Moment 46 - A Tribute To Jamal Edwards

00:02From watching your journey as an 18 year old kid that sat in Moss Side in Manchester, watching YouTube and reading articles and things like that, I got to see one, I guess, one dimension of being a successful young entrepreneur. But there's this other dimension, which I think, especially at that time, nobody really talks about. And I think it's probably quite hard for you to articulate the true nature of being a young, successful entrepreneur that had a lot of spotlight and a lot of people talking and really on this wave of sort of youtube um when i was when i was watching you in the day so i guess my question is what are the things about being a young entrepreneur when you came up where you came up that people just don't appreciate or just don't realize i don't know i think just living your life in a public like like and i'm all for making mistakes like and for people to learn from them and and myself learn from them but i think it was a lot of pressure of making sure you're like like the way you dress like all that sort of stuff and it was only to a certain point where people didn't know who I was it was only my local the local people that knew who I was the Google Chrome advert then took me to another like level in terms of like publicity which I was I think

01:11like about 19 really I was just like whoa it's just mad like people come up to me taking pictures people staring at me I was like what is doing before I just get mad anxious I was like and I was like and then like some people like it got to the point of like where people take pictures and that and i'll be like why why are you taking a picture and i didn't understand and then i'd be like what's my name like can i just think what like do you think i'm mistaken do you like is it someone else but most of the time like all the time people's oh jamal come on man like sbtv and i'm like yeah cool so that's the like publicity fame side of um being in the spotlight What about the business side in terms of you were at the center of this super fast growing media platform and you were really an early mover in that space.

02:01I imagine you get brands swarming on you and there's team members and there's this sort of expectation that you have to be the CEO and the founder and know all of the right moves to make. What's that like at a young age? You've got to pay people as well. Yeah, I think I was the youngest boss, if you could say that. Like everyone that I employed was older than me. And it was very daunting for me to be telling people, oh yeah, do it like this, do it like this.

02:26I used to let people sway my decisions because I was like, I've always been taught to respect your elders. So like if I say, let's do a video like this, someone older than me, but I think it's like this. I'd be like, yeah, probably, you know, but I've actually got more experience, but, or like more years on your age. But I had to learn to like sort of take that back and actually do what I wanted to do. but in the early early days it was very daunting like I would never tell people like oh yeah can you do this because I'd be like oh they're just way older than me they're not gonna listen to me I'm like I'm a kid to them do you know what I'm saying and I think I had to overcome that like fear of just people saying but you're this age like what you're doing you can't tell me to do that and I'd say like that and it's not saying that like that people that worked for me was like that but that was just programmed in my head like I used to tell myself that over and over again that was definitely like something I had to overcome.

03:20Because there's like a lot of kids out there that will be thinking, they might be 19 years old, 20 years old, whatever. They'll be thinking, I think I'm too young to start anything or do anything. What would you say from your experience to those kids? Now, especially you can start a business at whatever age. I did pocket money pitch and kids like 11 years old was pitching me a forecast. I was like, what? This is crazy. So I feel like the age now has been lowered I think like when we were in school, entrepreneurship and business wasn't really like co-signed as much as it is now.

03:54And they're seeing people like myself, people like you, other people, like breaking down the barriers. And like, you know what? Actually, enterprise can be done at whatever age it is. And it doesn't matter what background you're from because like people are actually making it happen. That Google advert was massive at the time. Actually, I feel like I remember where I was when I saw it. It was like the first advert of X Factor that year. It was crazy.

04:14I know. I was like sweating. Really? Literally sweating. And I was like, what was it? It was crazy. I got the list of like where it was going. Like it was on Sky Sports. Really? They gave you a list? Yeah, they gave me a list of every like, it was huge. And yeah, like it was like Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber was like my counterparts. I was the one in the UK. And I think the reason why I did well is because like a lot of people related to the story, but it was a surreal moment.

04:40It was a surreal moment. Like it was a surreal moment. One of the things I actually spoke about in the last podcast I did was about race and the topic of race. Here's my kind of opinion. One of the things that I've got to be honest frustrates me a little bit is when minorities, specifically black minorities, because it's the group that I feel like I can identify with the most, fall into the trap of thinking that their race will hold them back. Or even in cases of like, you know, gender or even ageism.

05:14will hold them back because they are black. And it's a young, successful black man like yourself. Do you ever see that? And what's your opinion of it? I used to, but that's the right. I used to think it's because I'm black. Yeah. Yeah. And now, like, I don't think that as much, but that depends upon the people that you hang around with and that you surround yourself with because I surround myself with so many different groups and I like to connect those groups.

05:41so like my upmarket city boys i would connect them to like my state boys and we'd go to like so house for example and they'd all be there and they all get on and they all like fine but everyone seems to make a segregation and i like i think back in the day i used to have that in my head if i never used to get anything it's because i'm black it's because i'm black and then i built my mindset out of that because it was going to keep me trapped if i kept like thinking like that all the time and I just gotta um like I feel like it doesn't like doesn't matter what what race you are um it goes deep it goes deep like it goes deep like obviously the history yeah like that you can see like like black history and you can learn about it and I'm not gonna go into it I I know bits about it and I'm not like I'm not gonna say I'm like a historian or whatever but I know about like the oppression oppression oppression all that but it's like we're in a in a new age and people can say oh what age or race or whatever but it's in your mind to to be the change you want to see in the world that's a Gandhi quote like and I try and make sure that I don't let that affect how I move because otherwise it's not a blame game

