A Journey at eFishery: an Employee Perspective
A few days ago, we just celebrated one of the most important milestones for #efishery as we raises US$90M series-C funding and become the world’s largest aquaculture technology startup.
I thought this was “just” another achievement of the company and good for the branding so I will just repost anything because we were told to do so :). But then tonight I join a space talk on Twitter talking about #eFishery journey with Gibran Huzaifah Amsi El Farizy and the most exciting part is, one of our very first investor from Ideosource also join and shared his very interesting perspective from the investor side. And it hits me: I can share mine from a “mere” employee perspective. Because I learn a lot during these last 7 years, and I think it worth sharing.
To give you the context, I join the company at early 2014, a year after its incorporation. I was new to the workforce, freshly graduated from a university with no prior working experience. I’m glad I got the opportunity to join the team. Thanks to the co-Founder and also the CFO at that time, my direct supervisor and mentor, to trust me with the accounting and finance role.
My work relationship with #eFishery has its ups and downs. Being with the company for five years, I have the urge to explore more. I think the fifth year will always be a critical time in someone’s career. You feel like you learn enough, afraid of getting stuck. So you try to looking for the new opportunity. I want to be here because I choose to be here, not because I don’t have somewhere else to go. Then, I took an offer from another company basically because they allow me to work from anywhere. WFA is not that common at that time before the pandemic, especially for a finance role. So, I go for it. I left Bandung ‘supposedly’ for good. But due to some reason I came back to Bandung, and resumed my work at efishery again. So, I worked for 5 years before I was resigned from my full-time position in 2019, but then I was working on project basis so basically I still a part of the company, then I re-joined again in February last year and still counting.
When the host was asking about the lowest point at eFishery journey, Gibran mentioned that critical time from 2015. Yeah, I remember it clearly because I was handling the company finance. We hold BoD’s salary payment for three quarters, and received money from them (and their spouse) instead. I don’t know how they managed, but they did. Until one day, we run out of cash. We can’t continue the operation unless we got additional funding. As a finance person, I had a privilege to read the situation in advance and plan an escape strategy, but I was being “brainwashed” to that vision of bring the future of Aquaculture. I believe in what we were doing and I believe in the team so as long as we do it together we would be fine eventually. Later on I learn that this is what Pak Andi Boediman of Ideosource called the two formula to asses any startup company: (1) The problem to be solved is real, and (2) If the problem is real, do we believe the founder (or the team) can solved it?. In my case I believed in both. And just like that, I consider it as one-month-break and spend most of the time to go on holiday, hiking my first mountain, meet old friends, doing whatever I never had a chance doing when I was a students. Actually, I was borderline nervous. But I am an expert at avoiding my own problems, and when I start worrying, we got the news that we will resume the operation shortly. Not surprisingly though, none of us resigned. Everyone back to the office as usual.
Another critical time, in my version, was when we try to adopt our new, more comprehensive business model, an end-to-end solution of efishery ecosystem to-be. I had to go back and forth to Jakarta a few days a week to meet our potential funders. I used to go to that elite office buildings in central business district with that pillow face after sleeping on that early morning train from Bandung with a big backpack with laptop and everything. Imagine I was this shy accountant, never really comfortable speaking in front of people, but then I was being trusted to handle such a big task, the partnership for our new financing business. Normally Gibran will initiate the meeting and do the pitching, and I will just continue the process. But oftentimes he let me be, to learn on my own, he said. I often argue with him about how brazen he was in front of the potential funders, like “what?”, “what did he said, 1000 targeted farmers? we don’t even had our first 100!”. We haven’t had the traction and experience whatsoever so basically we only sell the story, the dream. But he said that’s how it’s done! And now I fully understand, seeing how big it becomes now and how much it helps people especially the farmers.
Other learnings I got along the way would be sum up below.
- Keep improve yourself as the company grows. It took me three years to go from accountant to senior accountant and then leading the accounting team for 1 year. During those last two years I was taking my MBA degree and managed to go on exchange program for one semester abroad while still working at the company. Then after graduated, I was working under CEO Office division as Financial analyst. That magic spell #TumbuhBersama was planted deep down into my subconscious mind. Because there’s no way the company would grow unless we also grow as an individual. I rejoin as Finance Business Partner last year. I would say the latest role is the most exciting so far. Anyway I’m hiring for my workmates #Ads alert!
- Don’t just hide under your desk. Go visit the farmers. Even for me as accountant, I would be happy to hop on that empty seat for a business trip to see the real world. Go talk to the users, the farmers, you will meet the unexpected.
- Embrace Failure. This is the safest place where I can make mistakes and learn from them. I always remember our Founders used to say: Today’s failure might inspire the next two or three years plan. This is also one of the quality I always admire from our founders: they would admit if the strategy is not clear, admit if we failed, but always encourage us to take the learnings.
- Create a Healthy Working Environment. I do enjoy my job and the people I work with, and I also believe that I can also enjoy living at the same time. At efishery we have our outing schedule to refresh our mind, sports club to keep us healthy, and if you are lucky you could get friends of a lifetime and I believe most of us here did. I have this foody cult with my previous teammates in which we are hunting one new food place every week during the year, so whatever Gibran throw at us we would discuss it over the food. It never ceased to amazed me how good food is good for the mood. Also here, Family comes first. It’s not a shame to leave work for personal matters as long as you are being responsible.
The list could go on an on as I learn more when I am here. I am lucky enough to be a part of this journey. Now that we got more funding, it also means more people supported us and more opportunity to create a real impact for more people in the world.
