Today In The Suite welcomes Nami Baral, Founder and CEO of Harvest Platform. Nami is an innovative and ambitious woman who finds herself at a unique point in time: a FinTech founder working at the intersection of finance and technology. And as an investment banker turned executive turned female founder, Nami has illustrated through her career the beauty of the pivot.
In our discussion, Nami walks us through each major shift she’s made in her career and how all of her previous chapters helped write the one she’s currently in with Harvest Platform.
Nami created Harvest Platform to support the average American, who is riddled with debt. Backed by a group of powerhouse investors, Harvest Platform uses AI & automation to help users reduce bank fees, credit card charges and more, to ultimately increase net worth & achieve financial stability.
With a wealth of experience making challenging career choices, Nami shares her wisdom for how women at every stage of their career can walk the tight rope of being a woman and being successful in the business world. Her story is an undeniable testament to how living life on passion and purpose always grants you a seat In The Suite.
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🤩 Thanks for listening, we appreciate your support and 5-star reviews of our show!!!
❤️ Please follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/inthesuitepod/
📧 Want to get in touch? Email me at tina@growintentionally.com
Today In The Suite welcomes Nami Baral, Founder and CEO of Harvest Platform. Nami is an innovative and ambitious woman who finds herself at a unique point in time: a FinTech founder working at the intersection of finance and technology. And as an investment banker turned executive turned female founder, Nami has illustrated through her career the beauty of the pivot.
In our discussion, Nami walks us through each major shift she’s made in her career and how all of her previous chapters helped write the one she’s currently in with Harvest Platform.
Nami created Harvest Platform to support the average American, who is riddled with debt. Backed by a group of powerhouse investors, Harvest Platform uses AI & automation to help users reduce bank fees, credit card charges and more, to ultimately increase net worth & achieve financial stability.
With a wealth of experience making challenging career choices, Nami shares her wisdom for how women at every stage of their career can walk the tight rope of being a woman and being successful in the business world. Her story is an undeniable testament to how living life on passion and purpose always grants you a seat In The Suite.
Join the conversation to hear more about:
Referenced Material:
🤩 Thanks for listening, we appreciate your support and 5-star reviews of our show!!!
❤️ Please follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/inthesuitepod/
📧 Want to get in touch? Email me at tina@growintentionally.com
Tina Powell 0:08
Hi, this is Tina Powell host of In the Suite where I sit down with top women leaders and some of the biggest names in the financial services and the wealth management industry. Together we'll discover some of their best secrets and top strategies to grow great business build a strong brand and lead teams in the 21st century. I hope you'll enjoy hearing their amazing personal stories of triumph, trepidation and transformation in hopes of becoming better leaders ourselves. The time for you to lead is now and you're in the sweet
Nami Baral is the FinTech founder on a mission to eliminate bad debt. using artificial intelligence, machine learning and a FinTech Platform. She's engineered from scratch It's called Harvest Platform headquartered in New York City. And it's backed by a group of powerhouse investors, including Barclays Bank, Kleiner, Perkins lakehouse. ventures and more. As founder and CEO of Harvest Platform, a FinTech Platform and FinTech startup that utilizes artificial intelligence to eliminate bad consumer debt. From fees to credit card charges to student loans and more Nami finds herself at a unique place in time. She's a female FinTech founder working in the intersection of finance and technology, and she's also a brand new mom. In this week, we talk about nominees fascinating origin story, being born in Nepal, and finding her way to the United States to conduct Cancer Research at Harvard Medical School. She then transitioned her career to investment banking, and then to Twitter where she spent four years building cutting edge real time bidding products and leading revenue partnerships before Twitter, Nami built her financial sector expertise as an investment banker in New York. She also graduated from Harvard University with a degree in economics and mathematics. And one of the many gifts that you'll discover about Nami is that she is excited about creating solutions that are consumer friendly, especially ones that elevate the financial lives of all consumers and all people. In fact, Nami is so passionate about her mission, that she's pivoted her research and career from medicine to money at Harvard, and look at her now. Mommy's amazing journey and the genesis of Harvest Platform is testament that living your life around passion and purpose. Always has a seat at the table In the Suite. So Nami Baral, welcome. It is an honor to have you In the Suite again. Thank you so much. For making the time I'm really, really excited for today's discussion. I just wanted to welcome you. I'm really happy that you're here.
Nami Baral 3:09
Thank you so much, Tina. It is a pleasure to be here. And I am really, really excited for our talk.
Tina Powell 3:15
And now one of the things that's really fascinating about you is your background and origin story, which is reason why I wanted to invite you into the suite today. This is going to be a real treat for our listeners today. And interestingly, you know, your path, as you describe it has not been a ladder, nor has it been strange, but I look at it from my vantage point. It seems impressive, challenging, and I'll say totally unexpected, which makes it more intriguing. So I'm really excited to get into that today. And you started here you came actually you were born in Nepal. And you came here for first study Cancer Research at Harvard Medical School.
Nami Baral 4:04
Yep. When I came to the states from Nepal, I came to study pre med. And the plan was to actually do an MD PhD. And as part of that, I was studying Harvard College, doing my undergrad studies and also doing Cancer Research at Harvard Medical School.
