Startup Life in Ukraine
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Hosted By Lauren Conaway

InnovateHER KC

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Alyona Mysko

Today's Guest: Alyona Mysko

CEO and Founder - Fuelfinance

Ep. #909 - Startup Life in Ukraine

Today’s episode of Startup Hustle brings together two founders, one from the US and the other in Ukraine. Lauren Conaway shares an insightful and inspiring talk with Alyona Mysko, the CEO and founder of Fuelfinance. Listen to their raw conversation on startup life in Ukraine and how Alyona keeps her business afloat despite the turmoil in her country.

Covered In This Episode

It’s an extremely challenging time to be an entrepreneur in Ukraine right now. Aside from running a business, the safety of yourself, your family, and your employees are on top of your priorities. So how does a startup business owner like Alyona conquer these adversities?

Our guest shares her stories with Lauren about it. They also talk about competitive analysis and how to use data to separate yourself from competitors. And, of course, the founders talk about what the future looks like for Fuelfinance.

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Expect an open and honest conversation. So, what are you waiting for? Tune in to this Startup Hustle episode.

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Highlights

  • Alyona’s journey to entrepreneurship (02:03)
  • How does Fuelfinance work? (04:00)
  • Alyona and her approach to tackling a company problem (05:10)
  • The reality of starting a business in Ukraine amidst a challenging time (08:10)
  • What’s next for Fuelfinance? (13:23)
  • On competitive analysis and setting a competitive advantage (16:25)
  • What are the pain points in growing a startup? (22:03)
  • Alyona’s go-to-market strategy (24:31)
  • The main challenges while growing the business (27:12)
  • Alyona’s hobbies and interests (30:29)
  • Time management in Alyona’s style (35:19)

Key Quotes

I couldn’t say it’s okay because you simply read this news, and you try to understand. Okay, I read this news, but now, I should go and do my work. It’s like I really don’t have some time to be upset or something like that because it’s really important to do the job.

– Alyona Mysko

One of the things about overcoming adversity is that it makes you more flexible. It makes you more tolerant of risk. And it makes you either all of these things that an entrepreneur just truly needs to be and should be.

– Alyona Mysko

It’s about sharing experience and knowledge. But, also, it can be a source of leads. It’s building communication and building networks through sharing experiences.

– Lauren Conaway

Sponsor Highlight

This Startup Hustle episode is brought to you by Full Scale. The Missouri-based development company can help you build a software development team quickly and affordably. What’s more? They also have a platform to help you manage that team efficiently and remotely.

So answer a few questions to start your project now! Moreover, remember to check the list of Startup Hustle partners and see if they have services that your business may need too.

Rough Transcript

Following is an auto-generated text transcript of this episode. Apologies for any errors!

00:00.18

Lauren Conaway

And we are back. Thank you for joining us for yet another episode of the Startup Hustle podcast. I’m your host Lauren Conoway, founder and CEO of InnovateHER KC, and today’s episode of Startup Hustle is powered by FullScale.io. They can help you hire software developers easily. They can help you build a software team quickly and affordably. They have a platform to help you manage that team. Full Scale is there when you are ready to deploy software solutions, so definitely keep that in mind. Now, let’s get to our guest. Ah, very, very excited. We have actually tried this a couple times now, and so the third time’s a charm. We’re gonna get it, but we have a very fun guest today. Very excited to talk to Alyona because she gets really excited about data, friends. We’re about to get real funky about some data. So, thank you so much for being with us, Alyona. Alyona Mysko is the CEO and founder of Fuelfinance, and we are so glad to have you here today.

01:07.64

Alyona Mysko

Hi, Lauren. And nice to meet you.

01:09.87

Lauren Conaway

So yes, this has been a long time coming. I’m very excited. So I’m just going to ask the question, and here it comes. Tell us about your journey.

