Justus Hillebrand, Digital History Consulting Inc

[00:00:55] Sanjay Parekh: Today's guest is Justus Hillebrand, the founder of Digital History Consulting, a research company that provides consulting, collaboration and research services. Justus, welcome to the show.

[00:00:57] Justus Hillebrand: Thanks for having me. Glad to be here.

[00:00:59] Sanjay Parekh: So, I'm excited to have you on because what you do is so unusual compared to every other guest that we've had on the podcast, which is awesome.

I'm so excited about learning something today, but before we get into that, give us a little bit about your background and what got you to where you are today.

[00:01:16] Justus Hillebrand: Sure. I'm originally from Germany. I did my bachelor's and my master's at the University of Cologne in history. And then I wrote my thesis on Maine history, where my then girlfriend, later wife is from and then for my PhD, I decided to move to Maine, and get my PhD at the University of Maine and that's where I got involved with digital history. I met my professor who was into that, at a picnic of all places and she was like, "Oh, I'm into maps." I'm like, "Oh, I'm into maps." And, then got to talking and she had a kind of big project of mapping Holocaust ghettos across Eastern Europe and that way I got involved as a research assistant in that project and got to be the database guy. They needed someone who knew or wanted to learn about databases, and it fit my mindset and how my brain works. So, I started doing that and continue to do so until we actually decided to move back to Germany and we were trying to figure out on which side of the Atlantic we were going to live.

And I couldn't stay on as a research assistant, so they were like, "Oh, we can do contracting." I'm like, "Oh, sure. I'll contract. I don't really know what that means, but I'll, contract with you guys." I started doing that. We were in Germany and also got, through them, got the connection or that research team got the connection to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum going, who were planning a similar kind of project.

And then they asked their good colleagues, "Who do you know, someone who knows how to do this?" And they're like, "Oh, we have a guy." And I got involved with that. And at that point, legally, I guess I was already an entrepreneur and didn't know it. Because at that point, basically it was my tax consultant, which I lovingly call our tax lady.

She said, "Oh, if you incorporate it, you'd save a whole lot of money on taxes." I'm like, "Oh, I'm a businessman? Okay." And then it was like, I looked into it, and I was like, "Okay, I can do that. And, if I'm already incorporating, I might as well turn it into something and see how high this rocket can fly."

And then, in 2022, I guess is when I did the official paperwork and everything, started everything in 2016. That's the arc in years I described and then I guess I had a business and kind of fell into it. That's what I usually say. And now, yeah, did two years of, I still had backup side gigs to the business and now is the first year that I get to do only the business on the whole, that's my only income at this point.

[00:04:04] Sanjay Parekh: So, I've got to ask a question from earlier on because it's been just burning in my mind since you said it. You said you were studying the history of Maine, where your girlfriend and now wife is from. Which came first, the girlfriend or the studying the history of Maine? I want to know the order of these things.

[00:04:22] Justus Hillebrand: That's fine. The girlfriend came first. If you want to know, we actually met in Ireland at a semester abroad and you find ways how to see each other. And there were interesting things that I wanted to learn about Maine. I kind of two birds, one stoned it; if that's a verb.

[00:04:39] Sanjay Parekh: Yeah, I think that's like the extreme expression of, I dig you because I'm just going to study the entire place around you. That's pretty high up on the list there of.

[00:04:52] Justus Hillebrand: If you find things that are interesting and can pack it into a cool research project, someone will give you money to go there. And that was part of the reason. But, yeah, that's the connection. It went well hand in hand.

[00:05:07] Sanjay Parekh: So, I understand the order of preference here. It's like, how can I get somebody to fund me to go see my girlfriend? Oh, the history of Maine is kind of interesting. So maybe that'll work. So I get it.

[00:05:17] Justus Hillebrand: I actually found it interesting. I actually wrote my dissertation on Maine and my home region in Germany.

[00:05:24] Sanjay Parekh: Oh, that's awesome.

[00:05:26] Justus Hillebrand: Because it seemed so similar to what I knew already. So, it was actually interesting. I wasn't just trying to come up.

[00:05:34] Sanjay Parekh: Okay. Accidental entrepreneur is what it sounds like. Any entrepreneurial things that you did when you were younger, any entrepreneurs in the family, anything like that, or are you the first one to take this ride?

