In this Prime Talk Podcast Video Sponsored by GETIDA, Nachman Lieser, the founder, and CEO of ConnectBooks, a leading eCommerce and Amazon accounting software, shares his life's journey into eCommerce.
Understanding the back end of your e-commerce business can seem daunting and intimidating at times. But if you want to grow in a healthy way, it is something essential that you need to know. Yoni Mazor from PrimeTalk discusses the intricacies of accounting for Amazon sellers and for other e-commerce entrepreneurs.
In today’s episode, PrimeTalk has teamed up with Nachman Lieser, the founder, and CEO of ConnectBooks, an e-commerce accounting software with the simple goal of organizing your business data in such a way that you can make the best decisions for your company. ConnectBooks has created a niche market for themselves by focusing exclusively on third-party sellers. Built by accountants, you can be sure that this plug-in software will work for you in the most effective way possible.
Nachman Lieser talks about his humble start to how he created his accounting company, all before his 30th birthday. So if you’re a third-party seller, or a budding entrepreneur, or even someone with an interest in the back end of the business, then this episode is for you!
Click the link to learn more about ConnectBooks.
Click the link to learn more about GETIDA Amazon reimbursement solutions.
Yoni Mazor 0:05
Hi everybody. Welcome to another episode of PrimeTalk. Today I have a special guest. I'm having Nachman Lieser. Nachman is the founder and CEO of ConnectBooks, which is a leading e-commerce accounting software. Nachman, welcome to the show.
Nachman Lieser 0:21
Hi Yoni, thanks for having me on the show.
Yoni Mazor 0:23
Our pleasure. So today's episode is going to be all about you. All about the Nachman Lieser story. So you're gonna share with us who are you, where are you from, where were you born, where'd you grow up, how'd you enter the professional world. So I guess without further ado, let's jump right into it.
Nachman Lieser 0:40
Amazing. All right, so my name is Nachman Lieser and I'll start off a little bit with my background. I grew up in Brooklyn, attended orthodox schools throughout my, right, elementary and then we go high school. After that, you know, got married and, you know, as in the orthodox community we got married young, I started to work very early on in my career.
Yoni Mazor 1:08
So well how old were you when you got married for example?
Nachman Lieser 1:12
I was 20.
Yoni Mazor 1:13
Very good. And you said Brooklyn, which part of Brooklyn?
Nachman Lieser 1:18
Borough Park.
Yoni Mazor 1:19
Borough Park. Very good alright so you were already 20 years old, you grew up in Borough Park, you got married and where’d you start working?
Nachman Lieser 1:27
So what happened was...I was...I was learning at that time, you know, studying rabbinical college and stuff like that after my marriage usually, that's the custom in our tradition that we were like, for I say like a year or two after you get married, so it's like a half year after I got married and I was still learning and at some point you know financial difficulties got very hard and my spouse was not able to continue working so I had to start looking for a job immediately.
Yoni Mazor 1:57
Hold on, so the first years of your marriage you were mainly focused on studying to become a rabbi and rabbinical college?
Nachman Lieser 2:03
Yeah, it's not studying to become a rabbi. I think it's just plain studying and it's just you know it's basically like staying in school to a certain extent, but after you get married like another year or two it's just custom. that the way you're, you know, especially get married so young you're setting up your life for the future and in the orthodox tradition it's, you know, like if you're setting up your future it's better to stay in school like for another year, you know, and you know, it's not like the school I mean they're very easy-going it's different, but you know just at least your head is focused on your studies and stuff like that for the first year or two of marriage when you're laying the grounds.
Yoni Mazor 2:41
Yeah share with us, with the audience, like, you know, especially the audience that's not really too diverse in the Jewish world, right in the Jewish orthodox world, so in the studies what do you study? what kind of topics you guys cover or what's the mindset at least?
Nachman Lieser 2:56
Everyone is different, you know what I'm saying? there are these big communities in Lakewood, these communities in Brooklyn, depends on the type of, you know, there's a lot of different sex, sects in the orthodox community, so depends on what type, you know, liquid they focus more on one on different topics you know in other places they focus more you know we focus a lot more on the Talmud or words, whether it's studying the actually the Jewish law, you know getting all the laws and interpreting it and getting in very detail and stuff like that.
Yoni Mazor 3:28
And what was your major so to speak what was your main focus?
Nachman Lieser 3:32
As I said before, we didn't have any...my major, was more like in the Talmud, but it's wasn't you know, there are two parts. there are some people that go in and get married you know they get married and they like can stay 10 years. I actually have a friend who got married the same time as me and he just actually spoke to me I spoke to him last week and he's like oh I'm starting to work now, I mean you know he was able to pull it off 10 years. something that I wasn't able to do but some people go into master and you know they attend to come out something else most of us know like we just go a lot for like just a year or two just you know as I said it's very different when you're all day in work, and your head is focused let's say or you're a politician or you're a journalist or you're busy doing accounting, when you come home at the end of the day and you want to like you know just relax and you want to have a little conversation, a little cup of tea, where is your mind going to drift first? is your mind going to drift into politics? is your mind going to drift into the stock market? Is your mind gonna drift in business? Is your mind gonna drift on vacation? Or your mind is gonna just maybe about a little bit about the Talmud or about you know tradition and
Yoni Mazor 4:39
Let’s talk for a second, to just expand a little bit on the horizons of the audience. So, correct me if I'm wrong, so the Talmud is essentially the commentary right? The job of the, you know, the rabbi's, Jewish rabbis about oral Torah right? The Torah is like the script that we got from Moses right? And that was in writing. But there's also the Oral Torah, which was passed from one generation to another orally, verbally until it was finally written down. And then the Talmud came in as a major, major project of commentary on it. So we can really understand the nuance of, you know, the faith, the traditions, the laws, the rules. And it's very, very rich, very diverse, and very challenging because there's a lot of conflicts inside. Really, the art of the conflict is really laid out in the Talmud, where you have opinions, ideas, and how do you settle them? How do you convince one side, convince the other side with their, I guess, philosophy or take on it, or commentary on it, and sometimes they agree that somebody wants a conflict that sometimes they just agree to disagree, and there's no resolution? So it's the fact that once you dive into that world, that becomes a very fascinating project that you see how, you know, the Jewish traditional mind works, in terms of challenging each other disagreeing or agreeing, or, you know, agree to disagree. So this is you saying, once you go back from a hard day at work, your mind is not necessarily in sports, politics, stock market, it's more about, you know, my, my faith, my traditions, and, you know, my history, my, the connection that we have to the past, that's what you want to have more in your mind, then. Then other things, was that kind of the mindset that?
