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Off to the Valley is a podcast that brings to light incredible stories of those who left the familiarity of home for new horizons. Inspired by Silicon Valley culture, it really extends to a global community of individuals who've dared to step outside their comfort zones.
Lisa Wehden: So there is a possible
route for transferring your H1B to your
own startup, but the reason why it's
not very desirable for lots of people
that I spend time with is because the
H1B has a prevailing wage requirement.
And that has a specific
job classification.
Prateek Panda: Hello, and welcome
to off to the valley where we
explore the remarkable journeys
of those who've embraced change
and embarked on new adventures.
I'm your host, Prateek Panda,
passionate about uncovering stories
of resilience and innovation.
Today, we are honored to have
Lisa Wehden on our podcast.
She's the CEO and founder of Plymouth,
a pioneering company revolutionizing
immigration services in Silicon Valley.
Her journey is a testament to
perseverance and ingenuity.
And her path to Silicon Valley began
with a personal struggle, navigating
the complexities of U.S immigration.
From overcoming visa challenges herself
to founding Plymouth, she has empowered
countless individuals and startups with
faster, transparent immigration solutions.
Her background as an investor at
Bloomberg Beta and her advocacy
for technology driven solutions in
immigration underscore her commitment
to innovation and community spirit.
Lisa, it's a pleasure
to have you on the show.
Lisa Wehden: Wow.
Thank you so much for that introduction.
It's a pleasure to be here.
Prateek Panda: It's
great to have you here.
Let's get started with a little
bit about your background.
Tell us where you grew up, what was your
background, um, what got you to the U.S?
Lisa Wehden: Yeah, so I grew up in a
very small town in the north of England,
the industrial heartland of Yorkshire.
My parents were actually
immigrants to the UK.
So my mum left Algeria when there
was a civil war and moved to the UK.
And, like many good immigrant
mothers, she drilled into me
education, education, education.
And so, I ended up getting into Oxford
University, and when I got there, I was
really curious about what I should do
with my life, like, as any good student.
And whilst I was there, I ended up,
meeting a lot of incredibly talented
individuals from different backgrounds
because I got involved in this,
organization called the Oxford Union.
And the Oxford Union hosts
leaders from around the world.
So economists, politicians,
titans of industry, fashion icons.
And, we also hosted technologists.
So individuals from Silicon Valley.
So, we hosted Jack Dorsey, Brian Chesky,
Eric Schmidt, and countless others.
And I remember at the age of
19 or 20, I was like, Oh, those
are the people I want to be.
Like they are changing the world.
That's what they're like fast,
they're ambitious, they were
building companies that I was using.
Like it was just this energy
that I felt was electric.
And unlike my peers who ended up going
into law, banking, consultancy, I at that
time wanted to go into the tech industry.
And, that was what got me started around
thinking like, Oh, I have to be in America
because America was and continues to be
the leader in the technology industry,
Prateek Panda: and what was the first
step that encouraged you to start?
You know, moving towards Silicon
Valley physically as well?
Lisa Wehden: Physically.
Yeah.
So, after I graduated, I tried to start
a company and this was like 2016 in the
U.K trying to start a technology company.
It was just not what graduates were doing.
It was not the default career path.
And I came to the U.S for a few months
and, met someone that I thought was like
really great partner to work with, but I
couldn't stay because of the visa and so
ended up leaving and, realizing that I
would need a work visa to stay in the U.S.
And I essentially realized I needed
to like build up my Career and
professional achievements to actually
be able to apply to the U.S and so I
spent two years working on building
entrepreneurial ecosystems in Europe.
And after I did that, I was like able to
go and pitch myself to people in America,
in Silicon Valley to give me a job.
And that was like the beginning of my visa
journey, like getting a job in the U.S
and then being able to apply for a visa.
Prateek Panda: Do you mind me
asking what visa you were on
while you were working in the US?
Lisa Wehden: So when I first moved
officially to the United States, I was
on a J1 visa, and the reason I was on a
J1 is that, the H1B lottery had passed,
um, I wasn't considered eligible for an
O1 visa and, I was only here temporarily
for a 12 month period, and so it was
a really great visa to apply for.
