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Welcome to the Stacking Slabs, a podcast for sports cards collectors. There's been a tremendous amount of change to our Hobby over the last few years and the one constant has been the passion from the collecting community. Stacking Slabs is built by the collector and lives to tell stories for the collector.
what's going on everybody welcome back to another episode of hobbyjobs here on the stacking slabs network i am brett excited to be here you have seen a lot of hobbyjobs episodes in the feed this week we are excited to be sharing conversations that we had with individuals at the national individuals building cool things that's the best part about hobby jobs telling the stories behind the businesses telling showing the people behind the businesses it is motivating and it's something that i certainly have a lot of passion for as a business builder in this space today we are joined by Danny Mosse of collect talent she's gonna be talking about her career experience and the build of a new platform to help individuals in the industry find open roles and help businesses in the industry fill those roles really good conversation we had that at the card letter booth excited to share that at the end today i wanna talk about building before the validation arrives i think most people do not have an idea problem they have a permission problem they see the gap in the market they hear the same frustration in conversation after conversation they know they have experience to help but before they move they look around and ask one question has somebody else already proven this works if the answer is no they wait then somebody else builds it the the market responds the idea becomes safe and suddenly everybody wants in that pattern shows up across the sports card industry collectors chase a card after they see someone else buying it creators adopt a format after they see someone else do it and it gained traction businesses add a service after competition proves collectors will pay for it we look to the market for evidence before we give our selves permission to act the problem is that by the time the evidence becomes obvious the opportunity to build something distinct has started to disappear today i wanna talk about what it means to build before validation arrives not to make a reckless bet not to ignore the market not to confuse passion with demand i wanna talk about how strong operators develop enough conviction to act early create something useful and let real behavior determine what happens next then we're gonna get into the conversation i had with danny danny's spent her entire career in the auction space sotheby's christie's golden ebay she's now building collect talent her work sits inside one of the biggest gaps in this business the hobbyist people who want careers it has companies that need talent what it has lacked is enough infrastructure to connect those two groups that makes danny the right person for this conversation before we get there let's start with this week's operator note validation and permission aren't the same thing validation is evidence it tells you whether a problem is real whether your solution helps and whether somebody cares enough to return refer another person change a decision or pay permission is emotional it is the comfort we get from watching someone else take the risk first strong operators need validation they don't need permission that distinction matters because the sports card industry rewards imitation the market gives us visible feedback we can see which cards sell we can see which videos perform we can see which businesses raise money add customers and expand studying those signals is part of being a responsible operator but observation becomes a problem when it replaces judgment if the only reason you are building something something is because another person proved it can work you're starting with borrowed conviction borrowed conviction is fragile it works while the numbers move up it disappears when growth is slow the market turns on you or the original operator moves on to something else then you're left with a business you copied but never really understood that is why so many parts of the industry starts to look the same the same content formats the same cards receiving attention the same services competing for the same customer the same conversations moving around in circles the answer is not to be different for the sake of being different that creates a different problem sometimes nobody is serving a market because nobody wants the service an empty market is not proof of an opportunity it is only an unanswered question the operator's job is to answer that question without spending more time money or trust than the evidence supports this is where research on entrepreneurship helps sarah savathy at the university of virginia studied how experienced entrepreneurs make decisions under uncertainty her research started with thirty entrepreneurial ceos and led to a framework called infestation the core idea of this conversation expert entrepreneurs do not always begin by predicting which market will become large they begin with what they already control who they are what they know who they know then they ask what they can build from that starting point they also think in terms of affordable loss instead of making one large bet based on a forecast they decide what amount of time money and reputation they are willing to risk on the next step they act they bring other people into the process they learn from the commitments those people make then the opportunity takes shape through action that is the important correction to the phrase build before validation it does not mean bet the mortgage on an untested idea it means build the smallest useful version before the market gives you certainty use what you know control the downside create a chance for real people to respond then pay attention to what they do this is close to how stacking slabs began when i started the podcast i did not