S3E12: Teaching Kids to Code with Entrepreneur Katy Lynch

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In today’s episode of the Learn to Code With Me podcast, I talk with Katy Lynch, the CMO and co-founder of Codeverse – the company behind KidScript and the world’s first technology-enabled classroom for kids aged six to twelve.

Katy’s journey into the tech world started at review and advice site Where I’ve Been. She then set up her own company called SocialKaty, which was acquired a few years later. Katy became the CEO of Techweek, the nation’s largest tech festival, before creating Codeverse.

In this episode, Katy tells us about her mission to teach one billion kids to code. She shares her advice on starting your own business and reminds us how important it is to get involved in your community.

This episode was transcribed with the help of an AI transcription tool. Please forgive any typos.

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Hey listeners, welcome to the Learn to Code With Me podcast. I'm your host Laurence Bradford and today's episode, I talk with Katy Lynch. A seasoned entrepreneur, Katy is the co-founder of Codeverse, the world's first fully interactive coding school and educational technology platform for kids. Before starting Codeverse, she was the CEO of Techweek, the nation's largest traveling technology festival. Prior to Techweek, Katy was the president and founder of SocialKaty Inc., Chicago's largest Social Media Marketing Agency. And at our conversation we talk about entrepreneurship, technology, and much more. Remember, you can get Show Notes for this episode, plus more information about Katy at learntocodewith.me/podcast. Enjoy.

Laurence Bradford 1:42
Hey, Katy, thank you so much for coming on the show.

Katy Lynch 1:44
Thank you so much for having me, Laurence.

Laurence Bradford 1:46
I am so excited to have you on because you have such an impressive background and you've done so many awesome things. But really quick, could you introduce yourself to the audience?

Katy Lynch 1:54
I certainly can. So I'm Katy Lynch and I am the co-founder and CMO of Codeverse, which is essentially the world's first fully interactive coding studio, and educational technology platform for kids, between six and 12 years old.

Laurence Bradford 2:11
Awesome, get really excited to talk about that. But first, I kind of want to get into your background and what you were doing before you started that. So I was browsing your LinkedIn before for interview. And you are quite the entrepreneur, I must say you have had if I'm if I'm counting correctly, like two, three of your own companies are your CEO and another. The first I would love to talk about your social media company, social, Katy, that you ended up merging with manifest digital. So was that like the first company you ever started?

Katy Lynch 2:43
Yes, that is, and kind of how all that came about was. So I was born and raised in Scotland in Edinburgh, and I moved to Chicago a decade ago. And when I first came here, I worked for a startup that was actually owned run by my new husband, Craig. And so I worked at that company for about two and a half years, managing all of their marketing efforts single handedly. And so, interestingly, in 2010, Craig ended up selling that company to TripAdvisor. And so that's when I spun out and started SocialKaty in August of 2010.

Laurence Bradford 3:22
Oh, that's so cool. So is that then again, looking back here, LinkedIn where I've been? Yeah, the company. Okay, where I've been got it. Okay, awesome. So you're doing marketing there, and you met your husband, Craig? Congrats. That's really that's really cool that that, you know, you moved to the US or working in Chicago met your husband and, um, you know, still together and that's that's really awesome. Yeah, yeah. And then you went off and start your own company. So what gave you like the, I don't know, like the motivation or the idea to go do that.

Katy Lynch 3:51
Yeah, absolutely. So while I was that where I've been, and this is really true for any any startup you know, my, my role there was very broad, but it was vague, right? Like I was hired on to basically manage all marketing efforts for them. So that was everything from social media, to video to the blog to email marketing campaigns. And even though I was doing that role almost full time, I dabbled in other roles to like I was doing a little bit of business development and sales. So I wore many hats. And I'm just a very curious girl by nature. And so the longer that I worked at the startup, the more that I wanted to learn about every department of the business, so I found myself spending a lot of time with the tech team, learning about the product and the technology that was used to build where I've been learned a little bit about the financials, really just learning operations, you know, all aspects of the business. And so, by the time where I've been sold to TripAdvisor I felt like I really understood at that point, what it took and what it meant to start and to run a business. And so, again, when where I've been ended up selling to TripAdvisor, I realized and recognized that there was a gap in the market. Like I noticed that there was a ton of marketing agencies out there and PR firms that offered social media marketing services as an add on, but it wasn't necessarily their core competency. And so that's where I came up with the with the idea to launch a Social Media Marketing Agency, where we basically helped startups. And so I told my husband about the idea, he loved it, built my website, and I was basically off to the races just pitching startups on the different services that I offered.