Prateek Panda: Okay.
And you know, uh, for a lot of our
listeners, many founders or immigrant
founders of startups who are in the
US already, usually are on one of the
popular work visas, which is the H1B.
And rarely do others know that
on an H1B you can't start a
company or you can't pay yourself.
Well, you can start a company
technically, but you can't pay yourself
and you can't be fully employed.
What is the best way for people like
that, to start figuring out how do they
work full time for their own startup?
Lisa Wehden: So there is a possible
route for transferring your H1B to your
own startup, but the reason why it's
not very desirable for lots of people
that I spend time with is because the
H1B has a prevailing wage requirement.
And that has a specific
job classification.
And so if you're a founder of a startup,
it's very difficult to pay yourself the
prevailing wage requirement, because
typically startup founders actually
pay themselves a much lower salary.
And it's hard to map someone's
qualifications to the CEO criteria
or the CTO qualifications.
And so it's just not very well
designed for startup founders.
And the core insight at Plymouth
is actually many more people are
already eligible for the O1 visa
pathway than they might realize.
And the O1 is great because there's
no minimum degree requirement.
No minimum salary requirement.
You can apply at any time in the year and
you can get an answer within 15 business
days if you pay for premium processing.
And so if you're an entrepreneurial
talent, it's just this really
great visa that you could pursue.
And I can kind of share why many
more people are eligible for this
visa pathway than they might.
previously realized if
that would be helpful too.
Prateek Panda: Yeah, I think we
should because I mean in my personal
experience, i've been on a O1, and
in the beginning I did not think O1
was an option for me because I thought
it's for like movie stars and research
scholars and you need to have a lot
of papers to your name and what not.
Although by that time I did had a startup
that was doing decently well, but I still
did not think myself eligible for an O1.
It was only accidentally that I found
out and then eventually got an O1.
So definitely tell us a little
bit more about why you think a lot
more people are eligible for an O1.
Lisa Wehden: Well, congratulations.
That's no easy feet.
I'm always happy to hear someone
getting their O1 approved.
And yeah, there's this like total
myth that you have to be a Nobel
Prize winner to get an O1 visa
and that is not the case at all.
There are eight criteria and you have to
meet three out of the eight criteria, a
couple of the criteria that some people
might already have, if they've played a
critical role at a company which is very
prominent, they could meet the criteria.
And so, If you're a critical
software engineer, maybe you've been
contributing code contributions.
If you are a product manager, maybe
you are leading the product roadmap.
And so we can prove your
criticality in that way.
And then for the distinguished reputation
piece, if you're a startup that's raised
venture capital funding, maybe you've
got a few press articles, maybe you have
accepted in some accelerators, like we can
prove that it's relatively distinguished
to have a startup who goes through
those like successful achievements.
If you work for a larger company
like, you know, Meta or Stripe, for
example, it's easier to prove that that
company has a distinguished reputation.
The other criteria is
judging the work of others.
And people can judge hackathons,
they can evaluate the pitch
competitions, different examples to
help you judge the work of others.
If you've ever peer reviewed work, so if
you're an academic, that can also count.
So those are two criteria that
might already be available to you.
If you've worked internationally and
you've been paid an American salary
internationally, It's more likely than
not that you have a high compensation
compared to other people in that country.
So for example, if you've been working
in the UK and you've been working for
an American company, maybe you have
a high salary compared to others.
And I can also talk through some other
examples if that would be helpful, but
just wanted to give you some ideas around
how people could already be eligible.
Prateek Panda: Yeah, that's amazing, Lisa.
On that note, let's talk a
little bit about Plymouth and
you started this company that
helps people with their O1 visas.
What was the reason for
starting out this company?
I'm guessing you've been through
your share of visa struggles,
but how did you think that?
Okay, this is what I want to
do and build my business on.
Lisa Wehden: So I tried to build a
different business before Plymouth and
I realize I just wasn't as passionate.
