Student, Startups and Success Secrets with Nikin Tharan on Indian Community #23

Transcript

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 0:00

Welcome back to the Indian community podcast. I'm your host Amit Gupta with my cohost Rahul Mehra. And today we're joined by Nikin Tharan. Nikin is an EB1A Einstein green card recipient who's been making waves since his childhood. At the age of 9, Nikin was already innovating in a lab affiliated with India's border security force, earning recognition from the president of India for his projects. After a full scholarship took him to Northeastern University at 16 Nikin helped commercialize groundbreaking radiation detectors and co founded MedSix, a startup focused on post operative recovery. now he's pioneering a VC backed mental health startup and also helping others navigate the complex world of visa applications, drawing from his own experiences documented in the Amazon bestseller. unshackled. Join us as we delve into Nikin's inspiring journey and an essential discussion for students and recent graduates.

Track 1: 1:09

We

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 1:09

are exploring strategies to enhance employability for immigrant students in the USA. Essentially, how can students become opportunity or job magnets? Tune in as we uncover valuable insights and actionable tips on becoming more hireable in today's competitive job market. So dear students and young graduates, don't miss this one. Welcome to the Indian Community Podcast, Nikin.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 1:44

Thank

Track 1: 1:44

Welcome.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 1:44

much for having me,

Track 1: 1:46

Yeah,

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 1:49

join both of you here today and do this for the community.

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 1:54

Thank you so much

Track 1: 1:55

Nikin. My first question is, you know, I actually love the term Einstein green card and I've heard it for the first time when I heard about you. So what does it exactly mean? That's just okay.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 2:16

a Nobel Prize winner, athlete winning an Academy Award or have some other high distinction like that in order to get the green card. So it's the first category of green card. it's the EB1A green card. And if you have those qualifications, I mean, that's all you have to show is you're kind of received or won a lifetime award right your field. if you don't, certainly in my case, I don't have that kind of accomplishment yet, you're able to still make a case the U. S. government through your CIS. And there are eight criteria. They want you to show distinction across those eight criteria, right? So they want you to have five or six criteria fulfilled and it's qualitative as well as quantitative evidence. I mean, some of the criterias are have you won, if not a significant award, have you won regionally or nationally recognized awards in your field, right? And have you gotten traction for your work? So if you're a researcher, it means. Do you have a higher than average citation count for your publications? If you're an entrepreneur, it means have you commercialized some interesting invention? Has it been licensed been used by the general And also, have you been a judge of the work of your peers in the field? So have you been a judge at hackathons or startup pitch competitions? And it really depends on what your field is. Um, I mean, my experience is. That of applying as an entrepreneur, as a startup founder, but someone who's a product manager, someone who's a software engineer, an architect, they would all have very different or they would go about building evidence in the criteria in different ways. But I think to answer your question, it's very rigorous. EB one A. However, it has an approval rate of 75%, which means that if you have the profile for it, you qualify. Only a few hundred are awarded each year for individuals from any particular country. A lot of the people who apply for receive it. So that's an important consideration, and I truly believe that anyone puts their work into building their profile get the EB1A card. So it's. um, has a tall bar. It's pretty rigorous, but you don't need Einstein love. Like not by a long shot.

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 5:06

That is very humble of you, Nikin. I'm sure there's so much of achievements at the back, which are also contributing to all of this. But, um, having said that, we, um, a lot of us live in that imposter syndrome thinking that we don't have enough credentials or enough material to support that application. And I think um, You know, people should follow you on LinkedIn and see all the posts that you share, because I think you make it really simple for people to understand all the things that they can talk about all their achievements and how they should present themselves so that their case is successful. is strong and they're able to actually communicate the value that they bring to the table, right? Um, so that, that's the main thing. It's all about communication and because they, everybody has achievements, you know, if they've come up to this level they've achieved so much already, but it's just that they feel that they don't have enough because of the term Einstein, because that kind of raises the bar, right?

