The best piece of advice for married business partners, Co-founder of Beyond Insights, Terence Teoh

Terence Tam: Hello, this is Terence from Founders Go Naked. And in this episode, we are very privileged to have Terence Teoh, one of the co founders of Beyond Insights, which is one of Malaysia’s largest education. Company when it comes to stock market investing and trading, and they have been around for long, long time as well.

So we’re very privileged to have Terence here today. And Terence, tell us about briefly about beyond insights. If I missed anything there. Please. 

Terence Teoh: Well, thank you, Terence. And, yeah, Beyond Insights, as you mentioned, is one of the largest educator in the space of stock market investing and trading. So we educate the public about the a proper way, a systematic way, a safe way to invest in the stock market.

And a lot of people don’t know this. There are actually many ways you can make money in the stock market. You can go for the long term investing way. You can also do short term trading and very short term trading. There are also various tools and strategies that you can use. For example, you could use leverage instruments like options or CFDs, for example, to maximize the usage of your capital for better returns.

In short, there’s so many ways and what we endeavor to do is to help individual investors and traders out there to eventually develop a system that they can use that suits them, suits their personality, suits their lifestyle, in order to, achieve financial independence, to generate wealth that is sustainable for themselves and also for their family.

Terence Tam: So that’s fantastic. And how many students have you have gone through your courses? Roughly? I mean, In the past, how many years has it been? 

Terence Teoh: We just celebrated our 15 year anniversary last year. So this is our 16th year in business. And today we have about 6, 200 graduates who has completed this one of our program.

Terence Tam: Nice. Nice. Well, I mean, it just speaks volume that you had so many students go to your courses and you have been around for 15 years, which is so I’m sure we have a lot to learn from you today. But before we start, I want to shoot a few 55 simple questions for you so that you know, the audience can get to know you as a person a little bit better before we get into the meats.

Yes. Yes. I’ll get into the meat of the interview, right? 

Terence Teoh: Okay, so Terence, I know we both share the same name, so this could be confusing for the listener, but I’m Terence Tam, and we’re interviewing Terence Teoh, right? 

Terence Teoh: Of course, Terence is a great name, that’s why we all have Terence here. 

Terence Tam: And okay, so, Terence, I want to ask you, what year did you start your business?

Terence Teoh: My, 2008. 2008. The yeah, we registered the company and we had our first public program on 2009. 

Terence Tam: Wow. 

Terence Teoh: Okay. So 2024 now. So, yep. 15 years. Okay. 

Terence Tam: So this next one is a quick trick question. Okay. What date is your anniversary, your wedding anniversary? 

Terence Teoh: Wedding anniversary, so it’s 19, September, 19, 8, 98. There’s a lot of nines there, so I’m gonna get it right. So, September 19, 1998. 

Terence Tam: Wow. Okay, you could have waited one year and had one more nine to it, but that’s okay. Well, at least I’m sure you get off the hook with that one from Kathlyn. So that’s great. Next one is what is your favorite food, Terence?

Terence Teoh:  Oh, that’s easy. First thing that comes to mind is Chee Chong Fun and the Penang, the Penang Chee Chong Fun. Not from anywhere else but Penang, Malaysia. 

Terence Tam:  Alright, for those of people, those people living overseas, can you describe what it’s like? 

Terence Teoh: It’s, it’s like, it’s rice cake but made in a very flat manner and then cut into little pieces. And then we take it with sweet sauce plus chili sauce with a little bit of peanuts, sometimes sesame. Yeah. And fried onions as well. Yeah, it’s delicious. So if you do visit Penang, make sure you actually get that.

Terence Tam: You’re making me feel hungry already. What is your favorite country to visit? 

Terence Teoh: So many. I would, I’ll put it this way, there’s one place that I have, one country that I’ve visited the most, which is Maldives. I think we’ve been there. Six times already, and I’m sure we’ll still, we’ll still go back. Yeah. It’s just,  it’s just a really great place to just chill and do nothing, you know, and it’s not that far away. It’s only four hours flight, so it’s convenient, it’s beautiful. Yeah, that’s our go to place if we need a break. 

Terence Tam: Nice, nice. Alright, and the final for this quickfire session is who did you give your first kiss away to?

Terence Teoh: First girlfriend. Okay. 

Terence Tam: Let’s not go dive too deep into that. Otherwise Terence will get in trouble here. So let’s move on to the main section of the interview. All right, cool. So yeah, Terence, can you give us the highlights of your journey with Beyond Insights from when you started to today? Just give us an overview of, ]you know, how it got started, why you started it, and you know, the, some of the highlights on your 15 year journey.

