He Oversees 300 MSPs Across the US, Here's What He's Seeing

[00:00:00] Hey guys, Damien here. As I continue to interview the top MSPs in the world, one thing has become incredibly clear. It's time that we let go. Even more than that, every time I focus on my zone of genius and get out of the way and do the very few things I'm good at and delegate to others, I'm ready for that next level of growth.

[00:00:20] One way that I can help you is with Servocity. We co-manage more backups and disaster recovery so you can focus on what you do best, let us do the rest, and then what we do is we test the backups every single day so you never have to worry. If you'd like to engage us or just learn more, click the link below.

[00:00:38] Sometimes it's the lack of belief in yourself, either overthinking, second guessing, you know, entrepreneurship and business ownership, it's not for everybody. And you have to be decisive and you have to believe that you can do it. If you don't believe you can do it, you've already lost the game.

[00:00:59] Hey guys, Damien Stevens, host of MSP Mindset, founder and CEO of Servocity. Today, I continue my mission to interview 100 of the fastest growing and most interesting MSPs on the planet. Today, I get the blessing of interviewing Dan Shapiro. Now, he's the president of TeamLogic IT with 200 owners, 300 locations, and $200 million in sales.

[00:01:32] Now, what's a guy with 1,500 employees got to do with my MSP? I know you're probably thinking that, but let me tell you this. They're going to open 30 new offices in the next 12 months. Very few people spend the time in the trenches with MSPs to go from zero to one as Dan. And they know when you're going to hit this $500K to $1 million issue and what to do with it.

[00:02:00] And Dan spends more time in the trenches with hundreds of MSPs than virtually anybody in the industry. If you want to learn how you can level up your MSP, don't miss out on our conversation today. Well, Dan, I'd love to just dive right in and help me understand how you came to lead TeamLogic IT.

[00:02:22] So it's a little, not exactly a ladder, you know, to get to running one of the biggest MSPs in our industry. Back in the day, now, probably about 20 years ago, a little over now, I worked for a company called Kaseya. And Kaseya, the RMM vendor, we were just getting the company off the ground back in those days.

[00:02:47] And I built out the initial marketing team and then the cloud infrastructure there. And during my time at Kaseya, I sat on the board of directors of CompTIA, Computing Technology Industry Association. And going to my first board meeting at CompTIA, I noticed a gentleman on an airplane had, I think he had a Datto backpack on his shoulder.

[00:03:13] It just kind of caught my eye. We were leaving the same flight from Orange County, California to Chicago. And then the same guy sat right next to me at the board meeting. We introduced ourselves and this guy, Chuck Lennon, the founding president of TeamLogic. And he was literally sat down right next to me at the at the board meeting. We introduced each other and I realized I was talking to a customer of Kaseya.

[00:03:40] So, TeamLogic had standardized on Kaseya's VSA for remote monitoring and management. Well, over the years, Chuck and I kept in touch. And it just happened that we lived in the same little town of Laguna Beach, California. 24,000 people. So, a small town by most people's measure. And we would get together. The two of us kind of joked around that he liked Michelob Ultra and I like martinis. And we would compare notes on the industry.

[00:04:10] So, as the industry went from break-fix to managed services, managed services to cloud, cloud to security, all the things that were happening, we were comparing notes all along the way. And Chuck was moving back east. He called me seven years ago to tell me this and said, I'm moving back east. I thought he was just telling me I was going to lose my drinking buddy at the watering hole.

[00:04:36] But he was actually calling me to see if I would pick up the reins of TeamLogic. And that was just about seven years ago now, a little over seven years ago now that I joined the company. So, I joined as the second president and chief operating officer here at TeamLogic, Inc. Now, I think most of us, including me, didn't really appreciate this breadth and scale of TeamLogic IT.

[00:05:04] Can you give me some of the numbers on offices or revenue or headcount? So, we've accomplished quite a bit over the last 20 years here at TeamLogic. And key to your franchise model is opening up new locations every single year because these are brand new business starts. Once we get people up and running and going, that's how our business continues to establish momentum in the market.

[00:05:33] So, over the years, we've recruited, launched and opened 300 offices, over 300 now. And those 300 locations are owned by 200 owners. So, about a quarter of our locations are owned as what we would call a multiple. In other words, somebody owns another location in their area, for example.

[00:06:01] And those collective owners combined are responsible for, as a 12-month look back, over $200 million in revenue and growing annually as a business. And growing annually this year, we'll open another 30 locations. We opened over 30 locations last year. And that's just our track record and our plans and our goals are built around that.

[00:06:31] So, it's, over time, built into, it's not one monolithic MSP, but a community of owners who are dedicated to supporting the TeamLogic brand in their local community. And all of it really adds up. So, a year ago, last April, we passed our billionth dollar collected in managed services.