01:22.85

Alyona Mysko

Ah, yeah, I think, like my journey has started, I believe, very early because as I remember myself, I was always interested in mass, in different calculations, and in chess. But I always tried to understand how I could use it in my daily life. And already a student, I decided that finance is my real passion. After that, I decided to build the company because I was working as a financial analyst, as C four, as a financial director, and I was always wondering why founders and entrepreneurs don’t like finance. It’s so cool.

02:14.36

Lauren Conaway

I know. Like our listeners, the entrepreneurs listening at home there, there’s a large number of them who are like ah, all right. Okay.

02:18.52

Alyona Mysko

Yeah, it. It can be um. Ah, yeah, I think listeners now try to imagine all this like boring reports that are not glamorous when I talk about finance, but it’s not about that. It’s about really.

02:31.57

Lauren Conaway

Yeah.

02:40.20

Alyona Mysko

Cool data and insights that you can use to manage your business completely in another way. And that’s exactly what we want to build with Fuel, so we really want to make all founders fall in love with finance.

02:49.27

Lauren Conaway

Who um make all founders that are all others.

02:55.24

Alyona Mysko

Possible, and you simply can achieve the new next level of managing business with that.

02:58.32

Lauren Conaway

Okay, and how does Fuelfinance push the ah envelope on that vision. How so tell us about Fuelfinance and how does Fuelfinance empower entrepreneurs to fall in love with the accounting side of their business.

03:15.30

Alyona Mysko

But yeah, a few finance Cloud Financial departments for startups. So We provide the product for revenue stage startups, and this product completely helps all. Automates the function of the financial team for the early-stage startups. And what was really important was our product and all startups and founders. They get all the insights very fast. So How, what financial results can they get from what business Metrics. So how they can make decisions and everything can vary. Obvious and beautiful way with beautiful dashboards were designed ready to use insights, and also we have very cool support for our customers. Our financial success managers really were supportive of making it. Everything is clear in this financial system for our customers.

04:13.23

Lauren Conaway

That’s all right. I have to admit you make it sound kind of fun. So I’m halfway in, but now I’m gonna let’s bring it home, and I want to tell you about how you kind of figured out how you wanted to attack the Fuelfinance problem. How did you take your experience and your inspiration and turn it into a viable business model? What was that process like?

04:40.59

Alyona Mysko

Ah, like I was barking as a financial analyst and financial director, and um, I remember that, so I was always this question. So why should I do this manual work every month? Ah, it was financial management, so usually, you should do all these reports and plan actual analysis and even unit economics. So I like it very often. Ah, but I found that all these processes are similar in different business models. For example, you know for. Marketplace startups. They have a very similar financial system and very similar outputs that they should get, for example, from their financial system every week and every month, so with our team, we started to test this idea by simply building our product without getting caught. But with the use of Google spreadsheets and we simply started to build based on our Google spreadsheets these types of different systems, and it was like ah very crazy when first customers they used this not ideal product at all. Ah, but we understood that it was really efficient for them, so yet the product gave them value, and um, we saw how founders simply started to change after the first months of using this product. So.

05:53.66

Lauren Conaway

Yes.

06:07.40

Alyona Mysko

They started to be more financially successful. They started to make other decisions already. Ah, after this testing, we decided. Okay, we should get like our product team, we should hire engineers and. Start to build from that type of the product already start to build a more optimized product with much more integrations with database and with everything single like that. So we really started in a very startup way which was bad and MVP without quitting. But I now believe it was a very good idea because it helped us not to fundraise during the first years when we tested our idea, and it was a very cost-efficient way for us.

07:17.20

Lauren Conaway

I Oh yeah, can you hear me now? I’m so sorry I was having an issue with my mic. Okay, sorry about that. Ah, so that.

07:18.66

Alyona Mysko

Lauren, I don’t hear you? Yeah yes.

07:30.56

Lauren Conaway

That was quite a story, and thank you so much for sharing it with us. I love hearing your perspective as a founder on what you know what it took to ideate and develop and iterate through this whole process. That’s really cool. Now I have to ask, I detect a little bit of an accent. Where are you?

