Non-conformists ought to have a space to gather and a community to belong to. Tomás Moreno Cebrián-Sagarriga, a 21 year old IE Business student and young entrepreneur firmly believes and fights for this idea. I had the pleasure to interview him for the first year anniversary of one of his latest projects: The Shift Z, a newsletter for non-conformists. Tomás is currently a second year BBA (Bachelor in Business Administration) student at the institution; however his incursion in entrepreneurship began when he was only 13 years old. In this interview, Tomás gave us an insight into his relationship with innovation and creativity while growing up, his aspirations for the future, and the key elements of his past that have driven his success up until today.
When asked about his favourite hobby, Tomás did not hesitate to respond “to think big” and we are left with no other choice than drawing our own conclusions regarding his own success story. Refusing to belong to a lost generation -as some refer to Gen Zs- he decided to launch a project that aims to bring to light the talent and potential of all the individuals that make up this unusual group of people. His idea was to create a space where talented people could share their stories and for others to relate and be inspired by these testimonies. The concept of The Shift was originally born in September 2020, however not formally released until February 2021. When asked about the evolution of The Shift, Tomás explained to us how part of their success is linked with a proposal which offers something of value to their subscribers – which have reached 45,000 in the past year. “The first mail took me 90 min to read through. The last edition has a 15 min podcast with a couple reflections that adapt to the content consumption of Gen Zs” commented Tomás, undoubtedly there has been a big change that reflects the growth of the project.
The Shift offers content produced by Gen Z for Gen Z. The core of the newsletter is a 15 min interview with a young influential Gen Z. Each newsletter has been different since the idea is to keep what holds some value for the people. The invitees are successful people from different areas ranging from sports -such as Formula 3 racers-, literature -being the youngest author to publish a book on Gen Z-, and the business and entrepreneurship world overall -being Tomás himself who sat an interview for the 12th edition of The Shift-. “I think I might have something to bring to the community, we wanted to wait and have other guests first, but ideally we want all the team to be interviewed”, commented Tomás. The mere fact of creating a movement of non-conformists Gen Zs already implies that there is something that we can bring to the community.
Additionally, The Shift also includes interviews with successful people from older generations than Gen Zs who offer their advice to their 20 year old selves and also serve as an inspiration for the young people who consume this content.
Tomás foresees the growth of The Shift Z in the upcoming years as a transformation from a newsletter to a community. Instead of a competitive growth, he believes that The Shift has a lot to bring to our community overall. Through workshops, roundtables and events, this platform has the potential to bring together bright minds from different fields and perspectives to develop holistic approaches to relevant issues, The Shift Z will become a community of authority in matters of Gen Z. When conversing with Tomás about his trajectory in the entrepreneurship world, he emphasised on the value of the quality of people we surround ourselves with. Having taken part in 2 summer programs in the US -Georgetown and MIT-, he believes that beyond the academic experience itself, the people with whom he shared the experience were fundamental for him.
Being surrounded by people who challenge and inspire us to surpass our comfort zones. Defying the theoric system comes from a family environment filled with entrepreneurs. Looking for educational opportunities outside the boundaries of his own school – Bitcoin, 2 entrepreneurship summer programs in the US – Being the most important takeaway according to his perspective, the people that he met in the way.
Tomas finds himself in an interesting dilemma: whether to continue his personal projects and let them grow until their fullest potential.
If you want to discover more about this interesting project check out their webpage!