[00:07:00] So, in the 20 years that we've been doing business, we collected a billion dollars. Now, in the next four, maybe five years from now, we'll have collected our second billionth dollar in revenue, just to put it all in size and scale. And about how many people does that represent? That's a great question. We track between our owners and their technicians,

[00:07:28] and then the corporate staff that have a TeamLogicIT.com mail address, about 1,500 and growing. Yeah. So, you're not a single MSP. And if you were, certainly 300 offices, 1,500 employees, 200 million revenue would certainly make you one of the largest in the world.

[00:07:55] But I'd love to dig into, as a franchisor, first of all, as somebody who was an MSP, it's hard to wrap my mind around a franchise or, but I have so many questions because I think you have a very valuable lens. To understand, you know, this market. So, one of the ones I'm just curious about is, you said something like, in the next year, you may start 30 new locations. Yes. Sometimes an MSP starts one or two. Some of the really large ones start four or five or something.

[00:08:24] How do we do 30, right? Yeah, right. How do you do 30? How do you think about 30? How do you approach 30? Obviously, you know, in this industry, we talk a lot about process and operational maturity. So, you must have a different level of process because, you know, I know it's not apples and apples, but a typical MSP, you know, opening another office or two would be just a nightmare.

[00:08:48] So, there's a couple keys to the equation here on how we do what we do. And let me start off with just the owner and the caliber of who is an owner and just explain a little bit of the background of who decides to carry the flag at TeamLogic in their local community. So, about half of our owners are technical. Half of our owners are non-technical when they come to us at TeamLogic.

[00:09:16] And of those owners, the one thing they probably all have in common is their background and experience. So, they usually have professional experience. They've accumulated a certain net worth and have a track record in business. So, they could be a mid-career corporate executive from an IT function, from a sales function, from a finance and administration function. And they have a desire to start a new business.

[00:09:46] So, they're leaving the corporate world to own their own company. They have to have a certain level of entrepreneurship in order to do that. And they have to be of a certain caliber and character in order to take that leap. You know, it's a big bet. You've been a business owner yourself, so you know how hard it is to get a new business off the ground. Now, as a franchisee, they may be looking, first of all, as a new entrepreneur or business owner,

[00:10:14] they may be looking at starting their own business from scratch. Maybe they come across a franchise model. Maybe they come across a range of franchise opportunities that they realize that maybe they thought they like pizza, so they want to run a pizza parlor. And they realize that they don't like the hours, you know, or the commitment to staff and the inventory and all of that, the risks that go along in hospitality.

[00:10:42] Then they realize, hey, there's business-to-business opportunities in franchising. And then they see our model. Now, the half that have a technical background pinch themselves. They can't believe that there's a model around IT and technology, and it's something that they know, and it's their passion. Everybody in our industry, you know, is so passionate about technology. But then the other half, maybe look at the model itself,

[00:11:11] the managed service model, and recognize how lucrative it is, the fact that we have monthly recurring revenue, and every month's a better month. And, you know, you build up the space of subscription-based customers to grow a healthy business and reach your personal goals and professional goals of small business ownership. So that's a big part of it is the people. Then there's the process, like anything, right?

[00:11:39] There's the process of, think about it, brand-new business starts. So these are not conversions, I'm an MSP, and maybe I just want to use tap into TeamLogic because I like their marketing system or I want to follow their operating model. Chances are if you're already an MSP and you've got the kind of character that it takes to be an MSP, you've probably done okay by yourself. You know, I'm not saying that we couldn't help you, but that's not who we recruit

[00:12:08] or who self-selects to be a TeamLogic owner. So they follow a system. They have to start off articles of incorporation, getting cybersecurity insurance, finding an office location, right? All of the things that go into building a business, a ground floor opportunity, and hiring a technician. That's part of the requirement. We don't look for people who want to work from home. We don't look for people who want to be fingers on the keyboards

[00:12:38] managing the tickets, right? We want people who want to run a business and build a business and create a culture in their own community, be the leaders. So that's who we look for and who finds us. And it's kind of birds of a feather, you know, attract. Anyway, then it goes on to the elements of getting yourself open for business. Now you're ready for business. Now you've got to start promoting your business.

[00:13:08] And that's where, whether it's the marketing system for the new opening process kicks in, whether it's lead gen, whether it's networking, whether it's wrapping your vehicle, all the things that you would normally do to establish a local presence for your business. We've got a runbook for all of that. And that's franchising. Same thing with stack. We know what vendors are the right vendors for you when you're getting your business launched. And we curate that.

[00:13:38] And it does change from time to time. And it's the right technology for an MSP to get themselves going, whether it's because of the tech itself, the company culture, the support they get, the assistance they get from the vendor, or whether it's just the pricing terms are best for getting yourself off the ground so you don't get vendor bloat out of the gate. You know, we have a system for that. And then there's the support.

[00:14:06] So we have peer groups from the start. This is something that we do right out of the gate so that you get assigned accountability group to keep yourself on track, whether it's the opening process or the lead gen process or finding your first client, keeping your first client, you're delivering on the promise, all of that all along the way. We shadow you with a peer group.

[00:14:36] We have a business support manager. We have a sales enablement director. We have operational director that follow you through your journey of opening your business. And it's designed in a way to provide that start to your business that improves your success. So, but it still starts with the right person has to have that fire in their belly to want to build their own business.

