Desmond Lim, co-founder and CEO of Workstream.
Courtesy of Desmond Lim
Desmond Lim is not any stranger to onerous work.
On the age of seven, he fell in love with basketball, however when his household could not afford to purchase him his personal ball, he got here up with the cash by himself.
“Cash was at all times tight,” Lim instructed CNBC Make It. “My dad and mom are each hourly employees. My dad’s a driver. My mother’s a cleaner.”
“I selected a sport that’s free, so I can play any day that I needed,” stated Lim. “I saved up for 60 days not consuming lunch, to [have] sufficient cash to purchase the ball. Then, I held on to that orange rubber ball and performed it for 5 years, day by day, till it was bald.”
That angle has served him properly in life. As we speak, the 39-year-old is the co-founder and CEO of Workstream, a human sources, payroll and hiring platform made for the hourly workforce. The corporate has raised about $120 million to this point.
Humble beginnings
Lim was born and raised in Singapore and was the primary in his household to attend college. From promoting eggs on the native market to driving vehicles, Lim says, most of his prolonged household, together with his dad and mom, have been — and nonetheless are — hourly employees.
“[My parents] each solely completed fourth grade,” he stated. “My dad is up at 5 a.m. each morning, and he will get dwelling by seven, and he works six and a half days per week. He barely stops for lunch.”
Desmond Lim, co-founder and CEO of Workstream, along with his dad and mom.
Courtesy of Desmond Lim
Lim noticed the grit and work ethic that his dad and mom had and utilized these traits to his personal life. In excessive school, not solely was he a prime scholar, however he additionally led his college’s basketball group, as captain, to win a nationwide competitors.
“After we gained the Excessive Faculty Championship, I used to be the captain that carried our faculty flag and ran round the entire college as the college cheered for our victory … I believe that second modified my life,” he stated. “Sports activities taught me that you just want time, persistence and a group of individuals to construct one thing nice.”
Lim was additionally chosen to play basketball professionally for the Singapore Nationwide Youth Workforce whereas in highschool. It shortly turned clear that he had the chops to get right into a prime college, however his household did not have the means to assist his training.
Desmond Lim along with his basketball group in Singapore.
Courtesy of Desmond Lim
“My mother instructed me: ‘I can’t pay to your school. You should not go to school. It is best to go and work,'” stated Lim. “That nudged me to determine learn how to go to school by myself.'”
Finally, Lim’s entrepreneurial journey was largely born out of a necessity. He stated he began companies since he was younger so as to have the ability to afford college charges.
On prime of specializing in his research and basketball, Lim began his personal tutoring enterprise in highschool. Inside two years, he says, that enterprise introduced in about $100,000 in income, which was sufficient to pay for his college training.
That tutoring firm turned simply the primary of a number of companies that Lim started.
Equally, whereas finding out at Singapore Administration College, Lim set his sights on a brand new purpose — he needed to maneuver to the USA to get a grasp’s diploma. To economize, he bootstrapped and began one other enterprise — a Thai meals restaurant — whereas nonetheless engaged on finishing his diploma.
After graduating from college in 2010, Lim labored in funding banking for a number of years earlier than shifting to the U.S. for his grasp’s diploma at Harvard College in July 2013.
‘I used to be so hungry’
Whereas at Harvard, Lim zeroed in on establishing his personal tech startup.
“I used to be so hungry once I was at Harvard, I felt like I used to be ingesting from a firehose. Typical folks take 4 courses — I used to be doing seven courses each time period,” he stated.
Throughout his first yr at Harvard, Lim chilly emailed about 50 startups within the San Francisco Bay Space, hoping to achieve some startup expertise. That winter break, he flew to California, the place he slept on a buddy’s sofa and labored at an training tech startup at no cost.
Desmond Lim along with his Harvard classmates throughout orientation week.
Courtesy of Demond Lim
“And the next summer season, I once more labored at no cost for WeChat … earlier than they transformed me right into a full-time function. So, I used to be simply so hungry to study all the things, about startups and firm constructing,” stated Lim.
In 2016, Lim sat in on a buddy’s class at Stanford’s Graduate Faculty of Enterprise known as “Startup Storage.”
