Importance of Cash Flow Management for Small and Medium Sized Businesses with Nick Chandi of ForwardAI | Soar Payments LLC
Nick Chandi of ForwardAI; Cash Flow Management

Importance of Cash Flow Management for Small and Medium Sized Businesses with Nick Chandi of ForwardAI

Today we’re joined by Nick Chandi, CEO and Co-founder of ForwardAI, as we explore the reasons behind early startup failures, focusing on the mistake of poor cash flow management.  He also discusses the potential of real-time payments and shares his thoughts on upcoming trends. If you’re an entrepreneur or a business owner, you don’t want to miss this captivating conversation with Nick. 

Payments & Fintech Insights In This Episode

  • Nick’s long experience with real-time payments 
  • The solutions ForwardAI offers
  • The importance of data and analytics for businesses 
  • Nick gives insights on AI and ForwardAI
  • FedNow coming around the corner and its impact on ForwardAI
  • Preventing Fraud when it comes to RTP
  • Nick advises business owners 
  • And so much more!

Today’s Guest

Nick Chandi : ForwardAI

ForwardAI is officially Service Organizational Control (SOC) 2 type II compliant for their partners’ peace of mind, but their security-first principles go beyond compliance standards. From rigorous employee training to strict protocols, they are constantly testing and improving their security measures to achieve best-in-class security, so you can work confidently with them.During the pandemic, it became clear how complicated the small business loan application process was. For some SMBs, it took months to secure financing. These delays were confusing – and with ForwardAI founders’ knowledge of accounting data, it seemed strange that lenders weren’t using technology to connect directly to the information they needed. Determined to make a difference, ForwardAI was created to bridge the technology gap for financial institutions, lenders, and other fintechs.

Featured on the Show

About PayPod

PayPod is the leading voice in the payments and fintech industry, covering payments, risk management and new technology. Host Jacob Hollabaugh interviews leaders who are shaping the payments and fintech world, as they discuss the latest developments in the payments and fintech industry.

Episode Transcript

Jacob: Welcome to PayPod, the Payments Industry podcast. Each week, we’ll bring you in-depth conversations with leaders who are shaping the payments and fintech world from payment processing to risk management and from new technology to entirely new payment types. If you want to know what’s happening in the world of fintech and payments, you’re in the right place. Hello, everyone. Welcome to PayPod. I’m your host, Jacob Hollabaugh. And today on the show we are diving into cashflow management for small businesses and how banks, lenders and the broader fintech world can better support their SMB partners and how we can all help make money move faster. And as a small business owner myself, I can definitely say I’m excited to get into this one. As the idea of having immediate access to funds, the moment they are paid would be a real breath of fresh air and help streamline things in so many ways for me and many others. Joining me to explore this topic is Nick Chandi, co-founder and CEO of Forward AI and member of the Forbes Finance Council. Nick and his partners have spent years building companies that help small businesses get paid faster and is the perfect person to explore these topics with. Nick, welcome to the show. Thanks so much for being here.

Nick: Thanks for having me. Jacob Absolutely.

Jacob: Pleasure is all mine. Before we dive into forward AI, your current company and everything within the industry, it is touching. Could you give us a bit of background on yourself and your career? I found it pretty interesting looking through your work history to see what appears on paper to have been a bit of a natural transition from the world of IT to bringing IT in tech mindset to the financial world and specifically accounting. Could you fill us in on how that transition took place and a bit of what you’ve done work wise prior to forward?

Nick: Sure. So I have a very interesting profile. I spent the last 20 years working with accountants and bookkeepers, and we built a very successful company in Canada that we sold in 2019, and we were providing services to these accountants and bookkeepers and I also built another software called Slick by Online Accounting Solution that were used by more than 40,000 small businesses at that time. We had a successful exit in in 2019 and we were looking forward to do something new in our life. And what happened this then? This pandemic hit. And at that time I got an opportunity to work with hundreds of small businesses and trying to help them get those P2P loans checkup. You know, most small businesses, whether you are a contractor or a Shopify merchant loans, P2P they were not enough for you for most of the people they were. But sometimes you need extra help to get you through the difficult time. And we try to help those businesses as well. And we found they were in a very difficult situation because if I’m a contractor and I need to take on a job and I need to buy some raw material and inventory like 50 K, I need that money in my bank account. But if I don’t have it, my only option will be talking to my bank.

