#174 Rotem Zifroni is the future founder of a social startup

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Rotem Zifroni 0:00
You need one person to believe in you. You need one person that you're counting on, and he is believing in you. And here's the one person who is telling you I also think that this is the right thing to do. You have my back. Also, this is something that I had and this is not why I chose to do it. You know, I had this question. Sometimes you need one person to say, Yeah, this is making sense. isn't making sense go for it. And sometimes this is all you need to do. You know, I'm, I have some people who come and consult with me also. And I feel like I'm this person will tell them. Yeah, go for it. Like, you can do it. I really think that if you feel like you can do good in some things in your life. So you can do good in other areas. If you're a person who know how to study who know how to, you know, work hard, and ask the right questions. So I think that you can do it, you can do it. I really believe in this. And I really believe in mentors. So this is I think this is really important.

Tim Bourguignon 1:03
Hello, and welcome to developer's journey podcast, bringing you the making of stories of successful software developers. To help you on your upcoming journey. I'm your host, Tim bourguignon. On this episode 174 I received hold him Tiffany, Houghton leads the front end development team at front leg. She started her career in the IDF Intelligence Unit at 200. After completing her military service and studies, she joined the software industry where she has been working as a software engineer scrum master, and more generally, as an expert in building complex development processes ever since. Robin, welcome deftly.

Rotem Zifroni 1:43
Hey, thank you for having me.

Tim Bourguignon 1:45
But before we come to your story, I want to thank the terrific listeners who support the show every month, you are keeping the dev journey lights up. If you would like to join this fine crew and help me spend more time on finding phenomenal guests then editing audio tracks, please go to our website, Dev journey dot info and click on the Support me on Patreon button. Even the smallest contributions are giant steps toward a sustainable dev journey. journey. Thank you. And now back to today's guest. As you know, just the show exists to help the listeners understand what your story looked like and imagine how to shape their own future. So as always, let's go back to your beginning. Sorry, where would you place the start of your debt journey?

Rotem Zifroni 2:36
Okay, so basically, I think my dev journey starting is a pretty special story pretty different ones. So I'm going back to my past as a child, I never wrote a single line of code. Actually, the first line of code I ever saw was on the first day of universe I was a child who was very involved in the Israeli scouts I actually was a professional tennis player I dedicated my time my free time to play tennis I spent hours on the court I even became an A tennis instructor professional one I was leading the kids to play tennis also as a student I extended at school I extended chemistry and art which is very different than computer science. And I also always like to tell that this is pretty much defines me like chemistry for the mind and art for the spirit which I think this is me by involving those two parts. I can even tell that before army like I postponed my service in one year and I chose to volunteer for one year spend a year with a group of people we live together we make a pretty pretty much pretty good project happen we learned a lot about leadership and how to make things happen and this was really meaningful for me as a leader

Tim Bourguignon 3:49
Okay, now I you piqued my interest, how did you go from chemistry and art and tennis on the side somewhere to computer sciences that doesn't make it doesn't make any sense.

