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This week, we talk about how to define the purpose and constraints of a business.
Two founders talk about how to build software businesses that are meant to last. Each episode includes a deep dive into a different topic related to starting, growing, and sustaining a healthy business.
00:00.54
tylerking
We just had a ah new person start at lessnoing Crm which is always super super exciting. Um I don't know why it hit me this time but like I mean how how many people have you hired in your career like 50 more in that maybe like.
00:00.76
Rick
What's up this week Tyler
00:14.18
Rick
I Don't know I haven't thought about it Actually yeah.
00:19.91
tylerking
I'm like less involved. This is a Crm Coach. So That's like the the main team at the company that is just like super super together like it's It's had strong leaderships in day one I haven't like really ever run that team So when a new Crm Coach starts I'm not like all that involved in the day-to-day stuff, but it's still kind of like. Inspirational almost I This is going to sound stupid. But I walked in and she was like she had gotten lost in our office and was like walking in the hallways trying to figure out where she was you've been to our office. It's like it's not huge right.
00:51.26
Rick
I Mean yeah, it's like not something you get lost in I don't feel like yeah.
00:56.60
tylerking
It's not something you get lost in and I don't know why that made me smile so much but just like this is such a big day for her. You know like every time you hire someone. It's like a life changing event for them. Even if if you as the Ceo are not like super super involved and like. I don't know I got like a weird energy out of just being around someone going through such a big thing even though like I'm not really doing much in the situation. Also I was like our office is big enough that someone got lost. Yeah, it's like 2 hallways. Ah.
01:18.71
Rick
Yeah, that's cool. Ah, what was she looking for.
01:28.89
tylerking
So there's there's just like 3 sections of the office and she was just trying to get back to where everybody else was and she just went the wrong direction out of her office. So yeah.
01:38.75
Rick
That's cool. It represents um, a newness a freshness um like you've you've changed. You've grown. You've grown. Um, ah is that what you're you're getting at.
01:48.29
tylerking
Yeah, well and just like um just the privilege of offering a job to anybody ever like even if she leaves in a year which I you know obviously hope that doesn't happen but like this will still be a year of her life. It'll have a meaningful impact on her like it's just a reminder.
01:55.50
Rick
Oh.
02:06.86
tylerking
Startup world does so much of this like you know reach a billion users and scale and be billions of dollars and like that's one way to think about how you impact people but just being like 1 person on earth just like uprooted their life. She moved from Minnesota to St Louis major major deal. That's like a very different type of impact but like 1 that I find even more motivating I think.
02:28.54
Rick
No, like yeah like people I mean people people's basic needs are are met through their profession and their work and if you have a part of that like and you do it right? It's a big a big deal.
02:41.79
tylerking
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's definitely a lot of responsibility too. So maybe that segues nicely into my my next thing here which is just like we've got we had a meeting last week and someone was like so the interns start in a month
02:44.96
Rick
Do it wrong too like it's a big deal.
03:01.17
tylerking
Like what really and I know I knew that like I knew in my head. It's mid-may is when they start, but ah, it's really coming up so like 9 new people are going to be working here temporarily in a month and it's just like crazy rush of stuff to get done right now which is also like a different type of kind of energizing.
03:17.20
Rick
Um, you are you the 1 managing that again I can't remember.
03:21.40
tylerking
So um, normally no so there's we we have 2 types of people we have developer intern like software engineer interns. There's 3 of them that's mostly I'm like I will be their project manager but I'm not like the one onboarding them in that stuff. But then there's the coding fellows because the person last summer who did it. Left the company I'm not sure what long term the plan is but this summer I'm running it so the 6 people yes I'm in charge of ah I don't even know I don't have a plan yet I have to figure it like I haven't onboarded anyone in a long time. So I have to figure that out. But I spent like two full days this week just like moving furniture in the office which I haven't done since 2019 because the office was closed. Yeah I know I love it though. I really like it. It was so cool by the way so none of this is like interesting but so I was doing it and like yeah.
04:04.20
Rick
You're still moving furniture in the office you got to have there's people for that I know just you're the Ceo though he shouldn't be moving furniture.
04:16.95
tylerking
So it's not the highest impact thing but I I gave myself permission I worked like I worked over the weekend I worked till like one thirty a m on Monday doing I was just in the zone and I was like you know what screw it I'm just I'm gonna play interior designer for the rest of the week
04:30.38
Rick
And I'm being I'm being I'm completely joking I think like it's one of the most rewarding things is to like do the like some of that less important work. But it's like you know showing everyone and then also very rewarding the.