see much content exploring the psychology of collecting there was plenty of conversations about what was released what sold what increased in value and what somebody should buy next i kept coming back to a different set of questions why does one card stay in your mind for years why do you sell a card and regret it when the package arrives why does completing a set feel different from buying a card with a higher price why can a smaller collection feel more meaningful than a larger one those types of questions matter to me because my background sat at the intersection of marketing human behavior storytelling and collecting that combination was my operator advantage i did not know how large the audience would become i knew the questions were worth asking so i started to ask them the early episodes became the test collectors listening became the evidence the conversations relationships and opportunities that follow were not proof that i had predicted the market they were proof that consistent action had surfaced in need and that difference mattered conviction got the work started evidence determined whether i kept investing and the mission stayed steady while the execution changed that is how conviction should work it should keep you moving long enough to learn it should never make you immune to what the market is teaching you if nobody uses what you create you need to listen if people care about the problem but your solution misses you need to change the solution if the same people return ask better questions share the work and request more you have earned the right to take the next step conviction gets you moving evidence earns the next investment wanna dig into this week's operator spotlight with my man gabe at gabey card stacks gabe gives us a clear example of what this looks like during our conversation gabe said something that stayed with me i don't see anyone else doing it i might as well be the one he was talking about college football card content college football had become had been part of gabe's life since he was a kid his dad went to arizona state had season tickets saturdays meant games tailgates and time together when twenty twenty one bowman university arrived gabe saw a category he understood he knew the players he knew the programs he understood the schedules fan bases prospect cycles and the attention patterns that shaped demand most important he enjoyed the research very few creators were helping collectors make sense of that category there was little infrastructure around it and the absence alone did not make it a good idea the stronger signal was that college football collectors already existed and wanted better information the passion was there the support system was missing gabe started filling that gap he showed people what he found in value boxes he explained why one player interested him he compared talent programs prices and opportunity he helped collectors understand why a nine dollar autograph deserved attention when similar players were selling for twenty or thirty dollars that was not generic football talk attached to cards it was category knowledge collectors could use the expertise became content he opened up a patreon group to go deeper he's got a discord which gave collectors a place to exchange information with people that cared about college football he was not waiting for an employer to write a college football card job description he was doing the work before the job existed then ryan johnson card collector two noticed gabe's knowledge created a conversation the conversation created a relationship the relationship created chances for gabe to help with player evaluation pricing and college inventory eventually the demonstrated value became a career opportunity gabe moved his family from arizona to ohio and joined the card collector two team it is tempting to reduce this story to one sentence gabe followed his passion and landed a job in the hobby that version is incomplete passion did not create the opportunity by itself gabe turned his passion into expertise he turned that expertise into useful work he shared the work long enough for people to trust it the profession came after the proof he did not receive the title and then become valuable he became valuable before the title arrived that's the lesson if you want a career in the industry do not wait for somebody to give you a role give you a role before you begin showing what you can do build a body of evidence solve a real problem make your knowledge useful to somebody else if you wanna hear that conversation i had with gabe it was on passionate profession it is in the feed you can check it out this week the operator resource that we put in the newsletter this week was the empty space test it is designed to help you separate an underserved market from an empty one start with a person complete this sentence i want to help blank who struggle to blank because they currently lack blank sports card collectors is too broad college football collectors who lack reliable prospecting and pricing information gives you something you can investigate next name the unresolved problem what are people forced to figure out on their own what information remains trapped inside private conversations what process creates repeated confusion what existing solution feels incomplete what do people care about that the market barely acknowledges the absence of competition is not evidence of demand the presence of a repeated unresolved problem is a stronger signal then audit your operator advantage what category knowledge do you have what professional experience do you have what relationships have you built what subject can you hold your attention after the first wave of excitement wears off what can you execute better than the average person the advantage often sits inside the combination gabe combined college football card knowledge card expertise research and communication stacking slabs combined marketing psychology storytelling and collecting your individual skills do not need to be rare they the