Laurence Bradford 5:53
That's really cool. That's awesome. And, like, I see okay, again, look here, LinkedIn, but you were doing that for four years and then you ended up getting acquired by another digital agency.

Katy Lynch 6:03
Yes. And so how that all came, came about was. So when I was launching social KD way back in 2010, I knew that I wanted to, I knew that the end game of the business was going to be having social Katie acquired. And how I got to that conclusion was, you know, social media cannot really stand as an as a, like a standalone, it can't really act as just like a standalone company. And I knew that it would roll in beautifully to another agency. So I grew social Katie for four years. With that in mind, I knew that the end goal was to be acquired. And so it was around November of 2013, where we had about 70 clients and about 27 full time employees that I decided to to sell and so that's when I really shopped social Katie around manifest was the perfect fit for us. And so In July of 2014, was when the acquisition went through.

Laurence Bradford 7:04
Awesome, congratulations. And at the end, I have a few questions. I'm writing them down as you're speaking just more like business and advice like that. But you kind of walk us through your journey because the next thing that I see that you did you were the CEO of tech week. And it's really funny because I think I was shown your LinkedIn profile or shown your bio or something a while ago, while you were the CEO of tech week. Someone. I don't remember the context as like this really, this woman really looks familiar like this. I feel like I've seen her before. I think it was through that. So what is tech week? Exactly. And how did you end up there?

Katy Lynch 7:39
Yeah, so in a nutshell, tech week is the nation's largest technology festival. So it's in multiple cities across the US and no, it's International. It's in Toronto, in Canada. But essentially, yeah, I took on the role as CEO back in, I believe it was May of 2015 So, kind of how kind of how that all came about, excuse me was, so I was that manifest psalter manifest, decided to make sure that the transition between social Katy clients was smooth across the manifest, and then stepped away from that company. And the opportunity really presented itself when the chairman of the board, you know, presented a tech week to me, said that, you know, he really wanted me to be on board, as CEO, and I and I already had the existing relationship with tech week. I was on their advisory board for a couple of years prior. So I was familiar with the brand. I was familiar with the mission and the team. And so that transition was from manifesta. Tech week was was pretty smooth. And so run tech week for a while and interestingly enough, it was while I was that technique that I had the idea to start code first.

Laurence Bradford 9:01
yeah, it's amazing how like it like how things just lead into one another and all that good stuff. So let's again, I have these other questions I want to get I want to get to at the end. But let's now kind of jump forward or jump to the present with code verse. So you had the idea to start this back when you're working in tech week. And of course, you guys are geared towards children. So what gave you get the idea to start this?

Katy Lynch 9:26
Yeah, so a couple things. So the idea came from a panel that I hosted and moderated out in tech week LA, in November of 2015. And the panel was surrounding a documentary that you may have seen or may not have called code, debugging the gender gap, which basically focuses on the lack of women and minorities in STEM. And so I'm kind of sitting there with the documentary makers and you know, a huge audience of like, 200 people and we just Get into this really riveting discussion around, like the factors and the reasons as to why young girls lose interest in science and maths and tech at such a young age. And, you know, long story short, I came away from that event feeling a bit disheartened right on one end, in the sense that, wow, this is so unacceptable that, you know, young girls are losing passion and interest in these fields. Because if anything, it's such an exciting time to be in tech, you know, not only as a women in tech, but just being in the tech world in general. It's just it's so fascinating, and it's so fun. And I mean, like me personally, I've had nothing but wonderful experiences in this world. So part part of me left the event feeling disheartened, but the other, you know, part of me felt inspired to start cold first. And so I'll never forget this, but uh, I was on a flight on the way home from LA to Chicago, and I was Skyping, my husband midair.

