12: Belly of the Pivot Beast: On Bouncing Back from Zero with Adam Chaloeicheep

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Hi, I'm Jenny Blake, your host of the Pivot Podcast and author of the book Pivot Turn what's Working for you into what's Next, which comes out with Portfolio Penguin in September of 2016.

In this podcast, I talk with peak performers to reverse engineer their most successful career. Pivots interview experts on what it takes to be agile in a rapidly evolving economy and open the kimono on what happens. Behind the scenes of my book and business, you can learn to capitalize on risk, fear and uncertainty as the doorways of opportunity. My promise is that you will leave every episode with practical tips, tools and tactics. For show notes from this episode, visit jennyblake Me podcast.

If change is the only constant, then let's get better at it. Here we go.

I am really excited to have Adam Tilloa Chief, on the phone today. Adam is the brand strategist and mastermind behind JennyBlake Me, and we met when Adam was in a major Pivot year and then I went through my own right after that. Adam, thank you so much for being here.

Thanks Danny. It's great being here.

So when I first met you, you had sold all your things, gotten a one way ticket to Thailand, and toward the end of that time you studied a monastery. And when we met, you were just about getting on the plane on the way home. I'm curious if you can just think back to that time. What was going through your mind as you're coming home in terms of trying to figure out what's next?

Yeah, that's a complicated question. I would just say, because.

To Thailand in the first place was renting out my condo, quitting my job, selling my clothes, my furniture was essentially to let everything go and.

See what comes up. For me.

Finding success the way I had before financially was great, but it wasn't fulfilling. So coming back, it was more of how do I take everything I've learned, all the freedom and the studies from the monastery about letting desire go and understanding how it can attach to us emotionally, and then knowing that coming back from that eastern mindset to the Western world, how do I come in to still wanting to create and still being okay with the desire to want to build companies as an entrepreneur.

But having a balance where I didn't just totally like wring myself out and kind of staying true to the things that came up for me over there.

That was the biggest thing that I kept Thinking about essentially probably about for two whole weeks, even after I got back to the West.

Yeah. It's so interesting what you said about kind of clearing the decks that you. It wasn't just. This was not a vacation. You really wanted to kind of wipe the slate clean a little bit. Can you tell us just a little bit, what were you doing in your career up till that point? And how did you know it was time to just walk away from it all and quit your job and like go take time to think? How did you make that decision?

Yeah, I was just like so fucking tired. I mean, I was exhausted. That's really what it came down to. I felt depleted. And no matter how much coffee I drank or Red Bull or whatever, I couldn't find that fire and that passion inside. I think when you leave college, you are so excited to make something of yourself and you're so excited to make money for like the first time that you get kind of caugh up and just diving into whatever comes your way. So right out of school I actually had the opportunity to go work for a startup, which I didn't realize was a startup at the time. I was just looking to do great design and work with cool designers. But I was working in this new concept of like high end student housing. So that's what I was doing. Quickly from within four years, went from seven to 170 employees. And after four years I was, I had a design team. I was overseeing all sort of brand assets for every single project that we had. I was traveling all over the country. Things were like, in that way felt really, really great.

But then the recession hit and the company completely turned, changed their values and where they were going. And all of a sudden the cool kind of shiny new project that was coming up every month wasn't happening anymore. And I wasn't kind of blinded just by the next big thing that we're gonna work on. And I really took some time, about six months where I was like, we're not doing anything that I'm really excited about anymore. At the same time, the company never had established like internal values that were kind of like a cultural thing. It was just people were just working towards a project so there wasn't even anything kind of unifying me there with the actual people that were coming in. I actually got bored of them as well. And I wasn't insp. So that was, that was a thing. And also it's like my first job and I was making like really good money. I just bought this brand new condo, like everything on the outside looks fantastic. So I was needing to.

I don't know what I needed to do. It just felt like I needed to get the hell out. And at that time, yeah, that's just the way. That's the way my personality is. So that's where it came to. Everything is kind of cumulated once and that is. I tried to do the freelance thing after I left that job. That didn't feel good. I hated the agency world. Everything just felt stifling. Everything I turned to and I knew I needed to get my head clear in whatever way I could and I had to do something drastic and that was my drastic choice to go to Thailand.

