Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
My guest is the founder of u x D Academy.
It has grown into a beacon for career switchers and
aspiring designers who lack the means or desired to pursue
a traditional four year degree. He has prepared ux D
Academy to the fourth from the AI and Design Education.
Please welcome to the Money Making Conversations Master Class, every train.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
How you doing, Everett, I'm doing well. It's my first
time in Atlanta, so I'm excited.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Well. Good. First of all, mister Swain, it's important that
people understand when you say AI, what does that mean.
Let's educate them about that first.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Yeah, so AI is the book.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Because people are saying AI is taking job. Now, you
said AI will able people to have a career.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Yes, yes, so. AI.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Artificial intelligence is a buzzword right now. Everybody's probably heard
it at some point. But there are two schools of
thought with AI. One, companies, unfortunately, are looking at AI
to replace people. And then there are the top companies
that are using AI to amplify their people. So giving
them AI as a means of a co pilot to
(01:05):
help them with roles or tasks.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
That they do not want to do.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Now, how did you how did you get started? Was
your this is very technically driven? Technically driven? Give us
a background? I asked you be their expert.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Now, yes, so you know what's interesting. I took an
aptitude test. I said I was equally analytical as I
was creative, and I should do graphic design.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
Now.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
I went to school for that not knowing what graphic
design was, and then I couldn't find a job in
graphic design. Once I graduated, I stumbled upon an article
that says, what is UX user Experience design? And so
I understood what that meant. I was like, Okay, I'm
the one who gets to design how a product or
digital product works and so they make more money. So
(01:51):
I went to go that route, and then ultimately I
decided to teach people how to do the same.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Now, let's talk about this because you in the area
where there are a lot of professional schools that are
giving our certificates, and this interview is about people who
don't want to go to a four year institution. With
that being said, is it people don't want to go
to a four year institution or does people want to
(02:18):
or feel they can be success be successful without going
to a four year institution.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
At K It's a combination of both.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
I've been someone who is saying you don't need to
go to school for what I do, and it's it's
proven well over forty percent of tech companies do not
care about degrees anymore. They care about certifications. But ultimately
is your portfolio. Can you do the job?
Speaker 2 (02:41):
Prove it? Let me see it.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
So UXD Academy is literally showing people thirteen and older
how you can become an AI experience designer or an
AI automation expert without a degree.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
You know, we've been drilled go to college, go to college,
go to college, go to college, get this degree. It's
wonderful lifestyle. Right now you're telling me a certificate?
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Yeah yeah, People's eyes light up and say, wait, I
don't have to go into this massive amount of debt
to get this type of job that's paying you one
hundred and fifty two hundred thousand dollars. Sure, sign me up.
What do I need to do? That's more the reaction
that I get. It's not so much of like a
disbelief like wow, I could I can do that with
(03:23):
a degree. It's more like tell me how and show me.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
How Now, with that being said, how was you XD born? Everett?
Speaker 2 (03:32):
It was born from a question, to be honest with you.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
So, my second job in my field, I had the
rare opportunity of working for a black manager in the
ux space, and it's extremely rare, and so I after
a few months working on his team, he asked me.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
What do you want to do with this career?
Speaker 3 (03:50):
I said, I want to teach a work in a
corporate space for about ten years and then teach it
at the university level. He asked me, why do you
have to wait to teach people? The girlfriend I had
at the time, I helped her successfully switch her career
and become a designer. He said, you talked to girl, right,
why can't you teave people now?
Speaker 2 (04:09):
Two weeks later we founded UXD Academy.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
What gap do you see in education of workforce development?
That u XD Academy was created to film the gap in.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
The workforce honestly, diversity and not just skin color.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
I'm talking about diversity and background.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
One of the things I did not like about the
industry was the gatekeeping aspect. People were very pretentious against
people who did not have a degree. And then a
few years later company said we don't care about degrees,
and so the gap that I'm feeling is showing people
from all backgrounds, Hey, you can learn this, and let
(04:52):
me go ahead and create a curriculum that allows you
to perform better than people who have the degree.
