put some processes into play that said, all right... you now need to go and take a long bath and read a book. I love a good bath and I love a good book without the glass of wine. Sure. So,
Ricki Barnes:yeah. And do you have, I guess, advice for women who might be under a lot of pressure, under a lot of stress? I think women are particularly good at putting themselves under stress and pressure as well as all the external pressure that we're under all the time. Any advice for people to find their way to cope with it in a more healthy sort of way.
Sam Brown:The advice that I was given was if I didn't find a way to relax, I would turn back up at the hospital with another heart attack that I wouldn't have survived. And I said to the cardiologist, I don't relax. I work. I'm a single mum, two young children, and it's a start-up. It was a crazy start-up. We did stupid hours. And he went, go for a walk, read a book, take a bath. So I did all three. I have many a raft in my life and I have different rafts for different things. I have... rafts that are my happy rafts and I have rafts that are my sad rafts and I've got rafts that have been with me for like 22 years and I've got new rafts but I found a raft that I was comfortable to talk with to say hey I'm not okay I thought I was okay but I'm actually not okay they didn't judge me they still love me they're here to support me they cook me a meal they invite me out for dinner so it was getting back to reality so finding your reality because No job on the planet is worth a heart attack.
Ricki Barnes:Definitely. Do you want to give a shout out to the people who are in that raft that supported you at that time?
Sam Brown:Yes. So I have an amazing mother's group who have been with me for 22. Our oldest children are 22. And those women are from all different walks of life. We've got women who are in business like me, women who have been in tech startups. We've got stay-at-home mums. We've got women who have their own businesses. And they... I wouldn't be here without them, actually. They're my for every people. They're my for every raft. And we've had people that have moved to the East Coast. They're still here. We've had births. We've had deaths. We've had loss of children. We've had divorces and marriages and licenses and 18th and 21sts. And now we're at the stage where all of our children are now getting partners and we're waiting for the first engagement. So it's exciting times. But yeah, without those women, I definitely wouldn't be here. It's incredible having that friendship last so long. Yep. And you know what it is? It's communication. It's time. In the early days when our babies were little and none of us knew what we wanted to do with a career, it was Keely whose husband Sam said to me, come and do some testing for me. And Sam really sort of skyrocketed my passion for tech. But it came out of my mother's group, Chance Meeting. In a suburb that I didn't even live in, I ended up in a manning mother's group like 25 minutes away. It was just random and fluke and I fell in love with these women and here we are.
Kate Kirwin:So cool. I've had the pleasure of, I feel like I've seen a lot of the journey of your kids growing up into the young adults they are now. You've been a single mum for most of your career. Yeah. What's that journey been like? And do you have any lessons that you want to share with our audience?
Sam Brown:It's been hard. My partner passed away, I was 34 and the children were very young, so in primary school. And it was a very unexpected heart attack on the way home from work. And it was hard. It was really hard. I took a couple of months, three months off work and then said to my boss at Nearmap at the time, Can't afford to not work anymore. He'd paid me the whole way through, but that's not me. That's not who I am. I need to work for my money. And he said to me, I'll move you into a sales role, make sales and renew licenses of Nearmap with state, federal and local governments, and I'll pay your commission. And I'm like, I don't know how to sell. And he went, this is the only way you're going to make money. I'm like, okay. I trust you. So he put me on a training course to learn 101 sales. And my first commission check was, I think it was like $500. And I took my CEO and his wife out for dinner to say thank you. Then I just started to claw my way. I landed a deal with a federal department. And that was my biggest commission check that actually paid for my partner's funeral. So it was hard, right? Yeah. But you've got to show up. You can't not. You've got to just keep going. You've just got to and have your bad days because there were days I'd sit in the office and cry, as you do. The school would ring and say, come pick your kids up because they're just not coping. But you had to show up. It's been 13 years and I'm still teary. Thank you
Kate Kirwin:for sharing that with us. Yes. I feel a little teary too. I know, it's terrible. But I think it's so important telling those stories. Yeah.