[00:15:06] So that's a little bit about how do you do, so how do you do 30? It's hard work. You know, imagine opening seven locations in a month or another 10 locations in a month because they'll come in cohorts throughout the year and try to get everybody on the same pace. But, you know, it's hard to find the tech. It's hard to find office space. And so as people come through that process,

[00:15:35] when they're ready, we get them open. So, so many questions. So much I want to unpack there, Dan. Yeah. How do you guys figure out who to self-select? Because it sounds like, you know, whoever has X dollars is not the right fit. And I think we've all hired the wrong person or hired the wrong person to open a new location or any of this. Yeah, so franchise development is quite the process.

[00:16:02] And what our motto, we don't find you, you find us. And that's just part of the way that it works and that we have a rigorous process that you have to go through in order to want to be a franchisee of our network. And there's a, you know, we're equal opportunity. So financing does come into play. You have to have established net worth

[00:16:29] and cash on hand to be able to build, build the business essentially. But you have to really want it, you know, and you have to apply for it and go through the interview process and come visit us. It's part of our expectation is, you know, you just don't sign up online and off you go. It's, we want to make sure that it's a cultural fit as well. And it works. And, you know, you're touching on

[00:17:00] the key ingredient there is culture. You know, we have a very distinct corporate culture that attracts people that want to do business in a certain way. And when they understand our team and what drives and motivates our team and our character and our value system and our business philosophy, that kind of person who highly values the qualities that we value,

[00:17:30] again, birds of a feather. And we get, that's how we get the right people. And the beauty of that is then you've got people with a certain value system in our network, these 200 owners who hire people within that value system. And then they collaborate, cooperate with one another. We're all in it together, even though we're several hundred, couple hundred separate legal entities, right?

[00:17:57] But we have this certain esprit de corps that makes the team logic difference and provides more advantage than even our franchise system as a whole. You know, the support that they give one another, and when I say they are owners, it goes beyond anything I've really, with all my experience in MSP, all the communities I've participated in, I've never seen anything quite like

[00:18:27] the way this group of folks engages with one another. It's really a special little corner of the managed service industry. I want to come back to that, but I wanted to dig in a little bit more because I know in the earlier days, culture for me, you meant you're kind of like me or my other people or you're somebody that comes in early or you're, heck, you at least live in our city, but you're establishing offices all over the nation

[00:18:57] and with very different backgrounds and very different skill sets. So, you know, I think it's hard to boil down culture without it being just like, I don't know people that agree with me. And I imagine the breadth and the depth, not only geographically, but, you know, the background of skill sets and all sorts of things means that you have to have a better understanding or a different understanding maybe than others. So how do you help figure that out

[00:19:26] and not make it just like whoever Dan or Damien says is good, you know, which seems completely arbitrary? So I'll back up a little bit and talk about our business and then share credit where credit's due. So Team Logic has 20 years of franchise experience. We're part of an organization called Franchise Services that has 50 years

[00:19:55] of franchise experience. It's been around a while. The founding CEO of Franchise Services is a gentleman by the name of Don Lowe. Don still looking out the window, comes to work every day after 50 years in our business. And one day Don told me a little story. He said, you know, Dan, cultures are easier to create and they're harder to change. And I share that with all our prospective franchise owners

[00:20:24] is getting the culture because it's 30 new business starts. Establish a value system. We have a university class. It's a requirement. You got to come to California to get yourself trained six days of training before we put you in the peer group and help you get your first client and all of that. And Friday afternoons, we review your business plan. And a big part of that is your value system. So our value system, you know, what makes us tick and how do we keep

[00:20:53] our culture alive is it's not about the technical skills. It's about the soft skills. It's about hiring people who are in line with your own business philosophy. So if you hire right and you hire those people that you can trust and that you feel are going to be a steward of your company, steward of your brand, steward of your culture, when you do that, then you perpetuate that culture

[00:21:22] and you feed it, you nurture it and it gives, it pays the dividends. So for us, it's really important that we treat each other like family. And when I say each other, we treat, the staff treats each other like family. We treat our owners like their family. We expect our owners to treat each other like family. We treat our vendor ecosystem like family because we know things are going to happen and things are going to go sideways.

