Kevin Horek: Welcome back to the show.
Today we have Mona Akmal.
She's the c e o and Co-founder at Falcon.
Mona, welcome to the
Mona Akmal: show.
Thank you so much, Kevin.
It's great to be here.
Kevin Horek: Yeah.
I'm excited to have you on the show.
I think.
What you guys are doing at Falcon is actually really innovative and cool.
But maybe before we dive into all that, let's get to know you a little bit better
and start off with where you grew up.
Mona Akmal: Yeah, let's do it.
Uh, I grew up in Pakistan.
Okay, great.
Cool.
Um, yeah, and I moved here when I was 20.
Okay.
Kevin Horek: Wow.
So walk us through what made you move to America.
Mona Akmal: Yeah, so, you know, I was always, uh, uh, the odd one out
in Pakistan, I guess, in that I was a girl that really liked computer
science and mathematics and physics.
And uh, also I'm very independent.
I don't like being told what to do and, uh, uh, Pakistan's a very communal.
Country and I appreciate that, but it wasn't really my.
Um, vibe.
And so it was very important for me to, uh, move to the US one because it was the
technology hub in the world at the time.
Sure.
And second, I wanted to live a pretty independent and free life.
And third, I wanted to support my mom financially.
Uh, and actually, you know, the story of moving here was pretty funny.
I was in my second year in undergrad and.
Uh, one of my friends as a way to haze me, uh, made a resume, uh, for
me and submitted it to Microsoft and didn't even tell me about it.
And I came back, uh, from my classes one day and got a phone call from
a recruiter and he was calling from Seattle and we had an informational,
they flew me to Dubai, they made me an offer and I was still in my.
Sophomore year in undergrad.
And so then I was in the Mad Rush, did 22 units every quarter, graduated
in three years from undergrad and moved here, uh, not knowing anyone
in the us uh, at the age of 20.
Wow.
Yeah.
Wow.
Kevin Horek: So what did you take in university and why?
Mona Akmal: Yeah, so I did, uh, uh, my focus was predominantly, uh, computer
science and actually social sciences.
Uh, so the reason for computer science was I'm a pretty analytical, logical person.
I like to build things.
Okay.
And, um, also because there's an element of computer science that's very creative
when you're building cool products.
Uh, sure.
Then social sciences was my minor because I've always been a student
of history and psychology and organizational behavior because I don't
really understand people intuitively.
So I have to almost learn it through my brain why humans do what they do.
Um, and yeah, that was, I'm really glad I did that actually.
Kevin Horek: Okay, very cool.
So, You obviously rose in the ranks at Microsoft.
You were there a long time.
Walk us through kind of your journey there up until becoming, you know,
CEO and, and what you're doing today.
Because a lot of people, Microsoft's one of the top companies to work for.
Mm-hmm.
A lot of them was right out the rest of their career there.
Mona Akmal: Totally.
I mean, many of my closest friends are still at Microsoft and I got to
know them, you know, 20, 25 years ago when I first started there.
So, So, um, Microsoft will always remain, uh, you know, my first love,
I loved working at the company.
I, but my MO at Microsoft was always working on V1 products and, you know, when
I had been there for 12 years, having done four different zero to one, uh, products.
I realize that that's actually where I am happiest.
Uh, I like to go from nothing to something.
That's when I'm in peak performance mode and I am not particularly
motivated by comfort or an easy life.
I don't really give a about money.
Uh, I do care about learning things I care about.
Working with people I really like and I'm not very compromising
as a person, just fyi.
Uh, and so Microsoft didn't feel like I was gonna be maximally
learning and working with the type of people I was looking to work with.
More entrepreneurial.
And that's when I decided to leave, but I wasn't sure what I wanted to do.
And so I did the Goldilocks approach, which is I'm gonna
go try a bunch of stuff.
I don't know you and generally, I don't feel like the big things in life
you can think your way into, you just have to try a few things on for size.
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
Right.
And so worked for three very different CEOs with three very different missions.
Mostly because I was putting myself through CEO school,
uh, lots of hard knocks.
Uh, and then I felt ready, and that's when I started Falcon.
Okay.
Kevin Horek: So how did you climb up, come up with the idea of her
Falcon and what exactly is it?
Mona Akmal: Mm.
Yeah.
So, uh, first, you know, I wish I could tell you a founder story that
was, you know, I was couch surfing and I thought, why aren't other
people able to couch surfing like me?
And that's how Airbnb started.