Rotem Zifroni 4:01
So I never dreamed of being a software engineer. This wasn't on my plan. This is why this is so interesting to my opinion. So I think the first waste was during the arm so I started I decided to join the army to the intelligence for a unit called H 200. This this is one of the most important technology unit of the Israeli intelligence I can tell a few words that my unit is responsible basically for collecting intelligence from multiple sources and disciplines and responsible for distributing it to the relevant targets on the right time. Right Place. Right hands so I think this was my first twist like choosing to go somewhere where on the first time I need to use my brain like I found myself in a group of the smartest people in Israel with me and I knew that this is the like the first opportunity to let my this side of me shine. Up until then, like I was instructor, I had social skills and so many things. But I never really chose to like do think of smart people like using my brain. And then I found myself with a big challenge. And I can I can tell about my role. Like, I think that my role in the in the unit was super interesting, I can tell that the real challenge of my role was actually to put many kinds of data into one picture, one correct picture. And to know who is the right people to know about it, my work involved working under pressure, like almost 24/7, we worked, we had an online work and the offline work. During the online one, we manage shifts, where I think hundreds of people are working, and I am the responsible to control this whole thing. And to make it good enough to help the right people make good decisions. And also during the offline work, I was the product manager, I was an officer commanded many soldiers leading them and helping them with their issues. But also on the other side, leading the project, building some architecture of things, system programs, it was more like a matrix management leading many disciplines. I had the opportunity to lead very big task force, I think the top one of it was leading a two month task force of more than 100 people working to my instrument, we had opportunity to directly influence the safety of Israeli people like it was a direct impact, I had the opportunity to work with the high ranked people at the army, working with them day to day, helping them understand the situation, all the information they need in order to make a very important decision for Israeli citizens. So I think this was the first time of my life being in a technology area. Even though I wasn't a developer or something like this, I wasn't even executor I was the lead the leader of this of this project. But I think this was the first time that I knew that there is something here something is interesting here. And also, this was the first twist of my story, which I will always love to tell, I realized two things during being such an impactful person. So the first thing is, I really want to have this impact in my life, like doing things and making people life change. This is what I want to do in my life. I'm not sure how, why and when. But this is what I want to do. And the second thing is the more special one, I think. So it really bothered me, like during my service, that we also got credit and compliments and things like this for our projects and for the thing we achieved. But it really bothered me like that I'm not really the one that did the magic. Like I'm leading this group, enthusiastic and amazing and challenging. But I'm not really the one that is working in order to get this piece of information, this meaningful piece of information, I can say that this is like being a team leader of developers without being a developer on your own, this feels like this, this feeling and I think this is the part that I also realized that I want to start from the bottom, like I could have the opportunity to go out from the army and become a product manager, which is basically a managing people without actually being an expert in each discipline. But for me, it wasn't working. Like for me, I knew that someday I will be the product manager or a big leader. But I have to start from the bottom. Like I have to be the one that making the magic happen. And I think this was the first waste of my story. And then, after five amazing years in the army, I decided to leave the army, which was also a very complicated decision. I could easily stay in the army and grow there and making things bigger and bigger. But I felt like I want to achieve this impact of my own. And the Army is really a shortcut, like in a very short period of time, you'll find yourself influenced many people. And I felt like I want to do this by my own. In the reason I decided to leave the army. It wasn't an easy decision. Many people were like, What are you doing? But I went for it.

Tim Bourguignon 9:18
Before we get there. I would like to come back to one thing. So you went to the army when you were 20 Something like this

Rotem Zifroni 9:25
1919 And you

Tim Bourguignon 9:27
find yourself in a matter of months in such a leading position. How, as far as you can say on the show, how does the the army prepares you for that to be to take somebody coming out of high school right into a leadership position in a matter of months.

Rotem Zifroni 9:44
So this is a good question. First, the army have very good courses for intelligence people like we learn for a long period of time, almost one year. We are getting prepared to this role. Oh, and also we starting as a soldiers. And then if you feel like you want to be better, so we're going to learn how to be an officer. So we're going to the it's called by the fact like to the place where we're becoming an officers where we learn how to lead people how to manage processes, how to be dedicated to the army, and then we come back and we professionally lead the soldiers. But yeah, we spent almost one year getting prepared to this supposition, we learned a lot of materials regarding many staff who learn how to work under pressure for a long time, we are more acting like a shadow where people are sitting next to us and making sure we were doing the right thing. But then surprisingly, we just they just throw us to the water. I don't know how to say it. In English. This is in Hebrew, this is a very famous, but they just throw us to the water. And you'll find yourself one day sitting, managing this extremely important thing. One mistake can lead to really crucial things to happen. And this is really stressful, like we're dealing with, with really a lot of pressure. And if you are the right person to be there. So you're just making it better and easier. But yeah, we are not sleeping much. And we were home only every two weeks or three weeks. This is a tough one.