[00:21:51] But we remind ourselves that we didn't do it. It didn't happen on purpose and we're just here like you might with your kids, you know, the things you learn or teach your kids when they're little, you know, that we respect each other and support each other in that way. We build trust with our franchisees and quite frankly with everybody we do business with through honoring our commitments. So when we do what we say we're going to do,

[00:22:21] show up on time, follow up with that document, whatever it might be, you know, pick up the phone and call you when I said I would, then you come to rely on the fact that we're going to do what we say we're going to do and that's trust. And for any MSP that's out there, your staff. So if you can't trust your staff to take care of your clients, you got a problem as an owner of an MSP. that means you're following up, you're the one trying to make things

[00:22:49] right all the time and it comes down to, you know, maybe it's lack of integrity or lack of commitment, lack of urgency in your staff. So you want to get people that hire the people that share your values, hire the people that know right from wrong, hire the people that, you know, sometimes people don't know what's right or wrong. So in your company you have to make it okay to make mistakes because you don't want, you want to foster that openness

[00:23:19] that people will, if they have a problem they'll say, hey, I think I made a mistake and we can laugh it off. If we can laugh it off then we can clear up the mistake and move forward and know that next time there's a mistake you won't have any fear of making, of sharing that you made a mistake. Now sometimes you don't know that you made a mistake but then that's where doing the right thing just integrity. So I'm going to fix problems as part of my job if something doesn't go right I got to make it right. You know,

[00:23:49] how can we make it right? Can't always wave a magic wand but where I can I'm going to try to make things right. We operate with a certain urgency so for for a tech company you know, my background if you go way back early stage tech companies we were always trying to get first mover advantage and I think we did a good job with that at Kaseya no one will doubt doubt that for a new business start

[00:24:18] like a new franchisee it's all about cash flow break even you know you started your business and I got to cover my expenses so that's our urgency and the staff knows that and then we have it's just it's a simple word called results that sounds there's I'll unpack that for you a little bit results is profitable growth not just top line we operate on a royalty model so you can grow your business

[00:24:46] and not be profitable and we still win but you won't be happy as a franchisee so the staff is calibrated to driving profitable growth for our franchisees and if we drive that profitable growth then our franchisees are happy our staff is happy everything works out in the long run so you know it's just a it's a value system and it's like I say it's more

[00:25:16] than just saying the words it's you know it's living it hiring the people that can they can follow that kind of business philosophy and then reminding them about it all the time you know we're always trying to improve our processes we just want to polish the stone or polish the fender whatever you want to call it on our systems because a franchise system can be think about security and all the skews all the way to the statements of work and all the

[00:25:45] operating procedures in the middle you know that's a lot to deliver on and it's changing all the time so you know we have to be committed to always always moving the ball down the field always helping out a little bit more so that's a little bit about you ask ask that question how do we do what we do and what about culture culture is is key for us something else I found after interviewing so many top MSPs

[00:26:15] is peer groups so since you've been there did you always enroll new owners in peer groups what does that look like have you evolved that yeah so that's a great that's a great point the peer group is has evolved over time in our business and it's for us establishing a peer group in the way that our peer program

[00:26:44] started was certain owners have a level and sophistication in their business with a certain commitment to the values with a certain commitment to growing their business openness and sharing you know their plans which could include their exit strategies or personal lives and all of that being transparent with their financials it's out of a population of a few it's hard

[00:27:14] to get just that group in a small ecosystem like ours but it did happen and it has and it does happen it happens on a regular basis where we'll bring together owners that are like-minded I think one of the things that the company did right and it was before I got here we had some of our top owners in those types of peer groups where they were up and running and just trying to navigate the industry and grow together at the same time we

[00:27:43] established the peer groups we call it pay centers for our new franchisees so that out of the gate how do I navigate everything I need to know about being an MSP but what we notice is observation sometimes it's like fresh set of eyes is that there's a gap in between being at the top and just getting your business started people like Gary Pika would call it the ticket trap you get

[00:28:13] to this point where you're about a half a million not quite a million in revenue and you're spending all the plates you can spend and you're too busy to sell you're too busy to hire and now you're stuck in your business and we recognize that had its special challenges so what we did was we created a peer group more of an accountability group during that special point of

[00:28:43] inflection in an MSP's life to get them over to the hump that doesn't mean you have to have the same level of commitment to be in a peer group that shares openly their financials or otherwise but you got to be willing to talk about your pipeline got to be willing to talk about your people and your operational challenges because it's such a critical point in your business and getting the feedback from others and then openly expressing your commitment to solving your problems

[00:29:12] is improving the likelihood that you're actually going to go do it so I think those peer groups whether ours is like a closed ecosystem of peer groups within our network but it's hard business and it's hard to go it alone and you can go to if you're just getting your peer exchanges from flying around from one conference to another over the year and you're on the road all year well who's running your business you know

[00:29:42] who's talking to customers or prospects or solving the technical challenges or inspiring your team so having that group even if it's informal is a good way to keep your business constantly moving forward that's really insightful have you seen other areas that are certain inflection points certain head counter revenue milestones just like that but it maybe different ones

[00:30:11] it's funny you ask some of our owners there's always a stigma about that million dollar milestone you know and aside from just getting myself to break even and getting myself to that area where hey I'm now making a decent living on my business I was asking one of our top owners this is about a year and a half ago we had a gathering

[00:30:41] at our owner summit we have our own get together with the vendor show and the program and the whole bit but I was saying hey how did you you know what did you think after you went through that first milestone of you hit the million dollar milestone and his comment was I never looked back you know so it was rather interesting and I feel like as your business grows having that repeatable

[00:31:11] sales cycle is a key indicator of another milestone I mean you get yourself to a certain point but then now can I what do I need to do to scale my business and when you get to that it's maybe not time based may not even be dollar based but it's activity based hey I've got I've got my account management and and we call them technology business