way they fit together needs to give you credibility a credible way to help then create the smallest useful version not a logo not a full website not a year of inventory create one useful thing a weekly piece of educational content a research report a collector guide a small community free consultation a manual version of the service you want to build put it in front of real people and watch what they do compliments feel good but they're weak evidence look for the behavior do people return do they ask specific follow-up questions do they share the work without being asked do they introduce you to somebody with the same problem does your work change a decision does anybody ask whether they can pay for more help attention tells you the idea is interesting behavior tells you the work has value if you want to make this practical run a thirty day conviction sprint during the first week speak with five people you want to serve ask what they do now where they struggle and where they have tried during the second week publish three useful pieces of content that address what you've heard during the third week offer one small manual solution help a person before you automate the work during the fourth week review the evidence did the same problem appear more than once did people use it use what you made did anyone return refer someone or request more did working on the problem deepen your interest can you stay committed if the response remains slow if the market stays indifferent change the idea if the problem is real but the solution miss misses change the execution if the problem repeats your advantage is credible and the people keep engaging keep building the final question is the hardest one am i pursuing this because i understand an overlooked problem or because being different makes the idea feel important conviction should help you move before the validation arrives evidence should decide whether you continue or not this is the mindset methodology i'd used in my career working in technology it is something that i've applied to things that i build and create here in the sports card industry with stacking slabs the hobby job i wanna spotlight this week is content creator at layton sports cards i selected this one because it connects directly to gabe's story in the larger theme of this episode content is often the first interaction between a collector and a hobby business that means the role is not limited to cutting clips or following trends the person in the seat needs to turn live breaks new products events customer interactions and the people behind the company into stories collectors can understand the work needs to answer a business question why should a collector care about layton when they're not ready to make a purchase today that requires more than comfort on camera it requires judgment you need to know which moment deserves a story you need to understand what a collector finds useful you need to protect trust while working inside a business designed to sell you need to create resources for people to return even when they're not buying if you're interested in this role do not let your application carry the entire burden show the work create a sample product explainer turn a one page break into a short story with a beginning decision and an outcome build a three part series around a collector question layton is positioned to answer the job descriptions are everything all the information is there turn it into something useful demonstrate that you understand content as a trust building system not just a pile of posts you do not need to wait for the title to begin proving you can do the job today's guest Danny Mosse cofounder of collect talent brings fifteen years of experience across sotheby's christie's golden and ebay before founding collectibles advisory and launching collect talent she served as the global head of the ebay vault where she led the vault's launch and oversaw its acquisition by psa collect talent is building a job board and a networking platform for the wider collecting industry the premise is important companies do not companies do not only need people with functional skills they need people who understand the category the customer and the culture around the objects being bought and sold at the same time passion does not make someone ready for the role collect talent is trying to connect both sides professional ability and real category knowledge danny and i sat down at the national to discuss her career in the hobby what she has learned from working across the collectibles businesses and why she decided to launch collect talent here's my conversation with danny Mosse
alright we are back with another conversation here on hobbyjobs got a chance to meet today's guest a couple weeks ago in new york at fanatics fest and our second conversation in person is happening right now at the national Danny is a builder in this space she just launched a new platform collect talent an awesome career in collectibles and i wanna get into that and talk about it welcome how has this national experience been for you so far are you feeling the energy or is it kinda suck the energy out of you like where are you at right now no i love going to the national especially first off it's seeing getting the opportunity to see people again is just so wonderful and also sort of the evolution for me take for example when i was at ebay like a couple years ago we it was live commerce was a part of it but it was maybe a third of the booth right and now when you go to ebay live commerce just has become such a poor heartbeat and not just for ebay but for you know other areas of the national it's just really fun to kinda see the evolution of how businesses have changed and how collectors and fandom and have the alt changed over time and what does that look like at a forum that's as big as the national so you have a very unique path in this space and i think it's very rare i connect with a lot of people see where people work usually there's one stop at a company that that supports