Latest / StartUp Health NOW Podcast / Live From the Conflict Zone: How David Sarabia of inRecovery Is Supporting His Team in Ukraine

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Live From the Conflict Zone: How David Sarabia of inRecovery Is Supporting His Team in Ukraine · StartUp Health NOW Podcast

• 0:00
  [ on-hold music] I've seen things that I think will always haunt me. [laughs] And, um, you know, that feeling of knowing that you can be potentially killed because you're in a war zone, literally.
• 0:16
  There's bombs dropping in, in the country, and there's s- there's air sirens that are just haunting, uh, honestly. Uh, that, that sound will always be with me.
• 0:25
  I think, I think I, I've, I, I, I was able to experience what probably our ancestors felt in World War Two, in World War II when the air sirens would sound.
• 0:33
  [on-hold music] Welcome to StartUp Health NOW, the podcast where we celebrate the entrepreneurs and innovators who are reimagining the future of health. I'm your host, Logan Plaster.
• 0:48
  My guest today is David Sarabia, the CEO and founder of InRecovery, a StartUp Health backed company that brings digital health tools to the addiction recovery market.
• 0:59
  David was on vacation in Tulum, Mexico when he saw the headlines. Ukraine was under attack and Russian forces were moving in on the capital. After the shock of the news wore off, David snapped into action.
• 1:11
  He'd spent a good deal of time in Ukraine cultivating a development team there for his startup, and now his team was in trouble. So instead of taking his flight back to California, he booked a ticket to Poland.
• 1:22
  He had no plan and few connections, just a desire to help. He's been on the ground in Krakow now for more than a month, organizing supply runs into Ukraine while still running his startup.
• 1:33
  When we heard about the important work he was doing, we tracked him down for an interview.
• 1:36
  Exhausted but encouraged by the strength of the Ukrainian people, he shares a bit about the work he's doing and how others can help. Here's my interview with David Sarabia.
• 1:47
  [on-hold music] David Sarabia, CEO and founder of InRecovery. Thanks for joining me today, um, at StartUp Health. Hey, Logan. Good to see you. You know, uh, we...
• 2:02
  y- you're the CEO and founder of InRecovery, which is really upgrading, you know, how addiction care centers, um, deal with data and, and deal with, um, telemedicine.
• 2:12
  But really we're here to talk today about kind of what you're doing right now, and really it starts with where you're at. So tell me, w- where are you at right now? [laughs] So right now, uh, I'm in Poland.
• 2:24
  I'm in Kraków. Uh, tomorrow I'll be in Ukraine, in Lviv. And I've been out here since the beginning of March, uh, right when the war broke out between, uh, Ukraine and Russia. Um, but yeah, that's where I'm at.
• 2:35
  [laughs] Uh, w- where are you typically based? So typically we're based in San Diego and New York City, so we have a d- distributed team.
• 2:44
  But, uh, we have also a product team, uh, primarily development, design, and product is, product development over in Lviv and Ukra- and, and Kyiv in Ukraine.
• 2:56
  So we have a massive interest obviously in what's going on right now in the world and, and making sure that we take care of our people and, uh, and, and be there for them.
• 3:06
  So y- you run a startup and, uh, a, a big, a portion of your team is in, in Poland and in Ukraine. How many folks do you have, uh, over there? So, uh, not in Poland. Uh, I'm currently in Poland.
• 3:17
  This is just the, the bordering, you know, country with Ukraine. It, it's, uh, it's ten- tends to be wet. But, but the team is in Ukraine. Yeah. We have, uh, about five people there right now.
• 3:27
  Uh, we had a bigger team in the past. But we, we are always expanding teams over in, uh, in Ukraine. We, we have a, a lot of, a lot of investment in that, in that, in that country.
• 3:36
  Uh, so take me to when you, you heard about the conflict. Um, you know, really surprised a lot of folks. Uh, you know, they... We saw the build up.
• 3:44
  We, we thought something could happen, and then [snaps fingers] uh, it just, it hit the headlines. Take me to where you were and kind of what your thought process was about how you should respond. Yeah, absolutely.
