From Refugee to PhD | Dr. Pradeepkumar Sacitharan | 562

And welcome, welcome, welcome.

This is Peter Winick. I'm the founder and CEO at Thought Leadership Leverage, and you're joining us on the podcast today, which is Leveraging Thought Leadership. Today, my guest is Dr. Pradeep Kumar Sasyadaran. If I got that right, my day's gonna go well. Did I get it?

Your day's gonna go very well.

Oh, awesome. Okay. That was, that was the part I was most nervous about. Let me give you a little bit of a bio here. He's a global e-commerce expert. He's the CEO of Donsfield. He's got a PhD from the University of Oxford in molecular and cellular medicine, Fulbright scholar at Harvard, and he's gained international business networks and was the VP of development for a leading global biotech company. We can go on and on and on, but let's just dive in and hear his story. So you and I had an interesting chat a couple of weeks ago and you gave me a brief version of your really interesting story. Why don't we start there? Because I'm always fascinated by how someone gets to where they are as a thought leader, and yours was clearly a really interesting story. So give us the condensed version of your world.

Yeah, I get these— well, first of all, thank you very much for this wonderful opportunity. So I get these podcast requests and we send them out as well because my way of giving back. Yeah, it's been an interesting story to break it down. I know we only have 20 minutes, Essentially, I was a war refugee smuggled on a plane by my mother, brave mother, into London. Grew up in social housing because that's the only kind of housing we got. Surrounded by gangs, learned a lot on the streets. Fortunately to me, I didn't get into any legal troubles. But I got into a lot of fights, took up semi-pro weightlifting, was not quite gifted enough to go to Olympics, but weightlifting kept me disciplined. Dropped out of high school at 16. And I just done sales. So life from 16 to 21 was sales and weightlifting. Got into a serious gang fight at 21. Found myself in a 4-hour coma. And I said, hey, Pradeep, I woke up alone in the hospital, but I'm like, something's got to give. So I just made phone calls. Sales, right? Phone calls, 3 phone calls. Small community college, they're like, come on in, kid. Then I was like, oh, crap, I can really do science because I knew muscle biology, right? I fell in love with it. And I said, obsessive. I always talk about obsessions. Then another 13 phone calls into Imperial College, another 47 phone calls and application going to Oxford. Oxford, I loved it. Won national prizes, discovered drugs. And then I got to Harvard and I was like, hey, This is great. Then I knocked on my professor's door. I said, hey, can I have 300 million? Because I think I had 3 ideas for, um, this drugs. They're like, right, it doesn't work like that, kid. So listen, for that early journey about sales, uh, I always say life is 3 things, a sales game, a numbers game, and a risk game. So that early life and that journey coming from a dropout to Oxford and Harvard, it really catalyzed my thinking on the world and what's possible. Right? So then I thought, okay, even Nobel Prize winners are constrained by the data constructs of their life. So I said, hey, look at these professors, they want me to work for 30 years. I said, no chance. So I'm broke again. I traveled the world, went to Paris, Sorbonne, went to Jerusalem, learned from the best people, came back to the West. And I said, hey, can I have 300 million? They're like, no kid, it doesn't work like that. You need 10 more years. So I made sales game, right? Numbers game, still that got that street mentality. Now I've got the Oxford and Harvard mentality as well. So I made 272 phone calls. One guy picked up in China, he's like, come on over. So I landed in China, 18 months after my PhD, became associate professor, got my lab, discovered the 3 drugs my professors in the West said will take 30 years in 18 months. And then someone recruited me for VP for business development in biotech. I was 30, I was VP, I was associate professor. So in 9 years from dropout, I achieved all this. I'm like, whoa, the sky's the limit if you really tap into real thinking and thought leadership. So at that time, I had a global community, a global leadership position. And then the pandemic hit and I came back to the West and I said, can I have the same job? They're like, nope, you're too young and overqualified now. I'm like, crap. So I started hustling for 8 months, didn't get a job at the same level. So I started my e-commerce, became very successful on Amazon and e-commerce, use that money now to leverage into higher-level commodities. So now, a kid from Northwest London, don't tell me how I'm trading in commodities, metals, in fuels, oil, still doing e-commerce, and really building a business conglomerate. For me, that's why I want the legacy and then leverage that. So it's really a crazy life.

Yeah, it's been a— so I love the fact that the grit, the determination, you know, it's one thing to go all out and cold call when you have nothing from an educational perspective, et cetera. It's another thing to continue to do it once you've got the PhD and the Harvard degree. I think a lot of folks that come from that sort of the traditional path there don't have that grit and that cold calling. That's a general statement, and I know that's not universally true. Give me a sense of your, the underlying thought leadership, because there's lots of different things that you've gone after that you've succeeded in from e-commerce to chemistry and the medical and all that. But, but gimme a sense of what is the underlying thought leadership? What's the underlying message that has driven you?

