Monica Millares: [00:00:00] Hi Shalom, it is an absolute pleasure having you in the show.

Shalom Ben Or: Thanks Monica, it's such a pleasure to have this conversation with you. I was really looking forward to this moment to have this, uh, this chat. And, uh, you know, I'm excited.

Monica Millares: Likewise, because like we met and we have a chat and then at the end, I was like, you've got a very strong mindset.

Not only you're an entrepreneur, right? Like all the entrepreneurs have a strong mindset. But I was like, I like the way that you think. So I was really looking forward to this chat. Thanks. Um, so I want to start in that because yeah, you do come across as a, as a strong man as such. And we all know that strength sometimes comes from pushing through, you know, like the rough times and we all have like tough times.

So that's how I want to start. Like, what's your mindset when it comes [00:01:00] to failure and going through the difficult times?

Shalom Ben Or: Question to start with. Monica . So I'm a, I, when I was a kid, I was an athlete. So until, like, when I, until the end of high school, basically I was in the, I was doing judo. It's a very. Like you, you're alone, it's you in the ring with your competitor and you need to, you need to deal with it, you need to win, um, and when you lose, you lost, not the team lost, no one, it's like you, yourself, you're the one who lost, um, and I think what, what my coach and I were, we, we usually what we did is that like, we celebrated wins, But we, you know, we acknowledge losses you lost because and you go while you lost and you understand that losing is important.

It's not [00:02:00] something you need to avoid something. It's really important for you to become better in what you do, because if you're not losing, it means you're not pushing yourself. You're not competing in the right competitions. You're not in the level that suits you. Um, and once you lose. Now you have the opportunity to learn and become better.

Now we always want to win and you will do whatever it takes in order to, but when you lose, that's fine. Let's put it in perspective. Let's understand and let's fight. And there is more, there is an important fights. Which win and you're going to win and there is the ones that you can lose and if you lose that's fine and I think this perspective is really important because

Try and win everything understand what is important what is not that important And if you lost in, in a not that [00:03:00] important fight, take it, understand why, use it to fuel your, your, your ability to become better.

Monica Millares: Yes. I like that approach because it's a, it's a perspective because sometimes when we struggle, that it's the tough times.

It is. It's not like we're. Losing in a competition, it's just like life is tough, but at the same time, if we use that mindset that it's like, well, it's tough because I'm losing on my ability to manage the situation better, then you're like, Oh, I just learned something. And therefore you can make those tough times easier slash better to cope with.

Shalom Ben Or: Yeah, a hundred percent. And I think eventually, like when you're an entrepreneur, when you build something. Um, you're not in a sprint and you're not, uh, you don't have a direct line. You have a mixed line, go up and down. Sometimes simultaneously, [00:04:00] your personal life, your business life, you are so much that going on.

And if you like, you need to win everything. And if you, if you didn't win, it's the end of the world. Then it's like you, you in, uh, you don't have any, it's really hard to celebrate small wins that way, like, because. Every time that you won something, you know, you diminish it. You said like, no, it was very small.

The important is in front of us. Let's continue. Let's celebrate. Cause like continue, like expecting to win, um, will not get you to anywhere. And I think, understand like losses is super important. And to, um, to, to cope with it. But also I think through understanding that you can lose, the win is much more sweeter.

And [00:05:00] then when you have this more wins. You know, it's like, it's the, it's the few that get you, that get you going.

Monica Millares: Yes. I like that. Really good perspective, which I'm like, that's a beautiful way to start the episode, just first two minutes. So we're like, boom, straight into it. Um, so, um, well, you have, now I know that you have also a sports background and an entrepreneurial background.

What's the piece of advice that you wish somebody gave you when you were younger, when it comes to your career or your business?

Shalom Ben Or: Um, I got so many, so many advice, which is, I should have listened. So, you know, when you start, when you start a company, everyone goes, everyone telling you, look, it's like, it's a marathon, you need to, you need to, you need to prepare yourself.

It's not a year. It's not two years. It's like, it's a [00:06:00] journey. Um, and I think, uh, I am this, I did understood how, like, When you start, you have a very fluid understanding of time. Like you say, yeah, five years, fine, easy five years from now, we're going to be there. But then these five years, you know, it's like when you're in there as an entrepreneur, it's like some long five years.

