Building Tech in Small Towns: Jordana Wright on Apps, Innovation & Women in Tech

LET's Network: Welcome to this episode of Let's Network the Podcast. Today, Tally and I are joined by Jordana Wright. And today I am so excited because whereas Talia gets too nerd out when we have all the baking and the cooking and all of those kinds of guests, we rarely get someone on the technical side. So I am so excited that we get to have you here today, Jordana. For our audience who may not know you yet, can you introduce yourself? Well, thank you so much for the wonderful introduction, Emily and Talia. I'm so glad to be here with you guys today. So my name is Jordana Wright. I am a builder of many things, mostly tech-based things. And I lead a venture studio called Small Town Giants. And it's essentially we just build tech solutions to everyday problems that people have and especially problems that exist in small towns. I live in a small town. So whether that's we could really use a dating app in this small town or we need like a chore app. For my family, so we can keep track of the kids' chores and what we need to do. And so any problem that you have, there's a tech based solution that I can usually help build. So that's me in a nutshell. And I'm so excited to have you here because we met ⁓ through a conference two years ago, I guess, a year ago. And we just stayed in contact. And this is the power of sisterhood. We only met each other for like two days, but anytime we see each other doing something cool on Instagram, we're like, way to go, this is amazing. And you can still Those sisterhoods with just the briefest of introductions. So I am super excited to have you on. This is gonna be fantastic. And so I just want to jump right into it. So you describe yourself as building something big in small town Canada. What opportunities do people overlook when it comes to building a tech company outside of a major city? Because I remember when we dropped you off after the conference, it's a small town where you live. It's a very small town. So I love it, but I was like, it's interesting to have a tech company here. So I live in a gorgeous small town on Georgian Bay and I absolutely love it. Like I relocated from Toronto. My whole family lives up that way. And I always thought I was going to be like this big city girl. And there's no way that I'm going to end up in a small town. And I will tell you, things change. I don't know if it was a process of just growing older, seeing things differently, but I was like, I need my space. I need a backyard. I need nature. I need water. I like cannot live in this city anymore. So I found myself in a gorgeous small town and I've absolutely been loving it. When I did relocate, I wasn't sure if there would be kind of a tech ecosystem that I could tap into and I could continue to do the work that I used to do in Toronto in a place like the small town that I live in now. And what I found actually really surprised me. I think a lot of people overlook just the talent and the tenacity and the creativity that exists amongst people living in small towns and living outside of the big urban centers that most people know and most people assume everyone who's doing something must live in. What I found is a lot of the people that I encounter in my small town, they are people that just optimize for lifestyle. They are business people that are just as savvy as people who live in Toronto, Vancouver, wherever else, but they just want to run their business while being close to family, living in an environment where you can raise kids and have a community feel and have a nice backyard and have the water and have just like, I don't know, the environment close by and not feel like you're in this very like detached urban landscape. And I'm not knocking anyone who lives in cities, raises a family in s in cities, anything like that. But I just want to highlight like the beauty and the networks and just like the really cool professionals that work in small town environments like this. And I do think that we're often overlooked and there's just so much happening in each small town. And I'm sure you can relate to that. And I'm sure you've seen that as well, right? ⁓ yeah. I can relate to that so much because I moved from like Ottawa to Kempville. So it was very much the same thing. I didn't move here for nature. I don't think all the same. So like I'm more indoorsy than outdoorsy, but unhealthy society, right? Like to be on a paddock, like nailed it. That's it. But it's true, the level of the caliber of talent that you see out here and and the small shops, those small shops are competing against these giants. They have to be smart. They have to be quick. They have to have so much talent in order to even compete against these people. So it it is amazing to see. What talent does come out here? And like you said, it's just a different way of life. Mm-hmm. Now, you're the founder of Small Town Giants, a venture studio focused on solving challenges in small towns. What inspired you to create this model and how do you decide which problems are worth tackling? Mm-hmm. So I think for me, I want to solve everyday problems with tech. I think when people imagine tech Tech-based solutions, tech companies, they think of like these massive world-changing problems. You have to raise venture capital. And and I I did do that the first time around. So for quite a while, for the past like decade, I led a tech company that was a property rental and activation kind of platform, essentially like Airbnb, but for social good. So it rented at a lot of community spaces, like library spaces, church spaces, like big sanctuary performance venues, commercial kitchens that they have, meeting rooms. So just kind of think the Airbnb, but like these social purpose real estate owners. So I did that. I raised the funding. I did the traditional pathway. I was the quote unquote tech bro for a bit. But I just think that I learned that you can do things a different way. Like I think I just like woke up. I got out of the hustle culture. I got out of the need to try to prove to people that I'm saving the entire world. And I thought about very practical things that I could do to help everyday people with tech. And I think that's why I made this pivot. I I kind of did the thing that was the expected thing. And now I'm tr kind of doing the thing that I wanna do. So I think in life we have these moments where we are on this expected path and then we take a pause and we're like, wait a minute, what do I actually do I want to do this? Why am I doing this? Or maybe it was just for a period of time that we wanted to do that. And it goes with tech, but it goes with everything else. I think we need to really reflect on what it is we're doing in life, whether it be professionally or in our personal