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Hi, I'm Adam Grant. I'm here with Jessica Jackley, the author of Clay, Water, Brick, and also the co-founder of
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KA. Jessica, tell us why you wrote this book. Thanks for having me, Adam. It's nice to
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see you. It's nice to be here. I wrote the book to share with people my own entrepreneurial journey and more
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importantly to share with them the incredible insight and wisdom that I encountered in unexpected entrepreneurs
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along the way. So whereas for most of my formal business education I got a lot of
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um I got pointed in the direction of a lot of sort of usual suspect examples um in terms of who you know who's who in
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business and especially in Silicon Valley who's who in the startup world which ends up feeling sometimes like a
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very narrow place of you know a certain kind of tech startup led by a certain kind of um person. when I got to
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actually get out into the world and travel and work a lot with entrepreneurs in usually developing countries, but at
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very least communities that were um socio-economically disadvantaged, I would meet these incredible people doing
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really important work despite the fact that they had very little education or very little resources or well I should
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say and often um or no connections to anybody in a powerful position. they they lacked or had lost a lot, but they
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were incredibly wise um incredibly um clear thinkers, intelligent people doing incredible things. And I find their
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stories the most motivating, motivating and empowering and um inspiring of any other entrepreneur studies that I've
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encountered. What What did you learn from them? So, if if you think of some of the entrepreneurs who affected you
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most, you said they had a lot of wisdom. What were some of the takeaways? So, well, the o the clay water brick. It's
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funny. Yeah, this is my first book interview, so it's it's uh still not rolling off my tongue, but Clay Water
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brick, that title is taken from is inspired from the story of a brickmaker named Patrick, who I met in Uganda and
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who basically started to change everything for himself when one day he decided to make life better and to try
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to build something and he had all virtually nothing. So he literally, you know, not not not figuratively, not like
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in a cliche way that we talk about rolling up your sleeves and getting your hands dirty, like he actually really did
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this, dug into the ground beneath his feet, his bare feet, and started to shape a brick, shape bricks out of the
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clay, mixed water with it to make the right consistency. And then that's how,
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you know, after a few years, he built a brick business where he had several employees and was certainly thriving,
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certainly relative to where he'd been before. So for example, I mean that's just one
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little glimpse of one story. And of course I think the main lesson that he can teach all of us is that you really
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you don't need to wait to get started. You don't need to wait until you have
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all your resources nicely lined up. Just start with whatever you have in front of
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you. Even if it's messy or scrappy or there's it's rough around the edges
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again, quite literally. Just start and you can build something pretty amazing. And you also did that yourself. So tell
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us a little bit about how you started KA. Sure. Uh gosh, it makes me feel old. 10 years ago, I was in East Africa
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meeting people like the Patricks of the world and I realized there are a few things. One, I realized that they indeed
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were incredible entrepreneurs. And that was huge for me because for most of my life, the narrative about um poverty
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that I that I had heard did not allow for now didn't allow for that to be a reality. I heard from well-intentioned
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nonprofit organizations uh that wanted me to participate in their work as a donor that the poor were not
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entrepreneurial necessarily. They were people who had stories mostly of sadness and suffering and desperation and they
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needed me to participate as a donor and the organization would sort of take care
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of the rest. I didn't hear the stories of strength and and and empowerment and
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people sort of lifting themselves up by their bootstraps if they only had access
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to a little bit of a resource that I had had access to my whole my whole life, a
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small bit of capital, small loan. Um, and so that for me changed the story and I thought those stories were really
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worth sharing. So one, I heard I saw a different story of poverty and potential that was huge. And two, I really felt
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like I mean I am for most of my life I've been kind of a lite. I'm not, you
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know, I I've studied philosophy and poetry undergrad. There were computer science courses. I did not take them.
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There were there were business courses. I didn't take them for the record um
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until later. Went back and got my MBA. I'm a fan of that. That was a good thing. But um I saw the potential even
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even I saw the potential of technology in these very um faroff places in the middle of a village with no electricity
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source in Uganda or Tanzania or Kenya where I was working at the time 10 years ago. But I saw how I could hand my cell
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phone to the goat herder that I was meeting and have that person talk to my mom and dad back home. And I could leave
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my camera and get pictures from what was going on in that village where nothing else really had reached. Um it was very
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easy to to to connect them with just little bits that even I had. So seeing that there was a new story to be told.
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Seeing that that new story, this is two parts I guess allowed for a different response, not just for anybody who heard
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the story to participate as a donor to a big nonprofit that would end up touching
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that person, but somebody could respond directly perhaps with a loan directly, which was needed, not just the
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donations. Um, and then seeing that technology could really connect everyone led to the idea for KA. And I
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laugh when I read case studies or things like that that have been written about KA because at this moment in time the 10
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years ago idea being born moment. It's often said in a very sophisticated kind
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of intimidating way. Like I hear it and I think wow did that really I'm like oh
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this is me. This is my story because they'll say something like thus was born
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the idea for the world's first peer-to-p peer microl lending marketplace. And
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there's all these big words. I mean they sometimes they um it's even written
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about as you know an early crowdfunding thing. I didn't use the word crowdfunding until like five years ago.
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Well, not maybe a little earlier than that. But it was a very simple desire. Ka was born out of a very simple um
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desire and a very simple set of ideas to connect people that I knew back in the United States mostly with these new
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friends that I was meeting these incredible entrepreneurs who had a different story to tell. The way to
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connect them was through a loan. So that's what we tried to do. And I I know
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there are many people who have been inspired by the fact that this wasn't just charity, right? you're you're
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actually able to get a loan. The repayment rate staggering. Can you tell us a little bit about how that works?
