Hello friend.
If you've spent any amount of time on social media, this chap's distinctive face is probably familiar.
Khaby Lame built a global career without really saying a word.
He didn’t do it by waxing lyrical about the world's ills. Or by doing stunts worthy of Tom Cruise’s respect.
Khaby simply reacted to other videos with an unimpressed look, two open palms, and a stare at the camera – and this simple trick set the TikTok world on fire.
Which makes what happened next even more bonkers.
In 2020, Khaby lost his factory job in Italy. Rather than look for traditional jobs, he started making TikTok videos. And six years later, Khaby bagged around 160 million followers, making him the most-followed creator on the platform.
Then, in January 2026, a publicly traded company announced plans to acquire the company at the centre of Khaby's commercial activities.
The proposed price?
$975 million.
Now, before you tell your boss where to stick your job and start practising TikTok dances in the kitchen, there's an enormous asterisk here.
Khaby wasn't being handed $975 million in cash. The deal involved shares in a publicly traded company and the whole thing has since attracted plenty of scrutiny. At the time of writing, because of the way it was handled, his stock was deemed ‘untradable ’, and Khaby quietly removed all traces of the scheme across his platform.
But that's not really the interesting bit.
Think about what somebody was trying to put a value on.
Khaby doesn't own an oil field. Nor did he invent a revolutionary microchip. He doesn't have thousands of factories pumping out widgets.
What he built was attention, recognition, reputation, intellectual property and an enormous audience.
Somehow, a former factory worker who became famous silently mocking silly internet videos had become an investable business asset.
And I think the kids understand the significance of this better than we do.
Not All Kids Want to be 'Famous.'
Ask a room full of children what they want to do when they're older, and many will now say they want to be a YouTuber, streamer or influencer.
And we shouldn’t be surprised.
But telling a teenager that becoming the next Khaby Lame, KSI or MrBeast is a sensible career plan would be a bit like telling them to become a Premier League footballer.
It can happen, but I wouldn't bet the farm on it.
But I honestly think that these conversations are too binary. Either you will become a multi-gazillionaire or be trapped in your parents' basement trying to appease the algorithm.
There is a bit of nuance that we are all ignoring.
What if young people aren't only attracted to these careers because they want to be famous? What if they like the idea of owning what they create?
For a long time, the career script was pretty straightforward.
Study hard. Get your qualifications. Find a decent employer. Work your way up.
Essentially, spend the first part of your life proving that you are valuable enough for somebody to employ you.
And for millions of people, that model still works.
But the internet has added another possibility.
You can build something valuable that belongs to you.
An audience. A reputation. A product. A community. A piece of software. A body of knowledge. A creative style.
And you don't necessarily have to choose between the two worlds either.
A teacher can have a job and own educational resources. A designer can collect a salary while running a small digital business. A consultant can sell their time and build a product (and this is exactly the path I walked on).
That's why I think the old idea of a "career ladder" is starting to look a little shaky.
Modern careers could increasingly look more like portfolios.
Part employment. Part ownership. Part experimentation.
And I’ll tell ya what: young people seem to have clocked this already.
I'm not sure the rest of us have.
Qualifications Shouldn't Be 'Down with The Kids.'
Just to be absolutely clear, I am not suggesting we introduce GCSE TikTok.
Nor should schools abandon Maths on Tuesday afternoon so Year 9 can work on their personal brands.
Put the pitchforks down.
What I am saying is that the economy our young people are entering is changing, and perhaps the way we prepare them needs to change with it.
We are very good at teaching young people how to prove their value to somebody else.
Qualifications. CVs. Job applications. Interview technique.
All still important.
But how much time do we spend teaching them how to create value themselves?
Can you spot a problem? Can you make something people actually want? Can you explain an idea? Can you build an audience around something useful?
Do you understand money, ownership and intellectual property?
Can you make something, discover nobody wants it and have another go?
That's entrepreneurial thinking, but I don't think it should be reserved for people who want to become entrepreneurs.
And before this starts sounding like one of those hustle-bro videos where some bloke in Dubai tells you to wake up at 4am and monetise your grandmother, there's another reason I think schools have a role here.
Not every young person has the same opportunity to experiment.
Some have parents with money, contacts, technology and a safety net. Others don't.
School is one of the few places where we could give every young person the chance to build something.
Let them solve a real problem. Test an idea. Try to sell something. Make £10. Lose £10. Create something nobody wants and figure out why.
Not because we're trying to create an army of 16-year-old Steven Bartlett-type CEOs optimising when and how they take a pee-pee.
Because they should understand that getting a job isn't the only way they can create value in the world.
And that's why I find Khaby Lame's story so fascinating.
Forget the $975 million headline for a moment.
A man lost his factory job and started making silly videos on his phone. Six years later, investors were trying to put an extraordinary price on the commercial world that had grown around what he'd created.
Khaby is obviously an extreme example, but the change he represents isn't.
For years we've prepared young people to answer one question:
Why should somebody employ you?
Maybe the new economy requires them to answer another one as well:
What can you build that is yours?
I reckon that's a question worth teaching them how to answer.
And I suppose there's a reason I keep coming back to this...
At 23, I desperately needed somebody to help me answer questions like these.
I'd done what I thought I was supposed to do. I'd gone to university, got my degree and entered the working world expecting that, somehow, everything would work itself out.
It didn't.
I lost my job, struggled to find another one and spent months wondering what on Earth I was going to do with my life.
More than 20 years later, I can look back at that young fella very differently. There are things I understand about work, failure, perseverance and finding your own path that I desperately wish somebody had explained to me then.
Which got me thinking:
What would I tell my 23-year-old self if I could sit down with him today?
That's the idea behind the latest episode of the Maverick School Podcast.
I share seven things I wish I'd known at 23, including what university never taught me about the reality of the working world, what kept me moving when everything seemed to be going wrong, and one lesson in particular that took me more than 20 years to properly understand.
Not because I've got life figured out. Far from it.
But there are young people trying to find their way through an uncertain jobs market today while technology is changing many of the rules around them.
Perhaps a few of the things I wish somebody had told me are exactly what somebody needs to hear now.
If you know a young person who is struggling, maybe this is exactly what they need to hear right now.
Listen on your podcast platform of choice below.
Apple Podcasts
https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/ep14-7-things-i-wish-i-could-tell-my-23-year-old-self/id1881678199?i=1000786917080
Spotify
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5i473E7cuea072UXZPbCCD?si=6456ef2233d24e6d
Podbean
https://www.podbean.com/ew/pb-mrjrv-1b3fb7e
Until next time,
Karl
