ROOTED.

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FOUNDATIONS

Our word for 2022 was “Rooted.” Rooted in our purpose, calling, and location. There was always a light-hearted debate on whether we’d stay in the Bay or go back to SoCal for the longest time. Both places would be a blessing but would come with sacrifices between our facilities, careers, and community. 

After some prayer and a short trip down to SoCal during the holiday break, we felt we were still called to stay in the Bay Area. Noelle envisioned her career in epidemiology intersecting with the tech industry someday, Vive Oakland church was beginning to see an incredible 10x breakthrough, and we wanted to help fill some gaps for our community of new parents. 

Throughout 2021 as we were throwing around the idea of getting rooted, God had put it on our hearts to begin giving above and beyond the tithe and to pour into our local campus and the permanent building that our church believed for. We decided to sell our first investment property home in Cleveland, much to the confusion of advisors, friends, and even family, and increased our tithing significantly. This was undoubtedly a massive stretch of faith for us, but we ultimately walked away with a priceless truth that would translate directly into our home search. 

Everything belongs to our Father — Our time, talents, and our treasures. 

Everything is for His plan, His Kingdom, and for His glory.

We get to be His stewards and simply return back what is already His. 

Our Father is good. He loves us more than we could ever imagine, and He knows exactly what we need in every season. 

1 Peter 4:8 summarizes our thoughts well:

“Be generous with the different things God gave you, passing them around so all get in on it: if words, let it be God’s words; if help, let it be God’s hearty help. That way, God’s bright presence will be evident in everything through Jesus, and he’ll get all the credit as the One mighty in everything—encores to the end of time. Oh, yes!”

With our foundations solidly put in place, we decided to start exploring and dip our feet into the sizzling, red hot real estate water. From a human perspective, the timing could not have been worse. There was a historically low inventory due to a confluence of factors, and the stories we were hearing were just nuts. 100k over asking, 15 offers to compete against, the headlines go on. 

THE SEARCH

So we started the search thinking that this would take over six months. We had a pretty strict criteria for what we wanted in a more permanent home, and we told ourselves and Tamika, our fantastic realtor (aka God’s Agent), that we were in no rush.  

Super bowl weekend Saturday – we decided to check out a few places since we were already making a drive down to Noelle’s parent’s house. Figured, hey, why not? It could be fun. The first house that we stopped at was like a dream. The listing had popped up the night before, and we saw that there was an open house we could visit the following afternoon. We showed up really late (I blame the poopy diapers) and thought we had missed it, but the realtor was friendly enough to let us in. Again, a dream home that we figured we had no business dealing with but hey! An excellent start to our day. Fast forward through the day, we ended up visiting 4 more houses that were all nice, but we didn’t feel particularly led to make an offer on any of them.

Monday – Synced with Tamika. Told her about how house number 1 was a dream. The other 4 were meh. We chatted some more and concluded that, hey, what’s the worst that can happen if we just throw our hat in and make an offer? It, of course, felt strange to make an offer on the first house during the first weekend of the first month that we started searching, but we figured why not? If we get this home, it’ll add to God’s glory. If we don’t, all good! We had 0 expectations of getting it in the first place and knew God had something better in store. 

So we said, let’s do it! Let’s put an offer in! We submitted the offer and a personal letter that Albert had put together the night before. He had a template he was going to use from past offers on other investment properties, but for some reason, he felt called to pray and really ask the Holy Spirit to help him re-write the letter with greater intentionality and purpose. We told our story, the foundations that led to this point, and what and who this home was for. We also had a cute picture of Hazel and Hapa on the top of the page. 

Wednesday 12pm – Offer is officially submitted by the 12pm deadline. We wait in hopeful anticipation. A few hours later, Tamika calls and tells us some shocking news… our offer ended up being the ONLY one submitted from that past week. The seller was willing to accept it if we accepted his counter. We had till 5pm. 

…hm…

Um, God? This is either a crazy miracle that makes NO sense to us, Tamika, or even the agent on the other end, or we TOTALLY missed something that all these other potential buyers didn’t. Which one is it? What is going on here?! 

We looked through the disclosures again, the inspection report, all the documents but didn’t find anything out of the ordinary. 

Still strange, still not normal, and still fighting our rational, “EXPLAIN THIS MIRACLE” part of our brains. Make this make sense to us! 

Wednesday 3pm – we get news that other offers are coming in now post-deadline. We gotta make a decision! 

Wednesday 4:45pm – We go on a somewhat frantic stroll praying, talking, and ultimately believing IN FAITH that this was the home for us. We were scared but came back to our foundations on why we were doing this and who this was for. 