• 3:55
  So I was actually on vacation. I was in Tulum, Mexico with my girlfriend at the time. And I, um, everything broke out while we were there. And I made the decision while,
• 4:08
  while almost com- coming back to California to, to just fly out to Poland directly and, uh, and come and do something about this. It just, it just felt like there, there was a real major need for, for help here.
• 4:21
  And one of the major problems is that we tend to just see it from afar and not really... We're kind of desensitized to war and all these things.
• 4:28
  And, and knowing that my team is here and their families and their close friends and their loved ones, I couldn't call myself a leader of a company that has a team in Ukraine and, and just watch it from the sidelines.
• 4:41
  What messages were you hearing from your Ukrainian team at the time? [sighs] Uh, uncertainty obviously, fear. Um, I mean, that's, i- i- it's, it's something else when your country, you know, gets invaded, right?
• 4:54
  And it's, it's a, it's a really painful thing to watch. Um, you know, you, you're in a flow, you're working well, you're... You know, as any startup, you have your ups and downs.
• 5:03
  And, and when you're in a, in a flow and something comes in and kinda sidetracks you, you kinda can get over it easily or just maneuver.
• 5:10
  But this is not something that is so easily maneuvered, and it's something that, you know, affected not only their, their morale, but also their mental health and, and their well- general wellbeing.
• 5:20
  Um, you know, we were able to, to get some people out early on. Um, but we had some very brave, uh, teammates that stayed behind.
• 5:28
  Uh, one of them Milanka, she's one of our software engineers, and she's just been a rock star there, you know, making herself useful, making sure that people have what they need in, in, in Lviv and receiving even people from outside of, uh, from, from other parts of the country to, uh, to help them kind of, uh, you know, either relocate or, or move over to Poland as they're, as they're going through the refugee journey.
• 5:49
  Uh, had you been in Ukraine before? You traveled in the region, uh, hiring people? Yeah, yeah. I've, I've been in Ukraine f- multiple times.
• 5:58
  [laughs] Uh, I think when, when I came in the, the first time, while I, while I came out here, um, they saw my, my, my book of stamps and my [laughs] and my passport and like, "Oh, you practically live here." Yeah.
• 6:08
  I've, I've been, uh...When I build companies overseas or, or when we build teams overseas, I actually, you know, integrate there.
• 6:15
  I- so I spent almost a year in Ukraine, um, build- you know, really getting myself into the startup scene there, making myself useful also in development scene.
• 6:23
  I'm a, I'm a developer myself, so I participate a lot in the meetups and so on, and really made a name for ourselves, uh, i- in Kyiv.
• 6:30
  And, um, yeah, so I've been there many times, and coming here was really just a kind of a no-brainer I guess for me. Yeah.
• 6:39
  So I mean, that seems like a key piece of your story here in that you didn't just go on Upwork and find folks that happen to be in Kyiv.
• 6:47
  You went to Ukraine time and time again, you built a community, you were integrated, like you said, among your team.
• 6:54
  Therefore, when something like this happened, they weren't just offshore developers, which is very common, they were your friends and colleagues. Is that right? Exactly. No, yes.
• 7:04
  And, and that's, that's the key thing about building it overseas. I mean, I know that's not the topic of conversation, but it's, it's so important to...
• 7:10
  You know, my, my past companies I had, we had almost 250 people w- before we sold in, in Manila in Philippines, and they were our family. You know, we knew every single one of them.
• 7:19
  We interviewed every single one of those employees. In my second company, we had 60 people in Romania, same thing. You know, we... I, I, I always make sure- Mm...
• 7:27
  that when I build an over- a team overseas, they're not just a, a corner office, you know, where we're just saving money, but rather they're really a, a, a major part of the family here.
• 7:34
  And, and if anything, you know, what, what, what's happened over this time period or this period of time is we've become closer. I mean, we're like a family now.
• 7:42
  We've always been like a family, but we're really truly like a family now. It's been, it's been a really, uh, amazing, uh, transition from just being colleagues to really calling them family.
