 And welcome to another edition of Business in Hawaii. I'm Daelyn Yanagita and we are broadcasting live from the Think Tech studios in downtown Honolulu. If you want to tune in live, we are at www.thinktechhawaii.com and you can sign up to get on our mailing list there as well. The theme of Business in Hawaii is to bring you stories of local businesses by local people and our guests share with us their journey to building successful businesses in a sometimes challenging environment. In the Think Tech studios today is Ricky Lee, Stuff Doer. Ricky, welcome to the show and thanks so much for joining me. No problem. Great seeing you. So on Business in Hawaii, we often talk to entrepreneurs, to business owners and I think one of the great things that you're going to bring to our show today is talking to the journey of being a W-2 employee, then being the entrepreneur, owning a business and how that all works out and when the right time to pivot is and what inspires that. Now one of the great things that you told me is, hey, I got into my initial career because that's what I thought I was going to do, but it didn't really work out that way all the time. Talk to me about Ricky and how you guys started and how that all happened. So my very first job in Hawaii, I lied to my boss. Oh, great. He asked me if I could build web pages and I couldn't, but I said I could and I went to Borders, bought a book and I learned that night. So my very first lesson was, it doesn't really matter what you know, it's that you can learn fast. So I've been just carrying that through my now 20 years in business, 20 plus years in business. Wow. Yeah. So I know that you're originally from Hong Kong. Yes. When did you decide to move to Hawaii? In the mid-90s, I just graduated high school, realized I couldn't get into any of the Hong Kong universities because I was too dumb and HPU took me in. So you started your career in Hawaii at HPU? Yes. What did you do? I was there for 13 years. Wow. I left there as the senior network engineer. I started as a student worker and I just worked my way up from there for 13 years. So it sounds like you planned on a career in IT, sounds like you potentially flourished in your IT career. After 13 years, what makes someone decide to leave? Just one day you wake up and it's like, do I want to die doing this? And I mean literally, I was sitting in the ER, hooked up to a machine when I got a troubleshooting call and the machine went off, the nurse comes in and says, that job is going to kill you. Literally. Literally. And that's when I decided this is probably not the place I want to literally die. So that forced you to pivot? Forced me to look at my life, yeah. Okay. So, but did you know you were an entrepreneur at that time? No. I just knew that I didn't want to keep doing this. But this was undefined at that point. It's just I did not like where I was at that point. So there are quite a few opinions right now on living life, mixing career with personal and doing everything, making choices that bring you joy. So you're sitting in an ER, you realize that you need to make a change. How do you decide what that is? Okay, my first, I did not, up until that point in my life, I had planned everything out. But at that moment I said, well, most of my plans failed. So why should I plan the next step? I just gave my resignation letter and said I'm leaving in six months with the only idea of the six months was I needed to build up savings before I said goodbye. So that was basically it. I didn't know what I was going to do after the six months. I just knew I couldn't be there anymore. Did you, did you think about what you wanted to do? What would be enjoyable? What would be, to be honest, at that point I was in survival mode. I just, I had empirical proof that I wasn't happy and I just needed to do something to not be unhappy anymore. So a lot of my guests say that they've had the entrepreneurial spirit all along, right, and that they knew they wanted to be entrepreneur. Did you know? Nope. No? Nope. Maybe the only thing that I could say was entrepreneurial, I can't even say the word. See, that's how much I don't have it. I can't even say the word. But when I left my, that 13-year job, I had all the intention of going into another IT full-time job. But as I was going through those interviews, I was like, no, this just doesn't fit. This isn't right. I need to figure out what is, what will work for me. And then I started running out on money that I saved up for six months. So I just did whatever was there at the end of six months. Okay, so you know that there are people who pay consultants to walk them through a career change to determine what it is, is their next step. So you're self-taught. You manage that process all on your own. So what did you end up doing? Well, after the whole, I didn't want to be an IT consultant anymore. I became a photographer. And then from there, I became Governor Abercrombie's full-time photographer. And then I started managing his social media. So if anybody was talking to Governor Abercrombie during the first two years of a demonstration, hi, you're probably talking to me. Wait, so did