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 6:09

Definitely. Yeah. And I think it be called sounds in her ProCon shackle. And whenever she speaks about calls, it is, it's a talent visa and there are three talent visas. So you have the EB one A, you have the EB two NIW, both of them are green cards. And then you have a work visa, which is the O one A. And all three, about storytelling. It's about identifying your, the impact of your work, kind of categorizing it, telling, communicating USCIS and also doing some extra bit of profile building, it really differs what your background is, which industry you come in. All three of these are talent visas. And really anyone can build their talent visa. Case right to qualify each of these

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 7:07

Yes, Sondarya did mention that. We've had Sondarya on our show as well and she shared some interesting insights into this into this process. So, yeah, kudos to you and Sondarya both. Great. Um, Nikin, coming to the topic of our podcast, right, which is focusing on students and I'll tell you why We came up with this subject, right? And we spoke about this a little bit offline as well. Every other day I see students reaching out fresh graduates who've spent a lot of effort and money on acquiring these master's and, you know, bachelor's certificates here in the universities in US. they're reaching out and saying, I'm looking for a job or I'm looking for an OPT and I need to stop this clock, which is otherwise I I'm going to have to go back home. and, um, every time I look at them I feel sorry because, um, this shouldn't be the case. They shouldn't be in this position. And, um, And you've been a student yourself. You've studied here in the U. S. Um, what, according to you, are those unique challenges that these students are facing, especially when they're seeking employment? And how would you recommend that they start preparing to overcome these? Got

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 8:27

that's a great question and something that I've thought about a lot in how do you? become Job magnet right How do you make your resume like scream? Which is hire me I'm going to be an asset to your company And this brings me back to my student days, right? And I was grateful to have a set of mentors at that time and some of whom were recruiters. I mean, they did recruiting for a living and they were able to share some insights with me. And the other part was also, I kind of came to the US for exposure, so I put myself out there and went out and pursued opportunities other than just classwork. And something that's available to most students on campus is research opportunities, So you can volunteer as a researcher in one of several labs on campus. Because you, I mean, ideally, you, it's a paid opportunity. get to work as a research assistant, but volunteering is a way to get started. And you shouldn't do research for research sake. So what I would is be very clear in communicating with the professor that you want to have an end goal. And an end goal for any researcher is to have their work published. if not published, to be able to together a conference presentation and speak at a conference. If not speaking at a conference, giving a talk at the university symposium or any event that the lab has. So essentially you want to work towards