Nick: But the fact is, most banks approve only around 15-20% of the small businesses who apply for a loan with them. So this was happening. And what we saw that no bank was willing to help these small businesses because they were still looking at the old data. You know, they were asking for the business projections for the next three years. And that, in my view, is the most meaningful thing to ask to a small business. And they are asking for P&L balance sheet those kind of data. And they we know these small businesses, 74% of them, they don’t have any kind of formal education. They have never studied accounting. They can barely read these kind of statements. But that’s the way bank worked at that time. So we saw an opportunity because we saw there were some fintechs and they were able to connect to accounting systems and banking systems and other platforms. And we saw there is a huge opportunity in the market to connect these banks or lenders or other fintechs with that data source of those accounting systems. So forward is a is a technology company that that connects to the accounting system. So ERP platforms that are being used by small businesses, we we connect to all major accounting systems like QuickBooks, Xero, FreshBooks.

Nick: We can pull data, we can push data. So it’s a kind of bidirectional data flow from these business systems, accounting systems that I call the main operating system of a business. We take that data, we open our API to the banks or lenders or fintech for even small businesses who need to use that data. We we take that data we provide so that in case a lender want to see their customers or their are that kind of data, that cash flow. We also provide cash flow forecasting as an API. We also provided a kind of platform and as a cash flow management platform where small businesses can see how is their business performing, who are the good customers, bad customers and how much is their accounts receivable payable? And now we also have a kind of solutions built on the new payment IKP platform that that’s available in the domestic market and that can help. Businesses get paid in the real time. And that’s the way we are solving the problem for the small businesses community as well. So that’s how I got connected from the accounting world to the solving the financial problems of small businesses.

Jacob: Wonderful. And yeah, there’s a bunch of follow ups there. You started hitting on a bunch of topics. We’ll get to here. One other thing, though, I love after the successful exit that you and thankfully there’s a lot of people looking during this time of the pandemic that did expose a lot of gaps in the market and areas of where help could be provided. And you found one and are able to provide that. I do wonder the partners you have with Ford, were they the same partners that you had with the previous company or working with new folks?

Nick: In the previous company, we were selling exclusively to accountants, accounting firms or bookkeepers in the new company for our new product Forwardly is still targeting those that market, but we are also providing our solution as an API. In case you know, other bigger market. They need to look at the data of these small businesses. They have an opportunity to solve problems for that small businesses. So our partner on that side is mostly with what we see, the lending company, invoice financing company, cash flow forecasting platforms, those kind of companies, they are they’re using that data to build their solutions to solve cash flow problems for these small businesses.

Jacob: Certainly. And the focus here is obviously, as you’ve referenced a few times, cash flow. And you touched on a little bit before, but I’m wondering if you could expand on why is cash flow in particular such an important part of the SMBs? What does increasing that pace of the cash conversion cycle unlock for that small business?

Nick: Yes, cash flow is such an important topic for me because many decades ago when I was at school, my first business failed because we failed to collect from our customers. Most of our customers paid that time. But you know, but some of the customers didn’t pay that time. And that business folded very quickly. And I was a student at that time, very young person, and didn’t know how to manage my business, how to manage my cash flow. We learned the lesson and we built a very successful business from which we had an exit. And the thing is, we know that 82% of businesses, they fail because of cash flow problems and many of these businesses were profitable, but they didn’t have the cash when they needed it. They couldn’t convert their inventory into cash. They have poor cash conversion cycles. And maybe the reason is, you know, they couldn’t manage it. And they were. The fact is, you know, most of the small businesses, they are making their decisions based on the intuition and gut feeling instead of looking at the data or insights or analytics. So we believe there is a need in the market for businesses where they can look at the cash flow. They can proactively monitor it so that they can take steps. So the steps could be anything. Let’s say there’s an outstanding invoice. You can pick up a phone and call the customer, Hey Nick, can you pay me tomorrow or next week? I need to do payroll and I’m going to give you 1 or 2% discount or other way. You know, there are some repeat offenders. Maybe you can penalize those kind of customers with a 1 or 2% penalties.