Like I couldn't wake up every single day
and like, this is what I wanted to build.
And I had written an essay on immigration,
my own immigration journey back in 2021,
and it got quite a lot of traction online.
And people were like, Oh, I didn't know
about this visa category that I want.
Hey, people reached out.
I ended up having chats conversations.
And, I realized that that was
like a really big problem to
solve, uh, around people just
understanding that this was possible.
It was an education gap that I identified.
I never thought it'd
become my life's work.
I just wanted to go out
and do more education.
Like I was excited about this
and it felt really rewarding
to help people in this way.
And basically I left my job when I got
my Green Card and I wanted to work on
things that I really, really cared about.
And immigration was one of those
things I just really cared about.
Um, and so I spent kind of six months
exploring how I would solve this problem.
And, I ended up meeting these two guys
from the Institute for Progress, uh,
Alex Stapp and Caleb Watney, and they
were like, look, we really want someone
to work on high skilled immigration.
And so we ended up having this
lunch for a couple of hours, and
it turned into a bigger project.
I wrote a one pager on this,
and it initially started as an
educational project, and then
quickly became actually a company.
So it was never intended to be
like, this is going to be a company.
This is going to be a venture company.
It was like much more organic than that.
It was, what was the problem
I was trying to solve?
And that was how I ended up solving it.
Prateek Panda: So as a O1 recipient
myself, I understand some of
the complexities with the O1.
So it's very different compared to
some of the other work visas and it can
be hard to sort of prove some of the
requirements that are needed to get an O1.
In terms of technology and
differentiation, what does Plymouth
do as a platform that is different
from, let's say, if I choose
to work with a traditional law
firm versus coming to Plymouth?
What's different?
Lisa Wehden: We are significantly
faster than a traditional provider.
And so typical providers takes about 4
months to put together an O1 application,
our standard process is four weeks.
The reason why we can be so quick is
we leverage technology in every single
part of our petition production process.
And so we are building a first of
its kind case management system that
streamlines the data collection.
We pull in as much internal
documentation in the most seamless
way about you as possible.
So traditional providers will ask
you for all this information that
is already readily available.
And we've built clever technology
to do deep analysis on you and the
companies that you've worked on
online to make a much richer, much
more precise data set around how we
prove your extraordinary ability.
And so we're able to leverage
technology in this moment to make
the process significantly faster.
We do also utilize AI in our process.
So we've utilized kind of
research agents and things of that
nature to make it much quicker.
But we are a tech enabled solution and so
you will always have an attorney who is
reviewing and internalizing your petition
because we believe that's important
to have top tier legal advice too.
Prateek Panda: So I understand the
part about the technology, which I
think is amazing because I think if I
recall my own application and I'm doing
renewals now, and that is one of the
most difficult or boring mundane parts
of the job to do is just keep looking
for stuff about your own self and
then send it to your attorney, right?
What else do you do from a
storytelling perspective?
And the reason I asked this is one
of the challenges I faced was I
was a founder of a cybersecurity
company, but I was also a marketer.
So the head of marketing and what I
had to do was to prove my marketing
expertise, which meant that a lot of
times when I was judging competitions, for
example, I was doing that as a founder.
But it wasn't talking
about my marketing skills.
When I was talking about some of my
marketing skills, which is around,
hosting events and going to conferences,
speaking at conferences, I would be
talking about security because, hey,
I'm a marketer for a security company.
I talk about security.
So I remember that in my first petition,
the adjudicator was fairly confused
if I'm a security guy or a marketer.
So I think a lot of it is left to
interpretation, which means that
how you say the story matters a lot
more than anything else, perhaps.
Is there something that Plymouth does
with respect to articulation of these
stories that can help candidates
have better success rates with O1s?
Lisa Wehden: Yes, so we've built a very
specific methodology in partnership
with our experienced VP of Legal who
spent 10 years building O1 petitions
to focus on conciseness and clear
storytelling around technologists.
And so we have teammates who have
experience in venture capital.
I come from a venture capital background.