[00:31:40] reviews process down I've got a repeatable sales cycle in I now have operating either manager director chief operating officer of my business in place where I have a different role leadership now in my business than just being the sales person or the problem solver or the recruitment person in my organization so I think there are more

[00:32:10] other points of inflection or more at least you know somebody may say certain revenues or other metrics for me I look at it more activity based do you have the right activities buttoned down in your business to where you're busting through that next challenge or barrier of growing an MSP which is again a complicated business absolutely

[00:32:40] how much out of curiosity how much is this you know I have this never started a franchise and I have this preconception that franchises are about to start and they give you the playbooks and processes and maybe it maybe don't start off using marketing and later I start to use that more but I have this maybe false preconception that it's really more about the start is it really all about the start obviously you don't get off the ground nothing matters or is it as I reach different levels you

[00:33:10] kind of have different playbooks or different ecosystems I want to tap to figure out how to get to that next level well we have a saying we use all the time which is follow the system our system and we not saying we're the only way

[00:33:46] try to backfill you have to build your business with the intention that you're going to get to that milestone that you need to be at within the first 12 months of your business and in the next few years you're going to be at another level in your business now different people work at different paces for different reasons sometimes it's family situations that can get health situations

[00:34:16] can be a distraction sometimes it's the lack of belief in yourself comes in you know where you you're either overthinking second guessing you know entrepreneurship and business ownership it's not for everybody and you have to be decisive and you have to believe that you can do it if you don't believe you can do it you've already lost the game

[00:34:45] so when you lose that sometimes it takes a while to realize that you know it's the only way to see the problem is looking in the mirror you know that it's my business I got to get out there and do more and whatever the do more might be whether it's more prospecting networking whether it's more investment whether it's more or better

[00:35:15] hiring or more sales activities or more follow up in my day to day you know no sales no eat so that's just what it takes to be a business owner so I don't I mean we have a way and I firmly believe that our system works when our owners work it right you take that and you apply it you will be successful very different ways that you

[00:35:45] could do things following process is obviously key I love to switch this up a little bit and ask you Dan what are some of the challenges you faced in the seven years and more specifically around the mindset where have you not believed where you could have or you been in this space for a while I am curious if I were to look at challenges in the business and challenges personal

[00:36:14] I think the challenges in our business probably the same challenge and opportunity that all MSPs face is security it's been really surprising how MSP and MSSP converged over the last few but bad guys never sleep they create we've got people working remote outside

[00:36:44] and from behind that firewall and there's always something new and there's no finish line you just have to keep on top of whether it's processes whether it's tools whether it's training or otherwise to combat the security challenges that our industry faces that our industry requires you know if you look at requirement for

[00:37:14] cyber security insurance or other compliance standards the game is constantly evolving and every year there's going to be a new dot something on CIS that we're so that's on the business front I'd say overcoming challenges like on a personal level I'll go back I've picked up a few things here in franchising but I'll go back really

[00:37:43] span of a 30 plus career and if I were to reflect back personally I got a few gray hairs now what did I learn to get the few gray hairs is that I only have a couple regrets really only one and that was selling a BMW to my mechanic because this kid wound up driving it

[00:38:18] I had a better understanding of compassion earlier in my career than maybe later in my career if you ask Warren Buffett he might tell you I wish I knew about compounded interest rates earlier in my career but for me it's compassion when you're a leader in your organizations that you have to

[00:38:48] understand some of the challenges that your people are facing it's not that they're not trying hard or it's not that they're not capable it's that there's something underlying that you got to get to and you have to help them understand that because they have to solve those problems and when you can understand that and I'm not just talking about passion for your work and I'm not just talking about empathy or sympathy I'm talking about truly understanding

[00:39:17] inside the personality the psyche what's causing that person that block what is a true limit limiting factor when you can figure that out for them then help them understand what that is then you start unleashing potential and you know when you're an early stage startup so a lot of venture backed startups there's not a lot of room for that right I mean you're going against very

[00:39:47] competitive times you're looking at first mover advantage you got a lot of venture money you're trying to put to work and people have to be on their game and it's chop chop there's only you know what we would call gas in the tank you know because we get so many dollars and if we don't put those dollars to work quickly we don't get the next round of funding and all of that so I would say that the venture community you don't always associate with the most compassionate bunch so learning that

[00:40:17] over time and then I feel like you're working in the franchise model in particular because these entrepreneurs are betting it all you know they're taking their family money their life savings their retirement funds etc and they got a lot on the line and this is their livelihood I mean it's 10 year commitment pretty much good chance of renewal for their business and so when they get

[00:40:47] they get stuck you gotta help them you know and how do we do that you know we have to understand what is that block what's that challenge how do we get over it and how do we get over it together you know what can we do to help help help help remove that suffering you know to get somebody to that next level of their life where they can pursue their own dreams so you know like I say a little bit about just a commercial for