• 7:54
  You know, maybe we can dig into that more in a minute. I think that's a really interesting piece of advice to maybe other founders thinking about how to develop offshore teams. Um, I love that mentality.
• 8:05
  Um, and you could talk more to sort of like the, the, the pros and cons or some of the, the challenges of that.
• 8:11
  But, um, let's go back to you, uh, i- choosing to instead of fly back from Tulum to California to just go straight to Poland. What was your strategy, um, and what did you think was gonna happen when you landed?
• 8:24
  I had no plan at all.
• 8:26
  [laughs] You know, just like anything else, have, uh, just landed here, figured it out, and rented a hotel, um, and started making calls and, you know, meeting people, and it, it all came together very, very naturally.
• 8:38
  You know, there's a, there's a major effort out here in, in, in, in Kraków and, and Poland in general with the refugees, with the situation with, with Ukraine. They, they've really been an incredible country.
• 8:48
  They've opened their doors to, to hundreds of thousands of refugees so far.
• 8:52
  But, um, you know, when, when I came out here, I saw that many of my friends or maybe a f- a handful of my friends from New York, from London, from Switzerland had individual efforts that they were just kind of mobilizing themselves.
• 9:05
  And so naturally, I brought them all together, did the entrepreneurial thing, and, uh, started making connections here wi- within Poland. And, you know, within a couple of weeks, we were just rocking and rolling.
• 9:15
  We've been doing quite a lot, um, been able to help over almost 300 families as of today, um, to really truly relocate and, and reintegrate.
• 9:25
  You know, we, we are using inRecovery as well now as a deploying of a, a, an instance of inRecovery for this to help them use our peer circles, uh, s- technology, to help them use our telehealth technology and so on to, to help them with the reintegration journey, um, as, as they're, uh, moving as refugees into different countries.
• 9:44
  Um, and the, and the key thing is that we've been able to keep them together as families, which is really important. Break that down for me.
• 9:50
  So you're using your inRecovery platform, which was designed for, uh, addiction care centers, recovery centers, and you're using, uh, you said an instance of it to, um, deploy, you said circles, groups, uh, therapy.
• 10:04
  Tell me more about that. Yeah. So, so it's really exciting, and we're still deploying it, but what, what we're doing is we- we're taking the same approach that we take with addiction.
• 10:13
  So in addiction, you, you get to treatment, but then you have to thrive in life, right? So there's the treatment phase, and then there's, there's the real life phase, what do you do next?
• 10:21
  And a lot of times, you, you have maybe messed up with your background, maybe you have financial issues, maybe you have criminal background.
• 10:28
  So reintegration is key with, with addiction care, with long-term sustainable, um, recovery.
• 10:34
  And so in the same model, we are applying the whole idea of peer support, um, which is very, very important with both mental health and addiction.
• 10:43
  We are applying the, uh, mindfulness stuff that we have in, in, in our platform, also, uh, telehealth services and just general case management services where you're able to look at a person and how they're doing and also apply, let's say, reintegration tracks for people.
• 10:57
  Let's say that my, my goal as a family, as a refugee family is to have a long-term, uh, placement, let's say, in Poland or Port- or Portugal or wherever I'm going, or maybe this is transition point.
• 11:09
  So we're able to give them buckets of things that they must do in order to actually, you know, either get a job or, or, or go, go through this, through this journey, which is really very similar to when you're reintegrating or coming back to society from, from active addiction.
• 11:24
  You mentioned that you, when you landed, you kind of started to knit together different projects, kind of the way, you know, an entrepreneur would.
• 11:32
  Um, obviously, there's some big sort of NGO, uh, action going on on the ground. You know, talk to me about kind of the importance or the role of that entrepreneurial mindset in a humanitarian, uh, effort like this. Yeah.
• 11:48
  So, uh, as I was telling you earlier, you know, the NGOs are doing fantastic work here. They have mobilized and, and gathered millions of dollars in donations, and, and, and they're doing outstanding work.
• 11:58
  However, they are large, very, very, very large organizations, and as with any very large organization, it takes some time to mobilize. It takes them a lot of time to go through red tape- Mm-hmm...
