Giving Kids a Choice, The Art of Experimenting and Having a Work-Life Balance with Zi Xin

Zi Xin is a Senior Product Manager at PayPal. Prior to his leadership roles and being an employee, he was first a start-up founder. He co-found Appic technologies with two of his peers while at university. This was his solution to the long queue lines while waiting on food. Appic technologies was acquired by Chope in 2014. And since then, Zi Xin has worked in product management and various leadership roles. Zi Xin enjoys eating and scouting for food places but he hates the long queues, so he thought of a solution for it. Back in college, together with two of his friends, they founded a queueing business called Appic technologies. Sleep training helps both parents and children. Zi Xin says when the child sleeps better, then they have more time for themselves. This means more resting time so that the next day, they can engage with the kids better. Zi Xin’s advice to his son is to do something that he loves and truly believes in. They give his son a lot of choice, but the struggle is whether they should be giving him that much freedom. However, Zi Xin says it's better to take some of this risk earlier than later, because you have less to lose and you can come back and try again. Zi Xin and his wife don't actually disagree on a lot of things. They try something out and if it doesn't work, they will change it. Zi Xin does not think they have fundamental differences in principles on how they should bring up the kid. They try, and if it does not work, they reverse it. Zi Xin learned a lot of parenting styles from books. Zi Xin says he likes to read and after he picks up that knowledge, he runs the experiment, apply what he learned immediately. So it is fulfilling for him. In terms of discipline approach, the two main things are trying to understand him, his perspective, and getting him to agree. No beating, because he thinks that is one of those things that could be harmful to a kid. He prefers not to instill fear and to inspire more. He wants them to see him as a friend who is helping them along the way. He thinks there are boundaries that we have to set and that should be informed early and then let him operate within those boundaries. Reliving his childhood through his son is the best thing about being a dad for Zi Xin. He enjoyed trying out things, something that he doesn't usually do. He wants to expose his child to various experiences so he went through the experience himself again. Mentally, we must have this switch off phase. It's not that you don't get any work done outside of work once you leave the office. But there is this very obvious physical transition, which is not so clear when it comes to working from home. To connect with Zi Xin, you may find him on LinkedIn: https://sg.linkedin.com/in/chongzixin ”It's better to take some of this risk earlier than later, because you have less to lose and anything that can be reversed is good. You can come back and try again.” “I think the biggest one would be doing something that you love, or like, it sounds very cliche, but also it's what I truly believe in.” “I don't want to instill fear. I want to inspire more.” “I do want to hopefully bring him up to be someone who is able to contribute back to society in a meaningful way.” Episode timeline: [00:40] - Introduction of today’s guest, Zi Xin [01:15] - Can you tell us more about your family? [01:38] - How did you meet your wife? [02:21] - Food stories and journeys with his wife [02:58] - When did having children come into the picture? [04:20] - What are the plans of having child #2? [06:25] - Sleep training their son [07:37] - What was the journey like in building his start-up company? [09:39] - What was the transition like from being founder to employee? [10:56] - Zi Xin’s advice to his son in his career path in the future [13:23] - Differences of parenting styles of Zi Xin and his wife [15:59] - Where do you learn your parenting skills from? [18:32] - Reading and quality time with his wife despite the busy schedule [19:08] - Discipline approach towards his son [21:58] - What is the best part about being a dad? [23:42] - How do you manage working from home and having a work-life balance? [27:57] - Connect with Zi Xin