In search of your IKIGAI

1. Vladimir Rusev
AUBG Elevate 2020
Founders Institute Goto Market 2019
Profuture - About Me 2018

2. The path to finding your IKEGI
• My Experience up to now and lessons learned
• Peak Performance and Success Habits
• Positive Habits
• Becoming Indistractable
• Abundance Mindset and Exponential Technologies
• What the world needs?
• Who is on your team?

4. Commencement 1997
Pride, joy, the AUBG adventure mindset

5. The AUBG university experience Part 1
Tried a wide variety of
classes.
Two majors Business
Administration, Politics and
International Relations
Learned how to sleep very
well in every occasion!

6. The AUBG University Experience Part 2
Make new lifelong friends,
playing roleplaying games
AD&D, Diplomacy, computers
Away from parents - build
confidence, resourcefulness.
Learned early on Time
Management - having to learn,
work and party at the same
time.

7. Wizcom / Sciant - Mission
• Started in AUBG Volga Dorm in
1997. Changed multiple roles,
started as QA then took
Accounting / Finance, finally took
everything Non-tech.
• Keep on learning while on the job
(ACCA) - Finance & Accounting.
Learned HR and IT.
• Grew company to 150 employees
in 10 years and sold the company
to VMWare
Mission: Create work for smart people, keep them in Bulgaria. Friends
and Family business. Didn’t really care about making a profit.

8. CableTEL - Blizzoo - Profession
AUBG mindset of optimism, positivity
and solution orientation.
Secured funding from Banks,
investment funds and VCs to complete
acquisition deals of Cable TV operators.
Too stressful. Blackberry on 24/7.
Quit to co-found my own company.
Profession: Learn the corporate world, climb the ladder, get good at
making contacts and get paid well! Create a cushion for your next gig.

9. EONTOYS -
Vocation
• Joined friends to co-found a company in an empty niche.
• Transfer best practices from abroad to BG
• Grew company from startup to 30 people but then EU happened
and distribution protection was cancelled. Soon had to scale back
company, fire employees and jump ship.
Vocation: Bulgaria needed branded toys and we wanted to get paid
well.

10. • I love reading books – it is my passion
• Translate books from English other languages
• Create short summaries to create interest and
then crowdfund translation and publishing
passion
Passion: Read and educate. Did not look for team-mates, and
validate the market first. Could not find working business model.

11. Connecto.ai - Mission
• Find the right co-founders and
start something in a hype
industry to learn
• Find investors to share the risk
• Hire a great team and figure it
out as you go.
• Make a good exit :)
Mission: Learn to create and scale startups. Learn Business
Development. Help the startup ecosystem.

12. • Learn SaaS Sales and share with other entrepreneurs.
• Became top Salesman for EMEA and 2nd place in the world
Leanplum - Profession/Mission
Mission: Teaching the Startup Ecosystem in Bulgaria about Go to
Market. Create a cushion for the next venture :)

13. Ikegai: Gather domain expertise in vertical I love. Create a coaching
business and learn how to scale it.
WildFit and Optimize.me Coach - Ikegai

14. Shapie - Ikegai
Wholistic, Personalized, science-based journeys to keep your employees in shape
Daily Physical
Activity
Nutrition Strategy
Stress & Recovery
Management
Personal
Coaching
Adaptive Data
Tracking
Community
Support
Ikegai: Join a startup in a vertical that I love and Scale its business.
Create a Bulgarian based Unicorn.

15. Peak Performance and
Success Habits
• WildFit Energy Revolution.
• Eat - not too much, mostly plants,
avoid sugar, grains and dairy.
• Movement 101 - every day 20-30 min
• Optimal Sleep 101 - 7-8 hours per day

16. Positive Habits
• Positive Psychology 101
• Gratitude and Journaling Practice
• Optimal Breathing 101
• Meditation 101

17. What are you hooked to?
Be Indistractable!
• We are living in the attention economy!
• Control app addictions (facebook, instagram, etc)
• Digital Minimalism 101
• Limit input of negative news

18. Abundance Mindset
• Technology turns scarcity into abundance.
Peter Diamandis, Singularity University
• What do you know to be true that others
disagree with you? Peter Thiel

19. Exponential technologies

20. What the world needs
The world’s biggest problems are the biggest business opportunities

21. Who is on your team?
● Best teams have a Business Person and a Technical Person
○ who is going to sell it?
○ who is going to build it?
● Look for partners with complimenting skillsets
○ Big Picture Focus
○ Operational/Organizational Focus
○ Domain Expertise