We accepted the counter, and minutes later, we got the official congrats from Tamika that the house was ours! 

3ish weeks later, during closing – Albert is at the new home, and he randomly bumps into the seller. They have an unforgettable conversation about his story, the vision he had for the house when he was flipping it and how he was moved to tears when he read our letter. “I knew immediately that I had to go with you guys. This was the family I wanted to build this house for.” 

There was so much more from than 20-minute conversation that can be saved for another story but wow, what a miraculous confirmation from God that everything would be okay and that He was in control from beginning to end. 

A CONSISTENT THREAD

It would be easier to label all those events from Saturday to Wednesday as mere coincidence. Just a bunch of random events that we were lucky to have experienced. Right time, right place. 

However, it gets harder to keep that rational hat on when you zoom out beyond that week but to the years before, seeing how God has connected all these things together to accomplish His will in and through us. There’s been a consistent thread of His grace, goodness, and unfailing love weaving itself through every season. 

As we celebrate this moment, we’re choosing to believe that God is real, that He is our good Father, and that something beautiful happens when we surrender everything to him.

Thanks for reading! If you’re around, COME THROUGH.

The Liao’s.

Vessel Talent 2021 Recap

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Year 2 of Vessel Talent is in the books! When 2020 ended, I remember asking myself what an impossible prayer would look like for this business for 2021. With our first kiddo on the way, I knew 2021 would look very different from every year in the past. I was going to have less time, less sleep, and less emotional, mental, and physical energy. Yet, it’s called impossible for a reason, so I said to myself, “Hey wouldn’t it be crazy if I could somehow double my revenue again for 2021?” 

Fast forward to June 2021 — baby Hazel is born. She’s healthy, full of smiles, and is a handful of work. Around that time, we found out that Hazel had a strawberry birthmark on her lip, which in short meant we had to be up every four hours to feed her and give her medicine. It also meant we wouldn’t sleep through the night until she turned 1. The delta variant was also getting crazy, and as a family, we decided it was safest for us to isolate till things cooled down.

With my paternity leave ending, I remember staring at my vision statement, scratching my head, and wondering how the heck this business was going to grow. I could barely stay awake in the afternoons, had a foggy dad brain, and felt incredibly alone and depressed. But it’s called impossible for a reason, right?

As the rest of 2021 progressed, I did my part in showing up to work as best I could each day. As a family, we continued to tithe and give above and beyond what we ever thought was possible and served His house in the ways we could. As we took those steps of obedience and faith, we got to watch God do the impossible and provide miracles after miracles. 

To start, I was able to not just 2x the revenue but very close to 3x! (Are you kidding! Crazy! I’ve had a chance to deepen my relationships with the Y Combinator startup community and other top-tiered VCs in the Bay. I’ve also had an incredible opportunity to hire my first employee who lives on the other side of the world in Olongapo, Philippines, and sees him thrive in his role as a source. More importantly, I’ve been able to build a genuine relationship with him, week in and week out, and update each other on the struggles and celebrations of life. It has also been a year of refinement. He’s helped me become more patient, wiser in how I listen, communicate and respond to life’s unpredictable interruptions and the power of living a generous life. 

Eph 2:8 describes God’s grace as unmerited, or as I like to say undeserved favor. There was nothing I did to deserve the blessings that came this year. I had so little to give with my time and energy, but that’s the beauty of grace. He loves us because that’s just who He is! He’s our Father, Our Savior, and our anchor of hope when everything else seems to be crumbling away. I don’t know why He decided to bless my business, family, and community in the way He did, but I’m thankful He did. We can’t always control life’s outcomes, but we can control HOW we respond and WHO we respond as. When it comes to work, we approach it not as a job but as a calling, an opportunity to serve the work, knowing that when we bring excellence to our work, it glorifies Him. 

Pastor Abby, our amazing pastor from our VIVE Oakland campus recently shared a quote that I think summarized this season perfectly. She said, “God doesn’t give us a formula to manage your storm; He gives us with an anchor to outlast your storm. As this year closes, I’m thankful for this anchor of hope that’s found in Jesus. I have no idea what 2022 will bring, but I know it will involve some impossible prayers again that draws from a deep conviction of who I am, who God is, and how He wants me to influence and impact this world. 

Let’s do this! 

God And Recruiting: What I Learned When These Two Worlds Came Together

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I always had a tough time understanding how my relationship with God affected my relationship with my work/career and, to a greater extent, the pursuit of success in it. I gave God the other stuff – sports, academics, relationships but my career? Nah, that was for me to control. 

