Cynthia Schreiner of CyperQP

[00:00:00] Welcome to MSP Initiative call. I guess I'm off Cynthia, you know. Livecasts, webcasts. Livecasts, webcasts. This is going to be recorded. You can watch this just about anywhere. You can go

[00:00:16] to mspinitiative.com. I am actually going to show you a couple of quick things. Going to do some housekeeping and then we get into our special guests, Cynthia, and talk all things cyber QP and

[00:00:28] channel and community and all that fun stuff. But first, let's do a little housekeeping. Let's make sure you all know what's going on. There's so much happening with MSP Initiative first at MSPinitiative.com.

[00:00:41] You can actually go to the sessions. Like I said, all the sessions are recorded so you can come back here and check those out. Usually it's with the great George Bardissi. I am no substitute

[00:00:51] for George, but I will pretend to play one on TV. How's that? And then we have community minds, which is an all educational event for the MSPs. There is no pitching at these events.

[00:01:04] You definitely, if you're an MSP, you want to come out to these events. The next one that's coming up is in Denver on September 25th and 26th. Even if you're in the neighborhood and you could come

[00:01:14] off for one of the days, it still would be worth your while. You're not forced to go to both if you have one day out of the week that you come on down. You want to check it out.

[00:01:23] It's a free event to MSP, so it makes perfect sense to be able to come out and check this out. Also, there are community block parties. If you haven't done a block party with George and company,

[00:01:34] you have missed out. I think Cynthia can also agree these block parties are absolutely insane. And there are block parties coming up for Datocon. There's a block party coming up for IT Nation. They also go across the pond and do block parties over there. So make sure you

[00:01:50] check out the website and go to community block party, and you'll be able to check out all of the different block parties that are going on here and abroad. Just crazy amounts of good time, and they're free for MSPs. You heard that right, Cynthia, free.

[00:02:07] Oh yeah. Us vendors are happy to get you there. And it is, like you said, a ton of fun, a lot of really great entertainment. But also if you don't, especially the really big ones,

[00:02:19] if you don't want to be where the live music is because maybe you want to have a conversation, or you want to go smoke a cigar, or you want to go do trivia, there's always something for everyone.

[00:02:30] Right? There are some quiet corners. There are some places to play games. There's some places to kick back and have a cigar. There are some places to maybe see something cool. The one last year in Miami was down by the water. So maybe you just like stare

[00:02:45] out at the water, which I can do for hours. I get that. So yeah, there's kind of always something for everyone. So don't feel like, you know, oh, it's just a big loud concert. Like there's definitely

[00:02:54] something for everyone. And there's also times as a big loud concert if that's what you're into. Yeah, exactly. That's a great statement, Cynthia. It's 100% accurate. I've always heard people say, oh, I don't want to go. It's just no, it's everything. There was karaoke.

[00:03:08] There was live band. There was a cigar, like you said. There was the ice luge. There was the game room. There was so many different things and you could just go outside and sit

[00:03:19] and have a conversation. So it wasn't like... Yeah, the hotel for a minute, which is not just the hotel. Yep, get away from the hotel that you're crammed into for three days, sometimes

[00:03:30] four days, and actually breathe some fresh air and you're not just in a room with the concert. There's several buildings you can go to and several places you can hang out. So it's actually very well-versed and wide range for what you can do. Yep. Awesome. Well, again,

[00:03:48] I'm no George Bardisi, but I am Ken Patterson from Total and I'm so happy to be filling in for George today because I have my good friend Cynthia on the other side of the screen here.

[00:03:57] Wish it was in person, my friend, but this will do for now. I'm just... Cynthia, why don't you share a little bit about you, a little bit about your story and a little bit about CyberQP

[00:04:07] and then we'll break into this. Yeah, so I am at CyberQP which provides help desk automation. So things like end user identity verification when someone's calling into your help desk so that you're not changing the password for the wrong person, especially a bad actor.

[00:04:24] Then also automatic rotation of system admin passwords so that you keep those passwords fresh and you don't have all that standing privilege. And we also have just in time accounts and account discovery. It does a lot of really great things. It's an awesome tool and it helps

[00:04:37] your help desk is what I always like to say. Me personally, I have been on the vendor side of things here in the channel for the last five or six years, how long has it been?

[00:04:48] But before that, I actually worked at MSP. I used to do billing and actually implemented auto tasks and would keep auto tasks fresh and up-to-date. And yeah, so kind of a long time

[00:04:59] around IT that was totally an accident. But here I am. You missed that 10 years of COVID in between? That's what it felt like, right? Oh my gosh. We get to see each other, right? We got to,

[00:05:13] I mean just as general as a community, we all got to see each other from what used to be March to September, October-ish and then that kind of stretched out to November-ish and then it

[00:05:24] stretched out to February-ish. So we were really starting to see each other almost all year and then you had that COVID hit and it was like, holy crap. So now when someone says to me,

[00:05:33] I've been doing this for three to five years and it's like, yeah, but that window in the middle, it really makes it seem like there was this long stretch in between where we just

[00:05:42] didn't see each other and didn't have that piece of it, right? Well, and such a big pivot too, right? Like I don't know that I would have the knowledge and experience with like

[00:05:53] virtual events and digital events that I gained from those years at COVID, right? And it became a different way of like, okay, how do you engage and how do you build community even when you can't

[00:06:03] be next to each other? I'm surprised a lot of people with how short I am. People apparently weren't expecting me. It's funny too because you get the opposite of that. Like there's people

[00:06:16] who's pretty tall. Like there's some people that I had no idea how tall they were because Brendan Silva used to be at Black Point and now he is with... Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. He's like really

[00:06:34] tall, right? Brendan's tall and I was on the road with him so I got to see the tallness because we knew. I knew too. You know me, I can't stay in no matter what's going on, pandemic or not,