Tina Powell 4:22
Which is so fascinating because now as I speak to you, I don't know how many years that that is from from that to the point that we are right now. But you are founder and CEO of Harvest Platform, a FinTech that's using AI to eliminate bad debt and Oh, so much more. And on top of that, you've been in an investment banker, you've been an m&a analyst, you spend time in product development. Oh, and by the way, you spent four years at Twitter as head of revenue, partnerships ease, head of demand, a partner solutions manager. I know you You already graduated from Harvard with a BA in econ. And math with honors nominee is just where do we even start? Let's start with Harvard University and, and pivoting from medicine to math and econ because that's a that's an unbelievable change. You know, what was the catalyst for that decision? Why? Why such a pivot?
Nami Baral 5:25
Yeah, as most South Asian and South Asian parents, you know, groom their daughters to be I was groomed to be a doctor all my life. So when I came to study for college at Harvard, the idea was to become a doctor. And at the same time, I was very, very interested in doing cutting edge research at the time, right. So I had the opportunity to be a part of broody lab at Harvard Medical School and do really interesting ovarian cancer research, which, you know, was a phenomenal opportunity that I'd gotten at the time. But around the time I came to the US, the country itself was experiencing this really interesting time. Right? It was 2008. You know, obviously, we remember it was the last recession, there was a lot of things going on in the economy and the economy was going through this upheaval. And for somebody like me who had come from Nepal, which is, you know, a developing country with not so much of a mature economy and has its own fair share of problems. I was expecting this utopia sorts when I came to the US. But then what I saw around me was a lot of hopelessness, despair, you know, just economic difficulties that the larger population was experiencing because of the last financial crisis. And to me, it was very intriguing, but at the same time, it was very, it inspired me to really try to get to the bottom of, you know, why would things like that happen to a mature economy like that of the US and I was already at a place where There was world class faculty that understood economics that was, you know, really helping to try and solve this problem. And so I decided to, you know, really take advantage of the opportunity I had in front of me, which was this once in a lifetime opportunity to really be a part of that conversation and be an expert in this field. So I decided to move away, you know, from the field of medicine and decided to focus on economics and math. And that's what I graduated with.
Tina Powell 7:29
Wow, that's a fascinating, that's a fascinating pivot. I never really thought of it like that, in that, looking at the US as a developed economy and seeing that there were, I guess, like, what all metaphorically like holes in the boat, right? And that you notice in that, yes, the country is very ripe for change and transformation, as it relates to the American household. What Have you noticed because 2000 the recession will was certainly let's, let's call it a traumatic event in the economy. And now I have to acknowledge the fact that we're in Coronavirus right now. And so in some ways, I look back at that time, and it almost pales in comparison to what we're seeing right now.
Nami Baral 8:21
So, you know, I completely agree with you the economic difficulties this time around definitely pale in comparison to what was happening before you can clearly see it in the unemployment rates and just how they have, you know, really increased this time around, but then this is also a recession of a very different color, right? in magnitude, it is extremely larger than the previous recession, but then at the same time, the response to it has also been very, very different. And intrinsically, this recession has been caused, you know, by a health crisis, right. So that makes it you know, a moment Much more complicated recession to solve even with the presence of all of the weapons that we have in our arsenal, and all of the lessons that we've learned from the last recession, even after deploying those things, without really solving this whole problem at hand, I don't think we are going to be able to get out of it on touched. Right. That said, I do think the government is taking really, really interesting steps, especially the Fed to try to lessen that burden on the economy itself. And so that it doesn't make the same mistakes that would meet which was a lead response or delayed response to trying to, you know, put some positive externalities on the on the economy by using the tools that had in its disposal. I do think the worst of the recession, though, is still to come. Because, you know, until and unless this health crisis is solved, and we can solve the problem of 40 million Americans being out of work. There is going to be a lot more we need to do to stimulate and you know, just bring the economy back. to normal.
Tina Powell 10:02
Yeah. And I'm interested in talking to you about it from the perspective of a founder in in FinTech. That's trying to solve a lot of problems for the American consumer. And we're going to get to that. I'm going to leave everybody in suspense right now. But again, a big takeaway from what you just said there, Nami is the fact that it is it's a health crisis, economic crisis, all linked together. We've never seen anything like this. And while there's fiscal policy, monetary policy and actions on behalf of our government, still, there's lots of different levers to pull and push. But at the same time, it's like it feels like it's a little bit of a moving target.
Nami Baral 10:44
Absolutely. Absolutely.
Tina Powell 10:54
So before you even started Harvest, you had a couple of interesting roles. And one that from from my perspective, especially being in social media and being in digital marketing, I look at it with MP. I have to I have to admit here, and I am curious to understand and know how you landed a role at Twitter what it was like to work for jack Dorsey. And again, you You seem to be making these grand leaps, right? I'm looking at your career, and they're all kinds of interesting heights. And it seems like you jump from one thing to another in a completely different ocean. So Can Can you explain now the origin or the I guess the journey from Harvard Business School, econ and math? You probably I think you went into investment banking right after that and then landed the role with with Twitter but can you kind of take us because there's a lot of female listeners right now, particularly ones that are starting their careers. In FinTech, you know, what's your advice for after graduation for that math and econ computer science? You've got the whole skill set. Where do Where should people take their career right after college? And where did Where did you take your career?
