Fintech CEO Laurel Taylor Says Federal Student Loan Changes Are Confounding Borrowers

Forbes

here is $1.8 trillion in outstanding student loan debt in the U.S., and the Trump administration is actively changing the ways borrowers can repay that debt. Laurel Taylor, the CEO and founder of a student-loan-focused fintech startup called Candidly, spoke to ForbesWomen editor Maggie McGrath about what these changes mean for borrowers and how she's navigating the turbulent political environment.  Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1  0:00 - Introduction & The Origin of Candidly 1:44 - The Scale of the Student Debt Crisis 3:02 - What is Candidly & How Does It Work? 4:47 - A User's Journey: How Candidly Helps Employees 8:01 - The Policies Powering Candidly: CARES Act & Secure 2.0 11:21 - Navigating Headwinds: Changes to Public Service Loan Forgiveness 13:30 - The Purpose of PSLF & How Tech Solves the Paperwork Problem 16:11 - From Capitol Hill: 'It's An Absolute Mess' 19:33 - The CEO's Balancing Act: Policy, Passion, and ROI 22:50 - How I Hire My Executive Team: Integrity & 'Sweeping the Floors' 24:58 - The Future is AI: Meet 'Kate,' Your Personal Financial Assistant 30:57 - A Founder's Vulnerable Lesson: The Mistake of Not Paying Myself 33:28 - If I Could Rebuild the System from Scratch... 35:36 - Goals for the Next Year: Doubling Our Impact  Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:  https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript  Stay Connected Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes More From Forbes:  http://forbes.com  Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.

Transcript

00:00disproportionately women do that women CEOs don't pay for don't pay ourselves while we're taking

00:05care of every everyone else around us and the experience that I had actually I was my husband's

00:13also founder founder and so we were moving during COVID and because I hadn't paid myself I've

00:20actually never shared this because I hadn't paid myself for four years I couldn't get a mortgage

00:24we were moving out of San Francisco and I was moving to be next to my Evie my niece Evie and my mom

00:32and I couldn't get a loan and I had to call my board and have a conversation with have have a

00:40conversation about wow I am out of alignment with my own values while I'm living the mission of

00:47candidly to help crush debt and build wealth oops I forgot to do that for myself and there are real

00:53implications and consequences for that decision

00:56hi everyone I'm Maggie McGrath senior editor at Forbes there is approximately 1.8 trillion dollars

01:06in outstanding student loan debt in the United States it affects more than 40 million Americans

01:14and joining us now is a founder and CEO who is trying to help these people and she's navigating

01:21a really complex political environment as she does so she is Laurel Taylor the founder and CEO of

01:28Candidly Laurel thank you so much for being here thank you for having me Maggie so you founded Candidly

01:34after your own experience with student loan debt can you give us a 90 second overview of Candidly's

01:40origin story I had a tremendous amount of student debt so I grew up in a household like 70 percent of

01:47Americans today knew I was going to college knew how I was going to college and that was through

01:53accessing scholarships grants federal loans private loans what I didn't know is that between my mom and

02:01I we would miss out on two decades of compounding interest on wealth while paying down debt and the my alma

02:08mater MIT MIT age lab and TIAA now one of our partners indicated we are not special that's what 80 percent of

02:16those with student debt do they first spend all of their income to pay down student debt while forgoing savings and

02:25retirement savings unfortunately missing out on the first ten years and the last ten years of compounding interest on wealth is is pretty financially devastating

02:35and you had debt at a nine percent interest rate as well that's a high interest rate so you're not only missing out on

02:42tremendous growth but you're spending a lot of money just to repay those loans that's right and it's the average borrower the average

02:51American today it takes 17 to 20 years to pay down their student loans and we see populations that now are taking 24 to 29 years to pay down their student loans and so

03:03one of the messages that I think is so important to understand for those who are privileged to not have student loans is that

03:12student debt is mom debt it's dad debt it's spousal debt it's grandparent debt it's everyone's debt across all ages and wages and it is

03:21the second largest life expense second only to mortgages and so as we think about going beyond student debt and then to savings and retirement savings

03:32really normalizing that most of us begin our journey

03:36with financial services on the liability side of the balance sheet not the asset side of the balance sheet

