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#106 Living Legacy w/ Ayoola Gbade-Bello
30 Plays24 days ago
Ayoola is a tech entrepreneur, creative strategist, and founder of KintraceAI—an AI-powered storytelling platform helping families preserve and pass down their legacies in deeply personal and culturally inclusive ways.
With over a decade in design, marketing, and digital transformation, Ayoola has led 200+ branding and innovation projects for global brands like Nike, Microsoft, and American Tower. Before KintraceAI, he founded Bedouin Group, a boutique innovation consultancy in Lagos, Nigeria.
Since moving to Canada in 2023, he has immersed himself in the country’s innovation ecosystem through programs at Communitech and Velocity, earning the MBET People’s Choice Award at the University of Waterloo.
A passionate community-builder and storyteller, Ayoola is driven by one belief: legacy is not what we leave behind, but what we pass forward—intentionally, and with care.
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Transcript
Introduction to Ayula Badebello
00:00:31
Find A Way Podcast
Hello everyone. This is episode 106, Living Legacy. And today our guest is Ayula Badebello. Ayula is a tech entrepreneur, creative strategy, and founder of Kintrace AI, an AI powered storytelling platform, helping families preserve and pass down their legacies in deeply personal and culturally inclusive ways.
00:00:52
Find A Way Podcast
With over a decade in design, marketing, and digital transformation, Ayula has led 200 plus branding and innovation projects for global brands like Nike, Microsoft and American Tower.
00:01:05
Find A Way Podcast
Before Kintrace AI, he founded Bedouin Group, a boutique innovation consultancy in Lagos, Nigeria. Since moving to Canada in 2023, he has immersed himself in the country's innovation ecosystem through programs at Communitech and Velocity, earning the AMBET People's Choice Award at the University of Waterloo.
00:01:24
Find A Way Podcast
A passionate community builder and storyteller, IULA is driven by one belief, legacy is not what we leave behind, but what we pass forward, intentionally and with care.
00:01:34
Find A Way Podcast
Welcome, Ayula. And I got to say, I got goosebumps from the last sentence. Welcome.
00:01:40
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Beatrice. It's a pleasure to be here. I'm excited, actually, to be here. I'm super excited. I just want to you know share my story, but also learn you know from you know you guys.
00:01:55
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
you know You guys have been doing really awesome on this podcast.
00:01:59
Find A Way Podcast
Thank you. Thank you. We appreciate so much you being here. We always say without our guests, we are nothing. So thank you for taking your time and investing this on us and what we are leaving against for for all our listeners.
Inspiration Behind Kintrace AI
00:02:11
Find A Way Podcast
So Ayula, before we start, can you share more about your business?
00:02:11
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
OK,
00:02:17
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um okay yeah, I mean, so the the the truth about it is I i want to believe you're talking about my current startup, which is Kintris AI.
00:02:29
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um my My passion for for building innovative solutions or platforms stems from my curiosity, basically. you know Curiosity led me into a design field.
00:02:46
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And if you know designers, it's always about finding solutions, right? And then the natural progression from there too was from finding a solution as a designer, I translated that into entrepreneurship because entrepreneurship too is essentially looking for solutions, right?
00:03:01
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
If you can figure out what is so a solution to problem, you, voila, you but you are already an entrepreneur. And especially when people start to pay you for it, right? So for me, um it goes deeper because for Kintrase, it was before now I'd always done, you know, maybe consulting businesses or even start-ups, this kind of startups I did were kind of service-based, you know, startups, the two startups I did before Kintrase.
00:03:28
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
But this one goes really right ah it goes really deep because it's it's super impactful. it's like It's almost like a mission-driven you know social cause, if you may, you know preserving legacies.
00:03:43
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And I didn't just stumble on it. I ah literally started this journey about eight years ago you know when I helped a family document story in book.
00:03:54
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
sorry in a book and And this particular family reached out subsequently to say, you know what, that book, we need to edit certain sections of it. And I was already super fascinated by the idea that I went to ask my father if we had a similar book.
00:04:11
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
you go And and my you know my father told me we didn't have a book, but we had ah story. And so I sat with him and I recorded 45 minutes of his own story.
00:04:22
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I did the same with my mom.
00:04:23
Find A Way Podcast
Thank you very much.
00:04:25
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And I set out on that journey to build that kind of book for my family, starting with my father's story. This essentially was where it started from, you know, that drive to want to preserve or leave them, pass down legacies from one generation to the next.
00:04:42
Find A Way Podcast
That is so powerful, Ayula. And when you were when I was preparing for this episode, um I got goosebumps along all the way. And um I briefly mentioned to you, um me and my siblings, we lately just started recording my, we're doing first with my dad and then we're doing it with my mom. We're meeting every week and getting like a full hour session and recording from age zero to seven. What you remember? is Seven to 14. So all of those things. And it's so valuable and valuable reading about Kentresa.ai, I'm just like, wow, this is what the world needs.
00:05:15
Find A Way Podcast
Because imagine being able to have access to that, you know, your story, your your journey, your families. And it's incredible.
00:05:23
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Yeah.
00:05:24
Find A Way Podcast
I'm i'm super excited to dive deep here.
00:05:24
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Thank you. Yep.