I do not have that founder story.
I guess maybe because I'm old.
Um, So for me it was really about one, what is an area
that I understand really well?
Uh, what is an area where I have a deep network and a competitive advantage in who
I can hire and who I can raise money from.
Like, for instance, I have no business building a consumer business
because that's not my background.
I've always been on the business and even of consumer products, right?
I, my network is, Engineers and scientists and investors who invest in deep tech with
data and analytics and machine learning.
So it was important for me to pick an idea that was in a space where I had
a competitive advantage as a founder compared to someone else doing this idea.
Um, I also wanted to pick an idea.
I, I personally don't believe when you start a company, you pick an
idea, you actually pick a space.
Makes sense.
Yeah, right.
Kevin Horek: I would agree with that.
Mona Akmal: And then iterate your way.
And unfortunately, right, like so many founders and we talk about
like someone had an aha moment and then they built a company around
it and then it became a unicorn.
And that's rarely how it goes, right?
Yeah.
So the space I picked was I wanted to right size the ROI on data
because I feel that companies hoard and hoard and hoard information.
But they don't actually know what to do with it.
So the way they work, the way they make decisions, the things they spend
their time on have not meaningfully changed since they invested a gazillion
dollars in their snowflake and five Tran and D B T infrastructure.
And I wanted to right size that the, that's really how the concept started.
We were not a company that was focused on go to market data at all.
When we first started, we were an augmented analytics company.
And then we, uh, iterated and realized that the business stakeholders that care
most about using their data to become more efficient and get more shit done are
revenue leaders and marketing leaders.
Because guess what?
They are compensated on their ability to get shit done.
It's not as black and, yeah.
Interesting.
White in engineering and product management and design, right?
Yeah.
And so that was a very pragmatic decision to go after people that have
an urgent need on using their data and actually have budget to buy software.
Interesting.
So they could use their data.
Not romantic at all, Kevin.
Kevin Horek: No, but I think, I think that the reality is is most
startups aren't always right and they don't have to be, and I.
Selfishly, I prefer solving hard problems, even if it's not really
the sexiest type of company, I guess.
Right?
Yeah.
Because I think there's a lot of really good problems to be solved
that are completely unsexy, but are technically challenging.
Mm-hmm.
And those are, in my opinion, are more enjoyable than, you know,
let's build a chat app or whatever.
Right.
Like, there's a million
Mona Akmal: of them.
Right.
I love it.
Uh, we are aligned, we think the same way on this.
Uh, totally.
Kevin Horek: So walk us through how does a customer actually use Falcon maybe from
like day one, and then give us maybe like after a month or three months or a quarter
or six months, a year kind of thing.
And how does it evolve over time?
Mona Akmal: Yeah.
So I'll give you a little bit of a, a 32nd detour before I
get the answer your question.
I promise I will.
Perfect.
Uh, so, you know, generally venture backed companies, conventional wisdom is
pick one very small use case and Yeah.
Uh, you know, get that right and then scale the shit out of it, right?
Yep.
Because that aligns with the venture capital, uh, timeline.
Yep.
Uh, we did not do that because I did not want to be one more
tool that does one, 100th of what a customer really wants done.
That's actually one of the biggest problems in go to market
is there are too many tools that do only bitty little things.
I
Kevin Horek: interesting that you said that.
So how did you.
Sell that because that's hard to
Mona Akmal: do, Uhhuh Well, so, um, that's a great question.
I think that there are investors for all types of visionaries
and all types of founders.
You just have to know.
What the fit looks like.
It's like dating, right?
Sure.
Yeah.
There, I believe there is someone out there for everyone.
Sure.
But, uh, some of us that are more picky have to search a little
bit harder to find our one.
Right?
Yeah.
And so we were very, very particular.
We actually researched and stocked our future investors for 12 months prior to
even reaching out to them because Okay.
So you didn't know
Kevin Horek: your current investors before you?
So walk us through that journey.
Sorry, I keep asking you questions, but
Mona Akmal: Yeah.
So I'll give you an example.
Okay.
Uh, Greylock was our, uh, lead investor in the seed round.
Sweet.
Yeah.
And why we picked them was because I had been.
Stalking two of their partners and what the thesis that they were
putting out, what content they were sharing, and also what types of
companies they were investing in.
Okay.
And what I learned from all those experiences and observations was
that this is the type of investor that plays for the long haul.
They're not looking for a quick exit, they're looking for the big picture
because for them, A 300 million exit or a 500 million exit is not interesting.