collectors maybe there's two like you've built your career on the back of working for companies that support collectors like i think it'd be interesting to maybe understand like how did this come to be like how did you get into this mind set that like this is the space that you wanted to build your career in and how did you go about doing it yeah it's a great question and if we go sort of way back all the way back to sort of family origin the idea of an object or someone loving something and that being transformative comes all the way back to my childhood my great grandfather was a was an artist he did anti war propaganda during world war two that's how my family ended up having to leave europe and ended up in the united states and this idea that art or a collectible or an object just means so much to people and have such a resonating value and be cared about really just identified with me from childhood then strong convictions loosely held i always joke that like i had such a passion for collecting and for art and all these spaces but more of a business mind i was an art history and economics double major in college i was interning at museums and luxury companies where you know their their high value jewelry and watches were major collector items and and i got my master's degree in art business and ended up at sotheby's and i lucked out with this sotheby's role that was the rollout of wholesale services and i was working person in new york and sotheby's new york after the auctions they come downstairs straight from that auction they pay and kick up because they plain and simple cannot wait one more second not to have that item in their collection so when you're winning these amazing collectors not dissimilar to trading cards cards being at the national they are losing it they are so happy that they that this i this book this treasure this grail for them is now theirs and that level of joy and witnessing it firsthand and i remember the sale i remember the the the the advisors and the collectors and like the amazing people that were there and i remember thinking i'm gonna be doing this for the rest of my life i am sold and that really just working building things for collectors helping make collectors' lives better helping them like pursue what they love just became the narrative of my career and i've had the pleasure because i am a builder and because i've had amazing people help me along the way that i've gotten to do that in a lot of different categories and do that at amazing companies throughout my career but it really was that and it still is today is how do i help these collectors find their joy like find what they love and if i can build a tool or a product anything that can make that easier i wanna build it i wanna talk about the the product definitely i wanna maybe learn from you across different categories across different companies you have been supporting the collector you've been observing studying the behaviors is is there like is there like what is a common thread that you've you've noticed whether it's book collector card collector memorabilia collector like what is something that is undeniably consistent across all those categories of collectors that interest you or that you think about often so i think there's a lot of the the foundational behaviors are very similar which is and there's a lot of confusion out there where people say oh there's certain collectors that collect because they love it and then there's other collectors that collect because it's an asset and that there's a lot i think you know this as well as anybody most collectors are sort of a confluence of both right when you're spending money you are driven by passion to spend your time i mean your money could go anywhere you have chosenness and that is passion driven but at the same time this is still you have a family you have responsibilities understanding the value and making decisions is a part of it as well and they go hand in hand and that is a very that's a common thread throughout also how things are sort of the mechanics it's really amazing are quite similar in the sense of you know most collecting categories right they have price guide tool their own version of price guide tools they have their own version of community of how do they how do they communicate with each other you know the trading card industry is much more comfortable building community digitally and being very transparent they are world less so but they're very good at you know congregating and having these conversations so community is driven through all of them and then this component of trust you cannot collectors like you cannot have something be a collecting item unless there is trust in what you are what you are buying what you are collecting whereby in every industry there's this same thing as with trading parts and collectibles there's this like beautiful tapestry of appraisers and authenticators and different ways that that gets signaled through so in this really broad scope the mechanics are really similar and then it gets nuanced as you work down but how collectors are able to really follow this passion has very similar stories i love the topic of trust especially in the collectible space i often say like it is the most important asset in this industry whether you're buying selling building a business connecting like trust is very challenging it's hard right it it's not something you can just like flip a switch and say oh i've got trust with this audience and we can sell into them like it takes a lot of work and consistency like you have helped build businesses and functions within this industry over a long period of time like how have you gone about building trust in a way that is genuine and not manufactured like how do you think about that just in your day to day work that you do yeah i think you i think you really do need to start first with like what is the object that you're trying to build trust around and what does it need to what does it need to create that trust as you know when