03:41that's my own experience to a tee what is candidly and what are you trying to accomplish with this company

03:48we exist to crush student debt and enable hard-working Americans to go beyond student debt into savings and retirement savings

03:59via simultaneous progress versus sequential and we are achieving that objective as a workplace benefit

04:07so we are offered by employers to their employees to help address the number one concern within the workplace

04:15today and at the time that I founded candidly it was a very novel idea to which to me is incredibly obvious

04:23coming from I led a global business unit for Google previously my entire career has been in technology

04:29so I'm new to the financial services landscape what was very obvious to me of course we need a digital

04:35experience to help address the most complicated more complicated on a daily basis aspect of financial

04:43services where we're beginning our journey arguably with the least amount of financial literacy you know 18

04:48to 22 and the big bet in creating what was once novel and is now firmly a new category into the new normal

04:57I believed that major positive policy levers would be pulled that would enable employers to address

05:06student debt within the workplace right alongside their 401k plan right alongside their tuition reimbursement

05:13program to help employees in their financial wealth and wellness journey and those policy levers were pulled

05:21in 2020 and 2022 and so now we're moving from from this new category into new normal in terms of adoption

05:30and access that employees and workers have to candidly we'll get into the policy weeds in just a second but

05:36let's go through an anecdote a hypothetical anecdote of a candidly user so let's say I'm an employee at UBS

05:43which offers candidly as an employee benefit I I'm me I'm Maggie I graduated with $65,000 of student debt

05:51I feel like I have no ability to save for retirement I go to HR they tell me about candidly what happens next

05:59yes first we meet you with empathy so there's a lot of shame that most individuals have that have student

06:09debt parents who wish that their kids were not graduating with student debt those I don't know

06:14how you felt but uh when I graduated with student debt I also felt like nobody else really like no

06:19one was talking about it and so there was this whole feeling uh around this whole kind of energy

06:28around it that was just we hear it from we hear it from those that we serve so when you hear about

06:35candidly as an employee you likely hear from a couple of different channels from HR but also

06:40through our outreach to really celebrate that your employer is offering the first benefit ever designed

06:46to meet you where you are today and enable you to move beyond this barrier to every other wealth

06:56accumulating event so what we're hearing from borrowers right now the four sentiments are fear worry dread

07:04and confusion so employees coming to our platform today are saying I do not know what is going on

07:11and just as you shared I have 65 000 feels like a tremendous amount and so what we're hearing is

07:1957 percent of those we serve do not know who their servicer is 46 percent do not know how much they

07:26owe we have prime and super prime so those who are super engaged in their financial services

07:35and financial wellness more broadly coming into the platform looking for number one guidance help me

07:41understand where I am help me understand the status of my loan because I may have been put into

07:48administrative forbearance or forbearance because federal programs have been coming on and off the

07:53shelf on almost a daily basis right so how much do I owe what's the status and then help me lower my

08:01monthly payment help me access these incredible federal programs that are available but I just don't

08:08know how to get into so the average borrower that comes into our platform we're helping them save 358

08:14dollars per month in less than six minutes by making it an elegant and easy experience to understand for

08:24you what are the available options that you can take advantage of and leave the experience with the

08:31problem solved and so that's the education part of it is there an employee match is there if I am paying

08:38six hundred dollars a month is in this example UBS giving me a one percent match instead of a 401k one

08:48percent match or how does that part work incredible so there are two different major pieces of policy

08:53policy that passed one was called the CARES Act which enable employers to offer five thousand two

08:59hundred and fifty dollars annually tax-free to help employees pay down their student debt now in this

09:07program design and the most the greatest usage of employer contributions to help pay down student debt

09:15is in health care education and technology segments of of the work the workforce and so that actually

09:23enables employees to pay their debt down faster now what employers are seeing when they use what's

09:29called their section 127 budget they're able to tap into their tuition reimbursement budget for past

09:36present or future education so the same budget for skilling and reskilling

09:41can now be applied to address the debt workers are bringing into the workplace we have facilitated over

09:47a hundred million in employer contributions to date it shaves off about six to seven years of their

