Mayank Jain

Mayank Jain's career has followed an unconventional arc. After graduating from IIT Roorkee, he spent two years writing code at JP Morgan before co-founding Musicfellas, an indie music discovery platform. When Times Internet acquired the company in 2014, he documented the lessons from that journey in his book Restart – Lessons from one startup for another. Then he did something most people wouldn't expect: he walked away from tech to play poker professionally.

He'd been playing since 2008, but went full-time in 2016. Over the next decade, he logged more than 3 million cash game hands and represented the Gujarat Team in Seasons 1 and 2 of the Poker Sports League. His coaching draws from Game Theory Optimal foundations while teaching players how to punish opponents who deviate from sound strategy. He's worked with complete beginners and seasoned grinders alike, and his students point to his structured, methodical approach as what sets his teaching apart.

Poker isn't the only thing he teaches. He's currently building The Little Rationals, a program that develops critical thinking skills in students aged 10-17. He writes a newsletter called The Processor on Substack, covering everything from decision-making to books to what it means to live well. The thread connecting all of it? He describes his approach as "meaning-driven, process-focused" - less concerned with outcomes than with thinking clearly about how to get there.