Terence Teoh: Sure, to put it plainly which is something I tell everyone, the, the real founder of the business is my wife, Kathlyn. She founded the business because she just had that immense passion to want to share her knowledge. And when we started Beyond Insights, our intention was actually to train people on personal mastery.

And that inspiration largely came from our learning journey ourselves, right? And,  that was back in  2003, 2000, or perhaps 2002, I think. By chance, I got a free ticket to the Tony Robbins program, Unleash the Power Within, which was held in Kuala Lumpur at that time. So I went there and I was blown away by this tall American guy on stage who has that amazing ability  to actually do what he says he does, right?

To create transformation and instant change in people. And when I went back and  shared with my wife, I said, you know, you’re going to go and watch this guy. And actually on the same night before I finished the event, I told her I actually bought ticket for her already, you know, for the, for the next event in Singapore the next year.

Terence Tam: Nice. 

She was skeptical at first, but tickets already bought. So she went along the next year  with me. It was a buy one, free one deal at the time. So we went along and then, she experienced the thing. And then we went on to, I mean, over the years, we actually did, I would say almost all the Tony Robbins program, but the most significant program that we have done is the one called it with destiny.

And that has, that has been a truly a transformational event for us because when we went there to that event, we had a problem statement. Which is, you know, we were about, seven years into our marriage at that time, and there were tension, there were challenges, within the marriage, which we, that time didn’t have the resource, resource to, to resolve it.

So we kind of stuck at, at this, place that’s not, not great for marriage. But going through that program, it actually not only changed our relationship, it changed the way we look at our life as well. And so that, that was the turning point that actually I believe has a lot of impact on Kathlyn’s view perspective of life, as well as given her a mission at that point of time, to want to do something similar for people in Malaysia.

So, long story short, when we started Beyond Insights, we actually wanted to teach a personal mastery program. But after doing all the market research and studies, we realized that it might not be a very viable business because we thought that at that point of time, probably no, no one will pay for this kind of training.

And well, there is a way to do it, which is to sell it as a corporate training. But we didn’t want to do another corporate training that plenty of corporate trainers out there, you know, teaching all kinds of stuff at that point of time, we just didn’t want to do the same thing. So we kind of put that aside.

And then, we thought of, you know, how about teaching what she is good at at the point of time. So what happened was that you know, before we went to do this Tony Robbins thing, we all should, we also explored, a few years back then explored quite a few education on the wealth side.

So, the one that caught our attention is really the stock market investing and trading part. And again, Kathlyn was the one who pick it up  and went to it with real  passion and interest. And, you know, few years after that, because of her dedication in just honing the skills and her ability, we came to a point where we were able to generate enough from the stock market.

To know that, you know, if we ever choose to leave our employment at a time, we can do that. Right. Our ability to generate income from the stock market, has already given us the assurance that, you know, we can choose what we want to do. So that, yeah, that was in 2008. We established a company.

We were figuring out what to do. And one day we just decided, Hey, what, what, why not just, you know, teach, teach what we know best. Right. So that’s then came the idea where Kathlyn actually created trading psychology program. Again, you can see how we kind of marry the, the two ideas, right?

Teaching about stock market and the personal development, because the truth is that success in stock market as in success in entrepreneurship, success in career, relationship, and so many other things in life, 90 percent of it is about the mindset and the balance is about the strategy that you apply.

So that was our first program. We call it trading for success. At the core of it is a trading psychology program, right? How do we help traders to build that mindset to overcome all the challenges that they will face when it comes to trading in the stock market, in the financial market. So that was how we started.

We started off just teaching one program. On the very first year, on the second year, you know, because some of the students who attended the first program they asked, they asked us, right, hey, so you, you have taught us about psychology, but you know, we, we don’t really have a strategy that we can bank on right now.

So why don’t you teach us the strategy that you apply as well? So we started teaching the strategy. And that, that’s how things have developed over the years. So if I could summarize the roadmap from the starting point to what we have now, we’ve been working really hard to create and design a complete curriculum where people can learn, not only learn, but learn until a stage where they can actually create professional level results because you know, I think trading and investing is actually a profession that deserves a lot of respect that sometimes people don’t give enough of, right? Well, what I mean is that, I mean, if you, if you look at any profession out there, right?