Sam Brown:Yep. But it's constantly showing up. I didn't want my kids to go, mum had a bad thing and therefore she fell in a hole and she couldn't get out of bed. Nope. She got up, she brushed off her knees and she kept on rocking. And yeah, we've had some tough times. Who has a death of a partner and a heart attack within a few years of each other? It's hard. But I'm still here and I'm still happy and I'm still kicking goals, you know.
Kate Kirwin:S o inspiring. Honestly, so inspiring.
Sam Brown:No, I think, do you know what? It's nothing... different than anybody else would do honestly people have bad shit happen to them they have car accidents they have cancer and sickness and people have that sort of stuff that happens and they just get on with it yes we we moan and yes sometimes you can't see the light at the end of that tunnel but you know it's there and it's about making sure again surrounding yourself with those people that when I do stumble you're all there to pick me up and hold me and We all still rock on, right? We still love each other. And I think it's about not overcomplicating it. Don't go out and read those books. Just use your common sense. Surround yourself with your girlfriends or your guy friends or whoever it is, your parents, whoever. Your raft. Your raft. And that's it. And lean on them for support.
Ricki Barnes:So do you think attitude you have of, you know, it will be all right, there is light at the end of the tunnel, right? it's going to happen is one of the reasons that the startups you've been involved in have been so successful?
Sam Brown:Yeah, absolutely. One of my big catch cries is that I don't fail, right? We all fail. We all fail at things. Yes, I could have been better at something. Yes, that didn't go to plan. But again, there's always a light at the end of that tunnel. I am an optimist. There is nothing in this world that I cannot do. Nothing. I believe I could do it. I mean, okay, maybe I can't go to space. But, you know, maybe if I throw enough money at it. Maybe in a few years' time. You never know. But there's nothing in this world that I can't do. And I apply that logic to every startup I come into. Some of those startups I come in and it's just a mess. with founders that have got really strong beliefs in how they want something to go. But fundamentally, it's just not how life works. My job is quite often about corralling them into my way of thinking, which I know makes me sound really like a dick, but it is my way of thinking that will take the staff and that product and that business on a journey to get to where it I'm not a one-man band. All of these startups have had hundreds of people to make them successful. But when you've got a champion in there that is constantly pushing the good fight, that yes, we're going to get there, yes, we're going to get there, rallying the troops, it makes you want to show up and do your best.
Ricki Barnes:Have there been any startups that you've been involved in that haven't gone as you'd like them to go, that you gave up on, that you... you know, decided I really can't help you.
Sam Brown:Yes, there has been one. I beat myself up about this one company for a really long time. It was one of the saddest days of my career because I went home feeling like a failure. However, I didn't actually fail. I just realised that that was just not my person. At the end of the day, I am not everybody's cup of tea and it is okay to ...it is okay if we don't get on fabulously. For me it was about recognising that the way that I do things... ...and the way that other people do things don't always align. I am pretty brash. I'm pretty forward. I don't mince my words. I am here to make you successful. I am here to make you shine. That's all I'm here for. And it's your business. But if I'm not your person... then it's okay for us not to be in this road.
Kate Kirwin:The theme that we're exploring is about the alternative pathways to success. What does success actually look like for you? Do you have a definition of what success i s?
Sam Brown:Making others shine. I am successful when everybody around me is successful. It's as simple as that. Success in a business is having a business that I can walk out the back end of and go, ha ha, look what I just did. We've taken it from this idea, this conception, this business that isn't making any money and now we've got this massive beast that's super successful with thousands of customers that love it. That's successful. But that's not my success. My success is all the staff that I've hired and helped and grown and mentored and coached and loved over the years and their growth and their success is what? I determine my
Kate Kirwin:That's so beautiful.
Sam Brown:My very first employer, way back when, when I was very young, said to me, tell me how much you need to earn to be successful. And I said to him, it's not about the money. He went, you're not going to get very far in life, are you? Like, yeah, of course I am. He said to me, no, no, no, you need to have financial goals. You need to determine success and finance. And that stuck with me because Money is not a currency for me. Time is a currency. So you giving your time to me means that I'm successful because you want to spend time with me.