Speaker 1 (04:56):
So let me ask you that they can be frustration,
there can be in office. No, I won't use your
anger because there are people out there that go to college,
get your degree, may be in debt or may not
be in debt, and then somebody with a certificate comes
along and is competing competitively from a financial or salary standpoint.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
Can that create a problem. I don't think that's it
can create a problem. But I think that was a
problem I'd say probably four years ago. Not so much
anymore because so many people are entering I have entered
the field without a degree from a four year institution,
So I don't think it's much of a problem.
Speaker 1 (05:37):
Now, good, are you a four year graduate? I am okay,
So you a four year graduate? Give me your degree
background for it? Because this everything you're talking about is
technically driven. Okay, talk about you.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
My background is I would say creatively driven.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
So I was a graphic design major, which if I
had to boil it down to Layman's termsraphic designers about
creating pretty graphics or pretty images using color theory, psychology,
and things of that nature to create a banner, an image,
a poster.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Or whatever it is.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
Well, that's sort of died a little bit with the
advent of AI tools like Canva and things like that.
Now I don't need to have a degree in graphic
design to create pretty images. I could just use Canva
to do it. And so I made the switch. I
reverse engineer my career. I actually said, Okay, I'm creating images,
or at least what the school taught me is to
create images. But I'm seeing where the money is money
(06:32):
is actually creating digital products. So I reversed engineer at
that taught myself how to do it, and I'm sharing.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
The wealth back.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
So how do you make money? It's money making conversations,
mass to classes. How do you make money?
Speaker 2 (06:43):
So I make money a couple different ways.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
Won by a consultant as a consultant for companies to
create digital products. Right now, it's the buzzword is AI,
so AI agents automated workflows.
Speaker 2 (06:56):
But the cool thing that I've done is within UXD Academy.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
I have built an AI experience agency called our Table,
and it's a way for me to not only it's
a way for me to create a learn and earn
pipeline where I can train people at UXD Academy. I
take the top ten percent of those and employ them
at our Table on a project basis. So I go
out and get small business clients via our Table, and
(07:21):
then I bring that work into the school so that
way my apprentices can see what real, real world work
looks like.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
Everyone AI, what exactly is AI? You know it exploded
chat gt GPT right that came out like two years
ago and did it? But it's been out longer than that.
And so then you say, I'm a self taught AI person,
(07:50):
So how can you teach yourself AI? African American, black
person of color? And are you consulting? How are you
continually able to educate yourself and stay in front and
stay up because ever changing industry?
Speaker 2 (08:08):
For sure?
Speaker 1 (08:09):
How did you make decision to teach yourself because you
went to be a graphic designer that's what you've been
trained in. This feels way more technical, it is well.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
For for sure.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
So YouTube University, I learned, Wow, practically everything that I
needed to learn about this from YouTube.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
I found great content creators. I followed them.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
They are.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Creating the waves or behind directly behind the people who
are making the waves.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
So I just stay right in that lane and follow
what they're doing and test it out.
Speaker 3 (08:39):
I tell people YouTube, Google and books taught me everything
I know about AI and what.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Is AI when a standpoint of the reason I keep
harping there because you know, a year ago, i'd use
AI lot. From a standpoint of I have my podcast.
It translates my podcast, It gives me a descriptions, it
tells me give me some marketing campaigns and things like that.
Am I under selling the more I can do with AI?
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Yeah? So I like to tell people AI. Just think
of it as the.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
It's the smartest person you know or the smartest intern
that you know, and you can train that intern to
work specifically for you. In a nutshell, that's why, and
AI really is like the greatest mimic on Earth. It's
just learning from things that we've already produced. It's not
(09:38):
really creating anything. It's more like mimicking and guessing based
off of its data. And so we have to feed
it good data and it'll give us a good output.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Okay, cool. You don't want to miss an episode of
Money Making Conversations Masterclass, So right now, follow a subscribe
to Money Making Conversations. It's free and you can find
it on the iHeartRadio, app, spotif Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Speaker 2 (10:04):
Please don't go anywhere.
Speaker 1 (10:05):
We'll be right back with more money Making Conversations Masterclass.
Welcome back to Money Making Conversations master Class with me
with Sean McDonald. Let's get into more details here. You
actually Academy teaches design, design tools and AI.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
How So I have an online platform built on school
skol and effectively what I do is I've created my
own curriculum in video format, so I put that on
that platform. But it also serves as like a combination.