Katy Lynch 11:04
And my husband Craig is a phenomenal businessman. He is a very well known technologist here in Chicago. He's built multiple companies. He's sold business here. And so I went to him and was like, Look, between my skill set and your skill set and how passionate we are about getting, you know, children into coding at such a young age. I think that we should start something together. And he recognized that and loved the idea. And so I stepped away from technique he stepped away from his company belly, and we full force been into code verse together. And so really, the reason why we decided to start with kids as young as six is because Craig and I collectively have done a ton of research on all the tools and all the games and all the apps and resources that exists out there today. And many of them do cater to young adults or adults, right. But there doesn't seem to be a lot out there like real programming languages, and very collaborative social fun environments that teaches kids as young as six, how to build apps and how to build games. And so that is what we've done with code verse is, not only are we building these beautiful state of the art studios, starting in downtown Chicago, but we have also designed and developed a real programming language that's been designed from the ground up for children. And so the cool thing about this is that children can use kid script, the language that we've built, children can use this to not only build games and build apps that can be submitted into the app store, but they can also use kids script, to be able to program or code any physical object. Within our state of the art studios, so whether that's a 3d printer, or a robot arm or a drone, or lights or speakers, all of these cool tech gadgets, can be can be programmed through kit script.

Laurence Bradford 13:14
Okay, so I have like 1000 questions. But first and foremost, like, how do you build your own programming language? Like I know, I mean, I know there's like hundreds of programming languages out there. And people like, there are other stories. I've heard of people kind of creating their own or something. But this is quite different because it's geared towards children. So like, how did you go about that? Like, I'm really curious who like helped you do that? Or like or like, well, how many people were working on this project? Was it just you and your husband? Were there other people? How long did it take? Yeah, I just please tell me more about that.

Katy Lynch 13:47
Yeah, for sure. So, um, so Craig and I initially founded the company. And then we brought on a third co founder whose name is Dave, arrow, and Dave. He is an entrepreneur. He's also a Fantastic technologist. And he was one of the first engineers that Craig hired at belly way back in 2011. And so between Craig and Dave, they have built this language kit script. And so how they went about doing it is you're absolutely right Lauren's There are dozens upon dozens of languages that exist out there, like JavaScript, and Python, and Ruby and Visual Basic, etc, etc. However, those languages are way too advanced for young children. And so essentially, what Craig and Dave have done is they've taken the core concepts from those popular languages. And they've created like a kid friendly syntax around to those languages.

Katy Lynch 14:47
So they've basically created like an easy to write easy to read syntax. So when you think of what that really means is when you think of like the popular languages that exist out there, there's there's multiple ways to do it. One thing, right? Like if you learn Python, there's multiple ways to do do one action within Python or with another languages. But with kids script, we've simplified it. And to the point where there's only, there's only basically one way to do one thing. So it's very easy for kids to understand. And the other beautiful thing about this language that we've built is that if children, I guess, quote, unquote, graduate from kids script, and they want to learn other languages, it's very simple for them to do so.

Laurence Bradford 15:34
That's awesome. And how long did it take them to build this?

Katy Lynch 15:36
Yeah? Ah, 14 months.

Laurence Bradford 15:39
14 months to to create kids script.

Katy Lynch 15:42
Yep.

Laurence Bradford 15:43
Yeah. Okay. Okay. That's awesome. That's, that is really cool. Okay. And bring all this down. And then another question I had when you're speaking before about Codeverse and what you guys are doing, why six years old? Like is there a reason why you wouldn't start any younger like, like five, four years old?

Katy Lynch 16:01
Yeah, I mean, what we've noticed is that, you know, six and older is really that sweet spot. And the reason why is because, like kids don't necessarily have to have prior experience of anything to be able to learn to code, other than being able to read and write and type. And we found that by like, we've tested this on kids younger than six and it's just, it's, it's hard for them, right? Whereas we've sat in front of classrooms of like, six year old seven year olds, eight year olds, and they they pick up so quickly, like we have, like, it's so fascinating like we've had six year old kids boys and girls build like their first game within like 20-25 minutes using kit script.