7ish years later, in the real working world, I’ve come to understand that there was and is an undeniable linkage between what I had once thought (and wanted to believe) were two worlds. It didn’t make sense before because I had on blinders. I had some past wounds and hurts from my upbringing and unmet expectations from myself and others that led me to separate the two worlds. If it was my wound, then being successful in my career was the band-aid for it. If it was my wound, then it was up to me to control the outcome and create my own little kingdom built to serve and give me glory. There’s a lot there to break down, but that’s another post for another day. 

For now, I’m here to reflect and celebrate how God has worked as a recruiter in and through this career. What was once confusion is now rock-solid truth in seeing how God is in everything I do, how I do it, why I do it, and who I do it for. 

Here are three areas that I’ve experienced God moving powerfully from my early days in recruiting to the present-day running a consultancy.

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The Pains (and Joys) of Becoming A Dad

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Imagine living a life where you can do anything, anywhere at anytime. Where do you want to eat? Where do you want to travel to? When do you want meet up to workout? What do you want? 

That was, let’s call it my old life. 

As I’m rounding month 2 of being a new parent, I’ve had a ton of time to just reflect on the challenges of this new life and dig deeper to understand WHY it’s been challenging.

When we were getting ready for Hazel to be born, a lot of the questions I had for new parents was really about more surface level stuff. What is it like not being able to sleep? What kind of baby gear did you get? How did you transition back to work? Etc etc. What I didn’t expect was how mentally and emotionally draining it would be transitioning out of this old life…this “me” life .. this life where I was in control. I was the boss of my decisions and if I had to be a bit more straightforward — a life where I served myself, my desires and my needs. 

But where does this ‘me’ attitude stem from?

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A Whole New Perspective

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With little Hazel nappin’ away, I figured I’d sneak in a quick entry here. One of the things I was looking forward to in becoming a Daddy was gaining a new perspective of what it means to be a Christian. Really up until now, my perspective as a Christian came from that of a Son ^ Father relationship — understanding that I am loved, I am saved, that I am cared for, that I have a solid rock and foundation to stand on, etc. I get to follow in Jesus’s ways and just be a vessel for what the Father wants to do in me, through me, and for me. And don’t get me wrong, there is a LOT of depth to just that perspective to dig through and see the beauty behind. 

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Adding To

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As the days wind down till the arrival of Baby Liao, I’ve been thinking more and more about my upbringing, the models that my parents created, and the said and unsaid expectations that come with it all. 

One of the phrases that have emerged in recent conversations has been along the lines of, “Wow, if only I can be as good of a parent as my parents have been to me.” 

If only. 

To be clear, the ‘if only’ statement comes from a positive place. My parents, like so many other immigrants who came with almost nothing, showed what sacrifice meant day in, day out. They found a way to get an education, excel in their corporate job, raise a family in a safe area, and modeled what it meant to be generous, kind, and loving followers of Christ in their community… along with so much more. 

In other words, they set a pretty darn high bar for me to follow. 

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New Home, Old Nostalgia, Same God.

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2 weeks in the books! Finally feeling a bit more settled after the initial mad rush to finish minor repairs, making visits to my second home at Home Depot, and making the home feel like home.  

Here’s a side hustle idea for someone: Create an e-course to help educate clueless new homeowners like me on how a house works. Topics include basic handyman-ship, the ABC’s of plumbing, HVAC systems, appliance repairs, and how TV mounting. Bonus points if you make it VR-compatible. 

Jokes aside and on a deeper level, owning a home has triggered a myriad of nostalgic feelings that as a result, have led me to think about the shortness and beauty of life. These nostalgic feelings were hitting from all the angles — mowing the grass, taking the garbage can out, walking around 99 Ranch (NOT Ranch 99 y’all!), and driving around quiet, empty streets at night. 

There’s this continual thought of, “Wait I’ve seen this all before.” 

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Lessons about Stewardship

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The first time I got a practical understanding of what it meant to be a good steward was from Dave Ramsey’s book, “The Legacy Journey.” He had this (amongst many other nuggets of wisdom) to say about stewardship:

“At its core, the spirit of gratitude says, God, I’m going to manage this wealth and stuff Your way — because it’s Yours. Thank you for trusting me to manage it for you.” 

The rest of the book covers so many paradigm-shifting topics on wealth, work, and how it intersects with what the Word says but what I walked away with was just having this concept of being a diligent and faithful manager to the things I’ve been blessed with. How can I be a good steward of not just my finances but also my time and talents? 

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29

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Hello, 29. 

Here we are (finally). Another year, another morning, another spontaneous, free-flowing post to write in one sitting. Please excuse the typos as I’m without internet connectivity here in Joaquin Redwood Regional Park. Let’s see where this goes! 