The platform serves as a combination of LinkedIn Google Classroom,
(10:47):
so people can post which I encourage people to share,
Hey I built this, and then every two weeks I
do a free class where I show people, Hey, here's
what I'm actively working on, and here are the.
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Tools that I'm using to build what I am building.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
And so people can come in and ask me those
type of questions and then thirdly a mastermind a weekly
mastermind group where people can get guidance from me and
helping build their portfolio as well as working on client work.
Speaker 1 (11:16):
Wow, so underserved community. I will tell you I won't
get on a soapbox bodyess, but I will tell you
that I feel that for the first time in history
that people of color, black people who are on these
programs or whether you can call the welfare program programs,
that well you actually with these certificates, like you said,
(11:40):
you don't have to go to a four year school,
four year college or to your junior college.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
Well, you can change your life in a manner more literally.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
Listen, Please let my let my listeners hear this by
going to your website and seeing the results because living
a life on section eight of staff programs, you don't
have to do this. No, you can live a better life,
live in a better community. I would tell you that
living in those communities under those programs force you to
(12:14):
maintain a certain lifestyle, force you to live a certain way.
For you at u XD Academy can bridge a gap
of academic freedom, financial freedom not only for the individual,
but for their family members and their family and family
members talk to us. You can soapboxes if you want to.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
Sure.
Speaker 3 (12:33):
The job I had before my career as a designer,
I worked at a mortgage linding bank.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
I hated it.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
I was making about fourteen dollars an hour, and I
got to the point where I said, I hate my situation.
I don't like this, and so I leveraged YouTube University
and went down a rabbit hole and started teaching myself right.
The routine that I had was I would get up,
I would go to work from seven to three. Then
(13:00):
I would work out from three to four, and then
from five to about two am. I am learning, I'm building,
I'm redoing my portfolio. I am putting my best foot
forward so people can give me a chance.
Speaker 2 (13:14):
Unfortunately, that took me about three years.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
Took me about three years, but somebody gave me a shot,
and I haven't looked back since I started.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
When I got my.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
First job, I made seventy five thousand. The second year
I made one hundred and five. The third year I
made one hundred and forty. So it's just gone up now.
Part of that I do know how to speak, I.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Know how to interview, will hered you well.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
However, my portfolio is what got me that, and so
I am literally showing not only just people that looks
like us, but hard working people. A you follow what
I'm telling you, you can change your life in under
a year and a half.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Okay, well that next step, what do they have to do?
Will you say? Follow what I'm taking telling you? Where
they're going to have to go to follow what you
are telling us in this interview?
Speaker 2 (14:04):
Perfect?
Speaker 3 (14:05):
So of course you can go to my website, yes
UXD dot Academy. From there, it'll launchpad you straight into
the free community.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
I offer a free community. That's the thing. I'm giving
away my information for free. What you're paying for is
my guidance.
Speaker 3 (14:22):
So I take a do it yourself approach because that's
what I did. So I'm going to give you the
meat and potatoes of all the courses you need to take,
the certifications.
Speaker 2 (14:30):
You need here, all the books you need to read.
I give you all of that, so there are no excuses.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
If you want to take your own time, sure you
can get there in under two years. But if you
want that guidance, well then that's where you're going to pay.
Speaker 2 (14:42):
It's just hey, let me give you the course. Correction
that you need.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Lit's say you have a graphics you have a four
year degree. I'm trying to really reach the people who
have neither that's lost here in this interview for the
very first time, trying to understand where they can fit
in it, trying to disseminate reality from their reality.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
Talk to me.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
So for that person that you described, what I teach
people are AI tools, specifically no code and low code tools.
So no code is exactly how it sounds. You don't
have to know any code in order to use this tool.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
If you know some code, then that means you can
take a low code tool and push it to the
max because you actually know the language. That's me no cue,
so you know the language.
Speaker 3 (15:39):
But you can literally build a chatbot an agent in
ten minutes with these tools, and I'm teaching you how
to do that and then how to do it on
a larger scale. So I would say again, you actually
Academy's YouTube channel is a great place to start, but
in my community, I also list out the YouTubers that
(16:00):
I learned from. Right, and you watch one video, You're
going down the ramp hole and you can see the
phone that you have in your pocket.
