Joey Wignarajah is the Managing Partner at 19days, a B2B SaaS (software as a service) venture studio that builds scalable businesses. In his role, he manages the fund operations and helps entrepreneurs rapidly build their operational processes and systems. Through various roles in private equity and as a venture capital advisor, Joey has invested in a wide variety of B2B SaaS companies, helping them grow and operate more efficiently.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- How 19days helps entrepreneurs and businesses solve problems
- 19days’ process for hiring talented entrepreneurs to overcome operational challenges
- Joey Wignarajah shares how 19days finds banks to partner with
- What inspired Joey’s entrepreneurial journey?
- Joey’s early career as an engineer in the US Navy
- Joey details 19days’ investment criteria
In this episode…
When establishing a business, entrepreneurs must consider how to identify and solve operational problems. But, with so many factors involved in growing a company, how can you determine the most efficient strategy for success?
Private equity and venture capital expert Joey Wignarajah suggests partnering with other entrepreneurs or firms to help you manage your affairs. It’s critical to choose ambitious and growth-oriented leaders who can consolidate your processes and maximize your revenue. 19days partners with high-growth banks to monetize their portfolios and build their assets.
In today’s episode of The Same Day Podcast, Mat Zalk speaks with Joey Wignarajah, Managing Partner at 19days, about streamlining entrepreneurial operations. Joey shares what inspired him to become an entrepreneur, how 19days helps entrepreneurs and businesses solve problems, and the company’s strategy for overcoming operational challenges.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
- Mat Zalk on LinkedIn
- Keyrenter Property Management
- Keyrenter Property Management Tulsa
- Keyrenter Property Management Oklahoma City
- Keyrenter Property Management Arkansas
- Keyrenter Property Management email address: [email protected]
- Joey Wignarajah on LinkedIn
- 19days
- Founding Sales: The Early Stage Go-to-Market Handbook by Peter R Kazanjy
- The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod
- The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg
- “Exploring New Possibilities in Entrepreneurship” with Chip Gaberino
- “How To Raise Capital Using a Growth Perspective” with Michael Basch
Sponsor for this episode…
This episode is brought to you by Keyrenter Property Management.
Keyrenter Property Management is a full-service property management company who helps their clients buy, renovate, and operate real estate assets.
They help clients build wealth while taking the headache out of property management.
That’s why, no matter what rental you have — single-family homes, condos, townhomes, or apartments — they can give you the management solutions you need.
To learn more about their services, go to https://keyrenterpmc.com/ or send them an email at [email protected].
Episode Transcript
Intro 0:05
Welcome to The Same Day Podcast where we discuss driving incremental business growth and other topics related to real estate, property management and entrepreneurship. Now to the show at hand.
Mat Zalk 0:20
Mat Zalk I’m the host of The Same Day Podcast where I connect with top business experts and real estate leaders. A couple of past shows where we had some fun guests on we had Chip Gaberino have Topeca Coffee that Vondell Burns a Thankless Production we had Aaron Miller of In Tulsa talking about all the great work that in Tulsa is doing to promote the entrepreneurial scene here in Tulsa. DARREN WALKER is a local real estate in local real estate expert focusing on industrial properties. He’s doing some some cool stuff too. So go back and check out those episodes. If you are interested in any of that. Today’s episode is brought to you by Keyrenter Property Management Keyrenter Property Management. We’re a full service property management company helping our clients buy, renovate and operate real estate assets. We help our clients build wealth while taking the headache out of property management. Joe, you don’t know this. But in the summer of 2021, we had a client out of Colorado drop a non performing 64 unit single family scattered site portfolio onto us. He was like boom, manage this. And I was like oh my god. So I drove the properties. And they were like 25 vacancies I think he didn’t he thought there were seven there were 20 fives over the first four months we renovated and leased 2425 homes brought the portfolio back to life fixed the deferred maintenance issues of which there were a ton put on a bunch of roofs and fixed plumbing, nightmares and then we renewed leases, signed new leases, etc. So the point is, it was it was a rough summer. It wasn’t as hot as this summer. So it was it was better to do it last summer than the summer but it was running around and we ended up hiring Seth rice who’s our general contractor because I was like I cannot handle all of this anyways. Doesn’t matter what rental you have a single family home or a huge portfolio of Macondo Townhome Apartments we have the management solutions you need go to keyrenterpmc.com or email us at [email protected] huge a huge shout out to Mike Basch who again like he’s always he’s even though he’s been on this podcast and he’s and he’s been he’s been on once he’s like always on this podcast because everybody in Tulsa knows Mike Basch when I’m like how do we know each other he’s you know, essentially all roads lead back to Mike Basch.