relationships, and just like consider like what we have all these opportunities to pivot and to do new things and what is it I actually want to do? So I think it was that moment that really helped me make this shift. I think if you looked at Emily's notebook right now, she'd have a doodle saying, I love Jordana. Literally saying everything speeches on a daily basis. So I'm gonna let her jump in here because I know she's super excited. No, this is brilliant. And I think there's so much power in what you're doing, not only from supporting those small town municipalities. Like it looks like some of your projects have supported the infrastructure that goes into like making those small town communities thrive, let alone supporting those in entrepreneurs independently. And there's so much power in being able to find ways that technology can actually like unleash your mental load and make your life easier. I just did something two days ago where someone was trying to do a social good community thing and I was like, nope, if I can jump in on the tech support, like easy peasy, we're there. Sign me up a hundred times over. So I absolutely love everything you're saying because it resonates so strongly. Mm-hmm. And it's just this idea too of tech being a part of everyday life and making everyday life easier, whether it be in your business, your day-to-day kind of home life. There are so many ways that you can implement technical solutions that just lighten that load and they don't have to be overcomplicated. They don't have to make things more complicated. It can be pretty straightforward, especially in this day and age. So I'm right there with you with those tech solutions. Now, do you find that a lot of time it's that reducing the overwhelm piece that takes up most of the time? Because I don't know if it you're finding it in your town, but I find it a lot in ours that it's that That overwhelm because small towns, you know, you get so ingrained in how you're doing things that this idea of change is scary. And I feel like that might be the biggest hurdle you have to overcome with being able to implement these solutions. A hundred percent. Like I had to learn, even just like myself, that I can't always come in. guns ablazing and just because I know something and I feel like I know better and we all have those moments where we feel like we know better. We have to have sometimes a bit of a soft approach because sometimes like there are instances where I feel like change is necessary, but I might not know the the history of the dynamics between different organizations or people and an approach where you're just coming in and you're telling people they need to change. It just doesn't work. I wish it did. So I'm kind of learning this like change management process, which is really about talking to people and doing consultation and figuring out like what are your real pain points because I might be thinking something and I might be seeing something, but that doesn't necessarily mean like that is their core pain point or what they're feeling day to day or what they want to see change. So I'm sure you see that even in your own community. Like you might have all sorts of approaches that work so well for you. But once you start to talk to people, you're like, ⁓ I'm not necessarily ready For this, but they want to do this. Okay, so let's get started on this. ⁓ yeah. Okay. Now they're right. And you kind of just take it step by step. I think we both would have experienced that moving from big cities to a small town with the BIA being like we came in with rose-colored glasses and being like, this is gonna be awesome. All I want to do is help. And like, no, there's tradition, there's a way, and you have to adapt. And and that it, you know, I did come in on the blazing too, and I kind of had to step back. So it's not just tech. It's everything, but you kind of have to be excited, be resourceful, have that initiative, but also kind of respect the traditions that are there. Mm-hmm. A hundred percent. Now kind of moving on to the app portion. Every successful app starts with an idea. What makes you think this is worth building? Like this is a good one. We've got a golden nugget here. Mm-hmm. Well, I think for me, I have a bit of a an idea around this that kind of like bucks against what most people believe. But I think if an idea helps even one person, it's worth building. If it just helps one person make their life easier, make their business run more smoothly, it's worth building. And you have to kind of like bring some context around the scale of what it is you're building so you can decide like how to resource it in a way that like where the money makes sense and it balances out, like you don't want to throw too much into things that aren't of a a large scale. So you need to do that work around like what is the scope of this? Who is it helping? What does this look like before you really roll out any kind of solution? But there are things that I built that literally just help one person. And there are things that I built that help thousands and thousands and thousands of people and they're each equally impactful. The one thing I will say is when you are deciding what to build, is to like very seriously ask yourself, is this solving a real problem? Cause one of the things that I find in tech is now that we have all these tools, people get so excited and sometimes they'll build something that solves a problem that isn't a real problem. And it's just the excitement of building and they're overbuilding and they're creating this feature and that feature and this needs to be this color and that needs to be upgraded in this way and that way when your community or the people who want to use the software or product just want one small feature. They don't want all of that. So again, if it just helps one person, it's worth it, but you have to actually make sure it's solving a real problem. And I think that for me is kind of like my litmus test when I'm Thinking about what the solution needs to look like or what it is I'm building. I've spent so many years working with engineers, software engineers specifically, and they get so deeply invested in what their perception of what they want to build is. They forget to ask that very basic question of what problem are we solving? And who does the like whose problem are we solving? And it sounds so simple. But when you're in the midst of building things, you're just adding so many things and you feel like this needs to be perfect and that needs to be perfect and we need all these bells and whistles and we need to do this and do that. And you're so deep in it that sometimes you just need to either, I don't know if it's through conversations with other people in your community or just like speaking with your customer to really figure