07:43.10

Alyona Mysko

Yes.

07:49.72

Lauren Conaway

From yeah, so, and I’m really, really curious. You know, one of the things that I wanted to talk to you about was, you know, starting a business in Ukraine. You’re experiencing a volatile time.

07:50.38

Alyona Mysko

Um, from Ukraine.

08:06.91

Lauren Conaway

Right now. Correct.

08:08.30

Alyona Mysko

Yeah, correct completely every day, I think.

08:10.62

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, can you tell us a little bit about that, like the process of starting a business is a kind of societal turmoil, and what has that been like?

08:23.29

Alyona Mysko

Exactly when the war started, it was crazy because exactly for that day, twenty Fourth of February, it was planned for our launch of the new website. And we were working till midnight or even later, so when the board started the first like one day was completely crazy and it was not the question about the business, it was already the question about safety. Ah, of all team members, safety to your friends or family and um also like um so the first is the days and the special first week was the craziest for us. Ah, already I think like this. After the first week, we understood how to combine everything together. So the first priority was relocation and safety of all team members, and so we had like these priorities, and the first was safety. After that, the second was to help Ukraine to win this war. So many of our team members started to volunteer, and they are still volunteering and helping Ukraine win this war and also we. We are working, so we are developing. We are growing despite the war and like despite aversing, but it was a completely crazy period of time, especially during the first weeks. Now. It’s also not so easy because we’re all Ukrainians, and it really hurts every day, so every day, we have news about new rockets and new deaths, and it’s simply complicated. They had to stay very. Energy weighs and with high energy, but we try to do it, and we do our best now because we also understand that it’s very important, not only to win this war with our military forces, but we also believe it’s very important to win this war economically.

10:36.30

Lauren Conaway

Yes.

10:39.57

Alyona Mysko

So we should hire more people, and we should grow. We should pay salaries. We should donate to military forces, pay taxes, and everything. All of this is really important to win this war.

10:50.20

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, ah, how are you? I have to ask, are you mentally sound and spiritually happy? Are you okay?

11:02.68

Alyona Mysko

Um, spiritual, he thinks? Yeah, so balancing gear. We are fighting and trying to hang on. But like, today is also the day when more additional rockets are at the center of Ukraine, and three children died. I couldn’t say it’s okay because you simply read this news, and you try to understand. Okay, I read this news, but now I should go and do my work. It’s like I don’t have time really to um like to have some time to be upset or something like that because it’s really important to do the job.

11:47.70

Lauren Conaway

Yeah.

11:54.23

Alyona Mysko

And still growing. So yeah, I think it’s something like that now.

11:56.79

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, well, I want to just take a moment to. I wanted to take a moment to honor the fact that you are here. You’re sharing your story, and you’re going through something that is really, really awful. I mean, I know that. Many, many across the globe have watched what’s happening in Ukraine and just been horrified, and so you know, worried and sad for you and actually folks the time we set up to ah to record this episode. We were having some technical difficulties. We just and I was like, you know there is something interfering with signals where she’s at so I’ve actually been thinking about you for the past four days like okay I hope she’s okay, like and I mean that’s nothing that’s a drop in the bucket like living with that kind of. Fear so close I imagine it must be very oppressive, and so I want to honor that you’re doing a very hard thing. I want to thank you for being so vulnerable with us Today. You are just a person who lives in her truth, and so it’s been. Um. And honor to have you share that with us. So thank you and now let’s get back to the business, and so I’m just going to ask you know how? What? What are the next steps for Fuelfinance?

13:11.98

Alyona Mysko

Um.

13:22.70

Alyona Mysko

Ah, the next steps like keep growing to be a billion company. Yeah, it’s a goal, and I think like the main goals simply now change the financial sphere because um.

13:26.40

Lauren Conaway

Um, okay, all right. That’s a good goal.