Nachman Lieser 6:17
Yeah it really, it depends really, where your head is all day. And you know, if your head is all day in tradition, and you know, studying all those other stuff, you know, you're a different person, that different kind of person, you're not going to be this wild animal down the street, because you're, you're indoors, you're studying, you're thinking of being a human. It was just interesting, as you were like describing more about the Talmud, just one very interesting quote of the Talmud, which in today's days is, you know, it's a little different. But they said when they used to argue a lot back and forth, and these are great sages, and they would argue bitterly, and you know, try to prove each other right or wrong, back and forth all day. But when you came into this, to the synagogue and the place where they were studying, you would think that they're better enemies, because of the way they were fighting with each other, but when they left, they were very, they were good friends. And there was never such a thing in when they were agreeing or disagreeing. That was a personal matter or something that they were insulting somebody. It was they agreed, they disagreed, but it was all about the lows all about the Bible all about the Talmud, and once they were out. They were friends, you know, there's no, there are no issues.
Yoni Mazor 7:26
Brothers, yeah, they're brothers, where they unite their understanding that this is all done for, for a higher purpose. And this is on an intellectual level, it's nothing personal, it's intellectual. You know, very much like two lawyers, you have two lawyers in a court arguing for their clients, usually, for the lawyer's end, they don't take it personally, they might get very heated on one another, you know because they're trying to basically win the case.
Nachman Lieser 7:47
And it's hard to see, it's hard to see. If you have a case like a serial killer, and you have like two top lawyers fighting with each other, that they should go out for coffee 10 minutes later, after the court case. To be honest, I don't know if I will, if I would, you know, I have to have a high profile lawyer, I don't know if I'll be happy to be talking to the other lawyer.
Yoni Mazor 8:07
Well, I’ll tell you this much. My father is a lawyer. And I know that sometimes, you know, he's assigned to a case, and then he has to argue it. And then a very good friend of his, a lawyer from school, even the school days is on the other side. So they do the best for their clients. And they bitterly, you know, fight over the case. And then once it's done, there's still friendliness. So friends is not an intellectual professional level. You know, sometimes it's not the case, sometimes you have a totally different lawyer you never heard of, and then you really don't like their style. And then you might have a personal feeling about it. But any case, just to borrow a little bit from the world of, you know, lawyers, sometimes you have those elements wherein court, when it's the case being debated one way or another can be that doesn't have to be a murder case, can be also financial case of, you know, I want to get $10 million from the insurance and you're suing for 100 million dollars, and you're fighting over a certain amount of money, but you're doing it passionately on a professional level. Once the argument is done, and they go out and have some coffee together. It's all good. It's all in good faith. So just to borrow a little bit from there, like you're saying, it's never a personal thing. It's more on the intellectual level once they get out of the synagogue, all right. The (Hebrew word) they call it, they're good to go just as a brother, as united as one, especially with the faith. So this is kind of the world you surround yourself, you know, growing up and also especially after you got married to make sure you have that, continue to continue that mindset. And that was important to you. And I guess also for your family and your wife as well because obviously, she supported it. So this is kind of the backstory of how you entered the world as an adult to take us to the next station. You did two years of that and well what happened next?
Nachman Lieser 9:36
So it wasn't 2 years. That was on the plan for two years, but like six months after I got married, as I started bearing certain financial difficulties because I, you know, we got we get paid for learning at some points, you know, we get something but it's very little, and then my wife was unable to continue working to unforeseen circumstances.
Yoni Mazor 9:57
Oh, so she was working? When you got married?
Nachman Lieser 9:58
She was working, yeah, she was working.
Yoni Mazor 10:03
And you’re paying for this college or the rabbinical college was actually
Nachman Lieser 10:06
Yeah yeah but they pay nothing. They pay like maybe four or 500 a month. it's nothing but it's...when you get married and you know you're living in a one-bedroom apartment and you don't have any expenses, you know, it makes it easier. So I was, I started, I had to start looking for work from one day to the next, and I saw I just couldn't make it and it's not like I was prepping for anything. it's not like I had six months to prep, two weeks to prep. I started to scout out and started to look for a job. so I've put up my resume and I can say I probably sent that out to over 100, definitely emailed that over 100 places, went to a lot of places, and didn't even get any interviews to be honest.
Yoni Mazor 10:48
And what year was this when you launched out the resumes, you were basically in the street looking for a job...what year was that?
Nachman Lieser 10:55
Correct just when i was 20. So I got married right when I turned 20, and I was like 20 and a half like at that point.
Yoni Mazor 11:02
Yeah, but which year? Like 2000 and? 2011. You for the first time I guess for yourself you were, you know, shipping out your resumes, trying to score a job.
Nachman Lieser 11:15
Yeah and now I live in a suburb area, Muncie, New York, which is like 30 miles north of the city. Today it's a very built-up place, it has changed a lot in the last four or five years especially with a good economy and also the city has been booming as well a lot of people are moving out of the city because prices are going crazy high in houses and stuff like that. So today the suburb is completely different, I would say it's almost like a city where we live today, but when I got married here, you know it was nine and a half years ago, it was like half a desert. I don't know. Past 8 o'clock there are no stores open, you know, there were very few businesses here, they weren't that many businesses, the economy wasn't booming, we only three years after 2008. It was a slow economy, everything was slow. so it was really hard at that point to go out and make a living. Would it have been the same if you know somebody like gets married you know starts to look today for a job its way easier? I mean, first of all, there are way more, many businesses...
Yoni Mazor 12:20
today in Muncie, where you live, Muncie is like 30 minutes north of Manhattan you know it's they call it upstate a little bit you know it's really also the border with the state of New Jersey today is much easier because the city is more robust more, you know, larger population more businesses that are there.
Nachman Lieser 12:40
I mean, right, I'm saying there is COVID going around and there are those industries that were hardly affected by COVID and you know people still claiming unemployment but I'm saying pre-COVID yeah? Pre-COVID was no big deal to get a job. Even now with certain industries you know, certain industries are back to normal e-commerce is back to normal you know there's a lot of retail you know some can somewhat get around that the restaurants were actually hit hard. But I'm saying put COVID aside, you know, today it's, in terms of getting a job, today it's definitely easier than it was, you know, in the past.
Yoni Mazor 13:14
Take us back nine years ago, you were filing your resume, and what happened?