you, you're a self-taught photographer? Yes. Where do you, where do you learn that? YouTube. Yeah. I already have YouTube. There's, I don't know, YouTube books, mostly YouTube. Yeah. And so how did you learn your first gig? I told someone I was hungry and I needed money. And they were like, I'll give you a hundred bucks to do this. And I'm like, okay. And that's how it started? Yeah. So you started a freelance business in which photography was the, the mainstay of it? That's what brought in most of the money, but it was more of I would do anything. I mean, that's my catchphrase. Hi, I'll do stuff. So it was, I'll do anything within the realm of my abilities. If you wanted a network built, I would design one. I wouldn't do the work of actually giving you the, plugging in the cables, configuring stuff, but I would create the network and the specifications and the, what equipment you would need. Or if you wanted an audit of the existing computer systems, I would come in and do that. Photography, obviously I would come in, film video, I would do that. Need a guest writer for a little bit on your social media. I would do that. It was really just where there was money. I would go try and get it. That's amazing. So did you have a strategic plan to that? I mean, or was it just based on survival in me? It's based on survival. It looked, now when I look back, it looks like I had a plan. You know, that, that classic, you're the line of A to B. That's where you're supposed to be, but it's actually like this. That was me. It's like some, they were like three month stretches are like, okay, I'm down to my last hundred dollars. Okay, the phone's ringing. Don't answer the phone. Honestly, there was that level sometimes. Really? Yeah. Okay. So I think that maybe some people believe that they do want to be a freelancer. What does that mean? What exactly does that mean? Does that mean doing anything? For me, it means doing anything. For other people, it just means doing what they were doing before, but without the nine to five rules, without having the structure of having an office. One of my current coworkers, she, she started out in PR. She's still doing PR, but she's not doing it for a company anymore. She's, she's doing it for herself. Without the nine to five rules, she's happier because she gets to have kid time with her kids and make money. So when we started talking about ramping up this interview, you had mentioned, you need to talk about how not to freelance in Hawaii. Tell us about that. The funny thing with how not to freelance is it seems like that's how I became, how I keep getting to the next stage. Like people tell you when you quit your job, make sure you don't have any debt. Well, when I quit, I had 20 grand in debt, but that also motivated me to keep getting the next thing to pay that credit card bill so you don't get the calls. You know, keep doing something that you love because that you'll be happy. No, I hated that. After a while, I hated photography. So I had to quit doing photography while my brain reset enough that I could go back to it just being an artistic outlet versus I need to do this so that I can get money so I can pay the rent next month. So when you decided to start doing photography and then some other development type things, did you consider yourself an entrepreneur at that point? No, someone had to tell me that I was. So someone actually had to walk you through the steps of setting up a... No, that part, no, that I winged it. I was like that first year where I found out that I had to file something in June. See, I don't even know what it's called. Someone's like, you know, you have to file something in June, right? I'm like, really? Okay, I learned that in May. And so now, now with that experience under your belt, what would you say about freelancing? Would you encourage it? Oh, I always encourage it. That right, why? You never know who you truly are until you're facing that, what am I going to do? What am I going to do to keep being who I am? It's weird to say it that way, but it's... That's one way to think about it. Who are you? Right now, I'm Ricky Lee and I will do anything that's fun and interesting to me. Which might not be fun to other people, but I find it fun. I think that you found a niche. So I stalk you. But you review new products? Yep, I'm a gadget reviewer. I'm still doing photography, but not as work. That's just more artistic outlet. I do videography for people and I do videography for myself. I fly drones now and even that's a funny story, but I fly drones and I still write fiction once in a while, but it's... I haven't published anything. That's just for, I don't know, fun. Creative outlet. Well, I want to hear about the drone story. That's for sure. We are going to take a quick break. So we will be right back after that break. This is Business in Hawaii. Hey, loha. My name is Andrew Lanning. I'm the host of Security Matters Hawaii airing every Wednesday here on Think Tech Hawaii, live from the studios. I'll bring you guests. I'll bring you information about the things in security that matter to keeping you safe, your co-workers safe, your family safe, to keep our