04:42.76
tylerking
Yeah, it's it's got an interesting like culture element to it and I could tell like a very specific thing happened so several people of the company didn't work here. It started working here after the pandemic so they've never been around for anyone starting and ah. So they haven't been through this summer like some are so different. All these interns It's like the company is 50% bigger so they would walk out and see me moving stuff around and be like what are you doing like why are you doing that and then someone who's but who's been here longer would walk out and be like hell yeah interns coming I can tell. Ah.
05:13.80
Rick
Yeah, that's cool. That's funny. Do you have like a lot of work to do to prep for them. Um, or do you feel like you're you're you got everything taken care of.
05:13.27
tylerking
It's just like this cultural thing that the new people don't get yet.
05:22.77
tylerking
I Have a lot of work but like manageable work like it's It's one of those things where there's no uncertainty about. Can it get done. It's just a matter of doing it. So anyway. Yeah yeah, how about you? What's going on.
05:33.28
Rick
Awesome! Well, that's a goal. Well I ah my main like personal update is one of my goals this year that I outlined in our mega episode of the ah beginning or end of this year end of last year I can't remember where we did it but um was was I want to get back to my personal habit basics like. Back to the basics with personal health habits sleeping eating working out moving that kind of stuff I'm struggling with it. Um I when I put this on here. It was the beginning of the it was Sunday and I was reflecting on my like weekly regiment like. I'm just not doing a good job like my weight's going up my sleep's going down. Um I'm working out less. It's bad. So um, what I committed to on Sunday was like I don't I just got to do something to get out of this funk and so I've committed to like a 30 day challenge Thirty days is like short enough to where it's like doesn't seem like the end of the world to like hold yourself to it whereas but it's long enough to where some real habits get developed in that timeframe. Um, so I have a 30 day challenge that I'm putting myself through where I have to like.
06:32.48
tylerking
Yeah.
06:44.21
Rick
Yeah, do a certain so couple of things every day go to the gym go to get sleep and.
06:46.95
tylerking
Is this like your creation or is this like so-and-so so influencer says here's a 30 day challenge.
06:51.45
Rick
I made this up completely on Sunday um, but like I basically did like here's here are 4 or 5 have daily habits that I would like to do I would like develop habits around and I'm going to do them every day for thirty days
07:00.93
tylerking
So have you ever been one for like public accountability like have you thought about tweeting this or something along those lines.
07:10.74
Rick
No, but I'm not like I don't want to tweet this like and that's not me talking about it on here is making me uncomfortable. Ah but like no like I have like a list. It's like one two what is it 1 2 3 4 or 5 things and.
07:15.20
tylerking
Yeah, well, that's what I'm asking. Ah.
07:27.57
Rick
Yeah, so far like I've done four days of all 5 things. Yeah yeah, so i.
07:28.40
tylerking
Oh wow, that's great. It's It's so funny. How important momentum is here because it's like why? why did you need this thirty. Why didn't you just do it anyway and I'm the same way I'm like in a little like exercise rut right now. And yeah, you just have to like Jolt out of it somehow.
07:42.34
Rick
Yeah, and I don't care actually about hitting the thirty days although I'm going to try to hit it. Um, but like I just know that if I do this that some good habits will start developing and some bad habits will get dropped and I don't have to worry like somewhere between like 10 and thirty days from now I'm not going to have to worry about this but I'll feel better about myself.
07:57.67
tylerking
Yeah, cool, how could you should you have started this before like every time in my life when I finally fix a problem I'm like I should have done this two weeks ago or a month ago or whatever. Do you think you timed this right? Do you think you waited too long. Yeah.
08:15.40
Rick
I always wait too long like if you have to go to a 30 day challenge you've waited too long right? So the fact that to shack myself out of it means I waited too long. Um, but at the end of day I got to do some I'm up to the point where it's like I can't continue down this path anymore I got to fix it and you know part of my goals This year is to get back to good habits. Um, by the end of the year so I hopefully you know a couple weeks I'll feel better I feel better about it. But um I feel I already feel better four days in than I did on Sunday so you know related to personal health I did you know last episode we talked a little bit about um, you know what? it's like as a startup founder early stage. Um.
08:34.53
tylerking
Yeah, yeah.