[00:06:43] so I had to go out and play but I did see him in person. Brian Weiss is pretty tall, MSP out of California and then there's a bunch of like just vendor folks that you don't see that often in

[00:06:56] the first place. You saw him on screen and then you're standing next to him going, wow. Holy... And for me, pretty much all the time I'm going like that but there were some people that were,

[00:07:07] you know... It is funny that you mentioned that because we were just talking about the other day about how many times we talked to people through the screen and you know obviously

[00:07:16] it's good and bad, right? We had that screen fatigue where we needed to get away and breathe and do something more than that but you're right, it brought us together in ways that we didn't

[00:07:25] think of before. Yeah very much. And now everybody's doing happy hours and you know I still do my calls every Thursday from a community perspective that carried over from COVID and you're right, it did bring us together in some ways and teach us the things, the right things

[00:07:42] and the wrong things to do with the screen and all the you know all this. Outside the box, right? Like how do you engage with people when you're not literally standing there waving

[00:07:52] your arms at them? Right, right. Yep it's uh it is interesting to see and we guys and obviously CyberQP did a great job and had a lot of virtual events too and um yeah you guys

[00:08:05] definitely had your had your fair share of things to do. Yeah and I was with Lion Guard at the time still and so it started yeah Lion Guard that's right. We were running virtual events here

[00:08:16] you know doing all sorts of things. You just got to keep trying something see what sticks, right? Yeah exactly. So first so let's jump in a little bit here and you know let me ask you a couple of

[00:08:31] you know what's the biggest question you get? You know the biggest struggle that MSPs have that you guys solve. You know what are those what are some of the big ones that kind of

[00:08:41] you know if I'm an MSP and I'm saying okay CyberQP I heard what she said but you know give me a couple of examples of struggles that you guys have

[00:08:49] faced head on that an MSP watching this would be able to say oh all right I get that I have that happening all the time. Yeah so um you know first like the the thing that really started CyberQP

[00:09:02] was that Jim our CEO used to run an MSP and he hated password reset tickets and he wanted to see hey is there a way that we can like you know can we automate this? Can we put the power into

[00:09:14] the end user right and the answer is yes because we've got an end user app it's a self-service password reset app where they're actually open it up with biometrics like

[00:09:24] you would with your banking app and then they can reset it right there or when they call into the help desk and if you're using like Autotask or Connectwise there's a plugin right there right so the help desk

[00:09:35] person is not going to have to go and log into another system that can actually reset everything right there. So now even if you know you have clients that still want to call in

[00:09:43] because they love Doug they want to talk to Doug every time that they need to reset their password well that's fine but Doug can get it done faster so you've cut down on the amount

[00:09:50] of time that it takes so that's like one like really easy one for me to give you. Another one would be like if you had to let a help desk person go and you're thinking about all of the admin

[00:10:01] passwords that they might have had on hand for things like Active Directory or you know Outlook 365 things like that then you can actually go into our system and say hey reset all of those

[00:10:12] right now and boom it's done instead of logging in to all of those systems later that night trying to think like okay hold on which clients which where what could they maybe written down

[00:10:24] on a post-it note before they left because they were mad that we let them go so those are two like really easy use cases for me to mention there's definitely more. Nice nice and definitely you see obviously you know it's definitely very common especially with passwords now

[00:10:41] just becoming either harder to you know you have to be smarter to create passwords if you're doing it on your own I highly suggest a password manager I think I really feel like

[00:10:54] you know it's too hard to constantly come up with passwords how about just that one that you need to manage your password manager and then just make that a nice phrase and then you're good to go but having to manage them all and change them all or

[00:11:08] leave them and think that they're secure when you think about the breaches the the incidents that have happened over the years and even Microsoft had said you know 90 some odd percent of these would have never happened if they had had three things in place MFA password management

[00:11:28] and training. Right but then very easy. Your help desk you get like they're there to be helpful they want to help right so they can make mistakes because they're trying to be helpful and so if

[00:11:43] you've had the same admin password just standing right standing privilege sitting there since 1982 or even since last week it's standing privilege right so you you got to move that target right which is which is cool with the just in time accounts because those actually deactivate

[00:12:01] so that you don't have that standing privilege at all so you're now going to that zero standing privilege. Right so from a standpoint of and I know that you're not the technical person

[00:12:10] neither am I anymore but you know from what you've been seeing yeah this this rapid change with AI you know are there some things that you can talk about that you think will happen in your industry

[00:12:23] from the stuff that you're managing now that you're managing more than just the password part of it you know what are some changes that you think are going to happen in the next

[00:12:31] six months to here. I think we'll hear password lists more often right we actually have a password list option for the help desk users when they're creating just in time accounts so I think

[00:12:42] that's going to be big and then like you said what are what are all these extra layers that we can continue to put right why do we constantly have to have standing privilege I think that you'll

[00:12:53] see a lot more with that like zero trust help desk I think you'll hear much more about that. Nice I'm sure you your company is aiming right down that aisle. Oh yeah oh yeah.