• 12:08
  and to actually get real efforts out on the ground, um, in the front line especially. And when you're dealing with war-Time is not a luxury. Uh, it's not something that, that, that you, that you have, right?
• 12:20
  It's, it's, it's, uh, it's really... You need to move fast.
• 12:23
  So one of the things that we encountered personally when, when I was, like, coming into, into Ukraine for the first time was we had two NGOs lined up that were going to provide to us, they had already agreed to provide us medicine.
• 12:36
  I was coming in to provide medicine to a couple of children's hospitals in, in Lviv i- in Ukraine. And, uh, and they flaked on us last minute, you know.
• 12:44
  And they were just saying that, "We need about two more weeks to process our paperwork." [laughs] And I'm like, "Well, I don't have two weeks. I'm literally on my way to Ukraine right now."
• 12:52
  So, um, in the same manner, uh, trains were a mess that night. Everything was just kind of pointing in the wrong direction to just, you know, not go, but I, I, I did it. So I called an Uber.
• 13:01
  I told the Uber, "Listen, I know it's Sunday." Sunday, if you've ever been to Poland, everything's closed. They're a very religious, uh, country here.
• 13:08
  And, uh, and so I told him, "Let's, let's find an open, uh, pharmacy anywhere along the route."
• 13:14
  [laughs] And he had his wife, uh, on the internet, on the phone searching, and we found, uh, one last little pharmacy in, in this, in a little small city called Reshov, which is one of the last stops befo- before you get to the, to the Ukrainian border.
• 13:27
  And, uh, came in and, and I told him I wanna buy a bunch of medicine for children, uh, for a children's hospital, and they asked me how much. I told, I told them, "All of it."
• 13:35
  [laughs] I think they thought I was making amphetamines or something, but they, they really were shocked when they heard that.
• 13:40
  But after I told them what we're doing, they, they, they were completely open to providing it to us. And, uh, and so ended up just making it happen that way.
• 13:49
  And came in, rol- rolled in with a couple boxes of, [laughs] of medicine, uh, by foot, uh, on the Medyka border, which was quite, quite the experience.
• 13:56
  Um, um, but yeah, you know, going back to the idea of that entrepreneurial mindset, you just make it happen. Yeah.
• 14:04
  Um, so obviously that, that story really stuck with you, you know, uh, having to improvise o- on the road there.
• 14:12
  Uh, are there other situations you found yourself in that you, that are, are really gonna stick with you for, for years to come? I mean, that same night I think is gonna be something that I will never forget.
• 14:23
  Um, it was extremely cold. It was about three degrees, or two degrees Celsius, about 20 degrees Fahrenheit. Uh, freezing cold, really, and it was that kind of cold that just, like, goes into your bones. Um, and I saw
• 14:37
  such great efforts, actually, on the Polish side, humanitarian efforts, um, people from all over the world, uh, joining to help.
• 14:44
  However, once you cross over to Ukraine, uh, Ukrainian Customs was looking at me like, "Are you cra- Why, why do you wanna come? Are you sure you wanna come in?" [laughs] I was the only one actually going into Ukraine.
• 14:54
  And, um, and then I got to see the border on the other side, which was this somber, horrible feeling of just seeing people in desperation. A- and these are women, families, because the men cannot leave.
• 15:06
  You have to be, uh, you know, if, if you're between 18 and 60, you can't leave the country. And seeing them there with their kids in the freezing cold just broke my heart, number one.
• 15:17
  And number two, it, it really made me understand what it feels like to, to be in this despair and this feeling of uncertainty that you just wanna get out. Um, and I think I'll never forget that.
• 15:32
  It, it was, uh, it was something else. Yeah. Uh, how long have you been there, right, uh, so far? So I've been here since the beginning of March, so about a little over a month and, and two, and a week.
• 15:43
  Um, going back into Lviv, uh, tomorrow. I'm bringing in supplies. Uh, so I've been in and out of Ukraine, uh, but, but based out in, in Poland. So I go to Ukraine for a couple days and then come back to Poland. Okay.
• 15:57
  Um, uh, I guess my question is, and that's a long time, how is this impacting your, your business? You know, you're having to, uh, alter your focus. Uh, you've, you've got a startup that you run. Right.