you're talking about memorabilia it has a whole different subset of trust signals some really really challenging and require a lot of like human eye behind them and history and storytelling to build that to build that up and you really truly do need to start with the collector and the object of what signals actually drive that drive that trust instead of just assuming they're all one and the same because they are not and what's interesting is then you can think about trust like is this something that can be scaled for other areas which having worked on the ebay authenticity guarantee program like that was such that is such a loved program because it it just creates so much value for the market and we spent so much time when we were working on that revolt of really making sure that we were covering all the components and getting through all the information of what buyers and sellers and the collecting world really needed to transfer to each other so to me i think you really have to start there's so many different ways that trust comes through but if you are not starting first with what is this collecting item and what for the collectors and what do they need to actually to actually make this happen like you're nowhere you you really have to honor and respect what you're working with i don't think it's always been this way certainly as a collector of collections my whole life but collecting is certainly cool like look at everyone out here like the there's gonna be hundreds of thousands of people circling through here and you and i connected through a common interest in trying to provide information for collectors who love this space so much or love other spaces so much that they wanna work in the space so i remember like us interacting me reading your content and being like okay like she's sees a similar problem that i see and that's like providing people in this space advice on how to work for companies in this space because there's no blueprint before we get into collect talent i'm just interested in like where did this come from from you obviously like you have a rich career of working for companies that support collectors but where did the inspiration to build something for collectors to work in the the industry come from well first off my inspiration for building like building infrastructure building trust i mean that's been what i have had the wonderful opportunity to do for most of my career so starting with sotheby's and you know integrating payments checkout and shipping because before that buyers would purchase and they sort of say okay you're on your own go sort go sort out your shipping and so having that launch being able to bring on payment platforms and all these things to support buyers and sellers was really amazing and then at christie's we worked on price guide tools and all of these different tools to communicate value to the sellers and then chris we also did like an internal livestream when i was covering the asian art departments because it was covid and all of our buyers couldn't come over so we needed an internal livestream to help support these sales and quite frankly give buyers access to also like mandarin speaking home bidders so a lot of these and then ebay vault being really about how do you create value in for a collector so the inspiration of all this i'm always looking for how can in our industry how can we get information to collectors not necessarily to disrupt the industry but to enable it to grow and there's so and i know you feel the same way that i do that there's there's so many people out there that are so fascinated by what we do and the collectibles industry but be it through content or we launched a tool called collector calculator dot com which helps people understand net returns or now with collect talent where you can discover talent it's just really helping people have an on ramp so collect talent which is our is the job board job and networking hub for the collecting industry which bobby eaton and i just launched that really stems from me navigating my own career and feeling like there just wasn't a way to signal hey i'm an operator in this space but i am so die hard passionate about supporting collectors and here's all the categories i've worked with like there was no place that supported that way for me to signal to the market and then on the hiring side which bobby has lived you know just because i've lived it as a revenue leader bobby has lived it as coo like probably a hundred times over is when you're looking for people with expertise be it as a part time job an appraiser or a full time expert or someone in operations that you wanna just be really passionate about your category you have nowhere to find them and so this really came from the fact that i feel so strongly that our industry is so robust there's so much opportunity there's so many ways that you can build a lasting wonderful career but are we actually you know putting aside the work that you're doing and i'm doing and some others are doing are we actually banging the drum enough to make people aware of that no i don't think we are at the moment and it's a gap because it means that we're not able to bring on as much talent as we want and people have to think of collecting as a side hustle when it doesn't have to be so that's where collect talent was sort of inspired by and what i'm excited about is i don't really want our industry anymore to continuously be called like niche esoteric because it's just signals to people that they can't have a long lasting career in it and it's just not true anymore do you congratulations on the launch thank you i'm sure it was a sigh of release once it went live yeah do you think that there is any correlation between increase in talent working in collectibles and the stability of the price of the collectibles do you think if there's more people's ideas working in this space the collectibles in general will stay at a healthy place from a market perspective so i think that there's a couple different parts of it so you