09:53repayment attorney and again it's tax-free for for both parties that just went into permanent extension

10:00just so exciting because employers were saying we don't know if this is going to be temporary it's set to

10:08sunset at the end of the year but now actually one of the really positive attributes of the one big

10:14beautiful bill which i know we'll get into is permanent extension so there is a recognition that employers

10:20want to help their employees pay down their student debt because they get return there's a 76 percent

10:26reduction in turnover across employees receiving that contribution the second piece of what you just asked

10:34is actually very different program design with secure 2.0 there's this tiny little provision within

10:39secure 2.0 over 90 provisions that helps employers offer a retirement match to employees who are paying

10:49down their student debt and foregoing that retirement match so the retirement match is available but most

10:56employees as we talked about with the mit age lab really are prioritizing being debt free first or if or

11:03they can't actually afford to have any money taken out of payroll for a future state because they

11:10have they and today they have to pay their student loans so that's where we're seeing employers offer

11:18a retirement match it actually goes into the retirement savings plan while employees pay down their debt

11:24and that's that simultaneous progress that we were talking about and what we're seeing is durably now

11:31we're bringing 13 percent of net new employees into retirement savings first time savers they're

11:40saying yeah i got to pay down my debt but now i get an upside and you're helping me build wealth and then

11:45we're seeing 27 percent who are already saving in retirement savings but not able to maximize that

11:52employer match because of their student loan payments 27 percent there's a lift in 27 percent of those

11:59now able to maximize the match i could have used that because i definitely remember getting enrolled

12:04in the 401k and they wanted to auto enroll me at a certain percent and i bumped it down a few percentage

12:11points because i needed that cash flow to pay down my student loans so these are two pieces of legislation

12:17that have been tailwinds for your business we're sitting in an environment right now where there have been

12:23a few headwinds candidly processed a record number of applications to public service loan forgiveness that

12:32program but the trump administration is looking to make changes to this program how is that affecting

12:39your business right now so the primary the primary effect of our business right now is a total

12:49distress that borrowers are showing up in our platform we have a 460 increase in the utilization of our

12:58platform we're seeing a 200 and a 280 increase in uses of our in use of our coaches so there's a high

13:06tech and then a human touch component so we're seeing this surge of utilization of our benefit number one

13:15because we are coming off a period of four and a half years where 43 million americans actually did

13:22not have to pay their student loans they could they could they could push pause they could hope for

13:28forgiveness and what we're seeing is for four and a half years non-repayment was met with no consequence

13:37right it was an opportunity to take a breath hopefully save uh and accumulate a nest egg

13:44and now non-repayment means credit scores dropping by 170 points and individuals waking up in the

13:52morning realizing they've had a 170 point drop in their credit score so i think what's really important

13:59as we talk about public service loan forgiveness is to appreciate we're at the highest default rate in

14:03the history of the portfolio we're currently transunion just shared a data point right 31 delinquency and

14:09default that includes prime and super prime so that's really a symptom of something seriously wrong

14:18seriously broken if those who are fully engaged cannot figure out how to manage this part of their

14:26life so from a public service loan forgiveness perspective i think it's important to share there's

14:32been so much controversy around forgiveness the public service loan forgiveness program was introduced

14:39in 2007 bipartisan and it was designed to bring public service workers into our economy to fill mission

14:50critical jobs so when we think about our parents in the hospital and as we think about children and we

14:56think about a pediatric icu and we think the school system and teachers my mom was a social worker

15:03firefighters police officers mission critical roles where individuals are sacrificing and they're saying

15:10this is a calling i it's my calling to be a physician i'm going to go into public service i'm going to make

15:15below market but after 10 years of really diligent payments 120 of them my outstanding balance will be

15:23forgiven and the negotiated rule making process around public service loan forgiveness is designed to

15:33the is designed to ensure that public service loan forgiveness that that is out that that is available

15:43for employers who are offering what this administration is defining as public service

15:49and that brings up a question because when trump initially announced these changes he said that

15:55the public service loan forgiveness program had quote misdirected tax dollars into activist organizations

16:02end quote that he went on to kind of describe that harm national security so what does this mean for

16:08folks who you mentioned those 120 payments so that's 10 years of repayment there are people who chose to