I mean, if you want to be an engineer, you’re going to spend four years, at least four years in the university, right? You want to be a software developer, you’re going to spend at least three years. If you want to be a medical doctor, that’s even longer, you know, six years and whatnot. So, to be financial market investor and trader with professional level kind of results.

You know, you, you not only you’ve got to spend time, you’ve got to spend effort to learn different aspects, in the stock market as well. Otherwise truly you are better off just, you know, leaving your money to other people to manage, which arguably may not give you the results that you want. But for anyone who wants to succeed in it, they need to be aware that there are a few aspects to learn.

So, unfortunately in the market back then, a lot of people are just teaching so called they are secret sauce, right? As if there’s like this one Holy Grail where you can just follow exactly, and then you will get results. But that’s, that’s, that is never the case. So, what we have endeavored to do in the past 15 years is to build a very complete and comprehensive set of curriculum where someone can join Beyond Insights.

And first of all, learn the fundamentals, learn the foundation, skills, which will enable you to do, to have decent return, return as better than, for example, your, social security return as better than putting your money in, in unique trust or fixed deposit. So it, it’s just gives you more advantage.

And for the people who are, who are, who find interest in a subject you want to go further, and get even better results that’s better than most of the so called fund managers out there. They can also achieve that by going through, the more advanced level education that we have in Beyond Insight.

So to, to summarize in the past, 15 years, we have spent that effort to develop a really comprehensive and career complete curriculum for people with different level of interest. Meaning to say, if you just want to have some fundamental knowledge, you can learn that from Beyond Insights. When I say fundamental, it will actually enable you to do better, than giving your money, putting your money in unit trust, for example. And for those people who find interest, in the subject, they want to go develop themselves further.

They can actually truly be on this program, achieve professional level results as well, right? Which is,  I would say on par with both so called fund managers out there. So that’s that. And also in the past few years, we are so invested heavily in technology. We have started develop our own, software that can guide our students to trade more systematically to help them to make decisions more precisely to make their decision making process faster so that they can just focus on doing the right things.

So I think the, the development in technology is really exciting, you know? The speed of development AI is so fast that we just, we hope we can continue to, to innovate and invest, invest in this space, and to be able to help our students, better and better. 

Terence Tam: Yeah. Fantastic. I mean, Terence, I, think one of the big lessons there for listeners is that from what I’m hearing, all throughout this 15 years, you haven’t come come up with offerings that the market doesn’t need your offerings and your programs. They’re all based on the needs of what your students need. Even today. And when you’re talking about AI and stuff like that. You’re kind of like saying, Okay, how can we help our students better?

And I think that customer focus, I think, is probably one of the reasons why you guys are one of the most successful and, you know, have been around the longest is because you’re putting your customers first and your customers needs first. Would you agree? 

Terence Teoh: Yeah, definitely. You know, our, we created this mission statement when we started the business, right?

Our mission was to bring out the best in people and their financial future. So, yeah, bring out the best in people has always been a focus and it still is the focus today. Yeah. And, it’s how do we bring out the best in people is about giving them the resources, giving them the facilities they, that they need.

Because yeah, actually, we also believe that most people have all the resources they need within themselves. What we need to do is give them the resources and facilities, whether it’s the program, whether it’s the software system, to help them to. So, definitely I would agree. I think that that’s the, that, that should be the primary focus for all business to focus on the customer’s interests first.

Terence Tam: Yeah. I mean, even when you first started and you’re going, okay, maybe we help people with self mastery, but then you realize, okay, that’s not what the market needs at this stage. It’s more like, okay, maybe they actually, what they need is to get a high income for themselves through trading through stock market investing.

And you went towards that and then you merged, self mastery in it. Whereas I think a lot of people would just say, well, I am in this particular niche and this particular field, and I’m just doing this and not listening to what the market wants. And that’s where they create a lot of problems. So moving on Terence, I’m just wondering like, what was some of the biggest challenges you have faced in this last 15 years?

Cause I’m sure there are quite a few with like, you know, such a long period of time. Can you name one or two that were some of the biggest that you have to face as a business? 

Terence Teoh: I think in most business, the challenge would always be about people. I think if we compare ourselves to many businesses out there, I wouldn’t say that we are growing as fast as a lot of business out there.

But we also made that conscious decision to grow the business in a way that we can sustain it. So that, that also means that, we need to make sure that we hire the right people, people who are aligned with Beyond Insights values and, and it’s not, not easy in a sense that, I mean, if you look at the company’s profitability, our profit margin is not that great.