Speaker 2 (16:09):
That's more than enough to get you to it right.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
And we know everybody lives off their phone nowadays, so
you know there are just many computers for sure. I
was those of my picking my phone. This is pretty heavy,
it is, you know it was supposed to be just
because they small don't be in their light exactly, which
means that a lot of technologies is crammed into that.
You don't want to miss an episode of Money Making
Conversations Masterclass, So right now follow a subscribe to Money
(16:35):
Making Conversations. It's free and you can find it on
the iHeartRadio app, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get
your podcasts.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
Please don't go anywhere.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
We'll be right back with more Money Making Conversations Masterclass.
Welcome back to Money Making Conversations master Class with me
for Shan McDonald. And let me ask you this effort
in the next twelve to eighteen months, what major AI
trends or technologies you believe will have the biggest impact
on a small business. I'm a small business. This shows
(17:07):
about small business businesses and entrepreneurship.
Speaker 3 (17:11):
Talk to us, so I would say automated workflows, AI
agents and AI powered customer experiences. Those are going to
be the three biggest I say, major shakeups in the
next twelve to eighteen months.
Speaker 2 (17:27):
This year was dubbed the Year of the Agent, which.
Speaker 3 (17:32):
Effectively I just tell people an agent is a suped
up chat bot that can perform tasks for you on
its own or with you.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
That's all it is.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
And the reason you're on this show is that I
know that the world we live in is changing. The
way we view opportunities has to change too. And when
I saw what you were developing or have developed short
term opportunities through academic training, I'll point an example to
my audience. I'm based in Atlanta and Goodwill offer the
(18:08):
program where EV installations, and they were offering a paid
training period, and then after that paid training period was
over with, then you had a full time salary that
was over sixty five thousand dollars no education, and we're
(18:30):
talking about less than six months. This whole period, this
whole lifetime experience was changing. What are the obstacles in
your business and how have you overcome those obstacles.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
The obstacles I have are trying to partner with educational institutions.
They still operate very in a very archaic way, and
so they are very much reluctant to change. I am
trying to convince them, like, hey, this is where we
are now. You need to adopt and need to train
Pece based off what's happening now. So that's been an
(19:03):
obstacle to try and convince them of that. However, I
don't spend that much time trying to convince people what
they can't see. I go and listen to the people
who I'm trying to help, and they give me a
great perspective because they are telling me what their problems
are and I'm attacking that head on. So I would
say the biggest obstacle is just not knowing where the
(19:25):
hell I'm going sometimes.
Speaker 2 (19:26):
But I am grounded in what I'm doing and the
purpose that I'm doing. It allows me to overcome that.
Speaker 1 (19:31):
You know, big fear. It's kind of an interesting interviewing
you because you use the word AIAI so much. And
the number one fear in the people who don't know,
especially in the minority community, is that AI is going
to take their job. I believe there are from a
robotic standpoint, jobs are going to be replaced. But again,
(19:54):
somebody got to run the robot. Somebody gotta program the robot.
Somebody gotta be able to organize a strategy to advance
the services of that robot. AI. I don't believe it
is going to replace the job. It's going to create
options for a job. When I say that, Everett, am
I incorrect?
Speaker 2 (20:15):
No, I don't think you are AI will replace some job.
Yes it will.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
So there are some reports I believe it was MIT
came out with a study and showed that ninety five
percent of AI polot programs failed. That's at the enterprise level,
that's not at the small business level. Small businesses have
sewn about eighty percent of positive ROI from using AI.
(20:45):
And that is where the biggest opportunities are going to
be is to help small businesses introduced safely, introduce AI
to them so that way they can scale.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
That is going to be the biggest opportunity. And that's
where I flourished.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
And companies that are less than fifty employees, they need
help and giving them AI by way of automating certain processes,
giving them AI what I call AI co workers, which is.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
Just you know, effectively chat GPT as.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
A coworker, right right, So those are going to be
the biggest opportunities from a small business standpoint.
Speaker 1 (21:22):
You know what. I again, Everett, thank you for coming
on the show. I'm an interview and the founder of UXD.
Before we move forward, is there an app.
Speaker 2 (21:31):
The platform that we learned on school that there isn't
that for that?