Joey Wignarajah 2:21
I’ve never seen anything like it. No.
Mat Zalk 2:24
And I was joking today by the way that he we had a friend in town when he used to live in like the lofts above 36 degrees north there was a neighbor of his Josh Coburn from Australia who was working on a product to do that like sticky things on the shower so you can put your soap in and your razor and actually still use a bunch of new great products. But he had when every time Josh would go out of town to do a sales meeting or anything else Mike could be like, Hey, can I borrow your apartment? I’ve got people coming in town I need them to stay somewhere and Josh is get frustrated because he always felt like his his apartment was a hotel. But now I was talking to no blacker this morning actually over breakfast and no one was talking about attend to being the new like the new social space downtown because everybody’s like hosting events there because it’s such a great space and I’m like Mike’s always it doesn’t matter. He takes a lot he requires a lot he asks a lot but he gives back way more than he takes which is just a funny I’ve never met somebody like Mike anyways, Mike didn’t originally introduced this. My father in law David Foster actually originally introduced us you were in private equity and my father in law was like shopping me around my first week in Tulsa because I think he just wanted me to stop living in his back in his above his garage and the apartment of his garage and make sure that his daughter was taken care of. Little did he knew I had plans in store but he was like shopping me around all sorts of institutions around town just I guess, kind of networking stuff. So that’s originally how we met a couple of minutes I’ve been in touch ever since. But I will say shout out to my dad for introducing my father in law for introducing us and shout out to Mike Basch for for being the ultimate connector in the fair city of Tulsa Oklahoma. Anyways, Joey Joey Wignarajah is an amazing human being managing partner at 19days. We’re gonna get into that Mr. studio here in Tulsa. He started business working as a private equity operator, a consultant in strategic planning at the Pentagon. He was an officer in the US Navy with tours in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Baghdad. Wow. I don’t know why the navies in Baghdad. I want to hear about that too. Like the Navy since there’s no I guess. Anyways, he’s got a Master’s in Public Policy from Harvard MBA from MIT and a Bachelor’s in Computer Engineering from Tulane. What an amazing human being a crazy resume.
Joey Wignarajah 4:35
A lot of professional add some grabbing story.
Mat Zalk 4:41
Yeah. I love it. That’s what we’re here to do. But the very first thing is welcome to the show. I’m happy that you’re here.
Joey Wignarajah 4:46
Thanks. Thanks for having me.
Mat Zalk 4:49
The big thing that you and I are connecting on right now is 19days. Tell us about tell us about 19days what it does. Why What does 19days mean? And and what the ultimate goal is? And then we’ll work our way backwards into the into into Baghdad.
Joey Wignarajah 5:02
Sure. Yeah. So 19days is a new venture studio, we launched to go in search of high value problems in any industry that we can solve by building incredibly badass b2b SaaS businesses, right? So we go, we go probe industries, we find high value problems by working with potential customers. And we build just amazing software that people like to use to solve them, go find an operator with expertise to can grow the business and build a whole company around it, ultimately, with the goal of building those businesses to $5 million in recurring revenue and finding an exit.
Mat Zalk 5:03
So here’s, here’s my perspective on what’s going on. The the challenge is, there’s a ton of people that want to be entrepreneurs, and you hear a couple of different things you hear some people go, I just can’t find an idea that I can actually execute on, I want to be an entrepreneur, I want to go start a business, I want to be my own boss, and I want to have, I want to be responsible for the livelihood of other people in my world, my ecosystem, whatever else and I can’t find an idea. And to those people who say, open a franchise business, go be a plumber, you can, there’s a lot of ways that you can actually solve people’s problems and have a business without needing a grand idea. And then there’s the other people that are like, have have a million ideas. And I’ve got a friend who spent time with him in Colorado, and he’s got like, crazy ideas and patents, but he’s never been able to execute on any of them, because he’s not an execution list. And he doesn’t have that he can’t put like one after the other. It’s a different skill set. And you’re like bonding those two things. I mean, you’re this is the like, 19days is the essence of entrepreneurship. In my mind, it’s like, let’s find a problem that’s that is that we can solve with relative ease, right? I mean, we have to be able to put some technology together and some marketing put together, you know, all the pieces, but then scaled relatively quickly. So we can get to a bunch of million dollars in revenues. And then find the operations piece that goes through it, and do it again and again. And again. So you’re taking the heart of execution and the heart of ideas and bonding them and then doing it over and over and over. I don’t know of a more entrepreneurial, like endeavor than that.