Nami Baral 12:15
Yeah, absolutely. So when I graduated from college, I started my career in investment banking. And mostly the reason behind that is trying to acquire really, really solid quantitative and analytical skills. So as an investment banker in the formative stages of my career, I was working mostly in mergers and acquisitions, and really working with large cap companies. Like for example, Pepsi is one that I worked with in helping them buy and sell units. The skill set that I got from that was really to be able to get that extreme attention to detail and form that quantitative background from a skillset perspective. Now, I am somebody who always seeks growth and in My pursuit for growth, what I realized is traditional finance at the time, especially after the last financial crisis was not really a place, which allowed me to grow at the pace that I wanted to. And so when What I wanted was growth, and at the time growth was happening in the rise of mobile, right, the rise of apps, you know, especially post 2010 2011. You That was the time where the app store was burgeoning with, you know, ballooning up with many, many different kinds of apps. And everybody knew that the future of this technology was in mobile. So I decided to take a leap of faith and went from traditional finance to joining a very, very early stage startup called mopub, which was building real time negotiation products but for advertising and trying to do all of that within 300 milliseconds that was that they were trying to build. And to me, it was very Very interesting, right? It was not so much the industry it was in, but more. So the way the team was building that product, and just the amount of technology, data science, and, you know, just mathematics that went into it. And I found myself really, really interested in just learning more about that and wanting to contribute to that field. So I made a leap of faith and went to that early stage startup when he was not not making any revenue at all, especially as an international student at the time. It was a crazy move. But I think, you know, when you take calculated risk, and when you have the conviction to follow them through, I think they pay off. And the same thing happened in my case. Within six months of me joining that company, we were able to release a very, very highly sought after, in monetizable product. We made multiple folds of revenue growth. We launched the product and within six months, we got acquired by Twitter, and this was Twitter. IPO. So I personally went into Twitter through the acquisition of a startup that I worked in. And it was a phenomenal business to be in because we were all VC riding the waves of digital marketing coming to the fore forefront and really mobile advertising starting. And at the same time, Twitter itself was going through really, really interesting times, right, who was still pre IPO at the time, and at the time, the CEO was decoist, although the initial founders, including jack Dorsey, you know, they were not in a CEO position at that time, but post IPO, jack Dorsey decided to join again as the CEO of two companies. Yeah, right there and Twitter. And you know, it was phenomenal in many different ways because we got the opportunity to really see Twitter ride these, you know, absent flows of the stock market and really go from a private company to being a very, very iconic public company. But at the same time, it was very inspiring to see the journey. jack Dorsey himself had taken as the founder and as the CEO of two really, really interesting companies at the time. And what was it like to work for jack Dorsey? It was great. It was inspiring. It was humbling. It was, you know, it was monumental, I would say. And I think the reason behind that is what I saw and doing really understood about leadership was, you know, I really grew within Twitter personally and professionally, I got the chance to build out a really large team that was responsible for almost a billion dollars in revenue a year. And I learned from jack on you know, how to really build an inclusive leadership, right. He was a revolutionary in many aspects. And one thing that I personally think a lot of people do not know about jack is that, once again, this inclusive leadership style at Twitter, there were a lot of female executives, you know, women leaders that, you know, were 10 in hand with him and he gave that opportunity he trusted he believed in that team. The same thing at square if you see it right, a lot of if you look at the executive profiles of, you know, executives at at square, you will see that some of the biggest roles are occupied by women there. And I think it's a testament to him just believing that, you know, believing in delegation and believing the power of female leadership and you know, letting it run through.
Tina Powell 17:28
That is so interesting. I never knew that about jack Dorsey. I understand him as somebody that is intensely driven, and that someone also that has a high degree of I'll call Know thyself. I understand that he does intermittent fasting right for like an entire or an entire weekend. And I look at that also too with envy because I'm Italian and it's really hard not to me, but I look at him as somebody that's extremely disciplined with His habits and his and his mind in being kind of like a fly on the wall. This is so this is so fascinating with this inclusive leadership of females, as you talk about, do you have any suggestions as to? How would if I joined Twitter today, you know, rewind in many years, many years back here. What is your advice Nami for getting on the radar of male leadership? Right, you walk into a culture and you you can see that they embody that the female leaders, how does a female leader though get on the radar of someone like jack Dorsey and be part of that inclusive leadership that you talked about?
Nami Baral 18:45
Absolutely. And you know the answer to this for women in any scenario, but then also extremely true for any any woman that wants to get into the leadership table is to go above and beyond right now. It's It's not fair, because you have to work twice as hard as you know, maybe your male peers to get notice. But at the same time, we have been used to doing this our entire lives, right? Like we do way more work than, you know, men do. Whether, you know, there are a lot of supportive men in our lives. And I think most successful women do not get to where they are without the support of the male counterparts that they have. But at the same time, I think we're all used to doing more than what is what should be on our plate. And I say, embrace that as a strength. Right. But what I think where most women fail is in being confident about themselves, right? Despite doing the work despite going above and beyond, we need to be able to own our efforts and be confident that hey, you know, what I've done is great, and I want to be the face of it. And I think that is really what you know, everybody, especially young women who want who are ambitious and who Want to get to that stage, you really, really need to embrace that confidence and conviction within you do the work. But then also make sure that that work is presented and heard by the others that are in, you know, in a higher seat than us so that they can really come to you, when things come when they want to learn about those things, right. So be an expert in whatever skill set you have in what you are good at. And then also make sure that you know, it is amplified through to the people around you.
Tina Powell 20:31
That's really important that shift in mindset that you just talked about to see that the fact that we work twice as hard, and to wear it as a badge of honor rather than to kind of complain about it. Or sometimes we might compare ourselves to other people. But actually to take it and to look at it from a totally different way provides a lot of confidence. It can make us feel more confident in those types of situations. So that's a good place to start. Any other, I guess quick tips for building confidence. We're always looking to build our confidence, you think that you build it inside the company? Or is it more at right or more outside? It is internal?