Nick: Maybe you can apply for a loan with the bank or a whole day. Bill, that’s not critical for for a week or two so that you can get through the difficult time. But businesses can do only if they can see the data or so that they can make their decisions based on on the real time data. So that’s our solution. And it’s very close to my heart. The truth is, most businesses, they don’t even understand the difference between cash flow and profit. They think, Oh, they made a sale and that’s revenue is coming up. But if you look at any income statement, revenue is just a top line number on that one. It’s it’s not the most meaningful thing. It doesn’t tell you how profitable you are. But even if you are profitable at the time of tax filing or at any given time, it doesn’t mean that you have money in the bank to do the payroll or pay rent or buy inventory at a discount. Or there is a you need to add ten new tables for the upcoming summer time. Do you have cash to do that one? And that’s why it’s very important for small businesses to monitor their cash on day to day, weekly basis and monitor it proactively. Even if you are not using a app like ours, you should do an Excel sheet. You know, it’s not the best thing to do, but there should be a way to do it, you know? So that’s that’s where we are coming from. And I believe monitoring and taking proactive action is very important. To small businesses. Cash is the lifeblood for any business. It’s the oxygen that keeps a business going.

Jacob: Totally agree. And it’s definitely with the small business too. I could see it myself included in this. As a small business owner, it’s way more common for on the small or medium sized business side of someone who just says, I have a skill or an idea for a product and I know I can do the work well, whatever it is I’m selling, I know I can provide it and provide it well. But then that leap from just because you can do that doesn’t mean you can run the business successfully. There takes a lot more planning and not just intuition of I can do this thing well, I’ll do it for X amount of people and make X amount of money and it’ll be good. But giving them the tools to help them figure out those next steps of the proper planning of the proper data to work off of is pretty cool. Within your precise offering, you’ve got the add on called forwardly white labeled cash flow forecasting tool. A couple questions related to that. First one, without of course, giving away, you know, the secret sauce, if you will, Could you tell us a bit about how AI and machine learning are aiding this tool to be able to forecast that cash flow, what type of data you’re gathering to make those predictions of cash flow for the next few years?

Nick: Sure. Yeah. As you know, this is a time for the AI and, you know, I’m sure everyone is aware of Chatgpt now and we are concerned about what’s going to come up after GPT four when.

Jacob: It comes up. Every podcast episode is a topic that no matter who we’re talking with, it is going to likely come up.

Nick: That’s right. And what we in our cash flow forecasting solution, we took a very interesting approach how the forecasting needs to be done. You know, traditionally forecasting was done based on the financial statement with accountants. They look at your P&L balance sheet and they create, you know, some kind of statement for you. But now because we have the technology that can connect to accounting systems, core accounting systems that were not available before through API, they were not open data was completely locked that time. And now we have the technology. So what our technology does is we look at the very detailed data of those customers and suppliers and payments and when is the due date and whether the payment was being made on the due date or not, or whether it was five days late. So we look at those kind of data sets and we built our models based on that information. And it’s a unique source. It’s a proprietary technology because as you know, small businesses are very different. So they don’t have millions of records. You know, small businesses may have maybe a dozen or a few dozen hundreds of transactions. That’s it. And building a forecasting models based on that one is very different than building on a huge amount of data that the CHATGPT or other platforms have been able to build. But our forecasting is very accurate. It meets the need of the market that we serve as mostly SMBs, small to mid-sized businesses. It’s a very robust platform and it’s able to predict how much cash you will have in your bank account tomorrow or next week. We can go up to six months or even longer term, too. But as you know, with any forecasting as you go longer, you know, the forecasting is not that accurate. You know, we have been doing the forecasting for weather for so many years now and it’s still not perfect, Right. So that’s the way it is.

Jacob: And on the accuracy front, is there key inputs or maybe a key length of time you need data for that’s going to, you know, the key metrics that are going to increase how accurate it is? Is it weather, how long they’ve been in business, number of transactions? Are there any things when you look at a new user coming on that you can say like, hey, this is going to be with X amount accuracy, We can say this versus with this higher X amount accuracy. We can say that what would be any of those key inputs that like are the best data points to improve that accuracy?

Nick: Yeah, most of all, the things that you mentioned, we look at the data for last three years of historical data that that’s very important to us and but we give more weight to the latest data, what’s happening in the last few weeks and months and quarters. So that kind of data is very important to us. Then the data that we had three years ago, because small businesses, they are so versatile, you know, they are so diverse group of people. You know, some are small, some are big, and coming up with a model that’s going to work for everyone. It’s a challenge. You know, it’s a challenge a lot of companies are trying to solve. And we have solved it in a in a meaningful way so that it brings most accurate data most of the time in most of the situations for the seasonal businesses or even if you are a wholesaler, you know, that kind of business. This. So try to look at all businesses because businesses, the ice cream shop may be open during the summer days, but they might be completely closed during the holidays in the winter. Right. So looking at that kind of data is also important. And we were able to look at the data in a holistic way and are able to create a good picture. How the cash flow of that specific business is going to look like based on the data that’s coming in the accounting systems.