You understand that, um, you committed to something. Um, so like, it's, uh, I will going to contradict myself because if I would understand, I may not, you know, I would maybe we'll just, I would. done different stuff, which I think my path and my, my career so far, it's great. And I cherish it. So, you know, I advise that I should have, you know, listen, but not listen [00:07:00] is like that it's a marathon.

It will take time. Um, and I think the one piece in this advice that I would, um, maybe take more seriously is to enjoy. Enjoy like the, the beginning. Enjoy the small moments. It's so hard to start, but there is so much fun stuff there and there is so much, um, know really important events that happen to you and you when you start your first money, like your first, like, you raise the first money even, it's a $20,000 each.

It's like someone living give you $20,000, like. Yes. Your goal is to raise millions much like you just raised 20, 000 for an idea. It was a slide, you know, someone gave it to you, it's in your bank account, celebrate it, like celebrate it hard. Um, I think, [00:08:00] um, the advice was it's a journey, embrace the journey and celebrate the, and like chase the small stuff, uh, chase the, the, the milestones, the bad and the, and the good and the

Monica Millares: good.

Yes. Yeah, you're right. I'm a big, I'm a big believer in celebrating, uh, the little wins. I call them micro wins, because yeah, it's like it's the micro wins that make, that make the difference. It's not just the, whoa, big trophy. No, it's a micro win that, that shows you the, that there's progress and that keeps you going.

Because like you say, it's a marathon. Yeah. So this podcast is about basically how can we create an industry that it's more purpose driven and creating products that have impact. In your opinion, what's the role of purpose in the industry and how can we make it better?

Shalom Ben Or: I [00:09:00] think it's a, it's super important, especially in today's environment where we see that like good to have financial services are just.

Doesn't have doesn't have a solid business model. Um, and I think when I look on how we, how we, how we look on, on the solutions and the product we bring into the market, we, we look for, for, you know, three different components. Um, one is the value we bring to our clients. From our perspective, when we lend to a client, eventually when we give him the money, when he pay us back, he need to have more money in his pocket.

It cannot like, it cannot be that he will pay us and he will left with less money. Um, so it's like, [00:10:00] and it's not a, it's not a vague value. It's like, it's a really, it's like, it's a, it's a really strong value. It's like, okay, we give you money. When you pay us back, you have more money in your pocket, straight.

It's not like you need to search for the value. It's not like you really enjoyed from the experience. Therefore, you had value or you got it very fast. This is your, no, your value is that you have more money than us. Our value and your value is similar. Like it's based, it's made, like the basics are the same.

I think first is like looking on the value you're bringing to your client. And second is about, it's about, you know, solving problem. But I think solving problems should come in. Um, I think money can change power gaps because eventually if someone doesn't have money or someone doesn't have access to capital [00:11:00] or someone doesn't have the best payments options.

You have gaps compared to someone else who have the access to, um, so what we're trying to understand, or when we look on problems, we're looking on how we can shift power or spread the power even, um, in the industry. So we working with, uh, within the agricultural supply chain and we always, when we lend to businesses there, so we lend to small to medium sized businesses within the agricultural supply chain.

And it's super important that with our capital, they can compete with the bigger guys. They can be able to get the best, best product in order to sell and to fulfill their orders. So we're looking on their problem is that they are squeezed. They have the margin is the smallest. the access to products, [00:12:00] which they are trading with, uh, the hardest because they short in cash, how we can shift the power difference towards them and be there, you know, added value, allow them to, to compete and become better.

So I think like when you look on problems that you want to solve, see how you can shift the. The power gaps see how you can, you know, bring a solution to someone who is like in a, in a, in a position that through financial services, he can become. Much better. You have much more power, banking power, ability to do more, et cetera.

I think the third, the third point is, is about, um, the markets. Um, because we're in the global economy, you know, and startups, I think, uh, because we [00:13:00] are the riskiest. And we are the boldest as well. We should go to markets that have a massive risk and a massive reward next to it. Um, and I think currently for, for us, especially like we work in Africa, currently we're in Kenya.

It's really rare. that a company will say our market is in Africa. This is what we're going to do. This is what we believe most of the different filter companies looking on the global, on the Western world, trying to, to Do very important things and like shift the needle. But eventually everyone go to the same place.

Um, I think because we are the riskiest and we are the boldest, let's go to, you know, the untapped markets. Let's open them. Let's let's see how we can change the product and how we can [00:14:00] demonstrate that there is like really high returns in this market. Um, so like think about, think about your market when you, when you, when you deploy your product and when you want to expand, think about not the, the less risk with, you know, smaller margins, you know, massive markets.