Personal Loss and Legacy Importance
00:05:27
Find A Way Podcast
well
00:05:27
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Yep.
00:05:29
Find A Way Podcast
um You've built brands for giants like Nike and Microsoft, but Kentrace AI was born from something deeply personal, as you've mentioned, the loss of your father. Can you take us back to that moment when you realized a simple recording could change the way we think about legacy forever?
00:05:46
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Yeah, um yeah you you you already connected the dots. When I started this journey for Keen Choice, I'll be very honest and um maybe slightly biased to say i wasn't even processing that my father was going to pass.
00:06:02
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
like I thought it would and thought it would be here with me while I was building you know this platform. The idea was just to go tell him or show him, oh, you know what? I've built this really beautiful stuff. like Look at it.
00:06:16
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
However, it was it didn't it wasn't actually a straight line. you know um somewhere When the idea or the inspiration to start, and I started taking my father's stories, putting it together, and my mom's,
00:06:30
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
and I started taking getting some more data, I then said to my, I figured this obviously exists, right? All I just need to do is look for the platform and plug this into, and then I have my book.
00:06:43
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And this was what that led me on that rabbit hole chase of looking for how to get this done. I found some platforms like Ancestry.com, right?
00:06:54
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um Which essentially helps you to build like a genealogy of your, family tree. And I thought, oh, beautiful. I just need to do what's, you know, I had always known about Ancestria, but um this was the first time I was using it or attempting to use it, you know, for this purpose. So I started putting my family story, poor putting my family name and all of this.
00:07:14
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And then, you know, the the feedback was, it was, you know, the it returned zero ah returns. Like there was nobody to connect with. and And it got me curious, like, OK, so does that mean this platform, as much as this the talent that they have got, like, what, several billions of records?
00:07:33
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
But then they didn't have anything for my family, so it shows that there's a gap somewhere. um So i I decided that the idea was for me to build a genealogy platform for people like myself, people of color, like Africans.
00:07:46
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
That was the original goal. That was the original mission. And this was where everything really started. you know um However, there was a question that I could not answer at the first instance, which was, where would you get the data from you know if you're going to deal this?
00:08:02
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um But I kept living in denial. I was very delusional, like, oh, no, no. i just I'll just do the same thing that Ancestry does, like pull records from public sources, and that's it.
00:08:16
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
But as I always say, it's easier for ah gar for you for for you to find a needle in a haystack than for you to find data in certain parts of the world.
00:08:28
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Interestingly, where i come from in Africa, you can't find such data. It's mostly oral. It's mostly people remember than having it stored somewhere. But again, I still felt, you know, we'll still do it somehow.
00:08:42
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And that was it. So i lived with that dilution for several years. you know At the time, I think we called it family genie or something. Family genie, the whole idea for that was like the genie in the bottle, where you send the genie on ah on on an errand to pull this thing together.
00:08:56
Find A Way Podcast
Yeah.
00:08:56
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
This was the vision, right? i didn't I didn't know anything about AI at this point in time. I just imagined that it was going to be like an assistant that I would send on an errand because I have no technical background.
00:09:07
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So I just thought, oh, yeah. so yeah Along the line, when the reality dawned on me that, no, you can't do this, it's not possible, I gave up. like I was like, you know what, I can't do this anymore. So I packed it up and that was it.
00:09:20
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Until I think 2022, when AI became mainstream, it was about that inflection point towards the end of 2022, that AI became mainstream.
00:09:27
Find A Way Podcast
Mm-hmm. What?
00:09:28
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I started to see the power of AI. And was like, okay, this technology can at least do 50% of the work, right? so I went back to it and, you know, rebranded it. I wanted ah wanted a name that was sexy, like like Facebook.
00:09:46
Find A Way Podcast
hu
00:09:46
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So King Tris, you know, so so you saw that you understand, you grasp it almost immediately. Once you hear, okay, it's King. So, you know, the family, Tris, we're tracing them. So merge that together. And I thought, oh yeah, this is a good universal, sounds universal enough, right?
00:10:00
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And then we started working on it. We were like, oh, you know, so many assumptions. We had three main assumptions. The whole assumption was, oh, you know, um this is going to be for older people.
00:10:10
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like the older people are going embrace it. The second one, like I said earlier, was we're building this for Africans. Then the third one was that we're building a genealogy platform. And this was everything I had until and moved to Canada in 2023.
00:10:23
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And I think the story changed somewhere way down the line.
00:10:24
Find A Way Podcast
No.
00:10:26
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
But to answer your question about, you know, my linking it back to my dad, it's it's it was the fact that November 10th of last year,
00:10:37
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
my dad then passed exactly a year after I left Nigeria to Canada. And so I recall that day very vividly. It was fine. It wasn't like it was, was he had already started taking it.
00:10:54
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
you know But we thought it would recover, like we were doing everything. But you know because I'm not there, I was trying my best to get resources across and you know sharing as much love as I could.
00:11:06
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And then very early morning, very midnight, you know my wife just burst into the room and you know she was screaming. was like, what's going on? Apparently my brothers had called her from the UK to say my dad had passed.