Jacob: Certainly. Let’s pivot to discussing RTP or real time payments, which you referenced earlier. Can you give listeners a background on when RTP came about the benefits it offers and what the adoption rate has been within the broader payments world or financial world?

Nick: Yeah, that’s a very interesting question because if you look at the RTP, it’s been around us for last five, six years now. It came in 2017, so that’s been a long time. But adoption so far has been very, very low and there are multiple reasons behind it. First of all, it was a slow pace of adoption because RTP is a product of the clearing House, TCH the consortium that is owned by big banks. And as we know, these banks that they took the lead in promoting RTP. But the smaller banks, you know, they are a little hesitant to adopt a product that is being developed by big banks. We saw just a few weeks ago, you know, what happened with Silicon Valley banks and where all the deposits moved. They went to the big banks. So smaller banks, they are inherently opposed to the idea of working with the product that has been developed by big banks, that that’s one problem. And second problem has been even the bank itself, the 25 banks who own, TCH they haven’t been very proactive in promoting it. If you visit a branch I haven’t seen any promotion of RTP in any bank branch so far and banks are still focused on promoting the credit cards.

Nick: And because they have been if you look at all the major banks, they have a good role in taking a lion’s share of issuing all those credit cards or debit cards. Right? So they are focused on protecting that interchange that they have today. But hopefully things are going to change now because we you know, the FedNow is coming in July this year. And I strongly believe that we will see more adoption of the real time payment with the FedNow being around the corner, because today we know only around 300, maybe 320 banks. They they support IT systems and that there is a discrepancy there, too, because most banks, they are able to receive RTP payments, but they are not able to send their handful of banks that can send the RTP payment today. So that’s why we haven’t seen much adoption. But we FedNow being here and later this part of the year, I believe smaller banks or credit union or community banks, they will be able to participate in the real time movement as well.

Jacob: Speaking of the FedNow, because that is going to be a massive thing, I believe, in June or July expected this year. So a couple months from now. Can you speak to how this will kind of build on or like the differences between RTP and Fednow other than just who’s housing it, who’s running those real systems? And maybe will this have any direct impact on forward AI and its offerings at all?

Nick: RTP is built on an ISO 20,022 messaging standard. So what does it mean? It’s just a bigger pipe where we can push a lot of data on that pipe, like we can record, you know, invoice number amount, even a line items that’s showing up on the invoice or the discount quantity, those kind of information that could be part of the RTP messaging today. And we believe similar functionality is also available from FedNow as well. I have little understanding how the standards will follow, but based on what I have read, there was a booth of Federal Reserve or FedNow they are promoting at May 2020 last year and we had some discussion and they I was told that it’s very similar to RTP and I believe at the back end there will be companies like us or other companies who will be able to connect to both systems and depending upon where the money is coming from or where the money needs to go, both systems would be connected just like the way ACH it is today. At the front end, people won’t be able to see any difference. And and the fact is, people don’t care. They just want their money to be coming in and going out faster. That’s what they want, right? So I think once the system is out and it’s going to be very, very. Quick because in the early days, we we know Fed is still working with the companies. So there are companies who are already building infrastructure so that there is no disruption when FedNow is launched And the movement of the money would be very, very smooth and seamless for most people in most situations as well, certainly.

Jacob: And it definitely feels like because they’re promoting it much more than RTP has been historically and just it feels like the floodgates are going to open and this could really be the moment. And hopefully from a consumer standpoint, it is the moment where we get much closer to as much of payments world being quicker, transaction times quicker, processing times, the better. Fraud is definitely one of the issues though, that you kind of referenced. There is maybe why the adoption rate was slower before. It’s an issue that’s dealt with industry wide, but certainly when talking instant payments, I think fraud is one of the main things that comes up with that is it increases the chances for that to be possible. How can consumers and businesses protect themselves from fraud when using an instant payment type of service?

Nick: That’s right. You raised a very good point. And fraud is known, I believe, with almost all the payment methods that we are aware of. But specifically, it’s even more relevant in the push payment kind of system like RTP or FedNow. They are kind of push payments. So the problem with that one is, you know, as soon as you press the send button, your money is gone and there’s little you can do it. And there are horror stories in the UK or European markets where people had to face those kind of fraudulent transactions and there were little they could do. But what we see in a European market and I believe the similar things we are going to see as well, because you Fed or they want a good adoption of RTP or instant payment market in the domestic market, there has to be good fraud prevention and there should be kind of good consumer protection. Things need to be in place. So what they are doing in a European market is, you know, they they are making both banks responsible for those kind of transactions. I believe we will see a similar approach being taken in USA as well. We saw the same thing happening with Zelle.