Laurence Bradford 16:47
Wow, awesome. So like, what if, because you have these like physical centers, right? And in Chicago is where you guys are starting, is there like so there's a hard requirement that the children attending must be like six years or older? Yeah. And you said, sorry, you gave the aged men six, six to 12 years old?

Katy Lynch 17:05
Yeah. So six to 12 years old. And and you're right, so the first studio is opening in Chicago, and it's opening in Lincoln Park. And then over the next 18 months, we hope to launch three additional locations throughout Illinois. And then the goal is over the next five years to have one chord verse in every major metropolitan area of the US. On top of that, we'll be launching SAS, so for kids that are not near record for studio, they can essentially learn kids script at home.

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Laurence Bradford 19:51
Awesome that Yeah, that was actually a question I had written down earlier on. Like I was wondering if it was just offline if it was online for both, but sounds like yeah, you're you're plans to have a studio in major in all major cities across the US, but then also like an online course or something where interactive environment where kids could go log on and learn that way.

Katy Lynch 20:12
Yes, absolutely. Yeah. You know, ultimately, our mission is to teach a billion kids how to code. And, and I understand that that's a lofty goal. But Craig and I are going to be working on this for the next 20-30 years. So that number doesn't seem daunting.

Laurence Bradford 20:29
Yeah. Wow. That's really awesome. Okay, so, okay, so really cool. So you basically before you even like, launched the website, and I guess you guys don't even have the what when is the first physical location opening?

Katy Lynch 20:42
The 15th of July.

Laurence Bradford 20:44
The 15th of July. Okay, cool. But this project you've been working on for like the last 14 months or so?

Katy Lynch 20:50
Yes.

Laurence Bradford 20:51
Okay. Cool. And right away when you first began working on this with your husband and the other co founder, did you realize right away that you We're going to be like creating your own language and teaching it that way online, or did you look into like scratch or some of the other? Like, that's the only way I could think of honestly like the children friendly programming.

Katy Lynch 21:10
Yeah.

Laurence Bradford 21:10
I don't know. Right? Yeah.

Katy Lynch 21:12
No, we so we knew that we wanted to build our own language. And, you know, as I said before, Craig and I did a ton of research on coding camps and classes and different tools and resources and whatnot that exist out there today. And we just recognize that nothing like code verse really exists. Like there's no like, 360 degree experience where kids are in like a very, you know, futuristic modern classroom that is, you know, tech enabled, you know, to the point where our language is able to manipulate or program, you know, objects that kids can buy, you know, in stores, right. And that's kind of the really cool thing about kid script is you know, ultimately You know, down the line, if a kid is using kids script at home, and they have, you know, certain objects that we may sell within our physical locations, they're going to be able to program some of those objects at home, which is super cool. So we're almost taking technology. And we're telling kids like, Hey, you can apply this language to building your own app or your own project. But you can also take this language and apply it to real technology that exists out there in the marketplace today.

Laurence Bradford 22:30
Awesome. So I would love to switch gears a little bit now. And because you just have seen us, you've done so much, and you start your own companies, and I think you must be a wealth of knowledge. So do you have any advice for people? For the listeners that would like to start their own business? Maybe they even have an idea? Maybe don't? Is there any kind of advice you could give to them?

Katy Lynch 22:52
Yeah, I have tons of advice. I could write a book about this. Um, you know, I think there's a lot of things that you have to consider Right. I mean, first and foremost, you know, what is your idea? Secondly, is there demand for your idea? Right? And so and so how do you come to that conclusion of figuring out? Is there demand? I mean, the first thing you need to do is a ton of research. And figure out, you know, who are your competitors? How big is the industry size that you're trying to target? How big is your target audience? Who is your target audience? Who are your competitors? What are they doing? How does your product? How is your product or service different from what already exists in the marketplace? How does your product generate revenue? Right? So these are all the types of things that you need to consider. Secondly, you need to think about, okay, who do I need to connect to, to to kind of get my product in front of the right people, right. So So networking is a huge part of your role. as a as a founder or CEO or co founder is doing research into the community that you live within and figure out, okay, who are the VCs? Are the angel investors that I may want to connect with in the future? If my business, you know, if I need to raise capital in the future, and, you know, do do I want to have mentors, you know, who are those individuals? Have they run companies before? Have they sold companies before? You know, how can I pick their brain and learn from them? So that's something to consider.