Tim Bourguignon 11:21
It sounds like it sounds like it. Definitely not an easy job to put in behind you at some point. So how did you make this decision to get out of

Rotem Zifroni 11:33
it? Well, as I said, I felt like staying in the army will be the easy decision. I felt like I'm in a good place people are very appreciate me. I had my commander was a person who really believed in me, they offered me some very great thing that I could do. But I felt if I'm not quitting the army now like I'm here forever. And I will always feel like I'm not sure that I actually did it for my own. And this is this was extremely important for me. I want to check out I'm gonna do it in the real world against real verbal, experienced people without anyone help me helping me.

Tim Bourguignon 12:13
Stay with us.

Tim Bourguignon 12:14
We'll be right back. Hello imposters. If you work in tech want to work in tech or our tech curious in any way you'll want to listen to this. We've launched a community of professionals who come together to share information and advice about jobs, roles, careers, and the journeys we all take throughout our lives as the designers, builders, fixers investigators, explainers and protectors of the world's technology. We call it the impostor syndrome network. And all are welcome. So find the impostor syndrome network podcast wherever you listen to find podcasts, and look for the isn community on your favorite social platform. Hashtag impostor network.

Tim Bourguignon 12:57
Okay, and even in hindsight, I am jumping the way in the future. Do you think you'd had this with what you were searching for now? It's six years, it's been six, six years since you're out? Yes, something? Six years, six years? You think that's pretty much what you were searching for?

Rotem Zifroni 13:16
I'm sure it is. Awesome. So

Tim Bourguignon 13:18
let's get there. So how did you make this transition out of the army? Finding a place to land finding what you know? Like what can be reused? Where you can start? It'll take you there. How did that happen?

Rotem Zifroni 13:31
Okay. So I want to make an important step in my career and tell you about a really big project I was involved in, who actually have to say it was the most important twist of my career. Basically, I was one of the founder of an nonprofit organization called the door, which began as a dream of us a few people, we dream to connect between elders in the city of Tel Aviv. And between the Y generation you could say to young people, we did it out of understanding and out of our personal experience that we truly believe that this is a win win situation, like the elders will probably feel more like they belong, lonely, the elders until we were very lonely. And we truly believe that also the young people will feel meaningful, and also will have a person to talk with and to hear stories even get some good food. And we truly believed in this and we went for it. And we actually created many connections between elders and young people. It was longer term connection, like we was we were searching for young people who are willing to, you know to visit an elder people once a week for a time of four years something it was really meaningful for me like I was one of the role. key role. Not sure how I was one of the the most passionate founder about it. We had many connections And the municipality of Tel Aviv worked with us and it was very successful. But then we came up with a kind of a startup idea, which is more suitable to the white generation, because we understand, Okay, we are creating connection, this is very good. But not a lot of people want this long term commitment. Not a lot of people, this is very hard to convince a person to be committed to a person for one year, this is not our reality today. So we were looking for other plan, which will be more scalable, you can say, and then we founded a plan, we call help on the way which basically, we created, it was based on WhatsApp groups. And we connected between two sides. One side were the social workers of television municipality, which are working with tons of elders, which need help with day to day tasks, with getting their medicine with getting something from the supermarket with fixing something at home, and between a community of young people who can easily take one small task and give 15 minutes from their lives. And when you collect it, and you'll get hundreds of young people doing this. So you create a very big impact in the city of Tel Aviv. So we had this plan, we had everyone involved with us. And it was very successful. We had WhatsApp groups, in a few neighborhoods in Tel Aviv. Each one of them had, I think, 200 volunteers, and we had someone who, getting the tasks from the social workers, and posting them on WhatsApp. I can give an example like I can post an elder in this street need help with getting her medicine from the pharmacy, who can take it, and then someone will just say I'm in the area. So yeah, I can take it. And then like we even create a community between the young people it was great. And it was, it was obvious that this is a good idea. But then, okay, we want to we want this to be scalable, we want to be bigger, we want to do it in other cities, we want to more volunteers, we want a lot of things. But we have many blockers, for example, WhatsApp groups are limited for a few 100 of people, you want some more, you just can't have it. You have telegram or stuff. But at the end, you're limited for a few hundreds of people. And second, like we couldn't afford so many people working for posting those messages for controlling this process, reaching for the status, letting the social workers know what is going on. We even needed some insurance stuff and signature and some stuff that were extremely complicated to manage. And I think you know where I'm going to, but we reach to a point where we understand that we need an application, that we need a technology that we need to develop something. Because in order to make this impact so meaningful, we have and I think this was the time when I understand connecting now the story for the army, like I want to do something with a lot of impact for Israel. So this is the point when I realized that in order to do big things, you need to be involved with technology. And this was the point where I knew that I'm not going to university in order to study industrial engineering, or management or economy or any of this, I knew that I want to go to this black box, which I never understand how it is working. And I'm going to be a device, I'm going to be a successful one. And one day I'm going to do some big things with technology for the thing that is really important for me, which is not cyber or or things like this is more social or educational things. So this is this actually leading me to chose computer science. Once again, everyone around me where what? Okay, I can say it but everyone, everyone, why the hell are you going to learn computer science? And I can say that even many people didn't believe in me. And for me also, it was like, Okay, I will try. If it goes, well, I will just quit. But let's try. And yeah, so I found myself the first day of university sitting with a group of people, which 100% I was the only one who suffered the first time code running. I didn't even know like how, okay, you're writing code, but what is happening behind it, like how you run it? What does it even mean to run code? Yeah, this is how I started computer science.