Joey Wignarajah 5:44
Well, look, I mean, if you look at my own story, I mean, I was an employee until I left private equity, to start a medical waste company. And that was my inspiration. It wasn’t even my inspiration. It was my brother in law, who saw a market opportunity. And it was one I knew that I could go execute on it had a financial peace and to raise some capital had to build a building, which I did in the Navy. And so you put all those skills together with something I could go do. I’m pumped to have had that opportunity. But I waited my whole life to be struck by someone else’s inspiration. And what I realized is, there’s problems everywhere. And if you can go clearly define the pain that customers are having, you can build solutions, right. And the only reason that sounds that part sounds super easy, because my two partners, Jacob Johnson, and Dan Fisher, who founded get with a 50 person company that does all things digital, but we’re where they really win is in this discovery piece where they know how to find high value problems. And then they know how to create validate solutions. And then operational execution is all I’ve been doing my whole career. So you put those two skill sets together. And we think we can do this over and over and over again.
Mat Zalk 7:05
Yeah. So tell me about the first problem that you guys have had been working on? What do you what do you solve it?
Joey Wignarajah 8:17
Yeah, so the the first, the first venture that we’re we’re building hopefully, they have been codenamed deal docs until now.
Mat Zalk 8:27
Is that it’s actually not that it’s not that that’s not that, like, covert. I have a good name.
Joey Wignarajah 8:33
Yeah, no, we’re just we picked it for the sake of you know, the way one of the ways we validate, I’ll tell you about the product. It’s like, what do we validate that we really have something as we make fake pitch decks and we go sell, what are the things that entrepreneurs are a little bit afraid to do is to go start talking to customers before they feel like their thing is perfect. And we think you just got to get out there and take it on the chin If you want real feedback. So our first thing is our first venture is in commercial banking, right? An incredible space. Tulsa is an incredibly competitive market for commercial banking. Some of the, I think three out of the top 200 Commercial Industrial portfolios or bank are held by banks here in Tulsa. And what we did is we set out to say, how can we help commercial bankers, close more deals? And so we went out and I think at this point, we’ve probably talked to 50 to 60 bankers, loan assistance bank presidents, board members, loan ops people, compliance people, and hundreds of hours of interviews to find out that the messiest part is right up front. When you’re trying to get all your documents to the bank. Everybody hates it, everybody does it, because it’s a necessary evil. We believe it’s something that we can solve, and then move outward and solve a lot of other problems for banks from there. So we studied that problem for the first first probably call it five months of the year, six months and had just hit go on building the product because we feel like we’ve gotten a lot of Positive validation. And so to your point, what you asked me about before, the reason why we call this thing 19days, is because Albert Einstein said, If you give me 20 days to solve a problem, I take 19 defining it from when they’re solving it, right? And that’s what we do here, we focus heavily on problems.
Mat Zalk 10:17
So what’s, what’s the idea? Now you’ve solved the problem? Sorry, you’ve identified the problem. You’ve you’ve defined it, you’re working on actually like launching a product or developing the product? And then when are you going to start defining the next problem that you want to solve? Is that Is that right? Narrow, or is that in parallel,
Joey Wignarajah 10:33
so the goal is to do two to a year, so one approximately every six months, this one being sort of the first cycle soup to nuts has taken a little longer, we’re not, we’re not too far behind. But we’re currently running the process to pick the next venture. While we build the product. For the first venture while we recruit the operator to run the first venture, while we’re out talking to customers, and T and M up. And so it’s wildly busy. But we believe that we want to be experts in taking companies from zero to one, and then let our CEOs take them. So where they need to go,
Mat Zalk 11:09
not only are you like, you’re an entrepreneur building product, defining defining problems, building the product, but then you have to hire another entrepreneur, to like, actually run the company once you’ve got a proof of concept and some initial revenue. And that’s, I mean, that’s the that could be maybe one of the hardest parts. I mean, we’re we I’m gonna yo with a bunch of our mutual friends. And, you know, oftentimes we get on, you know, I’m on the board this year, and I’m trying to convince or cajole other people that have relatively large businesses to do things for free, using their spare time to help us grow the organization, which is mutually beneficial to all of our members. But it’s hard. It’s like you’re trying to it’s an entrepreneur trying to convince an entrepreneur to do something that he probably or she probably doesn’t want to do. That’s the hardest part. So like hiring somebody else in your entrepreneurial organization, and like, keeping the injection of entrepreneurial spirit is just as might be the hardest challenge around.