Okay, we'll be able to scale fine. Business model is fine, but in Africa or in, you know, the riskiest, the riskier markets, you can do it in a smaller scale, higher margins, you know, it's, uh, it's, it's balanced it up. Um, I think the way, the way I see the industry coming, coming along and like evolve and be bringing more impact is like.

First of all, think about your clients and the value you give them. I believe that the company and the client should have the same basics. And get the same value. [00:15:00] Um, second, see how you can shift the power through financial services, because seeing power power is not, uh, evenly distributed, um, in, in, in financial services are key to disturb, to have a way lever, like way, um, uh, uh, way better in balance, power distribution.

And third, think about the market, like see where you can create. The best returns. Um, and yeah, take more risk, be more, be bolder.

Monica Millares: I love I love all of it and it's the 1st time that I hear about power and power dynamics. It's like, and you have a very good point. It's like, our customers in your case, like, customers in the agriculture sector.

It's like, yeah, you're giving them a loan. But your expectation is that because of that [00:16:00] loan, they will be better in life. Well, in their business, therefore, the power dynamics will even out a little bit more so that by the time they pay back, they are better. I love I love that. It's thanks

Shalom Ben Or: and it's part of our like risk risk.

Um, Engines and everything eventually when when we look on the agriculture industry So we what we see is that in trading environments put aside agree The ones who hold the commodity He's the one who set the price is the one who like set the dynamics in the market Then you move to agriculture and like the ones who have the product which are the farmers Have zero power.

Then the one above them have some power, but the one who buy have the, the, the, all of the, all of the powers is the one who buys. And while we are not, we are not targeting farmers, we're targeting the level above farmers, we really believe that if they [00:17:00] will have, and what we see currently in the results, like give them the capital, give them the best financial services they, they can possibly receive.

Which is include payments, um, understanding of on their margins and how they should do their business, make them better businesses and give them the access to capital they need. And they will win. You know, they will become better. They will be able to negotiate better on prices, um, get better products.

And, and, uh, so I really, it's not just me believing it. Like our fundamentals are aligned.

Monica Millares: Awesome. And I think we're like full on in the conversation and we haven't talked about avenues as such. Can we're like, yeah, agriculture, decent fintech. And can you tell us what did you guys do? And then how did you come up?

How did you. Come up with the idea. What's [00:18:00] the story? So

Shalom Ben Or: I think this is a financial super up for the agriculture industry We here to serve the 2. 5 million agriculture small to medium sized businesses across the African continent currently we're doing Kenya. Our clients are businesses who serve the farmers.

which either they sell them the agricultural inputs the farmers need in order to plow the land. chemicals, animal feed, you name it. They have stores. We give them the capital to stock up and be able to, to sell forward to the farmers. And the other side of our customers are the traders, the aggregators, the small millers, basically the, the immediate market for the farmers.

This is our second segment of clients. while we divided into two segments, there is, very many varieties of businesses because We are across the [00:19:00] agricultural supply chain. So we have businesses who deal with animals or animal feed or animal as a whole dairy meat, you name it. Commodities such as, maize, soybeans, et cetera, and fresh.

So from avocados to tomatoes, all of it. And. What we, what we build in order to serve this wide variety of clients is that we have a very sophisticated underwriting capabilities. It's taking into consideration the uniqueness, the agriculture industry and the uniqueness of the businesses. So we understand the commodity risk, the value chain risk that these businesses carry with them.

And by doing it, we can, and we are providing capital in like as short as two days, we can provide 100, 000 in two days. And we do it through our app. [00:20:00] So the way, the way we started is that we believe the new wave of financial services are not one silver bullet. So it's not just, Hey, I'm doing only payments or, Hey, I'm doing only lending or I'm doing only neobanking.

the current customer base, they need everything. They need to be able to bank. With the, start up company or the higher company that give them the loans and give them the payment infrastructure. So what we did is that we bonded everything into one up, basically allowing our clients to choose the amount of services they would like to get from us.

So we giving them, all the options, including the ones we are not lending to. So if you, denied client, you still can use all of our services. And we're also allowing you to understand what, sorry, what you can do or what you need to do in order to become [00:21:00] eligible for capital. so avenues, what we are combining inside our, our super up, it's, an embedded finance approach where we are the, the, the interface, so we are the payment system.

