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In this series, we’re sharing tips, advice, and insights from real entrepreneurs who fight business battles every day. (Answers have been edited and added for clarity.)
Brian Park, CEO of Hank
Who are you and what is your business?
My name is Brian Park and I’m the founder and CEO of Hank, a digital platform that connects adults 55+ with people and activities in their communities. We both prefer group activities and support member-led activities like pickleball, coffee gatherings, art workshops, ping pong, skydiving and everything in between. Our goal is to build Hank for this generation to create and maintain the social relationships we know will help us all live longer and healthier lives.
What inspired you to create this business?
The genesis of Hank came from a conflict between two different parts of my life: professionally and personally.
By the time I started thinking about Hank, I had spent more than a decade working in the tech industry, where the usual rule of thumb was to “design for yourself” — meaning anyone under forty. There’s this deep-rooted misconception in technology that generations don’t understand or want new technology, so we rarely design solutions with older people in mind.
A personal part of my aha moment came when my parents were empty nesters. Outside the home, my brother and I watched as my parents struggled to find new social circles and activities. That perspective began to mix with my experience in the tech industry, and the two together began to shape Hank. My mom and dad eventually found social outlets through church and alumni organizations, but it was a long and disjointed process for them. Watching my folks struggle to transition into this new phase of life was so important to me and my co-founder Andrew (we’ve been best friends since 6th grade!) for our parents! The excitement that started Hank.
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What was your biggest business challenge and how did you get motivated to overcome it?
In my experience, one of the biggest challenges we face as entrepreneurs is keeping our focus – and truth – on your vision.
Our first iteration of Hank’s was actually a very different business: we were essentially trying to bring assisted living services like transportation and high-quality meals to the homes of senior individuals. We quickly discovered that building that business required a real shift from our initial focus around community building and social networking.
The challenge is that our first hank version can be viable, if it’s a short ceiling, trade – we’ve been seeing early wins! But we knew it didn’t quite deliver what we wanted to do for ourselves or the 55+ demographic. So, we basically went back to Nas Tax: we stopped everything for two months while talking to our users, whiteboarded new models, and rebuilt the brand and the product with our team.
Those months were both very exciting and also very difficult – it was hard for us and our team to start again after leaving the first signs of progress and signs of short-term viability. But, we’ll do it again in a second – Hank is better positioned to give value to our community, leading us to build a business we’re extremely proud of.
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What advice would you give to entrepreneurs looking for funding?
There are three things I always think about when it comes to scaling to any size: organization, running as a process, and telling a story.
The first two are really just about performance. Some first-time entrepreneurs make the mistake of thinking that if your idea is good enough, funding will magically appear when in reality there is a structure and timeline for investor agreements and relationships. To make the increase go smoothly.
The third – telling a story and getting investors to buy into your vision – is the single most important thing. This means you need investors who understand exactly where you’re trying to go. you You must be able to understand and articulate where you need to go. Take the time to get clarity on your vision and use that to anchor your story. Funding is only a small part of who you should be: you want investors to be partners who align with your vision, so they can advise you on how to get there and help you think about what it takes to achieve. The next phase of development.
What does the word “entrepreneur” mean to you?
Above all, perseverance and perseverance.
For every glorious moment as an entrepreneur—a great startup, a beautiful product, a category-defining idea—there are a million others that are stressful, difficult, and unknown. The best entrepreneurs come back every day, whether the business is growing or you’re still struggling with the product market, and they bring the courage and strength to learn and improve and solve problems.
It’s important to note that those same qualities are critical to having in your team. It’s not enough for a founder or founders to act that way. I find this to be true in the early stages of figuring out what needs to happen in a company.
Related: You don’t have to own a business to think like an entrepreneur
What is something that many aspiring business owners think they don’t really need?
I think it’s common for first-time founders to feel like they need all the answers before they get started, so they delay product development or fundraising conversations or other critical activities until they get them all “right.”
But one of the principles that Andrew and I live by as founders is the idea of small steps rather than nothing. We relaunched Hank’s new site at MVP level just a few weeks after thinking about the offering and redesigning the site. Since then, we’ve built it every week on a weekly basis based on feedback from our customers. It’s more important to get out there and talk to customers and start iterating on your product than trying to develop it in a silo until it’s perfect. over there it is. It’s not perfect, and the sooner the founders get comfortable, the faster they’ll move, the more energized your team will feel, and ultimately the better the product.
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