[00:05:47] Justus Hillebrand: My parents have a laundry service or had, they're retired now, and that's been, it was in the bottom floor of our house.

So it was part of our everyday lives that there's the business, that's what's happening, but I don't think they ever thought of themselves as entrepreneurs or anything like that. I think they inherited it from my grandfather who basically told my dad who married into the family, if you take over the business or learn the business, I'll buy you a car. There they went.

[00:06:20] Sanjay Parekh: So, bribery works apparently, still.

[00:06:23] Justus Hillebrand: Yes, it works. So, it was part of our everyday lives. And they were their own boss. I think that's like the big part that I took away from it. I learned later in life that, "Oh, that's not what everybody does." And as a kid, what do you know?

Yeah. So that's how that kind of started.

[00:06:40] Sanjay Parekh: And were you ever, asked, forced, required to work in the business as well?

[00:06:47] Justus Hillebrand: I was incentivized. No, I learned from a trained professional how to iron a shirt. I know how to iron my own shirts and did that in summers and afternoons for like extra money when I was a teenager.

I also learned how to press sheets and the big machine that like presses stuff and stood there with the ladies who like to chat and be part of the chat with the older ladies in the laundry service. That was, that's how I got into that, but it was never an expectation that I'd take it over or any of my siblings would.

[00:07:21] Sanjay Parekh: Yeah.

[00:07:22] Justus Hillebrand: They always said, do what makes you happy.

[00:07:24] Sanjay Parekh: I think after the podcast, I'm going to need you to give me a lesson on how to fold a fitted sheet because I still have not been able to figure that one out. That's just still escapes me.

[00:07:34] Justus Hillebrand: I sure can. It's basically cheating. I'll tease that.

[00:07:38] Sanjay Parekh: Okay, accidental entrepreneur. You basically started a company to save on taxes and you're like, "Oh, let's go all in." And this year, so you said you were doing side gigs before, so how did this thing actually develop? So, it's because you moved and you were doing all of this, was the one client that you had the only one that you had, or did you start looking for other clients? Like, how did you build a business?

[00:08:00] Justus Hillebrand: It started by word of mouth, where I had this one gig that was with my professor in grad school. And then the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum came on and they were a pretty big gig. So, I was pretty happy with that, and I could do both of those.

That's really what it stayed at for quite some time, because I didn't realize, this was I think before 2022, I didn't really realize this was a business or I didn't realize this could be a career. Because in grad school, as a historian, I was basically taught, "Oh, you'll become a professor." Or there's this new thing called alternative academia, like alt ac, and you go into like nonprofits or museums or anything like that.

But no one ever told me, "Oh, what you're doing is already a thing. And you can actually do this full time if you really want to." And so, I didn't know. Yeah, that's how that kind of started. And as soon as I decided, "Okay, this is, this is going to be a business," actually opportunities for side gigs came along that were not the business.

And I was happy to, or, well, on one hand, I was disappointed. I couldn't just say, "Oh, I can put everything into the business idea now." But, it was for the kind of financial security fear in the back of my mind. Because at that point, we had a family, we had a daughter, now we have two daughters.

And I couldn't, I didn't feel responsible. Or I didn't feel comfortable, and my wife didn't feel comfortable either, to just say, "Oh, this is going to be it. We'll just put everything into this. And if everything goes down the drain, then what are we going to do?" So, I bulked up the CV in case. And then once it grew from, once that kind of, went its course, I could say, "Okay, now I can actually focus on this."

[00:09:58] Sanjay Parekh: Yeah. So, what kind of side gigs were you doing at that point? Well, what kind of things were they related to this, databases and things like that are completely unrelated?

[00:10:08] Justus Hillebrand: They were related. I don't, I got to work for a small local nonprofit and got to research food insecurity in that county, not far from here. Because they were interested in how food pantries work and I thought, "Oh, I can, it's research. I can do that. And for once I get to talk to living people. And that's the thing I can do." So, I did that. And then, out of the blue and things that don't usually happen to historians, I guess, was a teaching gig that came along at a liberal arts college. They needed someone last minute and I applied and was like, "Okay, I'll try out teaching because I never got to do it during grad school because we moved and it was difficult."

So I tried out teaching, and got to do that for a couple months. And then I decided, "No, I'm going to, I'm going to do this instead."

[00:10:59] Sanjay Parekh: So the whole idea of going to school and being a history major and then being a professor clearly didn't pan out. That was no fun at all, apparently, if you only lasted a few months.