“It is the identical class that firms like DoorDash and SoFi got here out of,” he stated. “Our job was to exit to speak to enterprise homeowners, so we talked to tens, if not a whole lot of enterprise homeowners round Palo Alto, and we heard about ache factors.”
One enterprise they spoke with was Coupa Cafe, a family-owned espresso store chain with shops round Stanford and Palo Alto. It was throughout this dialog that Lim found the thought for Workstream.
He discovered that the corporate did not have the proper instruments to effectively handle their hourly workforce. They have been utilizing seven completely different instruments, together with Google Drive and simply writing issues down manually with pen and paper, stated Lim.
“I [thought] that is a lot work. There have to be one thing that we are able to do higher for them,” he stated. “So I believe that was the second, mixed with my expertise working my very own restaurant, coupled with my dad and mom being each hourly of us.”
Desmond Lim along with his co-founders, Lei Xu and Max Wang.
Courtesy of Desmond Lim
After finishing his graduate program at Harvard, Lim moved to the Bay Space in 2016 and co-founded Workstream in September 2017 with Lei Xu and Max Wang.
Three quick months afterward Jan. 4, 2018, Workstream had its first paying buyer — Coupa Cafe paid Lim and his co-founders $100.
Constructing Workstream
The early days of Workstream concerned plenty of door-knocking.
“It was enjoyable … [I was] promoting door to door, with some assist from Max and Lei. So we have been simply three immigrants within the streets of Palo Alto attempting to knock on doorways and speak to folks. It was type of humorous [and] we realized a lot,” stated Lim.
Desmond Lim with Workstream’s first investor, Eric Yuan.
Courtesy of Desmond Lim
The corporate’s first funding was a $25,000 examine written by Eric Yuan, the founder and CEO of Zoom.
“I first reached out to Eric about 9 to 10 years in the past the primary yr that I went out to The Valley … I believe it was a chilly e-mail [and] I stated ‘Hey, can I meet you for lunch simply to study from you as a fellow immigrant founder?'” stated Lim. Yuan stated sure, and so they proceeded to have an incredible one hour dialog at lunch.
From there, the 2 stayed buddies for a couple of decade, and when Lim reached out to get funding for his firm, the Zoom founder shortly turned Workstream’s first backer.
“He did not even ask me what I used to be going to construct. I stated I used to be going to construct a platform for the hourly area, and he was like: ‘Okay, I consider in you,'” stated Lim. “Since then, [Yuan] has really doubled down in each single spherical. He has now invested greater than seven figures within the firm over the previous seven years.”
Desmond Lim with Workstream group members in 2024.
Courtesy of Desmond Lim
As we speak, Workstream is an all-in-one HR and payroll software program constructed for hourly firms.
“Our firm’s objective is: ‘deskless deserves higher.’ We consider that the hourly economic system may be very underserved. There’s not sufficient good software program, each constructed for hourly firms, but in addition for a lot of of those hourly employees,” Lim instructed CNBC Make It.
“There are numerous instruments on the market for payroll, but it surely’s all constructed for individuals who work in tech, who work in workplace, who [are] desktop first,” stated Lim. “So what we’ve constructed is a mobile-first, AI-driven software program to assist [hourly companies] do their payroll, HR onboarding, all in the identical place, to assist them to economize and time.”
Workstream’s clients embody manufacturers equivalent to Burger King and Dunkin’ Donuts. The corporate’s backers embody Gold Home, Peter Thiel and Ken Howery’s Founders Fund, Jay-Z and DoorDash’s Tony Xu.
What’s ‘extra essential’ than onerous work?
Lim had a powerful work ethic early on. He was impressed watching his dad and mom and members of the family hustle as hourly employees to earn a dwelling, however there’s one trait that he says that may be much more necessary.
“Really attempt to discover and discover out what you actually need to do. Typically I really feel like making the proper selection is much more essential than attempting to work very onerous,” he stated.
“I believe one factor I did once I was youthful was I talked to many individuals,” stated Lim. “I used to be actually curious, and I might write to professors at college, I would write to founders. I used to be simply having informational chats with those who I seemed as much as for 20 minutes, for 10 minutes, for lunch.”
“I used to be simply very hungry to study from folks, and I believe that basically helped me form how I believe and who I’ve turn into at present,” he stated.
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