community safe. We want to teach you about those things in our industry that, you know, may be a little outside of your experience. So please join me because security matters. Aloha. Hi, I'm Rusty Komori, host of Beyond the Lines on Think Tech Hawaii. My show is based on my book, also titled Beyond the Lines, and it's about creating a superior culture of excellence, leadership, and finding greatness. I interview guests who are successful in business, sports, and life, which is sure to inspire you in finding your greatness. Join me every Monday as we go Beyond the Lines at 11 a.m. Aloha. Welcome back to Business in Hawaii. Today, we're talking to Stuffdure, Ricky Lee. Ricky likes so many in Hawaii, multi-tags himself into so many different roles to feed his entrepreneurial spirit. Ricky, you kind of enticed me with some drone story. Tell me about your drone story. So I have, I get bored easily, so I keep trying new hobbies. And a couple of years, three years ago, I started playing with drones. And I was one of those people uploading stuff to my camera. I didn't realize it was considered commercial, but I was uploading it to my photography site until one of my lawyer friend goes, you know, that's considered commercial, right? And I'm like, Sol, that's a 10 grand fine from the FAA per picture dude. It's like, wait, what? And I said, Sol, how do I get out of it? I said, go get a license. And the license was only 150 bucks. So I'm like, get the license done. Right, got the license. But that opened up another avenue, because now I'm a commercially licensed drone photographer. Wow, okay. So in your business, right? You're a photographer. You're a commercial drone photographer. You develop digital content. Yes. You're a product reviewer. Sure, I haven't made money on that yet, but sure, one day. It's super interesting. You buy all the stuff that people are thinking about buying. You tell us about it. So that's really interesting to me. So what's next for you? Well, the product reviewing stuff was the next. But I don't know. It's expensive. Yeah, right. You keep having to buy these products, right? Yeah. So I don't know. Right now, that's keeping me interested, but once I get bored, I don't know what's next. I wanted to talk about some of the highlights of your freelancing. And a lot of that is on your website. But we picked out some photographs that you took just so that we can get a flavor for all the different types of styles that you do have. And if we could talk quickly about some of them. So I understand that you're very familiar with capital. The shares seem to turn into every time someone needs something done at the capital. It's like, hey, Ricky's around. Yeah. So we had that one photo of Governor Ige, Senator Schatz. What are some of the other photos? You want to walk us through that? This photo was from when Jill Takuda was announcing her run for LG. And that was another one. I knew someone in her campaign. They needed some photos. I said, yeah, sure. I'll do it. Nice. This was from when Governor Amber Cromby's portrait was unveiled to him. That was the first time he actually saw his portrait. I mean, he stood for the picture. But the artist painted it. And this was the first time Gov actually saw it. This was when Esther Keaina was running for OHA. And we just walked around Chinatown taking pictures. Nice. I don't remember why I took that picture. Because that's about eight years ago. Sorry. So while Governor Amber Cromby was in office, you were primarily... Social media management and his photographer, videographer for the first two years. My guess is that you get to know a lot about a person when you're following them around like that, huh? Yeah. I mean, our days started at 8 a.m. and they didn't end until maybe 10 30 at night. Sometimes we didn't have weekends for three weeks in a row. So yeah. Wow. So you basically memorialized his days? Really much. Do you keep in touch with him? As much as I can. I mean, he's the governor. He was the governor. It's kind of... It's still a boss in a way, but he's also uncle in a way kind of thing. So I don't know. We have some other photos of some other places that you've been. This was one of the Pearl Harbor anniversary things, but this person, I believe, is no longer with us. Yeah. That's a nice photo. This one... It's one of the change of commands at Pearl Harbor. I don't remember what year. And this was from Senator Inouye's funeral. And that's my nephew in the Philippines pumping water. Beautiful picture. I'm keeping it in the role so when my nieces go, it's too hard to do something. I'm like, look what your cousin has to do. Okay. So you freelanced. You followed politicians around. You were the photographer, the social media manager. But I know that right now you are with AdStreams and with Becker Communications as a content developer. Content creator, developer, yeah. So when do you know to pivot, right? So when we were talking initially, it's about the pivot. When do I know? When am I supposed to know that's going to happen? That it's time to go and be an employee again. Are you walking away from your creative desires? What brings you joy? Someone