Nachman Lieser 13:17
So nothing. I wasn't really getting too many job offers. Went to this, I call, I reached out a few places you know try to get somewhere and first of all, they weren't that many jobs, you know, like when I want to the listing in the local papers to look like for a job, there weren't that many, like wasn't like today, it's like maybe five-six pages, like full of small ads. Then was maybe one or two pages.
Yoni Mazor 13:40
And what were you looking for? What did you feel you can do or?
Nachman Lieser 13:43
At that point, nothing, anything, and everything was what I was... I just needed to cover.I had like two weeks left to the first and you know I needed to pay rent.
Yoni Mazor 13:51
Wow. Okay, so what happened?
Nachman Lieser 13:54
So what happened was I had a friend who had a...he had a taxi company and he was kind of more like a taxi that we service in the community here and he kept on making me crazy and told me listen you know come drive me and I'm like no I'm not doing this and he's like just come. And then it came to a point where like I was, I had to make a decision you know? Either I'm going to miss the rent payment or I'm just gonna you know get into this taxi car and get it done. And then he called me up and he's like listen I got now another new vehicle. If you come now you'll get it and I was like okay I'm gonna come. So I ended up getting in there getting into the car and you know driving around i..my hours were...I had to do 50 hours a week we started off at eight o'clock in the morning I had to be ready you know because people got to get to the office at nine, so that was one of our busiest hours and then we would go roughly till went to six o'clock sometimes a little later sometimes they were open till 10 maybe something.
Yoni Mazor 14:59
How did people usually get paid for driving? Is it tips-based or is it hourly-based?
Nachman Lieser 15:01
No, so it was commissioned-based. We had, at that point the company was pretty new, was a new concept in our community to have like a car service from the community, so they tried to, you know, given that the driver should make money. So they used to give us 50% of what we earned. So let's say if I were to bring in $1200 a week, I would get $600 a week.
Yoni Mazor 15:24
So they dispatch you? But somebody calls in for a ride, they dispatch you?
Nachman Lieser 15:28
They had, yeah it was livery service. They weren't, we didn't really pick up by stands, you know, stuff like that. It's not like you look, like, it's people called in the company had ads, the company has ads running all over, and people would call the dispatcher and the dispatcher would look on the screen and usually what they would try to do is they will see your dropping off and let's say in this location they will try to get your call like from a minute from there so that's how you don't drive around empty right? So that would, that was the dispatchers, that was their job all day to get all the calls, and then we just had to drive and take people all over.
Yoni Mazor 15:59
How long did you stay in this position?
Nachman Lieser 16:02
So I started this position and I was, just like, I'd say around six-seven months and then I, at some point, while I was in the position, it was pretty hard then I was thinking you know what I can do? and what type of normal business can I go into? I was thinking of all different angles as you know and something that stuck with me was accounting and I decided that I want to really go more for a profession. I didn't really have at the moment any money to open a business or didn't even have the kind of experience or anything necessary. I mean, I remember even thinking of doing like a car rental company or something like because it wasn't really too many the name wasn't really anything in the neighborhood but then I was like, you know, even how do you begin like I mean what I know today is different than what I know that but you know like when people know the business doesn't even think about financial accounting but even before that like just to get all the legal stuff and everything. it was just too much. so I didn't like to get anywhere with it and then I decided to start you know getting for accounting and that's when I started to work, you know, my ideas of going to school and you know learning you know of our profession and that's where I that's when I started to think about it. so while I was thinking I had an issue that I was working way too many hours to go to school so I came up with an idea to get a CDL license and do some school bus driving.
Yoni Mazor 17:32
CDL license? What’s that?
Nachman Lieser 17:35
Uh, commercial driver’s license. Yeah, so I ended up going for a commercial driver's license. and the commercial driver's license, i was able to, you know, they had a schedule that where you can drive you basically you work for a school, so the schools, some schools, you know, they get through the government, you know, they get on the buses, you know, the district the school district gives and gives on the buses, and then there was a lot of private schools. especially the private, you know, where you have private schools where they have their own busing. so now they're on busing, they need somebody, you know, to be available eight o'clock in the morning, you know, pick up the older kids and then there are smaller kids that are a little later and then you got to do a couple of shifts on the way home. so what they'll usually do is they'll pay you like a full-time salary, but you're not really working more than like five hours a day. so you're starting off in the morning at eight o'clock. wasn't really for the future. I wasn't looking, like, to be a school bus driver for a job. but I was looking for the next two years to go to school, so I figured, you know, like, if I can wake up in the morning at eight o'clock and you know me to wake up earlier but I'll start driving at a finish at 10 and then I get a break for four hours.
Yoni Mazor 18:39
So essentially you're able to earn the same kind of amount of living, but work much significantly fewer hours and that opened up space for you to actually study, you know, a profession and become an accountant or...smart okay very good.
Nachman Lieser 18:52
And then what happened was is that the day I passed my road test, I mean how to take the road test like three times because commercial is not a simple test, each road test takes an hour, so finally I passed the road test and my manager from the office calls me up and says listen I want to talk to you. So I said okay I got into the office. He said we're looking to get in another dispatcher in the office. I think you would be the right fit. Do you want to accept the offer? so I think at that point you know it's I was sitting on the road during the day, by the way, it's very annoying, and to be honest, these days when I'm driving, I mean, I really don't drive too much because my office is like a block away from my house but you know if I go to the grocery or Sunday or anytime I'm driving and a taxi guy wants to cut me off or he's in a rush I always let him go because I really feel pain from these people. it's not easy sitting on the road 10 hours and you know they're like they're rushing to drop off the customer so they finish the call early so they can take the next customer they make an extra $2. and it's frustrating and you're like just sitting and taking your easy time because you're not working on Sunday or whatever you're not doing and this guy is just getting all upset.
Yoni Mazor 20:03
You’ve been there, you've done that, so you have appreciation. You know, you open up the way for them. that's very nice.
Nachman Lieser 20:08
Yeah so what happened was at that point I was like, I had enough of sitting on the road 10 hours a day especially driving local the same streets over and over. So i was still thinking of doing you know the bussing, but when I got the offer to do something in an office I figured it's gonna be way easier for me even if I have to put in like you know nine to six hours but at least I come home at night I'll you know be able to study and stuff like that.
Yoni Mazor 20:33
And did they pay the same or they paid a bit more?
Nachman Lieser 20:36
No, they paid more but it was very different with salary requirements, you know, there are times when the car service industry is very slow, especially in our, you know, parts like, you know, the car service is really more, it was more like servicing the community. I mean we picked up anybody but typically, you know, was the community, the people like to use us we have times, you know, like let's say for example in the summer, we have like the three weeks from when the temple was burnt where people don't really party and people don't do go swimming, people don't go attractions, we don't go anywhere, there are times where it was really hard you know.