• 16:10
  It, it's, it's been tough. I mean, the, the first... And, and it's funny that you ask that, because the, the people that I'm working with here in Kraków, they're all entrepreneurs as well.
• 16:17
  They all have their own businesses. One of the pe- one of the key people here, Anton, he's, uh, he's from Ukraine.
• 16:22
  He has one of the best sushi restaurants here in Kraków, and we met just by chance, and he's, he's been mobilizing incredible work in, in, in, in Ukraine. And we were talking about this f- when I first got here.
• 16:34
  He's like, "You gotta balance yourself." 'Cause he was, he can see how, how
• 16:38
  f- full blast I was going, and he told me the same thing happened to him when he first got, got involved, was, you know, you, you're, you're so passionate about it that you kinda start losing balance.
• 16:47
  And it's been, it's been a, a really good lesson in balancing your priorities. Um, obviously, we have the company to run, but it's, it's, it's, we've been able to, or I've been able to at least keep things moving.
• 17:01
  Um, you know, the team work pretty much autonomously without me. I, I do do, uh, some development still ev- every now and then, but, but they don't really need me on the, on the day-to-day. Um, but it's been okay.
• 17:11
  I mean, we, we just got awarded another contract, which was awesome. That was just two days ago. And, uh, and just about to close a deal in Puerto Rico with Inspira. So we- we're still, we're still doing our job.
• 17:20
  It's, uh, it's, we're just, uh, doing it remotely, and then we're, uh, you know, spending a couple hours a week, uh, doing some humanitarian work. I think it's just a matter of time management.
• 17:31
  [laughs] How long do you think you'll be there? So I'm heading back to New York, so because we are fundraising, um, I, I am heading back to New York next week.
• 17:38
  Um, but I'm probably going to take a flat here for either a month or two, uh, starting in May, and just kinda go back and forth between, uh, between the US and, and, and, and Poland.
• 17:49
  How do you think this experience is going to change your company, uh, or change you? The company I think will change dramatically, because I think everyone is, like I said, they're f- they're family now.
• 18:03
  It's, uh, they were before, but now they're truly have become a family. But in terms of, of myself, this has been life-changing, honestly. It's... I'm, I'm actually very glad that I came.
• 18:15
  Uh, it's made me understandThe importance of taking action when something is just completely wrong.
• 18:23
  And if you're able to take action, if you have the means to do it, if you have the time to do it, you sh- you should just do it, because- Mm-hmm... that's, that's how things change.
• 18:33
  And that's how you can make an impact on people's lives, is when you... You know, that's how I formed In Recovery, it was because I saw a ma- a major problem in the addiction space, addiction care space.
• 18:42
  And, um, in the same tone, you know, when, when I saw this breaking out, I, I couldn't just sit on the sidelines and watch.
• 18:49
  So it's, it's really changed me from, from that perspective, and I think I've see- I've seen an... I've seen things that I think will always haunt me.
• 18:56
  [chuckles] And, um, you know, that feeling of knowing that you can be potentially killed because you're in a war zone literally.
• 19:02
  There's [beeps] bombs dropping in, in the country, and there's so- there's air sirens that are just haunting h- honestly. That, that sound will always be with me.
• 19:11
  I think, I think I, I've, I, I was able to experience what probably our ancestors felt in World War Two, in World War II when the air sirens would sound.
• 19:19
  And these air sirens, to give you some context, they sound when there's a strike coming, and they end when either the bomb lands- Mm... or it gets intercepted. Thankfully, Ukraine has been- Mm...
• 19:29
  tremendously amazing when it comes to intercepting bombs. It's been thousands of bombs that, that have been tr- uh, attempted to, to, to strike.
• 19:36
  But it's, it's, it's something else when you realize that it's real, you know? It's, it's... We're so desensitized with media that we just see war on the news, and actually being there, it's, uh, it's something else.
• 19:46
  Yeah. Uh, has that been in Kyiv where you've, uh, heard the sirens, where you've c- sort of come the closest to danger? Um, it, it was in Lviv, but I mean, we... I, I d- I was there when...