out like what, what are we solving? Why are we doing this? What is our why? Like. what are we trying to do in this moment? And it can't just kind of be like a a vanity project with all the bells and whistles if you're trying to help people, like speak to the people you're trying to help and make sure the solution's actually helping them. And I think it comes to a point too of that sisterhood we kind of spoke of, you know, hey like how often have Emily Laura and I, like our Let's Network, thrown ideas into the chat and then they can either be supported or they could be ripped apart and ripped apart with the best intentions, right? Like Hey guys, because like you said, we do have tunnel vision. You're like, this is the best thing since sliced bread. And then someone will be like, Mm, is it? And you're like, Maybe not. And then but other times it can like, ⁓ my gosh, you're on to something. You know what? How about you do this? And so you take that original nugget and you just keep building and building it. So I definitely do think, you know, there's one thing I know with all of like tech kind of keeping it closer to the heart and stuff, but there is something to be said talking about it with people you trust. Mm-hmm. So true. Now, for someone who listening who has an app idea but doesn't know where to start, what would your advice be? Because I know, you know, many of us are like, this app would be great and then can't go further than that because we have no tech skills. I might be talking about me, I don't have an idea right now, but So my advice would actually be to try and build it yourself. And I know for a lot of people that sounds outrageous. There's a lot of people who consider themselves non-technical, who have never tried to build software before, who might not be computer savvy, hearing you need to try to build it yourself. They might think it sounds like tone deaf or what are you talking about? How would I even start? Like where what do I do? Where do what do I look into? But I think that through the process of trying to build something yourself, even if you fumble through it, even if you don't end up actually building it, you learn so much about what's needed. And what it actually looks like to build something. So if you do end up hiring someone after that, at least you know what to ask them. Cause I think for me, I I'm like completely self-taught when it comes to software development. But in the early stages, I had an app idea and I went to look for just anyone who could help me build it. And I realized very quickly, this was like the before the days of vibe coding and AI and all that kind of stuff. But I realized very quickly First of all, this was gonna be extremely costly if I hired this team of software developers. Like, is there any way that I can just figure it out? Like I'm a pretty resourceful, smart person. Like, what do I have to what videos do I have to watch on YouTube? What do I have to read? What courses do I have to take? Like, how can I just figure this out? Because this cost is like crazy. And then even through the process of trying to translate the idea in my head. in a way that they would be able to understand it and build it. It felt like I was playing a game of broken telephone where they just didn't have the context for what I was trying to build. They didn't have the patience. I could give them like the the best written description of what I wanted. I could give them the best like just like designs and specs and this is what I want. And it always felt like this game a broken telephone. And it was just so, so frustrating not to see my vision kind of Come to life in the way that I would hope. So I had my moment where I was like, you know what? I think I can do this. Like, these guys don't seem that much smarter than me, not to call them not very smart, but I'm like, if they can do it, I can do it. Like, what does this look like? What does the first step of learning how to build something look like? Like, let me get on YouTube, let me just try. And I just gave myself a challenge. I was like, the first challenge is gonna be. 48 hours over a weekend. Like what can I build? What version of my idea in my head can I build just over a weekend from start to finish? Whatever it looks like, it's probably gonna be something I'm embarrassed of. But let me just try. And then I like built bigger and bigger goals for myself, tried to build different features and slowly over time I learned. But I just think it's so important for everyone to try and build the thing themselves, whether you succeed or fail. you're gonna win because you're gonna have the context, you're gonna have the lessons, you're gonna have a better understanding of what that looks like. And in this day and age, there are so many tools that can help you along the way, so many tutorials. Everything's on YouTube. I would strongly encourage anyone who has an app idea, step one, try to build it yourself. And it sounds counterintuitive because a lot of people pay me to build things for them, but I always say try to build this yourself before you talk to me. Like just give it a try. to see what it looks like. I'm radiating with excitement because it's not just tech related. You're like, you know what? You can do it. You have every skill possible. I'm also really upset that we brought you on this podcast because I'm about to get 10 meeting requests from Emily. Listen, we're gonna go and do a whiteboard and we're gonna try this and I'm like super excited about it. But at the same time I was like Here we go. I'll just door dash her a coffee and we'll stay up till midnight. No big deal. Yeah. But it's so true what you said that just that idea of going through the motions of practicing and trying and learning, it's something that I actually just had a conversation with my 18-year-old nephew as he's graduating high school. It's like everything is figure outable. That even if you're not ready for post-secondary education, it may not be the path that you're going on. you can find the skills and you can build the skills to do the thing. So whether it's tech skills or other business skills, we have the knowledge at our fingertips to figure the heck out how we're gonna do the thing. Mm-hmm. And when you're when people see you trying, they want to help you. Like if if your nephew comes to you with an idea and it's just an idea You want to be encouraging of him, you want to support him. But if you see him trying and doing the thing and he's out there, it's like, how do I help you? ⁓ my gosh, you're doing it. When people catch you trying, they want to like it allows people to find you. It allows your people to find you. When you're in the in the midst of doing the thing, you're being seen and being open and stumbling and building in public and your people will find you. So