Yoni Mazor 21:10
Lemme just help out a bit here, you know, so yeah during the summertime usually there's about three weeks that the orthodox Jewish people they kind of remember the days where there used to be a siege and destruction of the temple, yeah there are two temples that we had and both they got destroyed in the same day historically, which is you know a wonder of its own. but there was a siege of three weeks that led to the destruction of the temple and those three weeks that's when we kind of you know since that siege became about three weeks that's when the temple got destroyed in those three weeks usually lands on the summertime we keep it easy we tone it down, we don't, we don't have weddings, we don’t have parties, we just you know, to commemorate the destruction of the temple, so saying those you know during those three weeks in the summer that's when the big you know business for the car service became much much slower because you know there's no swimming pools, no party, no...so much less traffic so to speak and less business for you guys to do right?
Nachman Lieser 22:04
Yeah and if you're working a commission-based salary and you have to knock out 50 hours a week and sometimes you’re just sitting in a car for about half an hour doing nothing like what can you do? There's nothing I was able to do. It's not like you know I'm not, it's not like I'm a salesman. I gotta knock on another 20 stores. I'm just relying on, you know, what it is. So it was easier to go into, you know, to go into the office and I wasn't sitting on the road anymore. So I decided to give it a shot. So I ended up switching over into the company and I became a dispatcher. Dispatcher actually is a very difficult job. At that point, our computer system was pretty good but I'm saying we didn't even have tablets yet we still had radios and we didn't have any major sophistication. It was more like it was a database and access and basically what I had is every time a person would call in, I had a list of like 30 other drivers on the road and I would need to memorize where every driver was dropping off the next call in order to be able to give good service to people, like tell them okay I’ll have a car in like 5-10 minutes and some people just say listen I don't have anything before an hour so it was kind of very hectic and when it gets
Yoni Mazor 23:13
You had to do the uber calculation like the GPS right? Where is he located? So you become like a real, like a radar so that can be very challenging and daunting because you've got to keep chasing the next one and the next one. Okay, so how long did you stay in that position of a dispatcher? What was the next station for you?
Nachman Lieser 23:26
I was there for like another six months as a dispatcher and then what happened was, as I was in the dispatch, I was working with the office, the boss didn't live in Muncie, he lived more upstate in Monroe, that's like 30 minutes north from Muncie. So they had another location in Monroe where the boss used to work and he would run that location. Then he had a manager which came, which ran the Muncie location, where I was working. So we sat together in one office with a manager you know like when I went out for lunch or if the phone lines were a little bit quiet, there was also another dispatcher so I was able to like you know just go away for a couple of minutes. We used to talk a lot and we became very good friends and he relied a lot on me and if, you know, if he couldn't come in one day he would, you know, ask me, you know, what's going on? Where are the drivers are up to? What things are doing? So I ended up, you know, getting some type of, you know, good relationship with him and he is the owner of the company and he has two locations. One in Monroe, one in Muncie right? So in the Muncie location, we had the manager, so the owner never used to come to the Muncie location, he’d come like once a month. So at that point I used to, but I used to talk a lot with a manager, so since I was in the office, I had the opportunity but you know the Muncie office and the location where I was working I had the opportunity to get to know the manager on a personal level and he got to know me on a personal level and it's not just about the person, was about my responsibilities and you know I was if they needed anything extra whatever they need to contribute, you know, I was always there and I was a good resource and I did a good job. What happened was the manager himself started a different business with a partner, a packaging business. And they, his original plans were more than the partner would run the business and he was the money guy, he had some money put away, which he invested. At that point, he decided he can't move forward as his partner. And they decided to part ways and he took over the business. So once he had his own packaging business where he basically makes bubble wrap, like, if you go to Walmart, do you want to ship something out, you know, you got to buy some bubble wrap, that's he buys the ingredients, he has machinery that he brought in, and he, you know, puts together that wrap. So he decided to take over the business. And he wasn't really, he wasn't capable anymore of managing, you know, this car service company, because the car service company, you know, got to be there eight o'clock in the morning, and we closed at 10. And there was a lot of work. And also, dealing with drivers is not the easiest. They're not, you know, the...whatever. So it's kind of like...
Yoni Mazor 25:59Tough crowd.
Nachman Lieser 26:01
It’s a tough crowd because it's not an ideal job that the person you want to work with, you know, if you're working, for example, you know, like today, where I'm working in an office, it's the people who I choose I want to work with and I can pick you to know, people with, cause they’re skilled people there. We were talking about unskilled labor, so it makes it 10 times harder. So at that point, he decided he had to leave. So the owner started to look for a new replacement as the manager, and they couldn't, it went by two months, they're gonna find one, the manager said, Listen, I got a great guy. I know he's young, I know he doesn't have any experience. But I feel that he can do the job, I'll guide him and walk him through to be a manager. So they were like back and forth. And then it came today where you said, Okay, listen, I'm not showing up anymore. And, you know, I give you really like three months notice and figure it out. So they had no other choice. And they decided they're going to move forward with me. So then I really got upgraded. And that's when I became the manager of the car service company. It was very challenging, because I was at the age you can get, you know, probably like around 21 and a half, and I had to start managing 35 employees.
Yoni Mazor 27:02
So, let's get this straight. So within a year, you started the job. But you know, a year later you were basically the manager of this company?
Nachman Lieser 27:09
Correct. Yes.
Yoni Mazor 27:10
So it happens to be, you did work hard. And you, and when the opportunity came and called, you stepped up to the plate, you put your focus on it and it happened. Okay, so 35 employees under us, you got the dispatchers, and the drivers and the whole party is, you know, being managed by yourself.
Nachman Lieser 27:27
Yeah, and it was difficult. I mean, it was difficult for us just, you know, the whole responsibility fell on me because the boss lived in Monroe. And it was really like two separate businesses. I mean, it was one corporation, but we were completely separate. So if it wasn't busy. At that point, I had to start doing sales. So I have to get involved in marketing, advertising. I had to change around how we paid drivers, I came up with a plan for how drivers could earn more money. I remember I faced one issue that the good drivers were leaving because the thing was when I'm making enough, so I had to change the way we paid them. So what happened was better drivers were able to make, like $12-1300 a week, you know, after that commission pay. So we changed around on a lot of things. And you know, I was you know, working around and the hardest part was that they were all my co-workers and all of a sudden I became their boss. Some drivers left because of that, they just couldn't work with it. They couldn't take it. But I ultimately tried to be very nice to everybody and very understanding and we worked for hand in hand. And you know, I took the company on to complete new level. I think when I started off the position, the company wasn't profitable, and I took the company into a profitable stage. So that was one that I did. So what happened was, I had already started my accounting career. So I started to study for my bachelor's degree,
Yoni Mazor 28:46
Where’d you study?