Joey Wignarajah 12:01
Oh, yeah. Well, the biggest misconception is you know about entrepreneurship is there’s no free time. Right? It’s like, just what have you decided not to do so we can make some pretty time burning? Yeah. So but well, what I’ll say is, yeah, I think it’s extraordinarily challenging to go find that right person, we have a pretty strong thesis about who we’re looking for. And, honestly, everything. We’re building, an engine that builds companies. So everything is a process, everything is clearly defined, everything’s an experiment, and everything gets tested. And if it doesn’t work, it gets adjusted. So one thing we’re pretty pumped about is we are beginning a partnership with Hogan assessments to help create a profile for who will be successful. But there was one thing that Mr. Hogan told us he said, In the beginning, it’s most important, it’s not so important to find the exact right perfect person. He said, just don’t find the wrong one. Yeah. What do you do? He kind of turned it on its head a little bit.
Mat Zalk 13:02
How do you avoid finding the wrong person through the assessment, presumably, but then, like, what actually definite?
Joey Wignarajah 13:08
And then you know, what, actually, well, I’ll say is a little bit challenging is about this is our we want to find growth focused operators. So people who have led sales teams who can focus on top line revenue growth, because we have all of the capabilities in the studio to help them with everything. Right. The challenge is, if you’ve ever hired a salesperson, the thing they sell better than anything is themselves. And I’ve never interviewed a salesperson that I didn’t think was amazing. So, so that’s the real scary part about it. Right?
Mat Zalk 13:41
Yeah. I mean, the other thing is it’s actually speaking of deal docs and banking I mean, the your sales guy has to be constrained at some level oftentimes, I’ve got to have my you know, top salespeople in the next room doing some training right now and I always find you and it’s on on my team is like, he’s there’s in our leadership team and our level level we run on EOS and our level 10 meetings that are always when we discuss definitely IDs stuff that are that are sales focused. It’s like me and Yan it’s on on one side. And then Robert and Chris, who are operator guys, on the other side, it’s like the risk committee and the and the sales guys in the bank. We’re like, let’s go let’s go in the operations guys, the risk committees like No, no, no, hold on, hold on, and think about all the things that could go wrong and how this might affect operations, whatever else, like sales guys just want to go in sometimes they’re going after the wrong things. Sometimes it’s not, it’s not a, you know, in our business, not a profitable portfolio of properties to manage. So you gotta you gotta have, you know, the salespeople also have to have some, you know, downside mitigation or some some way of assessing what what they shouldn’t be going after?
Joey Wignarajah 14:37
Well, so much of what they’re going to go after is what what you’ve designed into their incentive plan, because the same way that water will find a crack in something and salesperson will find the lowest energy way to maximize their commission. So if you only incentivize them on revenue, they will sign up revenue and you have a loser.
Mat Zalk 14:56
Yeah, I’m losing money on every unit, but I’m making it up in more I don’t know what it is that losing money on everything, but I’m making it up in volume.
Joey Wignarajah 15:02
All you’re doing is multiplying our losses. But yeah, yeah. So it’s wild. And so you don’t normally what I what I’ve said to most salespeople that I’ve hired or or interviewed indirectly or whatever is I reserve the right to review the plan quarterly. Yeah. And it’ll be a partnership, and we’ll change it. But I don’t know what’s gonna work or not work until you get in there. And you start.
Mat Zalk 15:25
Yeah. So you’ve defined the problem on the commercial banking side, you’re you’re developing product, what’s your next step? I mean, who are you going after who you can who your beta test partner is going to be or however you define that.
Joey Wignarajah 15:36
So like I said, we I mean, we’ve talked to dozens and dozens of banks have been really, really pumped, we’ve had some really positive feedback from from banks that I view is sort of really looking forward to the future of banking, like, you know, bank first, is thinking heavily about what their borrower experiences like. Because they recognize that will set them apart in the future. regional bank has been growing wildly, I think, you know, the way I understand it, one of the fastest if not the fastest growing bank in America for like, the last five or six years,
Mat Zalk 16:12
wow, what’s driving what’s propelling that growth for them?