16:16enter this program 10 years ago 10 years before the 2024 election or eight years before have you heard

16:23from any of them or what chaos and confusion does something a statement like that cause to candidly's users the

16:30chaos and confusion is is definitely at an all-time high we're coming off of again you know multiple years of

16:37daily headlines daily changes federal programs on and off the shelf program called save and income driven and

16:45paying as you earn and repay and all of these all of these different programs so we're just here there's

16:53just a lot of fear there's a lot of fear and distress around are these programs going to be available am i going to be

17:00able to continue to access them and so our job to be done is to help employees who we see 77 increase in confidence

17:10after having a conversation with a coach our pslf program which is automated we came up on the first

17:16anniversary less than two percent two percent were actually approved in user error on the employee side

17:23on the employer side the paperwork was was filled in incorrectly so our job is to ensure that every

17:30american worker who has access to pslf the pslf program gets into and takes advantage of that program

17:39and what we see is when we deploy the pslf program through candidly there's a 5x increase in utilization

17:46and throughput despite having access to pslf the average employee their first time applicants

17:55even after they've worked for their employer for almost seven years so they're applying for the first

18:00time they're an average of 58 000 plus that will be forgiven three and a half years from that point in

18:07time didn't know about the program couldn't figure out how to get into it couldn't figure out who the

18:13employer signatory was and so it's a really obvious application of technology and digital and data science

18:20to automate that process and ensure that those who are working for institutions that qualify can access it

18:29so that's our primary job to be done is to ensure that as a technology company

18:33last week we talked about in the negotiated rulemaking process there are 1.5 million

18:40employers that are pslf eligible institutions they cover 12.8 million workers that's just on the private

18:49sector excluding federal state governmental workers that's a huge there are like 2 000 employers taking

18:57advantage of the pslf program so it's it's a real converging crises communication operational technology

19:07and the private sector really being able to evangelize and make these programs accessible

19:14you mentioned the rulemaking you were in dc last week and you posted i want to read something that you

19:19posted online about your experience in dc you said quote while we rigorously debate policy real people are

19:27defaulting at record rates including prime and superprime borrowers who never imagined they'd be here

19:33each new administration adds more programs more complexity more bureaucratic maze for desperate

19:39families to navigate the most respectful interpretation the policy is designed to help

19:45without the ability to operationalize and automate and so it hurts instead those are powerful words how

19:52are they received on capitol hill i think it depends on the audience and the what i i think it's important

20:00to share that i i saw the department work really hard for three days to come to consensus there were a

20:10number of concerns that were presented that they earnestly genuinely responded to in the language that

20:20ultimately emerged from three days together my biggest concern it's the whole thing is just a disaster

20:29it's it's it's it's it's just an it's an absolute mess each administration has a different point of view

20:38on education financing how families access federal funding how much federal funding should be available

20:45since it was introduced from from the gi bill different different different programs and income driven

20:52repayment programs americans are like just trying to live their lives right they're like they're looking

20:59for a way up and out they are they are believing in the promise of education to increase lifetime earnings

21:05there is a you slog at the other end of that that with complexity uh brings devastating outcomes you know

21:17that 170 point drop in credit score is equivalent to bankruptcy and for those who are not in repayment

21:25there will be wage garnishment in the private sector so also for all of your business leaders that are

21:31listening in today in the in the in the fall the private sector will receive a letter from the irs

21:39requiring finance and hr to garnish the wages wages of employees who are not in repayment and that can be

21:45around 15 percent of of wages employers don't want to be in the business of wage garnishment of federal student

21:51loans so the most important thing for us to do together as a community and as an ecosystem

21:57is to proactively mitigate and minimize those that are falling into default and that is through

22:06making these programs that are available that no one knows about can't figure out how to get into them

22:10because it is pre-facebook technology i mean this is pre it's pre-facebook we're talking about phone

22:15calls and fax machines employees are on hold for several hours trying to get a hold of their servicer

22:22and modernizing it just like any other area of our financial services experience today so you are

22:30running a tech company ultimately but we've been talking about policy you were in dc so as a ceo

22:36founder you sit in an interesting seat how do you think about strategizing your time and dividing your

