From Amazon to AgTech: How This Executive Turned Her Side Hustle Into A Career

The results from Agritecture’s 2019 Global CEA census highlight how CEA is experiencing an entrepreneurial boom of new entrants. This is becoming increasingly common as nearly half of all farms started in 2019 had founders with no prior experience in agriculture. While it’s great to see this shift, it’s not as simple as sending a resume through LinkedIn. It takes long-term vision, a whole lot of networking, and a willingness to spend your weekends covered in mud at a worm farm or considering the 3P triple bottom line (people, planet, profit) with CEOs while finding creative ways to get to “yes.”

So, how does a veteran digital media executive turn her passion for urban farming, impact investing, travel, and experiential learning into a career? 

A Series of Fortunate Events, Plus Hustle and Grit

Jennifer Bassuk is a hands-on advisor and investor for startups focused on urban farming, sustainability, and tech, and an evangelist for agricultural innovation. She turned her side hustle into her profession and recently joined Fluence by OSRAM (Fluence) spearheading business development initiatives. 

From Attorney to Agricultural Evangelist

Bassuk was newly out of university and working as a litigator when “the internet happened.” She’s always had a keen eye for opportunity and a fascination with emerging markets, so it was a no-brainer when she got involved in the business side of digital startups. This took her on a path to Amazon, where she spent over 11 years leading high-profile ventures at Audible, as well as pioneering Amazon Publishing’s global rights business. She then expanded her expertise beyond print and audio to video by joining Storyful, a division of News Corp, where, as Global VP of Strategic Partnerships, she led the company's expansion into original programming and global distribution.

While she loved her work and found it challenging and enjoyable, she often found herself thinking about global challenges related to sustainability and food safety, and what steps she could begin taking to participate in finding innovative solutions.  Before she’d gotten her J.D., Bassuk had studied Environmental Policy at the University of Michigan and she remained passionate about issues impacting the environment and agriculture on a global scale.

The first Aha! moment came during a dinner at Outstanding in the Field. Bassuk was inspired by the conversations she had there with the local farmers—their aspirations and challenges—and left with a conviction that it was time to get back to her early roots.  She knew there had to be a way to combine her longstanding interest in urban agriculture with her professional skills and expertise to make a career pivot– but how? 

She found the answer in Israel, while exploring the Start-Up Nation’s tech ecosystem. Everywhere she looked she saw the intersection of agriculture and tech. Maybe she could leverage her experience to contribute to an ag-tech company? “I was at a point in my career where I wanted to turn my longstanding interest in hydroponics and urban farming into my primary professional focus.” 

Turning a Side Hustle into a Career Path

Once Bassuk decided to make the leap, she leveraged her tenacity, grit, and extensive network to explore how best to do that. She used her frequent flyer miles and vacation time to build her knowledge and contact base by studying the fundamentals of photobiology, networking with entrepreneurs building future billion-dollar agriculture enterprises, and meeting investors whose capital and know-how could make that happen.

Bassuk’s deliberate information-gathering and network expansion strategies paid off. She met and had meaningful conversations with visionaries in the field, and during this time her sidetrack turned into the fast track, but not in the way you might think.

She took a meditation class with Robert Hammond, who also happened to be CEO of the Highline in Manhattan. And although she’s certain it’s no coincidence that learning to meditate helped her identify her purpose and create the work she’d only dreamt of, it didn’t hurt that she encountered many fascinating people in Hammond’s living room, including Katie Grieco formerly of Tom Colicchio’s restaurant empire and others in the Farm to Fork ecosystem. 

Grieco introduced Bassuk to Marcel Van Ooyen, the CEO of GrowNYC, because she thought he’d be a good person for Bassuk to meet on her knowledge quest. As it turns out, Marcel was looking for someone with Bassuk’s skill set and connections, and he invited her to collaborate with him by advising on and supporting GrowNYC’s partnership initiatives with big corporations. He became an important mentor for Bassuk while she was in that pro bono role, and Bassuk remains involved with the non-profit.

Around that same time, Bassuk met Idan Cohen, the CEO of the ag-tech startup GROW. He’s an Israeli entrepreneur in NYC who has successfully launched several companies. As busy as he was, he was generous with his time and information, and Bassuk absorbed all she could from him, eventually becoming an investor in GROW as well. 

One apprenticeship led to another, and in the meantime, Bassuk continued to build her network.

It was Henry Gordon-Smith, the CEO of Agritecture, who suggested she attend Cornell University’s Executive Management program in Agriculture & Food and the University of Arizona’s Controlled Environment Agriculture Certificate program. The synthesis between business school classes and hands-on experience at greenhouses, vertical farms, composting facilities and dairy farms was exactly what Bassuk had been looking for. 

That’s when she began to see a clear path to putting her side hustle front and center. She was selected for HATCH, where she was invited to lead agriculture labs such as “Turning Farmers into Climate Warriors” and “The Future of Food.” She also joined the Summit community and was inspired by top food and ag visionaries that she met with such as Alice Waters.

Bassuk also connected with Farm One’s Rob Laing after making an angel investment in his company on Kickstarter when she saw that the terms included a meeting with the CEO. He pointed out a problem that Bassuk, too, recognized: Since so many companies in the agtech space were still small startups, they didn’t have the need or budget to hire senior leaders…at least not yet. But some of the bigger players, he continued, were already at that next stage. He’d told Bassuk he’d always been impressed with the team and culture of the LED lighting company he uses on his farm—Fluence, and noted that working with them could be a great entry point into the industry. 

Bassuk was able to meet Fluence’s Global VP of Business Development, Steve Graves, at the Indoor AgTech Innovation Summit and asked him for coffee. Before she knew it, she was on a plane to their corporate offices in Austin, Texas for interviews. While it couldn’t have been possible for Bassuk to imagine at the outset of her journey that the path she forged would ultimately lead her to this job – she’s quick to point out that it’s an even better outcome than she could have predicted. Her serpentine road to Fluence also reveals the important role that both intention and serendipity play in most successful career transitions.

Are You Thinking About Making a Lateral Move?

Bassuk recommends networking with a specific purpose—attending the right conferences and trade shows and taking courses to learn about new aspects of the industry that interest you and give you additional credibility in your job search. 

She also suggests:

• Aim to sell without selling. I add value to my relationships and expect nothing in return. This isn’t easy, but if value is derived from a purposeful place, it will be rewarded tenfold.

• When building relationships, remember that both sides of the conversation should have meaning and value. Don’t network just to close a deal, but rather take the time to create a meaningful relationship by getting to know people personally. 

• Always find something to learn. Whether it be about a new innovation or even a new restaurant; this provides for a more authentic approach and a great way to start a new friendship.

Bassuk stresses how important it is to network along the whole ecosystem of an industry you are passionate about. Look at the industry from a number of vantage points and don’t limit yourself. “I thought I would be working directly for one farm…and now I am working across hundreds of farms from two different vantage points—cannabis and commercial ag—geeking out on photosynthesis for an innovative company striving to make the world a better place.”

Bassuk is passionate about Fluence’s mission to improve the interaction between light and life to yield a healthier and more sustainable world. Their core value of curiosity—fusing research and expertise to foster innovation—lines up with her desire to learn and take on new challenges.

Bassuk continues to dream big. She wants to play a meaningful role in driving solutions for the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. She’s got a million ideas to contribute to the advancement of sustainable, accessible urban agriculture and she’s just getting started!

Connect with Jen Bassuk on LinkedIn!