Joey Wignarajah 16:15
I, you know, I without say that I’ve been ever been in a deeply, but the way that I understand it from Sean Copeland is, I feel like he has really figured out how to build teams in the bank, that wildly strong culture. So here’s these really strong, highly productive individual teams that are all working with in a very strong, productive culture. And they’re growing like wildfire. And inside that, I don’t know if you saw in the little Little League World Series that young man get hit in the face with a baseball, bat video, no. Sounds Oh, pitcher hits. So Shawn is coaching that team, pitcher throws the ball hits the young and the face, he takes a fine takes his base, the pitcher is visibly shook from the rough. And so the player that got hit in the face, walks off first face to the mound, and gives the guy a hug and says, hey, it’s fine. Like everything’s okay. And so it’s really interesting. You’ve got a guy like Sean Copeland leading regional bank, who, when I saw that video gave me chills, because he’s out there raising young men, not just baseball players. That’s an aside, but but that story. Yeah, that’s the nature of the bank. And that’s why it’s grown like wildfire. And then that hasn’t haven’t had any conversations here. But But I really excited about one that we have coming up with a bank with spread bank. They’re super innovative. They’re super well known for being innovative. So hopefully, we can go get them excited about what we’re doing. Yeah. Hello, yeah, I love it. The banks in Oklahoma have been awesome
Mat Zalk 17:49
deal docs. It’s a not so covert name for a commercial. That doesn’t really fit those things together. Right. Deal box, I love it. Tell us something like what what inspired you so you were working in private equity, you were not an entrepreneur, you’re working on a W two day job.
Joey Wignarajah 18:07
I was entrepreneur adjacent. I was helping people. But as an operator, my job was to sit on the boards and then help help people help people grow their companies and things like that.
Mat Zalk 18:21
I mean, were those people inspiring to you? Were they were they the, you know, did you feel at the time, like, yeah, I I, you know, I want to be an entrepreneur, are you happy kind of coasting along not coast to coast? Like, were you happy cruising along with them on their entrepreneurial journey journey and providing guidance and structure? I mean, because oftentimes, entrepreneurs lack they’re great at so many things, but they lacked the structure that’s necessary. And I’ve got Robert here in my office who’s provides the framework and the structure so that I can go out and you know, think crazy things.
Joey Wignarajah 18:49
Yeah, I mean, we invest in a lot of really great companies, but energy services, industrials, aerospace. And these are most of the entrepreneurs were people who had started these businesses from nothing. You know, one of our best investments was a midstream pipeline company. I think, you know, father and son bought it with, I mean, I think, I think maybe it was just the oil and gas wells or something like converted into, I think a peak like a $500 million revenue pipeline construction company. When we invested, the father is the, the grandfather, the father and the father was ready to sort of move the Son into the driver’s seat. So it felt like he wanted some more supports around them. So we went in and supported him. Hard not to be inspired by the people who built these amazing companies that hire you know, that employs 1000s of people in here. You know, one in New Mexico I worked a lot with a guy just realized he could do more work out on the west side, if he just made better trucks and he started welding things with trucks and cranes and running wasn’t all these things and all of a sudden he started getting a ton of work and built it from nothing. You know, in Oregon, I think so Steve Mitchell hired me I had I mean, frankly, other than being an intern hadn’t worked a day in a private business. And he said to me, no kidding, I don’t think you know all that much about business. But you seem decently smart, I think you’ll figure it out. And he hired me to be his first operations vice president. So learning it, Argonaut, learning how all these businesses work across different industry, software, hardware technology, that was incredible for me, but I just got to a point where I was starting to see a lot of the same issues and companies over and over again, and sort of got the itch to try something on my own. And that’s, that’s when it was time to step out.
Mat Zalk 20:43
And like, did you have any major fears going out into onto your own, you know, you’re present, your brother in law had this idea and he inspires you to do this to take a step into the medical transport, medical waste transport business, I mean, we’re taking that first, going out of a cush salary in a relatively stable environment into the entrepreneurial journey is tough. And I said all the time, because partners when I started my professional career at McKinsey, which follows the Steve Mitchell model of like, just hire smart people and put them in, they’ll figure it out. But it gets you to a point where you got these golden handcuffs, not only as a business card, pretty impressive. You have, you know, an expense account and your you know, your premiums or whatever, you’re eating a lot of steak and sushi and riddles. But you like at some point, you’re a senior partner, you’ve been there 15 years, and you’re making five $10 million a year and for your opportunity cost to leave that cush position, even if you’re not happy there is pretty pretty high as you know, whatever. So to take that entrepreneurial journey from being in a nice, you know, salary with a stable position is hard. Yeah, I’ll say.