08:41.96
tylerking
Yeah, that's great.
08:54.23
Rick
And whether you can take a break and I was like yeah I could take a break I don't I can I feel like I can take time I not worry about you're like well what about JdJD's my partner and like of felt and so I did talk to JD about that and he feels like can take a break so I feel really good about that. Um now ah he does feel like he has to be on a call on an emergency side. But.
08:58.88
tylerking
And.
09:12.87
tylerking
Yeah.
09:13.63
Rick
It's so infrequent that it's not a big deal. Um, he you know we didn't talk specifically about the busy season. But I we sort of I think are both under the assumption that during open enrollment which is November through January ish um each year that's probably not a time where you can feel like you could take a break. Um I probably won't feel like that either during that time frame but outside of that period. We both feel like we can take a break.
09:34.10
tylerking
Um, cool. Do you know if he's like actively planning to like or just even tell you like if if he goes off for a week. Do do you even know about that.
09:46.14
Rick
Yeah, he'd probably tell me that but I wouldn't like expect him to um, we have a weekly sink. Um, we haven't ever canceled that weekly s sinknc because he's been out or anything like that. But even if I was like on vacation I've kept the sink. So I don't know it's um yeah I think like.
09:59.88
tylerking
Yeah, yeah.
10:04.63
Rick
He has a lot of flexibility and he makes he writes his own day. But yeah, it'd be interesting to see like when he does want to take a break that's like like a week type break how he goes about communicating that because I have no expectations of him to do so.
10:19.74
tylerking
It's funny how these norms develop because like I'm just dealing with this a less annoying right now where this kind of strange pattern has emerged where if you take a planned day off you just put it on your calendar. You make sure you don't have any meetings on that day. It's you don't tell anybody I Mean. Depending on what your role is you might tell your manager but like you don't announce it to anybody. Um, but the culture has emerged that if you're taking an unplanned day off like you're sick or a mental health day that type of thing you email the whole company. Um, and I don't know why I've never asked anyone to do this I've explicitly said you don't need to do this. Ah, but like just everybody emails every time and I'm not sure like should I try to stop This is this an unhealthy thing or maybe it's good because it normalizes mental Health days. But it's just weird how these things kind of take on a life of their own.
11:08.71
Rick
Oh yeah, um I don't don't think I think it's okay to let it just happen.
11:13.12
tylerking
Yeah, but my concern I guess is then like a new employee comes in and sees everyone else doing it and it seems like a policy at that point when it's like you know if you are if you suffer from say clinical anxiety or depression and you need a day off.
11:30.76
Rick
Um, yeah, that's something though I feel like you can deal with when it comes up and just like create a policy on it and does that seem you have to worry about right now like that I have to worry about right now. No I don't think so yeah, yeah.
11:30.78
tylerking
I Don't want them to feel like they have to tell everybody that.
11:44.68
tylerking
You don't have to I don't think but like I what I guess the reason I mention it is in 5 years when you've got a team of 10 or 20 or whatever people. It's very possible. Whatever Jd does right now will become like the de facto policy. But is it. It is what it is. It's not like a problem I just think it's like an interesting little quirk of how companies grow.
12:04.67
Rick
He better do a damn good job of pick making good decisions then pretty policies. He's setting. The pressure is on Ah, ah, he's got. He's got a good life. He's like he's like an Rv resort in Key West. Um.
12:12.10
tylerking
Ah, yeah, yeah, he's he's setting a lot of culture. Probably anyway I don't know what my point is. Oh is he like doing the the nomad thing kind of oh cool. It's so interesting that you have this like Utah your customer base is all in you're the opposite of my company. My company. Our employees are all in 1 place but our customers are all over the world and you're like you're going to hire someone in Florida to.
12:24.66
Rick
Hopefully like yeah so yeah, he's been doing it for about a year now
12:37.52
Rick
The opposite If yeah, yeah.
12:41.89
tylerking
To do a utahpecific business. That's interesting. Yeah, um so I did my six month company presentation yesterday. Um, yeah, so yes, there's like 1 or 2 left to do. But so as a reminder for anyone who doesn't know what I'm talking about.
12:49.41
Rick
Um, who I've been I've been looking forward to this. Did you do your one on ones too. Wow.
