Prestine Davekhaw knows how much you earn.

Thanks to a viral IG platform she launched called MalaysianPAYGAP, where she has Malaysians anonymously submit [payslip verified] details about their job, including:

• Their salary + benefits (if any)
• How they landed that job
• The realities of doing their job
• Advice for those wanting to do the same

So you can see why people are obsessed with MPG. 😉

But what about the person behind MPG?

Well, Prestine grew up in a drug-infested home with her grandmother, who was her best friend.

She was told that her father was a dangerous man and that it was good that he wasn’t in her life.

When she moved to the US for studies, she found herself homeless for a period.

She ended up doing all kinds of insane jobs to make ends meet, including grilling 100 chicken wings in the Chicago South Side where she was at risk of being shot at at any moment!

She also spent her last $900 on a camera out of desperation - she only had 2.5 weeks to make rent!

But as it turns out, it was the start of good things in her life.

Clients came knocking & she was doing well but... something wasn’t quite right.

In 2020, she had her first taste of going viral when she published an article sharing why she was unfollowing famous influencers on Instagram - many of her clients then were famous influencers and they were, as you can imagine, not happy.

Prestine shares her life journey with remarkable candidness. Not just the highs but also the lows like how she bombed her Bvlgari campaign because she was “a cocky photographer”.

And how MPG came to be.

Want to learn more?

Highlights:

• 3:13 Grandmother as her best friend
• 8:42 Life is a work of art - Wilde
• 12:24 I can only learn by asking questions
• 14:36 Being homeless
• 19:44 Spending $900 to buy a camera off Amazon
• 21:57 9 hours of sense
• 22:38 Photography came out of desperation
• 24:15 Going back
• 25:49 Quitting without a plan
• 26:40 Landing international clients - including in Shanghai!
• 27:19 Going viral in 2020 through an article, “Why I Unfollow Famous Influencers on Instagram”
• 29:24 The Bvlgari campaign
• 32:48 The genesis behind MPG
• 35:10 The launch
• 37:16 Surprising submissions
• 41:31 Information is power
• 42:25 Becoming jobless
• 46:11 Community building lessons
• 49:21 Helpful advice
• 52:45 MPG Summit 2024
• 54:28 Disappearing Jobs
• 56:54 The controversy with the Side Hustlers IG page
• 59:56 Hustling to meet the CEO of AirAsia
• 1:01:33 Advice to others wanting to start side hustles

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I share the behind-the-scenes of running STIMY, personal branding, storytelling marketing and news on a personal branding course that I’m building so that others can also their own brands on their own terms.

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