07:02yeah you just got to carry on you've got to do it and it's like a self-fulfilling prophecy if you start to believe it right yeah like you manifest do you know what I'm saying why don't you manifest you're going to do something else not manifest that's because I'm black and the reason I didn't get that is because I'm black or it's because I'm young like I remember I used to do that as well like it's because I'm young but then I like ended up employing someone that had 20 years of experience and then me and that person combined got the job do you know what I'm saying so and you just got to think you're in a situation how do you take it and change it that to the way that it can fit you and then build on it and that's what i think frustrates me about it is because i see i see the issue i i know discrimination is a very real thing and i'm not denying that it is i think we're all just we all have our own prejudices yeah you know stereotypes and so but that's not something that i can really change at scale like i can't change the prejudice in people you can change your mindset yeah and i actually think that the prejudice or the belief that i'm being um i'm at a disadvantage because of something

08:05like my skin color that i can't change is more um dangerous or more conducive with me not being successful than the little bit of prejudice that john at that brand might have towards people that look like me so i think the mindset becomes a bigger issue this is a controversial topic of course because you know it's the important nuance is that you know prejudice and discrimination are still very real things yeah 100 but it's it's you you're how you deal with it there's a saying of like people get thrown things at them all the time but it's your reaction that is what makes it whatever it is do you know what i'm saying look at the football football at the moment and and racism for example raheem could turn around running to the crowd and start slapping whoever's being racist but no he deals with it properly like a big man diligently and do you know what saying so it's about how you deal with it definitely talk a second about um figuring out more as you've gotten older what like fulfillment is in life and what like happiness really is yeah do you have that answer um i don't have the answer do you know what it is for yourself do you know what the things are that um for me what makes me happy is being able to um give back i think when

09:16i when earlier like years ago i think money was like a big happiness factor but i've known people that have got serious money and they're not happy. So I feel like me, happiness for me is like being able to give back and improve other people's lives. Like, and I was doing that for years with SB. I'd put artists on and then they'd blow up. And then I'd be like, yes, I've been helped, helped a career. Do you know what I'm saying? And then like after that, it became more about the community of doing the stuff, the youth stuff.

09:48And that like for me is fulfillment. And on the topic of giving back to people, you're opening youth centres back up in London? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've got like four. I was supposed to do one and then I ended up opening four because I just got carried away. They were centres that were closed. Two were like drop-in sessions where young people can come and just somewhere outside of school and outside of your home where you can come and just talk like if you've got problems or whatever.

10:17And we want to try and do a lot of mental health workshops. And then we've got another session which is like music and media which like JBL have kind of like thrown loads of stuff at us Apple have given us loads of stuff where young people can come and learn to produce film anything that you want and then we've got one which is sports which is like for kids that want to do sport and I think the main thing that I want to do with these centres is like we've engaged over 150 kids over the past 13, 14 weeks but it's like if a young person comes to me and says I ask them what do you want to do one was i want to be a lawyer one wants to be a sprinter one wants to be a librarian whatever i would then use my contacts to connect them to that right person so then i'll go speak to like a law firm or i'll go speak to like apple or i'll go speak to the british library and then get that young person in there for work experience whatever and to try and help build their self-belief and confidence because i think that's one of the big things that i didn't have from when i was young i didn't really have the confidence and self-belief because no one used to tell me you could do that, you could do that.

11:21I just sort of like looked at the TV and the newspapers and internet and made up my own mind. But that's one of the big things that I want to try and do for the young people today. What impact did money have when you left Top Man and started making some money? I don't know, people like, you never know, people might be scheming on you. Touch wood, I've never been like robbed or whatever but you just never know. I've had people like say, oh Jamar be careful, like people will kidnap you and whatever and I'm like, because I think like people have that perception of you're making loads of money like in the early days and it wasn't that at all but it was like oh you've got like millions of views you must be making loads of money so I feel like money just brings money brings happiness and sadness I think but in the early days I used to think money was money made the world go around I don't think that anymore they say that when something becomes a job or it becomes like monotonous or like the same every day and also when you get paid to do it, you lose the creative motivation to do it.

12:22That's why you've always got to have oomph moments. I class them as oomph moments, like moments in my career where it just gives me a new oomph for a period of time. So for example, the most recent one was I did a fashion week party at Sir House Greek Street. I saw it. That was an oomph moment. And it was like, we were saying in a group, oh yeah, let's do one for Halloween or let's do another one for Christmas or whatever. But it was like, no, let that marinate.

12:46like that just like you know what I'm saying let it season you know when you put the season in the food just gotta let it get the juices you know what I'm saying like we're and we need to like when we as well as we're our losses and our wins we need to let it sink in because like if you lose like yes dust yourself back up and get back up again but you just need to realise what how did you lose and how can you like not make that same mistake again same thing for your wins like let it get out there and then move on to the next thing and I think like over the years I've always had to have these oomph moments like I did a talk about creating and curation I was a creator at first and then I ended up being a curator and I think one of the like oomph moments was like when I did the social media hub the first ever social media hub at Buckingham Palace where I took a selfie with Prince Harry and Prince William and I think it was from like one of that that moment I was like oomph like that lasted for like months and it's like when we're working you've always got to think of these moments like and I always try to say if I have four moments in a year cool that's good a moment each quarter and then I can have like little moments in between that but it's just

13:55reminding people I'm still here like because I'm like 10 plus years in the game now it's like you always just got to have them sort of moments