I mean, inherently in the service industry, in the education industry, profit margins are not that scalable because we always have to depend on a human to teach, right? Maybe in the future, we can get robots to teach, but now, you know, the, the, the products actually, other than the The material is the human who teach it.

So then that kind of limit our scalability in some sense. But that also means that we really have to put in effort, to groom people, to develop people. And that, that. It takes time, you know, and not, not everybody has the patience to grow slowly in a way that we want to grow. So recruiting talent,  had be a challenge, but I think it’s, we, we kind of accepted that right as as a challenge because of the choice that we make, we know that hiring the right people is important and therefore we are willing to wait for the right people and grow the business. Following the piece of the people that we have as well, right? Because it doesn’t matter how much ambition I have, right?

If you don’t, if I don’t have the people, I can’t make it happen. I can’t do anything myself, you know? So, growth has been a challenge, but I would say that it’s also,  it’s also because of the, the way we have decided to run the business. So I, while it’s a challenge, I also, I’m also at peace with it.

Terence Tam: Hmm. Okay. All right. And so what I guess the only solution is really the patience and, you know, having that patience to wait for the right people to come in. That means your criteria. And I mean, is there a challenge also where if you train someone, like you spend two years patiently training someone, then they decide, Oh, I can do this myself.

And then they leave the company and set up shops. Is that, has that happened before? Is that like a challenge for you? 

Terence Teoh: Well, while that, I don’t think that, that, that hasn’t happened. But, internally, I’m prepared for that. I think I have accepted that as part and parcel of the business. And I think it’s, yeah, it’s the, I mean, it’s not just about  them going to set up shops, right?

It could be just, just a staff who we have, let’s say, spent a lot of effort in grooming and then went out and do some other business or something else. That is more aligned with the passion and interest. I think we, we just have to accept that as entrepreneurs someone gave me this analogy, right?

As, as a business, we are like a bus heading towards a destination, you know, and in a journey, this bus will pick up passengers, but not everyone on the bus will want to go to the final destination. Some will want to get off you know, somewhere along the way and we, we got to be okay with that. You know, because it’s their choice, right?

It’s their life. And what we just want to make sure of is when they’re on the bus, you know, everyone gives their best in making sure that the journey is a beautiful one. The journey is a rewarding one. So when it’s time for you to get off the bus, just, you know, we’ll send you off. And yeah. Yeah, that’s a good way to look at it.

Terence Tam: I’m really curious about something, Terence, and, you know, I’ve been through this before, and for me, it didn’t quite work so well in terms of working together with your wife in the same business, right? I, when I had my business back in Australia and I had my wife in the business, we often would get into conflicts and arguments and stuff.

I mean, how, how does your chemistry work with Kathlyn and, you know, how do you deal with, you know, conflict prevention or, you know, resolution there. Can you share some tips? 

Terence Teoh: Yeah, I know what it means. That’s definitely not easy enough for everyone. It’s challenging. Just, just by the fact that, you know, when husband and wife work in the same business, you, the, the lines get crossed all the time, you know, between personal and, and business.

Sometimes business get personal and personal stuff become business, you know, and well, you would say that it is, it is a sacrifice, in some sense because like I say, right, sometimes you can’t avoid talking about business when you’re out having a dinner, you know, that happens. And, you know, as much as you want to avoid it, some, some things are just urgent and warrants the attention to be this, to, to be discussed.

Right. So, and I think it’s just to have the agreement that it’s for the best of everyone, meaning to say, I think that as a couple, we need to align our values. We need to know that, you know, what, what is considered most important for us. We got to agree on let’s say for example how we spend our time what is okay and what’s not okay.

And we do our best to safeguard those guidelines, right. And also have that grace to kind of accept and also forgive each other when sometimes you overstep that line when, you know, in our, in our speech, we get too personal when we talk about business. So it’s a lot of  acceptance of both parties, because when you have business.

I mean, when you work together, a lot of your weaknesses or shortcomings tend to show up which otherwise would not show up in the family context. So, so to summarize, number one value is alignment. I think both parties seem to be very clear what, what they each value. Understand what each other value and have an alignment.

Second is  to have so called rules and guides in place to clearly know when we overstep the boundaries. And thirdly, have have a lot of grace, and  in each other heart to just be able to give the allowance, for each other to sometimes overstep that boundary and, you know, forgive each other.