22:42time between the policy conversations and advocacy and explaining versus the regular operational financial

22:51strategic duties that fall on a ceo on a day-to-day basis i am always looking for mentorship on time

22:58management i'll start with that so it was it was an honor to be able to participate last week to

23:06bring an operator's perspective to bring a technology perspective on no matter what emerges from one

23:13administration to the next we need to make it as easy as possible for american families of again all

23:20different ages and wages to figure out the way into wellness and wealth and as a as the founder and

23:29ceo because policy has such important implication to the end user that we serve it's all about it's all

23:38about impact it's all about outcomes it's all about the relief and financial relief which is an

23:44intangible that is difficult to measure we measure the two billion in impact we measure the first time

23:50wealth that we're creating a partnership with employers but the intangible is that feeling of

23:56freedom and relief i got a plan i got a strategy i know what i'm doing and i know how to do this

24:03that is the heartbeat of the of the company and so the focus is on the heartbeat of the company

24:08which is how do we enable hard-working americans to go from the liability side of the balance sheet to

24:14the asset side of the balance sheet and how do we mobilize and move mountains and the market together

24:22to bring secure 2.0 which was passed in 2022 that just became available on january 1st of 2024

24:30how do we ensure that every american worker has access to that retirement match while they pay down their debt

24:38because we know in the data that they'll have an average of 450 000 at the time of retirement savings

24:46if they just get a match on their student loan payments for half of the time that they're paying

24:54down their debt and even if they never put a dime into retirement savings themselves that's four times what

25:01boomers have today that one little provision so we are a reason we are irrational we are unreasonable

25:08in willis towers watson indicated 42 percent of employers would offer the secure 2.0 student loan

25:16retirement match by the end of next year we want it to be 100 and we want it to be 100 of the market

25:23offering the retirement match which is about 46 of employers as soon as possible because those are

25:28individuals who have their first five years in the workplace or compound interest work it's

25:34greatest magic the last five years before they retire the urgency the urgency to get out and move

25:41the market together that's really so my time is like 90 on how do we move the market working with

25:46employers working with partners that distribute our offering like vanguard empower schwab tiaa bank of

25:54america meadow lynch guild like we go get after it together with urgency and that's the thing i think

26:01is missing the most is the urgency on you know making this accessible as soon as possible that urgency is

26:09hard to understand unless you've had student debt in my experience i paid my loans off a few years ago

26:15and i remember it was a huge accomplishment and i remember how i felt in my early 20s and it just felt

26:21like a monthly emergency every time i saw those balances because i signed up for auto pay come out

26:28of my accounts and i just wanted to pay down the debt faster but that's an experience that's very

26:33particular to a borrower and unless you've had that which you have as well i think it's hard to feel

26:39that urgency do you experience that in talking to folks who have no experience with student loan debt

26:46absolutely i can i can feel it i can actually feel it in the first few minutes of interacting with

26:54someone because i'm trying to figure out how to inspire them how do i inspire the decision maker

27:01who's in the seat and who has the power who has the power to affect their whole employee population our

27:08average employer today serves about 22 500 employees and the unlock of appreciating one of the employers

27:16we work with pearson we conducted a retirement plan assessment and then we pulled what we call a

27:23candidly impact assessment to help them understand what percentage of employees have access to the

27:28retirement match but if we're going in what percentage employees are participating but not maximizing

27:34and she saw her own data stacy at pearson and said i can't unsee i can't unsee what i've seen

27:39it's women it's a younger population those under the age of 30 leave 46 percent of the retirement

27:45match in the population it's their diverse population and she made the decision i want to be a part of that

27:52i want to help serve this population and bring them into the program and it's great for the business

27:58because it's a it's a double bottom line impact of retention acquisition and retention we're seeing

28:04a reduction in turnover north of 50 percent by those who have access to that retirement match on their

28:10student loan payments but as i'm trying to understand how to move the person that's the decision maker

28:18if it's a finance conversation then it's about the return on investment of the acquisition and

28:24retention in the data if it's someone that's lived the story it's really both but it is a bit more

28:32a bit more heart but sometimes that can turn off the odd so it it you know we're always trying to