you can't just keep ideas in your head. have to like get going. Even if you don't have all the tools, you don't know how to do things, like that's the way, like the the path is kind of made through movement and through getting things done and through stumbling and figuring it all out. So you you gotta get going. You just gotta try. And I think it says a lot for like the entrepreneur aspect as well. You know, if you start your business and you start with the bookkeeping and stuff, at least you have a general idea. But we've also said on Let's Network, if that's not your specialty and that's holding you back from excelling at your specialty, then you know, you can outsource kind of thing. But at least if you had a general idea. So it is a very important to hit that balance, right? Where it's just like do what you thrive at, try. And if you don't thrive at it, then you give it a go to someone else. You know what I mean? Like if if it may're not your strong suit, but building that app is, then focus on that. You know, and then finding what brings you joy as well. If you're like I hated Min and I will never go forward with something else, then outsource it, right? I agree a hundred percent. So we talked about building an app and just what are some of the biggest misconceptions people have about creating an app? Like, you know, there's so much tech now that can help you build it, or or what are some of the things that you've heard where people kind kinda hesitate? Mm-hmm. I think There is a lot of messaging out there in the world that makes it seem harder than it is. And I'm not gonna say it's there's obviously varying levels of complexity depending on what you're building. I'm not gonna make it seem like everything's so easy peasy. It really depends on what you're building and what you're looking at, like what you're hoping to do. But I think like even in my early days of trying to build things and trying to like reach out to other software developers or trying to like contract different agencies and stuff like that. Now in hindsight, now that I have the context and I have the understanding and I know how to build different things, I realize that a lot of these guys were making it more difficult than it actually was and making it seem more difficult than it actually was. And I think maybe to justify, I don't want to say overcharging me, but sometimes you'll like run into people that just, or maybe it was difficult for them and I just have a different approach, but I was just like so overwhelmed by their process and the way that they were doing things that I just assumed this is just too hard. Like this is, ⁓ my gosh. Like how would I even start this? And I feel like oftentimes there is that feeling of overwhelm and there is that feeling of this is just way too hard. Tech is hard. Science is hard. Math is hard. But it's just sometimes it's the approach that you learn it from that just makes it harder than it needs to be. So I would just strongly encourage people to Find their people, find their mentors, find their YouTube creator that they love watching that make that speaks in a language that works for them. Like maybe again, like we talked about like things like the admin or the bookkeeping. There are ways that people will teach you that or ways that people will take you through the process of what it involves that just makes it seem so hard. And you're just like bewildered by what what they're doing. And there are other people who are professionals that will say, I will help you and I will do this for you, but this is what it includes. And they're able to lay it out in a way that just like works for your brain. You're just like, that's what you're doing for me. ⁓ thank you. Versus people that just make it too hard. So I think for me, like that's the key misunderstanding is sometimes I don't know if it's a gatekeepy thing, but sometimes there are people that like to make tech feel much harder than it actually is. Yeah. It makes a huge difference. It's just night and day. Yeah. There's certain software developers that I'll speak to and I'm just like, what are you talking about? This is not that but for them it is. Everyone is different and everyone thinks through things in a different way. So yeah. You have to find the tools that work for you. And that's a lot of things with any sort of tech, right? Or anything in the real world may make sense to some, but not for others. So just find what works for you. So, you know, you kind of alluded that you've started different businesses and you have all these amazing ideas. How important is it to validate an idea before investing time and money into development? Mm-hmm. I think it's very, very important. That's like one of my biggest things is sometimes I will like, I don't want to say sell an idea before I build it, but I will actually get out there and figure out like, is this something people want? Is this something they would pay for? Like, do I have like am I on to something? Am I overthinking something? Am I like there's a lot of work that goes into actually listening closely to your audience or your clients or whoever it is that you're hoping to build for that needs to come before building. And I think because we have all these exciting tools, sometimes people kind of put the cart for the horse and they're building all of this stuff before they've actually gone out and spoken to anyone at all. So Starting with the problem and starting with who you're building for should always be step number one and actually listening to what they want and need. And sometimes what they want and need is gonna be way different than what you think or would hope for. So it's so, so important. It saves you a huge headache, saves you lots of time, saves you lots of resources to do it that way. And then just like funding wise. Do you kind of come up with an idea and then go after investors, or do you build it and then go after investors? Kind of like if someone's thinking about doing this, what would you give as a process to build? I think one of the exciting things about the era that we're in right now is the like financial barrier to building things and getting things built is way down. Like in the early days when I built my first venture, it was everything cost so much. It was like crazy. But now with all the tools that we have and with all the information that's out there, it actually isn't as costly as it used to be to build things, especially just like the minimum viable product version of your idea and to get it out there. And it doesn't have to be anything fancy. It doesn't even have to be a tech-based thing. My first venture that became this big thing and became this tech company, the first version of it was the equivalent of like an Excel spreadsheet. And that was it. For a very, very long time, people