Nick: There was so many fraudulent transactions and banks are figuring out how they can resolve those kind of issues and they could come to some kind of agreement. Okay, this is the way we are going to solve consumer problems or any kind of fraudulent activities because scam is going to stay. Doesn’t matter how much friction we put in place or try to make our system safe, there will be some fraudulent activity and we need good consumer protections in place. So it will be done through banks, through companies like us who will play a role identifying or solving problems for those people, because trust is very important. These credit card companies, you know, they have very nice consumer protections and problem resolutions in place. So I believe something like similar will develop for the RTP market as well over the time because it can’t work like Bitcoin. You know, you press the Bitcoin, you send it and there’s nothing you can do. And I believe most people, they are not ready to be their own bank. You know, they, they, they there will be someone who was tricked into clicking the wrong button and there has to be some process in place.

Jacob: Yeah, they’ll definitely be a learning curve on both sides of it. That’s right. The consumer themselves learning how to be a bit more careful as well as all of the companies offering all of the different services, learning how to mitigate that fraud the same way they have had to learn how to mitigate fraud across the spectrum and any service they have offered throughout the history of finances. Are there any other major trends in the industry you’re keeping an eye on in 2023 and beyond that forwardly or forward? I is trying to stay at the forefront of.

Nick: Currently, we are on a mission to solve cash flow problems for small businesses and we strongly believe that there is a bright future for RTP and we are going to put a lot of our resources in promoting it and supporting it and building new product, new way to look at the how accounts receivable and accounts payable need to be handled because there is almost a 1 trillion in stuck in the economy at any given time in the accounts receivable. So there is a need in the market to move that money faster to small business. That trillion dollar that I talked about, that’s the money that’s owed to these small businesses. So there is a need for that money to be in the bank account so that businesses can spend it, they can invest into marketing, into the growth of their business. And sometimes there is a need in the market. You need some amount in your bank account to make a critical payment, those kind of things. So different use cases are developing and I think we have an impact. Potential role to play. Currently, we are focused on solving cash flow problems by delivering money to businesses almost instantly so that they have access to the money they can invest into their growth. Yes, there are a lot of other things that I believe will be there in the future that that would be helpful in the economy, just like some stablecoins. You know, I believe they would be playing some kind of role in moving money faster. And other thing that I see, I talk their other founders, their company is very passionate about kind of B2B BNPL. There are challenges in the consumer side on the side, but B2B BNPL is going very strong just because it has been able to put cash in the hands of SMB. They can invest into the economy and at this time we know getting access to funds or any kind of credit is very, very hard. So those kind of solutions are also taking place.

Jacob: Yeah. And those are definitely the BNPL specifically has been a frequent topic recently on the show here of talking about how, again, there is some issues from the consumer side, but those come back to getting that tech better and better and better to more accurately predict similar to what you’re trying to do of the more accurate of predictions you can make on behalf of these consumers than the more better decisions can be made on who gets what money, when and be able to make it go fast. So yeah, that’s definitely been a topic on our mind and this shows mind. And I do want to just step back real quick. The trillion dollar number that you put out is just had me kind of my mind spinning a little bit as you continue to just man, that is a lot of money just sitting stagnant that yes like you said, could be used or could be the single lifeblood that a small business needs to keep going. And at the beginning of this conversation, we talked about some of them maybe aren’t making the proper decisions because they don’t have the right data to make them, but other ones are making the right decisions, but also just need it to move faster and are doing everything else right.

Jacob: And so yeah, here $1 trillion is just sitting there at any one time waiting to go to the person who is owed. It is pretty staggering. The final topic I’d like to get into a slight pivot here is business leadership and how to be successful in the payments and fintech world. A lot of our listeners are business leaders themselves in these industries. So when I get to chance to talk to someone who’s had success like yourself, I always like to get a little insight that might help those listening bring some improvement to their own companies or their own careers. The first thing on this topic is that you’re a member of the Forbes Financial Council, and I also saw you were a part of the BC Tech Council, specifically the scale CEO Council as co-chair. What are the benefits of joining groups like these and how is being a part of them helped shape and bring value to your career in the companies you’ve worked on?