Tim Bourguignon 19:25
That is fantastic. Fantastic story and a fantastic idea. I really like this, this, this social side of connecting people is fantastic. Why University? You had an idea. You had an idea at hand, why you wanted to do what you want to do apply this knowledge. Did you ever consider not going to university doing some kind of, I don't know, apprenticeship boot camp and just start. Computer science is very serious. So in my mind,

Rotem Zifroni 19:50
this is a very good question, because I think that in our modern reality, as you said, many people have the chance to become a developer with bootcamp and and some stuff. So I can definitely say that a degree is not a requirement. But for me, it was important, I really wanted to do the long, frustrating way, in order to believe in myself, like in order to know that I know everything that I need to know, I don't want to shortcut that this was like my assumption. I don't want another shortcut. I want to do the long way, I want to dealing with the most challenging things that that I can deal with. I want to feel like Yeah, I did it, I did it. I have a degree in computer science, which means like, I can do it as anyone else. And also, like, I can tell you right now, like, retrospective that I really fell in love with the university with the theory of computer science. Like I'm not the kind of developer who only love to code like I even considered doing the you know, another degree, I love the mathematics and all this stuff, like we're okay, I'm using my brain. I'm developing my brain right now, for me, it was important, but you know, this is something that is this is me, like for many people today, I'm saying, listen, everything is okay, you have the opportunity. Even if you study the I don't know, art in university, you can do it, you can do it with bootcamp, you can do it with starting as an all customer success in a company and starting from there. So yes, this is just me.

Tim Bourguignon 21:21
That is awesome. That's really awesome. So you got what you wanted for this, this curriculum? And how did you make the next step? Did you finish your degree? And then stop coding for this platform? Or do you search for a job and code on the side? How did that look like?