[00:13:08] Nice so let's break out a little bit because you know I've known you for most of this career and the vendor side of things and yeah you know the one thing I can say is that I've never felt

[00:13:21] down when I'm talking to Cynthia at an event all right you always bring the energy it's even when you've even when you whispered in my ear it's been a bad day but that was

[00:13:31] just a whisper you were usually the light in the so you know what advice would you have because you've been the new person on the block so first what advice would you have for the new person on

[00:13:43] the block just coming into the industry and and trying to figure out you know us crazy people and you know and how it all works and then two you know what would your advice be for the MSP

[00:13:55] that's coming in new to the channel from a standpoint of events. Okay which one first vendor MSP. Do the vendor side first because you just had you know you had the experience

[00:14:04] in the last five years. Yeah yeah so I would say big thing right I mean obviously you just got to like sit back a little bit and watch right like who who is talking to a lot of people and seems

[00:14:19] to sort of know some people and all of that and then introduce yourself and and be honest that like hey you know you're looking to get your foot in the door and here's what we do and

[00:14:28] I'd love to pick your brain and what I've found is that in our vendor community like everyone's really really really helpful for the most part I have people are happy to give you advice listen

[00:14:41] to your story you know if you have like a little thing like hey I'm rejoining my backdrop can we just have a quick zoom I just want to show you like a couple of my graphic ideas or something

[00:14:51] like that right because we all have opinions like I end theories about you know how things should look and why or why not right and like I have my whole list of why is and why not so why

[00:15:02] I do all the crazy things that I do and it may not be the right fit for you the new vendor but like I'm happy to share all of the mistakes I made along the way to get to where my belief

[00:15:13] system is now right and how I like run a booth and how I network and things like that so definitely sitting back and just sort of listening and watching and then also like every time you're

[00:15:24] walking through a vendor hall like just pause and really look how are people like if you see a booth that is always really really busy what are they doing right so just sort of taking some notes

[00:15:36] and then good lord do not sit behind your table on your laptop because no I'm gonna talk to you not supposed to eat lunch back there oh my god no please no yeah so the biggest thing I always

[00:15:52] tell people the first time they're gonna come work at one of my boots is you have to look like somebody that wants to talk to people so if you're staring at your phone or you're on your laptop or you're just

[00:16:03] talking to the you know the other person in the booth and you're not making eye contact and saying hello or inviting them into like what you're doing they're not going to talk to you right

[00:16:13] like not every msp walking by is going to be this you know jovial ready to talk to you person they might be shy they might be introverted right and so they need someone to say hi to comment on

[00:16:27] like god I see you're from long view Texas I've actually been to that hot air balloon festival before right like take a second and like look at their names see where they're from how can you

[00:16:36] engage is that a long enough monologue I could keep going oh it's great I mean that's a that's great advice and the idea here is just to say as much as we want to help people right because

[00:16:47] we know that there are new people coming into the space we know what it's like to be the new people in the space from a from a standpoint of the vendor side like we're talking about and then

[00:16:57] of course the msp side but you're right find your people find people who you see are succeeding and ask them for help and we have some good and bad people just like anything else in the industry

[00:17:10] if their person just doesn't jive or doesn't feel like they're given the positive vibe most people will don't give up ask people for help and then also always remember to send the elevator

[00:17:22] back down you know the whole you know you get to the top you always look back to the down to the bottom and help out always be willing to help other people and remember where it was you started

[00:17:31] how you came into the space why it is that things worked and usually our community works when we're positive and we help each other and we try to get people to the next level and you're right there's a lot of introverts there's a lot of introverted extroverts

[00:17:47] which is where i think that they you may think that they're extroverted myself included but really introverted it's just learned how to speak and talk to people and and be able to have that

[00:17:57] conversation but there's certain times where i get like oh my god there's too many people in this room but yeah and how am i going to talk to all these people right 100 percent 100 percent

[00:18:09] but yeah and just you know looking for ways to engage with people that feels meaningful right like i said looking to see where someone's from or just ask them a question start a conversation

[00:18:19] like not every conversation you have at your booth is going to be about selling your product right and none of them should be you're right it should be about the personal contact in that

[00:18:29] connection and then when they ask you can tell them but do i though worst thing that people can do is pitch if you jump in and you start pitching people right people will start talking

[00:18:41] a little bit of a you know a moment to connect first right i always in this piece too like i'm i'm here to learn about you and your business and if what i'm offering at cyberqp isn't

[00:18:52] a fit for you right now for whatever reason i still want to be the person that you come to when you're like synthi i'm trying to figure out like i have a billing problem okay cool well

[00:19:02] let's walk around this hall and let's find you the few vendors that help with msp billing right or oh my gosh i i don't i don't i can't hire an hr person but i really i need hr awesome and

[00:19:14] smarity is just right over there like let's go talk to them we're really really nice i've worked with them before right like because us vendors we all know what each other does or we have

[00:19:24] kind of an idea right that's true and that's a great point that's right most people will drag you over to the place you need to be yes and then also learn learn who does what and how well

[00:19:37] they do it so you can do the same yes and that's something else too that i think is really really really important right as vendors i think that we can kind of sometimes do um do a better job of

[00:19:48] understanding what each person in the space does so that we can be helpful right and then we can see where those stories like really make sense to tell yep and also you know we talk about you

[00:20:00] know we talk about mental health a lot and we and we don't think about how it affects remember this and that this is vendor or msp you don't have any idea what that person is going through

[00:20:14] yeah and so you talk to them and even then you might not know what they're going through yeah don't just judge people by your first interaction with them because you have no idea

[00:20:24] what's going on in their life at that moment when you've done that so i've really started to get i've started to personally do this for myself because you know i'm not the east kind of kind of

[00:20:38] you know blunt you know guy and a lot of times when you're that when you're fast to react and just like all right whatever and then you don't think about it there's so many ways that

[00:20:48] that can bite you and it doesn't do you any good to get that you know to do that quickly and i say that because you know there could be a situation where somebody's going through a really big life

[00:21:01] event and you went to go hit them at right at the wrong time and they snapped and then all of a sudden it's like you know what i'm not talking to that person anymore and then no one wins there

[00:21:10] i really feel like we could spend a little more time thinking that first like putting that thought in our heads first and here's a good example i had an msp who came to me and said

[00:21:21] you know hey i tried to go to the local msp's in my area and be a little bit more open and you know to break down the castle mentality and i went to this place and you know i started

[00:21:31] to talk to them and the guy was rude to me and just a jerk to me and basically told me to get out i don't want i don't want to hear anything you have to say and i said okay i said here's