assumed I started with the tech platform and I started with this big solution. And I started with this idea of building a tech company. It was not that. It was literally an Excel scratch sheet. And you just build as the need arises. So to get started, I mean, doesn't cost as much anymore. And you don't often have to raise the venture capital funding that you would have had to in the past. So I would say before you Go out and consider raising money, think about how you can just build things independently and build things in a way that is self-sustaining and actually revenue generating versus propped up by venture funding for a while. There are certain ideas that are so big that you just do actually need venture capital, but there are a lot of ideas, especially in this day and age, that can be built in a self-sustaining way. And when you do take venture capital, ⁓ there are a lot of voices that come into play that you have to listen to. So I would also just encourage people to be mindful of that. So yeah. Yes, I was gonna say with the venture capital too, I know you must have like you've seen the pressure side of it and you've now seen this other side of building where you get to have full control without those other voices and kind of adjust your timelines and adjust your goals as you see fit. And I think there's so much power in that as well, because as lucrative and exciting as the VC world is, once you get down, like once you start down that rabbit hole. You're tied to other people's goals and expectations and timelines and how much time goes between rounds of funding. So I really love that perspective of just be mindful before you go down that rabbit hole. Mm-hmm. Like it sounds exciting to raise a bunch of money, but yeah, it's just something to think about. So tell me a bit more about small town giants. Like is it you or do you have a team? And I'm just wondering, like you're tackling everything from local dating apps to tools that help residents better understand municipal government. What do these projects have in common and what have they taught you about innovation in smaller communities? Mm-hmm. Well, one of the exciting things about small town giants is I'm trying to build it out in a way that is inviting to all sorts of builders and creatives. Like a lot of the times for certain solutions, my mind automatically goes to a tech-based solution because that's kind of my primary tool for building things. But there are people who I'm in community with around building these solutions. Who are focused on marketing, are focused on design. And there are a lot of solutions that need those skill sets, that need multiple skill sets to be really strong solutions. So I'm building it out as a studio that welcomes all builders and that tries to build products or projects that has all of those bases covered in terms of like the design, the marketing, and the tech. Because when you build something and you're just if everyone is a tech person. Oftentimes we will build something and then we're like, wait, but how do we get people to even know this exists? ⁓ my gosh, we need someone to market it. We can't just build it and then it's just sitting here. Like we have to figure out how to get the word out. We have to figure out, do we know someone who knows like social media really well? Do we know someone who knows how to write a really good letter to counsel about what this is that we're building as a solution and how it can support what they're doing? Do we know? So I'm trying to really focus on having just that really dynamic group of all sorts of people who brings all kinds of skill sets to the table. So I'm the primary builder, but I have a few people that have kind of joined in the building projects and I'm still figuring out what that model looks like as we continue to build more products and monetize things and build out the studio. I've kind of been a one woman band for a very long time. Well, since my last venture that I built in a really big way, I was like, I don't want that anymore. I don't wanna have to manage people. I don't wanna have to do all that. Like, can I just build something on my own? So I've been doing that for a while, but now I feel like I'm ready to like go back into that mode of building a team and building something that involves many people and many skill sets. So Still figuring out exactly what that looks like, but so far I'm excited about the projects that have been built so far and the people that are joining along the That's so exciting. Now, as a woman building in the tech space, have there been moments where you've had to challenge assumptions or carve out your own path? You know, I still tend to be a bit of a man's world, even though it shouldn't be. So, you know, have you dealt with that and how have you reacted to it? Definitely. I feel like I don't know if this is like a millennial thing, but I think we've all kind of got like got bitten by the hustle culture and girl boss. And for a while I thought that's how things had to be. Like I thought I had to like live this lifestyle where the thing I was building or what I was doing was almost like all encompassing. And I was working these long hours and I was seeing progress. Like things were going well, but I just didn't feel that balance. I didn't feel like I was making time for my family and friends. I didn't feel like I was living the type of life I'd want to live. And although I I was the person leading the venture. I was still choosing to operate under this model that was very much built for almost like, I hate to say it, but like a single young man. And I was like, why am I doing this? Like this is why am I doing this? Like I don't need to do this. Like we can try, can we try a four-day work week? What does that look like? Can we try to work remotely? What does that look like? Are people still like delivering on what's expected of them? Okay, they are. And we're not like, cracking the whip. We're not working all hours and doing crazy things and not making time for family and things we want to do. And it just I I just, yeah, I think for me that was like one of the tough things is like getting swept up by this very specific idea of what it looks like to be a serious builder or leader in the tech field. It's a very specific archetype and it's an archetype that is largely built on a young man's lifestyle. And I am not a young man. So it just didn't work for me. And I think as I kind of again push back against that idea of what it looks like to be a serious builder, I did have people who assumed I was a not so serious person in tech. But the work speaks for itself. The things I've built, the things I've been able to accomplish, they speak for themselves. And I'm no longer concerned about trying to prove I'm like this work twenty four seven, always available, grind