13:00.51
tylerking
My routine is every six months first I meet with the leadership team and we just like talk about big topics make decisions stuff like that then we give a presentation to the whole company. So the leadership team. There's 4 other people on it. They present on their section. So like Michael who's head of serum coaching gives a presentation on customer service and so on. And then I do a deep dive um and then after that I do a 1 on 1 with everyone at the company to just like you know, read their temperature. Basically so it's really time consuming. Ah, but I'm basically through it and pretty pretty smooth this this time actually I think.
13:34.88
Rick
Um, that's awesome.
13:37.58
tylerking
Yeah I think if I'm being honest I probably put my thumb on the scale a little bit because what I do before these one on ones is I email everybody I'm like you have to answer like 1 of these. It's different every time but like 2 of these 3 questions or something like that and the questions are always like what's your least favorite thing about the company or like things that are.
13:53.17
Rick
Um, if you were this if you were the Ceo like what would you? What's the first thing you would do.
13:56.33
tylerking
Yeah, yeah, and it it gets really good feedback but it's also it's We're mostly a very positive company where like there's not a lot of conflict or anything but like I'm basically forcing them to say the things that they don't say otherwise I'll admit that this time I I didn't ask questions that pulled that out of people quite as much because like. The point of my presentation was we're in a growth Slump. We need to get out of it. It's time for us all to like put our heads down and do the work and so I didn't want to like invite a whole lot of distraction right? after that. So as a result the one on ones were a lot easier than they normally are.
14:29.52
Rick
Um, that's cool like it's just kind of fluffy one on ones.
14:32.99
tylerking
Yeah, yeah, and I so so I gave 3 questions and I said you have to answer one of them and one of them was that type but like very few people chose that one normally I'm like at least normally I do 2 out of 5 or something and like 4 of them are negative.
14:42.29
Rick
Mean.
14:50.40
Rick
Yeah, is that are you are you? ah cheating yourself like are you do you think that this might be mean you're ignoring potential problems that you otherwise would be available be available to.
14:50.44
tylerking
So it's like you can get 1 fluffy 1 but you've got to say something real and this time I was like if you don't want to say anything real. You don't have to.
15:04.53
tylerking
Yeah I've thought about that. Maybe I do this every six months so I figure like I can skip one probably but also also there's a there is a prop. Ah yes, yes, and I'm okay with it except that the thing is like Also there is kind of like.
15:10.55
Rick
Um, so that's a that The answer to that question is yes and you're okay with it. Yeah yeah.
15:23.86
tylerking
I'm I'm going to probably talk about this more in the next either the next or the second or next episode. But um, there is like a slightly low level problem at the company which is like our we do a lot of stuff that's like not about our core business. So like. Diversity equity and inclusion stuff. Ah, we say we like care about St Louis stuff like that. But like the team has gotten sort of misaligned on this and no one knows what any of that shit means right now and so we've been I've been hearing grumblings that it's like we need to like. Like everyone has a different idea of what we should be doing to benefit St Louis for example, so that I'm pretty confident is the problem that I could have gotten out of people but I already know it and I'm already working on that I don't know if you buy that or not yeah anyway, 1 1 problem at a time right.
16:11.76
Rick
That's now that sounds good to me like good good job. Yeah yeah, very very diff difficult problem.
16:18.94
tylerking
I Actually feel really I I was like kind of overwhelmed by it. But I like put a whole presentation together I'm giving it in a couple weeks to the whole company and I'm like I actually think like this is not going to be that big of a deal. We just have like there are some things that I haven't said out loud that I need to and once they're said I think it'll all be good I Know that's kind of vague I feel like I shouldn't.
16:35.45
Rick
Yeah I felt like you should yeah they should yeah that's fair I will ask no more questions about it. What else? Yeah I feel I feel like this next thing is like of the s of the type of.
16:38.90
tylerking
Say it publicly until like the company has heard it. Um, yeah back to you are you want you want me to go again. Yeah yeah, okay, so related to the presentation I'm going to give on. It's not. Specifically about dni but like diversity inclusion but it's like in that ballpark I need to define. Ah so actually I was just listening to micro conf not microconf. Um, what's the podcast ah start us for the rest of us rob walings podcast and 1 of the questions he answered was about like when do you set mission and vision and stuff like that and what he said is like if you don't set it at the beginning. That's totally fine because it's just like assumed like the mission is gets profitable basically but like over time you have to I think the cause of this realignment that it needs to happen. At less annoying is that I like we got big enough that I should have had like a reset and I didn't and so now that's what we're doing and ah with this I need to be more specific about defining like mission values. Whatever but I've heard you talk about this before so I wanted to ask you. What are all the words in that word soup and what do they mean to you.