00:11:20
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So the the the thing for me was at that instant, right it it dawned on me that the only thing I have left of this man, I couldn't even say my goodbyes. right The only thing I have left of him is that memory, that voice recorded that I have of him of several years. I mean, imagine if I didn't have that. I'm not i'm not sure it's only legacy I have of him. And I think my my mission now, because I think somewhere around that time, the mission changed for me, became very personal.
00:11:53
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It became, okay, you know what?
00:11:53
Find A Way Podcast
Yeah. Yeah.
00:11:54
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I'm not just doing this for, the goal is not just to build some app, you know, or some, the goal now is to actually ensure we put something in people's hands that helps them connect the dots across board.
00:12:09
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
There's a whole lot of dots, but more than anything else, help you feel that sense of identity, you sense of purpose, which is connected back to your family.
00:12:20
Find A Way Podcast
No, so, so powerful. And I love your sentence that you said, you've said legacy is not what we leave behind, but what we pass forward intentionally, and with care.
00:12:32
Find A Way Podcast
How has your own definition of legacy evolved from your childhood to now, now as a father and a founder? I'd love to understand that too.
Family Stories and Identity
00:12:41
Find A Way Podcast
Yeah.
00:12:43
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Yeah, i mean, it's again, you know, I'm, I'm, sometimes you, I don't want to say I saw this coming.
00:12:53
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like, literally, it's not like I sat in one corner and thought, oh, I'm going to build Pinterest, right? If anything, I thought my first business was going to be it for me, like the one I started, you know, was a consulting business.
00:13:05
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I thought that was going to be it, you know. nothing else. But from there, you know, startups emerged from there. um Most of them failed, two of them failed, you know, and Kintrase came along.
00:13:18
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And for Kintrase, it's super personal. it super It's very deep, you know? um And that's one of the reasons why I'm putting i'm putting so much into trying to make sure, like, we move in the best way, organically, with the best move forward.
00:13:34
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It's not about... some vanity metrics metrics here for me, but the fact that I'm doing this intentionally, right?
00:13:46
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
as
00:13:46
Find A Way Podcast
There's a purpose behind it, right?
00:13:47
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Absolutely, absolutely. um As you rightly mentioned, i um I've been blessed. I have two boys now, I have two kids. I got married, my wife and I will be celebrating our seventh year anniversary in December, actually, right?
00:14:03
Find A Way Podcast
Wow. Yeah.
00:14:04
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um And i recall when we got married seven years ago, we intentionally waited like two years before we started, you know, before we started a family.
00:14:16
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
The whole idea for that was I wanted to also connect to my wife. Like I wanted us to have ah our own bond before our kids arrive.
00:14:23
Find A Way Podcast
yeah
00:14:23
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And then yes, you know, my my first boy was born 2020, he's a COVID baby. he was born right. You know, in the because I remember the whole COVID period was all, you know, the lockdown.
00:14:36
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So there's a memory to that, you know, super, super interesting. When you think of the memories, you know, I kept, you know, and i in this age and time when there's so much, we're so lucky. I think this generation, and I believe it's god's just going to keep getting better, right? But our own generation is the one where we have tools to record some of these things, right?
00:14:56
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I look down now, you've got cloud, you got you've got, you you it's not enough that you're just taking pictures, you know, now you can also upload it to the cloud. So now you're like, so I've got this entire bank of my kids, you know, growing up, almost until until until this date, I still do it.
00:15:12
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like take pictures, take, you know, it's now what, it's going to be five in in in November. And then his brother is going to be three. Now, so for them, it's always been the same thing.
00:15:25
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
keeping those connections, keeping those memories. So we we deliberately built KinTrace to be very multimodal, right? So it takes four, it accepts four channels.
00:15:37
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It takes information from four channels. so so So images, video, text, and audio. Right. So if you think about it, this is essentially how we naturally, whichever one suits you, you would find yourself there.
00:15:54
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
You know, so in for my kids, more than I'm more than happy to actually upload some of these images of them, of theirs and some some of these videos to say, OK, this is exactly where you were.
00:16:04
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I look at my son today and I'm like, where's that baby I had like five years ago? He's growing so fast, you know, it's going super fast.
00:16:11
Find A Way Podcast
Oh, tell me about it.
00:16:12
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
yeah they They grow so fast and you're like, what happened to all the all the memories all the time? um And then sometimes when we're even watching the video together, like on the phone, it's like, that is that means that, you know, that was me when I was a baby. Daddy was, you know, all of this kind of stuff.
00:16:25
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So a platform like King Trace helps to connect everything, right, ultimately.
00:16:31
Find A Way Podcast
love that.
00:16:31
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And then the the beat where it now links back to the family is even the most powerful one because now it's not just you watching yourself. you sometimes you might even be able to watch yourself in reverse.
00:16:42
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like it's like it's the the reverse of your journey, because if I'm connecting his own story, layering it with my father's story, layering it with mine, his mom's, you know, the it's it's it's it's so much.
00:16:44
Find A Way Podcast
Yeah. be
00:16:55
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It's a lot. The average human being has so many notes to their stories, so many notes.
00:17:00
Find A Way Podcast
yeah
00:17:02
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And that the whole idea for us as Kintrace is now to bring all of those notes together to be able to identify connect on a very, very deep level.