[00:11:12] Justus Hillebrand: Yeah, it was only a gig for a few months. They didn't want me full, I was like filling in for someone, but yeah, I also didn't like — some parts of it, I enjoy; others, I know how to do, but don't enjoy. And how about I do the things I enjoy? That's what the business is about to me.

[00:11:31] Sanjay Parekh: I think the alternate is here, you've been completely ruined by entrepreneurship because you're probably like me, somewhat unemployable because you're like, "No, this is not the way things should be done. Like, why are you doing it this way?" So to get to that point where you were ruined for life by being an entrepreneur, was there anything that made you nervous in starting this and doing this on your own? And if so, how did you overcome that?

[00:11:58] Justus Hillebrand: I kind of already mentioned it. The, bulking up the CV, having the plan B to like, "Oh, if everything goes down the drain, I can still do this". That made me feel safer because I was, that was like the piece that made me nervous. That was, I guess ‘becoming destitute’ is the phrase. I didn't want to have to do that or start some job I hated because that's what I wanted to avoid.

[00:12:26] Sanjay Parekh: Did you feel like you really needed to do that bulking up of the CV? Because if the thing that you were doing failed, did you feel like you didn't have enough experience to be able to go out and get a job or what was your thought process there?

[00:12:39] Justus Hillebrand: I was a PhD in history trained to be a professor. So, I had a little experience outside of it in history and training graduate students. Now there's all the big talk. "Oh, you need to translate your skillset for industry." And even while I was doing the business, I was still applying to other jobs. Because I thought, "Oh, I need a job."

I didn't realize, no one told me this is, you already have it. This is already it. It was always like everyone I talked to, in my profession, in history, it was like, "Oh yeah, you do that for a while. And then you do the real thing." I'm like, "Okay, then I guess I'll do that until I realized that blessed day, I already have my dream job. Oh, my God. I already have this."

[00:13:25] Sanjay Parekh: Yeah, I think that's a funny thing with entrepreneurship is a lot of people that are not yet entrepreneurs are waiting for somebody to give them permission to be an entrepreneur. And here's the secret, there is nobody that tells you that, you just become and you just do the thing.

The other thing that I'm very disappointed about that you didn't have as an option for you is Indiana Jones. I mean, you have a history degree and all you needed was a whip and you could have gone and done some things. And just, I think it was a lost opportunity for you there, Justus.

[00:13:57] Justus Hillebrand: Well, you know what? I do look good in the hat, but I'm not that good with a whip.

[00:14:01] Sanjay Parekh: All it takes is practice. I'm sure you could have gotten there.

[00:14:05] Adam Walker: Support for this podcast comes from Hiscox, committed to helping small businesses protect their dreams since 1901. Quotes and information on customized insurance for specific risks are available at Hiscox.com. Hiscox, business insurance experts.

[00:14:20] Sanjay Parekh: Okay, so let's talk about, let's pivot a little bit and talk about the stress of doing all these things. So up until now, you've been doing the main gigs, some side gigs, all these things. You mentioned you have two daughters, you have family life, personal life, all of these things, how do you manage all of this stuff?

And then before, you were in Germany contracting for the Holocaust Museum in the U. S., so there's a time difference. So how did you manage kind of the stress of all of this stuff?

[00:14:50] Justus Hillebrand: It's just, it's a lot of juggling and with different gigs and well, my studies were at that point also still a thing. I needed to write a dissertation. And, really it was, well, support of my wife, and, clearing schedules. Now that we have two daughters and our youngest is actually five months old. So we're still in like the baby tired phase and it's really about clearing schedules with each other.

Like we have a shared calendar, and we try to stick to that. This is the regular day. And if we deviate, then you need to talk to the other person and, is that possible? Did something not land on the calendar or things like that.

And then, being flexible, but also understanding that the other person needs a break or, well, I need to put hours in. I can't just take time off all the time. I'm my own boss. And I joke that, if I take time off, my boss says it's okay. But it still needs to be, I need to put the time in. So, all of that balancing act is really balancing and communication.

[00:16:02] Sanjay Parekh: The boss says it's okay, but also later on the boss will tell you, yeah, your pay is getting cut. So yeah, there's definitely two sides of that. For sure.

[00:16:10] Justus Hillebrand: I try to avoid that.