have with the increase in value let's be honest you have more venture capital money more news stories more eyeballs coming in whereby we are generating more companies more startups really amazing companies in the collectibles industry are getting capital injections that allow for more jobs and you're seeing these initiatives that really do have the potential to drive into like gen z is wildly passionate about our about collectibles like what a pleasure that like gen z is passionate about what we're doing where you're seeing all of these areas being built that do have lasting potential for this talent and align with what next generations of how they transact and how they collect now another part of this is which you know i think we're all really curious and excited about is the rapid advancement of technology whereby we there's so much in the ai space and all these areas that are bringing talent into collectibles because the industry is so big and robust and that value of appreciation sort of drives that talent and that opportunity of wow we really because of the value of these collectibles can and will and should be investing in in ai and in these spaces to build efficiencies in what we're doing because the value propels it forward so i think there's a lot of different places where like talent can come in and a lot of places where you're seeing goals being created where the traditional companies are creating goals because they're making more money but also you're seeing more and more i mean look at the national the national in five years ago versus you know the national today it's a totally different landscape because of it you have a couple different audience types that you're trying to attract to collect talent you have the businesses that are hiring and then you have the job seekers as well like how do you think about in a startup phase and like getting the platform off the ground how do you prioritize or how do you think about growing those two pieces of the pie yeah so we think about so we basically have three prongs of how we think about collect talent at launch so you have first off hiring plain as a bug we have over a thousand jobs already at launch on the site hundreds of companies plain as a bug let's get the talent let's get the talent and the companies able to discover each other for jobs and what makes collect talent unique is that first off we are celebrating and when you make your profile when you post your job we're celebrating the fact that there are two parts to what how you wanna signal one is what is your actual skill set are you a marketer are you an are you in operations and then the other one is what is your passion and are you obsessed with points are you an expert in rare books and manuscripts like so signaling both those sides because that is what the hiring companies are looking for and the hiring companies when they create the roles are also sending message so one is hiring then two is service providers they are the bedrock of our industry right the like the appraisers the restorers the graders the live commerce talent they're all these people that are doing the advisors all these people that have built built their own independent businesses and are hired for their expertise helping them be discoverable is a big part of it and then the third is just all these companies that we're bringing on just making it visible to the industry here you can search companies and what they specialize in or what they're or are they live commerce and what they're about and when we think about how we're bringing people on we're seeing really quickly that there's just such a demand for people wanting to find jobs and be discoverable and also for a lot of these hiring companies they didn't really have a platform where they could signal what they were what they were doing and what the role meant so we're really focusing on those areas to sort of scale the business i love the plan of attack i don't know if you've been a part of these conversations but i've had a flood of conversations from people with like very strong professional experience worked in executive level functions at pretty established businesses and are like you know what i'm like tired of this like i'm spending all these these money building up my collection i love my cards it's like my escape from work maybe i can like apply my professional skills to the industry right now and find a job to work in this space i know it might seem crazy but i've never thought about it until like this moment and now i wanna explore that like i think when we were in new york i was sharing with you a couple examples of like people coming to me asking those questions like like i would imagine with collect talent like now there's a space right there's a space these individuals can go but like what like what do you attribute that like interest to in this moment of people like questioning like should i continue to take this job that i've been working at that i've been successful at or should i like like jump over into this industry and try to apply my skills to the the collectible space like what what do you think is driving that right now i think the more the the more that we're the industry is getting put into the news the more you know you're seeing consistently now like fanatics gets profiled regularly right you're seeing more ebay gets profiled like the more you're seeing these these news articles come out and the awareness build i i do think on the executive level and i have a lot of you know take an example you know a friend of mine called me me she's like oh my gosh the new the new cfo of collectors is from the company that i work for and that guy's awesome and you know he moved you know the more that the more everyone's out in the news and this awareness is building i think a lot of building i think a lot of these executives are realizing wait a second what these companies are doing these companies are employing like thousands even you know some companies are actually tens of thousands of people and what