… and Here’s Why I’m Joining SoFi
Another note: this is my 2nd post on Medium. I don’t expect it to go as surprisingly viral as the first. I wanted to close the loop, since many readers have asked. Also, the following opinions are my own, and not of my employer.
So I’ve left Google — to join SoFi.
I’ve only been at SoFi three weeks, after taking just the weekend off between jobs. And so far it’s been living up to my expectations. Dynamic, fast-paced, and supportive environment, that’s ready to execute on big opportunities and tackle very complex challenges. But I really haven’t experienced enough to say much about working at SoFi, so let me close the loop on why I’ve decided to join. It’s not about what I’ve left behind — it’s about the opportunity ahead.
I’ve always been passionate about personal finance — both understanding it for my own sake, as well as sharing knowledge with friends and colleagues around ideas and trade-offs. I started dabbling in the stock market circa 1998, becoming more serious around 2004— including going deep into day-trading and short-term options during the wild periods of 2008–2009. I’ve also been working on building a real-estate portfolio since 2012. My investment journeys look something like this:
Sometimes I won’t complete the cycle and decide that the opportunity isn’t right for me. Maybe it’s the lack of time, or the risk/reward model isn’t right, or I feel I’m at a disadvantage compared to other market forces.
Or maybe I’ll decide that I just don’t have the right education and support for this type of investment.
So I’ve started seriously investing since 2004 and onward — which means I started investing my money only at the age of 31! (Ooops — did I just reveal my age on Medium???)
And for those of you that still wonder — that was way too late of a start.
I’ve worked with many bright colleagues, super-smart, that had great educations and a fantastic sense for what’s right and what’s wrong. But many of them had near-zero financial education, and no-one to ask, and so they did what they thought was right — kept their money in the bank, accumulating 0.05% interest or something like that (I also did that at times). Others paid exorbitant fees (sometimes north of 2%) to have their money managed, most of the time being out-performed by the market after discounting the fees. Those of you who know me personally, know how I feel about these things.
So it’s a personal passion of mine to pass this knowledge along. I’ve tried teaching young teens about personal finance, as early as ages 14–15 (although organizing these meetings is hard). I’ve started organizing meetups for transferring my unbiased real-estate investment knowledge to people who are interested in learning from my mistakes. I’m not saying you should jump into the market at the age of 16; but it’s never too early to learn about the long-term effects of responsibly investing your money. And how going through life’s stages affect the way people should approach different investment types.
Technology is disrupting our lives, “self-driving” more and more of our daily routine tasks. Behind the scenes, it’s also transforming the way businesses operate and the leverage and scale they can achieve.
How about we bring this technology to the masses? Make personal finance and investing more manageable and understood, focusing users on what’s right for them, and empowering them with the aid of technology — all the while doing this as personalized life-time journeys and not just as ad-hoc engagements? From the time someone leaves for college (like my firstborn did 2 months ago), to the time they need to retire — with everything in between?
Which brings me back to SoFi. I won’t write a 2-pager about what’s exciting about the company, but if you’ve been following our company and CEO you know we’re expanding beyond the loans business. And SoFi has a fantastically loyal member base community that seek financial independence.
For me personally this is a great opportunity to work in an area that I’m passionate about — personal finance and advice — and be able to build and leverage data tools to help our members lead better financial lives, offloading the work they need to do to make good financial decisions. I also believe this area is ripe for disruption, and hasn’t found its Google or Amazon — yet. Obviously I’m excited if I’m willing to commute an hour+ each direction…
I’m joining SoFi as VP Products and Data to work on all of the above. I won’t add much more about this now, but I’m looking forward to sharing more when the time is right. Back to work!