• 19:59
  Or actually, I left the night, the day, the night b- right before the airport was bombed.
• 20:03
  Um, so I've been a- I've been lucky, I guess, in terms of, uh, leaving on the, on the, on, on the days right before something hits. But, um, I was there when, when the, uh, there was a strike from Russia.
• 20:13
  I think it was, like, a oil, oil fields or something like that that they were, that they were striking. But, um, but it was a, it was far away. Uh, nothing, nothing too close to, to home, I would say.
• 20:23
  But it's still something else. It's just, uh, just a very, very, um, awake- awakening experience, I would say. Yeah.
• 20:32
  What's something that you wish that your, uh, colleagues and friends in the United States knew about the situation that they, that they wouldn't get from the headlines?
• 20:41
  That it's very real, and that there are people that are really truly suffering, and, and that there's a country that has the strongest will I've ever seen.
• 20:53
  I mean, Ukrainian people, I have so much r- more respect for them now, understanding how they've united.
• 20:59
  You know, it's, it's impa- it's impacted that country in such a negative way, but it's also been extremely positive in terms of the unity that, that now exists there.
• 21:08
  And, um, and I think that there's a massive amount of respect that, that, that is owed to that president for, for, for actually coming to c- stepping up to the plate.
• 21:19
  Because I don't wanna get political, but he had not had a very good track record in his presidency. Mm-hmm.
• 21:23
  But when this happened, he really stepped up to the plate and he brought his people together, which is just incredible, and I guess that's what you do as a leader.
• 21:29
  You, when it comes to a crisis, you, you either flee or you, or you act, right? So, um, it was, it was a very valiant effort that, that, that he's done there, and a very commendable one.
• 21:42
  I, I wanna return for a second to something you said earlier, um, which relates to, to kind of the leadership issue, which is, um,
• 21:51
  you know, it wasn't just that you said, "Hey, I wanna go and I'll help our offshore dev team." You had spent years, uh, developing the relationships necessary to sort of be able to insert yourself.
• 22:04
  And, um, and so I wonder kind of what your advice is to a founder, um, who leads, uh, offshore or, or just g- global teams that they haven't really spent the time to, uh, to, to get to know those teams, or, or there's still really, like, a, a, a distance.
• 22:22
  'Cause I think there's a real connection here between the legwork necessary to do that and, um, being in the position, you know, mentally and emotionally to step in when there's a problem. Right. I, I think...
• 22:34
  Oh, there's, there's two, two things to unpack there. The first one, you know, about the pr- let, let's focus on, on the, on the, on the problem side, and then we'll get into the second one.
• 22:41
  But when, when a problem arises, and, and let's say that there's something like this, like a conflict. Um, let's say you have a team in, in Ukraine or s- anywhere else, wherever a war breaks out.
• 22:54
  I think showing up for your people is so important, because they'll understand that you're not just, you know, there for cost savings or for whatever else reasons, you know, the, the, that you have an offshore team.
• 23:09
  And that, then, is a good segue to the importance of actually just showing up.
• 23:13
  [chuckles] You know, I, again, I have a lot of experience building, building teams overseas, and, and I always tell f- uh, my, my colleagues, you know, other founders that, that wanna build a team overseas, and they just, you know, wanna have, like, an offshore team that's basically like a freelance team,
• 23:28
  and, and that's, that's okay. You know, it, they're-- Both, both models are, are okay.
• 23:33
  But it depends on what you want: Long-term, sustainable, you know, team that's part of your core, um, uh, culture, or just, you know, some cost savings that you can...
• 23:43
  You're better off actually instead of building a team just hiring an, uh, an outsourcing agency for that. But, um, if you really wanna have your people be loyal to you, be, you know...
• 23:53
  We, our, our employees get offers all the time, and they're, and they tell me about it. And then, then they reject them, obviously, because they love their job.
• 24:00
  And that's, that's something that you don't get with, you know, uh, contract workers.
• 24:04
  It's, um, it's very, very different type of mentality, and, and I think it comes from them understanding that, that you have their back and that you're there for them. You're the...