Rotem Zifroni 21:35
Yeah, so I was definitely focused on the degree. I wasn't the kind of person who like doing a side project or stuff because I was I need I needed to put really great effort in this studies in order to succeed, I can tell that it worked for me really good. Like, in a few months, I was like, Okay, this is just working, I'm passing tests, I'm doing works. I'm getting a pretty, pretty good grades. And this is working. So I had three intense years in the university and I the third year, I decided that this is my time to start working. I didn't want to wait to the degree to end I wanted to start as a student, in order to promise that I have a good place to be in and then yeah, I was looking for a job and not for quite a lot. I think this was maybe my first or second interview. And then me and weeks found each other weeks is a very famous, big, amazing company in Israel, one of the most like weeks is a startup, which other company looking at in order to understand like how to work and some very cool processes and structure. So yeah, I started my way with Wix as a student, I was actually in the first round of students at Wix, like, we didn't hire students, I was one of the first one we were 10 students or something. Yeah. And like think that it was the best school I could ever dreamed of. I had very good mentors. And also, like, I was pushed outside my comfort zone, time after time. And I think that this point, I understand that, yeah, I'm a developer, I'm coding. But all my social skills and the things that I did in my past and worked time after time are working out. This is working out also when I'm a developer, because I need to communicate with people because I need to leave projects because I need to feel like I own the feature. So ownership matters, because I need to be passionate about it. Because I think the developer who are passionate about the product or better, and I need to work under pressure, and you know, all those stuff, find the founder place for me as a developer. And this was cool. And also in weeks, I felt like I'm something else. I'm not like anyone, I have people around me who are going to sleep and before they fell asleep, they're reading blogs of React. I'm not I'm watching episode of Friends, you know, so I'm not this kind of person. And again, thing, things are not come easy, but when they do come so I am truly passionate about it. And it is just working. And I had a very good experience at weeks. My mentors let me take every opportunity that I wanted. And at a very short period of time, I found myself, you know, one of the leading players of my team, I found myself interviewing people, which was amazing. Like I'm sitting in my first interview, interviewing a software engineer to our position and thinking to myself, oh my god, I'm now the person who is checking how good he is, as a developer two years ago, I wasn't even thinking I could write a piece of code. This was amazing. Also, I got the opportunity to leading our new students to leading the processor For them the interviews and also the onboarding. This was also like, you know, a closure because I started as a student, and right now I'm leaving all our new students teaching them how to become superstar giving them the ability to believe in themselves. And, you know, that's cool. Like, three years ago, it was myself.

Tim Bourguignon 25:17
Sounds cool. It sounds like you're making an impact, which is one of the things you want to have. So you're really translating or moving toward those responsibilities and or, you're maybe like a magnet for those responsibilities where you can have an impact.

Rotem Zifroni 25:33
Yeah, this is really cool. My name is Dan, I got the opportunity to be a scrum master of my team, which was all also very challenging. Because I was young, you know, there were people more experienced than, than me, the team was pretty big. It was almost 15 people being a scrum master is challenging because you are leading the process without actually managing the people are. So it's living in the gray area. And it's a lot of responsibility without the authority. So it's, it was very challenging, but gave me a lot, I learned a lot, I felt very important and pushed me to, you know, to deal with this thing was involved with with creating the sprint that the upcoming sprint with being in the details of every task with the deliver information, sync between all a person but it was a great experience. And I think at this point, like I knew that this is the time for my next step, because this is great, but I really want to manage the people. This is my my thing, after all. And I think that the in this point, one thing is coming into my life, I had, I needed to get a decision if I want to lead a team inside weeks or outside. But I think that I knew that at some day, I want to I want to have something on my off my own at some point, I'm gonna move to the startup area, in order to see how things is actually working. Because Wix is a great company, which is working for years. And you know, the, the frameworks and system are all built for you and just take it and develop. And I knew for myself because of my background and everything that I need to see how things is being developed from scratch, or how to solve real complicated problem, how to see you know, when a customer needs this and how I'm now adjusting my my application for him Pena, then I found the front end, we have to say, I don't know if you want me first to explain about front end or attending your why I'm here.

Unknown Speaker 27:28
So I will need.

Rotem Zifroni 27:32
So I will first say why I'm here, I think first front, they found me like I didn't even like looking for a job or something. So I can say that front, they came to me and from this from the start, I knew that this is it because I was looking for a place that is growing and promising enough to become an empire. Like this was important for me being in a place which I 100% believe in the potential of the product. And also, as I said, want to play through dealing with cutting edge technologies and things that you know, there's technology in the industry in order to feel comfortable in this area. And also, you know, I wanted to place where I can grow my team, which will be hopefully growing and to have this personnel impact also. So this is why I'm here at fronted, I'm here for one month. That's it, but already feeling like I'm here for another

Tim Bourguignon 28:28
maybe before we talk a little bit more about how was this hiring process, the second hiring process after the first one. Okay, can you compare the team?