13:42.53

Alyona Mysko

And I’m very passionate about this idea. So I see how ah like I see how founders um, really can improve their business management and like they’re financial management with a much better product and it’s exactly what. Motivates me. I think I would like to do this job every day So when I hear feedback from our customers that it’s completely another way what they have now with our product and they finally. They finally don’t have this financial chaos, and everything is very clear, and I think like for me, it’s very important feedback, and it really motivates me. Do this like better and better our product every day, and I think it’s ah like. That’s our next step to develop the product as we can and maybe in some ways that we really haven’t imagined yet, but it will be much cooler and also ah. The next step, really? Ah, hire more Ukrainians and also like, I don’t know, so we are a profitable startup and um like it’s not something unusual for startups. But for me, it’s also an important part.

14:52.54

Lauren Conaway

Yeah.

15:08.28

Alyona Mysko

From our profits, we can also donate to support Ukraine, and it’s exactly what we do. That’s why I believe we have like several missions. What’s next so growing the business has improved our products. Ah. Have more happy customers with the birth of initial management and also help Ukraine win. So we have. I think we have many challenges.

15:32.19

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, well, so one of the things that I’m hearing is that folks, you know if you want to find a way to contribute to you know the social movement of what’s happening in the Ukraine support Ukrainians. Um, definitely look into supporting Ukrainian-owned businesses like Fuelfinance. That’s ah, that’s a way that you can support as well. So definitely keep that in mind, folks. Um, you know one of the things that you said, and I loved how directly you said it. But you said.

15:58.30

Alyona Mysko

Hello.

16:07.95

Lauren Conaway

A much better product like Fuelfinance is just a much better product, and I love that, but I want to talk to you talk to us about that competitive analysis like what? What did you do when you were developing Fuelfinance. What did you do to set yourself apart? Your competitors like what’s your differentiator.

16:27.69

Alyona Mysko

Oh yeah, like I think I might, so I simply make Mark his research permanently. But at the start, I made it. Ah, I think sorry, interviews with different founders of startups. So like, during the first one month to understand what key challenges they have with their finance, on the other hand, like ah I did market research about different tools. What? So what we have on the markets to manage finance and I was like shocked because okay, here I have like founders and on the other hand I have a number of different financial tools to manage finance, and I have some gaps here because ah founders when I talk to his founders all of them like using Excel, Docs, Google spreadsheets. And not some automatic products. Ah, in 90 to 90% of all cases and on the other hand like markets are over low and in that way, I started to think okay, it’s ah. Maybe we have some more complicated problem than simply providing I don’t know some tool whether you can build beautiful graphs and get like I don’t know cash flow projection or on the get financial planning, or I don’t know how to get like expense control. So that’s why I believe this problem with good financial management is much more complicated. It’s more about automation of the role of financial managers and financial teams. Ah, for a revenue stage startup, and I think it’s exactly what we built, so we don’t provide a product where our founder should sink what graphs they should build, so I believe that it’s not a good way to provide freedom in that way for founders in a good way. So I believe.

18:20.62

Lauren Conaway

Click. Sure itself numbers What to do.

18:32.20

Alyona Mysko

Yeah, they don’t should like they shouldn’t do all these reports and think about what graph I should build or what metrics should analyze now, and that’s exactly how we are different, so we already provide best practices for specific business models. So, For example, we have four solutions now for e-commerce for SaaS marketplaces and professional service startups and for each of these business models. We have an individual solution with individual dashboard Output Metrics. And what should be controlled and also we have very detailed ways. So the main thing for startups is revenue and achieving revenue and cross and on the other hand, also control cash especially now during this downturn and ah like when to talk about.