28:40as change agents as pioneers of a new normal in the market that we know has massive impact is

28:48understanding what matters what matters to the impact and outcome that that person power is looking

28:55to achieve i think that's probably advice for anyone running a mission oriented business now you

29:01mentioned your average employer serves a little over 22 000 employees how do you go from person with

29:08student loan debt to founder of a company serving you name some of the biggest names in finance was

29:14there one inflection point i think that there are there are so many inflection points that just happen

29:21almost on a daily basis it's the first customer who said yes that was a small medium business and then it

29:27was the first mid-market employer and then it was the first enterprise employer which was fiserv and

29:32salesforce and then serving the enterprise employer and showing the impact across their employee

29:39population and the return we earned the right at the same time as nailing vendor risk and information

29:47security requirements of the largest financial services companies in the world we earned the right

29:52to serve the machinery that moves the market that has you know descended on the market and is automating

29:59the 401k and 403b and automating tuition reimbursement and integrating into their offering so they

30:06provide a holistic experience that addresses the full spectrum of wellness within the workplace and so

30:12it's the momentum it's the first down the second down the third down and that momentum over now

30:21nine years as the clear category leader that wins every opportunity that we pursue and so the the challenge

30:28that we're trying to solve is how do we win more opportunities how do we get in front of more

30:33decision makers to serve more employees so i don't think there was a single inflection point other

30:41than the daily inflection point of just keep going you got to keep going uh because it is it's a long

30:49it's like a marathon that's it feels like a hit it's like a hit run but over a marathon course uh as

30:57we're you know fast twitching all of the different it's been a very volatile five years that it has and

31:04as a founder growing a business you have to also think about the team that you are hiring how do you

31:11think about hiring your executive team because it's hard sometimes to delegate so what do you as founder

31:18ceo look for in your c-suite integrity integrity is number one uh player coach so i have an expression

31:28we all sweep the floors uh we we do whatever needs to be done and we do it with humility and with our

31:36core values of empathy empathy for the other person what's the job to be done for our colleague

31:42with humility the best ideas come from those closest to the work with macgyverism we're always

31:49problem solving crazy problems as just part of the the day job in collaboration a real bias to action

31:56and collaborate so the culture of the company is a real roll your sleeves up work alongside one another

32:03my goal is to be the best the best the place where we can do the best work of our lives that is

32:10incredibly ambitious goal and that is also the point which is how do we be together the the place

32:18where we can do the best work of our lives what does that look like what does that feel like and

32:22it's kind and it's urgent and it's interactive and it's multi-disciplinary and diverse and so from

32:28the from management to elt to an intern i am looking for that problem solving creativity high

32:35integrity mission first because the mission it is so i look at the team and the number of changes in our

32:44product that we've had to make almost on a daily basis to respond to new programs changing programs

32:53changing calculations that could be quite fatiguing for a lot of people and our team just they show up

33:02they show up they want to get it done because they know the alternative is a system of incumbents

33:08who will be able to respond to that three to four years from now and that's part of the 31 percent

33:14default we have to solve right now so that that mission is i'm just it's so humbling to see the level of

33:22heart and grit and super high eq iq that that the team brings to the organization

33:29you are mission-oriented candidly is a mission-oriented business you just mentioned that

33:34in what you look for but i'm wondering as you're hiring if someone is an excellent technician or has

33:40excellent eq iq all these other things but they're just not passionate about student loans but they

33:46want to work for you is that someone that you hire or do you really need that mission-oriented person

33:52on your team you gotta have it all so they don't have to have had personal experience with student debt

34:03but there has to be emotional connection resonance with the mission of the work that we're doing

34:09because ultimately that empathy expresses as creativity and we are really excited can i tell

34:18you about our upcoming release of course so so we are releasing our conversational ai tool we call

34:27her kate conversational ai tool and kate is a direct response to the desperate need for a deeply

34:38personalized experience that has inputs into the system that are changing on an on a near daily basis

34:47and so when we look at that it's just fascinating when we look at the data of utilization of chat gpt

34:54right it took 10 years for the internet to get to 100 million users it took two and a half years for

35:01instagram to get to 100 million users it took two months for chat gpt to get to 100 million users and