Yeah. I think so many people can relate to going on adrenaline for a certain number of years, especially when you're in your early to mid-20s and then hitting this wall, like you said, where you were just fuck exhausted and to really pause and say, this isn't what I want anymore. And I know a lot of people, myself included, can relate that as these young, vibrant startups grow, it changes and the environment changes. And it's not always going to be a fit the person that loves working in an agile little startup to what becomes a big corporate behemoth.

And what struck me as so courageous for you was when you were coming home, you really made a point to be thoughtful about what you wanted to do. So, one, it took a lot of courage to go to Thailand for that amount of time and step out of the daily grind. And then two, when you came home, I know it was really important to you to find something that was inspiring and resonant.

Can you share a little bit about just. I know that it's a challenging process and it doesn't happen overnight, so I would love if you could just share the things that worked and didn't work on your journey toward figuring out what was next once you came back.

Mm.

In a way, I almost think everything worked. It just didn't work in the way that I. That I thought it would. So when I came back, I was very determined to work with health and wellness companies in the capacity of what I similarly was doing before. Creative directing, doing brand strategy, doing kind of product launch development and stuff like that.

But it came down that I just kept doing all this research and reaching out to the right people, but they weren't interested in what I had to say. So then I was like, okay, well, let me do some more research to really give myself better words to use and talk about better processes, methodologies. I mean, it even came down to the Point where created this whole entire concept development for the new Lululemon men's store. And I mean that even got me all the way to Vancouver where I talked to them and talked to all the heads and stuff like that. Everyone loved my ideas and there was a lot of good momentum behind it. But after a few weeks it went flat again. I mean I made some good. But what happened is every time I did these things I learned a bit more about myself. And because I'm a man of action, like I have to, I am introspective to an extent, but really like I learn by doing so every time I did a new resume or I read a new book on a process or I created these concepts and created this whole beautiful book with like a value system and the value proposition all like that. I didn't realize but I was teaching myself in a way of how to think about if anyone came to me for a product or service, how I can get it out there. I mean, in addition to that, like, yeah, I mean there was also some personal things I just had to take care of. And I felt that on the personal side, if I took care of some of these things that I would have more mental freedom and less worry. So then I could experiment even further. For example, I needed to sell my mom's house and I needed her to move to a better environment. So coming back to Illinois, working with her for four months, packing up the house, selling it and then moving across country to a climate that was not just better personally, but also the weather wise was very, very helpful and could start it at the same time. So.

I would. There's actually when I look back at every step it was and I think failure is looked at the wrong in the wrong terms these days. Like every single step, like I learned something along the way. It was frustrating every step when I didn't get the response I wanted. But now when of look back at Steve Jobs, connecting the dots is exactly. I need to do every single step to get me where I am today. I know that's a big, somewhat 10 foot, 10,000 foot view of that landscape, but you really don't know what is going to benefit you until you get through it and you accept the frustration. And then you're like, oh, I really just learned all that from that whole project that somehow you hope is going to accumulate into a bigger, a bigger idea down the road.

Right. It's a great example of piloting and putting feelers out. And I can imagine that it's frustrating. You know, you reach out and so many people can relate to that as well, where they're applying for jobs and just not getting traction. And in your case, you would get all the way to the end. You know, you were in Vancouver meeting with executives and then as you said, it was like the door remained shut for some reason. So as you had put those feelers out and you kept sort of learning and adjusting, learning and adjusting. I know two other things were kind of happening in parallel. You had some clients on your own, but didn't exactly know what you wanted to do with them. And you were debating graduate school. So let's take one of those at a time. What were you doing to sustain yourself financially during this time? And how did you handle the financial fear of having to live off your savings for the most part for a period of time while you're in between jobs?

Yeah, I had lived off of. So like I said, back in Chicago, I bought a very expensive condo and then I rented it out. Then I moved to Thailand. So there was a period of time where actually those savings were getting depleted rather quickly. And then when I came back and moved my mom to the west coast.

I moved in with her. And I mean, there is nothing more humbling than being 28, 29 years old, living with your mother in a two bedroom apartment. So I quickly learned very, very quickly that like, shit, I gotta still keep making money and I gotta figure this out as we, as we move forward. So the fear of a dwindling bank account is something that.