• 24:11
  And that they're really part of a family versus just a, you know, like, like with any job, you know, you, you always get offers on LinkedIn.
• 24:18
  I even get offers on LinkedIn, and I'm a founder, and I would never leave my company, obviously.
• 24:21
  But, you know, there-There, there's, there's that decision point when, when you, when you wanna figure out, "Okay, what, what type of team do I wanna have?"
• 24:31
  And I think if you really wanna have a, a fully integrated team- Yeah... you gotta show up at least a couple times a year.
• 24:37
  A founder might push back and say, "I don't have the money or the time to go and, you know, be in the, the Philippines or be in Ukraine. Uh, I'd love to do it, but it would be a luxury."
• 24:46
  [laughs] What would you say to them? I think you always have time. I think, uh, if anything, this trip has taught me that I have a lot more time than I thought I had. [laughs] You know, we're always, uh...
• 24:58
  W- I think, I think when you're, when you're in the middle of the storm, you don't realize, you know, how- What do you mean by that? So I, I... What I mean by that is, uh... Sorry, you had a delay there.
• 25:05
  What I mean by that is that y- when you're in the middle of, of just, you know, the storm of work, you just, you're, you're kinda, like, counting the hour- you're, you're, you don't have enough hours in a day.
• 25:15
  But if you realize, like, when you're actually productive, it's, it's, uh, it's some- it's very different than... It's not about working, you know, 20 hours.
• 25:24
  It's about working 10 that are extremely, extremely productive. And, um, if anything, when you, when you have to allocate time, like what we're doing now, you make sure that you don't waste a single minute, [laughs]
• 25:35
  and that you take care of yourself, too, because that's something that's been always a problem for me, for myself personally. Like, I... And you know this.
• 25:40
  I mean, I, I've come to our, to our, uh, to our workshops, you know, broken down and, and, and all the way up and every, in every direction, and it's, it's that balance, you know?
• 25:50
  And it's so important to take care of yourself, too, and not forget about that. Um, but I have some great peers, actually from Startup Health, Emilio Goldstein from, uh, from Mindkine being one of them.
• 26:00
  He's always checking in on me, and, you know, he's like, "Hey, are you taking care of you?" [laughs] And, uh, and it's really cool to have that.
• 26:07
  But yeah, I think, I think for any founder that feels they don't have time, just, you do. [laughs] And if you feel you don't have money, trust me, flights are not that expensive. You can figure it out. No. No.
• 26:18
  I, that's an, that's awesome. That's, that's an inspiring word. Um, last question for you.
• 26:23
  If someone is listening to this and they wanna support what you're doing, they wanna help, and they just, they're just not quite sure what the best avenue is, that they want their, their money or their time or their efforts to go to the right places, what's your advice?
• 26:37
  Yeah. So my advice is, you know, just the... There, there's a lot of organizations you can donate to, right? And, and I, and, and they're all doing a good job.
• 26:45
  I, I don't wanna bring any, any organization down, but the efforts that are smaller, more private tend to have a, tend to mobilize faster, tends to have a quicker impact, which is what's needed right now, and there's a lot of these.
• 26:59
  Um, you know, we're, we're just one. You know, we- we're six people, and some of our teammates that are working on this part-time every now and then, and, uh, we, we've been able to accomplish a lot in a month.
• 27:11
  And, you know, a- and it's just starting. You know, we're putting together a protocol now that can be replicated.
• 27:16
  We're gonna open source it on an ocean, uh, board, which will basically have all the best practices cooked in for, let's say, refugee, uh, type of efforts or let's say for supply type of efforts and so on.
• 27:27
  And we wanna operationalize that in different countries where people can just, you know, take over.
• 27:32
  But in terms of, of contributing, we, we are accepting contributions just recently, um, uh, just because of pressure from my friends actually, and from even, even from our clients, Caron Treatment Center, which was just a, a surprise, but I wasn't surprised.
• 27:47
  Uh, Brad Sorte, who's a YPO guy, he, he reached out, you know, personally emailed the entire company, uh, telling them what we're doing. He found out that we were do- I hadn't told him. I hadn't done any PR about this.
