Oxford professor and founder of luxury leather brand Neri Karra, Neri Karra Sillaman, shares the event that changed her life at age 11 and how she managed to turn that trauma into global success, and breaks down the success principles we can all learn from immigrant entrepreneurs to build sustainable purpose, impact, and legacy.

Welcome to Let's Talk Legacy. We have Neri Karra Sillaman with us, an Oxford University entrepreneurship professor and the founder of global luxury leather brand, Neri Karra, and let's dig right in here. And something very impactful happened to you at the age of 11 when you were forced from your home in Bulgaria. Can you explain that situation and what happened, and tell our listeners a little bit how that shaped the path you're on today?

Neri Karra Sillaman: Sure. So I was born in communist Bulgaria. At the time, the country was run by a communist dictator, Todor zhivkov. He was awful, so we ran for many years. We will hid in our Bulgarian neighbors homes. And in 1989 Todor zhivkov, I think he cut a deal with the because the communism was coming to an end. Berlin Wall will come down in shortly after we would immigrate, we would become refugees. He cut a deal with turbuzza, who was the ninth president of Turkey at the time, so one night, we have one TV channel only he will cut. He came on TV Todor zhivkov and said, Anyone who is Turkish needs to or fuse. Turkish needs to leave the country in the next three months, like he basically gave a window. So you have to leave. And my father, I came home one day from the library. I was 11 years old. My mom told me, bring back those books to the library because they are leaving for Turkey, and I see my grandfather crying, everyone crying around us, and this is called

family separation, because not everyone gets their papers at the right time, on time and so on. So a police officer that my father paid money to to drive us to as close to the border as possible. Took us to his little ladder car, and we took only two suitcases to our names, drove to near these train tracks. I remember that, and we basically followed train tracks. It was close to midnight when we finally made it to the border, and it was mayhem, people who were basically in tremendous confusion, pain, fear, not knowing where to go and what to do. And I remember my father screaming like a wounded animal, throwing the suitcases on the ground and kneeling to kiss the cement, the asphalt, and he's kissing the Motherland soil, and he's like, we finally made it, but we were set up to live in a refugee camp. It was set up by Red Cross. But even before then, as soon as we crossed the border and we are going into this unknown place, when I saw the fear and confusion and the poverty

and all everything around me, I made a decision, I have to get a good education. The way out of this will be if I get a good education. So this was a very defining moment in my life. I talk about it one, one realization was that my childhood ended. I'm no longer a child. The second one was, I need to get a good education. The only way out of this would be that it defines everything I do today. I think it's also the reason why I wrote a book as well, and I have a career in academia or in thought leadership, one could say it's that, because it drives everything I do in life.

It's amazing how just your early, early childhood and those experiences, how it shaped you, and then you managed to turn that trauma into success. And so you founded a global luxury brand now in business for over 25 years. Talk to us about the beginning of Neri Karra and where it is today, how it's kind of gone through the years.

Neri Karra Sillaman: So as I said, after the Berlin Wall came down, I mean, we were immigrants. We were refugees in Turkey, and ironically, we didn't really speak the language that the local Turks speak. We spoke in a dialect. Our education, the diplomas that my parents said were not recognized. So my mom worked as a cleaner in a medicine medical factory. My father worked in construction, illegal cab driver, any job they could find, and one day, the Berlin Wall falls down, and that marked a turning point in our lives, because my father was able to go to Russia and observe that women and men very well dressed and we speak Russian, because when. You are in communism in Bulgaria, you start learning Russian from the age of eight. So to us, culturally, perhaps it felt we felt a lot closer to people who were all coming out of communism, because we've been through the same thing, where you are not allowed to express yourself, you are not allowed to own a business,

yet you dream of a better life for yourself and for your loved ones. So he had the idea. So he saw people carrying their belongings in plastic bags, and yet, the idea, if I sell leather products to former Soviet republic countries, I can have a business because I see people carrying their belongings in plastic bags. And few years before we would end up in Turkey as refugees, we met a Turkish businessman vacationing in Bulgaria, which is like seeing a unicorn, because you are not a lot to cross that iron, iron wall. So somehow he he was in Turkey, and when he met my family, he gave them his business card, which my father kept through and took with himself, along with those two suitcases when we were leaving the country. So he found him, he had an atelier in Turkey, and he said to him, remember me, and he made a proposal. He said, I'm not here looking for a job, but I'm here with an eye, with an idea. I want to sell your leather products to Russia. I would like, you