Just sucks because you, it's almost like you hit certain thresholds. Like in your mind you're like, okay, I got this much left in the bank. I'm not going under here because I'm just not going to do it. But then you kind of do go under it. You're like, oh, want to be going that low?

I don't want that low.

Until essentially you get to such a low amount that it restructures your understanding that, oh, I can live on that amount. Oh, I can live on that. I mean, I'm not, I'm not telling you, go into the red and take a bunch of loans. I think that's actually the opposite of what you should do. Don't go into the red. Spend within your means, but it really, really teaches you how to be, to be lean. So money problems. You're just gonna learn as you don't have the money and you keep trying to move forward. You just, you just, you just get used to it. Now. Is it ever great to like not have money? No, I Mean, no modern.

And I'm a capitalist, so that goes against my grain. But you do get. And I think that the important lesson I learned from going almost down to zero after having a lot of money and going from, you know.

$160,000 salary with bonuses down to making almost nothing for a year, really, really humbled me.

In knowing the influence that money has on your mindset. So then I knew when I did make all my money back again, I wouldn't be as careless and as dumb as I was before. So that's a money issue thing.

And how did that. How did the being frugal, like, how did it inform what clients you took on, when, how. You know, I'm sure that was its own learning process through this time as well.

Yeah, I think what sometimes that we forget when we go through these pivots is that we have to also keep doing what works and what worked was. And what I had been known in the industry was.

Someone who was really good at branding experiences in like a physical context. So whether that was for new community living or.

Student housing, etc. Within that realm, I was known for that. So I had people coming back to me for it, along with some other side branding project. And it was great. It was great. But part of it was like, I don't want to be doing that. I want to be doing more strategy, more leading teams, this and this and this. But I needed to. I needed to make money. So I think one of the things I learned was take what is coming to you, find the good in it, and especially if it's giving you money. And at the same time, keep searching, keep searching when you have time on the side. And I think if you keep doing those two things parallel to each other, at some point they do merge into something that is probably more in line with what you really do want to be doing.

Great. Yeah. It's so fascinating. So you had the health and fitness brand outreach, your own freelance kind of clients are coming in, and then there's the third parallel line that you explored simultaneously of graduate school. And I know that so many people who are at that point that you hit and unsure about how to move forward, not gaining traction. They do consider, should I go back to school? But it's a big choice. It takes time, money, energy, possibly moving to a new city. So what were the considerations for you? What were the pros and cons? And how did you eventually move forward.

With exploring the grad school track? Yeah, I mean.

Yeah, that's one of those.

That was really more intuitive Gut thing, more than analytical and being from a design thinking kind of process and approach. That was probably what was pretty scary for me because also had $5,000 in the bank. So when I was looking at grad school, it was more in search of trying to understand approaches and how design and business can really come together. And there's more on the market now. But at the time, the inventory of these graduate programs, there weren't very many of them. There were a couple. And one of them that I stumbled across was that was at Parsons. Now you're right. I had been kind of looking at grad programs for probably since I was 26 or 27. I knew that being a trained graphic designer with a concentration in branding was awesome. But I wanted to be leading projects and be building businesses and being in. Be more of the innovation officer rather than doing all the actual design work. Also, I just knew that there were people better than me. I knew I was good enough. I could go back if I wanted to, but I wanted to explore other areas. So essentially when I came back from Thailand, we're in California and we're doing all this stuff.

That was. It kind of came down to that. How am I going to grow.

Into something that I want to, that I want to be if I'm not.

If I don't, if I don't feel super completely confident in being able to apply that and actually adding value to companies? Right. I can keep testing the waters. But for me, I really wanted to know more. The graduate program that I got into, two graduate programs. The one I chose was in New York here. And that came from coming to New York on a visit. Hurricane Sandy was about to happen. I walked by Parsons. It was an open house. They were open 45 minutes before they're closing everything down. I go in there and I talk to the director and we only talk for 15 minutes. But I'm obsessed with Steve Jobs. I read everything about him. The inner workings of Apple, his mindset. I feel like I have similar interests and passions, the way that he thought about things. And so right then and there, I was speaking to the director and we talked about Steve Jobs and what makes Apple Apple and the processes and stuff like that. Now that to me was so awesome and comforting. And I just felt like, oh, I'm speaking to someone who speaks my language. I need more of this. And.