Ricki Barnes:We've talked a lot today about, you know, the various different paths that your career has taken, which has obviously been a lot of change. You've changed industries. You've done a lot of different things. What would your advice be to people who are feeling stuck in their careers?
Sam Brown:Change. Move. Take the different role. It's not about the money. Don't chase the title. Chase the passion. Chase the joy. What's the thing that you wake up in the morning going, fuck, that's the best thing on the planet. That. Go find that job. Now, maybe it's in data. Maybe it's in tech. Maybe it's in, maybe you want to be a dental hygienist. Go be a dental hygienist. There is nothing stopping you on this planet by yourself. and that limiting belief in what you can achieve. I know that I can achieve greatness, but my greatness and your greatness are going to be very different. Wake up, decide what you want to do, make the plan, action the plan. That's it. It's as simple as that. Don't overcomplicate it. Is it as simple as that? It is honestly as simple as that. I have been quite wealthy. I have been very broke where my house was going up for mortgagee sale because I couldn't make my mortgage payments. I've been on all aspects. I've lived in a rental. I've had moments where I'm like, this is too hard. I just need to move my children back in with mum and dad. I've been in all those spaces, but never once did I ever think I can't do this because I know I can. It's just about how deep do I have to dig and how much do I have to change what I'm currently doing to get me to the first hurdle? Because once you've jumped the first hurdle, the second one's easy. The third one's even easier. And it's all just about putting those little hurdles into play. Go jump them. We can all jump. It's just about how high.
Ricki Barnes:Excellent way of putting it. We've got a Sam Brown pep talk. I'm going to listen back to this whenever I need to feel energized in my career.
Sam Brown:I'm very good at prompting everybody else up, brooding up the spirits. I'm pretty good at that.
Kate Kirwin:Do you have advice for people that have a goal in mind of where they want to be but they're not qualified to get there? They haven't tried it. How do they realize that g oal?
Sam Brown:Use your network. Absolutely reach out to your network. And if you don't have a large network, reach out to someone in your network who does have a large network. We all know somebody who knows somebody who can get you in as an intern for a day. Come spend the day in the life of to see if that is something you want to do. Find places like She Codes who will actually show you what coding looks like. There is a lot of these around. And genuinely, putting it out there. I'm a big believer of if you put it out to the universe, it will provide. So for me, the more you're talking about whatever it is that you're wanting to change or look into, it just starts to turn up on all your feeds and you will naturally find that those people are starting to surround you. And be ballsy. Ask for help. Go and say to your employer, hey, not loving it, thinking I might want to be in that department. Can I do a day a week and see if I like it? What's the worst they're going to say? No. Go find a company who says yes. Because if that company says no, that's not the company for
Ricki Barnes:Sounds like really what we need to do essentially is channel our inner Sam Brown.
Kate Kirwin:Yeah. There's a reason to have her on my like little advisory board, personal advisory
Sam Brown:I am on quite a few people's personal advisory boards. Look, at the end of the day, we can't do this alone. We have to do this with a raft. So make sure, again, you surround yourself with the right raft and the sky's the limit. I love that.
Kate Kirwin:On your LinkedIn, I found while researching for this podcast, a quote that you've shared, which was, your smile is your logo, your personality is your business card, and how you make others feel becomes your trademark. I love it so much. Can you tell me a little bit about what that means to you and how that's played out over your career? Yeah.
Sam Brown:So I don't even know where I found that, but that has played out several times. I turned 40 a while ago and I started planning my 40th birthday right at the last minute because that's how I roll and very quickly realized there was 250 people on the invitation list and everybody was like you can't have 250 people I'm like of course I can watch me and it was all different rafts of my working career my family everybody was there but the big topic that kept coming up all the time is I love how I feel when I've left you When I go home, I'm still buzzing because of being around you and your personality and your loudness. And I am very, very loud. I think having constantly heard that my whole life, I've had a lot of people say, you're too loud. You just need to tone it down. I will never tone it down. If I am too loud for you, see ya. I don't need you in my space and that's okay. And I get that you can't always make everybody happy. But I think I do a pretty epic job of making people happy. I mix my personal life with my business life because they're all ingrained. So for me, what you see is what you get, whether I'm in business or I'm in personal, whether I'm at a funeral, whether I'm at a wedding, I am just me, just me. Don't change. That's my advice to your raft of listeners. Do not change. Be authentically yourself and do not apologise for that. Don't apologise. That's
Ricki Barnes:excellent advice. Speaking of advice, what is the best advice that you've ever received?