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Recruiting During A Pandemic: 7 Lessons That I Learned

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When I decided to leave the Mother Nest of Facebook this year, I remember asking myself what my ‘Word For The Year’ would be. What’s the word that’ll be at the forefront of my mind as I began exploring this new venture? What’s the word that I can craft a story around that can inspire others? How harmless of an exercise can this be?

Well, the word I chose was Uncomfortable.

And man, let me tell you how true that has been…and we’re only 6 months into the year!

Between figuring out legal, tax, tooling, how to find new clientele, negotiating contracts and just tackling new roles I haven’t done before (hello imposter syndrome!), there was this thing called COVID-19 that came up right as things were starting to flow that’s left millions of people unemployed and transforming the economy for the foreseeable future.

People have been telling me how terrible a timing starting this recruiting consultancy must have been and hey, they’re right in many regards. However, I wasn’t completely shocked. After all, I did ask for an opportunity to get Uncomfortable and I did set my expectation that it wasn’t going to be easy. I just didn’t think that those words would have rung so true, so soon and in such a dramatic way.

With all that said, I’m grateful for how this pandemic has expedited and sharpened some of the lessons that I was going to eventually learn anyways. Here are a few things that have been on my mind.

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Uncomfortable – A Word for 2020.

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My word that I chose for 2020 was ‘uncomfortable.’

I know it’s a weird word to choose but there was something in my heart to just want to seek chaos. To get stirred up a little. To break some spiritual, emotional, mental and of course, physical muscle.
I chose this word knowing full well that I was leaving the safety nest of Facebook and entering the world of a solo consultant which had its ups and downs.

What I couldn’t have predicted and I’m sure no one could have was how soon the downs came.

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The Two Most Important Things I’ve Learned Since Leaving Facebook

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When I started Vessel Talent, I fully expected that I was going to accelerate my professional and entrepreneurial career. With Week 5 now in the books, I can definitively confirm that I’ve learned more in this past month than my past 2 years at Facebook. Easily.

With growth, there were more hours.

With more hours, there was less time.

What I didn’t expect was how less time and added pressure from my professional world would lead to some surprising changes in my personal and spiritual growth as well.

Two major themes that highlighted these learnings:

1 – Saying No leads to more Yes’s. (I know that’s corny but I’m keeping it).

2 – Choosing to rest.

Follow along so I can share a bit more on what that means.

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Recruiters: Don’t Make Another Job Change Until You Read This Article

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I never thought I’d be writing a post like this.

You’re telling me I have options when it comes to my career as recruiter?

For most of us who graduated college and stumbled into recruiting, the ideal path was get into an agency, grind, make the transition internally and call it a day and that would have been a fantastic career.

As I enter into this next stage of my recruiting career, I have started to wonder though— what else is out there?

What choices do I have?

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First, Foundation.

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I’ve been pretty hooked to this incredible cooking competition show on Netflix called The Final Table and it’s been hard to not leave jaw dropped each time the chefs present their creations. It’s almost mysterious how they’re able to consistently create a technically balanced dish with just a few ingredients and just an hour of cooking time. I mean it takes me nearly an hour just to cut up some peppers, onion and garlic and by then I’m already losing motivation and feeling tempted to UberEats an entree of Panda Express.

What I’ve loved the most about the show has actually been less about the dishes they’ve created but the mini bios that they put together sharing the backstory of each chef in the competition. They dig into their upbringings, where they trained and all the sacrifice that goes into being the best. It’s taken them decades to slowly build up a pretty unshakeable foundation, even when put to the test with a competition like this.

As I reflect on my 20’s so far, I’m simply in awe of how God continues to build up a foundation that’s based on His Word, His Promises and all the grace, love and power that represents Him. It’s a foundation that’s been tested, refined and slowly getting polished for it’s debut in the future when I start a business that I know will change lives and have an impact for His Kingdom. It’s truly only by His grace that I’m even able to build a foundation that I know will serve me and the people I serve well when things get tough but also when things are amazing. To think that God continues to whisper dreams of starting a business to an ordinary, pretty untalented guy like myself will never cease to dumbfound and humble me. Amazing.

I’ve written quite a bit about this in sporadic bits and pieces in the past but as I was going on my afternoon stroll with Hapa (my pup) this afternoon, I felt led to tie it all together.

Without further adieu,

THE FOUNDATION

(aka, Truths To Lean On When I Finally Go Full-Time Into Entrepreneurship).

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Thank you, 27.

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Thank you 27.

As I’m reading through this past year’s journal entries, reflecting on the overarching storyline and it’s many high’s and low’s, I’m feeling deeply thankful. Truly, truly thankful.