Right.
Interesting.
Um, in a lot of the smaller VCs, that is not true.
They're looking for a quicker turnaround and even a little bit of return is
worth it, but, That's why we wanted to go with a firm that thinks bigger
and um, has a little bit of ideology behind their investment, right?
They are thesis investors, not general purpose.
We will invest in anything that is doing well.
Um, so that was the process.
And then obviously, like any good seller would, right?
Um, my first call to them was through the most senior person I could
possibly find that was connected to both of us because that shows.
Um, a certain level of ability to hustle.
Right.
So I found the c e O of Accolade, um, uh, who was also one of
the co-founders of Concur.
Um, and had him make the introduction because he knew me well.
Right.
Got it.
Okay.
Smart.
Then I actually had my entire talk track tailored around the content
that I had read from the investor, the partner that I was actually speaking to.
So he felt like he was talking to someone he already knew because I had done the
hard work of educating myself on him.
So it felt like I was familiar because I was literally saying words he had said.
Right.
Okay.
Interesting.
Um, and so on and so forth.
That's just the start of the story.
Kevin Horek: Okay.
Any other highlights along that journey of recruiting or, uh, you know,
kind of corralling those investors?
Mona Akmal: So, one, I don't believe in a high volume game.
So, you know, in our seed timeframe we spoke with a total of five firms.
Um, in our series A timeframe, we spoke with a total of eight firms.
Uh, because to me, if you do your due diligence and your research about
the firms and the partners, You can actually rule out a lot of shitty
conversations without ever having them.
Uh, and interesting.
So, and, and then really going in, uh, so going in fully understanding
what their puts and takes are, right?
Because it's a sales call, right?
Remember, they are selling you money and you are selling them the privilege
of being a part of your company.
As long as you understand that trade, you can really make every
conversation streamlined for that.
Kevin Horek: No, that that makes sense.
I've never heard it put like quite like that, but that makes a lot of
sense and I think that's actually a really good way to look at it.
Mona Akmal: Uhhuh.
It's also, I think, for founders critical because fundraising is.
Brutal experience.
Yes.
Especially, you know, you, you feel like you're putting yourself out there because
your company is not different from you.
You are your company and your company is you.
So when an investor passes on you, it feels like personal rejection, like
someone telling you, you know, youre ugly or you are stupid, or whatever.
Right?
Yeah.
And so that's why actually, I'm such a believer in.
Doing your research upfront because there's a real opportunity cost.
It's not just the, the shitty meeting you had, it is how much
you spiraled after that meeting.
Yeah.
And how much it distracted you and how you leaked all your energy
that you could have spent having a good conversation, you know?
Yeah.
Kevin Horek: Yeah, no, I think that's actually really good advice.
So I want to get back to the product a little bit.
I asked you a few minutes ago about, so like how does somebody
actually get started and then walk us through using the product, you
know, in the coming weeks and months?
Mona Akmal: Yeah, absolutely.
So, uh, Falcon is a multi-use case product.
So unlike single use case products, we solve a lot of problems.
And essentially the value proposition is.
We're going to use all your go to market data, sales, marketing, customer
success, product data, um, and we are going to help you automate intelligently,
um, key aspects of how you generate pipeline and how you generate revenue.
Okay?
So the use cases pretty much cover the entire customer life cycle from
you reaching out to the customer for the first time all the way
to them renewing their contract.
So, We do not, we are not a P L G motion.
You actually have to talk to us, uh, how to get your hands on Falcon.
You would talk to a person on our sales team so that we can figure
out what use case are you, is your top business priority with
respect to revenue generation?
Based on that, you will buy a portion of Falcon.
Our implementation takes about two weeks.
At the end of those two weeks you are trained and now you're ready to go.
And, Uh, generate more revenue, more efficiently, what that would look like.
And then 30 days, 90 days, 120 days in, often most of our customers will
expand because now there's another problem that's blocking them from
generating revenue efficiently.
So a very simple example here could be, let's say I'm talking to a.
An enterprise SaaS company, and they tell me our biggest problem is we
don't have enough top of funnel because we don't really understand which
channels and campaigns are effective.
Our sales team is doing outbound prospecting, but it's
not resulting in pipeline.
We will then deploy our pipeline generation automation solution,
which will automate a lot of what a good rep would do.
It would provide intelligence to marketing teams about which channels
and campaigns to invest in, in order to generate pipeline, and we will
automate a lot of the process of creating and launching those campaigns.