19:15.93

Lauren Conaway

But

19:24.00

Alyona Mysko

The revenue so we have a very detailed level in our system. How you should control your revenue starting from the number of leads planned and the actual conversion rates, the cost of the acquisition plan of your customer, the actual number of your customer, and finally like revenues that you will get. So we have a very detailed way how you should control your business. What business metrics should you control to get your revenue planned at the end of the month? I think it’s how we differentiate from all other customers. So we provide a full system without um. Without needing a founder to be involved in some manual work or set up some financial system, So we have the best practices that we give simple founders to use and simply ready-to-use recommendations and insights inside the system.

20:18.91

Lauren Conaway

That’s incredible. I love it because, really, it’s specialization and customization for your clients, like an understanding that each type of business needs are going to be unique.

20:25.19

Alyona Mysko

Yeah.

20:32.73

Lauren Conaway

And so you’re able to kind of cater to that which I love. It also reminds me of today’s episode sponsor, FullScale.io. They are fantastic at helping you come up with custom solutions that are going to work for you when you’re trying to build out your development team. Finding expert software developers doesn’t have to be hard when you visit FullScale.io. You can build a software team quickly and affordably. They are so efficient. I have heard so much feedback from their clients that they just love them. Use the Full Scale platform to define your technical needs and then see what available developers, testers, and leaders are ready to join your team. Visit FullScale.io to learn more, folks. We are here with Alyona Mysko, CEO of Fuelfinance, and we are talking about a lot of different stuff. We’re kind of hopping around a little bit. But I’m going to kick us back off with something I want to hear a little bit more about. That product development piece, like you, kind of talked about how you got there. But as you were getting all of this feedback because it sounds like you were looking for a lot of different feedback mechanisms from potential clients. What are the pain points which are awesome? That’s a great place to start, but like once you get to the actual definition. Did you put a team in place? Did you hire a bunch of people to help? What was that process like?

21:58.00

Alyona Mysko

Ah, that means a process about feedback here from customers.

22:00.64

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, how did you act on that feedback like building out your team of developers and ideating, you know, did you do Storyboards? Did you do wireframes? Like, what did that look like?

22:12.72

Alyona Mysko

Ah, ah, we have a very standardized way of building like our product. So we built all features based on customer feedback, and we have the same process as it was like previously. So – of all like we build very easily and VP for example, we decided that we should have additional features at our product. We simply built it like on Google spreadsheets we tested it on our customers. And we got feedback. We get feedback after that. So if it was useful or not useful, where it was okay for them, where it was not okay for them, and we have these financial success managers who all also like they are like part of this process. So they usually get this feedback, and we have these meetings where we analyze all this feedback from customers and all features that were tested, and after that, we simply analyze. Okay, how many of our customers have the same problem. Is this like part should be implemented to our product and if you decide that yes and is already this idea for example on Google spreadsheet, so we decided to have to make this part and implement this part already in our like financial system and make it like? Ah, in all our products for all customers. So it’s exactly like the process. How we built and tested all those ideas now, and I believe it’s like very um I think it’s a very efficient way. So we simply do. We don’t like work and features which are not um, which are not so useful for our customers. So we based our like product map and built our product map based on our experience working with customers.

24:09.59

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, oh man, I Just love your approach. It’s so it’s driven by empathy, and yet it’s very systematic. That was fabulous. Now, Fuelfinance already has clients like customers who talk to us.

24:25.86

Alyona Mysko

Yeah.

24:29.17

Lauren Conaway

But your go-to-market strategy is once you have the product developed and you are ready to deploy. What did that look like?

24:36.38

Alyona Mysko

Oh yeah, like, um, we are a little bit crazy about that. So um, I think like during the previous year I was the one person who’s responsible for sales and marketing and like it was a little bit crazy. And now we have already hired our head of marketing. But um, yeah, go-to-market so with us many ideas. So, first of all, I have a financial background, and I was also a mentor at different accelerators. Um. Financial mentor and we tested ideas to go to market with different financial workshops, and it was based also on my own passion for sharing my experience and knowledge about finance, and we made like online workshops. We still do these online workshops, and they simply share, like my experience how to manage finance in startups, and I believe it’s a good strategy when you talk about go-to markets and especially a good strategy to share like the content. Ah, especially in finance, where everything is so complicated. So when really ah when really founders can get very easy information and in a very fun way also and it can be like um. Not only about the go-to-market. So it’s all about sharing experience and knowledge. Ah, but also and in an additional way. It’s ah it can be like a lead like a source of fleets. Ah, but very efficient because it’s about building communication and about.