Rotem Zifroni 28:36
This is a very good question. You know, I didn't even start talking about it. Yes. So yeah, actually, I thought to myself, Okay, well, I'm successful, but I'm, this is my first place and I don't really know like how it will be to be interviewed to other company like what they're expecting outside. Because, you know, I started as a student and now I'm supposed to be someone, you know, to be a team lead to be a senior one. And yeah, it was I was really curious about how it's gonna be I'm gonna be good enough. And they will they want me like, you know, even though I'm not the geekiest person or the smartest one and yeah, you know, I think they recognize it. And it worked. Very good. I had the technical interviews and also they gave me a home assignment. Which you know, I didn't do anything on my weekend besides this, I was so passionate to see if I can make this home assignments as good as I want to end. Wow, I learned so much from it and it was so exciting, you know, to do something else then then what I am used to do, and I think it was good, it was great. And it was also you know, okay, so it's good. It's going good. So I'm not sure this is answering your question, but

Tim Bourguignon 29:47
did did the second round of interview influenced the way you interview as an interviewer

Rotem Zifroni 29:53
do I you asking me if the way they interviewed me influenced how I interview or The opposite. Exactly this way, you know what I don't think so, I think that even as an interviewer, I have my own my own thing, I really love to interview people, because I think that this is challenging to help them be in their comfort zone, because you want them to be good. You want to help be on their best thing. And I think this is, you know, this is something very difficult to learn. And I really wish to be you know, better at it from time to time, but finding this balance between helping them but leaving them to deal with their own issues. But this is really important for me, when I interview someone to know that I'm 100% sure if I'm not going with him to know that this is from the the good reason, and not because maybe I need to think about it. Like I'm not sure.

Tim Bourguignon 30:47
That's alright, that's alright. That's the tip I always give to my mentees is interview a lot. Also, if you don't want to change the company just keeps on interviewing, because you see things you see how things are being done. And probably in every second interview I personally did as an as a candidate, I picked up one thing that I could use in in in the future, one type of exercise or one type of questions with Hmm, that's interesting that I want to reuse and later on as an interviewer, I can then reuse that and see how can I deal with this person who seems very nervous? Or how can I deal with this person who doesn't feel confident about what they can do? And how which questions can I ask to make them shine first and bring them confidence in telling what they really can and not what they think I want to hear and then build a real interview and not this theater play or something like that? I picked up

Rotem Zifroni 31:39
stuff. Yeah. So I think this is very good. Thank you.

Tim Bourguignon 31:43
What did you do doing exactly from nowadays? Yeah, yeah. So

Rotem Zifroni 31:47
I'm in front end, I'm the front end team in the company. And I really liked it, I would really love to tell about front end, because I think you know, this is like, also a very impactful thing. So I'll tell this as a story. Why do you need front, let's assume that you're a developer, in some sass company. And anytime you build a SaaS application, so there are something which are a boilerplate that you have to deal with. Let's take for example, let's say that you are a developer, for a company who are developing a Task Manager software. And you are really want to spend your time building your core product, which is an awesome task management software. But then you'll find that if you want to really to go to the market, so there are those boilerplate, boilerplate, those background necessity, that you have to have things like user management, authentication, like secure access API token, so you need to manage roles and permission on some stuff. And you know, this sucks. Because I was like, in our, in my three year old company, I did it again. And again. And this is sucks, like, I want to do my core product. And I think this is where front end comes in, like helping our customers focus on building their software's and provide him with all the essential features that they need in order to work as a SaaS application. So we enable them, you know, all the things I've mentioned, authentication, the SSO the MFA, some capabilities, such as a password complex ability, and also the admin administration, things such as audit logs and web books and roles and permission reports. Some things like this. So yeah, so actually, we are a platform for developers. But our products are meeting our user, but also their end user. So this is very awesome. And also special, because the front end of our company is the core of the company. We are not just you know, the UI of the back office or something. We are actually implementing stuff that many user I get to getting to see this is fronted, I think my journey here is, it's just a big, where