know, very small commission, 1% or even less. And I can make it a big, big success. And my job at the time, later on, I became a translator, taking the Turkish companies to Italy, to suppliers, to trade shows, manufacturers and so on, and really figuring out, understanding how the leather industry really works, and at the time, my parents were making commission by selling wallets, bags and accessories to former Soviet republics, basically Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Russia, Ukraine and so on. And it became, you know, they were making good enough money. We were no longer. They were still renting, but at least we were out from the refugee camp, and I went to study at University of Miami, through through financial aid. When I was at University of Miami, I I was studying business, and my book starts with that I was in the computer lab of University of Miami, seeing a computer for the first time when I would realize that Andrew Grove, who is the one of the early founders of Intel was

a refugee like myself, and having this change of perspective that being a refugee is not a bad thing. It's not something to be ashamed of and that you belong, you are enough other people who have built businesses, successful businesses in us were once refugees and immigrants as well. So this is actually the start of many things for me, because until that point, I felt like I didn't belong at University of Miami. I felt like fish out of water, but recognizing that the big businesses in us were once also founded by people like me, like refugees and immigrants, gave me a sense of confidence, because it's an example of someone else like me

Absolutely. Well, your new book called Pioneers: Eight Principles of Business Longevity From Immigrant Entrepreneurs, is really doing well. Share a few of the eight principles, I want to hear about these.

Neri Karra Sillaman: One of them is cross cultural bridging, because you can blend two different cultures like exactly, like I said, when you are coming from a different culture, you bring a different perspective, but ironically, you can also because different contexts, different cultures, are going to have different institutions. For example, I'm talking about Russia. Right after communism ended, there are no rules, no regulations, very different way of doing business. So Western companies hesitated to go into Russia or former Soviet republics quite soon after the Berlin Wall fell down, but my father and my my parents and us, we felt a lot more comfortable in that context. So. What I call, it's a very academic term, but by being different, by coming from a different perspective, you can actually bridge two different institutional contexts and two different cultures and create a business that can that in other circumstances or conditions will not

necessarily thrive or be created. In my book, I interviewed Dominic Council. He's the founder of Dominican cell bakery in New York. He created Cronut, and up until that point, he's struggling. He's doing everything himself. And one day, his wife is from Taiwan, I believe she they are girlfriend and boyfriend at the time, and there's a Mother's Day, and she says, How about, what about, you know, you are French croissant and donut, and they create and I love that example. It's because it's exactly what cross cultural bridging is. But in a product version, it's a donut and croissant coming together, and it becomes such a success from even with one creation like the next day, there is lines and lines of people. They can't keep it. Keep it in stock.

You're making me hungry.

Neri Karra Sillaman: Yes.

So is the family element, and the fact that many immigrants founded businesses tend to be at least at the start family businesses, part of why they last? I mean, what is it about the family that makes these businesses last?

Neri Karra Sillaman: You are spot on, and you are basically leading me through the next principle, which is about homophilic ties. And I used to say, build your own family. Early on, when I was doing my PhD at Cambridge, I would say I had a paper on this topic. Because even at the time, I studied ethnic entrepreneurship, so homophilic ties and is basically finding people who are like yourself, with similar values. So you don't necessarily have to start a business with your family, and not many of the entrepreneurs I've studied have done that. But when you are building the business, you use those ties that are very familiar, like you have to find what is common between you and other people, with your employees. And, no, I'm not saying you have to treat your employees as your family. It's not that, but you have to when with your business partners, or when, I mean, I what an example comes to mind is Hamdi Ulukaya, when he was creating Chobani and he owns, he decides to buy

the craft factory that has gotten out of business. When he comes into the city, the little hamlet where craft factory was, he sees people and former employees of craft who are very sad. They just look like someone had died. They were just so sad. They were not angry, they were not fearful, they were sad. And when He is building Chobani, he's building it together with people who were once part of the craft factory. So that's a very powerful example to that, because when you are building a business, you have to focus on what is common and find people who believe have the same shared values as you. I call it strategic homophilic ties, because you don't necessarily have to come from the same culture, use it in such a way and build it in such a way that will establish trust. Of course, with authenticity, you are not not to fake it, but this is a very important point, and but not everyone needs to belong to a family or needs to build a business with a family, but you can use

the same strategic elements that one has in a family business without being a family

Got it. Well, you talk to us a little bit about your role as adjunct professor and entrepreneurship expert at the University of Oxford.