Sam Brown:Don't tone yourself down. Same advice. Same advice. Don't tone yourself down. It was from the most random person who didn't even work with me. And she said, be unapologetically yourself. Never tone yourself down. And it's just stuck with me. And I'll never forget her, ever. You will never go wrong in this world if you are yourself. You may lose jobs because you are too loud, too big, too forward, too this. Fuck that. Pick the right company. Pick the right people to support you. Don't tone yourself down for a company. It's just not worth it. Life is too short. What's next for you? Wow. My third unicorn. It's a cyber security company. We are in the scam prevention arm of cyber security. So it's about notifying you when you are accessing a scam link or a fraudulent site or a your toll is overdue, pay your toll. You know, your Coles order wasn't paid correctly, pay your Coles order. When you click on those links, we tell you that they're a suspicious site. And the thing I love about this is it goes with my personal morals and brand of protecting the everyday user. Part of my customer service journey is about making sure that people are heard, people are listened to and people are protected. We know that scams are ripping millions of dollars off people globally. And when Joe came to me with this and said, hey, I want you on board, I jumped. And at that stage, I was with two other startups. So I had three startups on the go and it was a little much. And now I'm just solely doing one. We are getting ready to launch our product. I said to Joe, you can't keep me because once I get this product up and running, I will go and do something different. So he came up with 10 other business ideas that all stem off this one. And he's like, so we'll get this one up and then we'll move to the next one, right? And then the next one, right? So it's very exciting.
Ricki Barnes:So with your challenge, is there anything that you need? Who would you need to add to your raft? Is there anything that... our raft of bitches, our listeners, could do to help you?
Sam Brown:What I do need is businesses. I need businesses that want to protect their business from scams. I need mums and dads. I need families that want to gift a loved one. One of the products we've built within our extension is Gift a Loved One so that I could buy it for my mum and dad who might be a little bit older and don't necessarily understand. And that just means that everybody is safe and protected. So I would ask your raft that if they're interested in protecting themselves from an online scam, that they go and look at safer.com. That's S-A-P-H-E-R.com. Amazing.
Kate Kirwin:And how can our listeners find more about you and what you're up to?
Sam Brown:I do have a pretty decent LinkedIn presence, Sam Brown-Perth. I am a lover of West Tech Fest. So come and have a champagne with me. I'm the noisy one at the back of the room in every session. If any of your raft need some mentoring, want some advice, just genuinely want to know what their next steps could be if it was me, happy to have a chat.
Ricki Barnes:Thanks for joining us today, Sam. We loved hearing from you and loved hearing all of your sage advice. I'm sure there's lots of people who would like to reach out and probably take advantage of a mentoring session with you or, you know, just a pep talk even. Unfortunately, once again, we're otterly out of time.
Kate Kirwin:That's right. But if you didn't go to university but have a banger career, we would love to hear from you.
Ricki Barnes:And where can people reach us?
Kate Kirwin:We're on Instagram at Raft Podcast or you can email us at hello at raftpodcast.com.
Ricki Barnes:And for previous episodes or to find out more, don't forget to check out our website raftpodcast.com or find us wherever you download podcasts.
Kate Kirwin:Thanks for listening, Rafters. We'll catch you next time.
Unknown:Thanks for having me. Been fabulous. And a bucket list item ticked off. Record a podcast. Thanks ladies. I love it. Thanks bitches. That's what I should say. Thanks bitches. Thanks bitches. Thanks bitches. Bitches out. Bitches out.