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Sure. So, um I have like one micro credit micro finance joke and here it comes. Get ready. Uh credit is due not
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to necessarily pea for the super high repayment rates which are at least 98.5 often 99% on average
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at any given moment. Um but because throughout micro finance overall there's a lot of work being done
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to help people succeed especially with the missiondriven organizations that are out there. I mean there are big banks
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that now offer microloans and then there are nonprofits grassroots organizations
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that offer loans sometimes they offer to different groups but even when they're
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offering to the same um you see a lot of organizations work really hard to make sure those people succeed and to make
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sure repayment rates get up there. whether that means extending a loan, um making sure that there's group support,
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that sort of thing. Often loans are given in groups. There's so much to talk
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about. Um but um yeah, it's been really amazing to watch. I mean, it's it's been
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one of the greatest experiences of my life to watch the world respond and say, "Yes, we value these entrepreneurs, too.
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We want to lend for free. I mean, at 0% interest, for no financial gain. We want
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to lend to somebody so that they can try to reach their potential." I it's it's
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been awesome. And I think yeah, so repayment rates 99ish% and then if it hasn't crossed already, it's keeps about
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to cross 700 million in loans in these little $25 bits from people all around the world. Wow. Of course, you can't
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help but wonder about impact. And I know you're aware there's some evidence
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that's come out recently suggesting that maybe micro savings programs could be
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more effective than micro lending programs. How do you how do you react to that? What do you make of that? I think
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there's no well as um Nicholas Kristoff who I know we both really appreciate um
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has talked about there's no silver bullet. I would never claim to say that micro credit micro lending is a silver
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bullet. He's talked before about in this in other context sort of a buckshot
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approach which I I love that analogy. Um I think micro savings I mean what's
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funny is they're often a part of micro lending programs. Micro finance right is the largest
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heading we can talk about and I mean if anybody if any Wharton folks are listening to this I'm I'm obviously
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preaching to the choir but obviously micro finance is the broadest heading micro credit is one such product under
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that heading one such service um micro insurance is one micro savings is another often these things work best
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together and the truth is you know I believe in the power of teaching people to think entrepreneurially or better yet
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just giving them opportunities to to figure out how to activate that part of themselves. Doesn't always have to be
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taught, per se. I think you just give people opportunities to exercise what they already have inside of them. And I
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think I value watching people go through the process of receiving a microloan regardless of the outcome of
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the viability of the business. Now, of course, I very much prefer when those businesses thrive and go on to provide
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more of a sustainable livelihood for folks, but I've seen cases in which somebody receives a loan, they ended up
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having, you know, something happen. There's often an anomaly, like there's a
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disaster they needed some of the money for instead of repaying their loan fully or the business survived for for a
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while, but then it shifted. Whatever happens, if it's not a business success
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at the end of the journey, I've never once met somebody who has not grown or
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changed in a positive way because of the entire experience of going through receiving that loan, being trusted with
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that resource, and given an opportunity, given a chance to thrive um and build something meaningful in their lives.
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So, it's a little bit of how I look at it, but I'm I'm I'm fascinated by and
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and very uh pro uh the idea of micro savings programs. Maybe maybe that'll be
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the next thing that really takes over the space and is is prioritized above microloans and other things. That that
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would be interesting to see. Jessica, what do you think are the biggest misconceptions that entrepreneurs carry
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around? I think regardless of um where they are, where we are in the world, um entrepreneurs tend
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to get stuck I think more than they need to because they think that they need something to move forward and actually
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there's you know they can get there anyway over around through they can figure out a ways are great at doing
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that in general but I often see people stop at particular points where they don't necessarily need the things they
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think they Um, for example, um, with my second startup co-founder, there was a woman, um, and this is a
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story also in the book, but there's a woman who thought that she needed to raise
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$90,000 for her small business. It was a a whale watching kind of tour business.
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And it turns out that she she put, you know, she put that out there into the world to say, "This is what I need to
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get. I need this funding so I can go purchase a new boat and all these things." And her friends who were
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supporting her, they didn't have all the money to support her. and financially,
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but they knew the thing that she needed. They knew they needed this boat, and so
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they were they were on the lookout for this, and it turns out they found it at, you know, a tenth the cost, something
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something incredibly discounted. So, she she ended up kind of getting there in a
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different way than she thought she would, but she definitely thought the path was raise the money, then find the
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thing itself, not go direct to the thing itself. Just a small example. So, we don't always need to be funded before we
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can get started as entrepreneurs. Absolutely not. Absolutely not. It's helpful. And for some it's absolutely
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the very first you know the first thing that that is necessary but it's not always the case and that's the fun of
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entrepreneurship right and the way I think even broader than being an entrepreneur starting a business or even
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acting entrepreneurally within a company being an entrepreneur living entrepreneurally I feel like is about
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seeing those other ways through those other ways around and seeing opportunity where we might overlook it at first.
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Jessica I can't help but notice there have been a few squeaks in the background. What's going on? That is the
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That is absolutely true. So, my infant son, my third son, is over there in the stroller chiming in now. Um, he's with
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me because tiny right on Q. Asa, say hi. And he is with me um pretty much non-stop these days. This is what it
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looks like for me to work be a working mom. So, I he's here. He's in the
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studio. And I appreciate that everyone has been so welcoming, including him, wherever I am. That's kind of my mo.
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That's how I That's how one of the ways that I find balance. He comes to a lot
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of my work events. We hope to have him on set in a future year. He's he's uh
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he's getting ready to go. Great. Jessica, thanks for joining us today. Thank you, Adam.
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[Music]