To be honest, I don’t think I’ve felt this way the week leading up to my birthday, let alone the morning of.

There’s usually some sense of Dread. Regret. Pressure to have done better. Feelings of not being good enough, not successful enough, not productive enough. Questions of What could have been, what should have been.

It’s different this morning and I have a feeling it’s going to stay this way in the birthday mornings to come for many, many years to come.

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Walking with God at Work – A First Year Reflection

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Reflection time. I know I’m about 2 months past due my Faceversary (Facebook’s term for 1 year anniversary – cute, right?) which means I’ve procrastinated long enough and it’s time to write.

It’s been an interesting year to say the least at the big blue and as I reflected on this past year, the lessons that came to mind had surprisingly little to do with my professional growth but everything to do with how I grew in my walk with God.

Of course, if it was up to my selfish self (more on that later), what I experienced this past year was not the way I would have authored it. The story I would have directed would have casted Mr. Me as the main character with everyone else (God, you included) as the supporting cast. Perhaps the tagline to that story could have been – ‘The Story About Albert and All His Career Success.’ Perhaps I would have made a few different career decisions by now if it was ultimately about me.

But thank God, that was and is still not the case. He loves me too much to have a story like that unfold and for me to miss out on some of the deeper and sometimes harder lessons to learn.

So with that out of the way, here are a few things I think God’s been trying to teach me this past year (and for the foreseeable future).

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Patience, I Don’t Like You But I Need You.

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Patience, I Don’t Like You But I Need You.

With the first deal done, I’ve been finding myself feeling more anxious about finding ways to do the second. There’s been an unrelenting flood of momentum rushing me along in my education, networking and desire to continue forward.

Problem is, like most newbie investors we were lacking capital for the purchase and potential rehab costs.

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Not Just Another Venture

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Not Just Another Venture

I remember driving home from work this past summer feeling stuck, frustrated and depressed.

That drive was one of many moments that year where I just couldn’t move on from my past failures as a wantrepreneur and couldn’t see what my purpose for the future which led me to feeling worthless in the present. If you were in the passenger seat with me, you’d be surprised that this typically optimistic and casual guy was acting all funky.

I vividly remembering cursing at my steering wheel (that poor innocent wheel) and demanding God to speak. I needed answers. I felt like i was racing against time and I was losing. Here I was as Mr. 27 Year-Old Albert, feeling disappointed that I hadn’t lived up to the expectations of Mr. 22 Year-Old Albert.

Why did I waste all those evenings and weekends on side hustle projects that always led to nothing? 

What happened to those dreams of running a passive income business that would replace my day job? 

What happened to those dreams of writing a book? Of traveling the world inspiring thousands of people with motivational speeches? 

What resulted from all the ambition, drive and potential that so many people had saw in me from a young age? 

Some might call it a quarter-life crisis but maybe a better categorization was a pre-30 crisis. I had a narrowed tunnel vision that everything that I ever wanted to happen needed to happen in the next 3 years. I knew life would change once kids came and I didn’t want to have regrets of not taking bigger risks when I could. Whatever the label was, I knew the enemy was whispering all sorts of lies about my identity and purpose and I couldn’t find my voice.

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Unscripted: My First Week at Facebook

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I thought I’d take a few minutes to jot down how my first week at Facebook went in a pretty light and loose tone. I’d be doing my future self a huge disservice if I didn’t capture these raw feelings that are still floating around.

My first 5min as an official Facebook employee, (still super surreal to say that) was greeted with a smile from a red-shirted Orientation staffer who said, “Welcome to Facebook!”

There was modern, happy pop electronic music blasting as I was whisked to a courtyard where they were serving continental breakfast with bagels, scones and coffee. I grabbed a small plate and met my first Facebook friend, Prasanth, Data Engineer from North Carolina State who said, “what’s up!” Prasanth was going to be one of probably 50 people I’d meet that same week and I felt bad for the mini introvert in me that was about to go into hibernation. Shortly after I entered into Building 15 where a massive crowd of n00bs (the default name for new hires) probably 300 of us? sat together awaiting the day to start.

Already in this room alone was 3x the amount of people that was at Otto, the last startup I joined and 15x the amount of people at RockIT, my employer before then. I went on to learn that Facebook’s recruiting team alone had over 2,100 people and 26,000+ as an org.

Jeepers.

Facing ahead was a propped up stage with two big projector screens. There were other red-shirters around with headsets and microphones doing sound checks and staying ready in case there were any production issues. Fred, the main Red-shirter hopped on stage to pump up the crowd, share some jokes and got things started for the week.

I won’t go into too much detail into the next few days but as I promised, I’ll share some things that I felt.

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