[00:41:16] compassion out there you know it's something that didn't have as much appreciation for earlier in my career as I accumulated over time I think that's a wonderful answer I have this mental model I don't know if it's correct but I kind of see you as an aggregator of all the things problems solutions right with 200 owners 300 offices a few people probably are seeing our industry in

[00:41:46] the way that you are I'm curious like what are the challenges that that are you see are the top ones that are bubbling up or that happen again and again yep you know there's a couple different approaches to franchising there's the very strict model and then there's maybe a softer model we tend to be on the softer model side when it comes to that let me give you some examples pretty easy

[00:42:16] for people to think in franchising of hospitality brands like a McDonald's or a KFC and the colonel was known to throw the gravy on the floor if it wasn't made to a specific specification or everybody goes through hamburger university and learns how to set the fryer to three minutes to make those french fries come out consistently because it's part of your brand standard in IT and

[00:42:46] I'd say business to business franchising in general we sell as much about of ourselves and our value systems our commitment to show up on time and be friendly and be consultative all of those are part of our brand value and that's embodied in every franchisee every one of our owners but when it comes to the aggregator of the problems or the challenges and even the opportunities is bringing

[00:43:16] things to market inside that brand value that we can't always be the first to market we have to be right to market and if we're going to be right to market we have to carve out the path that we think is it may not be best for everybody but it might be best for the majority where are we going to find that next dial to turn whether it's pricing differently or whether

[00:43:46] it's better ways to bring the next security tool in our stack to market we have to figure out as much of a turnkey way to do that now that may not work for everybody but if we can find a way that it have the mandate like it's a happy meal or

[00:44:15] impossible burger and everybody is going to get it and we have to line up the supply chain that way but we might look at what is the next level of 7 by 24 security analysts with eyes on logs to isolate a desktop or server if need be when the end user did the darnedest thing so we have to figure out who are the right vendors

[00:44:45] so we aggregate that challenge or that problem and we figure out what's the best way we do a lot of that by talking to our owners talking to that and then hopefully you get right to market I use this analogy I'm based here in Southern California so grew up born and raised in all of that so grew

[00:45:15] up surfing and sometimes people wonder how do you catch those waves right an analogy well you check the weather report the tide situation the swell direction and you show up at the right spot at the right time of the day so it's not too windy the tide is right the swell is at the right angle and then you stretch before you go out and you go where the waves are basically so we go where the puck is going in our business to try to navigate through some of that to be right

[00:45:44] and being an MSP is super busy work and we can't throw 30 things at an MSP and say adopt 30 things at once we can maybe we get a shot at one two maybe three in a year that we think you can adopt in your business to make a fundamental change whether it's value to your customer or price point or price advantage for you our labor efficiency

[00:46:14] I can go on and on and there might be 12 things because technology changes really quickly but what are the three that make the biggest impact and we have to think about that when we build our plans and roll out our plans and spend our treasure here at the corporate headquarters to try to figure out what are the right relationships and where do we double down or back off a little bit in order to make sure that we're solving the you know as an aggregator of problems we're solving the

[00:46:44] right problem for our franchisee and like I said earlier a lot of it is security you know that's a primary these days for probably not just us but most MSPs if we were to zoom out a little what's you probably talk to more MSP owners than virtually anyone so I'm wondering is there a common one to three challenges you know culture or leadership or sales or I'm just kind of curious if you see like these are the things

[00:47:14] that you know I know that right now it's cyber security in 10 years who know it will be but there also seems to be these things that gosh we all need you know unless you're natural in one of those it's a common pattern challenge wise probably the biggest thing in the business and it's been this way and shouldn't come as a big surprise to people how do we get the right people the best people keep the best and brightest in our staff the thing that breaks my heart is when I hear somebody say they're

[00:47:44] going to back off on their marketing because they're going to break their bench if they bring on a new client awful position to be in as an MSP owner right so you know I was surprised that many of our owners turned offshore if you look back six to seven years ago pre pandemic before we had remote workforce and all of that and people working from home we're always made in America and now we've got some franchisees looking at

[00:48:13] offshore labor because there's available resources readily available resources the infrastructure like what we're doing right now tends to knit us together a little better and you can get some price advantage for skills that maybe otherwise you couldn't even hire for let alone keep so labor is always been a big challenge for the business today where we

[00:48:45] again another recent phenomenon I mean licenses like M365 people take for granted as a cloud service but providing more desktop as a service or other application hosting is gaining and gaining popularity in MSP base as a whole not just us here in our ecosystem but across MSP communities and channels we see more and more of that in the small to medium

[00:49:15] business space and then there's always that specter of artificial intelligence AI right around the corner that I feel like where we are we're looking at chat GPT it's cool it's kind of fun but is it really going to fundamentally change my world you hear even

[00:49:45] some of the top leaders in tech Bill Gates gets productivity by summarizing email so does Mark Cuban this is what they're deeper problems like in the medical field that'll make fundamental shifts or automating through agent based technologies where we're not just finding out