Nami Baral 21:15
Yeah, I think I think it's a combination of both. And I think confidence when you build it, you know, especially for people that it doesn't come naturally to, you have to once again try to build up the environment, so that you can be in that position. And I think a significant component of that is networking with other people who want to do similar things, or having mentors who can, you know, really help you cross that river, quote, unquote, right? So if you yourself are trying to build up confidence, if you know that you want to excel in a certain area, you the best thing you can do is build a network of other people who have done it successfully and really learn from it. That is the other other part where I think a lot of women they're actually periences dwarf in comparison to their male counterparts that, you know, men tend to do a lot more networking compared to women, right. And of course, in this post COVID world, networking is very, very difficult to do. But then once again, it has also leveled the playing field in that serendipity doesn't happen as much, you know, in person anymore. So when you show the, when you take the effort, it will show results, right. So, I will say that try to, you know, build out that network and seek out other people who can help you get to that state of where you want to be.
Tina Powell 22:35
Well, speaking of networks, we had Sasha Pilch on this In the Suite, and of course, she's the co founder of New York City, FinTech women, along with Michelle Tran, and she'd mentioned you by name Nami on the podcast is somebody that we asked her who has been really an amazing leader. at New York City, FinTech women. At the time it was right before Coronavirus, where Sasha and I were actually supposed to meet in New York City at the Barclays rise center. And then all of a sudden at the last minute, we decided to go virtual on it. But at the time, I said, what has been one of the most inspiring women and standouts that you've seen, because at the time, it was just almost all personal events, and networking. And so she mentioned you by name. And again, it's one of the reasons that we're extremely fortunate to have you here today. So, thank you for that. And New York City, FinTech women. We will have a link in the show notes. And I highly highly I'm a member as well to all the events right now have been gone virtual for Coronavirus. And there's there's women like Nami Baral in New York City, FinTech women, that would be happy to connect with you and again to just be a fly on the wall and who Listen as they speak and do events, and we can all learn something. So thank you for pointing that out. I think it's a really, really important takeaway from today in that you're the next step to build a confidence very quickly is just join a network of like minded women in New York City, FinTech is there.
What I love is that you're basically doing the stacking you've accumulated, you have this cumulative knowledge and all of these different areas that now poised you for where you are today. So you are the CEO and the founder of Harvest, and I would love love to hear how you now that was the next step after Twitter. What was the genesis? How did you leap from Twitter to then Harvest?
Nami Baral 24:55
You're absolutely correct in saying that, you know, there is a stacking of skill sets that has happened And then I truly believe that your some of your decisions, the decisions that you make, you know, earlier on in life and at every point in your life really make you the person that you are today and in the future. And for me it was very similar right like I have always been very, very much a math nerd and very quantitative in that's what led me to finance and it gave me such a solid background to start with. And I could use and apply those that skill set anywhere else that I went, even though it wasn't finance that I went to, I went into tech and a Twitter obviously I got the opportunity to build really interesting products and I learned about execution and product management, but also people management, how to nurture human capital, how to make sure that you are not just mentoring people, but uplifting them to making sure that you are empowering them to you know, really be successful not just in their jobs. That you're asking them to do at that time, but also in the future. One of the things that I always thought about my team was not to think of, you know, like the success metric for myself at the time with my direct reports was not so much. What are they doing for me today? And are they successful in these jobs today? But what will they do tomorrow? And how can I help them get to it? Right. And that was what I learned from the leaders around me too, because, you know, I learned from people who were my managers, and I tried to do the same thing for my own direct reports. So building that empathetic leadership was part of you know, my journey at Twitter. And after working at, you know, Twitter for for several years, you know, I got the opportunity to really be a part of many conversations and talk to many people from all walks of life in America, right. People from Alaska, Oklahoma, people from San Francisco, New York people, you know, we're making a lot of money and people But we're not making a lot of money and really try to understand what is it about their lives that they love? And what is it about their lives that they're scared about? Or what worries them or what keeps them up at night. And when I realized that, you know, the problem that most of America faces today, and when I say most of America is really, really the average American, right? When we get out of the San Francisco, New York bubble, we, when we look at the country as a whole, I realized that most of the population really suffers from this idea of being buried in debt. And that is what you know, does not help them live really uplifting, fulfilled lives. And when I started in really understanding that component of it, you know, it was one of those things that just bugged me so much, right? Like, you know, if you've ever had that idea, we just like keeps gnawing at you and you know, you're not able to sleep at night. We want to work on it nights, and we And you talk to everyone about it ad nauseum. That's how I felt around the time when, you know, the idea about Harvest, you know, just planted itself in me. And so, you know, it was very, very obvious and clear to me that I wanted to work on it, and I needed to work on it. And Twitter had prepared me for in many different ways to build products and, you know, really nurture talent. So I decided to use that to my advantage and start a company that, you know, was really fulfilling this, you know, this scratch of an idea that I had about how can I help people get rid of the debt that is so you know, overpowering in their lives?
