LONDON — Phoebe Hugh, the 28-year-old CEO and founder of insurance startup Brolly, has had an unusual career path, to say the least.
“I was running and dealing a Texas Hold ‘Em poker game; I was an Indian head masseuse; I was a roller-skating waitress; and then I started a company around that,” Hugh says, recalling jobs she did in her teens. “It was a strange time.”
Hugh is featured on Business Insider’s UK Fintech 35 under 35, a list of rising stars in the financial technology sector. Her startup Brolly is an artificial intelligence-powered chatbot that helps people navigate the world of insurance. It has raised seed funding from Valar Ventures, the investment vehicle of renowned Silicon Valley investor Peter Thiel.
Business Insider jumped on the phone with Hugh to hear about how she got where she is todaym, and ask what advice she’d give to aspiring entrepreneurs looking to follow in her footsteps. Here’s what she said:
‘Grit and sweat and tears’
Hugh’s eclectic early employment was inspired by a desire to go travelling before university. That meant doing odd jobs in the evenings while working as a receptionist at a gym in the day.
“I was looking at jobs on the internet and tried to do things that were slightly different,” she recalls.
Waitressing on roller skates or dealing Texas Hold ’em poker may sound world’s away from insurance, but Hugh believes those odd jobs gave her a valuable attribute: resilience.
“If you are really trying to do something, the more grit and sweat and tears that you put into it, hopefully, the more you get out,” Hugh told Business Insider. “I would say try very versatile things. Put yourself in positions you feel uncomfortable in and I guess that gets you quite comfortable with any other situation where you feel out of your depth.”
‘Ask people who’ve done it’
Hugh credits a conversation with Alice Bentinck, the cofounder of accelerator programme Entrepreneur First, with giving her the confidence to set up Brolly.
Hugh was on Aviva’s graduate trainee scheme for two years after graduation, but became frustrated with the slow pace of the organisation. She tracked down Bentinck for a coffee after hearing her speak and ended up going on the Entrepreneur First course, which helps aspiring entrepreneurs figure out how to set up a business.
“Speak to as many people as possible and then try to figure things out,” Hugh said. “There are some people who have given so much of their time to me, with no agenda — really, really helped me — and it’s those people who really stick out in your mind.”
Hugh feels “out of my depth all the time” when running Brolly, which she cofounded in 2016.
“When we first had to hire people I had absolutely no clue how to do that,” She said. “The first time we had to hire, we started interviewing and I thought, god, I don’t know which questions to ask, I need a structure for this, we’re going to be doing so much of this.
“My usual strategy is to ask people who’ve done it. I spoke to our investors, I spoke to other founders, and asked them to help me, give me advice. What are the tools I can put in place?”
‘Life is about finding problems to solve’
Hugh believes it’s vital that founders find something they’re passionate about rather than just a good business idea.
“It’s really important for people to figure out what they love doing, what they cannot not do,” she says. “You have to experiment to figure out the things you become obsessive about and then if there’s anything holding you back from making those changes, then those are the things that you need to tackle next.”
Hugh admits that for most people insurance is boring, but she sees her startup as more about problem-solving that actuarial tables.
“I think most of life is about finding problems to solve,” Hugh says. “Once you do that you can actually have an impact and add value.
“Most people just hate dealing with insurance — it’s a really complicated part of people’s lives. They put it off, and then they end up overspending massively and buying the wrong product. They find out at the pain point that they’ve either bought the wrong thing or they’ve claimed and they don’t understand it.
“Insurance is such a big part of our economy and it’s really important to people’s lives to have the right things, but the whole industry is just completely stagnant.”
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