[00:21:40] a scenario let me let me just put this in your brain what if you're that person and three other event three other msp's came to town and told them the very same thing only they stole his business

[00:21:52] yeah and now he has that wall right it's like the the the the female of the male scorned right once they've been scorned a bunch of times they're not going to trust and that's what

[00:22:04] msp's vendors we all have kind of gone through different levels of being scorned msp's mostly right because they don't know when their favorite vendor's going to get bought they don't know if some of vendors lie into them and then going to hurt them like there's all these things

[00:22:17] that are their favorite person at that company yeah exactly there's so many things that happen that make the make emotions happen so i said this to this person and said you didn't think of it

[00:22:29] from that angle but think about it you're an msp how many times have you been burned how many times and you went to this other msp he's been burned probably a couple times and now he's

[00:22:38] you know angry you got to come at it from a different angle he's like oh my god i didn't think of it that way like i was just because he was mad at me i'm like i'm some pizza

[00:22:47] i'll send something over and then just say look i just wanted to be able to be on the same level i get where you're coming from if it's that's the reason but changes that she just changed

[00:22:57] the way you're thinking because you just never know what exactly is happening at that point in time and i feel like if you adjust that if you adjust that in your brain as it's happening

[00:23:08] for me at least it's helped quite a bit i don't know what your thoughts on that are no i i think i think that that's it's really really important to remember that you know what we see out here

[00:23:18] isn't you know it's not the whole story right and my first thought when you were telling that story was like for all he knows like he's lost business to that msp that's walking in there all

[00:23:29] jolly wants to be friends and he's like dude i just lost like one of my biggest accounts to you like because you know that happens with local msp but that's tough and i think too right just being

[00:23:40] sensitive to his vendors like when you notice that someone is not up for the conversation that you're trying to have with them right or they're you know sort of rough as they walk by or whatever

[00:23:49] like that's fine like let them go on their way they will come to you when they are ready right and that's that's okay that doesn't have to be a personal attack it's just right it's where they are

[00:24:01] in their day and that's you know and then i think it's it's good to remember too that even when we do look happy right we might be very distracted in our minds we might have a lot going on i know

[00:24:13] personally i have been working the booth when i found out a family member passed you know or like my kid that i thought i had everything set up perfectly for now is about to like

[00:24:24] is 30 minutes away from not being picked up from something right like so now i'm like frantically trying to like do this and have a conversation to be happy and frantically trying to yeah yeah

[00:24:34] a lot right so a lot of times you know just give people some grace i think is is a good message yeah i agree i agree and that like i said sometimes it's hard because you feel like we're we operate

[00:24:46] it on a on a different playing field than most industries we're fast everything's fast we were like boom boom boom boom boom and i operate that way and then sometimes i'm like holy crap i just

[00:24:55] did 20 things in 20 minutes where am i where's my brain and then i missed something because of that did i i gotta slow down and i gotta focus and try to make sure that i'm not like doing that

[00:25:06] having that boom boom boom moment and you're right you do it at shows i mean we were at a show and um we found out that an msp had passed away um a good friend of ours and you know

[00:25:18] i was an emotional wreck and people were noticing it like literally saying what's wrong with Kenny P like he's not his usual self and it's like give me that minute like i'm here and i'm i'm there i'm

[00:25:29] very functioning i'm still highly functioning but at the same time that hit me hard like it hit me really hard to know that we lost someone that was very close to all of us we it was kind of

[00:25:39] unexpected even though we knew he was sick but man you're right you gotta have a little bit of grace and even the best of us or the best the best of us that have the biggest smile and put on

[00:25:49] the show could still be having something going on so yeah have grace i do i do like that that's a great sentence have grace and then i think back to the like you know what do you say to like a vendor

[00:26:02] coming into the space is like do find those people that you can trust right and it takes time you're not gonna just find it after one event right it's multiple events it's multiple times

[00:26:12] doing things together and all of that but you know i now have people that when things do happen and i need a quick 30 seconds in the hallway to just be like oh my god this is happening and i'm like having

[00:26:25] a moment and they need a big hug okay i'm gonna move on now like i'll be fine for the next couple of hours but just having those people that you can trust and like yeah that's really really

[00:26:35] important too yep you definitely have to have those people and there's a good core group of people that will always have your back as uh you know i mean that's like that that piece that we know

[00:26:45] um but i felt really great when when somebody um a new person into the space i was talking to them and they were like oh yeah my boss told me that if i'm ever at an event find you your home

[00:26:57] yeah and i'm like aw like i might cry i'm gonna get a little emotional it's like when you know that's how someone feels you know at an event that when they're in the space and it's crowded

[00:27:10] and they're worried that's your home base right and i think that's cool that was a really cool thing to say and i and i felt it because the person didn't even tell me it was the person the

[00:27:20] worker that told me this um i thought that was really cool and that's something i think we all have to find is find your home find you know find people like you said the person you can

[00:27:29] go out in the hallway and give a quick hug to and be like okay i'm good yep and get back at it remember it's not all going to be easy that's the other thing but don't quit don't ever quit don't ever give up

[00:27:40] on what it is you're trying to do just because there you know you met some bad people and it was negative experience because i've seen that before and that'll lead into the msp side because the

[00:27:52] reason why i say both Cynthia is that i started to realize that from an msp side to it gets clicky in the vendor side but on the msp side there's this feeling of a click and sometimes as a new

[00:28:10] msp you come into the space and you're not getting that warm and fuzzy other msp's aren't necessarily pulling you into their groups because they're like oh i'm here i have this

[00:28:20] association and i'm working with these guys and they don't mean to do it either i think it's starting to warm up a little bit but for newer msp's that don't get the channel because there are a lot of msp's