told me there's no shame in going back to a full-time career. Well, not full-time career. There's no shame in going back to the paycheck because the paycheck enables you to do the fun stuff. And what defines when you should pivot for me was when I started hating doing what I was doing again. I was like, okay, I need to go do something else that my brain reset and then come back to this. Maybe come back, maybe not. I know that there are quite a few folks, myself included, wanting to know your advice on, hey, how to get out there and maybe do something independent and then also being able to recognize when you failed. Oh, it's easy to tell when you failed. Isn't it? I mean, don't you just know that something isn't working anymore? Sometimes denial takes control, right? In that case, you need a friend who will act as your older brother, older sibling to go, hey, stop. Yeah, I kind of had that. I think a lot of folks have a fear, right? I want to go out on my own. I want to have my own business. But they can't overcome the fear. How would you advise, share experiences about overcoming the fear and jumping in and going for it? Overcoming fear, I've never really done that. Not that I'm fearless. It's just I'm scared of everything, but because I'm scared of everything, I'll just do it. So because you're scared of everything, you're scared of nothing, basically, because you just have to face it head on. You just have to do it, yeah. You're also a self-taught entrepreneur. So for someone without an entrepreneurial background, or a coach, or a mentor, what's your advice on getting started in that? Do the Nike thing. Just do it. I really, we had a mutual friend, Brian, who had this phrase of get off the pot or do something. Yeah, in those sorts of words. In those sorts of words. And I took that to heart every single time I've had to make a decision, like, why am I waffling? Just do something. Yeah. But what about the financial risk? What about the legal advisory side? What about all of those things that are going to keep me up at night? Unless you're doing something truly illegal, there's nothing on the legal side that will get you. I mean, unless it's short of selling drugs, everything else is just a fine order, or you can work it out. That's one thing I never really understood with people. Why are they so scared? It's like, everything has a way to be worked out. There's nothing that will permanently destroy your career, destroy you. Or there's very little things that can do that. But just try it. And if it doesn't work, go back and flip burgers or something for two months and get some savings back. So is this your path? You're going to do what you love in your freelance business. And then when you need to, go ahead and tap a job for a paycheck. Yeah, it's worked out so far, so yeah. Is it a way of life for everyone? No, it is not. I think I can only get away with this because I don't have a family. I don't have children. I don't have a wife. It's just me that has to worry about stuff. Do you see your freelance business growing into something much bigger? Or is there a size at which you say, hey, this is my sweet spot. This is where I stay. I don't see it growing, but not because it won't grow. It's just that for me I've had to... Oh, that's one thing. I've had to redefine what is success to myself. Because everybody thinks that you want to get into a C position, a CEO or something like that. That's not what I want. I want to keep having fun. I want to keep doing stuff that's interesting to me. That's what I define as success. If I'm not having fun anymore, I've failed. Some people think that success is by how much money you make. Sure. I don't think that's a good way to live your life, which is weird coming from a person from Hong Kong. But sure, if that makes you happy, but there will be some years you'll make 120 grand, and other years you'll make 30. So how do you adjust? What happens in those years? You do everything you can to pay your current bill. You look to the end of the month and you survive that month. Yeah. We're almost out of time, but I wanted to give our viewers an opportunity for Ricky Lee to tell them about all the stuff that he will do for them and how to find you. Well, you can find me on most social media platforms as RickyLee99, R-I-C-K-Y-L-I-N-N-I-N. You can email me at ricky at rickylee.net. What I can do for you? Well, I'll tell you if your idea is dumb. That's awesome. Ricky, I have truly appreciated the interview. There's a side of entrepreneurship that we sometimes don't talk about on this show, and that's a side of, you know, sometimes there's a struggle and sometimes you make it work because it makes you happy. And I really appreciate you sharing that side of the story with us. So thanks again for joining us. Unfortunately, we are out of time. I want to thank Ricky for joining us today and a big thank you to the amazing production staff here in the ThinkTech studios. If you would like to be a guest on our show, please feel free to email your information to shows at thinktechhawaii.com. Business in Hawaii airs every Thursday at 2 p.m., and we look forward to seeing you here next week.