Joey Wignarajah 21:42
Honestly, the first three days, I was like, What did I just do? Right? Yeah, but I’ll say, I mean, because Steve is incredibly generous. He paid me well made sure that I was traveling 90% of the time, sometimes three cities a week. And I’ve ever just a testament to the kind of guy he is he’s like, Look, if you’re, if you’re exercising, and you’re trying to be in shape and, and you want to eat two chicken breasts, and the restaurant will give them to you order two entrees. He’s like, I don’t care. Do what you have to do to be healthy, right? It’s a good pay for gyms daily, whatever you need to do to be to feel good. So incredibly generous guy. And I could have just stayed there, right? Yeah, I could have stayed there. Fortunately, the flipside is, because I was on the road all the time. My my personal expenses never really grew with my income. So I was pretty conservative in what I spent just because when you’re only in town two or three days a week, you can’t possibly sure didn’t have a house. Didn’t have family to worry about. So the first math I did is how much do I spend a year? And how long can I be without a job and it turned out like five years. So that’s point number one. Number two is no doubt in my mind, if I went back on my hands and knees crawling, and Steve was taking me back, I might have taken a little bit of a haircut on income or something just because the guy loves a good deal. But it’s a little a little safety net there. Yeah, you know, I’m really thankful for that. I tell him that all the time.
Mat Zalk 23:05
I mean, that’s a that’s a big deal. But put your point one, though, I mean, that’s a critical lesson in business. How much money do you have in the bank? And how much runway do you have to kind of develop your product until you get your first sale? That’s a big, big, that’s a big, big lesson. Tell us a little bit about I want to hear about your US Navy experience. I mean, once on him obey, which I told you I’ve been I was on the Cuban side of that. I begged. You can’t get up. I don’t know if you know this, because you’re on the Cuban you’re on the American side of the of the baseball. When was that? What year was that? 2006. So I was on the other side of that fence. 1006 I was this this? This is February, I took the LSAT. I think I was living in my grandparents in Florida, I took a little bit of time off of schools in Santa Barbara with my grandparents, I took the LSAT and then I went with my dad for two weeks and he left after that and I stayed for another two weeks, I took a motorcycle, basically from one of the southern towns Trinidad or CMP ghosts or something and I wrote a motorcycle around to Baracoa. And on the on the on that journey you pass Guantanamo. But you can’t go up the mountain on the Cuban side without like a permit from the Cuban government, which requires being a tour or whatever else. So I slept outside of the town of Guantanamo, which is actually a town on the human side, obviously, and and under at the police station under a mango tree until the next day when there was a bus that was coming. And I had a chance to like beg them to let me come on the bus with them. So I could go see the thing. You know, you go up this mountain and then you end you have an overlook of the actual naval base. So I did it that way. Which was for sure a unique experience. But at that time, I was 100%. In February. I was there on the other side of that. I love it. I might. I might have seen you drive it around in this big Chevy truck. Driving. Yeah.
Joey Wignarajah 23:39
I was down there doing construction. I mean, it was wild. I built everything. Yeah, I help build things in our detention facilities down there. The weirdest thing I built was a go kart track because there’s families down there. So the Navy closed the base and they called and they said hey, we have this go kart track. You want us to ship it down there. So You can put it back together, put together data. And if you Google, if you go deep enough in Google, you can find a photo of me driving a go kart. That’s
Mat Zalk 25:11
what I mean. How do you get that from computer engineering to mean that’s like civil engineering? That’s real engineering. In the physical space? How do you go kart track?
Joey Wignarajah 25:20
Yeah, in the Navy, the civil engineers, for the most part are construction managers doing some small designs, but a lot of the work is really a construction management, public works, management, and then and then sort of combat construction. So in Guantanamo Bay, I was essentially a construction manager. And I’ve spent more than a little bit of time with my dad’s engineering construction company working on construction sites and, and building things so so the Navy can take in train you how to manage contracts and stuff.
Mat Zalk 25:50
So yeah, and so Baghdad, similar stuff. I mean, you’re just you’re you’re handling all the construction of forward operating bases at River.
Joey Wignarajah 25:58
Baghdad a little bit different. It was a little bit