Nachman Lieser 28:48
So I did a, there is a program through Excelsior college, where basically you can clap away a lot of CLEPS, and you can
Yoni Mazor 28:57
So just let me help you here. So CLEP is College Level Examination Program, there's a, it's a CLEP program, or the college level examination program, is where you can actually test, take a test and know about the subject and if you score well on it, you're going to be able to get all the credits and that's kind of a shortcut that can be used and done in order to get college credits and then use your credits. And present those CLEP credits to a college, they accept it, and then they'll give you a degree. So you did that with Excelsior?
Nachman Lieser 29:24
Yeah, Excelsior. So I started to work through Excelsior. There is help in the community, you know, there is a program that guides you, you know, people that they're like mentors and they guide you through how to get this bachelor's and like which studies, you know, which studies do you wanna, you know, like, you know, take tests on what do you want to study which subjects you want to get into and you know, from how you, what tasks you should take. So I was looking at the long-term goal, my long-term goal was to go for accounting, a master's in accounting. So in order to get into the master’s program, I just needed this bachelor's. So I started to work in the bachelors. I think I started, you know when I was a dispatcher still. So I finally, and I continued throughout the school, it took me roughly a year. And a year, within one year, I finished the whole program, meaning it wasn't, it was the major was a liberal art, you know, it wasn't like anything in accounting because it wasn't necessary. So I was just looking to get into the Master's Course. And, like, just I said, I can go to this program and get you this bachelor's, and, you know, like few credits and math writing, English and stuff like that. They were like, okay, as long as you get all these requirements, you know, you can join the program. So that's when I started the bachelors. And then I continued on. I finished a Bachelor's. And then I was the manager, managing another car service company. And that's when I started the masters. So the Masters was like, kind of different. We had to join the Masters in accounting, we had like a prereq, where basically, we took like, a very advanced bookkeeping course. And then we had to take tests, and you know, they were very, like, harsh, and you know, like, like,
Yoni Mazor 31:06
What school? Was this Excelsior?
Nachman Lieser 31:08
No, so I didn't go. Then I went to FDU. So in FDU they basically, uh FDU is Fairleigh Dickinson University, they have two locations. I think one in Teaneck, New Jersey, and they have one in I think somewhere else in New Jersey, not sure. Oh, yeah, the other one is I think in more central Jersey, but they have two locations. And then there was a program in a community that ran through FDU. So what some people did is they wanted to help people get jobs. So said people working full time, you can't just drop and go to school. So what they did is they made a master's program, which was approved by the school and was all you know, you needed all the requirements, whatever the school wanted to get, like, you know, you had to Intermediate Accounting, accounting, you know, business and business law, whatever hey gave in the school. And they, we did it on Sundays. And then we did like one evening during the week. So basically, you can keep your full-time job. And underside you can attend school, they brought professors, every single professor was from professors who taught on campus. So we had the on-campus experience, wasn't on campus, but we were able to, you know, we got everything the same. Everything was done the same. And then the test or one or approved by campus, we even actually had in one of the cohorts, we had one of the deans sent even his son to join us because our class was, the semesters were quicker than what you do on campus. If you do this on campus, it would take two years. They did it in a year. I mean, it was a very tough, hard, tight schedule, but it's doable. So I started I wanted to start joining this, this program, and I started the first I like a requirement like a two-month requirement. You do like a prereq. And it was very hard to manage a car service business and go to school. What happened primarily, let's say Sunday, when I had to be there for like, three, four hours. We were I you know, I had a company running, and people needed to get through to me, people needed to call me, people had questions, and I couldn't just like turn off my phone. And then the, like the biggest nightmare was when it started to snow here upstate, you know, snow gets kind of slippery here. And they all have cars, you know, didn’t have four-wheel drive. I mean, we had snow tires on all the cars but it was like, you know, I'm getting a phone call. Okay, so it's starting to snow now. And at one point, we had an accident. So what happened was we started to close down the company, every time snow came down. We just closed the company. So I was like, okay, should I close? I stay open, How bad is it? Is it that slippery, and also the beginning of the snow before they even have a chance to plow when they have like the little, that little thin sheet of snow? It's like the most slippery as ever. And we were like, I was like, Okay, I couldn't focus. I like you went back into class and couldn't think about anything. And I just ended up making some decisions and then ended up leaving class. And then it came to a point where I realized that this school is really hard and tough. And it's not something that I will be able to do at the same time as, you know, managing a car service company. Also, we were open from eight in the morning till 10 at night so I had to be on call even in the evenings and like I had like one night, 12 o'clock, the driver calls me up. My car broke down. So I'm like where are you? Can you leave it there till the morning? No, because I'm blocking for other parking spots, they’re coming home soon. You got to go down. I had to get dressed and go down and try to get the car out and then have to get a tow truck. It took like two hours at like one o'clock in the morning to get a tow truck and then I had to tow it and I got everything done, but you can’t...
Yoni Mazor 34:42
Yeah, so it was basically surrounding you so tightly. It was very hard to, I guess, progress into the master's program. Yeah. So you dropped out?
Nachman Lieser 34:48
Correct. So at that, you know, at that point, I had an uncle who, have an uncle who has been, you know, he had a large business, used to have a large business at some point
Yoni Mazor 34:59
Doing what? What was the business?
Nachman Lieser 35:02
He used to manufacture furniture and sell it. A lot of his like office furniture. But he was a manufacturer, he made it. Yeah. What happened was when people started importing from China, that's when he went out of business. So he went out of business at that point, because it just couldn't compete with all those people at that point. My grandfather used to have a Coat Factory here in the US and make coats and stuff like that. He had like 30 workers, a small business, but made a very nice living out of it. But once you, people started importing, like stuff from China, these people weren't trained for it. And they just didn't know how to transition their business and they just blew away. So my uncle at that point, you know, he, he was, I mean, he's in a different business today. But at that point, and I, I called him up, and I figured I'm gonna ask him what to do. I told him, listen, I have a job here. I have a good job. I like my job. It's very challenging, but at the same time, I cannot do both. So he says to me, Nachman when you're going to be 30 years old, what do you want to be? Do you want to be an accountant? Or do you want to be a car service manager? So I told him, I want to be, I want to be an accountant. So he said, can you afford to drop the job and go to school? I said, Yes, I can afford to drop my job and go to school.