26:16.83

Lauren Conaway

You know.

26:25.15

Alyona Mysko

Building Um, commit Click Communication Network and simply like sharing this experience and I believe in that way of the building the market.

26:34.66

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, I mean, clearly, you’ve just put so much thought and research behind every step along the trail now. We have already talked about the challenges of trying to operate a business during a war. Ah, and so I’m not going to ask about that. But I’m gonna ask you? What are some of the greatest challenges that you’ve come up against? You know you seem to be pretty methodical and how you approach things. Ah, so and that’s great, but like what does.

27:01.95

Alyona Mysko

Um, yeah. Now.

27:10.32

Lauren Conaway

What were those challenges?

27:12.97

Alyona Mysko

Oh, I think like ah it’s already our first crisis and Fuelfinance and because the first one was the COVID.

27:21.00

Lauren Conaway

Sure.

27:30.52

Alyona Mysko

We were profitable all the time, and we did a foundry, so it was always a challenge when you get like some crisis and especially for example like it was when the worst started so we had – of our customers. They were like Ukrainian companies before the war. Now we have a completely different situation, so we have much like 60% of all customers from the yes, but it was crazy because so when the war started, these Ukrainian customers were simply posted to their subscription and. It was like very short periods of time to understand how to manage everything, so base salaries and simply like cover with our current revenue which is already – times decrease. Covering with this revenue our expenses, salaries and still growing so with much fewer budgets and it was really a crazy challenge, I think and. Ladia, I believe it was the second time. So the first one was something similar, I believe, during the covid, and now it’s like we already have higher revenues than it was before the war. So and. Ah, it’s crazy, and so we understand how to grow like 3 times faster than it was before the war with fewer budgets, so it was like a very interesting challenge and experience for me, and I think very valuable.

29:07.53

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, well, and I mean, I think that overcoming adversity, and you’ve certainly had to overcome more than most and more than is fair or right, and I’m so sorry. But um, one of the things about overcoming adversity is that it makes you.

29:09.23

Alyona Mysko

Fear ends.

29:27.20

Lauren Conaway

More flexible, and it makes you more tolerant to risk, and it makes you either all of these things that an entrepreneur just truly needs to be and should be, and so you know you’re getting quite a workout there too much, I would say but tell us about you.

29:43.39

Alyona Mysko

Yeah.

29:46.48

Lauren Conaway

As an entrepreneur, I’m just really interested. Have you always been so direct and purposeful?

29:54.46

Alyona Mysko

Um, I think yes.

30:01.30

Lauren Conaway

That’s like an embarrassing question. We can get it. We can move off it real quick. I’ll just be like no, no, no, it’s fine. I didn’t mean to ask that. What I meant to say was, how do you feel about the color blue? You know we could do something like that. Ah, but I’m just really interested. Like where I mean, were you always an entrepreneurial kid like I know I imagine that you always said that you always loved math and you always loved, you know, data and things like that. So I know that, but what else did you like? What else did you get into when you were a kid?

30:30.93

Alyona Mysko

I think I was always trying to do something different, So I was always interested. As a kid, I always had many hobbies, so I played chat.

30:40.40

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, and they changed a bunch as they did. You weren’t like it wasn’t all of them all the time.