35:07then we look at the data of how it's being used 74 percent for anxiety 74 percent of consumers go to

35:15chat gpt looking for advice on anxiety over 67 percent on financial advice and over 50 on an investment

35:24advice now the financial services landscape would scoff at that or medical professionals as well may

35:29not be appropriate it may not be appropriate but there's really interesting signal there of

35:38at scale individuals showing up and interacting with an experience that feels judgment-free

35:49math not great right llm is not great at math uh they're really rich in empathy and so because it's

35:57such a dynamic space as a technology company we always work with the best technologies to help employees

36:04and american workers and individuals make simultaneous progress so individuals show up to solve problems

36:14but the industry is organized around product so an employer may offer 50 different benefits and that

36:22those benefits may be provided across 200 different providers so what that means for us as we go into

36:29experience 50 different front doors that are all optimizing for one particular problem but that's not

36:36how we solve problems so individuals are able to come into kate our conversational ai tool and through a

36:44contextual natural experience problem solve and help that individual understand what their best options are

36:53take action on that leave with the transaction oh my employer is offering a retirement match

36:57well should i go into this income driven repayment program and pay less to my student debt so i can

37:03actually also top off and because we are a technology company that's been working on this problem for over

37:11nine years we have the ability to also understand what has to be true for the employer what has to be true

37:18for the largest financial services companies in the world which is the math has to be perfect and precise

37:24every time so in the back end kate is this very simple beautiful interface it's my multimodal responds to

37:32the user based on the language sophistication problem they're trying to solve but on the back end there's

37:37a horizontally extensible platform that's deeply configured to the partner and to the employer that

37:46has the ability to span so let's imagine a 401k provider they have a wellness they have a retail and

37:54they have an advisory services offering and they want their customer who shows up in the workplace to

38:01be able to move between their workplace their retail and their advisory services that could look like three

38:06different users three different experiences so our platform strategy integrates all of that into one

38:13back-end platform with tools and functions being called so the math is always precise and perfect

38:18so we can give specific if maggie comes in and you have sixty five thousand dollars in student debt and

38:23your employer's offering is six percent but you're also just had children so you're thinking about how

38:27to save for the future to not repeat the cycle that's a highly complex consideration set and we're going

38:33to bring the full power of the partner to bear in that discussion so you know all of your available

38:39options and not just learn about it but actually do it and transact and finish that experience with

38:47with a plan that also can change as you change so it's not just a student debt conversational ai tool

38:56it's actually a full financial assistant i was about to say that sounds like a cpa or a financial

39:02effect exactly so we're democratizing access what we've learned from our users who show up and on

39:08average save 18 over eighteen thousand dollars one coaching session with a coach which like almost

39:16doesn't sound real now those are heavily public service loan forgiveness oriented coaching sessions

39:23this is someone who works for a hospital who works for a school system didn't know how to get in the

39:27program didn't know how to get into an income driven repayment program we kept hearing i have no

39:31financial advisor this is the only financial advice i've been given uh the the relief and so when we

39:38thought about that we thought okay well the industry is optimizing the asset side of the balance sheet and

39:43the one percent the ninety nine percent who don't have access to a financial advisor and the financial

39:51advisor in advisory space actually is a critical knowledge gap in how to prepare and plan for college

39:58how to then pay and send your kids to college and then that repayment journey it's weirdly it's

40:05suit it's super weird that that's outside of the consideration set because it affects one in two

40:11american households so we are going to solve that problem we are solving that problem and we are going

40:17to bring candid authentic conversation to the number one consideration set for american households

40:24beyond a mortgage i mean student debt has overtaken medical debt credit card debt and and it's really

40:31thrilling to be a builder and an operator at the time of ai and deploy that technology to

40:40our goal is in eight years to have generated 800 billion in first-time wealth while crushing student

40:46debt and first time well i have a related question yes as founder ceo i've heard you say that one of the

40:52mistakes that you made early on was not paying yourself so for other founder ceos who might be

41:00watching this what is your recommendation how do you do that math how do you have those conversations

41:05with your board how do you pay yourself i've made a lot of mistakes i will i will start with that it's a