Katy Lynch 24:38
You know, and then and then, and then after that, it's kind of like, like with me and SocialKaty, like I was bootstrapped for the first year of the business. So it was me. So I'll speak to my own kind of experiences. I mean, to me, it was doing research, as I said before, on agencies that existed out there, what they were offering, what they weren't offering, what their price point was. And that's it. to how I came up with what my services would be and how much I would charge small businesses. But then I also did market research of my own right meaning, I talked to entrepreneurs and I shared my ideas. And I asked entrepreneurs, you know, how much would you spend monthly on, you know, someone or a team managing your social media marketing campaigns. And so they would tell me, like, my target audience would say, okay, we would be willing to spend x. And so after I came up with those packages, it was really a matter of me selling. And that is the one thing that a lot of people don't tell you, which is, some of the best advice you'll receive is you have to be great at selling and I'm not talking about just selling your product.

Katy Lynch 25:48
I'm talking about selling your vision, your mission, and your values to everybody that you need. I mean, you're constantly selling your investors. You're constantly selling your existing employees, and I'm talking about like, constantly, like every day you're getting them fired up about your business and your mission and why they're there and why they work for you. You know, potential employees, you have to get them fired up to get them, you know, to work with you, right, and to be on board and as passionate as you are about your mission. And so, selling is important. And then only after that, you know, you start putting processes in place, right, because you get to a point where, I mean, I'll speak to SocialKaty, but we got to a point where we have so many clients, and I was hiring, like I was hiring a new employee every couple weeks to keep up with all the clients that I was signing on with my agency. And so it got to a point where we had like, eight or nine employees working for me, and at that point you have, you can't be like a scrappy entrepreneur anymore, you have to put like, parameters around people's jobs, right? And put processes in place with like, HR and hiring and training and all of these different things for your business to be able to scale. And so that was really my third business lesson is, you know, other than selling and other than, you know, doing doing research and finding out if there's demand. The third piece of advice is is that is putting those processes in place so that you can scale much quicker.

Laurence Bradford 27:34
Yeah, I know that totally makes sense. And thank you for giving that there was so much awesome advice. Thank you so much. And I have another question. And I, I would again, I was doing research for interview I didn't realize like how much are actually that your husband was like one of the co founders of code verse that you guys had worked in the past. So what is it like starting a company and working with your husband and do you have any tips for people thinking of starting a business or working together in some way with their partner?

Katy Lynch 28:03
Yes. That is a terrific question. I mean, I'm not, I'm not gonna lie. It's hard, right? Because like, like people always ask me like, how do you balance work? And how do you balance life? And the truth is, is that there's kind of no such thing as balance. Like you kind of just like with me and Craig, like, we recognize that the business is everything to us. It's almost like a baby, right? It's like raising a baby. And so we live and breathe it, like we live and breathe it when we're in the office with our employees. We live and breathe code versus when we're at home. We live and breathe it when we're with our friends, right? Like we talk about code versus a law. And we talk about our journey. You know, and and being business people a lot when we're out and about with friends and family and whatnot. But that's okay. And both of us recognize that you know, we're working on something really cool, or working on something that we're really passionate about.

Katy Lynch 29:06
And to be frank, I cannot imagine building code versus anyone else. And, you know, I think, like one of the biggest reasons or I'd say there's like two massive reasons why Craig and I have been so successful in our endeavors. I say, first and foremost, we have great communication skills, right? And it's like, whether you go into a business with a spouse, or whether you go into a business partnership with a friend or just someone you know, like being open and upfront and honest, and being and having those communication lines open all the time is so crucial to your success. Right. So I'd say that that's, like one of the biggest contributors to why Craig and I have worked well. I'd say the other big reason why we work well is Craig and I have very different skill sets. Right, like Craig is very, behind the scenes, he's very, very technical, very data driven, very much a numbers guy. Whereas I'm extremely extroverted, I'm always out there and you know, in front of the camera, doing business development, managing relationships between our like customers and our strategic partners and all of our vendors. So again, we're just we have we have very, very different skill sets, but they work harmoniously with each other.

