I’m Yash Dubal, the founder and Director of A Y & J Solicitors, the immigration experts. I was born and raised in Gujarat, India before coming to the UK in 2003 after completing a computer engineering degree and borrowing £1500 for visa fees. Within 15 days of arrival I was working and self-sufficient. I even managed to save £50 to send to my mother so she could buy the first fridge she’d ever owned. Working seven days a week for 18 hours a day I took on several jobs and also ran a small college in London.

It was from this that I started helping friends from India with immigration advice on their college admissions and finding work in the UK. This led to me founding A Y & J Solicitors which now operates on a global level helping businesses to found UK headquarters, UK businesses to work in India along with Visa support and sponsorship for businesses and individuals. 

What inspired you to launch your business and what is the end goal?

My motivation was, and still is, to help others achieve better lives, while benefiting society, paying tax, building robust businesses, and employing people. I grew up in a small, remote village. My father died when I was 17 so my mother started working to support me and my two younger siblings. To me, it was normal, but, with the benefit of hindsight, it was an incredibly hard life. We were poor and lived in a one-bedroom apartment. I will always remember the shame of poverty. Many migrants in the UK will recognise these circumstances but it is normal life in many parts of the world. Until you’ve experienced poverty, it is hard to understand how much it can influence an individual’s drive to succeed. For as long as I can remember, I was determined to create a better life for myself and my family, no matter what. The end goal is to help as many people as possible and to grow the business to become the UK’s biggest immigration law firm within the next decade.

How do you set yourself apart from other businesses in your industry?

Our values are honesty, reliability, integrity, and transparency and we go the extra mile to help others. We have over a decade of experience, are multi-award winning and recommended by Legal 500. We have helped over 4000 clients with various immigration matters and we pride ourselves on our high degree of professionalism and knowledge of the ever-changing UK immigration system. We fight for our clients and, because of the real-life experience behind the origins of the business, we really understand our clients and their needs on a fundamental level.

What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learnt so far as an entrepreneur? 

To stay laser focused, you can’t afford to take your eye off the ball, especially in the early stages. Great systems and processes really help to achieve these and they’re vital when dealing with multiple clients that speak different languages and need different services from us. It’s also vitally important to provide great value to your clients. Honesty and transparency go a long way rather than a short-term benefit.

With all the success stories around entrepreneurship and how innovative people have to be to take the leap. How do you think you’ve innovated your sector and why?

Typical lawyer’s fees in the UK range around £150 - £300 per hour. I have seen great deal of people deprived of proper legal advice due to exorbitant cost. It is our quest to avail good legal advice/service to all. In my view, it is necessary to develop an AI based application that demonetise an expensive legal service in the UK. Therefore, we are now investing to develop an AI based application, i.e. ‘robo lawyer’ to address this.

What are your thoughts on failure?

Failure is an essential part of success. Without failing you never get the opportunity to learn. The trick is to fail, and then learn from your failure. I think there is an issue nowadays, particularly with younger people, that failure knocks their confidence so hard that people do not pick themselves up and try again. Businesses should reframe the idea of failure. It is a learning opportunity and a way to develop really important skills such as resilience and problem-solving. Some of the most successful entrepreneurs have resided over failures but have learned from them and come back even better.

What plans do you have for A Y & J Solicitors over the next two years?

Since the Brexit vote in June 2016, the UK immigration system has been in a state of flux, leaving employers and potential overseas workers unsure of the rules and processes they need to follow. Earlier this year, the situation became clearer, when the Government issued its new, post-Brexit policy. And then the coronavirus happened. Currently no one is 100 percent sure what will happen in the next months, and possibly the next year. In the next two years it will be our mission to help people negotiate the changing immigration landscape and make the most of the opportunities available to them through immigration. We hope to be helping increasing numbers of HNW individuals and their families in their plans to relocate to the UK.

How important is company culture and what is your top tip to get it right?

Company culture is very important as it defines your business and how people engage and interact with you. Our values at A Y & J Solicitors are honesty, reliability, integrity and transparency. We go the extra mile to help others. Everyone we employ shares those values and believes in them and also believes in what we do and achieve as a company. This helps to build culture. My top tip would be to make sure the people in your organisation share your values and understand them. Culture comes from the top down so set the right example, be authentic and be a human leader.

How do you believe the evolution of tech will affect your industry over the next 10 years?

The Visa system is process driven and inevitably will rely on more increasing digitisation. Visa applications are already largely made online and this will only increase. Artificial Intelligence will be used increasingly to determine an individual’s right to work or live in the UK. However, AI tends not to understand nuance or anomalies and with immigration there are always different interpretations. For this reason, the service we provide will always be in demand, and even more so as increasingly human adjudication will be needed to determine appeals when algorithms get things wrong.

What would be your top marketing tip, to grow a business that is so niche, yet incredibly timeless?

Find out your niche clientele, identify where they are located and then provide great value content; for example, relevant social media for your niche audience.

What do you think gives a brand longevity?

Authenticity is vital, as is connection to your audience and customers. The best brands are the ones that people trust and want in their lives. To achieve longevity as a brand, you need to be relevant and trustworthy with a message people understand. It is also important to continually innovate.