17:55.61
Rick
Um, oh I Hate this topic I hate it so much. Um, it's so no I think I think it's important I I don't like talking about it at the level of mission vision values because like it's it.
18:02.66
tylerking
I Mean do you think I shouldn't even be doing. Do do you think this is a distraction.
18:15.80
Rick
It minimizes the impact by so by putting them in these simple boxes like what you're really talking about is driving clarity throughout the organization around like some really important questions like what do we do? What will we do? Um, what won't we do.
18:17.40
tylerking
Okay.
18:25.52
tylerking
Yeah.
18:31.10
tylerking
Yeah, the the what won't we do is the big one that I haven't address that I need to but can you just like? yeah yeah.
18:31.63
Rick
How will we behave you know? Yeah,, That's the most important woman like like I when I think about all this stuff like good mission statements. Good value statements. They they don't necessarily say what we should do. It's like it's like good values. Are very like articulate about how not to behave um good mission statements like like they make it very clear what you wont will not ever ever do and it's like they create like constraints on the business that everyone has to align to so that you don't have to.
18:51.18
tylerking
Remove like.
19:08.94
Rick
Constantly tell people no and that's that's how I think about these things I forgot this right people keep.
19:11.18
tylerking
So what's I don't know if you remember like what people keeps were if you have any. It's I Really you didn't what like what? Yeah what you just said resonates with me tremendously that it should explain what not but I've never heard like how is a mission statement actually phrased to be what you're not like I've never heard that.
19:30.67
Rick
Not not is so so I can read leg up health. It's right up here I have I don't have a mission statement but I have I call it a purpose I said like this is how it's written leg up health exists to help utons better find use and manage their marketplace Health insurance.
19:30.74
tylerking
It hurt it that way I don't think.
19:49.53
Rick
Um, health health helping Utah marketplace consumers is our first goal and profit is second that's my purpose statement. It says Utah in it which means we're not going to do anything else at Utah um, it says service is more important than dollars.
19:56.14
tylerking
1 Okay i.
20:09.70
Rick
Um, so we're not going to prioritize dollars over over service. Ah yeah, yes, but I but I I strongly believe that we do What's right for the the consumer no matter what and we figure out how to run a profitable business with that as a constraint.
20:09.97
tylerking
Yeah I like that obviously that has its limits like you you you have to be profitable. But yeah I get that.
20:26.64
tylerking
Yeah, yeah.
20:28.36
Rick
Profit will take care of itself. Um, Marketplace is ah is in there is a constraint not Health Insurance Marketplace Health insurance. Um, yeah, so that's ah, that's like some some pieces there on the purpose side.
20:34.36
tylerking
So you're not doing other health insurance. Okay I like that? yeah.
20:44.73
tylerking
Yeah I Wonder So the thing is like our core mission or whatever you want to Call. It has not been in question at all. So We've always said our mission is to help small businesses succeed which is like incredibly vague right? like well what are we actually doing. Um. But everyone understands that what we do is we make Crm software and no one's ever been confused about that. No One's ever been like will you say your mission or are you right.
21:11.15
Rick
My ah for I Just like had an electric shot come through my ah headphones into my ear that was really weird. Um, yeah I'm good.
21:15.39
tylerking
Oh shit. Wow okay, wow. Um, so like you could interpret help small businesses succeed to be like okay well let's go start becoming a funding like a venture capital for small businesses. let's let's go plow the snow in front of their storefronts so that customers can get in like no one's ever been like Let's do that stuff. They've been like I get that we're a serum company. That's never been a problem but then like on this other stuff like what is our commitment to St Louis for example that's where people like don't have that clip where where they're like let's go volunteer at this random charity and it's like. Like that charity but like what does that have to do with what we're doing here. You know? Um, so I wonder like now now you're making me wonder do I need more specificity in like the main thing even though it's never been a problem.
22:03.10
Rick
Well, it's not doing much for you. Enter to create clarity. So like like if you want it to do something for you. You need to add more. But but you don't need to change that to drive clarity. You can add more fluff later down like would call it something else like.
22:06.98
tylerking
Yeah I Yeah yeah. Right? right.
22:22.84
Rick
You know it's not the it's not the mission or whatever you said it was. It's the it's the what we do overview.