Laurence Bradford 30:34
Yeah, that's so awesome. Thank you so much for sharing and i and i know like I mean, I can just imagine that it would be something that would work for some people like clearly you and Craig and then maybe for others it they need more of a separation between work and life before you know what whatever works for you and your and I actually, I wrote an article A while ago for Are you familiar? It's like technically, technically the the tech like website. I remember the article was all about couples who started businesses. together so it's something I always have been fascinated by like, yeah, couples that start startups. Yeah, there's pretty many. And I think I remember I was doing the research I didn't realize like, like, for instance, like Event Bright is the one that comes to my head, but it was like, a husband or wife or maybe they weren't husband or wife at the time, but now they are. They started the company together. So yeah, it's really cool, too. Um, it was real. It's Yeah, to me. It's fascinating. Okay, so moving on. Another thing I noticed, and you mentioned it a bit before about being on like the advisory board for tech week. And I see that you are on like, a lot of advisory boards and councils. How did you get involved in like in that industry? And how, like, what was the first one that you joined? How many are you on today and advice for people that want to get active and things like that?

Katy Lynch 31:44
Yeah, I mean, it all goes back to like I talked a little bit before about like, the company's mission vision values. And but I kind of am a huge believer in like developing like your own personal mission vision values, right? And, and for me, like, there are certain causes, and there are certain things that I'm just extremely passionate about. Like, for example, being a, you know, female and technology, like I'm very passionate about empowering girls and empowering females to do amazing things within the tech world, right, whether they're entrepreneurs or intrapreneurs, or their engineers or their marketers or whatever it is that they want to do. I'm just such a huge, huge advocate for women. That being said, I'm also a huge advocate for immigration reform, right, like being from the UK, my husband's from the UK. Many of my friends that are entrepreneurs are either from the UK or from Europe or Asia. And, you know, they've come to America and they've started businesses.

Katy Lynch 32:53
However, you know, the process for immigrants to become citizens and you know, be Running build businesses here is quite grueling, right. And you may have heard this from from individuals other than just me. And so to answer your question, I work with causes that I'm the most passionate about. And so here in Chicago, I'm on the Executive Council for a organization called Ms. Tech, which is all about empowering women in tech, but also helping women to get the resources that they need to be able to thrive, whether that like access to capital or access to like mobile app development, or web development or marketing services, or PR or whatever it is, and I'm part of Miss tech and I fully believe in their mission. Women tech founders is another one. foward.us I'm a brand ambassador for them. They are an immigration reform organization that was started by Mark Zuckerberg So yeah, those are just some of the causes, again, that I'm passionate about. You know, for any other, you know, women who's listening to this podcast or male that wants to get more involved in their community, I think that the first thing you should do is think about the, you know, causes that you personally care about, and then figure out or do your research on Google, okay, within my community, what are the resources and organizations and nonprofits or whatnot, that specialize in those things? And then just reach out to the founder or reach out to the founding team and figure out how can you be a part of their organization.

Laurence Bradford 34:41
Yes, awesome advice. And I just like, and how do you have time or like any I mean, time management, like I know, everyone feels like they're busy. That's something like I think everyone could agree on in one way or another. You feel like you've so much to do and overwhelmed with like, schedules and work and especially if you're a You know, volunteering outside are many of my listeners are learning how to code or taking classes. And I know I recently was taking a class after work, it was only twice a week and it like killed me was for like two months. And, and it was just so much extra on top of my plate. So any case, how do you like find time to manage all these things? And then also to, to, of course, to be running your own company, I guess actually, maybe better question is how much is the time commitment for some of these, like, these nonprofits and whatnot that you're involved in?