and hustle person. Like I've completely I'm completely like out of that idea of what it looks like. And I don't know if you guys have had your girl boss moment or your hustle culture moment where you're like, this is this is a lot. You know what? Women have had it such like for so long we were told we can't do anything, you know, stay in your lane being the homemaker. And then we started to enter the workforce and it's like break these glass ceilings, you know, do everything, be a mom, be an amazing employee, do everything. And now we've kind of hit a plateau where we have to figure out our identity. Like we kind of have to find a balance between finding that joy and finding those glass ceilings that maybe we don't need to break, but we can encourage others to break. We can support, right? So there's such a fine balance of we are so lucky. that we are now in more of a position to choose what we want our life to look like. It's not being as dictated as much. You know what I mean? And that's an exciting but also terrifying time. Yeah. And I think the key thing is really the choice that you mentioned and thinking about what works for you. And there's all these ideas about what we should be doing, but like having the choice to have that hustle culture tech bro moment, what what it was a choice and it had certain consequences, but I chose it and I went through it. And now I have the choice to do something different that just looks different and is a more humane way of running a business and leading a venture. And that's what I'm choosing for this point in my life. Well, and I think that's so powerful about not only why women are valuable in leadership, but why we need to encourage more women in leadership. Because once you've been swept up in that ideal of the tech bro and the, you know, everybody's chasing this ideal of the San Francisco dream and, you know, the Google slide and whatever. But then we have a chance to step out and say, that doesn't work. That's not sustainable for anything except for 20 something that has nothing else in their life. And so when you hit that leadership position, like you have this incredible opportunity. And I love the way you talk about adopting a four day work week and a remote work schedule because that has such a huge impact on not only your work, but on the type of team that you're building and the type of clients that you're attracting. Mm-hmm. It's so true. Now, through your work as both a founder and an investor, what qualities separate successful entrepreneurs from those who struggle to gain traction? Well, I think like one of the difficult things is success looks so different for so many different people. And I think that's something that we're slowly beginning to acknowledge that there isn't just one model and there isn't just one way. And even just in the investing space, there are a lot of ideas that people would assume are bad ideas or how would this work? And they work. And people are doing them and people are building and Incredible businesses around them. So I've reached a point in my life and a point in my career where I'm so careful about telling people you need to do X, Y, and Z to be successful because I've like broken certain ideas around what it looks like to be successful, what it looks like to build a certain thing. When I first built my initial venture, people were like renting out church spaces, renting out libraries? What why would anyone what are you talking about? And I was told it was a bad idea. over and over and over again. And these weren't people who actually wanted to tear my idea down. They weren't people who were being malicious. They were actually the people who I should speak to. They were seasoned entrepreneurs, they were seasoned investors and they were giving me their best advice. And sometimes that advice is wrong. So I would say like listen carefully when people try to give you advice about what's good and what's bad and what is successful and what won't be successful. Yeah, th the main message is is just that I made it in a very specific way at a very specific time that might not be able to be replicated again. So not to say that none of my advice is worthwhile or helpful, but I can't give someone the exact blueprint I followed because it actually won't work now. It just won't. It was a very, very particular time. So the only solid advice that works across every time period, every context is listen. Closely to your customer or your client. There's no specific model. There's no specific thing that will and won't work, especially in this day and age. There are people that are running amazing businesses, making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year just selling like their grandmother's jam recipe. And someone might say, jam? That's not a serious business, your grandmother's recipe. And you would be surprised. So I'm so, so careful to tell people what's good, what's bad, what they should and shouldn't be doing. The only thing I tell them is listen very closely to the people that you're hoping to serve. So what advice would you give to women who have a great idea but aren't sure they're qualified to build a tech company? And not even a tech company. So many women want to start a business. And we've seen so often a woman starts a business more as like a hobby, or they're not treating it as like a business they want to sell down the road. Like they're not treating it like an asset. So what advice would you give a woman who's like, I'm about to enter my entrepreneur era? Mm-hmm. Well, I would start by saying you are qualified. Period. Full stop. You are qualified. You already have everything you need to do what you want. Whether it be tapping into networks to support you or sitting down and learning to do things yourself. There's YouTube videos. There's groups like Let's Network. There's everything is out there to support you and to help you through this process. And that doesn't mean it's going to be easy. It oftentimes won't be. And there's a lot of lonely moments. There's a lot of ups and downs in business building and entrepreneurship. It it's it's not easy. But there are just so many resources out there in this day and age. And as I said with tech, like the bar for being able to build things has lowered significantly. Like this is the best time to try to build something. But I will say the bar for actually getting your idea out there and having distribution and connecting to customers and serving them well. is higher than ever. Like you have to do a ton of work to build the trust, to understand your people who you're trying to serve. That is something that's more difficult than other because ever because in this day and age, people are putting so many things out there that are like kind of scammy or people are uncertain or they're always like