30:48.65

Alyona Mysko

I think like there were some periods were these hobbies and I remember like ah playing chess playing saxophone like ah draw wink ah pictures and special like ah. It’s very crazy, but I spent like 8 years drawing like we have this Ukrainian national um type of drawings. It’s named like Petra Rivka paintings, and it’s a very old type of um paintings and. And I really master that, and it’s really crazy, but I remember myself always like from two sides. On the one hand, I was a data-driven person, though always interested in mass chess on the other hand. Ah, I always had this.

31:45.85

Lauren Conaway

Like a creative side. Yeah.

31:46.83

Alyona Mysko

Some parts I don’t know, like yeah like the creative side about music drawings and everything like that. So yeah, I even tried myself, ah to be ah like some way playing in theaters. So.

32:02.33

Lauren Conaway

Oh, man. Well, I got to tell you that it is so interesting to me that you’re like, right? You’re ambi-brained. You’re right- and left-brained? That’s really cool because I am actually fascinated by people.

32:05.66

Alyona Mysko

Ah.

32:18.12

Lauren Conaway

Who can use both sides of their brains like that? In fact, I like that I have a book that I’m going to write someday. It’s in my head. It’s called polymath, and it’s people like you who can get really, really into very different divergent disciplines. You know so like over here you’re doing.

32:23.91

Alyona Mysko

Oh.

32:36.24

Lauren Conaway

Music is connected to math, and you’re really good at math. But then you’re also really good at art, and people like that fascinate me. That is super cool. I love that. So you’re a polymath ah, congratulations.

32:46.15

Alyona Mysko

Um, yeah, it’s very interesting. Finally, I know that? Ah.

32:55.74

Lauren Conaway

And yeah, I may ah bug you for an interview at some point that’s super interesting. What ah what else? What else? Um, I’m just curious about what drives you to know.

32:58.88

Alyona Mysko

Um, yeah.

33:07.21

Alyona Mysko

Oh, I like swimming,so I was a cross-continental swimmer in buzz four so it’s like swimming six kilometers and I’m still swimming several times per week and.

33:15.91

Lauren Conaway

Yeah.

33:26.39

Alyona Mysko

Also like swimming and open water, and I’m also a fan of Thai Box boxing, so I think I had so many hopes from different ways, but it’s very cool because ah.

33:33.25

Lauren Conaway

Yeah.

33:43.89

Alyona Mysko

I like to open myself up to having different hobbies. It’s like ah you need like in some periods of time I don’t know some superpower and ah from each of these Hobbies. So I can take exactly that superpower that they need now. And so I also love skating and ah and also like surfing. So I like that I can have different periods of time, so I can like to use that Hob as attained now.

34:18.90

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, that is super cool. I am fascinated by this, so there are a bunch of studies out there that, at least here in the states, that people who were athletes. They tend to become business leaders much more frequently than any other demographic subs group. So like people who get accustomed to taking part in team sports. You know, you learn teamwork and collaboration, you learn how to fail and how to lose and how to, you know, get experimental. And work well within a team and so like that’s always been fascinating to me and so like here you are. You’re clearly very into an active lifestyle, and then it’s like, oh yeah, that it tracks that she is also a founder and CEO and a total data cheerleader. You’re a data geek a little bit. You know that, right.

35:07.76

Alyona Mysko

Um, yeah, yeah, I’m really talking.

35:08.67

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, yeah, you’re a data geek, and that’s it. Yeah, that is like that’s something to wear with pride.

35:15.85

Alyona Mysko

Yeah, yeah, but for sure, I have even, as you know, I have even planned a week calculated in hours and in tasks. So I have like my specific Google sheet for that, and I really made this analysis.

35:27.85

Lauren Conaway

Time.

35:34.32

Alyona Mysko

At the end of the week, I like planned hours and actual hours spent on different tasks, and I even sometimes like to build graphs to understand where I spend my time more. So what is the dynamic? So I think I will try, but it’s very efficient. It’s very cool, I believe that.

35:43.81

Lauren Conaway

Yeah.