• 27:59
  I, I didn't come out here to post on social media. I'm very private anyway, but even so, like, I didn't let my team post on our LinkedIn or anything. It was, "We're doing this because it's, it's the right thing to do."
• 28:09
  And now we're actually being more vocal about it, and as we do this, I mean, it's, it's, it's awesome the outpour of support that we, that we've gotten. Uh, it really, um... It's...
• 28:18
  I, I'm not surprised, but it's super, super awesome to see that. Um, and if anybody wants to contribute, they can always reach out to me.
• 28:24
  We can post, you know, information about that on the, on the description, uh, Logan.
• 28:30
  Uh, just to clarify, um, one of your biggest clients or maybe your biggest client's Caron, uh, the national chain of, um, addiction treatment centers. Uh, that's who you said reached out to you to assist? Uh, yeah.
• 28:43
  So they, they actually did it on their own behalf. I hadn't asked them about it for anything. And, and Brad Sorte, who's the new CEO there, he's someone that I know well and, and, um, and have a lot of respect for.
• 28:54
  He, he, he himself emailed. He has a, an email that he sends every, every month to the whole company, and he dedicated the one from March to us, which was quite awesome.
• 29:03
  And, and they, they made a big contribution to this effort- Wow... our efforts, which was really, really cool to see because, so you have a professional re- relationship with a client. Yeah.
• 29:12
  It's so different when it comes... And they're a nonprofit that gets donations, so it was kind of, uh, the, uh, the, the... It went full circle, which is kinda, kind of really interesting.
• 29:20
  But I wasn't surprised 'cause they're just a, an incredible organization.
• 29:24
  A theme I'm hearing here is that when you step up, um, you show up, you kinda break down some of the walls that are inherent, whether it's between team members, onshore, offshore, client, um, provider.
• 29:39
  Uh, you start to break down these walls and start to relate to one another as human beings. Right. I think that's a really great takeaway. Um, and, and just showing up, I mean, we always, we always hear this.
• 29:50
  It's a resonating thing with entrepreneurship, right? You show up and it's, it's the most important thing. But I think, you know, when, when you're leading in a time of crisis, it's even much...
• 29:59
  It's, it's infinitely more important to show up. Uh, now, uh, you mentioned something I have to ask about. You said that you've created a, um, a, a system.
• 30:11
  You've created, uh, protocols that you're gonnaPotentially scale up to other humanitarian, uh, disasters or other parts of the world. Did I hear that right? So we're, we're gonna focus in on this for now.
• 30:22
  I think, uh, you know, we, we, what we wanna do and a- at least long term, what I wanna accom- what I wanna get out of this is, is to be able to help other groups, smaller groups of, let's say, you and your five friends or, you know, f- couple colleagues that wanna get together and do something, to be able to do it in a way that has been proven, that has protocols in place, and that also has resources already lined up for whatever country you wanna help in.
• 30:48
  So, um, we're, we're, we're starting with Poland, like I said, and, and we're gonna expand this over to Romania through some Romanian friends that I have and, and hopefully, you know, keep this, keep this going and, you know, let it, let it have a life of its own in, in the, in the open source, uh, uh, mindset.
• 31:04
  In true founder fashion, not just helping, but creating a system that's scalable and productizable. I love it. Uh, David, thank you so much for taking the time with me. I [laughs] I know you are, are busy.
• 31:17
  You're probably sleep deprived, so you took the time, um, in the middle of your, your busy day out there and, um, I really, I really wish you safety and, um, success in tomorrow's deliveries and the, the weeks to come.
• 31:34
  Thanks so much, Logan. And, uh, yeah, def- I took a nap right before this podcast, so it was, uh, I was fully recharged. [laughs] Naps are your best friend when you, when you work a lot.
• 31:44
  So really, really good to see you, Logan. Thanks so much and, and thanks to the whole family for, for this. [upbeat music] Thank you for listening to Startup Health NOW.
• 31:59
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• 32:05
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• 32:13
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• 32:22
  We'll be back again with another episode next week.