A Life Full of Changes

Jeff Hui
Jeff Hui
Jul 30, 2017 · 5 min read

For some strange reasons, a thought of “I should probably write something down about what I have done in my life up to this point” has been in my head for a couple of days. So, here I am, my first ever article ever.

Just a quick warning though, don’t expect to learn anything valuable from this. It’s just a journey of mine, plus I have always hated writing when I was at school, so I am extremely BAD at it (surprise surprise).

To start this off, I guess I will introduce myself first. I am an entrepreneur wanna-be (just like every millennial) from Hong Kong, studied for a few years in the US. Now living the start-up life I love here in my hometown and hope to create a better culture and community for people who want to jump in and try on their own.

My Starting Point.

Throughout my entire Hong Kong education life, I was just a regular bad student you see every day. Copying all my homework from my friends, playing video games during class (Mario Kart was extremely fun, especially when you were battling at the front row against your friend upstairs) and after school, of course.

After three years of Mario… local secondary education, my family decided to move to the US for me to get a better education (no shit US’s education is better than HK). So, with a little bit of teenager rebellious fight against it, I went to the US and landed on 7th grade, one grade below what I was supposed to be in at the moment (yeah, my grades were that bad).

Explore & Expanding My Comfort Zone.

I would say this is the most important changing point in my life. We went to a small town called Clarkston at the border between Washington and Idaho the potato land. It was not the type of USA I had in my mind AT ALL (mostly just L.A. from GTA).

Everything was a cultural shock for me; the way they talk, interact, their lifestyle etc. For a kid that slept through all the English classes during school, this was quite a lot to soak up few weeks before the start of the school year.

The learning and teaching culture is the biggest difference. We were encouraged to take risks to try out different things, think about the problem differently. The amount of freedom we have to challenge different ideas, without having to worry about failing or giving the wrong answer is crazy for me at that time. This turned the switch for me and actually had me thinking what I would like to do for my life.

Fast-forward the time to my senior year in high school. We were allowed to take courses from universities as elective credits. Without giving too much consideration at the time, I applied to take part time computer science courses for two semesters. English Literatures vs. Computer Science, easy pick for me. Plus, after all these years of playing on the computer, it’s about time for me to learn how to talk to the computer properly. This ended up being the first time in my life that I’ve found what was being taught in a school is actually useful. It was at that time, I set a goal for myself that I want to use this computer knowledge I have to build a business.

Time For Changes Again. Willingly or not.

When I was choosing where to go for college, I was given two options. Either I stay in the tiny little town and continue my study there, or I can go back to HK. With the ambition to build a business with technology, I didn’t think this small town was a good place to start, so I decided to move back to HK.

With the goal in mind, I picked a business degree, aiming to study Information Systems when I was applying for college. However, things are not always rainbow and sunshine, I didn’t get into the major that I was shooting for and landed in Business Management. It didn’t take me too long to confirm that memorizing theories about the business world was not my thing.

Start Up. Pivot.

During my time at the management major, I met my girlfriend(ayyyy). She introduced me to one of her friends, my current business partner. At that time, he was working on an idea about students and mentors networking at the moment and I joined him as a co-founder of Affix Group.

Being a start-up founder was the best thing that I could ask for from college. Our goal was to create a place for students to meet with quality mentors who can give them advice and proper mentorship when they need.

As much as we’d love to continue the mentorship service to all the students, it was not a good enough business to put food on the table for us. So we shifted our focus to helping different corporates to launch their marketing campaigns within teenagers and university student communities. This marketing service has been running a little over a year for now, and we are now in the process of pivoting again to grow and scale our business as quickly as possible.

“The Only Thing That Is Constant Is Change” — Heraclitus

Don’t Be Afraid of Changes

This brings my journey to where it is now. In just a short ten years, I have gone through a lot of changes, ups and downs. It is also a crucial component for start-ups. Start-ups pivot a countless number of times during its lifespan, just to adjust their strategies and goals to align with the market and users; and their product is going to change people’s behavior in a certain way. Just think about how we are ordering our rides now with Uber and booking our rooms on AirBnb.

I was scared of changes before, but after moving to the other side of the world, starting a business rather than getting a job, shifting our focuses in the business and now pivoting to something new again, I have learned to embrace the opportunity to change. More importantly, try to pivot, instead of just change. The difference between the two is, pivoting is more proactive rather than being forced to change.

Thank you for reading this rant to the end. This is just me trying to learn how to tell a story and a little reflection of what I have been up to these days. If you find this interesting, let me know in the comments and give it a small thumbs up would be nice.

Jeff Hui

Written by

Jeff Hui

Educator who sucked at school. Noob writer. Entrepreneur.

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