Tina Powell 28:42
Oh, yeah, sure. I mean, I grew up with that I grew up with in a, I've seen that as an American. We've seen that everywhere. We've even seen it in the history books and in previous decades and as you studied American American history but dead has already stranglehold on American society, particularly with women, women who again find themselves alone, either through death or divorce later on in their relationship in my, in my own family, I can, I can see that and actually being a fly on a wall in a wealth management environment for eight years and hearing the stories of women, and it was all relative right now me even if you're making millions of dollars, you can still have a stretch a debt that is actually that strangulate to you every day and robs you of the oxygen that you need to go out and be uplifting to other people. What I think is really interesting is that in your prior roles, and we talked about that kind of stackable skill set, is that you understood that number one, that there was a fundamental problem that you needed to solve for, and you were extremely passionate about it. But number two, here's the here's the key. And here's what what I see what you bring to the equation right now is that you understand from a product knowledge and From a technical acumen, how to scale it, you know, and that's what's different, which was, you know, many years back, let's, you know, go before the iPhone and all of that when we have the same types of problems in society, debt has always been there, not to the extent that it is today, and certainly not student loan debt, we shouldn't we should end credit card debt and automobile debt. And we'll we'll I guess we'll get a little bit more granular in a few minutes and in looking at how debt is sliced and diced around the American ecosystem, but I think it's really important that now that technology in the world is poised to tackle these problems in a new way. And I know that that's some of the work that you're doing at Harvest. So we'd love to hear how do you approach such magnitude of a problem through the lens of technology at Harvest?
Nami Baral 30:53
Yeah, so at Harvest, what we're doing is we're leveraging artificial intelligence and machine learning to get the prove the net worth of the 99%. That's our singular mission. Right? Now, when you think about improving network, you think about assets and liabilities, right? And as a math nerd, I have always thought about, you know, I think everything is in these like four quadrants, right? So if you want to get somebody from one to 100, you have to get them from negative 100 to zero, right? So you have to tackle the darker side of their finances, which is dead. And I found what was missing in you know, despite all of these different really interesting innovations that have come in the in FinTech and in financial services in general, I realized that most of them are, you know, trying to focus on the more glamorous side of financial services, right? how can how can we get you to save more? How can we get to invest more? How can we get you to trade war? There's all sorts of really, really interesting companies in the space who do that and That has a proper place for itself. But when you look at, you know, the iceberg, right of a person's finances, savings and investments are on top, but most of their life is really submerged underwater, which is debt. And until and unless we solve that problem around debt, they are not really going to be able to live a financially balanced life. And by understanding that, and by, you know, helping consumers do that through the use of technology, which has the ability to be exercising discipline, even when people that be when human beings themselves are not able to, or you know, change behavior, which is difficult for human beings to do, but for a technical product for AI to be really, really diligent about sticking to a budget, it's easier to do that from a technological perspective than to do it from a human perspective. So I saw an opportunity there to really leverage this cutting edge technology that I had seen and you know, be Part of real time negotiation products at Twitter and establish that and take the learnings from there into a financial system itself. And that's what we are doing at Harvest at the, at the center at the heart of Harvest is something called a pro score will praise Yeah, a pro score it's it's, it's short for verified ratings and opportunity score. And what it does it gives you a leading indicator of your financial health. What it does your financial health look like today and moving forward compared to a credit score which is a lagging indicator of your credit risk that is generally used by lenders. So what I realized was this, this huge credit ecosystem we have that you know, people have a lot of debt and when they go to lenders, you know it, you know, they have different kinds of interest rates and aprs. And all of that is based on your credit score, which can be predicted Interesting if you do not really know how to deal with credit score or how to actually get it to a proper place, right, then not a lot of people have financial education in the US. So for many people, despite being very financially healthy, they may not have the right kind of credit scores, which actually puts them deeper and deeper into debt. So what we realize is, you know, we need to make sure that, you know, all of the gaps that traditional credit score has, how can we fill those gaps and provide a better form of transparency to both consumers and lenders so that we can slowly move them towards a much better financial future. And that's the product that leverages a ton of machine learning and, you know, really interesting data insights that we gather from your transactional data, to be able to really decipher a true financial roadmap that is customized to you and actually take the action on your behalf. So it's a combination of automation with financial knowledge.
Tina Powell 35:04
And that's really fascinating. So we had Danni Fava on the podcast to talk a little bit about artificial intelligence. What can you tell us about artificial intelligence as it relates to Harvest, in order for us to kind of understand not necessarily from a super technical geeky aspect, which I know that you that you could really geek out on right now, but also to I think more of the application. And the reason that I ask is because I am striving to actually see how artificial intelligence if we understand it from a fundamental knowledge of how it's being used in even behind the scenes. I think that gives us a little bit, a little bit more deeper knowledge about it. And so if you can kind of explain, specifically what is artificial intelligence, looking at As it relates to Harvest, is it looking at my past spending habits, you know, what kind of data is it looking at as it relates to me as a person at the individual level?