41:12very humbling journey to to be a first-time founder and ceo and it is it's something that i just started

41:19talking about the mistake i made of not paying myself about a year ago because disproportionately

41:26women do that women ceos don't pay for don't pay ourselves while we're taking care of every

41:32everyone else around us and the experience that i had actually i was my husband's also founder

41:40founder and so we were moving during covid and because i hadn't paid myself i've actually never

41:46shared this uh because i hadn't paid myself for four years i couldn't get a mortgage we were moving

41:52out of san francisco and i was moving to be next to my evie my niece evie and my mom and i couldn't get

42:00a loan and i had to call my board and have a conversation with have have a conversation about

42:08wow i am out of alignment with my own values while i'm living the mission of candidly to help crush debt

42:14and build wealth oops i forgot to do that for myself and there are real implication and consequences

42:21for that decision and fortunately my board was incredibly gracious and helped me evidence what

42:28i needed to evidence which was legitimate and true um in order to actually close on that on that mortgage

42:34to be by my by my niece and you know my sister had passed away so it was very important to me to be

42:40able to physically be by her but it was it was a real life lesson in we have to take care of ourselves

42:47we in all the ways and it's tough because the journey is hard and it's long and you know it's it's

42:53definitely not linear but yes we gotta we gotta we gotta pay ourselves and ensure that we have

43:01uh durability and stamina over over you know over time so laurel we have covered a ton of ground and i'm

43:08gonna have to let you go soon but before i do you've talked about how broken the student loan

43:13system is in america so if someone were to make you president for the day or play god with the student

43:20loan system and you could start it from scratch how would you build it what would you do

43:29well first i would work to put me out of a job because the reason that we are the reasons we exist

43:36is because of the complexity of how families fund education and how they pay down debt so if there

43:46was no need to fund if individual families did not have to fund their education journey what would be

43:54ideal and i think we will see more we need different and more diverse pathways into the workplace

44:02four-year university plus is not uh it's not the right path for everyone and it will increasingly be

44:11more difficult to access in the future for middle class and lower income individuals

44:17because of caps that have been placed on access to federal funding so while we're seeing

44:26that there will be a private market that will emerge to help families ultimately we would have pathways

44:35into the workplace i really admire the program in switzerland actually they have an apprenticeship program

44:42and so uh they i had an opportunity to uh attend a young leaders experience in switzerland and i saw 14 year

44:53olds walk in the hallway of various employers and so providing that experience and welcoming individuals

45:00of all backgrounds into the workplace to begin to learn the skills of interacting and presenting and

45:07building and creating and we really need skills into the workplace today through the advent of ai

45:15and re-skilling and skilling which we're all moving through i see a huge opportunity need and demand

45:24for pathways into today's workplace whether that's technology or healthcare or education

45:29education as well as trades i think there's a great opportunity for trades to emerge and then the

45:36traditional university system as well but ideally we wouldn't be saddling individuals with 17 to 20

45:44now 40 because we're seeing parents paying down their own debt and now sending their kids

45:49to school as well it's a 40 to 50 year journey to pay down student debt so ideally we would eliminate

45:56that and just have a number of different more personalized pathways into the workplace and

46:02employers would renew their requirement for degrees that is quite the vision in the meantime if we were to

46:10sit down one year from today what would you hope to report to forbes that candidly has accomplished in

46:16that time yes all about impact it's all about outcomes so we measure impact and outcomes in days and

46:22dollars off of debt so we're at two billion in impact today we certainly expect to double that and

46:29first time wealth creation so our vision is dollar for dollar for every debt we crush we want to create

46:35a dollar in first time wealth creation because wealth is not just for the wealthy it is now for

46:42everyone we have wealth creation opportunities and moments by translating smart policy into practice

46:49so retirement match on student loan payments is retirement match and emergency savings a retirement

46:54match on a retirement match but ideally a year from now we would be sitting down and the list would be

46:59so long of employers offering a retirement match on student loan payments that you know we just couldn't

47:05even get to at all uh and that it would create you know two billion plus an impact we'll have to have

47:11you back to report on your progress but in the meantime laurel thank you so much for sitting

47:15down with forbes we really appreciate your time thank you maggie

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