Okay.
About 60 days into that, you are now seeing the results of
more pipeline being generated.
Now we can have a conversation about, okay, what is your conversion
rate from pipeline to customers?
Right.
A and how much would you want that to improve?
And then get into our sales module for how do we intelligently automate
the process from pipeline to closed one, and so on and so forth.
Got it.
Kevin Horek: Okay.
So do you have specific verticals of customers that are like kind of
ideal for Falcon or does it not really
Mona Akmal: matter?
Yeah, that's a great question.
So any company that has a marketing and sales motion to generate
revenue is a good customer for us.
Okay.
Uh, we do not sell the consumer companies because obviously you don't
sell Instagram through sales reps.
Right?
Right.
Um, so we predominantly focus on companies that sell software
or hardware to other businesses.
Um, Using a sales team and marketing, traditional marketing efforts.
So in that, there's a vast, uh, set of verticals, right?
So Zendesk is one of our customers.
They're a customer support, uh, service and the crm, uh,
entrust is another customer.
They are a cybersecurity company, right?
The only thing that's common between these two verticals is they sell
technology, software, or hardware.
They sell it through a Salesforce and a marketing engine.
Kevin Horek: Okay.
Interesting.
So can you maybe give us some other examples of the
modules people can, um, buy?
Cuz you have a bunch of,
Mona Akmal: bunch more.
Yeah.
So essentially we have a marketing performance module, which is all about.
Right sizing your return on investment for your marketing
spend, whether that it's events or digital marketing, doesn't matter.
We have an SDR r uh, module where we will automate 70% of what N S D
R does to book more meetings for you as a company and to make sure those
meetings actually turn into pipeline.
Then we have a pipeline and sales forecasting and sales productivity
module, which is all about being able to forecast revenue, identify, uh,
risk in your deal so that you can predictably hit your revenue targets.
Then we have a module, which is for driving customer expansion, um, by using
your product usage data, identifying which of your current customers
are ready for expansion, and then prepping your sales team to go get
that expansion dollar in your bank.
And then our last module is around, uh, revenue protection, which is
preventing churn by driving customer engagement and customer adoption.
Kevin Horek: Okay, so I, I get, obviously it depends on which
modules and such that I'm using.
Mm-hmm.
But how, how do you guys price and monetize the platform?
Mona Akmal: Yeah.
So, you know, uh, uh, I'll, my 2 cents on this are until you get to your first.
Five to 7 million in a r r.
Mm-hmm.
The only thing that matters about your pricing is your core business model.
Right?
Because you're trying to figure out if, if your product is valuable enough that
you can charge $30,000 or $50,000, then.
Your go to market motion can be a sales oriented marketing motion, right?
If your product ends up being something that is sold for a thousand dollars,
or I would say sub $10,000, you cannot have a business model that's
predicated on a sales team because it's not cost effective, right?
Right.
So currently our pricing is based on modules which are essentially inferred
from the number of people or the book of business that we are helping improve.
So, for instance, our, uh, SDR productivity module is a function
of how many SDRs you have in your team, because that is how much
value we are gonna deliver, right?
We do not do seat based licenses because I find those to be extremely
annoying for data companies especially.
It's your data, right?
You should be able to use it.
We shouldn't hold it hostage.
Um, so we price by module and each module is priced by the size of your team
or the size of your book of business.
Kevin Horek: Okay.
No, no, that makes sense.
So walk us through a little bit of maybe.
The types of insights and data and maybe just simplify, just reporting mm-hmm.
That I, yeah.
Is it like a dashboard or, or walk us through that.
Mona Akmal: Yeah, so actually I think I, I think most dashboards
are garbage, so we try to push our insights in an operational way.
So let's say, here's an example.
I am an account manager, and I am about, let's say I sell Slack, okay?
And I am about to talk to a customer who has been using Slack and paying
us, let's say, a hundred bucks a month.
Okay?
Um, first of all, as an account manager at Slack, I am assigned 500 accounts.
Okay?
How do I prioritize which account to talk to this week?
Falcon will automatically tell you, here are the top 10 accounts
that where usage is going up.
They just signed up for your webinar.
We think there's a high propensity that they are going to want to
have an expansion conversation, therefore you should prioritize them.
You're not looking at a dashboard.
You're literally looking in Salesforce and getting recommendations.
Here are the 10 out of the 500 accounts you should talk to.
Sweet.