That'S when I went back and I applied. I got in, I got a nice little scholarship and I.

Made the leap.

It's so amazing. Oh, go ahead.

No, it's just Interesting. By saying the story again, I'm like, wow, I can't believe all that.

I have a huge smile on my face. Because you are. It's such a great example of building the bridge that you wanted. You had this vision. You knew that you didn't want to spend your life as a graphic designer. You were good at it, but not the best. But that you had this urge to do more innovation and strategy and work and be at C level and an entrepreneur. And it's just so cool to see how you clicked with Parsons and their ethos and have made the choice, the leap, like you said, to go and build this bridge to where now you are this person. And I know because I'm your friend, but your business is going gangbusters. You have a whole team now. You've completely rebranded. And one of the funny things for people listening, you know, many of you may have tried Lucent, which is our meditation app. The funny thing about Adam is right from his first semester at Parsons, he decided, I'm making all my homework apply to my business and the real world. So Lucent started as a Parsons grad school project and I got roped into it, so I've been an honorary Parsons student in some ways. Adam, can you talk to us about that philosophy? How are you making grad school work for you, given that it is a significant investment?

Mm.

You know, it's. I spoke with a lot of several very important people that I. That I respected before I made the choice for grad school, and a lot of people kind of say the same thing. Like, you know, it's going to be. You're going to learn some amazing stuff, but it's going to be the cohort, it's going to be the people you meet, it's going to be the ideas that are created from there. And as I said, like, being a capitalist, it was hard to swallow. Moving all the way from, you know, outside of San Francisco to New York with barely any money in the bank and taking on, you know, grad school as a corporation, taking on that expense of two years of.

Tuition. So I just told myself that I. If I'm going to do this, I'm going to. I'm going to do it so I can actually apply things in the real world as soon as possible. Because I think grad school is fantastic. A lot of times, a lot of theory, a lot of academy, you know, about academics, learning, and you do get to prototype and learn things, but it's within a school context, so it was almost like, too safe to Me. So I was willing to fail and fuck up and look like an idiot in the real world because I felt from, I just felt for me, I need to visually feel the failure so I can learn from it. And I just didn't want school to be a safe zone. I was like, if I'm gonna go and spend this money and do all this stuff, let's apply whatever I can and see what we can create in the real world the same time. Because I wanted to lead teams. I wanted to see how I could start leading people and seeing what their strengths were, how that complemented my weaknesses and how I could start building little groups of people and getting see if I could actually inspire them and to move forward on an idea. And there was a ton of failures. I mean Lucent was fantastic. I mean, I mean that Lucent, for all you listeners just know, is as much success. I mean Jenny did so much to get that where it is and we have another great partner on it as well. But I mean my thing was that I had no idea what was going to happen after grad school. I had no idea. And I came to a piece that I was like, fuck it. I don't know still what I'm doing. I still don't know this whole like ridiculous idea about passion and purpose. But I know that if I go there and I'm in a program that at least resonates with, resonates with me and the classes look cool and the people I'm meeting are of like minded. Something is going to happen from here. The next step was don't talk about it, don't think about it, don't read books about it. Apply it, apply it immediately and be okay to look like a complete. It's not even look like a complete idiot. You're just literally like you're learning how to walk, you know, and, and you got to find your stride. And that doesn't come by doing, by reading and doing what other people are trying to say to you. If you're reading it, go out and try it. See what works.

God, that's amazing.

I love failure of just like get out there, do it, learn by doing. I mean it's really cool. It's just fun to watch and be a part of. And it's inspiring because it's not always easy to do that. People do have so much fear of failure. Even though I agree with you, I don't really think failure is a thing because it always teaches us something.

I mean the thing is like, and this is from and this is Why? I think we both really understand meditation as a tool because sometimes you are going to fail and it is going to emotionally hurt and you have to be.