[00:28:31] that don't do the channel stuff they just do their thing they heard about it they might go to the local events but they're missing out on the larger exchange events channel futures it nation

[00:28:44] like these bigger events have so much more and by the way has nothing to do with those companies it has everything to do with the people that are there like all the people that show up the msp's

[00:28:54] so i bring this over to that side because it's almost like a high school like i'm putting this out to the msp's when you are at these events and you've been doing it for a long time and you see

[00:29:04] that kid in the hall that's not talking to anybody yeah through that person's mind be the person that goes over to them and says hey man what's going on you know show them where

[00:29:14] their rooms show them where their classes are like right because that's what happens they come to the event it's all over the place and especially if you're doing a hosted event where you're drinking out of a

[00:29:25] fire hose take them under your wing bring them in and show them for a number of reasons one it's just the right thing to do and it helps our community and builds us out better too

[00:29:37] what if they're the kid that decided to go home and end it like i'm done i can't handle this people don't like me i don't get along right you know what i mean like there's that mental health

[00:29:46] side of thing that just grabs me now and i think holy shit like we got to be smarter about this stuff we can't just be you almost can't be jerky to anybody and there's no reason to be jerky to

[00:29:57] people right so why not treat it like that where you see new people you bring them under your wing and get them you know get them as part in part of your whatever whoever your groups are and show

[00:30:10] them around and even connect them to other people in the channel so that they get a bit of a a warm reception as opposed to holy crap and then of course the other side of that is being a new msp

[00:30:21] is you get into a session you watch someone stand on the stage and say you need to charge $500 an endpoint or you're useless it's like holy shit i'm doing it wrong right you already feel

[00:30:31] like shit like get them into the right sessions get them seeing the right people because our industry does have people like that that make it even worse right and they're like well you have to offer

[00:30:43] you know this is my standard my gold standard for security and if they don't want to pay it for that's fine it's like okay well great how big is the market you're working in because maybe this msp

[00:30:54] market isn't that big and they're just trying to figure out even how to get over to the next city and like you know everyone's at a different spot in their journey right um and that new msp

[00:31:06] sure established msp you might know a lot more but this new msp might have a couple of fresh ideas that you've never considered because like you've been around since before there was an rmm

[00:31:18] right like they're gonna come in with a different perspective looking at it with fresh eyes and and in different thoughts so i think i think there's a really great opportunity for both sides

[00:31:29] to learn from each other but then i would say too right if you're a newer msp or maybe you're an established msp that's just not done a lot of the channel events and you're coming in and

[00:31:39] you're sort of trying to figure it out right right you know go to the meetups go to the networking staff right talk to people um a lot of times there'll be different types of of networking

[00:31:52] meetups right something for veterans for women so you know look and see what opportunities are there breakfast is an excellent time to meet some really really cool people that may not be the

[00:32:04] loud ones out at the bar but like they're there the next morning having their coffee they're up early they're ready to take on their day and and they're fresh they're ready to have a

[00:32:16] conversation whereas like by the end of the day they might just be like toast they don't want to talk like they're done so i think breakfast is like a really really really awesome time that

[00:32:25] people don't always consider as like a time for like networking and engagement but i think you can meet some really really cool people that like i said are actually ready to talk to you

[00:32:34] you don't even have to say anything either you can i would i would go to a different breakfast table every morning and just listen and then if if something came up or you know i had the

[00:32:45] opportunity after hearing some of the people at the breakfast table like you're right it's getting different perspectives having people talk about whatever they will feel like because they're a little bit more open sitting there at breakfast and having a conversation that's just open they're not like in

[00:33:00] a specific room focusing on any one thing and you just never know what you're going to get out of it and then maybe just asking people like hey what sessions are you going to or i was considering

[00:33:10] this session have you heard this person speak before like and then giving that giving those other misfeeds an opportunity to talk and share their experience with you and then you know

[00:33:20] perhaps you can say like oh i didn't consider that i might go try that session instead and then maybe you sit next to them and now maybe have lunch together and now like you know you're learning

[00:33:28] from each other and you've made the connection right but you've just just got to try yeah it's it's it's interesting too because someone someone had said to me a PAX AP on because literally

[00:33:39] i feel like everybody i ever met showed up at one place it was the weird it was so crazy having 2500 people and during the reception i talked to so many people but not in a meaningful way

[00:33:51] because there was so many people like Cynthia oh my god hey oh and you're like you know you're getting pulled in all the different directions and someone said to me he's like how the hell did you get

[00:34:01] to know these people it all started with my first event and me being willing to sit and listen and ask questions and then all of a sudden and by the way it was in correlation to my business

[00:34:14] growing too my msp took off after i started coming back from these events with information and learning and trying to figure out how to do it met new vendors right msp started to form this group

[00:34:27] of friends and then you know then sat on the exchange advisory board and really got like connected to everybody in the space and it was just like it doesn't happen overnight but it has to start with

[00:34:38] that very first visit you have to actually execute and go out there and do it and take your first shot at going to these events and being a part of it and stringing some together i don't recommend

[00:34:49] going to every single event because you have no time for your business but pick two or three you know one a quarter that has something there that means something to you and your business

[00:35:01] or if you're just looking to kind of gain more access to the msp side of the business go to the bigger ones itination exchange those ones are going to have more msp's even datacon will still

[00:35:14] have a large amount of msp's there and so if that's what you're looking for pick the ones in certain times that you can go to and then what i say to all msp's and vendors make your plan

[00:35:28] create a plan before you go to the event of who you want to talk to what you want to get out of it and all those things and stick to the checklist because even someone like me who's been doing

[00:35:40] it for a long time i did not expect what i expected at pack state and i didn't talk some people i meant to talk to i didn't even get to talk to right two days and i talked to i think we figured