00:17:12
Find A Way Podcast
No, I think honestly, Ayula, I got to say this is such a beautiful project you're working on, such a beautiful mission. I'm personally very moved and touched by it.
00:17:21
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Thank you.
00:17:23
Find A Way Podcast
And I just wish you like the best. And I wish the world can see what you're doing and can also utilize and and for themselves because,
00:17:27
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Thank you.
00:17:33
Find A Way Podcast
even in this experience that I've been going with my family, with my siblings and um my parents, it's so important when we go back in a few events and then we all get emotional remembering some things.
00:17:39
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
right
00:17:46
Find A Way Podcast
And then we're just like, oh my gosh, we did all of that. Look at all everything that we've, you know, everything he they've they've overcome for us. So it's, it it just gives us
00:17:54
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
yeah yeah
00:17:57
Find A Way Podcast
a power, some power and strength that it reminds us of the power and strength we carry within ourselves.
00:18:03
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
right yeah yeah i mean let me i'll give a a
00:18:04
Find A Way Podcast
And it's just so revigorating, you know, you going back into that and tapping into that force that you have in your family that's passed down to you. ah So it's, I'm, I'm very passionate about it.
00:18:18
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So that's like an analogy or actually a good example. An example is going to be very cheesy, right? The most cheesy example. If you're a fan of cartoons or animation, right?
00:18:28
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
if you One of the most powerful animation or cartoon that I have remember growing up watching was a Lion King, right?
00:18:29
Find A Way Podcast
yes. Yes.
00:18:38
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
The Lion King.
00:18:38
Find A Way Podcast
oh yeah
00:18:39
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um
00:18:40
Find A Way Podcast
yes
00:18:41
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Now, it was interesting because that it wasn't just you know how you tend to think that cartoons or animations are only for kids. But if you look at the story of Lion King, right it was that story of the guy that was lost or the the the big the the lion, Simba, got lost somewhere. it lost his sense of purpose at some point.
00:19:03
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Right. But the the the monkey, or you know, the baboon or something, found a way to redirect his mind or his lost focus by connecting him back to his past.
00:19:17
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like, you know, this is who you are. You you know, you remember not who you are, you know.
00:19:20
Find A Way Podcast
and Remember who you are. i get to know.
00:19:24
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
and So that's exactly what we hope King Trace would help some people find. You know, we know it will help people do a lot of things. Right. but The one I am most keen about is the one where connects, helps you understand who you are, who you really are.
00:19:41
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
If you find a moment in life when you feel lost, you know connect back to that and um remember who you are.
00:19:46
Find A Way Podcast
Yeah.
00:19:48
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
and um And I think we'll be fine. Great, great.
00:19:50
Find A Way Podcast
Oh my. Okay. I'm having so much fun, Ayula. I just got to say.
00:19:56
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
great
00:19:57
Find A Way Podcast
Now I want to hear a little bit about, I've been very fortunate to have experienced Nigeria, Lagos, precisely. My parents lived there for two years. um So I was lucky to have lived in Nigeria for a few months of my, um six months of my ah of my life. So three months each year.
00:20:14
Find A Way Podcast
And I want to hear about that. So moving from Nigeria to Canada in late 2023, You embedded yourself into Waterloo's top innovation programs almost immediately.
Challenges of Relocating to Canada
00:20:25
Find A Way Podcast
What was the mindset, the strategy, or even the emotional fuel that allowed you to integrate so quickly into a completely new ecosystem?
00:20:35
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Right. um And this is a very interesting question, but it's a super layered. um And I need to provide context to it because it wasn't like I just came and, you know, suddenly just found myself plugged into, you know, all of that.
00:20:43
Find A Way Podcast
OK.
00:20:49
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I've got my own sub story too, right? um as As you'd imagine, immigration, the the immigration itself, the entire experience, I mean, I'll speak for myself, you know, and most of everything I'm going to share anyway is going to be from my own experience anyway.
00:21:05
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um And meaning I'm not saying it applies to everyone. this is my own story, right? um The first thing to identify is like, it was like a massive reset button for me, like, and my family.
00:21:19
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like, it's super, like like, you literally push that button to say, you know what, stop. That type of stuff. That was the first thing that needed to happen. And this was because, you know, I'd been an entrepreneur for the longest period of my career.
00:21:31
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Up to that point, I was, what, maybe over over a decade in entrepreneurship. But I still couldn't feel, I didn't feel like I had a sense of, um fulfillment. I'd done a number of stuff.
00:21:43
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I felt like I was purposeful, right? I could show you my projects. if I could show you my portfolio, super rich, super, you know, but I didn't find fulfillment, right? um That was me.
00:21:54
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
My wife, too, has her own story. like Like, literally, you know, our one was is also layered. Then our kids, you know, especially the first one at the time, because the the youngest one was barely one when we even, you know, came here.
00:22:07
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um he also has his own right like we wanted him to grow up in an environment where you know he's able to be so his voice is heard and all of that like so so everything combined is what led us to that journey like okay you know what let's make this move and now to make that move means you're going to strip away everything you previously knew you're literally everything goes away you know at least that's the case for me everything literally went away the businesses i started networks are built the they my my own maybe whatever it is i had acquired up to that point i had to let go you know to be able to make up because you you know you you have to start life afresh and in a new kind environment thank god you talked about nigeria a beautiful country you know but you know you understand that there was a massive shift
00:22:58
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
difference in maybe the currency valuation and all of that. So he's like, oh, you're coming into a new country. So now the first thing we needed to work on was our mindset. Like you're coming into a new country, meaning you have to be super adaptable. Like nothing is going to be the way you know you plan it, right?