We are the management system for the business. the lender. So we can allow you to understand and do different things. And now here you go, you're eligible. So you can borrow from us. And it also allow us, sorry, allowing us to collaborate. We're collaborating with other lenders, such as banks. We collaborate with, with other software companies where we embed our lending capabilities into them.

so avenues is The way I see it is like we're like, an [00:22:00] octopus, we can, we can fit ourselves into very, narrow holes with massive amount of, of, of capabilities. We can control different things from one center. so from payments to lending. To wallet and bank accounts. and it's really exciting, we come to the coming to work and, we love what we do and we're really passionate about it.

And it's all start because we're super naive. Um, we, we, we, we looked on the agriculture industry here in Israel. And we saw that's like, cannot be so it's such an important industry and, and no one is lending to, and like farmers in Israel really struggle, but Israel is a very small country and what just to build a company for Israel.

It's like Israel. It's not big enough to, to serve, to serve the [00:23:00] purpose. And then we looked on different markets and we saw that Africa is like, yeah, it's like there isn't a normally there on one hand. Agriculture is like third of the GDP. The other hand, banks barely finance. You have like banks portfolio goes to agriculture only like 2 percent out of the portfolio.

We said like, cannot be someone like it's something that can be solved with and. We, we applied to the Techstars Barclays Accelerator program and we got in with like, um, a presentation, basically, like we were, we were agreeing as head. Um, but we took this opportunity and we, we managed to sell to Barclays, a pilot, Barclays Africa, um, raise money, build a company.

Uh, we sold. software to banks for, for the past, for the next, for this, for the first [00:24:00] three, four years, but then we took the opportunity to become a lender ourselves. So since 2022, we are, we are independently lending. While collaborating with banks in the continent.

Monica Millares: Awesome. And then why agriculture is so important?

Shalom Ben Or: We all eat, you know

Eventually if we want if we want to continue and like have this access to Healthy food and to allow into fresh food. We need agriculture and in agriculture and arable land In the Western world is diminishing. So we have less and less arable land. And in Africa you have like endless currently, if you look in on the continent potential.

And the way we see it, Africa also [00:25:00] growing rapidly by, by 2030, if I'm not wrong. Um, because I always confuse between 2030 to 2050, but 2030, one out of five people will be African. It's a super young continent growing super fast. And agriculture is currently 30 percent of GDP. And it's, um, it can and it should be much big.

Um, so we believe that tapping in where we are now into this very big niche allow will allow us to grow with the continent, to become a standard across the continent. How, how have, uh, agricultural is being financed, how businesses are being set. Um, and eventually how commodity is being. Trade and move across, across the supply chain.[00:26:00]

Monica Millares: Yes. And I think like talking about impact avenues is like one of those fintech studies actually having impact. It's not just. Hey, let's build a super app. No, it is like you have the, well, you just explained, right? Like there is a big need. We all eat as simple as that. And then the people working on the, on the food for us, like they need to be better supported.

So I'd love that from you.

Shalom Ben Or: Yeah, and then we appreciate, appreciate the compliment, uh, uh, what we're seeing eventually in, in. We strongly believe about it is that you should do good and you should create companies who do good, but eventually you should also earn very well. Um, so, so why it's super important for us that our clients will make [00:27:00] more money than us.

And that they will go and we're working in Africa. We have very good returns, you know. We're creating very good returns on our capital. Um, and we're growing very nicely. So, from my perspective, this is the win win synergy. Um, the market should have with, with company, you know, should have very good returns.

You should do very good to the economy you're working in. Um, so yeah, I'm, I'm

Monica Millares: excited about it. I'm like, well done. Yes. Well done and congrats. Um, just expanding on agriculture. I was just curious, like you, you're from Israel, uh, but you grew up in a kibbutz. Did that influence you and your decision of getting into, into agriculture or how did that influence even your [00:28:00] leadership style?

So this

Shalom Ben Or: is, this is like, it's my father answer. Like he heard me one say, like answer it and he said to me, like, listen, Shalom, you're like fourth generation farmers and, and I, and he, he's right. Like, like when my grandfather, grand grandfather came to Israel from. Um, everyone were like, we're farmers, you needed to, this is what the profession and when you grow up in a kibbutz, you need to, so a kibbutz is a social village and you need to, when you're a kid, you need to donate one day of your week for work for the community and kibbutz majority of the businesses are agricultural, um, related.