changing up their position on things. So people want to see authenticity. They want to see commitment. They want to see things that take time to build. That the bar for that is very high. But the bar for getting your product built Is again lower than ever. You can do it. You have everything you need. You're qualified. Now, can I jump in on that idea of like building the trust with your audience and with your ideal clients? Because I I I'd love to hear your perspective on it because I feel like there is such a different, like there's a different way to do it when you are building online versus when you are building in a small town. And there's so many different nuances that you have to take into consideration when you are building that trust and building those relationships in a small town. Versus when you're building for, you know, the great big world wide web. So I'd love to hear how you kind of balance that because you kind of sit with a foot in both worlds. Mm-hmm. Well, I think one of the things that people sometimes find tough is these things take time. Like even building a rapport with your own network, it involves you showing up consistently for like years at this point, you being reliable, people knowing, okay, we can count on Talia and Emily. They will give us good advice. They'll bring us together in a way that feels welcoming and affirming and just has good energy. We trust them. And that doesn't happen with one event. It doesn't happen with two events. I'm sure at this point, I don't, I can't even count. I don't know how many events you've run at this point. But it just takes, it takes a lot more time than people assume. And I think in this day and age, especially online, people are used to things happening so, so fast. TikTok, we're swiping through quick videos, information coming out as fast. We expect that we should be able to build relationships and things at the same speed that we can get information to people, but it's like there's almost like this like weird tension between like how we're used to receiving information and building connection online versus in person in real life. It takes months, it takes years, it takes consistency, it takes doing the work. And I know you two can speak to that. Like I feel like that's how you really build a true relationship where you can serve people well. It's amazing hearing that from you because, you know, so often we have the tech is taking over the world and you you you are someone who is a tech entrepreneur and you're like, nope, people are still the top priority. We have to keep that in mind. Yes, you know, technology is amazing, but at the end of the day, people crave that connection even more so after COVID, even more so after all of these things. You know, I see so many things with ⁓ if I see an AI poster, I'm not trusting that event anymore. So it really is kind of doing a full circle of people want to see people and connect with that person. And I think that's a good segue into the next question because we've had this whole episode about technology and we haven't really touched on AI, but AI is changing the way apps are built and businesses are run. How do you see it impacting entrepreneurs over the next few years? ⁓ That is. A tough one because I like I am the type of person, I am of the mindset that I want everyone to be able to see their idea come to life in the world. And I know that AI is creating opportunities that I wish I would have had when I built my first venture where people can like vibe code nowadays and get things built in an afternoon. Like I think that democratization of what it is to build things. is so so important. But I also think along with using those AI tools, I think that we need to make sure that we're still doing our due diligence and taking the time to really educate ourselves on what it is we are building and always like making sure like our platforms are very secure and are built in the right way because I've seen a lot of AI solutions that look very beautiful, like just the UI, the the user interface. Like it just, it looks, it looks impressive. It looks nice. But when you actually look behind the hood, it's like this app is not secure at all. Anyone could get all of this user data. I don't think you realize like you need to look into security and privacy settings. And so there are all sorts of things that go along with building good software that. AI kind of like flattens into this process of you just give it one prompt and it one-shots this amazing app and people don't think to look into security and look into all sorts of other things that are so, so necessary. So I love AI. I think that it is doing something incredible for a lot of people and it's democratizing the process of building software, which I am all for. But I think that we need to also continue to educate ourselves on like how to the approaches to building the best, most safe and secure software ever. Now, kind of moving forward, you've built such amazing businesses. Looking back, what's one mistake you made while building a business that taught you an invaluable lesson? One mistake I made is just kind of like putting the whole process in someone else's hands. Like I think when I first started along this path, I just initially assumed like this is all too hard. I can't do this. Like if I just give this over to someone else completely, they can do it for me. And there's still even if you do delegate, even if you do hand things off, you need to make sure that you're communicating what you want. You need to make sure that you're staying in touch with that person and you need to make sure that you're aligned with what those goals are. And I think that's one mistake that I made early on is just assuming that I needed to hand certain things off to other people. And now I'm like the biggest advocate for like the the kind of you can do it, like give it a try, at least learn what you're asking for, learn what it is that they're doing. Even if you choose to then delegate it, you need to have that knowledge. Like you can't completely delegate, for example, if you're not someone who is an admin person or a finance person, you can't just completely delegate the finances of your business to someone else and never look under the hood ever again in terms of finances. Like that's not how any of this works with tech, finance, anything. We need to always keep up with like educating ourselves on what it is that's happening and set goals and don't be afraid to ask questions, even if it feels like it's a stupid question. Like just keep on top of it. I think that's key. Someone else mentioned that on one of our previous podcasts. She built this million dollar business, but she didn't realize, you know, she had had lousy kind of bookkeeping and they were losing money and things happened that she