But all in all, I would say that. Although it’s challenging, it does really help to improve the relationship at the end of the day because, I believe that if if the marriage is strong a good marriage should be able to withstand all these challenges. So our focus the primary question would always be, you know, how, how do we support each other in the best way possible in the most loving way possible even though we are working together as a colleague.

Yeah. Hmm. And you, at the end of the day, you feel the pros outweigh the cons being in a husband wife business. 

Terence Tam: Yeah, I do. I do. Yes. Okay. So what is the biggest pro you think being in a husband and wife business? 

There’s never been a complaint of, Oh, you don’t spend enough time with me. Cause we’re with each other 24 seven. Yeah. No complaints there. Yeah. Good points. And we, we get to understand each other, I think a lot better. And, and that’s, that’s what makes a good marriage, isn’t it? To  have that real deep understanding of each other so that yeah, because acceptance come from understanding, right?

You can’t understand each other, then you, there’s no point talking about acceptance. So, um, I think, yeah, that having that opportunity to understand each other and then each other deeply because we also work with each other.

I think those are the, those are the pros here. 

Terence Tam: That’s beautiful. So Terence, I’m just curious, like if people,  you know, starting a coaching business or want to get into webinars and seminars, what is your one or two tips that would, you would kind of share with them to help them to improve? Maybe there are sales and the conversions at webinars and seminars.

Terence Tam:  You know, we’ve, we’ve been on the so called speaking circuit for many years. As in, we don’t only look at ourselves, but we look at  the other speakers whom we look up to, speakers who could, let’s say, you know, convert well. And I think there are, there are two types, all right, that there’s one type of speaker, you know, whether it’s online or in the in person setting, there’s one type of speaker could impress and convert really well because they are really polished in their sealed speech. 

They are really precise in their use of words, right? And there’s also another type of speakers, who can really inspire sometimes they may not, they may not be the best sales, but these are the type who create lasting impact.

As in, you know, you can still remember what they say like 10, 20 years ago on the stage. And if you ask me, as, as someone who is selling webinar, we have to endeavor to be both. In a sense that we really have to come from that authentic space where we have a real message that we want to share with people, we have real solid knowledge then.

We can really help people to become better in, in their lives. I think that’s, that’s the key fundamental if, I think if we can get this right. It’s already half, more than half the job done. So I think that that’s the most important thing if you ask me to choose between an authentic speaker and a great salesman, I would, I would choose the authentic person first because I know that I can, there’s something real I can learn there.

I’m not just and I’m not just being, I’m not just getting emotional buying because of a green, you know, sales pitch. So I think that come first and secondly is to, you know, of course, develop that, that ability  to speak well, to be precise in the way we use our words so then our message can be conveyed in an effective and efficient manner.

So it’s, yeah, this, I personally struggle with the second part, right? You know, as, as an introvert, I’m not the type who can express myself well, but I do realize that it is, it is a learnable skills as well. And so I would encourage, you know, everyone who wants to be a speaker and do webinars, first of all, just, just be sure, be sure that you have really something solid within you.

That you can give to people. It’s of great value. Determine that. Then slowly build up your ability to deliver your presentation in a in a better way. 

Terence Tam: Fantastic, because, yeah, actually, one of the lot of testimonials I hear about Kathlyn is that she number one is very authentic. That’s one thing I always hear from a lot of attendees to your seminars and webinars.

The other thing is that she simplifies things so that something complicated like the stock market. Even someone that hasn’t has zero like financial knowledge or accounting background can understand what the stock market is about. So I think if if any of you want to see how Kathlyn does it, I think you should maybe check out one of the webinars or seminars.

So talking about that, Terrence, if people want to find out more about yourself Beyond Insights and Kathlyn and maybe sign up for one of the webinars to check out how she presents and I know she presents really well. Where can they find you? 

Terence Teoh: Yeah, just go to www.beyondinsights.net. There’s a get started button there, so just click on that.

That will lead you to a introductory seminar that we are conducting. But once a week at the moment, so just, pick the dates that is best for you. Come and join us and yeah, let Kathlyn share with you wisdom and knowledge. And yeah, as Terence mentioned, see how she presents and I think more, more importantly, learn the message about the importance of investing and investing in ourselves as well.

Terence Tam: Yeah. Oh, fantastic. Terence, it’s been a pleasure catching up with you. And I think our listeners and I myself have gotten a lot from this interview about business, about presenting a webinars and about life in general and marriage. So thank you so much Terence for being on the show. Thank you.

Terence Teoh: Thank you Terrence for inviting. It’s been a pleasure. All right. Thank you. everyone.