35:54.27

Alyona Mysko

Ah, like from this data. Um, data-based analysis and also from a financial site I used many different features simply in very basic life and was a very I don’t know was everyday life experience so like planning, of tasks and hours and simply like that and so, especially with personal finance.

36:18.67

Lauren Conaway

Well all right? So we’ve gotten some insight into your mind, and I’m gonna ask for a little bit more insight into your mind because we have come upon our time for the human question. So I’m going to ask you a goofy question that has nothing to do with it.

36:33.91

Alyona Mysko

He.

36:36.61

Lauren Conaway

Anything that we’ve just talked about and the question is going to be, what’s your favorite dinosaur.

36:51.20

Alyona Mysko

Whoa! Oh my gosh, dinosaur. Ah, I ah.

36:55.42

Lauren Conaway

It could be like a specific dinosaur like the tyrannosaurus wrecks from Jurassic Park, or I’m trying to think of others or like the Flintstones dinosaur, the dinosaur that the dog did know I know.

37:03.91

Alyona Mysko

Oh, I remember. I remember the room? Yeah yeah, yeah, I remember yeah, like T-rex.

37:15.50

Lauren Conaway

There you go? Yeah, or it could just be like so, like, my favorite type of I, all right, I triceratops is my favorite. I love them triceratops the 3. They’ve got the 3 horns, and like the rock, I love them.

37:23.10

Alyona Mysko

Um, ah, what? What? What? Oh yeah, I Yeah remember.

37:32.33

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, if we actually have multiple triceratops statues and like paintings and pictures around our house because I love Yeah yeah, it’s part of our decor. But so how about you if it’s like, what’s your favorite dinosaur.

37:39.31

Alyona Mysko

Oh, seriously, I don’t know. I think that like from those films that I remember, maybe like I Really you know like I really, to be honest, I googled it now. So I believe.

38:00.70

Lauren Conaway

Okay, all right, all right? It’s okay. We’ll forgive it just this one time. But next time you and I chat and we’re going to have to have another chat, and next time you and I chat, I’m going to ask you, and you’re gonna be very confident. My favorite dinosaur is x.

38:07.88

Alyona Mysko

Oh yeah, but there. Um.

38:14.12

Alyona Mysko

Um.

38:18.81

Lauren Conaway

And you have to fill in the blank. So that’s my challenge to you, all right? Well, Alyona, thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us, ah sharing your favorite dinosaur. But most importantly, you’re hearing so authentically of all of your experiences. Thank you so much. Wish you luck.

38:19.60

Alyona Mysko

Um, yeah question.

38:29.87

Alyona Mysko

Um.

38:35.57

Alyona Mysko

Same and same.

38:38.15

Lauren Conaway

Yeah, thank you for being here. If there’s anything that I can do to help you out. Let me know, um, but lots of love is coming to you and to your fellow countrymen and women from this side of the globe, all right, friends speaking.

38:50.25

Alyona Mysko

Thank you.

38:57.27

Lauren Conaway

Episode sponsors because I know that we were speaking of them. Today’s episode sponsor is Full Scale. Do you need to hire software engineers, testers, or leaders? Full Scale can definitely help. They have people, and they have a whole platform that will help you build and manage a team of experts and take that off your plate. Visit FullScale.io, and all you need to do is answer a few questions. The platform will match you up with a fully vetted, highly experienced team of software engineers, testers, and leaders. They’re going to help you out. They specialize in building long-term teams at Full Scale that works only for you. To learn more when you visit FullScale.io. Friends, also want you to take a look at some of the Startup Hustle TV episodes we have up on our YouTube channel and up on our Facebook; in our Facebook chat group. We want to share Startup Hustle TV with you. You get to see Startup Hustle hosts like myself and some other rock stars kind of make fools of ourselves but also kind of kick ass. So, definitely check that out. We are so grateful, friends, that you come back to us week after week. Please keep on listening, subscribing, and sharing. We love telling entrepreneur stories to you, and you make it possible to keep on coming back. And we will catch you on the flip side.