they're doing and building and innovating and all these problems they're solving are i can identify with them and now i get to work on these problems these complex problems with something that i actually deeply care about or that my i'm watching my kids care about and that is i think really the is is exciting but a lot of this has to do with the executives are are starting to realize that our industry has a hope not only has a home for them but the problem sets that they get to work on they feel like they can take on those challenges but get to do it with something do it with a category and a physical object that they identified it which is great and let's be honest there hasn't been a way to say like as far as you you talk about executives thinking about it if you think let's take like we all respect nat so much if and nat is on linkedin but let's it's like if nat's linkedin if you think about his career path and if he named all the businesses where that all the companies that he created pre collectors you wouldn't know how passionate that guy is about card collecting right where would that live for him so that's the goal with sort of collect talent is to be able to make those signals so i'm yeah we're excited about it and that's a good example and i've i've never really heard or thought about it but the context where it's like you know i'm spending all this time when i'm of the most of the most successful businesses in this space and i've never really thought about him as as an example but he's definitely an interesting example when we think about just like professional skill set his love of collecting and just going all in on the space but i mean to that i think to that example we really do there's so many people that are that i just ran into right before coming here someone who works in consulting but has does a couple million dollars a year in ebay sales with him and his son and loves it but if you looked at his general recruiting and business profiles you would never know never know so the next six to twelve months collect talent like what are you focused on like what are your goals like what are you what are you working towards we're working just we're our goal is bringing everyone onto the platform we're gonna keep bringing on jobs keep bringing in on opportunities and the goal is to really we want this to be the hub where the collecting industry can find its people we want people to be able to say oh i need a i have an upcoming project i need a music expert let me let me go find a music expert on collect talent or i'm graduating from college i'm really fascinated by this industry let me see what jobs are now it's an opportunity to me or i am this executive and i have i spend all my free time going to like toy conventions and let me see what's out there there for me if i wanna turn my career into a career driven passion alright this has been fun learning about you your career building collect talent where can people go to learn more about you learn more about collect talent collect talent dot com and you'll see me and bobby there bobby is awesome and you can find us there too awesome i imagine there'll be plenty more conversations between us in the future based on our shared interest conversations between us in the future based on our shared interest in helping individuals find resources to work in this space danny appreciate it looking forward to doing this again thanks so much thank you
what i keep coming back to after that conversation is how much of the collecting industry still runs through informal networks jobs get shared through text messages candidates get introduced through friends important knowledge stays inside private conversation companies need people but the right people do not always know the roles exist people want to work in the hobby but they don't always know how their experience transfers that is not a talent problem it is an infrastructure problem and collect talent is building part of the infrastructure by helping companies and candidates find each other hobby jobs is building another part making the work skills decisions and career paths inside these companies visible both efforts begin with the same belief working in the hobby should not require you to already be inside the right private conversation the path needs to become easier to see but visibility does not remove responsibility from the candidate if you want to work in the industry hobby knowledge alone isn't enough companies need marketers who can market operators who can build system customer experience people who can solve problems engineers who can ship product content creators who can earn attention without sacrificing trust your passion gives you context your skills create value the combination gives a company a real reason to hire you the same principle applies if you wanna start a company launch a show build a service or serve an overlooked group of collectors do not wait for the market to remove every ounce of uncertainty understand the person name the problem know why you are equipped to help build the smallest useful version then watch what people do gabe did the work before the job existed danny saw a missing piece of career infrastructure and started building this is how new categories companies and careers begin not with certainty with a useful first step taken by someone who understands the problem well enough to move conviction gets you started evidence tells you what you need to do next if you wanna learn more about collect talent i'll include a link in the show notes if you are hiring looking for your next role or trying to understand people building in the sports card space subscribe to hobbyjobs if you wanna understand how you can work better or get more visibility on your business and what you're doing you can reach out to me at stacking slabs across those all social channels or stacking slabs at g mail dot com i will be back next week with another operator note spotlight resource and a new group of hobby jobs happy building thank you for listening