Track 1: 10:17

Um,

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 10:21

putting the effort in an end goal in mind comes to research. So that's one way. Another way is by doing projects and what do I mean by projects? So when I was at, um, Northeastern, we, and I did my bachelor's there, but we had, um, Hackathon Fever and fever is the most accurate term to describe it because we had bus and there were, I think, close to 10 of us. And every weekend during the semester, we would go from one campus to another. competing in hackathons. And what is a hackathon? A hackathon is basically a 24 to 36 hour event. So it typically starts on Friday evening or Saturday morning and you have a demo on Sunday afternoon. one of the most common misconceptions is hackathons are tech events. That's actually not the case. I mean, many hackathons today are interdisciplinary, so it could be from any field you'll have contributions to make. And in terms of the hackathon itself, the goal of it is to hack at something. And here to hack at something means to come up with a solution to a problem. And the solution could be a piece of technology. So it could be a web app, a mobile app, Chrome extension, a smartwatch, or it could even be a policy recommendation. It could be like a data set that you've cleaned put together, right? It could be in healthcare, for example, that it could be some kind of insurance change in terms of how PBMs and insurances, I'm just thinking out loud, giving a few different examples here. Okay. But it doesn't just have to be a tech product that you're building or solution you're coming up with in those 36 hours. And the best part about a hackathon is you get to meet new people. So I never went in with a formed team. I always met people on the spot, a team and developed a solution in those hours. the other is there are almost always companies there. So the companies may be sponsoring the event. And other times, they're there to recruit. So they're there to find who is the brightest, the sharpest set of students. And they're there to the interview process, so to speak. And in our case, I think during my undergrad years, I did close to 30 hackathons, right? So this meant almost every weekend we're out into the field. at a different university at one of these competitions. And it was crazy because we still had assignments to do. We still had homework to do. And all of that got pushed into the week, right? Because you're here Friday evening, all day Saturday evening. You didn't even sleep Friday night or Saturday night, right? I mean, you had sleeping bags. It used to be like a giant gymnasium or like some convention center where we were at, but it was a ton of fun. So you learn new things, you met new people and you got yourself in front of. companies, right? And we did a whole range of projects. And now looking back, I mean, to all the students listening to this, you don't have to go on. You don't need to be infected with hackathon fever and to do 30 hackathons. in terms of the outcome, so what came out of it is we had tangible projects share with potential Right. So employers could touch, feel, interact with we have built. And more importantly, we had stories to share, So we could talk about came up with the problem. I mean, how we identify the problem, how we came up with the solution, what are the challenges we faced. And it was out into the world. And out of those over 30 hackathons, um, that I've done to date, over 20 that I did during period. I had to remember an exact count. I did get a few very tangible, you could call them internship opportunities, right? Or work opportunities. most of them were just sleepless, sweaty nights and days spent away from comfort of my dog. But from one of them, I actually got, um, an opportunity to do a project at Harvard Law So with Professor Lawrence Lessig, it's called the Academic Independence Project. I had no connection to law, like but it just came out hackathon. Then from another, um, hackathon, we helped create a map of food deserts in Boston. So basically there are locations, even within a city, which are like far away from like a grocery store a convenience store, and they are known as food deserts. we did this for a food bank and this data was already there, but it needed to be cleaned up and put on a map. So very simple work. It's not a tech product that we built, it was just a map that we created, but we won a prize that, and that had a real world impact. And most notably, um, a startup that founded, a medical device startup I founded, MedSix, that came out of a hackathon well. Right. met my co-founder, who was a surgeon at a hackathon at MIT. We ended up winning the first place prize. We also grant, got a grant from MIT to continue our work and that set things off in motion for us. So you never know what opportunities are lies till you put yourself out there. Hackathons are a of yourself now coming back to employability. So go to hackathons or on your own initiative, you are putting together a set of projects. Now, what are the projects talking about and how should they be? So first things first, let me share my screen and let me talk about where do we find these hackathons.

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 16:55

So while you're doing that I do have a comment here especially for students who go pub hopping on weekends. You want to be hireable and you want to be a job magnet. Also start consider hackathon hopping what Nick is suggesting over here. So pub hopping can be done later, but I think the need of the yard is hackathon hopping. And the one thing that I have seen about hackathons, and I wanna mention over here, which initially I was also of the opinion that hackathons are just for techies. But, um, um, as an experienced designer myself, when I attended a few. I soon realized that, hey, there's so much of input that I can give him as a designer, as a marketeer, as a copywriter, as somebody who is coming completely thinking, you know, differently is also essential and is as a critical input for every hackathon. So in fact, for every hackathon team, go look for that creative soul who has no technical knowledge, no coding exposure bring them also into your teams because they'll add that flavor of creativity which is so much important.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 18:03

definitely. And in terms of the repository for hackathons, where you find them, I mean, devpost. com is a site to be. And So you can just search for

Track 1: 18:14

you

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 18:14

can just search for hackathons And you will come up with a giant list and you can find ones which align with your schedule and sign up to participate. I personally prefer in person events online events because we're more collaborative. No matter where you are, it could be in SF, in New England, I mean, in India, and you have hackathons, I mean, in Virginia, you have hackathons happening all over the place, right? And what do you want to do? is through attending these hackathons is you create a portfolio. There's a good friend of mine, Jake. We went to hackathons together and this is what a sample portfolio looks like. In terms of, um, Jake works at Apple right now. Right. And in terms of the projects that he built, I mean, these are great projects. One of it is piano lights. basically it's a hardware and software and the hardware. So let's say you're a beginner and you want to learn to. Play the piano. It shows you, it lights up the keys. So it shows you how to play like a beat of wind symphony, or in my case, like Baba Blacksheep or any other for that matter. And another software only project was Horus that he did, which is you can just upload an image and it shows you what that object is in different languages. So it uses API's. do that. And this is in fall of 2015, where this was really cool. I mean, this is before Google Lens. And then another project was Pong. I mean, I could play a short video here, but to quickly show you what was built, it was basically using an Arduino, two Arduinos. They were just competing against each other to play Pong. So it was a hardware software combination. And all of these are live projects. Right, so you have videos next to it. So any employer can, you have a description, so any employer can read about how you approached building the project, what the end result was. And this is true for all of the other projects. were built well. And I'll stop sharing my screen.

