Rohit Choudhary- I Asked Myself ‘What Exactly is The Risk?’, and Got The Answer - None At All (Co-Founder & CEO Of Seekho From India)

 

One of the best pieces of advice that I ever received was to ‘not let emotions get in the way of achieving career objectives, rather channelise them to do that in the fastest way possible. This completely changed my approach towards work.

1. Tell us about yourself and your journey.

I was born and brought up in a traditional Rajasthani family from Jodhpur. After schooling, I went to IIT Kanpur for graduation which was really a life-transforming experience for me. It made me not just dream but also capable of building my own company.

My first job was at Toppr where I got the chance to be a part of the team which figured out the business model for them. We then scaled it up, while I led monetisation products, to become one of the first ed-tech companies to make such a significant revenue in India.

After Toppr I joined Kuku FM in its early days, just a month after they started building it. I led Product for them as a part of the 6-member core team. We built it from scratch, scaled it to millions of users, and started monetising to eventually become one of India’s largest audio platforms. It has now become the fastest-growing content platform of India ever, which I am super proud of.

Then finally I went on to build Seekho with my old friends Keertay and Yash, to expose the masses of this nation to the knowledge and skills that we were fortunate enough to get.

2. How did you come up with the idea of Seekho and go about executing it?

I always wanted to build something of my own, but never found the perfect circumstances to actually start doing that. The lockdown imposed during the First wave of COVID gave me enough time to ask difficult questions to myself, which led to a strong trigger for me to just jump into it.

Working at Kuku FM, I realised that there is a huge need for “learning” amongst the aspiring Indian masses. Bringing together my experiences both from Kuku FM and Toppr, I decided to work on a content platform focused on learning, and that’s how came the name ‘Seekho’.

The first thing that I did was building a team. Keertay, whom I knew since our JEE prep days, shared this dream of Building a company for a very long time. It was a no-brainer for him and he joined immediately. Yash, who was Keertay’s roommate back in IITK, took some time as he always does. He came back the next day, fully prepared to dedicate his next few years to building something significant, together.

We knew we had to build India’s largest content platform for learning, but exactly how we’ll do that wasn’t very clear. We started with a free-to-use short video platform for learning with some help from our network, and after a lot of iterations, we built what we later scaled up to over a Million registered users.

3.  What has been your biggest challenge that you faced and how did you overcome that?

The second wave of covid was the most difficult part yet of this journey. All of us and our families were severely suffering because of COVID. It was so bad that Keertay lost his dad while most of our family members were at high risk.

But even in those circumstances, whoever was in a condition to be present in the morning sync-ups was making sure that those meetings were happening. The team was still pushing out bug fixes, onboarding creators, and doing their daily tasks. That is what actually kept us running and alive. It was only because of this perseverance, dedication, and team spirit that we got back on track very fast which eventually led to a 30x growth in just a year after that.

4.  What are the most important qualities of a successful entrepreneur?

If there’s one thing that one can build in themselves, I believe that it should be

“Perseverance”. Even the smallest form of success takes a lot of effort and time but only lasts for a few seconds until you realise that there’s a lot more to be worked upon. This is the reality of an entrepreneurship journey, and perseverance is a tool to navigate through it.

One must know how to keep going while building a startup, especially during the worst of times. There is no doubt that motivation to change the world and strong belief in an idea are extremely necessary, but they don’t really work when things start going downhill. There has to be something else that keeps you going day-in and day-out.

Personally, what works for me is the trust that my team, the customers, and our investors have shown in me. This is what makes me wake up every morning and do what I am supposed to do.

5.  What are some of the most important factors for running a successful business?

It all eventually boils down to the team. They are the ones who leave no stone unturned to make things work. A great Idea and long-term vision are definitely important for building a business, but they are a very small part of the system. A competent team who is willing to stick with you even in the worst times is what will make your business successful.

Hence, as a founder or a business owner, one must always aim to build an awesome team and treat them with the respect that they deserve.

6.  How can one overcome a hurdle of lack of funds when starting up?

I believe that is only a made-up hurdle in most cases, especially when you are at a super-early stage. 99% of the time it is possible to build and test POCs with very limited resources. In the initial stage, I myself was working on Seekho parallely with my job for over 6 months, of course without any funds.

Capital can definitely help you accelerate your business, but the lack of it must not be a

blocker for experimenting with stuff and figuring out what’s working and what’s not. And once you have done some validation for your business, there are a lot of people out there who are actively looking to fund good businesses with some working proof of potential success.

7. What made you shift from engineering and science to the commerce and the business world?

I was never actually very involved in academics, especially once I got into IIT. Though I did my BTech in Biological Sciences and Bioengineering, I found my happy face in managing college events and clubs during my time in college.

I even did half a dozen MBA courses during that time to get a minor in management, primarily because of my inclination towards the business world.

8. What did your typical day look like when Seekho was new?

Like I mentioned earlier, I was working on Seekho in parallel to my job for the first 6 months, and it was a super-hectic schedule, to be honest. I had 85-90 hour work weeks and Seekho got 35-40 hours out of them. On weekdays I was occupied with my job till 7 pm, so I worked on Seekho till midnight. The weekends were completely dedicated to Seekho, especially with the complete lockdown, which was a blessing in disguise.

As it was super-early, there wasn’t any structure to my Seekho work hours. Some days completely went into designing, some others into preparing for fundraising and networking, and so on.

10.  What are some of the best career advice that you have ever received?

One of the best pieces of advice that I ever received was to ‘not let emotions get in the way of achieving career objectives, rather channelise them to do that in the fastest way possible. This completely changed my approach towards work.

During my first job at Toppr as a Product Manager when I was only trying to figure out things, it got really overwhelming working with super-experienced designers and developers, and it was almost impossible to get any work done. That was when my manager and mentor-for-life, Joe Kochitty, advised me to work with them as friends instead of colleagues, and that really helped me get the job done. It worked so well that I could pull-off 3 consecutive stints of exceptional performance there.

11.  What do you feel about the formal education system?

I believe that formal education can do wonders, only if the best of it is provided to everyone. It is very less about the academic knowledge, and more about the values, skills, and network that it helps in building. I was really privileged to get some of the best formal education in this country, and it has contributed a lot to my personal and professional growth.

However, there needs to be a solution to deliver the same quality of education to everyone, and Seekho is an attempt towards achieving that.

12.  What is the biggest challenge in the startup industry at the moment?

The perceived cost of failure is too high, which stops a lot of talented people from building awesome companies. For a very long time, the first word that came to my mind when thinking about starting up was ‘risk’. And this is sadly true for most potential founders in this country.

But things completely changed when I asked myself - ‘What exactly is the risk?’, and got the answer - none at all. It is completely okay if I try and fail, and get back to a decently paying job, or even do an MBA if it comes to that. What isn’t okay is that I don’t even try, only to live with that regret all my life. The problem is that people are so afraid that they don’t even ask this question. Although this has changed in recent times, India still has a long way to go.

13.  Would you like to share some skills and learnings that you learned from your corporate work?

In my opinion, we must learn to find happiness in our journeys, instead of their outcomes or end goals. If you feel over-stressed because of your startup, or job, or anything that you are doing, what’s even the point of doing that? One thing that gives me the most happiness is not the closing of rounds or hitting some business targets, but the fact that I’ve got a team along with me who are proud of what they are doing.

No destination could ever be worth a depressing journey. Hence, one must choose a path where they’ll enjoy the journey, cause you never know how long it is going to take.

Interviewed By - Shashank Sehgal