Okay.
Second, you set up a meeting.
Now let's say your meeting is showing up.
Uh, you, you're gonna have a meeting with, uh, your customer who's using
your product Slack in 15 minutes.
You need to be prepared for it, right?
Yeah.
Traditional selling is like, oh, I'm gonna look up who the title and
persona of the person I'm talking to is so that I don't look like a dummy.
But when you're selling software, you actually need to know how
they've been using your product.
Right?
Sure.
Yeah.
So what Falcon does is 15 minutes before a sales rep is gonna have
a call with a customer about expansion, we send you a quick.
NLP based dossier that is saying here are the key things that
have happened in this account.
They recently added 30 users to Slack and, um, they have, uh, increased their Slack
messaging by 75% in the last two months.
And by the way, they are really interested in your webinars that are talking about
your Slack and Zoom integration right now.
Imagine how much better prepared that sales rep is gonna be
when they go in that call.
Yeah.
Kevin Horek: Yeah.
Okay.
It's a no-brainer then, right?
Totally.
Yeah.
That's, that's interesting.
Yeah.
Because yeah, and finding that manually obviously is doable.
It just takes a ton of time and effort.
Yep.
Mona Akmal: And let's be honest, nobody does it.
No.
Kevin Horek: Cuz nobody has a time and.
That's right.
Interesting.
No, that's fair.
The, the one thing that I, I pointed out to you, um, earlier before we
were kind of recording, is you post your own videos to social media.
Mm-hmm.
Which a not a lot of CEOs do a lot of people outsource their
social media post to somebody?
Internal, external?
Maybe a bit of both.
Mm-hmm.
Why do you think it's so important to post your own content?
Mona Akmal: Yeah, absolutely.
So, um, a few things.
One, I believe that when a company is young, the company's brand is
not known, but it is much easier to build the founder's brand
because the founder and the company are synonymous with each other.
Right.
So that makes sense.
Me posting videos is really me building awareness about Falcon through.
My outreach to the world, right?
So it is me doing service for my company.
Uh, I was sharing with you offline.
I'm a deeply introverted person, and, uh, the prospect of posting videos was
scary as hell for me for a long time.
And actually our head of content, Tai, has been extremely encouraging and supportive,
uh, and, and, and kind of kicks me in the.
Ask every two days saying, Hey, you need to post something.
Just go from the heart and and share something that is useful.
The second thing I've realized is that I do actually have a unique point of
view to share, which is completely aligned with what we're trying to do.
At Falcon because I'm not a traditional sales leader, right?
Right.
My background's product and engineering.
So outside, many people in sales calls have been very curious about how I
look at the world, and to me it's the only way I know how to look at
the world, but, It's, it's obvious to me that they have not thought about
it that way because they've been in sales or marketing their whole lives.
Right.
And I'm coming in as the outsider.
So that outsider perspective has been, um, surprisingly helpful
for people that are practitioners.
And so being able to turn that into authentic content that stands for Falcon.
Was, was, was really important.
And last thing I'll say is video is to me a lot more powerful than text content
because you can communicate so much more about like, how trustworthy you are, how
open you are, what your brand traits are.
Yeah, brand traits are much harder to come through in a text post
versus in, um, a video post.
So that's why I'm a fan.
Kevin Horek: No, that's interesting.
And people can actually just see your facial expressions and just
how you move and just your tone and like they can usually tell if.
Like how somebody, if it's just like you're reading a script, right?
Yes.
And you don't care, or, or you're really pumped about it and passionate
about it, where that doesn't really come across in text very
Mona Akmal: well.
Totally, totally agree.
So
Kevin Horek: how do you come up with that content then?
Because if you're producing content that often Yeah.
That's hard
Mona Akmal: to do.
Yeah.
So Kevin, it's so interesting.
I feel like, you know, um, as a, as a founder, you are in a time warp.
Right.
If you asked me, I've, we started Falcon three years ago.
This three years in terms of growth and learning feels more like 25 years.
Sure.
Right.
So I actually have the opposite problem where I have too many
things that I'm learning and I'm excited by that I wanna share and I
have to pair it back a little bit.
Um, but one thing that has been really helpful is.
We identified the three key themes that I wanna talk about.
Okay.
These are themes that are personally very, um, exciting for me.
I think about them regardless of whether I'm gonna post or not, right?
Okay.
These are just topics I care deeply about.
And these are topics that are a hundred percent aligned with Falcon's mission.