Track 1: 20:44

This is really informative really informative actually, you know, this is something actionable for our viewers to work on later on when they see it. So, um, again you have been, you know, talking about things like, you know, what talent you need, what are the extracurricular things you need to do to be employable? No, let's get to the core things like you know, when students are actually studying, so they are into skill development. So what skills do you think you know, students need to develop to be competitive in today's job market?

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 21:23

That's a very good question. So what, I mean, the that I operate in are healthcare and also of AI and it comes to real estate it's one of the startups that I'm advising and also immigration technology, so to speak, right? And thumbs off. The technologies that are useful today and broadly applicable, I guess my bias is my feedback is more startup oriented, right? So if someone wants to work in a startup, these are the skills that want to be having is problem solving skills, especially creative Problem solving skills. Are you able to come up with solutions to problems? On the fly, right? Are you quick thinking and are you able to, put on different hats? So multi task and say you're a software developer, but there is a customer support ticket that that you have to take care of, right? At this point of time. So are you able to switch gears and go into the customer mode without saying that, Hey, that's not what I signed up for. That's not in my skill set. That's not what I'm. studied to do or be, things like that. And practically speaking, I mean, in terms of the skills, The world is moving towards AI mean, that's the next smartphone and internet revolution that's happening in

Track 1: 23:09

Right. So

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 23:15

make that technology to the masses, as in how do you use AI to solve real world problems? One way of doing that is through chatbots. So learn how to build chatbots, it's become that connector, right? So you know how to make a large language model accessible a large set of users. And the other is with training. models themselves. most of the models, they, I mean, you do have ones by big tech companies, which tend to be but there are more and more specialized models for music creation, for video creation, for healthcare, for law. learning to train models, learning to develop models, that's a very big thing. valuable skill, learning how they even work, right? So lots of open courseware available. So on YouTube, Udemy, MIT, Harvard, all of that educational content now is freely accessible. I would how to do that. But those are just a few suggestions, top of mind that I have is you want to learn the fundamentals of how the new technologies are coming. And more importantly, in terms of skills, you want to make sure skills you have, they solve real world problems, right? So whether it's training the models, making them actionable to users, like connecting them users, that's where personally focus on.

Track 1: 25:01

the core skill is problem solving.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 25:03

Yes,

Track 1: 25:06

Pretty informative.

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 25:07

And summarize over here where there's an essence of volunteering. There's an essence of reaching out, being more proactive, you know, in terms of research, making sure that you're opting in to, to contribute to research. And then you're also to speak up at these events or conferences. you spoke about how, um, you know, Students should start looking at hackathons and start maybe considering hackathon hopping as a weekend activity where they can start, um, you know, solving these real world problems, creating these tangible products and having stories to tell now you do all of this. But you still have to build a brand and become that magnet, right? And, um, in today's world, we all know, and we see that LinkedIn is that tool where we are all essentially trying to be that top voice in our respective categories, trying to be that brand in our respective categories. So what are those? Strategies and tips that you would like to share of how somebody can use LinkedIn more effectively, especially young students.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 26:20