How useful can I be to my species and how can I use this journey to really turn on the key for the next generation? So legacy is not who or what you leave behind, but the bar you set behind so they can raise the bar. That's true legacy. Now I've got students, I've got employees, I eventually will have kids as well. So what, what, what is it? How are you going to really inspire the next generation, leave the legacies? And also, I wanted to tell you something that there's two thoughts here that opposing. There's a street hustler, and then it says Oxford, Harvard, right? And I always talk about egos and identities. The ego is good. And I tell people, use your ego. The ego is like your skin, you can't get rid of it. So you should know yourself very well and know what you are. But the identity is like the clothes you put on. And that has to be ever-changing.

So stay there for a second, because I think that, you know, there's a whole bunch of expressions, I'm sure it's similar for you, you know, you can take the kid out of Brooklyn, but you can't take the Brooklyn out of the kid, that kind of thing, right? So I think that, that hustle, whether it's developed or it comes out of literal necessity, out of survival, right? Gives someone a, an advantage that, that same person with the pedigree, with the identity, with the PhD and all that wouldn't have. And I think it would be easier for you at this stage of your life to say, I don't need to hustle anymore. I've got a brilliant education. I've gone to some of the best institutions in the world. I'm incredibly successful. But how is it that you haven't lost it? How is it that it's still such a part of who you are and what you do?

It's who I am. I'm driven for greatness. And Peter, I tell this to people, the studies show that if you're born into successful family, you are more likely to be successful, right? You can't argue against that. So this notion of, you know, they say if you suffer, the Hollywood notion that you will become better. It doesn't work like that. I think it's individualistic. It's who you are and you to realize your talent. I'll tell you why.

When you, when you, when you say that when you're born into a successful situation, family, zip code, economic status, whatever, you're more likely to be successful. And yes, the data bears that out. But when it comes to resiliency, overcoming obstacles, coming back from horrific personal and professional issues. I haven't seen any data that shows that. Have you?

No, I haven't. But I think it's highly individualized. And you really need to work out who you are, and how you can utilize your talents and what the purpose is of you doing it. If you don't, you're just another number. And I'll tell you why, a counter argument, and they say, oh, you're not standing up for your life story. I'm like, no, I'm standing up for the truth. Because 99% of this world lives on what, less than $10 or whatever the figure is, right? So how come 99% of the world are not driven for greatness? The end number doesn't match up. And then they say, no, Pradeep, no, Pradeep, you're, you're in the US or UK opportunity. That's okay. Let's break it down. The US and UK, 97% or 99% of the population are not in the top 1% earning $500,000 more. How come there's no hustle mentality in all of those individuals? So it's truly down to the data constructs you have, the individual nature and how you utilize that talent and what you find out and how you critically reflect on your purpose. So there's something driven in me. I'm not saying I'm special, but it's the ability to just say, hey, now is this time. Now is this time. I wanna keep going.

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So it comes down to, I had this, I had a brilliant executive talk to a couple of board members. I think I always used to say in China and everywhere, you can't expect passion, expect to pay. Right? Because you can't get people to actually do certain things. So you need emotional drive. And we, we in the West talk a lot about logic, but you really need emotional drive. Emotional drive, if the purpose is right, gets you up and going. So the emotional fuel is very important and you need to find that.

How is that different than intrinsic motivation, what you're calling emotional drive? Because there's a whole—

It's the same thing. It has to be intrinsic. Okay, and we separate the two, but I think it's absolutely physiologically important and psychologically important as well to get that emotional drive. It's absolutely imperative. And by the way, I think the Western kind of thought leadership heavily depends on the kind of intellect, and also soft skills and so forth. But there's an intrinsic holistic, kind of spiritual way that we forgot, I think, and that we need to incorporate.

Well, I mean, you, you, you made a comment a few moments ago about, you know, part of your thought leadership or your focus is around making the species better. That's a big, big, you know, behag, as, as they would say, right? Like, that's a, that's a big goal. Probably one that would never be accomplished to the nth degree, right? You know, because it's a relative piece.

How do you fully agree?

How, how do you measure your progress against that? Because if you have a goal that says, I want to do, you know, whatever. I'm running a business and I wanted to do 3% better Q2 than it did Q1. That's easy. Look at the numbers. You did it, you didn't, you missed it, you didn't do some analysis. How do you know you're making the species better?

Bold historic goals. So when I went to Oxford, I didn't want to get to Oxford, Harvard. I wanted 3 Nobel Prizes. They're like, what's wrong with you? They're like, well, I said, Marie Curie has 2. When I try to go to the Olympics, I didn't want 5 gold. I wanted 6 gold medals. Never got near the Olympics.

The Olympics are clearly a competitive arena.

Story is Nobel Prize winning, right? I never got there, but I, you know, it's the old saying, if you aim for the moon, you land in the stars. You will never surpass your wildest expectations and your goals. So it has to be bold and historic. And if you set them high, you're not deluded. You're actually going to make sure you want to achieve more than you want to achieve. And coming back to the actual piece, no matter what you do, if you hit Q2, Q3, whatever, even in a local level, national level, international, you're serving people, you're serving your customer. So if you're not doing that, is a holistic approach, is actually making the species better or serving in some way.