So we have, um, milk, dairy processing facilities. So you can go and walk in the. Dairy industry. We have turkey chickens. [00:29:00] We have different plantations from citrus, across, um, um, cotton, etc. We, so when I was a kid, this is what I did, you know, I walked. In the fields, I did the hard work in farming and agriculture, so it put, put it very close to my, to my heart.

Um, and when I got older and we saw, we thought about what we should, what we should do and what, what problems we should solve. The moment we looked at agriculture, it was an immediate tick. Um, so this is why agriculture is so, so close to my heart. I think you also asked, like, how did kibbutz influence my, my leadership skills?

So, again, you are very, because you're in a very close community, um, the, um, The way we grow up is that you can do whatever you want [00:30:00] as a kid, but you need to do it like no one will plan it for you and execute it for you. You want to go to a two day fine, do the research, understand your budget, do all the shopping, plan.

Everything will be there with you, um, and give you the guidance. And there will be an adult who. To assist but eventually use a kid you need to You need to do it. And I think early on, we had people who were the leaders there who, who need, who took them on, on themselves and like land and execute. And I, and I was one of them and, and I think it's really hard to lead a group of kids, you know?

Uh, it's like you're one of them, you need to, and everything needs to be in order. You need to follow the rules. [00:31:00] And you need to do everything. And, and so we did a lot of, we, you know, twisted quite a lot of the, the corners and, you know, we cut some corners and we, we didn't follow all the rules, but I think it really taught me on how to plan and execute, um, properly because.

We did parties. So we needed, we wanted to have like for a party for the entire region. We organized everything, the kids, you know, including, you know, the security and the amount, like the price, everything was part of it. If you are like I was in the front, so it's like really taught me on, on, on how to do it, how to motivate people, how to be able to, to lead from with an example, because again, you don't have any power beside the fact that you plan it [00:32:00] and you're going, you're going to execute it.

But like, you're the kid, like everyone are the same kid. Yeah. Like everyone on the same level, no one gave you a degree and say, Hey, you are the. In charge kid. No, you're the kid. Everyone are the kids. Um, and I think leadership, leadership to come from, from like, not from a power position. You need to come from, from a momentum, from, from, from an example that you, you set.

Monica Millares: Yes. We children lesson that you. Did you have when it comes to leadership because it's a very interesting experience that you had that it's like you weren't meeting other kids Well, you were a kid, but nobody told you you are the correct

Shalom Ben Or: I think what the main the main lesson is that like the great like title doesn't do anything You know, it's just like you have any title you want eventually if [00:33:00] people will not follow you The title was nothing, um, and you need to invest, um, create the, the environment for people to go and believe in you and to follow you and a title, it's fine, you know, it's nice, but, um, it just a title eventually you need to be able to lead without anything, you know, um, and you need to be one of.

One of everyone. It's like fine. You're the leader. There is no you can do everything and you are willing to do everything and you are doing everything. And the fact that you're the leader doesn't give you any special rights. Hey, I'm not doing this job because it's under my my page or whatever. No, people see it.

People, people react to it very badly. Um, so my main lesson is the title title [00:34:00] is worth nothing. You know, it's all, it's only about yourself and your own, who you are.

Monica Millares: Yeah. And I think what great, what you're giving us is a proper definition of leadership. It is not exactly, it's not a title of the highest paid in the company, fancy title names, but it's a, Hey, I'm with the people and I'm willing to do all the jobs.

And like you say, people do

Shalom Ben Or: notice. Your hands are the same as everyone else.

Monica Millares: Yes. That's a, I think we need to bring that more to work, not even corporate, non corporate, like just to work a little bit more of that leadership style. Yeah. I like that. So at some point you talked about, um, solving problems. But then solving problems doesn't necessarily means adding value.

Can you expand on that and how you're [00:35:00] using that with your product philosophy?

Shalom Ben Or: Yes, 100%. So, you know, you can, you can solve problems that, you know, there are problems. So, you know, our clients. One of their problems is that they, you know, they manage themselves on a piece of paper. Fine. You know, so you can say, Hey, I want to solve their problem.

I want to digitize them, like give them tools. And we, we tried it. Eventually they don't need for them. They don't need someone to solve their problem. They need someone to assist them have a better cash understanding. Um, so I think, you know, when you look on someone problem, you need to see what. Like what, what is the problem and what the value want to bring, because if you solve someone problem, but there is no value for him, you didn't solve me anything like, Hey, you gave me [00:36:00] a something, you gave me a solution.