Nami Baral 36:13
Absolutely. So, you know, I think AI in general, it is something that you know, you are looking at a broad set of data and trying to understand how you can really get different kinds of learnings for that that is going to be applicable to you in a predictive manner, right. So, it depends on use cases, the use cases that you are trying to apply AI for, and generally AI supposed to be a little bit more advanced, but using machine learning techniques to be able to get certain kinds of data related results. For example, one of the things that we use AI for at Harvest is in helping customers recuperate refunds on the fees that they may have paid to their banks right now, negotiate is something very human? Right? It's one of those things that generally humans do. And it's, it's one of those things that people don't really like doing either. Right now, what we're doing is when we leverage AI into this product, we you know, feed data about, you know, like millions of different negotiations and negotiation techniques and rules and logic and all sorts of you know, linguistic related things there to be able to understand for the, for the machine to understand, what is the actual, again, the thing that we are trying to negotiate here, what is the outcome, or what outcome do I want to get and what is the other party, you know, willing to provide, and to have some level of understanding of, you know, what a human would do in a certain kind of scenario and replicate that same kind of thing from a machine perspective, right. So that means being able to understand natural language when somebody says hi versus what the hell, for example, right? So very, very different things, right. But you know, the machine can understand in that case, like, you know, that one is rude versus the other is just normal, right? So, you know, AI is really used in those kinds of use cases where you're doing a lot of natural language, you know, processing on also generating the way human beings speak and negotiate and trying to bring that intelligence from a human perspective and transfer it to a machine. Now, other use cases of AI, especially when you think about machine learning, and the use of data in particular is looking at a lot of different you know, millions of rows of data about your spending activity or you know, where you spend, how you spend what your income looks like, how does it compare to the rest of the population, and really building certain kinds of predictions there and coming to something that is Rational result, right. So I think AI has obviously broad use cases in where you use it for but at Harvest in particular, we use one for making sure that we are really really understanding intimately your finances, so that we can build a very, very customized but robust actionable plan for you from a financial perspective. And second in the automation component itself, where we can do the same kind of actions that you as a human would do, that you do not have the time resource or the know how to how to do it for
Tina Powell 39:33
that is really exciting. So if I'm hearing you correctly, then Harvest is using AI machine learning lots and lots of technology on the back end, and that you can help me the Platform helps to reduce my bank fees, my aprs on my credit cards, without me having to call up a person and try to summon up enough courage or even to have The type of conversation that basically the Platform is doing it on my behalf on the back end without me even having to pick up the phone.
Nami Baral 40:09
Absolutely.
Tina Powell 40:13
Wow. That is unbelievable. How do you come up with an idea like that? That is the genesis of that is so it's, it's really incredible. I have to imagine that you've seen a lot of success stories and that you've been able to already change change lives. And it seems like, Look, if you add up the bank fees and the credit cards, at least you're steering someone into the right direction. What do you notice, like within, I guess, six months a year of someone actually coming onto the Platform, what has been like a really cool success story.
Nami Baral 40:50
We have heard many different success stories, you know, from our, from our customers, and that's really what keeps us going right? That journey of doing a startup Regardless of how successful you may be, or you know how successful the world thinks it might be, it is always hard. And it's harder than anybody tells you how hard it is, right? But when you wake up in the morning, and you see a customer, you know, really happy and they send you a note, that's really the fodder that keeps us going. And for us, it's really about, you know, the focus on this paycheck to paycheck population for the focus on the nine 9% means that when we are able to recuperate, you know, $500 for someone by negotiating these things automatically, that means we're not just getting them in money back into their pockets, everybody appreciates money in their pocket, but for many people that we work with, it means, you know, bringing food onto the table, it means you know, paying for, you know, medicine medicine for for their families or bringing groceries for their kids. And, you know, really, it's really not the amount of money that we're able to get for customers, but really how far that every dollar that we bring for them really goes right. And since we're not working with extremely high net worth individuals, we know that whenever we get back $500 $800 $600 for customers, it goes that extra mile. And that's really what keeps us going. In general, on average, if a customer were to use all of the services that we provide on on the Platform today, then on average, they tend to save roughly about $8,000 a year, which is something that we have always tried to optimize for an increase because the goal is to once again increase the net worth of the nine 9%. In force. We started by reducing your debt in the form of bank fees, credit card, interest charges, getting back even credit, credit card interest that you've already paid, but then also by offering you all of these other automation and policies for that financial roadmap.
Tina Powell 43:07
Do you foresee a need with all of this automation augmentation on our lives? Do you foresee a change in habits at like an earlier age? One of the things is that we've gotten ourselves into the situation in the first place, right? So it's like here we have Platforms to help us kind of solve our problem. But I feel that there needs to be some earlier intervention in the form of like schooling. We didn't learn about finance the way that we needed to really understand it. We didn't understand debt. Yes, we might have been introduced to the concept of assets and liabilities, but I don't think we really ever understood it, at least the way that it was taught during my error that could have had an effect on me as a just as a regular person is as a decision maker. So do you cut What do you see? I know you see You were recently on another podcast and you talked about a utopian vision for for how we handle our money. You know, what would you like to see what what should we be teaching? What should we be teaching the next generation? How could we all be leading better financial outcomes? Yes, having the the augmentation and the technology is an absolute important point of it. But how do we really change our behaviors so that they help to also to support the goal of increasing our network and reducing our our debt?