One of the key skills in venture
capital is storytelling, helping
founders tell their stories.
And so we have built this unique
methodology to help identify specifically
the uniqueness around individual's
fields, your field of endeavor.
And so when I'm hearing you saying like,
hey, I've got these two like fields,
like I'm a cyber security specialist,
but I'm also an expert in marketing.
I'm like, can we fuse this together?
Maybe your expertise is technology
marketing, specialized in cyber
security, or thinking through kind of
how to make, arguments that capture
the entire essence of an individual.
And so we have built a playbook
around specific technology
profiles to enable them to capture
the uniqueness of individuals.
And our methodology is focused on
very much precision to the criteria
so that an officer can just review
the case very straightforwardly
and say, yes, and there's nothing
left to confusion or chance.
Like there's no jargon because
that's one of the things that, I
think a lot of cases base that
don't go through our process.
It's like very jargony petitions that
are quite confusing for someone to read.
Prateek Panda: Okay, that's very very
interesting and definitely very helpful.
Tell us a little bit about,
you know, you moved to the US
when you were fairly young.
For the lack of a better word, fairly
inexperienced as a founder as well.
It was your early journey.
Lisa Wehden: Yeah.
Prateek Panda: but how did you
start about building a network
and a support system in the U.S?
Lisa Wehden: It's a great question.
So when I was trying to get a job in the
U.S, I reached out to tons of people.
Like I sent cold emails, I sent
Twitter DMS, LinkedIn, I reached
out to my immediate network and I
asked, could I get some connections?
And the thing that I did that I think
is really powerful is sharing like why
you want to get to know someone and
offering some insights or reflections
on maybe something that they have
published or what they're working on.
So doing the work to say like,
this is why I'm worth your time,
because I've researched you.
I kind of understand what
you're interested in and
i'm interested in it, too.
And so I think it's like writing
really good cold emails, explaining
your background explaining why you're
interested in talking to them and then
coming here when I like originally came
here, I had like a couple of people
that I knew and I would host dinners.
I would host events.
I would bring my immediate
community together.
And I would say like, you can bring plus
ones, you can bring people together.
And that's kind of how
you can grow organically.
Maybe you only know like a few
people, but those few people might
also know a few other people and
they might know a few other people.
And so I think starting with your kind
of immediate network is really powerful.
And doing stuff that is like of
value, like hosting like a dinner
around something you're interested in.
Like if you're interested
in cybersecurity, like host
a dinner in cybersecurity, like
build a community around you.
And I think the thing that I see,
sometimes like when people are
very new to Silicon Valley is
following trends, like following
what other people are interested in.
And if I could go back and tell something
to my younger self, I'd be like, just
figure out what you are interested in
and do that because it's very easy to
follow like hype cycles and trends.
Like a couple years ago it was like
crypto, everyone was like obsessed with
crypto and like there's still like a
crypto community and, but it's like now
AI is really cool and don't know, it's
just like your life and your career.
So figure out what, like, makes
you really excited and follow that.
'cause I think then you'll build a much
more powerful community around you.
Prateek Panda: I think
that's great advice.
One thing I like to talk about with all my
guests also is around what was happening
with your mental health as moving, leaving
your home country and the environment that
you've grown up in is difficult, right?
And you come to a new place.
You experience new things.
I remember my first night in San
Francisco, I was mugged at knife point
and it was very scary experience for me.
And, it took me a while, a few years
actually, to be able to walk on
the streets of San Francisco again.
I lived in San Jose and I used to always
take an Uber to a conference or a meeting,
and then once it's done, if I have to
stay past 6pm, 7pm, I don't take the
bus, I don't take a train, I get into
an Uber right out of the building that
I'm in and go straight home, right?
So it took me a while to get
to a point where I would be
comfortable walking again and so on.
And these are some experiences that you
tend to live with, both good and bad.
What was going through your mental health
journey as you build new relationships,
new friends, new support ecosystem?
Did you have difficult days of
missing familiarity of home?
Lisa Wehden: I'm so sorry that happened.