[00:16:12] Sanjay Parekh: Yeah. I presume you're at home working and it's easy to blur the lines and the boundaries and stuff. How do you set those boundaries for yourself? And what are those boundaries for yourself?

[00:16:25] Justus Hillebrand: Well, one boundary is actually, there's a dedicated space. If, during the pandemic we learned anything, it's that working in living rooms is not really a good idea. So I was, dedicated workspace is decided and the closing the door is important. Like this is work time and workplace.

And the other is, setting times, like setting boundaries in time. So, this is the time I get to, I go to work. This is the time I clock out. And we can be flexible about, something needs to happen, some kind of appointment. Okay, I'll just work a little later. That's fine. But that kind of time setting time and having afternoons with the family. That's also why I do this. I get to be flexible and I get to have my family time right here. That's the big perk. I don't have to go to an office. I don't have to travel somewhere and do all that.

And I don't work on weekends, which in for most people in regular jobs, I guess you don't really have to say, but in academia and doing a writing a dissertation, doing a PhD, it was expected. And a lot of professors that I know, just it's understood they work on weekends. And I was like, "No, I'm not doing that."

[00:17:41] Sanjay Parekh: So, that's one of your kind of bright line boundaries is weekends. You don't work at all ever?

[00:17:47] Justus Hillebrand: Well, if it's like a deadline emergency, I can cram a few hours in somewhere or into evenings and steal time from my sleep instead of other time. But I really, really try to avoid it.

Of course, some email still goes through my phone on the weekend and I'm tempted to write short replies. But other than that, it's really, I don't check, email on my laptop. I don't like, nope.

[00:18:14] Sanjay Parekh: Yeah, that's great. By the way for listeners, that might not be watching the video of this podcast, you can see behind Justus. It's very on par. You've got a bunch of maps just sitting behind you I've been looking at them this whole time that we've been talking so it's very on brand for you right there. So another great benefit of having your own space in your own office is that you get to put up the things that, resonate with what you do. So that's fantastic.

Okay, let's talk about kind of what you've learned now at this point. It's been some number of years you've gone through kind of these changes, realizing you're an entrepreneur, doing the side things now going all in you know. You've learned a lot at this point if you could go back in time taking the knowledge that you have now back in time with you and do something differently, what would that be?

[00:19:03] Justus Hillebrand: if I could tell myself anything, I'd be the person to give myself permission. This gets to be a thing, and that was really the big thing that I've now looking back and knowing all this, I wish I would have had this either a role model or someone saying, "Hey, you're already doing it."

[00:19:20] Sanjay Parekh: Right. And how do you think that would have affected your development? Would you have just gone all in earlier? What would have changed?

[00:19:28] Justus Hillebrand: I would have probably gone all in earlier and been less nervous.

[00:19:32] Sanjay Parekh: Yeah.

[00:19:33] Justus Hillebrand: Because it's like, when you're doing this and you're like, "Oh, no, I need to spend more time on this."

Because I need this to work. If you know, okay, it's, going to work one way or the other. it gets to be a thing, your job, you are an entrepreneur, which I'm still weirded out by the term for myself. Like I still don't like entrepreneur, founder is even worse.

I feel like, "Oh, that's some weird tech guy." That's not me. But, yeah, I would have gone back and said, "Hey, you can look at kind of business side of things and that's something you can learn the basics of." And if someone said, I should have listened to your podcast earlier to be honest, because I think, while I was listening, I already had the problem that, "Oh, I don't know how to do this."

Where should I go? What should this be? And you were like, well, every business owner knows that you built the airplane while you're flying it or something like that. And I'm like, "Wow. So, this is supposed to be how it goes?" I was worried about this.

[00:20:39] Sanjay Parekh: A hundred percent. Not too long ago another guest, we were talking about how you're building the ship as you're sailing it and I actually added in you're not even just building the ship while you're sailing it, you're also bailing water out of the ship and trying to navigate as well and figure out where you're going. It is one of those functions because I think it's a funny thing that we talk about entrepreneurs and founders who have succeeded and "Oh, they knew all the things and everything."

That's not true, when you go back and look at them at their very beginning, they had no idea you and every one of us that have done this for the first time, we were all clueless and figuring everything out as we were going, right? Only now, years later, decades later, you can look back and be like, "Oh, yeah." But even now, if I'm starting something new, there's still unknowns that I haven't learned. Somebody else has figured those out, I just don't know those things yet. And it's really our job to figure those things out that we don't know and figure out who can help us solve those problems.