Nick: Very important and I believe these kind of associations, they have been very helpful to me. For example, I was in a meeting of BC Tech just a few weeks ago, and that was a great opportunity to meet other co-founders in real life and learn about the problems they are facing. And what we find is most of the time we are we or someone else is facing a problem in a similar way. We always learn from the experiences of others, and this has opened new opportunities as well as new lessons that I wasn’t aware of before. Like just one of the agenda items, how now we have these remote employees and how we can work more effectively and how we can identify the top performance in the company. So those kind of things that came up for discussions and sitting in my office and most of the people are working remote and reading your email or reading online doesn’t help. It’s very important to get out or talk to your peers who are in the same boat as you and listen to them, share your feedback with them and am sure they learn a lot from my experiences the same way I have learned from them. And I believe it’s very important for any CEO or any co-founder and it’s very important to go out, join these kind of councils, share your thoughts and listen to the others and this will make a difference. This is the best way to learn nowadays. On top of that, whatever you’re listening to podcasts or reading blogs or reading a book, most people do.

Jacob: Absolutely. I definitely love that as a big believer myself. And yeah, the power of the group surround yourself with others. You don’t got to go it alone. And that doesn’t just mean within your company you’ve got your little team. It means leverage. Those out there who are doing similar things in different industries, who have done things before, and the power of the collective versus the individual. If I were to ask 1 or 2 key reasons or maybe characteristics that make a company successful in the world of banking or payments or finance at large, what would you say is a key characteristic or two that accompanies Got to keep in? Mind to be successful in this world.

Nick: It comes to the finding, the pain point or the product that people are going to use and might be willing to pay for it and think that’s the most important thing. You could be working on something and you can see there is a problem and you identify. You can build a business around by solving that problem and you want to work on that one. I think that’s a very important idea to start from. And once you see that people are willing to pay for that kind of product, it’s all about doubling down on the things that are working and finding those people early people, early supporters and providing them support and customer service is very important part of it. And once you find a few people, then it’s all about investing more time and energy in supporting those customers and growing and scaling the business and might be going to events or doing this podcast like this one or speaking engagement, those kind of things so that you can create awareness about the idea that you are working on. I think that’s the key. And you know, once you have that one, then then obviously you have some revenue. Then in the early days, it’s very important to hire people who move the needle and who are scrappy and who are hungry for the knowledge kind of thing. But as you grow, then it’s very important to bring experience seasoned people who have done the similar things before. So let’s say if I want to achieve 100 million in revenue, I would like to surround myself with someone who has done this kind of things before, right? I can take it there too, but it will take me a lot longer than someone who has gone through that path before. That would be an extra help and it could speed up the process. So keeping those kind of things are very important. I think paying attention to them is going to put any company on a growing path.

Jacob: Fantastic advice. And then the last one, then how about individually when it comes to navigating the industry, bringing value to the company you represent, What are a few key personality traits that set an individual up for success working in this world?

Nick: I strongly believe in hard work and passion because start ups are really hard when you start a company. You need to be willing to spend 10, 12, 14 hours a day. That kind of mindset is very important. So if you think you have that kind of mindset, you you’re willing to put that kind of efforts. Yeah, go for it. But make sure when you go for it, you don’t quit. You don’t give up easily because winners never quit and quitters never win. That’s the reality of life. And on the personal side, I am a strong believer that when you work so hard, you you deserve some rest as well. So make sure you enjoy the time on the weekends. Stay a Friday evening or Saturday or Sunday, whatever the time you have. Invest time into into your social circle. Get out and meet other people as well. Invest into your physical fitness. Very important. When you work so many hours, it’s very important to get out and get some fresh air, go for a walk or hit the gym, whatever you want to do, whatever you enjoy. I think it’s a mix of all those things, but it all going to start with your passion. And once you’re passionate enough, you are going to put hours into that and make it a success.

Jacob: I love that. So Nick, this has been an absolute blast. Very informative for those listening who might want to learn more about Ford or who might want to follow you in your journey, where would be the best place for them to go to do so?

Nick: Best place to go would be for ForwardAI.com. Follow us on the LinkedIn Twitter and if you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us, our team, and we’ll be very happy to talk to you.

Jacob: Absolutely. Well, it’s been wonderful. We, of course, link to all of those in the show notes so listeners can use those as they see fit. Thank you so much for your time and knowledge, Nick. It’s been a blast. Hope to speak again sometime soon.

Nick: Thanks for having me.

Jacob: If you enjoyed this episode and want to hear more, head on over to soarpay.com/podcast to subscribe on your podcast listening platform of choice. That’s s o a r p a y.com/podcast.