Nami Baral 44:36
Yeah, great question. I think there's a lot of things that affect our perception of credit, dad, finances in general that are a lot more cultural, right. So you know, to me, I had this immigrant perspective on what I saw as a debt problem in the country because I was born and raised in an environment that absolutely absolutely frowns upon debt of any kind. We are taught from a very very young age not in school but culturally from our parents from our you know, relatives you know in general in the, in the DNA of how we lived at the time to really not incur debt of any kind and really live within the means because we did not have credit you know, flowing everywhere around us. Now. Partially what makes America great is that it is a country in which if you have a dream, you can find somebody who can give you credit to you know, allow you to you know, build upon that dream, right and I do, I do truly, truly believe that this is what makes America the most amazing country of the world and a country I love more than anything else. But at the same time. Over you know, if you think about what how credit started in this country versus where credit is today, in Initially credit was supposed to be productive, right? You were supposed to take credit cards because you wanted to, you know, maybe have a little bit of liquidity in your business, or you know, you wanted to do something when you're self employed or you have your own business, you were given a chance to take out student loans because when he went to college, he was supposed to increase your income and improve the opportunities that outcome that you get after graduating from college. Now, decades ago, when you know, when all of these things were being introduced, you know, more credit cards, more student loans, more auto related things auto auto mobile debt was supposed to be productive because it was supposed to get you to work and it was once again supposed to increase your income. Now, over the several decades, the incomes have stagnated, but debt has continued to rise, right. And so I think the fundamental thing that we need to teach everybody and especially our children is that not all day is productive. And you need to make sure that you are living within the means if you do not have a way to access productive debt, and I don't think that distinction about productive versus unproductive debt is something that even mature people under even adults understand. Right? So first, we need to absolutely make sure that there is some sort of financial education and even if there is no financial education, that's our start, you know, teaching these things to our kids that are at an early age that they need to, you know, look at their finances differently. And they need to make sure that they don't incur unnecessary debt, unless it is a way to really, really move up in life. And I think that needs to be the first step. The second step needs to be for the debt that we currently have. How can we actually reduce that and what are the things that can be taken from a regulatory perspective from a financial perspective from a technological perspective that We as a country together, we can, you know, take steps to really reduce the debt burden that our country overall has, is that by eliminating student loans, I'm all for it is that by eliminating, you know, bank fees like overdrafts all together? I think it is a conversation that everybody should have. And, you know, I think this needs to be a conversation that everyone should have at the brunch tables at the dinner tables and tables everywhere.
Tina Powell 48:27
Yeah, yeah, we shouldn't be afraid to talk about it. And even if, if topics are not being introduced in an academic setting, we have the ability to start to introduce that art to introduce that narrative to the dinner table and just talk about it. I also have my own view that I think that social media while I love it, I think that especially Platforms like Instagram and Pinterest, but more particularly Instagram, where Wow, there's just you want everything on Instagram you want to buy now. Instagram, and especially influencers and people that we follow and really cool like suggestions. I know that I'm being targeted all the time for beautiful jewelry and handbags and all kinds of things and even things from my home like beautiful outdoor lighting. And you have to recognize in the back of your head that yes, you know you're being targeted, for particular reason probably be retargeted because of a site that you visited. And then unless it's unless it's debt that really truly looking at that as a way of is it serving you and is it going to build in the future? Or is it working against you? And I think that was really important because some debt is good debt It was good to borrow against for student loans do have their place in society for helping us to get a better job outside of college but also to making sure that we can live the lifestyle so that it's not putting that noose around our neck. A quick question about Harvest and that is number one, is it global? And number two, what's the cost?
Nami Baral 50:03
Yeah, so it's currently available to, you know, American citizens only. But it is something that we're expanding to make global because the idea of credit and the idea of using alternative data to give you a leading indicator of financial health is as applicable to someone here as it is to someone in India or somebody in South Africa, right. So we are bringing making this product global, but we are prioritizing, obviously, making sure that we can impact the lives of the millions of Americans that we're already working with today. And then the cost is there is no upfront cost to using Harvest. So whatever savings we're able to get for you. We take a cut of that if we're able to get you any savings if we don't get you any savings, then you know we do not charge anything. We have a very very value based approach to any kind of product right? We do not believe in massive subscriptions. We do not do Believe in upfront payments, if we are able to make an impact, a monetary impact for you, then we take a cut of it. Otherwise, it's free to use.
Tina Powell 51:09
Wow, I love that and remind everybody of the URL, it's goHarvest.com,
Nami Baral 51:14
it's joinHarvest.com
Tina Powell 51:19
okay, and go to any good get there right away that is really exciting, any other like exciting things that you're working on right now that you can tell us about in the future.
Nami Baral 51:30
So, there are definitely a ton of different products that are coming up, especially in a post COVID world right, as we have discussed earlier in the podcast. You know, COVID has upended many parts of our lives and definitely from an economic and health perspective, but I think it has also shown a glaring need for us to really think about the financial infrastructure that we have been used to, and how it does not make sense anymore in a situation where spending decreases or increases His, you know, income goes away where there is such massive unemployment and there's really a natural disaster in the form of a health crisis happening. So there is a lot of products that we are releasing so that we can really once again uplift the financial lives of our consumers in a post COVID world in a world that is optimized for, you know, based on the learnings that we've had in the past several months. So be on the lookout for more releases and launches of products. And if you go to join, Harvest calm, you will be able to, you know, essentially subscribe to all of the product launches that we will be releasing in the future.
Tina Powell 52:39
That is really, really exciting. Thank you for that. And I have a couple more questions before. One more question before final question. And again, you've been so generous with your time and we also have our interns from C-Suite Social Media that are accompanying this broadcast today. And they are very, very smart women who have a background in computer science and math and Econ, and attending some great university programs. And one of the questions that they helped to come up with today is the fact that you're you are a founder and and Nami just talked about it a little bit before about the sacrifices that you had to make as a founder. How did you know that you were founder material? Again, a lot of women right now in particular, and young people, they have the types of passions and, you know, love of what they're doing. But how do you know that you are that you have what it takes to be a founder because it is such a hard road? It's a harder road to be a founder than it is to be an employee somewhere. So you know, what's the what's the sign? What's the sign that yeah, it's, it's for you, was there a sign?