It doesn't move the needle, like why I should use it doesn't give me the value I need. and I think, look, what we're trying to do is to look on, the, the value our clients need. Understand why they're not getting this value from what they have and see if we can give them these values through our solution.

So I think it's a different way of looking on problems because, problems. Everyone have tons of problems that they live with them. They don't need no one to solve them. They're these problems just don't need to. but we all seek for different value. Link the value to the problem and then link the value to the solution you want to bring and then see if there is like a, if you solve a problem that way fine, but if you're just giving a value, it's also very good.[00:37:00]

Monica Millares: Yeah, and I think this turns product management on its head because usually we say, Hey, you have the customer, we need to find the customer problems. And then how do they prioritize them? But actually it's more of where we can turn that around and say, what's the value that they need, that they are not getting right now, which is very different to which problems can we solve for them?

It's minor tweak of words. I agree because

Shalom Ben Or: eventually. You don't, you, you wake up in the morning as an entrepreneur to seize opportunities and like solving problems doesn't mean you seize opportunities, creating value means that like you can, there's a price for this value is something you can get out this value.

Um, and I think value link way better to opportunities that you want to seize an entrepreneur compared to problems that you want to solve because eventually. [00:38:00] To be honest, we're not a charity company. Like there is tons of problems. We're not here to solve problems. We are here to create value for our clients because we believe from this value we can earn and they can earn.

Monica Millares: Yes. And do you have a framework or way of thinking in which do you identify this value? So

Shalom Ben Or: what we do in Avenues is that we always try to think about our client first. So.

Let's, let's look on our loan products. We, we want it to be as digitized as possible because it would make our life easier. Um, no paperwork, everything can be plugged in, plugged out. We can analyze everything fine, but our clients, how we can move it, how we can move it to our clients, how we can mobilize to our [00:39:00] clients.

And then we, and then what we're trying to do is not think about ourself and think about our clients first and then, and see if it ties. to our benefit or not. Um, and if you look on digitization, so all of our clients really want quick and easy onboarding process. They don't want to go into a branch, sit there the entire day, fill up papers.

They don't want it for them. Value is like quick and easy. Um, and they can do it. So while we understand that current problems that they have is that they need to go into a branch, fill up paperwork and understand it's fine. This is the this is a problem they have. And one of the issues. Of lending to the segment, but the value they want is like be able to do things really quickly.

Understand like easy the part of their head and this value also ties to [00:40:00] our value, which for us. Also, if it's digitized fast, easy, we can do it way quicker. We need less people to want to look at machines and we can do it. Um, so this is, this is how we look at things, trying to understand the value for clients.

See if there is synergy to the value we want to, if it's linked, if we can link it to one of the values we want to get out of this product that we want to roll out, tie the two and then move it out.

Monica Millares: I like that. That's a good way of thinking. Because many times you have like, Hey, we're solving customer problems. That's, that's a very common phrase within the product world, solving customer problems, and then you have company problems and yet you need to tie them up or you're compromised one for the other, but in your case, you're like, no, it's not about compromise.

It's, uh, finding the value for both parties,

Shalom Ben Or: 100 percent eventually, you know, [00:41:00] if we can do things better, faster, easier. You know, we can give more value to our clients. Um, our pricing can be, can be friendlier. Yeah,

Monica Millares: definitely. Um, so coming back to avenues and your culture, how would you describe your culture and how did you go about building it?

I

Shalom Ben Or: think, you know, first of all, we. We really, when we interview people and when we bring people into Avenues, we're looking, we have like a, we're trying to find the DNA, like the Avenues DNA, which I believe most of the company is trying to do so. Um, for us, DNA should, should be someone who can, you know, who can, we can see he is like purpose driven.

He's not here for, for the paycheck, um, which is super [00:42:00] important. No doubts. But eventually we're trying to see from where he walked from, from the heart or from the head, if they walk from the heart and they have all the skills and everything, we would prefer the people that walk from the heart, even if they have less skills or less degrees, because.

People that work from the heart, you know, they with, they will be with you in the, in the hard time, you know, they will not leave the company. They will, they will, they will want to push the company as, as strong as you want to push the company because they're like, they, they, they, what drive them is like an internal fire of, you know, I want, I want to, it's important for me to do something.

That I relate to it's something that excited me. I'm not just, it's not like, Hey, I have a nine to five job, hate it, but they might be fine, great. You know, if someone really wanted this, this is how they would [00:43:00] look like. It's not an evidence DNA. It's not, it's not what, what we want. So once we have it, and this is the base.