[00:35:52] out i talked to 780 people or something ridiculous like we went through and we were trying to figure out all the people that we actually came in direct contact with for more than a you know 30 seconds

[00:36:03] and it was over 700 people almost 800 people and i'm like that my brain hurt especially someone who wants to take the time to you know have conversations and be more meaningful and the

[00:36:14] fact that a couple people i was like hey let's talk at pack state and then at the end of it how did we never talk i know i've literally been at shows before where someone's like i post you

[00:36:26] know that's a wrap right and here's all them you know had a great time and i post all these pictures on linkedin and then had someone go i was there how did i never see you i'm like i

[00:36:37] mean i don't know i mean there were 3000 people there so maybe that's part of it but you know you would think that like these people that you know and would recognize and stop and have a conversation with and you might just miss each other the entire time

[00:36:50] so if it happens to us who have been doing it a little bit we know that it's going to happen to you so if you're an msp or a vendor create a checklist because the people that you really

[00:37:02] wanted to meet and talk to you should because especially if you're not out on the road that much and you've only picked a few events to go to this is your opportunity to meet someone

[00:37:11] face to face and you have that on your list of to-dos make sure you do it stick to that then make sure that you're connecting with people on linkedin so that you know if like maybe you're going to be

[00:37:21] at the same event so that you can have that coffee or you can you know meet up in whatever meaningful way and talk about your business you know the other thing that i think as vendors

[00:37:32] can be great for sometimes for msp is too is though i had recently at it nation secure had a conversation over dinner and this msp was talking about how much they really really liked

[00:37:44] this one vendor that they used and then i happened to have a conversation the next day with someone that was considering that vendor and i said oh well hold on let me let you talk to this guy

[00:37:54] because he loves them and he can like give you all of this information about why and so it was actually like able to like you know introduce them in a hallway and let them have that

[00:38:02] conversation but now they're actually getting to have like a a real life testimonial about what's gone right and why it's gone right because it might be going right because of the way the msp

[00:38:13] set it up from the beginning or maybe some tiny term that he negotiated or something like you never know there's nuances to everything but these are the types of meaningful conversations that you can have and a lot of times us as vendors can help you facilitate like finding

[00:38:29] those people yep 100 and that's a it's a great way to approach it it's all about those connections and that's the other thing that helped grow my network was doing exactly that just connecting

[00:38:41] people and saying oh you guys might be able to help each other it's not that i gotta listen yeah you got to get rid of that whole what's in it for me attitude mentality it's not what's in it for you

[00:38:51] it's what's in it for us our our community as a whole every time we make that connection we make our community better 100 right it's just so easy to do oh wait i know someone in texas who

[00:39:03] needs somebody in arkansas like here you guys should talk and here's the information and then a year later they're like oh man kenny p introduced us and we've been doing this ever since and then

[00:39:13] they started connecting people and it's just it has this really positive effect in our community and i really think we have the best it's the craziest but we have the best community

[00:39:26] i think we're you know it's crazy and we have you know we have a lot of work to do but at least we have way more people at least i've been doing this a really long time and i feel like we have

[00:39:36] way more people making it better than in the past there's way more advocates there's especially like i've never seen something you know we've always had security but cyber security just blew up right and so that's that was one of our new chunks like oh my god everything's about

[00:39:53] cyber security but then you have all these people tied to it you know they got the matlees of the world right that jump right in and he's not talking about packs eight he's talking about making it all

[00:40:03] better for the whole community right and don curbie and there's so many people yeah you don't see that in other industries where people are just completely selfless because they wanted to they

[00:40:19] want them they want to rise the tides right and i i really feel like we have to just keep doing that too we can't forget it and think oh it's on cruise control now because it's all we're

[00:40:28] always going to need it and we're always going to need to take a step and make it better and keep plugging that and you know now we're now we're diving into you know AI and you know

[00:40:39] the world wants to know about AI and how quickly that got adopted and you know thank god we got guys like jimmy who are stepping in and saying hey i can help msp's and you know help you plug in

[00:40:50] right and do stuff like that so it's good that we're we're we're that agile and we're that selfless where people are actually willing to not talk about them right it's about us as a whole

[00:41:04] that whole better together we are community all of it rising tides raise all ships it's 100% accurate and we have to keep working at it so that's why i always ask like if we got new folks

[00:41:16] coming into this community and you need help there's so many advocates out there make sure you find your advocate your home your person whatever it is and get involved and find out

[00:41:28] what your safe place to like have a sounding board right yeah you know we all we all get some harebrained ideas and i i just need someone to tell me like have i totally lost my mind or

[00:41:39] would this maybe work right and and i've found those people and it's you know and it's it's just it's a it's a group of really really smart and interesting and different and no two people are

[00:41:53] quite alike um yeah it's really great i always wouldn't i try to explain to people i'm like they're like oh you work in cybersecurity and then like they'll like say the name of some huge

[00:42:03] cybersecurity company or something and i'm like no no no no okay so you know like when the hospital needs an it company right and then they hire this like it company so that's called an msp a managed

[00:42:13] service provider okay my cybersecurity is for the managed the managed service provider so it's like a niche within a niche and they're like oh oh i'm like yes we have our oh we have our whole

[00:42:25] little own little sub world over here right yeah people don't understand that you're right it is hard sometimes to talk about the services we provide and then i always say you know because we finally

[00:42:40] it's finally you know covid actually finally pushed this forward um you know as bad as covid was there were so many good things that came out of covid um and one of them was msp's are

[00:42:51] finally actually thought of as first responders right and it's it's funny because you say well wait a minute why i'm like well what is separate from your family your health you know what is the

[00:43:02] most important thing in your life it's your business it pays for your family it pays for your health it pays for if that's your livelihood and by the way who's protecting that well that