that's a great question. So there are two parts to this. One is how do you build a brand around LinkedIn? And second is how do you use LinkedIn very effectively for networking, for outreach, for finding jobs, and the right opportunity. So in terms of the first part, which is writing on LinkedIn, personally, what I had to learn to do is be consistent. So it doesn't matter what you write. So you just need to develop a habit. of posting once a week, posting once every three days. Now I just post every day. And what do you write about it's not so much sharing facts. It's about sharing your interpretation of events. If something inspired you, something just ignited like a curiosity, or if you found a helpful resource, you thought of a helpful resource, you want to share that with. the community, right? And with the world, to speak, because there's a high chance that other people find it similar to you, it useful, interesting, and curious as well. And what I also had to learn to do is not overanalyze and not aim for perfection. So your first few posts are just going to be crummy. There's no way you're around that. They're going to be like, click big blocks of text, and it's going to come out like hard to read essay. And that's perfectly fine you get better over time as you get better with it. Then you improve how you write you also improve what you write Correct as well. And LinkedIn has a lot of reach. I mean, a post of mine with no likes, it still reaches 2000 people. that's powerful, right? 2000 people are made aware of even who you are. The fact that you're present on the internet in this world, and especially when you're looking for opportunities and you're looking for jobs, that's a very powerful tool

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 28:43

opinion

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 28:44

and

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 28:45

and you also have an opinion, right? It's not that, you know, the brain is, the gray cells are not working, right? So they're actually working and you have an opinion and you're sharing that opinion. So it does a lot of different things, right? So it talks, it shows you have the confidence, shows you have the power to think and express and communicate that. Um,

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 29:09

exactly. And one example of this is, let's say you and you're on your OPT clock, right? So you have 90 days to find a job and seniors, so campus resources, you figured out that on OPT, you can actually volunteer and that helps you stop the clock and you secured a volunteering opportunity. And you might think that, Oh, everyone, I mean, it took me time to learn about this. But. already know about this, or it's probably not that important to share, but that's exactly what you should. Yes. Hey, here's the problem I faced, and this is like the research I did, or this is how I found out a solution. And this was my solution. And here are a few alternatives or set of solutions for you to consider. And that's just a simple example of the problem that you're facing that could be turned around into very helpful content for the community. And this can be applicable not just as a recent graduate, but to the job search, to an internship search, housing search, finding roommates, so on and so forth. Right. Whatever challenges you're facing, whatever new skills you're learning, technologies you're learning, whatever inspires. your curiosity and the solutions you're coming to problems that you're facing on a regular basis.

Track 1: 30:43

That's just informative. I have another question Nikin. How crucial are internships and you know, all the ground experiences important in securing full time employment.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 30:54

That's a very good question. I would say it's um, chicken and egg situation. And that hasn't changed for a long time, which is employers say they want fresh freshers or fresh graduates. But then when you go for the interview, they're like, where is your experience? Right? So you need experience to get experience. So that cycle always exists. But what I also wanted to about is in terms of using LinkedIn for internships jobs and how to do that So going back in time again, because of the number of hackathons I did, the number of like projects I had, I received inbound offers to interview at Google, at Snap, at Dropbox. I never even had to go apply. So I was very fortunate way. And my other friends in the hackathon circuits had similar experiences as well. I decided to go the startup route. They went big tech route. The other aspect of it is when I was building my startup, I mean, I was building a medical device startup. I had, I was 21. I had connection to the healthcare industry, to the medical industry. So in terms of even forming a founding team, finding advisors, our first set of investors, I really had to lean in heavily on LinkedIn. And then I realized that, Hey, what I've learned, it could be applicable. students as well, especially for finding their job. So in terms of what that process involves, let me share my screen again.

Track 1: 32:56

Sure.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 32:56

Can you see my screen Amit?

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 32:57

it's coming up. Yes, we can.

Track 1: 33:01

Yeah.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 33:01

Perfect. There are a few parts to this. So the first step of this is learning to use the LinkedIn search filters very effectively. The search filters actually accept Boolean and what that means is you can really narrow down the people that you're searching. So let's say I'm looking for a software engineering job. Let's just take that as an example. the first thing to know what you're searching for, right? So there are a few tags that people use when they are hiring. So you can do we are That's a frequent tag that employers use. Then you go to people and you find a short list of people, all of whom have VR hiring. So

Track 1: 33:59

That's cool.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 34:02

the LinkedIn search filter effectively. The other is finding things in common, the people you're reaching out to. So let

Track 1: 34:12

That's good. Right.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 34:17

And show results. So this narrows the search. Again, you can make this as broad or as narrow you'd like. And here,