Yoni Mazor 36:19
How's that? You had savings? How are you able to do so?
Nachman Lieser 36:21
Now, I still have my CDL license, and I figured I was just gonna drive buses, I was gonna go, it was like a little bit of a downgrade, you know, to be the manager and then go become a bus driver. But I figured, listen, this is not any major future for me. And I wasn't really interested in staying in the industry. So the good part about the license is that I had it in my back pocket, I was just always able to fall back on it. So I call them my boss the next day. And I tell them that, you know, listen, I want to give you notice, and how much time do I have to give you. So he was all shocked. He says what, I wasn't happy? So he said, you know, give me another day or two, because he had another business and it couldn't just say said, I have a holiday coming up. You know, we're closer and come down to the office and let's discuss. So again, I went down to his office, and I told him basically, you know, I am just interested in pursuing my career. So he understood that he tried to convince me so he's not getting anywhere. So he said, Okay, fine, let's shake hands and move on. So the boss, that owned a car service company had a kitchen manufacturing business as well, where he manufactured kitchens in China. It was a big wholesaler. He wasn't that big at that time. But he used to import cabinets from China and sell it to local retailers selling New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Massachusetts, you know, I think today, he's selling all over the United States. So he at that point, calls me up the next day, says, Listen, you know, I never take one worker from one business to the next. But being that I know you so well, you're such a good worker, you're saying that you're going for an accounting degree? I need a bookkeeper in my company, do you want to take the position? So I was thinking to myself then and you know, I wasn't sure if he was playing games with me or something. But he offered me a nice salary. And it was, it was like in the league on accounting, like I was gonna learn to account here, I'm gonna do bookkeeping, so. So I figured that you know, it's a good opportunity. So I accepted the offer. And I already had a job for a bus driving company. So I had to, I had to find a replacement, but I found something very quickly. And that's when I started really, to get into accounting. So I started
Yoni Mazor 38:33
This is already what? 2012 or 13?
Nachman Lieser 38:36
This is probably, later on, it's very, almost, I think, in 14.
Yoni Mazor 38:38
14. 2014. After three years of kind of starting from the root, you know, the grassroots of, you know, being a, you know, car driver, all the way to bookkeeping, for a manufacturing company, and you know, the kitchen industry.
Nachman Lieser 38:54
Yeah, so I didn't have major experience in bookkeeping, but he had a previous bookkeeper there and he gave me some basic training, and then I learned a lot on the job and picked everything up. He just knew me as a person and I did a wonderful job in his previous company so he wasn't just gonna let me
Yoni Mazor 39:08
Tell you to continue your education and complete the master's?
Nachman Lieser 39:11
Yeah, so as bookkeeping, he was closed Sundays. So Sundays I had no, I just turned off my phone Sunday morning, I went to school for a full day. And just I enjoyed it a lot. And then whenever I need to study, I just turned off my phone, you know, hours were nine to five actually wasn't nine to five. But you know, any, any larger company, you're going to be putting in extra, but he knew one thing that when I'm in school, I'm in school and there's nothing he can do.
Yoni Mazor 39:37
But when you work, you get the job done, it might take you seven hours or six hours or nine hours, but you get it done. Doesn’t matter. So even if for one or two hours your phone was off, because you're in school for whatever reason. You're good to go.
Nachman Lieser 39:48
I mean, to be honest, each employer, they're not really allowed to demand that employee at eight o'clock at night to answer the phone. You know what I'm saying, I had to tell them and listen, it's after hours. You know, I gotta do what I got to do, but I don't mind.
Yoni Mazor 40:00
But it’s less, it's less demanding when you really have a car service when it's i know you got to go get the car out, or the client, or the accident or whatever it is right so it's not as demanding. Alright, so what's the next station for you? You got your degree. You're in bookkeeping...
Nachman Lieser 40:14
So I started to do a lot of bookkeeping work there and it was a big company, very complex. you know a lot of things were out of place and took me time to figure things out and to work my way around I end up gaining a ton of experience. A lot of experience especially in terms of inventory. We had a warehouse of 100,000 square feet and then we had another warehouse of like 30,000 square feet and I had to get inventory values. FIFO, LIFO, average cost all this stuff we're starting to pile in. We also did for the company a couple of big bank loans in the millions you know so I had to build all the financial documents for the bank. Now it was easier for me because I was going to school so I knew exactly, I know exactly what the bank wanted and then when the bank like, and then the other good part was that while I was in school as the teacher would teach something I would understand exactly what the teacher is trying to point out and then if I, when I came back to work the next day I would try it out over there and like do different reports and you know and just understand different things, you know, differently like for example what's the average age of a product line inventory shelf now that's not really more that's not really an accounting question but it involves a lot in accounting because you have to know what your turnover ratio is and we have known all these rations, you have to know all these numbers, and if your books are right, and everything is right you can figure this out very easily. So I worked in the company I'd say roughly like about another three years or more three and a half years and I was working in a company at the time attending school. So I was waiting till I finished school until I was done with a master's and actually graduated and got my degree. So I actually graduated, got my degree, everything was done and I was getting edgy at that point, sitting in a job because I wanted to do something eventually on my own and I wanted to progress more. I felt like you know reached the max and I want to go now into my own space and continue going out so i decided to pursue the route of working for an accountant. And then opening my own accounting firm. So I started to you know to go around local accounting firms I did go to try going to manhattan to a couple of accounting firms also tried at Lloyd’s but I didn't want to go to those bigger big floors, I didn’t like the culture and, you know, the way you have to climb the ladder takes forever in these big companies. But I went to a lot of local accounting firms and I even called up, I even called up one guy and I said I had an offer to work for somebody at night like I had a guy who had a, he was a distributor of fruits and vegetables, so the way they work is that people sent all the stores sending in orders during the day at night the market opens and there's a buyer and he goes around purchasing and then like a 12 o'clock at night he sends in the order. So what you need to do is you come to the office around 7, take all the orders that come in, you have to see what they have in stock, whatnot, then after the pier what the buyer needs to purchase once the buyer purchases you get all this stuff. so he told me the job like from six at night to like two in the morning and then you're free so I think they know they're a good idea and then I called a different account and i said, you know, would you hire me like from nine to three, like I’d even work for free I said. I was so desperate to get in somewhere and he was like why do you want to work for free and what when and where. But what happened was at the end of the day, every place I went to, for some reason, they didn't want to take me in. Like a couple of people asked me like so you're going to come here for two years and then go open your own firm? I said listen, I'm not lying to you, I'm not, I felt like very, not, I didn't know how to lie at the time, I said no I'm not planning to stay forever when I knew right away as soon as I have my knowledge I want to leave, but I said I don't know if I'll leave after two years but you know I'm not staying here forever. So what happened was I mean, when I look at it today from a perspective, a different perspective, is that any of these people would have said listen I have a good candidate here let me train him in and give him maybe some type of like partnership and his clients then maybe you know I would have stuck around but at the end, I couldn't find any job and accounting firm so what I had a lot of knowledge and expertise was on bookkeeping and I saw there was an opportunity to open up a bookkeeping company. There's quite a lot here in the area also so what I did was I decided to open a bookkeeping company where I do bookkeeping for small to medium-sized businesses. So at that point, I told my boss you know I'm going to be leaving, going on my own career, gave him like three months notice and
Yoni Mazor 44:46
Which boss? The furniture company or the vegetable company?