[00:50:14] problems but we're actually executing runbooks in our world today we rely on our vendor ecosystem for a lot of that so we're excited to see some of our vendors like Kaseya and Autotask come out with next best response for a ticket and taking a look at how to either write a response or interpret a ticket thread that's great stuff our NINJA our RMM vendor for patching has patched

[00:50:44] sentiment analysis now it's going to be a while before we all just rely 100% on am I going to let it patch it all for me or do I need to be part of that process especially given CrowdStrike and others out there of what's important and what's not you may not just delegate all of that today but having that information and intelligence available and what does that mean to the MSP for their own

[00:51:14] world and I haven't even gotten to clients yet businesses that are trying to license Microsoft copilot and they don't know what they don't know when it comes about securing the infrastructure or taking for granted what it means when you GPU MPU enable your Azure tenant and in your M365 environment you're basically using the collective of your data data lake in your company

[00:51:44] to get responses irrespective of whether that information is tagged and classified for confidentiality or not right so there'll be a role for us to play in that when it usually comes down to the same things people process technologies you know we'll be issuing we have them now acceptable use policies and we've got use cases internally on how companies can take advantage of

[00:52:14] those licenses today but it'll be an interesting ride as we get closer to that agent based technology where it's not just getting information and determining is it right or is it hallucinating but where we're actually relying on repeatable processes for almost every job there is on the planet there's some part of a repetitive muscle motion that everybody goes through whether it's daily weekly monthly

[00:52:43] annually whether you're an estate planner trying to figure out what information I need to collect to fill out a form or an insurance company or whether you're a radiologist trying to spot the tumor there'll be some augmented tasks and functions that will turn ordinary people into extraordinary people and that's something in our future so when you look at the overall

[00:53:13] opportunity MSP it's hard to find an MSP who doesn't think they have a bright future it's just part of our industry we are all excited and bullish and when we get together we have a lot of positive stuff to talk about we're in a growing industry and it's a great place something new around that next corner and again maybe that's one of the

[00:53:43] wisdoms of the gray hair you know is that you look back and say gosh I've kind of seen what's the biggest lesson you feel like you've learned over your career Dan

[00:54:12] hmm you know it's hard to say that if it's one lesson or the aggregation of the many lessons that I've learned you know trying to think about it I like my analogy so let me use a bicycle you know like running an MSP could be like riding a bicycle but think about what goes into riding a bicycle you got most people don't learn to ride a bicycle without the training wheels

[00:54:42] and when you take the training wheels off you're probably I don't know four to five years into it before you figure out how to ride a bike without the training wheels and I think for new MSP it's kind of like that you don't know until you get hired by your first client your tech does your first onboarding or the time that comes when you have to do an off boarding or what have you or scale your business think about how

[00:55:11] complicated a bike really is I'm not talking about just riding a bike but I can't even fathom how many independent parts go into a bicycle even just the wheel right a wheel has got a hub and a bearing and it's got some bolts and an axle and then I haven't even got all the different spokes and each one has a nipple that goes into the rim it has a tube it's got a valve on it

[00:55:50] going with the MSP toolkit there's a lot of tools and time goes by and we figure out better ways to engineer the tools used to be if you ride a mountain bike how a derailleur worked and how a shock worked and whether you can lock out your shock or not lock out your shock and the next thing you know we've changed the whole gearing around from front deraille to back deraille and it just changes the whole dynamic of how you ride a

[00:56:20] bike and bike gets a little bit more expensive but so does the game so there's a lot of analogy there when you look at all the different lessons that go together the one big idea in there is the lesson is MSP like riding a bike but don't take it all even honestly just being a biped and standing on two

[00:56:50] feet that's a miracle that we do what we do that we kill all the different foot motions that it takes just to keep your body stable and your equilibrium such that you don't fall over every single time it's amazing right and so I'd say that's the big idea I take away from MSP it's not just there's no one thing that's going to solve all my problems it's mastering the connectiveness of the financial

[00:57:20] model to the people to the technology to the marketing to the sales to the customer satisfaction and service delivery putting that all together there are hundreds of lessons to learn in every one of those areas I to learn to ride a bike

[00:57:50] and I mean I've seen people out of the gate in the first year you know miracle that payroll or pay for the

[00:58:20] first person or the next person or land that next client if there were one thing you could do differently or over what would that be oh I think I already answered that one for you with learning a little bit more compassion early in the career yeah

[00:58:53] I MSPs okay forget about just the team logic brand we're only as good as the weakest MSP here at team logic our team logic brand is as strong as the weakest team logic so if you look at protecting that brand the golden goose that lays the eggs it's not a very good look for an

[00:59:23] MSP to be compromised and you know that your your office as an MSP you're only as good as your strongest tech or your strongest employee and it takes that one employee or technician whether it's a non-technical person or otherwise to get phished and send out that that campaign that phishing campaign or your

[00:59:53] website gets infected and starts distributing malware I mean that is not a good look for an MSP so that's the challenge of the MSP in today's world is protecting your brand and for us protecting our brand is where we we've got a lot of different challenges that we face every day whether it's hiring other people getting the next customer all you know picking the