Nami Baral 53:55
Yeah, this design really is that you know, on end relentlessness in the passion that you have to solve a problem, right? It is. In these days, I think you know many of us have witnessed a lot of people want to be entrepreneurs. And I call it entrepreneurship, which is something that we broadly broadly see in current ecosystems. But why entrepreneurship dies really, really, really quickly. And the surest way to know if you truly want someone is to see how relentless you are in the face of adversities that you face, right. And these adversities could be many, many different things. You know, it could be about you know, fundraising, it could be just, you know, not being able to hire people, or you know, in general the opportunity cost that you have to, you know, give up, especially if you are a successful person, and if you have a cushy job like I have at Twitter, the opportunity cost for me to do a start up is really, really high, right. So when you are not doing Doing something for money, or when you want to do when you want to work on something day and night, knowing that the opportunity cost is very high for you, that's, that's really, really, really the sign. Right? For me, it was truly that and, you know, I had obviously a lot of things that I could have done and you know, just lived an easy life if I just continued to stay on Twitter. You know, these days, I recently had a baby, I have a I have a 10 month old, and thank you, thank you. But you know, just my my story about when when I decided to have a baby, obviously, it was a crazy decision to do especially because I just recently started my company. And, you know, if I was in any other position, I would have probably not thought about it the same. But, you know, I think back to when when I was at Twitter and the really, really great you know, maternity leave policies it has, right. So, you know, despite you know, if I could have stayed on Twitter, I could have taken advantage of those policies that I had a really, really supportive team. And you know, I could have just stayed taking the easy route there right? Now compared to that I decided to do my own startup. And you know, I had to have a C section and I was not able to take a leave for much longer than you know, just the time it takes for the food to heal. But all of it was my choice right? Now that but but that in in essence, are the different you know, little sacrifices that you have to make, right, the opportunity cost is extremely high. It's the small little things you know, the number of nights you don't sleep, the number of nights you're not able to, you know, read a book to for your child to bed to go to bed, or you know, just spend a lot of time with their kids. But at the same time, you know, the hope is that when my son grows up and sees what his mom was doing when he was young, I hope he will be proud and you'll see my commitment to improving the lives of others and not just my own.
Tina Powell 57:01
Oh, wow, wow. I mean, I've I'm, I was a huge non liberal and I still am admire, but even more so the fact that you have a 10 month old, I had no idea that is an that is really unbelievable, you make it look incredibly easy and right now with a pandemic, I mean, you have like all of these things coming at you. And yet you agreed to be on the podcast today. And I know that you're just you're working really hard behind the scenes. And, again, really thank you for your time today and for tackling a problem and for helping to make our society better and to make the lives of people like my daughter and my son better as a result that you're trying to solve problems of the world. So that's a huge you've made a huge, just a huge impact. And I really love what you just said before about clearing up that was intrapreneurship I never heard that expression you just like a light bulb fire Works went on in my mind. And it is you have to be really truly committed. And the door is going to slam in your face and it's going to slam really hard and it's going to hit you even to on the way out. So you have to be really, it goes beyond the the passion for something. It's this unrelenting kind of drive internally that you have that's going to, you know, help to set your course. So thank you so much for really defining that because I think our talk today here In the Suite put people on a on a course that now they can really feel confident about. And I do have one more question. It's the last question that we love to ask our guests here on the suite. And it's Is there something that you tell yourself or you wear or you carry that gives you strength In the Suite?
Nami Baral 58:48
That's a great question. And yeah, I think I absolutely do. I think everybody has like one thing that they hold on to for, for for power, or, you know, giving That strength, psychologically it's two things. It's confidence and humility at the same time, and materially I love the color red, it gives me a ton of strength and confidence. And so anytime you see me there's something red about me.
Whether it's my lipstick, or you know, or the blouse that I'm wearing, or is it heels, whatever it might be, there's a bit of red. Love it.
Tina Powell 59:26
I love it. Nami that is so beautiful. That's really incredible. I've heard all kinds of answers. And it's really fascinating you know, to hear it from from all different women. Lipstick was something that was also to brought up in the color. And and that was actually Stephanie Foster talked about her lips today. Today, too, and the color red that will always stick and you can see like right now everyone's on the broadcast, but look what's behind me red flowers. Love it. I love it. So I'm definitely gonna think of you You a lot more when I see the color red. So Nami, thank you so much for your time and your contribution today. Again, we appreciate that your work, the work that you're doing to impact women's lives positively. And again, you've been so gracious with your time, especially with your baby with your 10 month old son. So congratulations. And good luck to you. And I wish you well.
Nami Baral 1:00:24
Thank you so much. It has been such a pleasure to be a part of this conversation and thank you so much for your work and for the amazing insights that you're providing to you know, women who are aspiring to be a part of the C suite everywhere.
Tina Powell 1:00:37
Thank you.
You're listening to In the Suite, a podcast that shares amazing stories of women in business and the financial services and the wealth management industry. This podcast is sponsored by C-Suite Social Media, a digital marketing and social media agency for C suite leaders and finance and technology. You can visit C-Suite Social Media comm To learn more, and for show notes from today's broadcast, and thank you so much for listening and subscribing and helping to support this podcast with your reviews. I would love it and it means so much if you left us a five star review for this incredible episode with Nami Burrell. You can also follow her on Twitter at namrata_baral BARAL and @PlatformHarvest. That's Platform Harvest Harvest one word. And always if you would like to share the name of a successful woman in the financial services we should interview please send it to me at tina@csuitesocialmedia.com we have received a lot a lot of great names and we've adjusted to a weekly distribution schedule to make it all possible for you It's been tough but here in this week, we are rising to the challenge. So thank you so much for listening and subscribing to in the sweet