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 34:31

Right.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 34:32

looks like he's hired he went to Northeastern well. Looks like it's a car company. check his profile. He's been building this for seven years. It's pretty cool. And there are two ways now to connect with Joseph. would send a very nice connection request. I would add a note. I would personalize the note. Hey Joseph, we attended you. That's a very simple connection request. The other way is to send nicely crafted email. And for that, you can use this tool here known as SalesQL. So I get, I open Joseph's profile and I open this tool and I get two of his emails. So I can copy these emails and then send a very well written cold email to Joseph. And the topic of the email can be different. So you can aim to reach out to him for just networking, or if you're seriously in the job hunt, you can draft the email accordingly in terms of an open position, the company and that you're interested in applying for that open position. So these are a few ways in which I would leverage LinkedIn. What are other ways of finding common ground with people? So other ways are location, where you're from. let me remove we are hiring and let me say I'm from Bangalore and I want to connect with managers. So anyone who's also from Bangalore and who's a manager now shows up and this is helpful for networking. And if they have an open position Are they company? I can reach out to them directly or at least ask for a reference

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 36:53

So now it's three

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 36:54

or

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 36:55

So they're from Bangalore. They're currently a manager and have attended Northeastern University. They're currently present in the So I think what you're doing here is you're identifying those common factors or speaking points that you can connect to them about, right?

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 37:13

exactly. So you go from common ground to higher ground. So you find things that you share and you use that to build trust, build rapport develop a relationship. So I could also use the language I speak. So my mother tongue is Tamil. That's a great thing. So these are people I share a language with and they are hiring managers.

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 37:42

That is

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 37:44

Yeah, I'll stop sharing my screen. So these are tools, right? The important thing here is to have a strategy. So it's to apply these tools. And second, there's no taking away hard work. For me to find seven investors for my startup, I had to send 3000 cold emails. I don't know what that ratio is to job, but it's going to be a numbers game and you shouldn't shy away. from the hard work that's required.

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 38:19

grit nice that is so cool and the one thing that I've also noticed is a lot of students get activated only in their final years or and you know when the meter is going to start running and they're. you know, they're going to graduate and now they need a job. Is that too late? Um, or the, you know, is that something that they should be preparing from the first year, right? When should students actually be starting these kind of activities? When should they start networking?

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 38:54

That's a great question. I'd say in terms of doing research on campus, as well as doing projects, hackathons, they can start from the first day they are on campus. And networking, I mean, happens. And what I mean by that is if you're out there building value, either to a research topic or through the projects, that you're working on, you will meet people, right? Who want to, who are willing to open doors for you, who are willing to give you a shot an intern, as an employee at the company. Where I would use this more targeted approach that we just saw is when you're on the clock, when, hey, it's January and you need a summer internship, or it's January, you're graduating May and you need a full time job, then No holds barred, right? So you just want to put in be very intentional with the effort you're putting in and Be intense as well as and put in a lot of effort and my thinking towards that is you just have to be lucky once, right? So it's fundraising you just need that one lead investor to believe in you Same thing with the job search, or if you're dating someone and you're looking to get married, right? So in all of these different areas, that's a great question.

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 40:32

cool we can thank you so much. Um, in fact recently we spoke to a guy called Rohan Pradyumna. So he's a founder of a startup called Travana. it's an AI Powered or enabled planning company, right? And he was at university, I think University of Maryland. And right after that, he has gone and stepped into entrepreneurship, right? Instead of being a job seeker, he became a job creator. And I think when I look at look back at his story, and I look at your story, I see that I see those common points where he was also very proactive and very active across the hackathon circuit and was also trying to reach out and build something of his own, right? So there was always that quest to build something tangible. Now there's also one misconception among students is that you cannot step into. Entrepreneurship right after university. So when they see people like you and I think there's this opportunity for inspiration and maybe as a parting message. Do you want to talk a little bit about? What are those opportunities for students to step into entrepreneurship? What is that right path? Because a lot of them think that they're not allowed to do it or they don't know how to do it.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 41:59