Got it. You spent a good amount of time earlier in our conversation talking about sales, sales, and sales. And it's so interesting to me in that, in my work with authors and thought leaders and speakers and academics, I would say north of 90% of them, the area they struggle the most with is the business side of the house. They're really good at the research, at developing the thought leadership, at writing, at speaking, and all those things that scare a lot of people. But when it comes to sales, marketing, distribution, business development, you know, cold calling, whatever it is, it's not how they're wired. And, and that's number one. And even when they go to try it, it, it makes them feel uncomfortable. It makes them feel like I'm I'm too smart to have to be doing this. You don't get a PhD in sales from Oxford. So embrace that a little bit because I think that might shake some folks out of the trance that if you don't sell, you don't eat.

No, you don't. And everything's a sales game, right? Everything you do is a sales game. Even if you're going to sell to, you're going to get the good-looking woman or a man or dating or hooking up in a bar, or you're, I don't know, proposing an interview or you're selling Selling, say, and even, even I had a conversation, even meeting someone in terms of passing a message on everything that you see around has been sold to you, or idea has been sold as a concept to you. So everything sells fundamentally. And what you can't do, I think we've, we've looked upon salespeople badly. There's a connotation, but really, if we have a philosophical nature, I think it makes you better. And this is why it makes you better, because if you can sell to the world, you can relate to the world. That means you're actually automatically a better person. If you can sell to the world, you relate to the world.

I agree with that. And then if you look at what's going on in the domain of sales, so much emphasis on AI, on sales automation, on, you know, because there's so many tools that we can use to find the right prospect.

Yeah, yeah.

Create the right copy, you know, automate, automate, automate, which is great as a tool. But at the end of the day, not in all things, but in many, many things, the things that are harder are things like trust, like empathy, like listening skills, like social skill, et cetera, which I don't care what ChatGPT you're using, it's not gonna tell you, you know, can you, can you show me how to feign empathy?

No, you can't. Uh, I, I think the automation, Again, you can only do what you can do and it will be important. But really the face value upfront is very important. People, I still fly to meetings to get to know people. People still fly into London to meet me because you need that connection. I don't see how it's gonna differ. I really don't see how it's gonna differ.

Now, now there's a relative, you know, nature to that assumption, right? If I'm selling some, nominal service or whatever, it's illogical for me to fly halfway around the world to sell something that's worth $1,000 or something like that.

No, absolutely. It's ROI, right? And you gauge that and you do that. But I don't think you can beat it. And what it allows in person is you can't divert what I call the pattern recognition of our species, evolution, God, whatever. Evolved in a way or made in a way to recognize patterns and recognize safety and not safety, common traits and so forth. That kind of EQ, or I call it SQ, spiritual quota, is only available in person. And you can't kind of let the intellect or IQ deal with that.

So I'm giving an opportunity now to talk to maybe you 15, 20 years ago, there are folks out there now that are similar to you, maybe they came from, you know, the wrong side of the tracks, unfortunate situations. I, I doubt they're war refugees. There's not as many as them, but unfortunate circumstances, right? But they're smart, they're gritty, they're persistent. What is it that you would ask of them or advise them as it relates to thought leadership? Because it might be the furthest thing from their mind when you're in that survival mode to, to be thinking about this sort of abstract intellectual thought leadership, right? Like what, how would you, how would you counsel them?

So work out what comes easiest to you. Look around, do compare yourself. What becomes easiest to you? What does emotionally drive you in terms of subject? Then go out there and those two, get a sales job in those two overlapping areas. And just be the best salesperson there is. If it's a free job, if it's not, that's fine. If it's education, go for the education. And when you're in that position, have lofty, crazy goals and go after those and break them down and just, you know, do it, just do it. And then pivot if you have to, if it's not working.

Got it. And what that will teach you is what, how to communicate better, how to relate better. What's the other side of that? So let's say I did that for a year and I knocked all my goals out. What is it that I've benefited other than learning a skill and generating revenue during that time?

It gives you immense self-esteem and confidence. You look yourself in the mirror and say, hey, I don't know if I can swear in this podcast.

Go for it. What the hell?

Yeah, I say I'm fucking great. Like, it gives you immense esteem and confidence. And that's the most important thing. Because you tick off those small goals, medium goals, long-term goals. I'm like, oh my God, If I can do all this, what— imagine what else I can do. And also, it allows you to have a very thick skin. And now, Peter, people laugh at me. They're like, why are you phoning, cold calling banks, trying to get international banking transactions? And I'm like, I'm still hustling. I'm doing it because I'm so thick-skinned that you can laugh at me, you can call me deluded, but I've achieved so much. And you relate back to your achievements. You're like, oh, I can nail this. You can, you can do it.

So this has been great. I appreciate your time. Amazing story, amazing accomplishments. Thank you for spending some time with us today, Pradeep. I appreciate it.

Anytime. Thank you so much.

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