00:23:19
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
The first thing I said to my, however, you should have a plan. Have a plan, but understand that it's going to be fluid. It has to be a very fluid plan. you know so i mean i will tell you that what right in my own plan they the way it was supposed to be arranged was get a job first that was the first thing that was meant to happen for me based on my plan get a job and by a job i mean i was so ready to even work as an assistant whatever like i didn't want anyone to look at me from a lens of oh you're quote unquote maybe you're old
00:23:41
Find A Way Podcast
Okay.
00:23:52
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
older you've built a company you've not worked you know i don't don't look at me from that lens i'm i want to work as want to learn so i set myself like a 12 to 18 months path to learn to be in that to integrate into the system you know shadow someone you know get get hired maybe as a product manager i think i was i was looking mostly for pro manager manager roles right like assistant product manager whatever you want to call it just find me a job that gets me into the system that was the first plan Second plan was maybe after 18 months or 24 months, that's two years roughly, I can then start talking about, oh, maybe starting a consulting gig again.
00:24:29
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
you know By that time, hopefully I'll have understood certain things. Then the third thing I said was, OK, once I am in that phase, maybe I can now start revisiting school like because I'm someone that is always you know I seek for knowledge. I love knowledge, especially academic knowledge.
00:24:44
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
right So maybe I'll go back to school at that point, and then maybe, maybe, maybe it start up. I had kin trace in my briefcase all along, but I was not... um I was not confident with the version of Kintrase I had in my briefcase to declare it. So i I knew was something that i was going to come to, but I thought I would take some time, maybe like four years, three to four years before i come there. right So hopefully with that, it helps you understand that I didn't have any plan to integrate into any ecosystem.
00:25:14
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It was just a plan. Now, however, I did try. The only reason why I was then, okay, let me attend some community events or all of this is to meet people that maybe that could hire me, right?
00:25:27
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
As a product manager or something. So my friends were like, oh, it's happening here at Communitech. I saw what Waterloo, like they they the the presence of the Waterloo ecosystem now started to dawn on I didn't have this background knowledge before I left home. I knew about the University of Waterloo, but I didn't know how big or, you know, like how ubiquitous it could potentially be at that time.
00:25:51
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um And so that was it. So I, However, between November to maybe it's May, around May when I eventually applied to the University of Waterloo, note that the school was meant to be the last on my list.
00:26:09
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I didn't get a job. I was either being ghosted. I was mostly being ghosted anyway, like mostly. like Most of my applications, I didn't hear back from anyone. was struggling to find a job. was It was really, really a massive struggle. like I was wondering what's going on. You know, i thought with my experience, maybe I should get a job. I mean, 10, 12 years experience worth something.
00:26:09
Find A Way Podcast
Okay.
00:26:29
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
However, what I did, what I discounted was the fact that my 10 to 12 years was working for myself. I wasn't working for someone. So, you know, my resume was very most likely, maybe, I don't know, maybe it was intimidating.
00:26:39
Find A Way Podcast
No, Mike.
00:26:44
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I don't know what the word is. i just didn't find a job. And then add to the fact that we also arrived at the time when there was a lot of pressure on almost everything, from the job market to the housing market to so services to social services.
00:26:58
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
We arrived in the winter of that period. So it was tough.
00:27:03
Find A Way Podcast
no like
00:27:03
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And I'm not saying that with any, I'm not missing my words at all. was super tough. Then school. you know After if few you know you're strategizing, I decided to bring my last to the front. Like, OK, how about go to school?
00:27:19
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Then the issue of, oh, should you which school should you go to came up. We started reviewing what options. In fact, out of desperation, I was ready to go to any school. Literally, like, go to a college. In fact, I think someone told us, oh, you could just get OSAP grants and you just go to any school.
00:27:36
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Literally. That was what they told us. ah go to any school literally like just pick a school you get the grant the whole idea was get the grants to survive it wasn't about the school it was about getting the grants to survive so now this is where my wife my very beautiful wife actually now comes in because she then said if you must go to if you must collect some grant or something go to school then you should go to the best school like literally that was it's as like
00:27:45
Find A Way Podcast
Mm-hmm.
00:28:05
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And was like oh, really? And she said, yes, then apply for the best schools. And that was it. So we started applying. And I did like three, actually was just three, we narrowed it down to three, University of Waterloo was one of them.
00:28:16
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And yeah, that was it. I got into the university and I'll tell you what, again, another tension came up, which was at that time it were, what, maybe like over six months of our journey and we still hadn't found jobs because both of us were in that boat together.
00:28:32
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Our children were, um, at home as well with us because um but my first son wasn't qualified yet to go to school. The other one, we couldn't find a daycare for him. We're just on some long wait list.
00:28:43
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So we're at home. And the pressure changed to the moment we got I got accepted into the University of Waterloo. It was, why would we go to school when we can't pay our bills?
