Hidai sharing his story (and Orli's important part in it)

Hidai was interviewed by Kristy Yoder as part of her successful series "Behind the Scenes of a Founder - The real story of building a business and a life."

She did a great job capturing it and bringing it to life - you can read her LinkedIn post and below what she wrote in her LinkedIn article / newsletter:

"

I asked Hidai Degani to tell me about himself and his journey as a founder.

He warned me it was going to come out as one long piece. He was right. And every bit of it was worth hearing.

Hidai is originally from the Tech industry in Israel. He left 16+ years ago with his wife and two kids and had 5 relocations. Gibraltar. London. Berlin. Malta. Then Ireland, first Galway on the west coast, then Dublin. They have now been on the island for almost eight years. They became Irish citizens a year ago.

He said it simply. Ireland is home now. First time that has been true anywhere outside of Israel.

Along the way, he worked across e-commerce, e-gaming, fintech, loyalty solutions, small business solutions, and more. He worked for startups, scaleups, and multinationals. He held roles in user & customer experience, product development & management, marketing, business development, and digital strategy.

And then one day, he came home from work and knew something had to change.

The Feeling He Could Not Ignore

It was not the company. It was not the location. He had tried both of those fixes before, moving somewhere new, starting somewhere fresh. This time, neither answer felt right.

"I felt it was me. I don't fit anymore. I feel I need to do something different. I want to help more people. I want to work with more people. I want control over my time and my energy and who I work with."

He told his wife. She did not hesitate.

Do it. It is going to be okay.

So he quit his job and took the leap. Six and a half years ago. He has not looked back since.

He and his wife opened a consultancy together. She had always run her own businesses. He had always been an employee. Together they brought two completely different instincts to the same vision, helping people navigate change.

Career transitions. Business growth. Exit planning. Retirement. Whatever change a person is standing in front of, that is where they show up.

A Conversation on a Plane

In the early days, the doubts were loud.

He had spent his entire career as a manager with a team. That was all he knew. And suddenly he was asking himself questions he had never had to ask before.

"Can you do it? Are you good enough? Why would somebody pay for this? Why would someone care about what you have to offer? I've never done anything like that before. All of the imposter syndrome thoughts pop up."

He remembers one conversation on a plane with his wife. He was spiraling.

"I said to her, who is going to pay me to talk? I like to talk to people, I can see that. But who is going to pay for that? And she said, it's going to be okay. People will. Be yourself. Go and do it."

He said that moment mattered. Not just because of what she said, but because of what it taught him about what everyone trying to build something actually needs.

"Not everybody is lucky to have a person like that close to them. What we do in our company is we want to be, for some people, someone in their corner. Because to do it on your own is just a very, very tough journey."

What Six Countries Taught Him About Communication

I asked him about the challenges of moving so many times across so many different cultures.

He had a story ready.

In Gibraltar, early in his career, he was still sending emails the way people did in Israel. One o'clock in the morning. Two o'clock. Three o'clock. Normal.

His manager pulled him aside.

"He said, listen to me very carefully. If you have emails, you put them in a draft and you send them in the morning. One more email like that and you're gone."

He laughed, telling the story. But the lesson was real. Every culture has its own rhythm, its own style of communication, its own unspoken rules. And if you do not adapt, it does not matter how good you are at the work.

"You can be very good at your job, but if you can't communicate well with the people around you, it can clash very quickly. You have to be curious, learn from it, and adapt yourself."

Moving from Hebrew to English full-time was its own challenge. He remembers finishing the early days of work in Gibraltar completely exhausted, not from the tasks but from the constant translation happening in his head. Every sentence. Every meeting. Every email.

He still speaks fast. On purpose. It is a confidence trick he developed for himself. If he slows down, he overthinks the words. If he keeps moving, the language flows.

He is still learning. He says that about everything.

Go Back to the Why

I asked him what lessons have shaped how he operates today.

He kept coming back to one thing.

"Every time there is a junction, any question of is this the right client, is this the right decision, I always go back to why. Why did you start this business? What is the purpose? Who are the right people? How do you want to do it? And every time I stick to that, it turns out to be the right decision. Every time I strayed away from it, it was a mistake."

He also talked about learning to say no. It took him a while to understand that turning down an opportunity is not a failure. Sometimes it is the most powerful thing you can do.

"I don't need to take every job, every opportunity. I need to find the right people. That is why I do this as an owner. I can choose who I work with. That is my power."

He is honest that the pressure can make you forget that. When money is tight, when a project is right there, it is easy to say yes to the wrong thing. He has done it. He has learned from it. And he keeps returning to the same question.

Is this actually in line with why I started?

Turning 40 Was a Milestone

There was one moment in the conversation that stayed with me more than any other.

Hidai talked about turning 40. About the feeling that came with it. Not a crisis. Something closer to a release.

"At 40, I felt I am who I am. I don't need to please anybody else. I am not going to change. What I need to do is embrace who I am and do my thing. Remove every expectation of anyone else. Forget all of it. Just do what you want to do."

He said it took a long time to really live that. He is still working on it. But as a mentor who talks to people navigating major transitions, he sees the same moment in others. The age varies. But the feeling is recognizable.

There comes a point where what other people think stops being the loudest voice in the room. And when that happens, everything gets cleaner.

"Whether you think you can, or you can't - you're right. It’s one of my favorite quotes (by Henry Ford). You already decided. That is it."

What Is Next

I asked him what he is working toward right now.

He wants to continue the mix of mentoring, speaking, board advisory, and pro bono board membership that he has built over six and a half years. But he is also working toward something new.

His next step is landing his first paid commercial non-executive director/board member role in a private company. He has been building toward it through his experience as board member & chair at his sons' school, which he joined five and a half years ago and has chaired for over four and a half years.

"Once you get one, it is two and three and four. I am working on my positioning and my brand towards that. That is my next level."

He is not trying to abandon what he has built. He wants to add to it. Keep the mix. Take it higher.

For someone who has relocated five times, started over in five different countries, learned to communicate across cultures and languages he was not born into, and built a business grounded in helping people through exactly that kind of change, the next chapter feels like a natural step.

He is not arriving anywhere. He is still on the journey.

And from what he told me, he would not have it any other way.

---

"

Hidai's comment on LinkedIn was:

"Thanks a lot Kristy for inviting me to your series and for interviewing me in such a kind way, really appreciate it. 

You captured my story very well, and reading it written like that was an interesting experience actually - some parts of it are in my public profile, some parts I tell in almost every intro meeting but were never written down, and some parts very few people heard, or it's been a long time since I went back and thought about them.

So thank you again, and I hope this will be helpful for others!

And yes, I would not be able to do any of it without my amazing wife Orli, but not everybody is lucky as me :)"