Then we speak, you know, we, we operate from, from that, from, we, we, we feel this inner fire. So, you know, we very direct, there is no filters. You did a good job. You get a well done. Something was wrong. You will know exactly what went wrong. But when we speak with you, we both speaks from the, from the same position of, you know, inner flame.

So when. When I'm excited, when I come to you and I like give you feedback, even if it's a hard feedback, you will not fear of me going to fire you because both of us were coming from the same place. So we both want to win. We both are angry that we lost. Now we need to fuel this energy to win next time.

Um, I [00:44:00] think this is how we're creating this culture of like, we're a bunch of winners. We understand we sometimes lose. It's okay. We understand it. When we analyze our, our, why we lost, we do it with passion because it's important for us. When we go and create something, we do it with passion because it's important for us.

When we speak with our team members and when we do our dailies, we do it with passion because we're like excited from the day. It's super important for me to reach the targets for the week. Um, and, and I think this mentality is something that We really, we chase, we, we, we succeeding building it. We're like people, no matter they rank within the company, they come to win.

They come to like push avenues day after day, the harder the job. It's fine. They will come and do it hard time. They will come in, you know, [00:45:00] paddle through and, and, and, and win. And, and I think it's all about, you know, finding the, the, the people who, who are woke from the same basics, you know, all have like inner flame.

And they, they come because they really want to, they want to win. They want to, they want to do something important and they relate to avenues. And, um, so, and this is our culture. Eventually it's like, and it's amazing. It's amazed me every time. Like I was in Kenya last week for two weeks, you coming to the office, like people running in the stairs, if they, if they lay, they run, not because they are being afraid of being let go.

They like, they need to be, they need to be, they want to be in the office. Because they need to hear the brief and they want to start the day and they're like It's important for, um, uh, and it's great, great. It's a great feeling to see the [00:46:00] company that we've built.

Monica Millares: Yes. I can imagine because like, I even like the word that you use, that they have like the inner flame, you know, it's like the inner fire. And that's, well, if you've managed to hire people with that, then the company just keeps going, going, going. It's, it's, uh, it's a great principle. I think, especially as a founder, once you, you know, like there's companies that founders leave, come, go, whatever, but then it's, uh, if you're still the founder, then I think it's a great trait to keep within the company.

You

Shalom Ben Or: know, it's our company. We speak in we. It's ours. It's us. We win together. We lose together. I like that. Yeah.

Monica Millares: And it's kind of like full circle to from where we started that it's like, I didn't know the conversation was going to be like, Hey, full circle. I start with, with losing and winning and now we end [00:47:00] with losing and winning. It's been amazing. And I think I could speak with you like for another three to five hours.

Um, where can we find you and

Shalom Ben Or: Avenues? So I'm, I'm on LinkedIn. Stop having business cards. So I'm only doing, um, I think my, my email is quite, quite available. If you like to email me, it's also fine. I answer emails, I answer LinkedIn, um, so feel free to reach me out in one of the, or two of the platforms.

Monica Millares: Awesome. And then just to close the conversation, we touched like so many good points and it's not technical FinTech, but it's more like the wisdom behind FinTech. Um, if there was one thing. thing in fintech that you would change just one thing that you could change that could have the most impact in customers, staff [00:48:00] and shareholders.

What would that be?

Shalom Ben Or: So from a very humble. Uh, my, for my very humble position, I think, um, the value, I think, um, fintechs need to have the same, they need to aspire to center to sync their value and their client's value. It cannot be that they're like, you, you will win once your client will not pay you on time.

Like, you want the client will not pay you on time and this is your business model. It's just, it cannot be. I don't see it as a viable, it's a viable business model.

Monica Millares: Yeah. Yeah, I think that's a great point. It's a win win

Shalom Ben Or: business models. Again, it's like it should be, it should think your value and the client value need to be, [00:49:00] um, on the same fundamental. Cannot, cannot beat it like your clients need to lose in order for you to win.

Monica Millares: I love that Shalom. It's been amazing having you in the show. Yes.

Shalom Ben Or: Monica, I really, really enjoyed the conversation. Thank you so much for having me in your podcast. I'm really looking forward to hear, to hear this conversation when it would be released.

Monica Millares: Likewise. Thank you everyone. See you next week.

Okey dokey. Oh, that was really good. Thank you. Yeah, it was really good. Yes.