00:28:57
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It switched so to something theyre like, does it make sense to go to school can't pay bills? hey bill So I was like, OK, you know what? I'll just forfeit that and go find a job.
00:29:08
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So I was back again into job hunting, like just looking for jobs, looking for jobs.
00:29:10
Find A Way Podcast
my.
00:29:14
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
For two months, I started praying. i was like, what do I do? you know And everybody literally around me at that point told me, you can't survive in school without a job. You need a job first. Right?
00:29:26
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And I said, I'll pray about And I did pray about it. And I told my wife, you know what? I'm not convinced. I feel like I should still accept this offer. you know Most of my mates are my classmates at the time had accepted. I was the only one just waiting.
00:29:39
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
like I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. And then, lo and behold, I spoke to someone at this university to ask if there were other options for me. Would I find a job on the school campus? would i you know She didn't tell me anything that was life-changing.
00:29:55
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
But speaking to her kind of calmed me down a bit to understand that you know this is not a peculiar situation. like It happens all the time. But if you're willing to take the risk, or you know go for it.
00:30:09
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And that was it. So I went for it. And will tell you what, everything changed for me from that point in time. And this was what opened the doors of those ecosystem that you talk about now.
00:30:22
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Because I did try to connect with all of them before school they all mostly closed or shut their doors, you know, on me. But the moment I got into school, the story changed, you know, like I'm now in school i'm and I'm super invested. I'm super connected. They could see my passion.
00:30:36
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
They could see my energy. The doors literally flung their doors open to me, you know, literally. And so that's my story.
00:30:43
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
That's how it happened.
00:30:43
Find A Way Podcast
Wow.
00:30:44
Find A Way Podcast
Thank you for sharing that. um
00:30:46
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Yeah, sure.
00:30:47
Find A Way Podcast
That's incredible. and And I know I work a lot with newcomers and immigrants and and I'm personally one of them.
00:30:49
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Right.
00:30:53
Find A Way Podcast
So I know how we we reinvent ourselves in so many ways and we go through so many phases throughout this immigration journey that I i got to say, we're super powerful individuals just for going through that, right?
00:30:59
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Absolutely.
00:31:08
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Absolutely. Absolutely.
00:31:11
Find A Way Podcast
um Going back, I still have so many questions for you because I'm just, you know, so eager to learn more
Reflections on the Immigrant Experience
00:31:17
Find A Way Podcast
and more.
00:31:17
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
No worries.
00:31:18
Find A Way Podcast
but one thing that I want to ask you, when all is said and done, okay, what would you want your own great-grandchildren, who may never meet you in person, to know about Ayula Badebello, who Ayula Badebello was?
00:31:22
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Mm-hmm.
00:31:33
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um
00:31:36
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um i I don't know, wow, it's a very, I've never, it's such a deep question, but I i mean, not just even want my grandchildren, I want people that come after, like literally, like if they they connect with my story in whatever form, if they're able to find it, to just know that this was a guy that never gave up.
00:32:03
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like it was almost, it was always pushing us, always trying. um and And another thing I want lay on top of that is he was trying the right way.
00:32:16
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like not right not willing to seek to accept no, take no for an answer, but also not not going around cutting corners.
00:32:28
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like we're not cutting corners. we're doing this fights way the I don't know, um I don't want to sound moralistic, but I don't want anyone to look back and say, oh, oh I remember that dude, he found his way, but we know that that way wasn't you know a it wasn't a pure way, let's put it that way. you know So I want my my kids, the ones after them to know that there is there are ways you can succeed in life without that's that's that's the message i will really really love to pass it pass down them
00:33:05
Find A Way Podcast
I love that. Thank you. we We have this thing in the podcast, Ayula, that the previous guest leaves a question for the again next guest. The question that was left for you is, what is one thing you need to stop doing in order to be a better leader?
00:33:21
Find A Way Podcast
Is there anything that comes to your mind for that question?
00:33:26
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um yeah I mean, a few, but I think I'll just go for the one that is more of... I need to stop second-guessing myself.
00:33:36
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like, i
00:33:40
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
i I feel like I have been privileged to have a few gifts. One of them is that ah gift of, like, you know, God feeling.
00:33:52
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like, you've got this God feeling about something.
00:33:54
Find A Way Podcast
The intuition.
00:33:56
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Yeah, I like that. So, you know, so you have an intuition. um And I think most entrepreneurs have it. Like, it's what helps them, literally, because we don't know what the next thing is, but we're like, trying, and you know, so I just need to learn to stop.
00:34:12
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
You know, that other voice that is in my head that is telling me, no, don't, don't try it. You know, it's too risky. You that type of stuff. No, no, no, no. You need to find a way to shut down that voice.
00:34:24
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Of course, we more than anything else I've done, you know, I mean, it's why I'm here today, but I wish I could shut it down even more. Like, literally, I don't even want it to exist. I want to be able to say, okay, you know what, this is what want to and we'll go for it.
00:34:38
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
And then afterwards, even if it doesn't work out, I will say, okay, i learned so, so, so from it. So I would love to, the gift of not second-guessing myself would be the one.