I would say there's a lot of activities you can do to validate your idea before taking the leap of faith, Which is not even going full time into the venture, but even incorporating it. So I would say even that um, a leap of faith. And what do I mean by of work? that can be done. So you can build wireframes of your product. So you're not even talking about a working prototype. So you're talking about a design like wireframes. You can put together a presentation that clearly has like your value proposition. And the most important thing, you can get out of the building and go talk to customers. So you can do using the tools I just can do a lot of cold outreach, speak to customers. And truly find out if you're solving a pain point. And the way you know that is after you finish a presentation, the customers are literally going to be here, take my money. And the way they express that is different, but it's along the lines of. What stage of development are you in? Would this be released? How can we help you in the work that you're doing? So you will get very strong signal that you're building something that people want. And many times they'll also offer to co develop it with you. It's call me anytime. I mean, I'm here to help you out if you have any questions. And there's another set of responses, which is broadly can be categorized as, so. And that comes in various forms, right? Is I don't think so. I'm not sure. maybe we don't need this. I really don't see the application. Whatever, right? So if someone isn't, I mean, physically or either through Zoom, through their words, it would be different. Like literally giving you money to solve their problem. Then you're not solving a pain point yet. So then there's more discovery iterations for you to do. And personally, my thinking about this has certainly changed. The side project, the project, it basically has to call you in to the business, right? So it has to suck up so much of your time. There has to be so much to do. You have no choice but to incorporate it and make it into your full time gig. So personally, I wouldn't recommend anyone to quit their job and go in search of an idea. It's keep hacking, keep iterating. once you find something interesting. you have that pain point to solve, then you can keep growing it and literally pulls you in so the business should in. And if you look at the founder of Asana, so Dustin, forgetting his last name, Moskovitz, um, he was working at Facebook. He's one of the co founders of Facebook, right? And Asana kind of

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 45:08

Get

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 45:09

pulled him in, is it a light project and it started taking off and he's man, I just can't, I have to make this into a business. It just can't be a part time project So that's the approach that I would take. And yeah, before incorporating, there's a lot of validation you can do. You can do that on a student visa. You don't have to even think about the rules that. And when you're incorporating, who I would reach out to are startup founders who have been through this journey before and immigration attorneys, right? So many of them do free webinars. Many of them offer free consultations. Speak to people have a vested interest in making you succeed. And unfortunately, I've just seen a lot of international offices, meaning international offices, scare students, right? And the reason being the people who are sitting at the front desks are interns who are students themselves, and they just don't have a good grasp on the rules law. And the universities that have competent international offices. The IBs, Stanford, MIT, Harvard, you see the output of startups that, right? That's one of the reasons is the ecosystem, the offices, everyone's supporting students, unfortunately a lot of universities still have work to do, so they need to catch up to, but speak to people who have fruit on the tree. Speak to people who have walked your path before and have results to show for.

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 46:51

Excellent. Thank you so much, Nick. And I think we're at time. I know you have to go. This was a wonderful session. I learned so much about LinkedIn and the dev post website and just the spirit of being out there being proactive. You know, looking at those common grounds and then moving to higher grounds. I loved everything that you have shared in this episode, and we would like to invite you again to talk about some of the other topics that you're very vocal on LinkedIn. Especially on the EB1A, the route to EB1A and that journey that you would recommend for a lot of folks. But I really want to thank you for all the time and the insights that you've shared on this episode. We truly appreciate this. Thank you.

nikin-tharan_1_04-16-2024_131817: 47:40

Really appreciate you having me on. Yeah.

Track 1: 47:42

Thank you. Thank you. Before we end, I want to say something. Nikin and whatever you have said, you know, this actually today's topic was more focused towards students and employment, but I would say a lot of what you have said is, you know, consumable by people who are our age also. You know, a lot of us you know, so perhaps we can, you know, I will stop here and I would say that perhaps I'm at the can take up another episode where he you know, details things for people who are, you know, a little more experienced in their careers you know, how they can use the things. What does for it's the,

amit-gupta_1_04-16-2024_131817: 48:22

Excellent. Thank you so much, Nikin.