Stoa Digest #116: 👊🏻 To Bouncing Back 👊🏻
Quit talking, start doing, build the muscle for action and always, be at it!
Hello there Stoans,
If you are wondering why the ‘fresh crop’ and ‘introductions‘ channels on Discord are buzzing all day, well, it is time to welcome our newest batch, Cohort 14.
Go through the introductions and find some super interesting folks. Don’t forget to give them a warm welcome and show them the Stoa spirit. Get ready to welcome them over the coming weekend. Yay!
#Goteam! 💯
~ Jahnavy, Team Stoa
“I believe help is always offered when needed.”
Let’s meet Piyush Kedia, the founder of InCommon and a Harry Potter fan (duh, read his tweaked version of my favorite HP quote above XD).
In Piyush’s words, he wants to be like Dumbledore and have many many thoughts
(I’m sure he will, given how much he reads) and pull out those shiny, silver strings of random thoughts and revisit them through his very expensive pensieve. Strange, yes but fascinating.
Though he is an economics graduate, he never gelled well with numbers and data as much as he did with observing designs, neat patterns, and suitable fonts. That’s exactly where his journey of becoming the founder of a group of creative agencies (Blue Vector) and founder of a creative recruiting and staffing company (InCommon) began. ✨
There’s something that stands out about Piyush is his journey throughout college and after. Let me take y’all on a road trip.
In his first year of college, he started a stationary brand, Scribble, for his love of stationaries.
It failed.
In his second year, he experimented with smaller ideas and, again, didn’t work out like a boom.
In his third year, he started a social venture with a revenue-sharing model with rickshaw pullers, for his love for designing.
Had to shut it.
Later, joined his father’s business to sustain himself, and learned a few things (especially punctuality and discipline).
Then, left.
Did business consultancy for some time, and learned about services businesses.
And, left.
Started Blue Vector and the series of agencies. Handed it over to the rock-solid team he had built.
Now, building InCommon, with the same zeal, curiosity, and appetite for risk. WOW!
If you are still wondering what I wanted all of us to learn from this roadmap, read again from the top.
Resilience. ➕
And of course, to keep him at it and build things from scratch with him at InCommon, he has Roshan Shetty, his then, cohort mate and now, co-founder.
Roshan and Piyush are both from Cohort 4 and during one of their late-night Discord Cafe brainstorming calls, they gave birth to the idea of InCommon. Coming from similar backgrounds and experience in building things, they discovered that their skills are very complementary, and they share a strong love for good designs.
For all those who are struggling to find the right set of people to match wavelengths with, here’s Piyush’s tip: be open to conversations, keep trying, and genuinely care about the conversations you are having. If you have high intent, you will attract the same.
In Piyush’s words, “finding a co-founder is like marriage and he is in a happy marriage.” XD
Drop him a ping on LinkedIn and know where and how to find the right co-founder.
🫡 People of Stoa 🫡
Check out Jimit Gandhi from C4 sharing his experience on transitioning from a corporate to a startup! 🚀
🐝 Community Buzz 🐝
Another week, another meetup! The Hyderabad fam met over the weekend for an eventful board games night. 🎲
⏯ For Stoans by Stoans ⏯
From Stoa’s Induction to my dream job! Check out this blog post by Niyati Shah from C9.
Check out this new AI tool for more human-friendly summaries.
This week’s book recommendation - Build by Tony Fadell.
An interesting article on the future of professions and careers.
Is it right to own a common resource? A piece on the morality of land ownership.
ciao famo!