Okay or at least have the discerning thoughts that like, this is an emotion and it will pass. And once it passes, look back and see what you can learn from it. Right? Don't try to be in the moment analyzing your emotion because that just will spin you somewhere else. Literally. Step back from the frustration, take a day, talk to some friends or whatever, get through it, whatever long it takes, come back and be like, okay, what did I actually learn? And then what can I now reapply the next time? And I mean, that's innovation, right? So you got to innovate your own mindset, your own processes. If you're going to help anyone else do.

If you're going to. If you want to be in that mode, you want to keep continuing to evolve and as the world is evolving so quickly, you want to keep up with it. I almost feel like this is mandatory to do. Everyone should be doing it and be getting okay with this type of mindset because if not, you're going to be left behind.

Right? It's so true. And I love that you brought up meditation. It's. And just finding that palm within the storm and calm within the uncertainty and the ups and downs. Because this change process can be very overwhelming. What advice would you give to someone who is maybe where you were two years ago? They're just approaching a pivot and kind of feels like a dark zone ahead and they cannot see what the future is going to look like.

One of the things I've learned, and I wholeheartedly believe this now, is care deeply but have no expectations.

That's hard to take in at first. But if you really give as much as you have in that moment or that time frame to go towards a goal or something, inkling anything that you feel might progress you further, go for it. But really if it doesn't turn out the way you want it to, let the expectation go right away. And I think that if you start doing that practice sooner, you start coming into that mindset of like, I'm gonna give this 110%, but I have. But I'm not gonna expect everything that I usually expect from it now. I mean, I'm not gonna pretend here like I'm a Buddhist saint or anything like that. I'm far from it. I cuss like a sailor. I am hot tempered and you know, I can miss meditation times weeks at a time. So I'm not sitting there saying that I'm on a pedestal, on a lotus leap or anything. But what I have learned from just my learnings and this is just life learnings, this is from relationship learnings, this is just from anything. Client relations. I mean all the stuff all together is when you start setting yourself with such expectations, in my opinion, you start screwing yourself because you start losing sight of what needs to be done to the max extent in that moment. So that would be my one piece of advice. Care deeply, do your best to let go of expectations.

I love that advice. That is amazing advice. Thank you for sharing. And now for you, what are you most excited about as you look forward?

A lot of things.

I'm excited to finish grad school which is coming up in a few months here. I'm really excited to see what this group of phenomenal multifaceted intelligent design thinking creatives in the design lab that we brought together. I'm really excited to see where we go next. As you has just explained, we just went through, we are still going through a pivot where we were just startup, you know, a year, a little over a year ago. And through all our learnings the past year, we're now organizing our processes and understanding our internal values and really developing the culture at ABC to make sure that we stay true to who we are and how we want to build the company whether a client stays or goes. So I think I'm really excited right now just cultivating the ABC.

Design Lab and seeing where that goes next. We have all ideas from incubating our ideas to new clients to now starting to do different outreach and presentations and just kind of spreading the good word of of abc.

Awesome. It's been so incredible to watch you from when we first met having no clients to taking odds and ends stuff that just randomly came in to you forming ABC Design Lab to then hiring a whole team of people doing all kinds of work from real estate companies to branding to industrial design to brand strategy to Lucent the Meditation app. I mean it is so incredible to see the momentum that you've been able to generate, not just as a freelancer, as a business owner with a whole team. And how you've applied grad school to your business and vice versa, has been really cool to watch. So thank you for being an inspiration and a great friend in my life.

No, thank you. I mean, this goes right back at you again for all you listeners. Jenny's probably the most inspiring person I know, so kudos to you as well.

Thank you Adam. Thank you so much where can people find more about you if they want to keep in touch or learn about your work?

Awesome. Yeah, the website to the Design Lab is ABCDesignLab co. So that's ABCDesignLab co. And we actually have a fresh new website towards the end of April showing our whole offering. And if you want to talk to me directly, it's just adambcdesignlab Co.

Awesome. Adam. Thank you so much. And big thanks to everyone for listening.

Thanks so much for listening to this episode of the Pivot Podcast. To learn more and get in touch, visit jennyblake Me where I blog about systems at the intersection of mind, body and business. Or find me on Twitter @jennyblake. And remember, build first. Then your courage will follow. As in it always Facebook.