[00:43:12] would be the msp's they're protecting most of the businesses in our country and we're on the world now they're protecting that asset that your liability your whole world and it's about time

[00:43:26] we're finally taking that seriously now of course we started out i was one of those old school msp we started out selling like used car salesmen and that's what got us in trouble in the first

[00:43:35] place where most of the businesses started to think of us that way but we've become much more prescriptive as msp community and we're starting to focus and do the do it the

[00:43:46] right way and i think this is cool that now it's pushed up to hey you're the first responders of the business world well in the beginning though i mean it was break fix right you had a computer

[00:43:58] that plugged into the wall at your office that was not connected to any other computers i mean wasn't your fault that's just you know when dinosaurs roam the earth that's how computers

[00:44:08] work i had electricity symptoms i remember when our msp like like signed up got our first rmn like and we were like they were explaining it to me and i was like i think i get that and i like

[00:44:27] walked away and i was like i don't know what he just said whatever like i'm just gonna go back yelling at people about their time sheets but you know like it it it evolved over time that the

[00:44:37] what's amazing is in really a short amount of time how much it has evolved right and how quickly it went from like you know we just had a computer that plugged into the wall to we have a computer

[00:44:49] that plugs into the wall that plugged into a phone line that then plugged into you know high speed internet and like all this just very crazy fast progression and msp's had a lot of

[00:45:00] you know work to do to to stay with that because the bad actors were like oh i'm gonna go in here and we had to catch up with that because that's not how we were thinking we were just trying to like

[00:45:13] get the printer to unjam it just gave me the you just gave me the the verbal version of you just put a picture on my head remember the photo with the guy carrying the boombox with the watch

[00:45:24] with the thing and it said all these things have been replaced by this and it's your phone your phone can now replace your boombox can play music has a watch has a camera has a video

[00:45:35] cord as books right has bull all these things that we had to you know in the 80s and i'm sorry i'm dating myself but back in the days when we had all these different things that we had are

[00:45:46] all been condensed into a phone right and it's the same computer the things that you can do you know on a computer is is crazy i remember i remember buying encyclopedias there was an entire set at my house yeah and it's like i remember reading encyclopedia yeah

[00:46:06] that's where you got your information it was very uh very static and now it's information is flying to your fingertips i had these like big national geographic books and some of them were about

[00:46:19] animals and some of them were about places and some of them were about mountains or whatever but like if if something came up that i wanted the answer to i went to the bookshelf in the living

[00:46:29] room of my parents house and either picked an encyclopedia or a national geographic book and like looked for the information how's like it's crazy how different that is world yes it's now we sound like our parents well back when i was a kid

[00:46:47] it's true and that's why now there's so much like when i talk about when i talk to msp is about you know my time in the space and then my transition i always go back to holy crap like

[00:47:06] there's so you're liable for so much more yeah as an msp because everything rests on your shoulders and by the way it was only a short time ago where you could write a little disclaimer and say well

[00:47:18] you know my my customer decided not to use backup and not to use this but here it is i wrote this in a piece of paper and you signed it so it makes me not liable that's gone yeah you

[00:47:29] have to you have to be more careful with the customers that you pick for to be you know to work with because if they're not taking your security stacks seriously and something goes wrong

[00:47:40] there you're still the person who takes care of their network so for me it's like oh wow so much more to think about and and and worry about um there's the good news is there's so many vendors

[00:47:52] that can help and and you know fill those those those those gaps in and you can find them and talk to them and kind of have that happen but it's a lot harder to make those decisions now

[00:48:03] you know you really have to trust the people you're talking to and trust that they're you know all these different things won't go wrong um yeah i would be i'm a bit more nervous

[00:48:14] even thinking about it because someone always said to me well when you start an msp i said yes an msp right now would be to start up would be super easy but not because i did it before but

[00:48:25] because of the tools we have now the solutions you know you get the packsates and the surewebs and the like these companies that can get you kick started right out of the gate with a stack

[00:48:34] and then you can go to work it just there's a whole lot more to protect on the other side and there's a lot more rules that you have to comply by yeah and and the automation too right so

[00:48:44] you can you can do a lot more with the smaller staff and um so that really helps your overhead it was just it's uh it's all very interesting it's funny because it's you know like we said

[00:48:55] the vendors evolved too like you got the the crush banks the roosts of the world like stepping in and helping with these things and then i'm talking to someone like oh yeah but i got roost and

[00:49:05] play and i saved like eight hours like eight hours like that's gold with the whole day right you just saved the days worth of work doing doing automation oh okay that's to me that's the stuff that wow you

[00:49:18] look at these new vendors step right in um you know and look it started for me it started getting really cool when nerdyo stepped in and started automating the stuff that we thought

[00:49:28] at the time was simple but nerdyo could kind of step in and take all this work that you have to do in azure and allow an admin to do it well like remember the days when you had to hire an azure

[00:49:40] engineer and you had to do this and sure bigger companies are doing that but when i started to see that that was to me the beginning of some of that stuff where

[00:49:49] holy crap wait a minute they have this all set up where you can drag and drop and and have this work this way boom and then obviously we have so many new vendors coming on

[00:49:58] and doing every every time something pops up we seem to have vendors a little bit ahead of it pop in and say oh we can do that oh you want automation yeah that's us right and i think

[00:50:08] and i think you guys kind of did the similar thing with the stuff that you're doing right it started with pam right and being able to do that stuff out of the gate and then you guys

[00:50:15] have just said oh wait we can do this too we can do this you're just right the zero trust help desk that's cool to me how everybody's been able to evolve with the things that are coming into play in

[00:50:27] the space yep 100% well like we saw a need right like a lot of cybersecurity insurance are saying hey no no no no more shared admin accounts we don't want an admin access for five people at you know