It sounds like shocking.
Um, and yeah, just sounds
like a crazy journey.
You know, I actually, I also got mugged in
San Francisco, not a knife point, but like
on my first two weeks, like I got my phone
stolen and I was like, oh gosh, I'm so
Prateek Panda: Oh my gosh.
I'm sorry that happened.
Lisa Wehden: But to answer your kind
of immediate question, it's taken
a long time to figure out like what
my self care routines are, like what
helps me kind of become much like
happier as a person and as a founder.
So I do a lot of meditation,
exercise, to manage some of the
stresses that come along with like
moving country, missing family.
I think You're right.
It's like a really intense experience
like you go from one ecosystem, one
culture, one community, and then you
dive in and you don't have much of
a foundation and you have to very
quickly build up that foundation.
I think this is something so powerful
about immigrant entrepreneurs.
They are inherently risk takers.
Like they move from one country to another
country and it's just such a huge risk.
Yeah, I think it takes some
time to build a foundation of
like really good friendships.
They take time to build up relationships.
I do think it's amazing about the Bay Area
is that people are so open and welcoming.
And so you can make
friends relatively quickly.
But yeah, no, it took some time to
figure out the self care routines.
And I also got stuck in the United
States whilst my visa was processing.
So I didn't get to see
family for two years.
It was also during COVID.
So it was like this kind
of like insane period.
And, yeah, I just miss them so much.
It was like really hard and now
I can go home and it's nice.
Well, I think California is
my home now, but it's tough.
Prateek Panda: But that's the tricky
part with immigrants as well, right?
Like the kind of statement that you just
made, we have to remind ourselves also
sometimes that this is home for us now.
But a part of us is also left behind
and there's family somewhere else.
So a lot of times we might take it
for granted, but it's, it's hard
for us to also process internally
that what is truly home, right?
Is it just where you live?
Is that home?
Or, you know, where your real friends are,
your parents are, your siblings are right?
So I think that's also part of a tough
journey for any immigrant for that matter.
Lisa Wehden: It's so interesting
because this year I've thought a lot
about this idea of what home is and
I think I used to be a bit more rigid
in my thinking like the UK was my
home and I was in America temporarily.
And now I think you kind of have to be a
bit more, Or at least for me, I have to
be much more like flexible in my thinking.
Like, this is my home, this is where
I'm building community, this is where
I've built life, and I see myself
here for the foreseeable future.
And I have to leave that kind
of old notion of like, that life
that I had is not my future.
And so it kind of takes some
time to get out of that mindset.
And now, yeah, I consider California home.
It's just sometimes I get those slips
where I'm like, oh no, like that
was home once, but this is home now.
And also, I'm trying to convince my
family to spend more time in California
because I think it's an amazing place.
Prateek Panda: Yeah, definitely.
It's one of the best places to be for
sure and especially as an immigrant I
think it's one of the best places to be.
So to switch gears a little bit, I'll
ask you a slightly more fun question.
If you had the chance to take one person
out to dinner, it could be anybody.
Who do you think you would want
to go out to dinner with and why?
Lisa Wehden: That is an amazing question.
The one person I want
to take out for dinner,
I'm just going to get his
name pronunciation right.
Like I could say a fun one, like the
fun person that I want to take out for
dinner is an author called Murakami.
You might've read some of his books,
Norwegian wood, Kafka on the shore.
I just think, one of the things, the
surprising things about building a company
is how much I love reading fiction now.
So like on the weekends, I love reading
a piece of fiction because it takes my
mind completely out of company building
and I get to be immersed in a different
world for an afternoon and it really is
just like an amazing distraction from like
the tactical parts of company building.
And so I've been reading a lot
of fiction recently, and I think
Murakami is just an incredible world
builder, so I'd love to go for dinner.
He also wrote a book on running, and
so he is a long distance runner, and I
also do long distance running, so I'd
love to talk to him about running too.
Prateek Panda: That's amazing.
It's interesting you said about
fiction because for a long time as
a founder, I read a lot of business
books, mostly everything nonfiction.