wasn't paying attention to because she just kind of let it go. And and so I do think it is really important that it's just like, yes, find people you trust, but maybe just keep ⁓ keep pulse on it. Exactly. And one last thing, one fun thing that I just added is So I built a little app just based on like kind of like the vibe of Let's Network. I kind of just want to show people tuning in, women, anyone who have an idea how easy it is to go from idea to the very first version. So last night I just spent like a little bit of time. I didn't even spend that much time. But I built an app and I'll send you guys the link. It's it's smalltowngiants.com slash network. And so this app I try to like capture your vibe and capture ideas around networking. So essentially what this app does is people can post like the current challenge that they're facing. So if they're like tax season's coming up and I am terrified or I want to scale my business, but I don't have enough money to hire anyone, what do I do? So they just post their challenges and anyone can click on a challenge and say, I have a solution to that challenge. I know the most incredible accountant. who is super friendly and approachable and amazing. And he helped me last tax season, or I know how to scale a business using tech without having to hire people. So it's just like a little fun platform just to show you how easy it is to take the essence of your organization or an essence of something that you offer and build it out into a full platform. So I'll be leaving that live just so you guys can check and see and know that this is easy. I just did that last night. So This is Christmas in July for Emily. She's so excited. Amazing. So what you don't know also is when we first built our website and everything, I do everything through the Wix platform and they have this idea, they have like an app option, but it's all through it's through their platform and it's like a subset of their app and it just it was sticky, it was messy, it wasn't quite right. And it's been one of those things it's like one day we'll get to it. So the fact that you're like just popped off on a casual Tuesday night and like that's amazing. It's that easy. So check it out. Maybe we can like collaborate on something, some idea that you have in mind. We'll do a quick overnight build and get it out there. But I just want to again encourage everyone you have what you need. You have the network you need you have the support you need in Let's Network and all sorts of groups. Like you you can do this. You can do it. I love that we met over Beaver Tales and all of a sudden building up at higher and it's just like this is the most friends forever now. Right? Yeah, we know with like five different types of beaver tails. We're like, good God. I'm like, I think we're best friends now. Is that how this works? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was fantastic. So just to kind of close it off, you've built companies, you've led teams, you've invested in founders and now created a venture studio focused on community impact. What changes would you like to see over the next decade for women building businesses and technology products? I would like to see a lot of like small scale, everyday businesses that are self-sustaining. So I'd like people to like get out of their minds that they need to build this massive tech venture, even though I did it. So I might sound like a hypocrite. I want people to completely forget that and realize they can build everyday solutions that help people. They can monetize it in ways that are self-sustaining and focus on those little challenges that you see in your everyday life. Like look at your everyday life professionally, socially, like is there a friction that someone in your community is experiencing? And can you build a little tool that just helps that one thing? And you would be surprised at the platforms, the websites that just do one small thing and they're very, very big businesses. And I'll just leave it at that. Like some of my most successful things are things that I've built anonymously and they just do one seemingly small, insignificant thing, but it's a thing that people just search for a lot and really need. And just keep your eye out for those little things. I know we all want to build big, world-changing things, and there is space for that as well. But just also think about interesting challenges that you see that no one else sees that you know exist. interesting ways that you're uniquely gifted or uniquely skilled to help people in certain profession. Whether you're like a let's say you're a photographer and you use certain like presets to edit your photos, you can come up with a platform with those presets and that's that's it. That's the whole business and you're selling presets or you're like there they're just s little every niche has its little thing that people know just helps others in their profession. And just focus in on solving real problems for real people. And sometimes small scale is the biggest and most sustainable thing. So that's my I love this. And I think this is coming at a really important time for so many people because with the return to work with the government, I think people are starting to really kind of feel the burn of those golden handcuffs versus it used to be this ideal, you know, life that they wanted. And then they kind of got a taste of the workplace balance with working from home. And that's kind of been taken. back from them. So I think this is going to be a really inspirational podcast for many people who are like, you know what? Maybe I do want to go for a different version of life. So this is amazing. I'm so excited you came on. Perfect. Thank you so much for having me. Now before we let you go, for anyone who may not already have Googled everything about you, can you tell them where to find you online? I would say the best place to find me is I'm kind of one of those software developers who hasn't gotten as much into social media. So I am trying, I am learning from Emily and Talia, and I'm giving it my best shot. So on socials, on Instagram, I'm Jordana Built It, J-O-R-D-A-N-A built it. And right now I'm building a lot of things at smalltowngiants.com. So that's where you'll find me building all sorts of things. And if you have any challenges in your own small town that you want to see. Some kind of creative solution built around. You can just shoot me a message at smalltowngiants.com and maybe we'll build something incredible for your town. You never know. That's amazing. Well, thank you so much. I have been vibrating this entire hour. So Tally should be prepared for all of the notes. ⁓ Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to listen to this episode, and we will catch you on the next episode of Let's Network the Podcast.