Neri Karra Sillaman: I love that. I love teaching, and when I've taken a time out of academia to build our own business, I actually very much missed it. It's an energy exchange, because the questions the students ask, how they challenge me, it's indescribable, and you can't even buy that. So my role, I'm an adjunct professor at the University here, I've taught a course there that I designed myself from idea to action, creating a new venture, creating a strategic new venture, and teaching the students how one comes up with an idea and how an idea develops into a. A business. And I put them into groups, they have to start working on it from lecture one. So at the end, they each present their company, and we have to look at, you know, viability of the idea, the challenges that they may that they may face, how they are going to raise money and how the business will actually become profitable. So at Oxford, my role as an entrepreneurship expert is a little bit more

different, because there I don't lecture, but I am a consult. You can call it tutor consultant. I will meet with students who are graduate level MBA, EMBA, students who have a business idea already. And then every week we meet, and they discuss with me again the challenges that they face, questions they have, and I act as a consultant for them.

Oh, that's great. It's invaluable, above and beyond just normal classwork.

Neri Karra Sillaman: Absolutely and they have like me. There are different entrepreneurship experts at Oxford. Each of them have businesses. Each of them are incredibly impressive in impressive experiences, resumes and how I got the role. It's very funny, because I was approached by one of the professors there, who asked me if I will consider it, and at the time, the program was just starting at the Entrepreneurship Center. And as part of my role, any student who is an Oxford student who has question related to my expertise can meet with me for free. And I love that exchange. I mean the students, especially who have been who I've tutored, coached, and I've given advice one on one. I'm not going to say friends, because it's more like colleagues. We are still in touch.

But you built a little friendship with them too, right? Yeah.

Neri Karra Sillaman: Absolutely. You know, one of them sends me a photo of their newborn child. I really love being with students and teaching and having this I'm not even going to say teaching, because they are the ones who teach me too.

Of course. So now we always like to ask our guests, what does the word legacy mean to you? In general?

Neri Karra Sillaman: This is the heart of my book, and this is the part that surprised me. Not surprised me, but it was just wow. Because when you know the way I'm looking at the books in front of me, the business books that when they talk about business longevity, they talk about growth, healthy growth, having a strategic advantage, sustained strategic advantage and so on. But when I started to interview the immigrant entrepreneurs who have built these impressive businesses who have lasted for many years, I had to relearn what business longevity even means, because it wasn't about profit. It wasn't about becoming the best in the market. It wasn't about growing. It wasn't about that, but it was about legacy. It's about the impact that they make to their customers, to their employees, and who they work with. So for me, it was, this is the heart of my book, and that's what business longevity is about. Because even human longevity, you can live until you are 120 years old.

But What value did you what what legacy did you leave? How were people in your life impacted by you, that's the heart of it. So what legacy means for me? Everyone has been sent to this earth with a task to fulfill, and that's legacy, I hope, to fulfill that task, and it's different for each of us.

Is your legacy different for your family legacy, as opposed to your business legacy.

Neri Karra Sillaman: I don't look at it that way. I am myself, an individual, and everything I do is a reflection of that, whether it's writing a book, whether working in my family business and my legacy, if I can summarize it, it will be to love

I love it. Do you think that came from the experiences you had as the child? Or do you think that was that in your genes were your mom and dad the same way?

Neri Karra Sillaman: They actually think first for other people and put themselves last, which is not healthy thing to do.

No, it's not. You gotta take care of yourself, but the balance, right?

Neri Karra Sillaman: But yes, I had to. I'm doing a different version of that, where I'm very mindful of boundaries, of my own needs, which I had to learn after the age of 35 I have to say. But yes, I definitely come from parents who are very, very. Generous, very loving, very, very caring and making sure that everyone else around them is taken care of. First, I've seen that in my family, but I think going through something challenging makes you really evaluate what matters most in life. And I always say to you know, people who are close to me, I will relive every single difficult moment and trauma and even all that, because I know at the end, it leads me to love. It leads me to wholeness. And that's the purpose of life.

Right. So, where can our listeners pick up your new book or reach out to you to connect with you and learn more about all of your experiences and what you do to help them?

Neri Karra Sillaman: I am quite active on Instagram. My handle is Prof dot Neri on LinkedIn. I'm Neri Karra sillaman, and I'm also quite active on LinkedIn as well. My book is available everywhere, Amazon, Barnes and Noble bookshop.org, anywhere and everywhere the books are sold.

Awesome. Well, I want to just say thank you. I love your your just willingness and openness to share and help people be better in business and in life, and that's what we're all about here on the show.

Neri Karra Sillaman: Thank you very much.