Speaker 1 (21:35):
Okay? Cool? Talk to us about that.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:37):
So again, I built my curriculum on a platform called
School that's skool relatively new.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
It's competing with products like Kajabi Go High Level. I
like School quite a bit. They do have a mobile app,
so again there are no excuses with me. You could
download the app.
Speaker 3 (21:58):
And launch into my free community and right there you
have all the access to people as well as to
resources that you need to learn this business.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
So because of the effort, what's your legacy?
Speaker 3 (22:09):
My legacy is I want other kids to have that
mentality when they go through my course and say, oh no,
I can create my own reality with this. If I
could have helped a minimum hundred thousand kids, yeah, if
I could help one hundred thousands, and it is a lot.
(22:32):
But I believe in focusing on the future doesn't mean
that somebody above forty can't learn it. I have people
who are fifty five in my class learning and they're
doing great. But I really want to focus on the
youth and to show them another option exposure. If I
can help one hundred thousand efforts out there, that would
be my legacity.
Speaker 1 (22:52):
Well, I like that because of the fact that the
youth really controls or changes the future. You know, you're
younger than me, I'm pouring into you. Hopefully by pouring
into you, you won't make the same mistakes. That's the
whole core of this show. Money making conversations masculine. I
want to I want people to hear you going, that's
(23:14):
a better job. There's a better lifestyle for you at
u x D Academy at least just look. Do your research.
He's already told you that. You go on YouTube and
verify what he's doing. He's just organized, and I think
that's the key component. You go to the website. He's
really hysterical. He has a video of himself. He's just
(23:34):
he's like a pitch man. He's just he's just constant,
just he's very entertaining. In fact, I would tell you this,
you're after watching your videos, you're not as hyped as
your website.
Speaker 3 (23:47):
Why is that that's actually my natural disposition to be
honest with you. And it's because like I'm actually in
the wise learning I do need to work on, you know,
you know, animating my voice a little bit more. And
that is that I'm going to be doing as far
as helping out with the editing too, like show the
funnier side.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
But I'm dead serious most of the time.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
But which is great. Like I said, you know, I'm
not saying nothing negative here, but like I'm letting you know,
I've done my research. I'm watch it on go. He's
very entertaining. I mean, I'm gonna just put it this way.
There's a passion on your website. And that passion is
driven by because frustration, I think, you know, because of
the fact that people don't know and sometimes you have
(24:29):
to be amped up a little bit for sure to
try to get their attention to show this there's a
better way.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Yeah, you're you're you hit that right on the head there.
Speaker 3 (24:41):
I am very much passionate on the front facing website
of things because I have to get I have to
get your attention and sometimes and I look, I've tried
working on it, but I've been told that you know
I could be very direct, very blunt, and sometimes it
comes off as harsh, but I'm like this, this is
no laughing matter, especially when we think about I'm gonna
(25:02):
bring them out to my soapbox to people of color,
black people, Look, we are at the bottom and a
lot of metrics, so there is no time for play.
Play like we have to we have to get on
the ball. AI is our opportunity to do that.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
It is it really, it really really is, And I
hope more and more interviews. I do like that. I
try to be consistent. I'm not saying a lot of people.
In fact, nobody's doing what you're doing. But there are
other certificate programs out there. Google has a cificate scholarship program.
I just mentioned good Will here in Atlanta has a program.
(25:41):
I'm sure there are competing type programs out there that
are presenting salaries that can put you in a middle
class and came immediately as soon as you pass it.
That's a job waiting on you because that skill set,
you know, it's really amazing. It was like, you know,
there are a lot of things is that our current
(26:01):
president Donald Trump talks about and right now he's talking
about it. They try to build a chip manufacturing company
in Arizona, and now he's getting a lot of pushback
because guess what, there're nobody here can build the chips. Yeah, yeah,
guess but they can if you train them. And that's
the whole thing. That's what we're talking about at u
x D Academy. We're trying to get these we don't
(26:24):
have the workforce, we don't have the people qualified a
u x D Academy. He will get you qualified for
opportunities that will change your life. Did I say it correctly?
Thank you for coming on Money Appreciates Now. If you
want to be a guest on my show, Money Making
Conversation Masterclass, please visit our website Moneymaking Conversations dot com
(26:47):
and click to be a guest button. If you're a
small business owner, entrepreneur, motivational speaker, influencer, a nonprofit, I
want you on my show.