[01:00:23] right vendor right all of those things I feel at least maybe as my advantage is added to add up to that pain point or that the risk factor of protecting the brand in and around security so we have a security first initiative internally and we have a security standard that we have aligned to CIS that we ask our franchisees to adhere to we

[01:00:53] have a number of internal security programs that we implement to ensure that we do everything that we can do not best way to lose a client and worst case is if there's a security compromise and it's on you as an MSP and then it

[01:01:22] makes a local pubs that's not a good look for you either so we've been through our own challenges being a shop we had to endure an international security challenge that took nation states to resolve that was pretty close to the fire in the kitchen as that ever want to be there again and touch wood we won't meanwhile

[01:01:52] we do what we can to bolster our own security here I think you're the first one that we started off recording and your security software ate the recording it's a malicious thing it wouldn't let us talk so you had to make sure it was on the up and up so you definitely have a lot of layers which is the right approach yeah what's something you're looking forward to right now Dan so you know it's our

[01:02:22] continued growth I think about it all the time you know we have a clear vision and a clear path you know we're at 300 what's the path to 400 and it's that all the steps along the way where we get together with a big tent all our franchisees come together annually we do it in the fall and we celebrate our success every year and so I one of those opportunities

[01:02:51] to share what we do together as a collective it's an honor to be able to do that and to be able to provide that lens to the owners everybody heads down in their business whether they're hiring or supervising or managing their ticket flows or whether they're selling the next opportunity or taking care of the client

[01:03:21] or going out and doing a scheduled business review all the daily activities and for me I love to watch the results that we achieve as a combined entity that we achieve that whether it's the top line growth whether it's our overall metric on bottom line profitability or watching our percentage of or whether

[01:03:51] it's the head count growing the number of devices we manage growing I just love watching that that's part of the MSP model and I would say for us it's like hyper scale right we've got 200 MSPs combined it's a lot 1500 and growing fingers on keyboards contributing to that success but if I was just an MSP I would be focused on the same things

[01:04:20] I would be looking at those same types of metrics that I could use whether it's how many end points my techs are managing or how many am I onboarding a new customer every month I would be looking forward to every one of those successes because you should be achieving it as an MSP and if you're not look in the mirror because that's where the challenge is because I talk to so many MSPs whether they're

[01:04:50] in our network or in industry and it's hard to find these days somebody who's still struggling to figure it all out it's not the way it we weren't really sure all the services that we were supposed to deliver or what we needed to do to curate our tech stack or what methodology of marketing worked or not any of them work as long as you put your mind to it and you're consistent with it

[01:05:20] all those things add up so really looking forward to whether it's next year or the near term future for our brand celebrating next year will be our 20th anniversary should say this year our 20th anniversary so for us that's a big celebration that we all get to pull together with as well so big 20 and 2025 so a lot

[01:05:49] to be grateful for yeah that is a lot 20 years what's one book you would recommend so I'm the kind of person that picks up a few books all at the same time and I'm always reading catching up different parts of my brain so I'd say and I don't know if this is for everybody but it's working for me there's a gentleman by the name of Ray

[01:06:19] Kurzweil who wrote a book about the singularity and it's a book on AI now you got to know this about Ray he's the chief architect for AI at Google that's his job he's also credited with optical character recognition OCR and he has a company that makes keyboards he's an inventor computer scientist through the whole history modern history of our industry

[01:06:48] and he wrote a new he's credited with predicting the singularity which is basically computer intelligence at the same level as human intelligence so where we can where compute can actually reason not just ones and zeros inputs and outputs but actually provide that human aspect to a decision or an outcome so he was credited with that 20 years ago when he wrote his book and he

[01:07:18] predicted now was the time well last summer he just put out a new book called The Singularity is Nearer and so he's doing a fast forward modern update on the case for why now so if you're in the tech industry and you're not thinking about AI as part of your future you will not be part of the future so you need to start boning up on all of that and not be a denier of it you know it's not a conspiracy it's a reality

[01:07:48] that there's a lot of infrastructure being thrown at it by the technology base in the world whether it's what's going on in other countries or what's going on in the US or what's not going on in Western Europe these days which is a bit of a shame is that there's a lot of investment happening in that space and so Ray's book especially if you're a computer scientist I am not I'm a CPA so I have to skip some of this stuff in there because

[01:08:18] I'm not as good at set theory as others might be but I get the gist of it he does a power data and the chipset challenge anything is really possible because we've got all the data and it's really coming down to power and chipset throughput and

[01:08:48] seems like NVIDIA is doing a good job on the throughput I know that Microsoft is about three mile island and the Saudis are building data centers there's a lot going on in singularity is nearer by Ray Kurzweil you can find it pick it up on Amazon that sounds like an amazing read right now good recommendation and thank you for your time thank you for being just so generous

[01:09:18] and open with your thoughts and where we are in the industry and where we're going and thank you so much for being on MSP mindset and just the gift of your presence Hey and you for inviting me and including me in your podcast series