[00:21:37] Justus Hillebrand: Right. And that's also the other thing that I really enjoy about this is, I get to learn new things. I got a PhD because I like to learn new things. I like to learn something and write something no one had ever known before. So, I, that's what I like to do and having not just the history or the tech side of things, but also all is the business side.

Which I mean, as a kid, I played these management games. You manage the soccer team or manage the TV station or something. And now I get to do this in real life. And I'm like, "Oh, okay. I get to figure this out now." I enjoy that once I'm not as nervous about putting food on the table.

[00:22:18] Sanjay Parekh: It's nice how that security gives you the ability to be a lot more flexible and creative in all the other things that you do.

Okay, so thinking about that is, is there anything that you use, so you're like a database guy, so you're in the databases all the time, but is there any other like technology or apps or systems that you use or implemented that you'd recommend to others to think about in terms of managing a business or growing a business like yours?

[00:22:45] Justus Hillebrand: Yeah, the, or the two things, I use generally, I like to start as low tech as possible. "Don't shoot sparrows with cannons," as the German saying goes.

[00:22:57] Sanjay Parekh: I like that saying, that's a great saying.

[00:22:59] Justus Hillebrand: Yeah, that's what I try to do. So I basically have Trello, which I use as a kind of organized to do list and keeping track of tasks if I need to put itemized stuff into builds.

So I know what I did. So I just move it to the ‘done this month’ column and so that's how I keep track of which project needs to do what or which side of which project needs to, what task done. And I use Clockify. I think there's other apps that do the same thing; it's basically a, what is it? A punch clock. So I punch in my time, I say, "Oh, now I'm working." And now I stopped working, which to me, who has the kind of, feels the need, it's "Oh, I need to do more. I'm not done yet." Because there's always more work to do and that allows me to say, "This was enough. I get to clock out now and I'm done for today."

Or if I'm not, if time goes somewhere else, I can say, "Okay, I need to like make up time here over there." I guess it's being your own hard boss in a way, but that really helps me to think, "Oh, I'm done. I get to say, stop now."

[00:24:13] Sanjay Parekh: Okay. That's great. Last question for you.

If you were talking to somebody who's thinking about taking that leap that you did and launching a side hustle or taking their side hustle into a full time business like you've done now, what advice would you give to them?

[00:24:29] Justus Hillebrand: I guess there's a few. Have a backup plan. Well, if you're nervous about it, have a backup plan.

If you're not, Godspeed. Do what you need to do. Because one big thing I always needed to do is trying things out. And that's, that's part of the good thing about a side hustle is you get to try things out and build it over time and see what you like. Because the main piece of advice I would give is, don't look at what the whole job is or what your imagined dream job is or whatever.

Look at the tasks you enjoy doing. Look at the individual tasks in your work day and the work environment, the people you want to work with. Look at all those things and try things out and see what you like. And if you find a job that gives you that, great. If not, well, you can build it. And you can have a job that has more good things than bad things.

There's always going to be some things you don't like. To have the individual things you like doing at work is possible. And look at those rather than dreaming about, "Oh, I'm going to be a professor. I'm going to be, this job title." No, look at like smaller scale and what you like to do for work. And then go for those, make those the deciding factors rather than the title or the big package.

[00:25:54] Sanjay Parekh: That's great. this has been fantastic. Where can our listeners find and connect with you online?

[00:26:00] Justus Hillebrand: My website is digitalhistoryconsulting.com and, Justus Hillebrand on LinkedIn. I think that's the only things I really have. Maybe in the future more, but for now, that's what I have.

[00:26:16] Sanjay Parekh: Awesome. Thanks so much for being on today.

[00:26:18] Justus Hillebrand: Thanks for having me. This was great. I will look forward to listening to more to people like me.

[00:26:24] Sanjay Parekh: Thanks for listening to this week's episode of the Side Hustle to Small Business podcast, powered by Hiscox. To learn more about how Hiscox can help protect your small business through intelligent insurance solutions, visit Hiscox.com. And to hear more Side Hustle to Small Business stories, or share your own story, please visit Hiscox.com/side-hustle-to-small-business. I'm your host, Sanjay Parekh. You can find out more about me at my website, SanjayParekh.com.