Katy Lynch 35:29
Yeah, I mean, the good news is, is that, you know, it's maybe only like, a couple hours a month, if that. And so many of the organizations that I'm a part of, much of the time commitment is through events, right? So if Miss Tech has like an event or whatnot, I'll go to it and I'll show up for like, an hour to, you know, to show your face and to mingle with people I know. And to meet, you know, new faces, people that I've never met within my community. So for me, I mean, It's just become a part of my life. Like, I feel like I feel like a typical day in the life of Katy is, you know, I wake up at like seven in the morning, I'm checking emails, I'm meeting with my team. You know, I'm forming strategic partnerships with all sorts of different schools and organizations across the city of Chicago. And that takes me up into like, the but takes me up until like six or seven o'clock every evening. And then after 7pm I basically decide, okay, like, what events are going on around the city. And so if it's a miss tech event, or if it's like, women tech founders or, or, you know, another organization that I love, I will prioritize that over anything else. And then in my free time, you know, on weekends or on Sundays or whatnot, you know, that's the time that I dedicate to my friends. And, and the good news is, you know, my friends are very understanding like they they know that I'm running code first. They know that I'm busy. You know, they know that, you know, my schedule is insane. And so they're, they're cool about it. You know, they're like, wow, if we only get to see you for a couple hours on a Sunday night that suits us fine.

Laurence Bradford 37:12
Yeah. And I'm sure I'm sure you also have a lot of friends. I mean, yes, your professional acquaintance, acquaintances, friends, whatever you call them, but at these different events that you go to anyway, I'm sure.

Katy Lynch 37:22
Oh, yeah. And that's kind of the beauty of being an entrepreneur, right is like, you make so many friends through running a business. And it's nice because they are facing many of the same challenges that you're facing. And you and you find as an entrepreneur that like, like, when I first moved here, I had a very, like, small set of friends and and some of them I'm like, not really friends with today. And it's not because I don't like those individuals. It's just like we've gone down different paths in our lives, right. And and no, I find that many of My friends are entrepreneurs because they get it and they're on like the same schedule as me. Again, they have the same challenges as me, they understand what it means to be a business owner. And that's okay. I just I feel like the community that I hang out with now and the people that I consider close friends now are not necessarily the same people that I hung out with in like high school or college, or even post college.

Laurence Bradford 38:26
Oh, yeah, totally. I mean, I can totally relate to that, too. And I'm sure a lot of listeners can also I just feel like it's part of I don't know, evolving and just finding like, really who you are. And yeah, and yeah, exactly. Anyway, Katie, thank you so much. The time seriously flew by I can't believe it went by so fast. I have a gazillion other questions I could ask you, but I'm going to hold off. So where can people find you online?

Katy Lynch 38:52
Yes, so they can find me on Twitter. So I'm just @thekatylynch or if they want to follow us on our company account, it's @codeverse.

Laurence Bradford 39:04
All right, awesome. Yeah, we'll definitely include those links, and other links that you mentioned in the show notes. And I wish you the best of luck as you move forward with Codeverse and get these studios opened. And as you also bring the program online, so anyone around the world can access it.

Katy Lynch 39:19
Amazing. Sounds great. Thank you so much.

Laurence Bradford 39:27
I hope you enjoyed our conversation. Again, the Show Notes for this episode can be found at learntocodewith.me/podcast. If you're listening to this episode in the future, simply click the Search icon in the upper navigation and type in Katy's name. Her name is spelt like this, K-A-T-Y, and the last name, L-Y-N-C-H. If you like this episode, head on over to my website, learntocodewith.me where you can find even more awesome code related content like my 10 Free Tips for Teaching Yourself How to Code. Thanks so much for tuning in, and I'll see you next week.

Key takeaways:

  • Kids can start learning to code as soon as they can read and write, so get them involved at an early age.
  • Young girls can lose interest in science, tech, and math at such a young age. It’s important to make sure there’s a platform for kids to follow their interest in these areas.
  • Before starting your business, find out if there’s a demand for your idea and research both your competitors and your target audience.
  • Networking is a huge part of your role as a new business owner; get involved in your community and work with causes you’re passionate about.
  • It’s important to be great at selling. Selling your vision, your mission, and your values to everyone you meet will help you get your business off the ground.

Links and mentions from the episode:

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