Nachman Lieser 44:48
The furniture. The what? So yeah, so at that point, I'd already finished school, I finished everything and now I'm starting...I'm ready to go on my own. So I started off, gave, after i gave notice, this like you know started an office, rented an office, put in some furniture, got computers, and this is...yeah around the end of 17. So that's when I started around and I just started, went through my contacts, anybody in my contacts, called them up, listen I'm starting a business do you want any bookkeeping? I did get two people to sign up through my contacts and then found another few people, went around stores around here you know just doing sales and then I started picking up the business within like four or five months started getting busy and I hired my first employee and you know we moved up and scaled up the business. And then it came to a point where I started doing bookkeeping for Amazon sellers and I came into space.
Yoni Mazor 45:45
The moment the world of e-commerce entered into your life.
Nachman Lieser 45:47
That's exactly when. I actually had a, what happened was interesting, because I had an article in a certain paper, writing in English, it was like a sales pitch like in terms of you want accurate accounting, you know, and how to understand the ups and downs of the business, so I had like a nice article where I wrote exactly about my bookkeeping and then i had somebody reach out to me. He wanted an accounting. And what happened was there were two partners in one business, now the partners in Amazon, it was a private label account, they weren't, it wasn't like 50/50, it was like one guy has had an account and he had like five-six products another guy later came in and gave him money to build up, you know, to bring in more of those products he had to build up the account and then he brought in other products on his own. So the original partner wasn't a full partner in the Amazon business, he was a 50% partner just then just in his products and they were like and they got into some type of dispute and they will want to know move on but he wanted his profit so...
Yoni Mazor 46:50
It sounds like Talmudic, you know the conflict from the Talmud, after yeah see yeah all right so it was good yeah that a little bit of a rabbinical college experience.
Yoni Mazor 47:00
Yeah so I had to work on the, you know, reports for two years - they were in business for two years - so I took all the reports on Amazon, took all the PPC, storage fees, everything, all the fees, and I had to split everything up and had to get them a set of books. Then they were also concerned that they overpaid vendors, which I had to go through as well, and then I had to split their overhead, everything. So I finally got everything split up and I gave them the report. It took me a lot of time to do this and I even built my own excel sheet importer and stuff like that. Then in my office next to me, I had a friend, a neighbor I used to talk with a lot and he was a programmer, and we had like a small business where he did programming you know as he did like projects that say you want to build tomorrow website to know who does your website you want to believe stuff like a little in house application, he’ll build it for you. So I told him you know I was thinking to myself like how I can expand my bookkeeping services so I figured you know if I can, I saw that in amazon there’s more of a need and people tell me, you know, there is not really any good accounting software, there's no good, there are not too many people who have the knowledge in amazon. So I think to myself if I can jump in the space, but I think you know if I have a software cuz I spent like a good three to four months I mean not full time, I had a lot of other projects I was working on, but I spent a good few months you know straightening out this amazon account and if I would have had a good software I could have done this in no time. I could have done this job in like six weeks and I could have charged a quarter of the price you know? I charged a lot of money at that point, so he started telling me he can build me some type of software so that's where the whole ConnectBooks came in. At the moment when I asked him about it, we weren't even discussing selling it to the public, it was just more to build my company, my services.
Yoni Mazor 48:46
Right so you wanted to scale up your ability as a bookkeeping company to service the growing sector of amazon sellers or your clients and they need you to know efficient good and healthy bookkeeping in a timely matter, so you can offer more probably for a better price and build it internally to scale.
Nachman Lieser 49:03
Yeah so then I like, after like two months into the project, I started realizing that, you know, there is, you know, that this is really something I can sell to the public. I don't have to just keep it for me internally. so I started looking into, you know, marketing and getting a website and getting everything else done and, you know, that's really when ConnectBooks started really to progress.
Yoni Mazor 49:25
And you guys launched, what? In 2018 or 2019?
Nachman Lieser 49:30
We launched in January of 2019 so it's gonna be exactly now two years since we launched the software. So it was you know that's when we launched and we went to the first show by the ASGTG show, that was the first time the public heard about us. And we set up a booth there and people started thinking about us and ever since then, you know, the program took off and, you know, been, we've been doing well. Every month we're getting new clients signing up, new customers and you know that's where I got to today. And guess what I'm still not, I'm still not 30!
Yoni Mazor 50:01
Yeah very good. So you got you...yeah so let's do a quick recap. Right around 2001, you got married, and that's...oh right 2011. Sorry yeah, I shaved off another 10 years. Alright so 2011 you get married, enter the world of adulthood where, you know, you realize you gotta start working so you score a job as soon as possible in a car service company you got upgraded a few months later and to dispatcher than a few months later and to the manager of the whole company. You already had schooling going on and then you were on a trajectory of getting your master's degree. You also got your CDL, your commercial driver's license, and so you kept them in the back pocket and you did actually utilize them at some point so you can actually you know have a better setup for a job and also mixing school. And then as you're about to leave with the manager position you got switched over to the, you know, doing bookkeeping for his kitchen cabinet company and also you had a position, correct me if I’m wrong, you also had got a position in this vegetable food distributor or that's something you had or no?
Nachman Lieser 51:07
No, I never took it because I really realized that when, I realized at one point, sometimes like when people offer a lot of money for a particular job and I’m talking like any six-figure job, it's not going to be nine to five most times. And when this guy told me it's like from six to two, I told him that I was really smarter because the original job that I took was also officially supposed to be nine to five like 5 to 1.