So, uh, topic number one is facts not fiction.
Uh, topic number two is, United instead of siloed.
And topic number three is efficient growth, not growth at all costs, right?
These are things I believe in, things I think about regardless of Falcon, and
so you'll notice that a lot of my posts actually come from these core three
themes that are very topical and top of mind for me at any given time anyway.
Kevin Horek: Interesting.
So the growth at all costs, comment or topic mm-hmm.
Is obviously kind of a bit controversial.
Yes.
In arguably, maybe even in a good way.
Mm-hmm.
Why do you think it's so important to not have growth at all costs?
Mm-hmm.
Mona Akmal: Yeah.
So this is, I mean, uh, this can be a two hour conversation, right?
Yeah.
I know it's a kinda worms, right?
So one thing that, uh, at the macro scale, right, we have built our entire
economy, global economy at this point with growth at all costs, which actually
results in consumption at all costs.
Right?
Yep.
The only way we can feed this mindless growth engine is to
consume, consume, consume, consume.
And to me, the very real, uh, effects of this mindless consumption are the
destruction of our planet, right?
So it's that fundamental.
I think growth at all costs.
It corrodes people.
It corrodes our planet.
It turns us into comfortable, lazy, uh, blobs.
That's not why we are here.
Right?
So that's how, uh, existential this is for me.
This has nothing to do with companies even.
It has to do with this, um, infrastructure that we live in where if we are not
running faster, we are somehow dying.
Right.
That's insane to me.
So that's one very important reason why not growth at all
costs and then sustainable growth.
To me, for instance, the tech meltdown that we have seen
in the last two years Yeah.
Should be reason enough to not indulge in growth at all costs.
Because who does that serve?
It doesn't serve the founders.
They are ingesting capital.
They simply cannot responsibly spend.
It doesn't serve employees because they are being overhired
to to do jobs that don't exist.
And therefore, even if they feel safe in the job, they really should
not feel safe in the job because there is no job for them to do.
They've been overhired.
Right, right.
Um, it doesn't do well for, uh, public investors, for, uh, civilians like
you and I investing because, uh, when the stock market hits the bed, because
of all these over-hyped companies.
It's people like you and me that lose out.
It's not the big, uh, hedge funds that lose out.
So it's bad for the public.
Right?
Yeah.
Um, the only people that actually make out of this, uh, with a lot of
money is either VCs or institutional investors in the public markets.
And, sorry, but like, that's not the God I worship.
Uh, no.
I a hundred percent
Kevin Horek: agree with you.
It's interesting.
That's the road I usually take too.
It's just, it's a lot harder of a road to go on than, you know, obviously
just growth at all costs, right?
Yes.
And so I think I, I get why people pick the other one, but totally, I
a hundred percent agree with like, what you're, you're doing and,
and why that, why you picked that.
Now that's, that's interesting, but it's rare, right?
Mm-hmm.
Not a lot of people pick
Mona Akmal: that.
Of course.
So, because I think you have to ask, right, what are most people's motivations
for getting into the business?
For me, the motivation is not, uh, I want to be a billionaire.
I couldn't care less.
I already have all the things that I want.
I think that's all, honestly.
Maybe also one of the benefits of being an older founder.
Right.
That, um, I've done everything on my bucket list already.
Uh, right.
There's, so it goes to motivations.
Why are you doing what you're doing?
Yeah.
Kevin Horek: Interesting.
So, but how do you, because it's hard to go, always kind of like
against the grain sometimes, right?
So like, how do you keep that up and that motivation and know that you're doing.
The right thing for yourself a lot of the times because at the end of the
day, you kind of just sell yourself out.
If you, if you flip and you know that you're uncomfortable with making that
change, like if you're fine with that, then fine, that's a whole other thing.
But mm-hmm.
If you, you know, cuz like, it, it can be challenging, especially
when times are tough right
Mona Akmal: now.
Totally.
I think that a few things, right?
Uh, first is I really do believe, um, Difficulty should never
stand in the way of purpose.
Uh, yeah.
Okay.
So, and there are ways to train yourself, uh, to get comfortable with what's
difficult because no big thing is achieved, uh, without hardship, right?
Sure.
Yeah.
So, and training yourself to be comfortable when your mind and your body
are screaming and saying, no, no, no.
Too much enough.
Right?
So one, invest in.
Mental and physical toughness, and I do actually believe
both of them serve each other.
If you are physically tough, your mind becomes tougher because it has evidence
that when your body is in distress, you still recover and you get stronger.