It's funny that you said this,
because I just am starting to
get back into reading fiction.
I read fiction as a kid, but as I grew
up, I had just not read fiction and it
makes me realize that I just, like it.
Maybe, you know, I don't want to say it
kills your creativity, but like fiction
is what helps you think more wildly.
And that's definitely helpful
irrespective of whether you're
a founder or not, but definitely
helpful if you're a founder as well.
Lisa Wehden: Yeah, I think a lot about
content and what I read and I used to
like read all these business books.
And I still read business books,
like I think they're very helpful.
Like sometimes I read blog posts
or yeah, I've just read High
Growth Handbook and Scaling People.
Like these like books are really
amazing, but they're not fun books.
Like it's not for entertainment.
It's like more for practical advice.
And I realized I wasn't reading books
that brought me, like, a different
type of joy, and I just find fiction
one of the best ways to just enjoy
life, like, reading another person's
idea of a fictional world is one of
life's greatest pleasures, I think.
Prateek Panda: Yeah, definitely.
So looking forward with Plymouth
at least over the next few
years, what is your vision?
What are you expecting to achieve?
Can you share a little bit
about what's ahead for you?
Lisa Wehden: Yep.
So we're celebrating our Plymouth 100.
So we've achieved 115 approvals for
Prateek Panda: That's amazing.
Lisa Wehden: which is really exciting.
And so we've been hosting dinners
and events to celebrate this.
We had a fireside chat with
Patrick Collison, a fireside
chat with Amjad Mossad.
We really love bringing our
immigrant community together.
We're hoping to 10 times the number
of immigrants that we can help.
So we'd love to get to a thousand
immigrants building in the
United States in the next year.
And the long term vision for
Plymouth is to become the on
ramp to the American dream.
So we help immigrants navigate their
entire journey in the U.S from immigration
to building community to other products
that we can offer them and really
build out this community and network of
individuals who are transforming America
and accelerating technological progress.
Prateek Panda: That is amazing, Lisa.
Congratulations on that achievement
and I wish Plymouth a lot of success.
I'm going to send you names of a few
more immigrant founders who would
be great for your fireside chats.
I don't know if you know about Ankur
Nagpal, he was founder of Teachable.
Yeah.
I'm happy to make an introduction.
I think he's a great speaker as well.
And he is also a tremendous supporter
of O1s and other immigrant founders
who need help with letters of support.
So he'll be great for that.
And I'm happy to do a warm
intro if that's helpful to you.
But overall, I think, I mean,
this was an amazing conversation.
Is there something else you would
like to tell our listeners who
are immigrant founders as well.
Some last pieces of advice.
Lisa Wehden: Yeah.
If you're navigating U.S
immigration, you're very
talented, please reach out to us.
We're at www.plymouthstreet.com
or @PlymouthStreet on Twitter.
I'm Lisa Wehden and we'd love to help you.
We've got over 20 resource guides
that are completely free to help
you navigate your U.S immigration.
So don't be alone.
We'd love to help you.
Prateek Panda: That is amazing.
And I think it's the spirit
of the community that takes
you forward with this.
I still remember the words that my
CEO told me when I was going through
my first O1 is just forget about
the immigration work, do your job
well, and you know, it'll happen.
It is complex, but don't be
overburdened by the complexity, right?
And I think that's where people
like you come in, who take off the
complexity of this whole process.
And thank you so much for
doing this amazing work.
So more immigrant founders can
end up in the U.S and do a great
job working towards their dreams.
Thank you so much, Lisa, for sharing
your journey and for sharing so many
interesting pieces of information that I'm
sure is helpful for all of our listeners.
Thank you again for taking your time.
Lisa Wehden: Great
chatting, thank you so much.
Prateek Panda: And that
wraps up today's episode.
Before we sign off, I would like
to thank you for your support
and thanks for tuning in.
If you loved today's episode.
Then don't forget to subscribe to this
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Be kind, be happy, challenge the norm.
I'll see you folks again for the next one.