Yoni Mazor 51:33
Got it, so you dodged that bullet, you never took that, and then essentially once you get your master's degree you decided to spread your wings you left the furniture company, and then you started bookkeeping service. And one thing led to another you had amazon sellers coming down to your doorstep saying help us. And you delved into the last few years of their work and scrutinized the whole thing understood who's against who, what was against what, and make sure that everything really makes sense to the client and also for yourself. That led you to invest in building software so you can use it yourself. That went well so you opened it up to the public, also known as amazon sellers, and so this is where you are today. And you called the software ConnectBooks so the side question, so the ConnectBooks is your main focus right now, or is also the bookkeeping company still is active and running?
Nachman Lieser 52:20
It's kind of hard. The bookkeeping company is a very good business, it makes a lot of money. It's a very different type of business you know? Software is something that you need to invest the amount of money we invested in the business of at this point over a million dollars. So it wasn't something that, you know, and it doesn't go overnight. It's a lot of hard work and a lot of that and you don't get clients along with it for the next to cover up your investment. So ConnectBooks is you know doing phenomenal and it's working its way up. In the bookkeeping company, it's more of a service-based business, so the investment you know, was more my schooling and my experience. It wasn't so much like you know the building, there's no tangible asset that i had to build into at that point.
Yoni Mazor 53:00
But you’re still running both businesses? They’re still running?
Nachman Lieser 53:04
Yeah, but what we did do in the bookkeeping company is we're streamlining the bookkeeping process as well. So we are focusing today only on amazon sellers so we don't accept new clients from other industries. It's just, it puts the company on the different roadmap when you have your niche and it's one thing that you want to do and you do it right and your employees as well, you know, you don't have to train them on five different industries like I used to.
Yoni Mazor 53:27
Nice. Got it. Makes sense, total sense. So you're running two businesses, you're a successful business owner with two tracks: one is bookkeeping, obviously, you are integrated into, specializing into amazon sellers or e-commerce sellers, and also, you know, having a SAAS business, software as a service, with ConnectBooks, so this is where we are today, right? This is quite a journey, quite an adventure for you, and you know, in only nine years and you’re still under 30 years old. So that's very good. Alright so thank you for sharing, you know, the whole experience, the whole journey. I appreciate it. I learned a few things so i always appreciate that as well. So to sign off this episode, I want to kind of sign off with two points: the first point will be if anybody wants to reach out, learn more about you, where can they find you? And the last thing will be is, you know, what is your message of hope and inspiration for amazon sellers or entrepreneurs listening out there?
Nachman Lieser 54:15
So the first thing is if you want to reach out to me you can go anytime to the website they can request or you know you can reach out to the team and if someone specifically wants to talk to me
Yoni Mazor 54:25
And the website is connectbooks.com?
Nachman Lieser 54:28
Correct. Connectbooks.com or you can find me on LinkedIn. Actually, I find LinkedIn today's powerful in a certain way where like people think that I always had the image that LinkedIn is always supposed to bring me business and like i try to post content that gives good value and that takes time and I don't have the time to do it. But I found LinkedIn to be a completely different source people from the outside world who, you know, like people in California or other companies or other like anybody and big service providers just want to partner up or just have a brief conversation with me, you know, they, they see my company, they're like, okay, I want to speak to the founder. So you just go on LinkedIn, you find me and you just send me a message. And I'll respond. It's kind of very powerful on that, on that end, had quite successful meetings going through LinkedIn like that. And then the message I would like to give out to people, is that rejection is very hard. And people always get rejection. But to grow in life, you have to accept the rejection, meaning it's not really accepted, you just have to, just to give like a little different angle, while I was driving for the taxi company, I had an option to work in a certain company, in B&H Photo, they’re in Manhattan, big, I think that one of the top 10 large private health companies in New York, so they have a lot of programmers, and they build that website and everything. So what they had at that point is they were looking for beginners and weren’t really interested in spending a lot. So what they did was they took beginners and they said, Listen, we'll give you like three or four months training, and then we'll give you small projects to work on, then we'll train you in and your work for us over here. So I went, then, I went down for an interview. And they told me, okay, you, you want to come for the programming, no problem. That was before I started my accounting school. And they told me, they said, Okay, go home, take Java for dummies, and, you know, read it and come back and show us what you can do. So I went home, I actually took off a couple of days, some work to do this. And I took Java for dummies, and I even had like my laptop and I wrote, I even installed, for anyone a little from familiar, and we now know what it is I put a version control version, Visual Studio had a version of Visual Studio I got on my laptop, I have no clue at that point what I was doing, but just the following example, in the book, and I got some couple of codes and you know, like hello world and Bill the calculator and probably did some get some posts, stuff like that. And then I came back from my interview and what happened was that they, the main manager who did the interview, who oversaw obviously, the whole programming department wasn't available for the interview. So they brought on a different manager. And I think I was the first candidate, you know, like, asked questions on the interview, and he had no clue what a beginner meant. And he, I showed him my work when I did you know, as knowing zero to program. Within two weeks, I built like a little calculator. And he wasn't impressed. And then he asked me what a string means. Today, I know what a string means. But I didn't know at that point. And I have some strings. And he's like, okay, you're not getting the job. So I left then, you know, it was hard. But guess what, I could have, you know, go home at that point. And I actually had even a week later, a different friend of mine who applied to the same job, but he did get the job. And I knew him very well. I was way more computer savvy and way more tech-savvy than him. You know, I always knew all the hacks and I was very into technology. And it bothered me a lot. But instead of getting depressed, instead of feeling you know, why I didn't get the job as seeing failed. I just said to myself, listen, this guy doesn't know who I am, doesn't understand the value. And for him to let such an employee go. It's him, it's his loss, not mine. And today, I have a software company. And I have a software company and I have programmers under me and I am the project manager and you know, and I'm busy. I don't you know, I'm saying I'm not a major coder. I know a little bit but I approve the code, go through the code. And if I can manage a software company I could have definitely been a programmer. So my message of hope is that everybody if you get rejected or something doesn't mean that you're not good, doesn't mean that the other person doesn't see the value because I have 1,000,001 rejections in life. It's just that you know that they don't, they don't see through their glasses, who you are. And you, sometimes it takes it's gonna be hard. It might be sometimes like an uphill battle that you got to fight. But once you reach the top and you get out there you know, people recognize you, who you are, people will admire you for your accomplishments and stuff like that.
Yoni Mazor 59:04
Very good. Very good. So once again, rejection, don't let it get to you, just focus on what you're doing and do it well and it will get you to a point of success and you'll feel great about it. Nachman thank you so much for sharing the story once again. I hope everybody enjoyed it. Stay safe and healthy. Until next time