[00:50:40] five help desk engineers across all of your clients right like that's not that's not the right answer so that's where the just in time accounts come in right and they we've got an amazing amazing amazing engineering team when i came on actually our engineering team

[00:50:55] was larger than our sales and marketing and i think they actually still are right like there's like a dedication to the product there that is just second to none fantastic so yeah it's uh it

[00:51:06] is really cool to see what what all they keep coming out with and i'm like okay hold on i just figured out how to like explain what we're doing in my words right because that's the other thing

[00:51:14] right like technical to a point i've been i'm very tech adjacent but like i've got to find a way to say all of these things in a way that like makes sense to me and that you are going to believe

[00:51:25] what i'm saying right and that i'm not just like reading a script um and i'm like oh okay cool explain that to me again is it so it's sort of like this it changes so much yeah i came from an

[00:51:38] engineering background and slowly started to learn the business side of things when i say slowly i mean slowly but i i pulled out of that finally and got my head in the space and started to learn

[00:51:50] the business side of things and still now like i understand it's when it all of it when it gets to a point but the security stuff has gotten to a whole another level like all of it is just going

[00:52:01] to a whole different level of what it can do what it needs to do you know i talked to matt lee one week and then two weeks later it's like yeah that thing we were talking about yeah

[00:52:11] that's already broken like there it's crazy to think how things change so fast like we talked about and it's even faster now it seems like it's like you know every six months and that's why i also tell

[00:52:25] people hey if you've looked at a vendor and you haven't looked at them in the last three months you should be checking out every vendor at least every three months and that was something

[00:52:35] i was going to say when we're talking about like msp is at a show right and you're talking about having a game plan you know night one maybe like go and and have a plan to talk to all the vendors

[00:52:48] that you are you work with hey what's going on right like is this person that was my account manager still my account manager like just you know just kind of go through all of that and and then

[00:53:01] night two okay here are the three problems i'm trying to solve currently in my msp and it looks like these are the vendors that might be able to to help me with that okay now here's my map here's

[00:53:16] where i'm gonna go like yeah you have a have a plan instead of just wandering around yeah and it's such a good opportunity to talk to the vendors that you are already using right 100 and i don't mean

[00:53:29] yeah first of all i don't mean change your vendors i mean you should understand what the vendors in the space are doing and understand that if you talked to someone six months ago they could be something doing something completely different so do your work and understand that

[00:53:43] those things have changed you know i mean i see it i work at you know i'm at total now and the things that we were talking to them i was talking to them about a year ago are completely changed

[00:53:52] to now so it's it's those types of things same with you guys right i look at your line car i'm like holy crap like look at all the things they do from day one right who we had an API to

[00:54:03] now there's an API plug into which has been great for some of the bigger MSPs that are looking to do some stuff there and let's us talk about some other integrations right but that's all new

[00:54:13] my the funniest one for me has been because you know we had a rebrand um little over a year ago and so i'll be talking with someone they're like oh yeah we already have that we do that

[00:54:22] quick pass and they're like okay so haven't read a newsletter lately that's us see the qp that's a good one it's all right though you know what they're busy they're running their business the

[00:54:34] bills getting paid passwords are getting rotated like that's a great one oh wait what yeah that's i don't know i i i have this with quick pass somebody who was it somebody had you know just

[00:54:46] you're right people kind of get busy and they put their head down like um somebody had moved from one company to another and we were talking about that person and they were like oh wait

[00:54:56] did what did they say oh did that company change their name and i'm like no the person we're talking about left the other company to go to that company they're so focused on the person they didn't realize that he changed companies they were just following the person

[00:55:13] and this folks vendors up and coming you've got to be branded all the time it's so important even though you might not want to wear that t-shirt one second longer you got to be branded

[00:55:24] all the time it's very interesting so sit down you can move into your company's colors see there you go there you go i'm close i'm close close to yours um you guys have a great team you know i i love what

[00:55:40] i like when i when i look at companies and i and i want to you know better understand their core i was good at leadership and you know jim jessup and matel like you have some great human beings

[00:55:50] over there um so great company to know if you all haven't checked out cyber qp make sure you check them out reach out to synthia synthia tell everybody where they can find you what's the best way to find you

[00:56:02] probably on linkedin synthia schreiner sdh r8 i in e r or just go to cyber qp um page and then you can find me there under people but i'm all over linkedin all the time and then other than that

[00:56:16] you probably find me at a booth because i am booth it's true that is true will they see you next on the road what's when it was a couple of shows yeah so i'll be at exchange security in frisco love that omni

[00:56:28] very excited and uh let's see and then after that i'll be at channel con um in atlanta for com tia's big show of the year which always love that one too so much good education for everyone um that's

[00:56:41] another great one right like if you haven't signed up for that if it's not on your radar that is a fantastic show to go to to just meet people and to learn a lot and to see a lot of

[00:56:54] vendor agnostic education right these are people that come together you know volunteer i'm on a workforce council right and like we just volunteer our time to try to like think through

[00:57:04] how we can better educate and better help so and that's what com tia is all about so it's a great one to go to nice i'm going to be at all of those so i will see as usual or maybe not because

[00:57:17] we'll be at our booths and we'll be crossing in the night who knows but what i'm gonna say you'll hear me before you see me because that's right that's right make sure you come out and check out

[00:57:25] sythia and her team uh at those events or go find her at cyber qp's website cyberqp.com um like i said fantastic team uh leadership all the way down great people great solution and so glad

[00:57:39] i got to fill in on the day that you were going to be here so that worked out perfectly thanks very much sythia as again this has been recorded you guys can check this on just about every platform

[00:57:49] george has it out there youtube anyway you want to watch it you can listen to it on a podcast you can watch it on the website mspinitiative.com thank you everybody for tuning in sythia as

[00:58:01] always great to see you thank you can thank you so much thank you to see you bye bye