Right?
So one is training for physical and mental toughness because the tougher
you are, the farther you can go, the harder the problems you can solve.
Kevin Horek: Second, sorry.
Sorry, can I cut you off?
How do you train for that though?
Cause that's, or what do you do?
Mona Akmal: Yeah, so a few things.
One, I believe in fasting because hunger is a very, very powerful
motivator, and being able to train yourself the power through and have
a meeting and, and, and get through your day even though you are starving.
Is, is a great way to train yourself.
Second.
Interesting.
Okay.
Uh, I train with the fitness coach and, uh, my explicit ask of her is, if I don't
feel like throwing up at the end of the session, you have not done your job.
Um, I will go and client steps and, uh, to the point of exhaustion.
Right?
So those are just ways to be physically tough.
Mental toughness is, honestly, most of it is having the discipline to show up
every morning, no matter how you feel.
You're hungover, you're depressed.
You heard really bad news.
The world is on fire.
Like, uh, my mom had covid and I had covid and she was in the
ER and I was fundraising from my car in the parking lot, right?
Yeah.
Mental toughness.
You just power through and this is all building stamina.
This is, this does not mean I am a superhero.
It just means I've been practicing this for a long time.
That's how I would train for it.
Kevin Horek: Interesting.
That's, that's really good advice.
Okay.
Keep going.
Sorry.
Was there other,
Mona Akmal: uh, yeah, so I think one is building mental and physical toughness.
Yeah.
Second is walking the path you are supposed to walk because when you
know the path you're walking is right.
Uh, it actually serves as a, uh, an immunization against
the doubt that comes up.
Right?
Yeah, that's, yeah.
There's nowhere else I would rather be, there is nothing else I would rather do.
Right.
Yeah, if I know that and I am not violating my principles and I am not
walking in someone else's shoes and I'm not doing this because I want other
people to like me or think about me in a certain way, my conviction is so strong
that whenever I have doubt, it's very easy to get back to a place of faith.
And then third and last is, uh, surround yourself with people
that you aspire to be like.
If you surround yourself, for instance, I have stopped indulging
in conversations with friends who are lifelong complainers because, uh, it
no longer serves me to be around that.
So that's fair.
Yep,
Kevin Horek: yep.
I get that.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Especially if they're not doing anything to help themselves.
That's right.
It's like, okay, well what are you doing to solve that?
Well, nothing.
It's like, well, then you, nothing's gonna change for you.
Sorry.
Like it's just the reality of things.
That's exactly
Mona Akmal: right.
Yeah.
Kevin Horek: Interesting.
So you, you touched on something though, uh, with surrounding yourself
with, like, how did you build the team at Falcon then with those principles?
Because finding like-minded people that you also kind of
aspire to be around, like.
It's hard.
Easier said than
Mona Akmal: done.
Yes.
So that's actually goes back to the original question you had asked
about how and why, why Falcon?
So one, I was extremely confident in my ability to hire from my network of
people that I've already worked with.
So the first five people at Falcon, including my co-founder,
we've all known each other for.
15 plus years.
Okay.
Um, and not just known each other socially, but actually have
worked with each other before.
So there is a shared language.
Yeah.
Kevin Horek: Second, which is a big difference, right.
Working together and being friends and knowing each other.
Mona Akmal: Yeah.
Yeah.
Fair enough.
Oh my God.
Huge difference.
Yeah.
Second thing I think is instead of coming up with aspirational
operating principles, we basically said, Our operating principles will
be inferred from who we already are, and we are unapologetic about it.
For instance, we are not everyone's cup of tea as a company.
We're extremely intense.
Um, we love our craft.
We are ruthlessly honest with each other.
Good though, and it's good.
But you know, uh, Kevin, it's, it's, um, It's surprising to me how many
people, uh, buy into it, uh, at the conscious level, but at the subconscious
level, when they experience it, they want nothing to do with it.
Right.
Um, yeah.
That's fair.
Yeah.
We're not accustomed to that kind of honesty in, in the workplace.
Right.
And, and so that's been a struggle for us.
But again, the last thing I'll say is, You have to believe that there are
people out there and you just have to not be desperate and keep looking and
be rigorous about looking, because to me, a lot of why people can't
hire people that are like them, it's because they don't put in the time.
If you have to talk to a hundred people to get one, that is
your type of person, do it.
It's just work power through.
Kevin Horek: Yeah.
Interesting.