Tim Bourguignon 33:57
are you on your journey, you said you wanted to go to the lowest level and start building up going again toward leadership. Where's the needle right now on this journey? Yeah,

Rotem Zifroni 34:08
I can tell you what will be like maybe the top of my journey like the I don't know, I want to be I'm gonna be the founder of the founder of a social startup. So as I said, I want to raise something working as a technology startup, but our product is a social product this is what I want to do I want to do it you know, as a big thing. So I think I'm getting closer to I think that I have some things I want to do before I want to lead more people right now I'm leaving the group of a few people but I want to let you know bigger groups of people I want to also be involved in the product management because I think this is very important if you want to, you know build something of your own which will be like more back to the where I started, you know, doing a product management and I think I'm really getting closer to come up with with my idea and starting this something Have my own hand making this, you know, just bigger and bigger.

Tim Bourguignon 35:06
I think you should send this podcast when it airs to your boss saying this is my wish for next year.

Tim Bourguignon 35:16
Sounds awesome. The only thing I wouldn't be concerned is like having a kids, you never really feel ready. So how will you know, now is the time?

Rotem Zifroni 35:28
You know, I think I have my checklist, same as kids. Like I need to be married first. This is my checklist, I need to have a dog. This is also in my checklist. And then I can have kids. So I think this is pretty similar. Like, I want to lead more than one team. First, I want to be a leader of leaders, I want to be experienced with this too, then I want to be a product manager for you know for a while and get my hands dirty with this area. And this will be the time

Tim Bourguignon 36:02
very rational and Cartesian. I like it. Yeah, very cool. Go back to the to the beginning of our story. You mentioned when you when you transition from the army, to word University going back to Computer Sciences or going going toward computer science, not back try to convince you that it was a dumb idea. Would you have any advice for listeners who might be facing a similar situation, they want to do something and their surroundings, maybe their family, their friends, I'm advising against it. What I have

Rotem Zifroni 36:34
very good advice. I think you need this is obvious to say you need to believe in yourself. But I have a better one, you need one person to believe in you. You need one person that you're counting on, and he is believing in you. And here's the one person who is telling you, I also think that this is the right thing to do. Like you have my back. Also, this is something that I had. And this is not why I chose to do it. You know, I have this question. Sometimes you need one person to say yeah, this is making sense. isn't making sense? Go for it. And sometimes this is all you need to do. You know, I'm I have some people who come and consult with me also. And I feel like I'm this person will tell them. Yeah, go for it. Like you can do it. I really think that if you feel like you can do good in some things in your life. So you can do good in other areas. If you're a person who know how to study who know how to, you know, work hard, and ask the right questions. So I think that you can do it, you can do it. I really believe in this. And I really believe in mentors. So this is I think this is really important.

Tim Bourguignon 37:41
And I have a big smile on my face. I fully agree. What I believe as well. Thank you very much. It's been a fantastic story. can people find you online and start a discussion and and read more about what you

Rotem Zifroni 37:55
do? Yeah, so I think a good start will be on LinkedIn. I'm definitely available there. So people can find me.

Tim Bourguignon 38:02
And I'll add that in the show notes. And I really hope to read about a fantastic social startup growing in Israel in the next years. Anything you want to plug in before we call it today?

Rotem Zifroni 38:17
I'm not No, I had a very great time. Thank you.

Tim Bourguignon 38:21
Thank you like well, it's it's been fantastic. And this has been another episode of difference. Ronnie, we see each other next week. Bye bye. Thanks a lot for tuning in. I hope you have enjoyed this week's episode. If you like the show, please share rate and review. It helps more listeners discover those stories. You can find the links to all the platforms the show appears on on our website, Dev journey dot info slash subscribe. Creating the show every week takes a lot of time, energy, and of course money. Would you please help me continue bringing out those inspiring stories every week by pledging a small monthly donation, you will find our patreon link at Dev journey dot info slash donate. And finally don't hesitate to reach out and tell me how this week story is shaping your future. You can find me on Twitter at @timothep ti m o t h e p orca email info at Dev journey dot info talk to you soon