00:34:44
Find A Way Podcast
hey
00:34:48
Find A Way Podcast
I love that. Thank you. um And if you could have dinner with any person alive or dead, who would that be?
00:34:55
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
ah whoa um Wow. That's a deep question.
00:35:03
Find A Way Podcast
Yeah, we're going deep today.
00:35:07
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Wow. If I could have dinner anyone, I'm going to be very, very sentimental and biased here and say I would love to have dinner again with my father.
00:35:21
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It's late now, and as I explained to you, I was not there in his last moments. And I still felt like he was still going to be, he was this larger than life human being. Like, you know, I still can't process it sometimes when I hear, when I know realize that he's passed, I would love to have Dina with my father again, you know, if possible in Canada, you know, like literally because the plan, the reach the plan, I was really looking forward to that moment when was okay, know what?
00:35:48
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Come join me over here. You know, I show him around and all of that. So I think it will be my father. this
00:35:56
Find A Way Podcast
thank you. Thank you for sharing that. um how do um Like knowing that I know that you have two boys and you are building a business um and building a business has a lot of urgencies and
Balancing Family and Business
00:36:10
Find A Way Podcast
all.
00:36:10
Find A Way Podcast
ah How do you balance this energy of ah the desire to be fully present in the moments that you one day want to preserve with your kids as well as growing the business?
00:36:22
Find A Way Podcast
How do you ah deal with the balance on your dayto day to day?
00:36:23
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Yeah. Yeah, I mean, remember that I said earlier that I think it starts from my wife in the sense that, you know, I think getting married to the right partner helps you, right?
00:36:37
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So the fact that, I mean, I don't know, think I was just lucky or fortunate, I don't know what it is, but I got married to this woman that makes me want to be present and available, right?
00:36:50
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So we've been doing literally everything together, like, you know, filling the holes, whatever it is we could do, I could do it for her, she does, but you know, all of that before the kids even even arrive. And the kids arrive and the routine just continued.
00:37:02
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
You know, we we love to be around each other, like this family.
00:37:02
Find A Way Podcast
Thank you.
00:37:06
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um And isn't it interesting then that I'm actually building a platform for families, like connecting. So for me, it doesn't even feel like work. It feels like an extension of myself.
00:37:18
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It feels like So if I'm hearing in anything family-oriented, I'm like the first number one fan of anything family-oriented. Like, yes, you guys you guys will would would not understand the impact of what you're doing at this point in time, but just continue to do it.
00:37:36
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So being present for the kids, being present for my wife, connecting it back to work. It doesn't feel like work, except of course it's work in a way, right? um We have a schedule.
00:37:48
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Now, of course, we we now need to now be very methodic about how we do certain things. So, My wife and I have some, we have a joint shuttle, a calendar, for example, like, okay, this is what I'm doing. This is what I'm doing.
00:38:00
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
If I'm not available, you know what to do. So we look at each other. We look at that shuttle in the morning to see, okay, where is the class going to come from? Who's going to go pick the kids?
00:38:08
Find A Way Podcast
Yeah.
00:38:09
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Who's going to go to do this? So it feels like, yeah, it's an amazing, it's an amazing,
00:38:12
Find A Way Podcast
i know I know how that goes. And we don't have anyone. So it's also that journey of not having family around.
00:38:18
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
to
00:38:19
Find A Way Podcast
You have to juggle everything.
00:38:19
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Absolutely. So it's it's like like an extension of everything.
00:38:21
Find A Way Podcast
Yeah.
00:38:23
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
My work today feels like an extension of my life. you know even However, there are other things that I don't do anymore that I used to when I started entrepreneur.
00:38:27
Find A Way Podcast
That's it.
00:38:31
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Now, maybe with experience, I know to shut down. and know to not overextend myself. like Literally, like when i when I was a bachelor, would be like locked into work.
00:38:38
Find A Way Podcast
yeah
00:38:43
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
like I don't do that anymore because of my I need to also be mindful of my health. The work would can wait, you know? So if I need to schedule family time, I schedule family time.
00:38:54
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I need to work, I work, you know, as long as it's not high pressure. If it's high pressure, yes, we know we have to like sort it out, you know? Yeah, so that's it.
00:39:03
Find A Way Podcast
Ayula, if you could summarize in one sentence, what is success to you?
00:39:06
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Oh.
00:39:09
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
oh
00:39:12
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
There's a lot of things I could say with success, but I think it's even one word. It's not even a sentence for me. Oh, well, it becomes a sentence when I extend it because i success is peace of mind.
00:39:25
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
ah That's a success for me. like um And trust me, I've come a long way to know that that is exactly the definition of success.
00:39:30
Find A Way Podcast
like
00:39:35
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
If you are able to strip away everything that you're doing, if it's work, if it's family, whatever it is, and you don't have peace,
00:39:43
Find A Way Podcast
You don't have anything, right?
00:39:44
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I'm not sure that's successful, you know. So, but if you're able to have peace, you can sleep with your eyes closed, you can, you know, you're good. Then then then you're young you're well on your way to achieving a successful life.
00:39:52
Find A Way Podcast
Yeah.
00:39:58
Find A Way Podcast
Thank you.
Influential Reads for Entrepreneurs
00:40:00
Find A Way Podcast
We're going to move into some more rapid rapid fire questions. I'm going to give you two options and then you choose whatever is best for whatever lines best with you. Okay.