So how do you manage though?
Those types of people that think they want that brutal honesty, but
can't really handle it because, and how do you screen for that?
Mona Akmal: Yeah.
So I'll give you a, uh, an honest answer on this one, which is I would say about
75% of the time it doesn't work out okay.
And Okay.
Um, we have to let them go.
And I, I understand that that's a politically incorrect answer, but when
you are as early stage as we are, right?
Yeah.
We're 30 people.
Um, it's very important to be able to work in peak performance
mode, uh, which doesn't mean it's a place for everyone, right?
And that's okay.
We don't have to be.
A place for everyone all the time.
We have to earn the right to get there.
So what we look for is diversity of perspective, but uh, significant overlap
on values and operating principles.
Kevin Horek: Okay.
No, that, that makes sense.
And no, like, I, I appreciate the brutal honesty.
I think, I think a lot more people are, are basically doing that.
They're just not saying that.
Mona Akmal: That's exactly right.
So
Kevin Horek: I, I'm curious, we're kind of coming to the end of the show.
Mm-hmm.
But what other advice would you give to founders maybe that are, are at
a bit of an earlier stage or, or maybe are struggling a little bit
with a company that's been around it for a few years, like Falcon?
Mona Akmal: Yeah, absolutely.
Um, I'll say a couple of things.
One, Um, all of us in our dark days compare ourselves with this, with this
mythical founder and this mythical company that is doing really well, and
we compare ourselves to this mythical creature and find ourselves lacking.
Yeah.
Um, here's the good news.
Every founder.
Is a wreck and every young company is a shit show.
Yep.
And that's just the nature of the path you are on.
Anyone that tells you otherwise is just plain lying.
So stop.
Percent, hundred percent.
Yeah.
Like stop wallowing in this negative thought pattern that somehow you are
and your company is less than, uh, those other people that you see in TechCrunch.
It's a shit show all the way up and down.
Yeah.
Kevin Horek: Even bigger companies too, that have been around for
decades or even probably worse.
Mona Akmal: Totally.
I mean, the years that, uh, Microsoft was a Windows predominantly shop.
Yeah.
Uh, Azure hadn't happened yet, and Mac was like, apple was eating our lunch.
Those were dark days for Microsoft and it was an 80,000 person company back then.
Right.
Yeah.
Shit happens.
That's just the nature of doing business.
The second piece of advice I would have is, uh, be all in, burn all the boats.
Uh, that's the only way to make progress.
All this bullshit about, you know, I'm gonna do this job and
this side hustle, and then I'm also gonna be an entrepreneur.
I don't believe in it because, uh, building a company is a,
an all consuming experience.
It takes everything you've got and more so if you are dabbling.
Don't expect the dabbling to be something that other people wanna invest in.
Get behind or for it to really go anywhere.
So either do it or don't do it.
Don't do this thing in the middle where you're convincing
yourself that you're doing it.
To me, that's the equivalent of getting a gym membership on January 1st and
thinking you've already been working out.
Right.
You gotta show up.
Uh, and then third and last is invest in your personal
and professional development.
To me, reading books is the best way to do that.
It teaches you discipline.
You are constantly nurturing your brain with new ideas, and no
one is too busy to read a book.
So read.
Kevin Horek: Interesting.
How do you make time for that stuff then?
Because obviously you're busy.
Mona Akmal: I walk it out.
I read 24 books a year.
That's my goal.
Okay.
And I do it religiously.
One is an audible that I will listen to and one is a book that I will read.
Um, okay.
How I make time for it is, it's just important.
That's why it's gonna get done.
So I, you prioritize it?
Yep.
Whenever I'm driving, I will be listening to a book and whenever
I am on, you know, free on the weekends, I'm probably reading so,
Kevin Horek: Interesting.
No, I think that's actually really good advice.
Thank you.
Sadly, we're outta time.
So how about we close with mentioning where people can get more information
about yourself, Falcon, and any other links you wanna mention?
Mona Akmal: Yeah, absolutely.
Uh, just reach out to me@monafalcon.ai.
It's Falcon with a K because the C was extremely expensive, so,
uh, and uh, falcon.ai is also our website and we're pretty responsive.
Kevin Horek: Perfect.
Well, I really appreciate you taking the time outta your day to be on the show,
and I look forward to keeping in touch with you and have a good rest of your day.
Thanks,
Mona Akmal: Kevin.
It was great to be here.
Thank you.
Okay, bye bye.