00:40:07
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
No worries. Yeah, sure.
00:40:09
Find A Way Podcast
um Spring or fall.
00:40:12
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Spring.
00:40:15
Find A Way Podcast
City life or countryside.
00:40:18
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Okay, now,
00:40:20
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
city life. Waterloo is city, right? Waterloo is an example of, oh yeah, so so it's city life for me, yes.
00:40:24
Find A Way Podcast
Sorry. Yeah, it's a city. Yeah.
00:40:28
Find A Way Podcast
um Not as big as Toronto though, but it's still city life.
00:40:31
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Yeah, yeah. Singing.
00:40:34
Find A Way Podcast
oh um Dancing or singing?
00:40:38
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um singing
00:40:41
Find A Way Podcast
Okay. And adventure sports or a relaxing spa day?
00:40:46
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Relaxing spoiler. Yeah, I think that's it for me.
00:40:49
Find A Way Podcast
That's good.
00:40:52
Find A Way Podcast
Ayula, can you, we, both Ingrid and I were like super bookworms. We love reading and we always collect recommendations from all of our guests. Is there any book that you like? It doesn't have to be business related. Any book that you'd like to recommend to our listeners?
00:41:08
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um
00:41:10
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I tend to read most of my stuff online these days. But I've forgotten the name of his book now, but it's one like it was one of those things that changed my trajectory.
00:41:25
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um this Is it founder, Blake Mycoskie, the founder of Tom's? He wrote a book. um I can't remember the name again. Okay, yeah, Start Something That Matters.
00:41:37
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
That's what it is.
00:41:37
Find A Way Podcast
Something that matters. Okay.
00:41:39
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Yeah, that's the one.
00:41:41
Find A Way Podcast
I'm going to write this down for them. Perfect. And before we close the episode, what would you like to leave as a question for our next guest?
00:41:53
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It's a simple one. It's because I'm assuming the person who was or is an immigrant. um So my question would be, if you had to do this over again, would you do it?
00:42:00
Find A Way Podcast
Yes.
00:42:07
Find A Way Podcast
Wow, that's powerful. Okay. yeah i will
00:42:10
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Like, would you do, would you take this, you were if you had to do this again, would you do it again?
00:42:16
Find A Way Podcast
Amazing. Leela, thank you. Thank you for telling your story. Thank you for your time. um Is there anything you'd like to add before we close the episode?
Parting Words and Encouragement
00:42:26
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um i I would just like to, first off, thank you, yourself and Ingrid for hosting me on the show, like having me, I didn't, again, like I said, I didn't have this on my bingo card. Like this is one of the things I i would do in under two years as an immigrant.
00:42:47
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
um But as I mentioned, and must be doing something right, you know, to be featured on um this show. you know, beautiful platform of yours. And so I'm really, really grateful.
00:42:58
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
I'm super grateful.
00:43:00
Find A Way Podcast
Thank you.
00:43:00
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Secondly is to pass the message down across to other immigrants, you know, at different stages of that journey um to say that we have to embrace that journey.
00:43:14
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
It is, it's crucial that we embrace it. Like, that's the first thing. And in embracing it, I think one of the things we have to do too is not to undersell the country that, you know, took us in.
00:43:30
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
So I think we have to find words, positive words to say about that country. Like literally. And somewhere, think everything is going to align because you can't speak negative about the country and expect the same country to to to work well for you.
00:43:37
Find A Way Podcast
Thank
00:43:46
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
You know, I think it helped me I know it's easy, maybe sounds very simplistic, but I'm just one of those people that I'm i'm an eternal optimist. And I'm always saying, just put you keep putting your best foot forward.
00:44:00
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Keep going. Keep going. Never stand still. That's like the message for them. Never stand still. as long as you're not standing still, you know the the universe will make a way for you
00:44:13
Find A Way Podcast
I agree in every single word with every single word. I'm also a eternal optimist. I always believe that there's always good in the experiences we go through.
00:44:23
Find A Way Podcast
And I'm always the half full type of, you know, half full cup type of person.
00:44:28
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
For
00:44:29
Find A Way Podcast
So and I think this makes the journey so much more enjoyable and worthwhile, you know, and as you we were were talking about in the beginning, like seeing every connection that we make as a gift and that there's always some good takeaways.
00:44:42
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
sure.
00:44:45
Find A Way Podcast
You're always going to learn something from that individual.
00:44:46
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
Same
00:44:47
Find A Way Podcast
And I take it as a gift as well. So and it was a true gift just meeting you.
00:44:52
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
here, actually.
00:44:53
Find A Way Podcast
i look forward to meeting you in person as well. a youla
00:44:57
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
same yeah
00:44:58
Find A Way Podcast
We will get to that. of You will arrange that for sure.
00:45:01
Ayoola Gbade-Bello
for sure.
00:45:02
Find A Way Podcast
And well, thank you. This was our episode 106, Living Legacy with Ayula Badebello. We'd like to thank all of our listeners. And we'd like to remind you that we will be posting one episode bi-weekly, always with a different guest.
00:45:15
Find A Way Podcast
So make sure to subscribe on your favorite streaming platform.