22:27.00
tylerking
Yeah, so as I've been preparing this presentation I keep I say over and over in it like we say our missions to help small businesses succeed the way we do that is we make sell and support software for small businesses. Still,. It's not super specific. But I. You could say crm right now. But we're starting to branch into other areas. So I didn't want to tie in too much. Yeah, right.
22:44.89
Rick
Yeah, Serum's probably not not the right thing. You don't want to constrain yourself to crm but you probably do want to constrain yourself to something broader than just like helping small something more narrow than the broad. The Breadth of like serving small businesses. Um, you know.
22:55.20
tylerking
Yeah, yeah.
23:03.28
Rick
I'm curious about your values because like that's actually I feel like you do a good job of that. Um I think like you've always done a good job about articulating behavioral stuff. Um, but I'm wondering like where you're fall feel like you're falling short there.
23:14.39
tylerking
So well. So I want to answer that but before I do I'm curious like I think in the past you have told me your definition of mission vision and values and I wasn't ready for it and I was just like they're all the same thing. Whatever can do you have those definitions handy off the top of your head.
23:24.30
Rick
Yeah, yeah, so let me I'll I'll give you all of it so mission I don't like the word mission I prefer purpose but like generally like what we are trying to do. Like what are we focused on like what are we doing like it's very clear about like today and like what what's driving today then there's vision and I like vision to be like what the world like I like it to be what the world looks like when we've accomplished our mission or purpose. Um, so like generally like.
23:47.72
tylerking
Ah.
24:01.34
Rick
Way I think about this is we have a purpose. We have a vision we will update our purpose when we accomplish our vision. Um and we will repeat so like at some point we're going to realize our purpose and when we reach our vision and we're going to need a new purpose and when that happens.
24:15.28
tylerking
So the vision and perfect and purpose are kind of like 1 to 1 tied to each other. You could almost combine them into 1 thing. Okay.
24:22.10
Rick
That's how I think I tell I think about it. Um, but I like I I treat them separately because I I I see the I kind of look at the vision I Like to start the vision statement with like in a perfect world like you know and now I have it written right here I can read it to you? um.
24:32.40
tylerking
Yeah, do you know your vision off the top your head like you have that written down. Yeah well.
24:39.35
Rick
This needs some work so I don't feel great about this but like the way it's written right now is in a perfect world. A Utah marketplace consumer could rely on a super agent to help them find and confidently choose the best marketplace policy for their family be available year-round to assist with coverage questions and issues with the insurance company. Streamlined marketplace application updates during open enrollments and life events and never sell hustle pressure or steer them based on commissions. So like that's what I want to build and when we've done both of those things like all those things and we've got a ah business running.
25:05.73
tylerking
Great. Okay.
25:14.64
Rick
Um, I'll say okay now like now we can talk about something that's bigger than just Utah now we can talk about something that's bigger than just the marketplace.
25:20.38
tylerking
Cool I like that and that makes me feel good because like I've never written it down quite like that. But everyone it less knowing knows what our vision is like that we say it over and over like basically where the product's going and and what will be possible once you know 1015 years from now.
25:37.69
Rick
There you go. So that's why like I don't want you I used to get caught up and when you first hear this mission vision value stuff as ceo it's like you see them as levers and you're like oh wow I finally got this lever that I can use this tool and it's like it doesn't matter what you call them at the end of day you're driving clarity about like you're trying to create create like.
25:37.98
tylerking
Once we've achieved our ambition. Okay.
25:56.58
Rick
Context for people that gives them the ability to make good decisions and and that's all this is trying to do and yeah, good.
25:59.50
tylerking
So yeah, Ah, yeah, so I think and I think we're about to get to values this is where our sort of problem is because everyone knows we make Crm. Um, software and I because I'm kind of obsessed with product thinking. I communicate all the time kind of 10 yearish vision type stuff. But I think the values we have and again I'm I'm interested in what your definition of that is but I think they've all been implied thus far and as you grow I don't think you can just be like everyone gets it. How would you Define values. Okay.
26:36.87
Rick
Ah, it's behavioral values. So it's kind of 2 pieces like 1 it. Well let me back up I used to think they were 100 % behavioral at Leg up health I have broadened them to be like more consent like. Not like we we will not break these things like these are these are constraining like I don't call them rules but like ways of doing business. Um, they're broader than behavioral. Yeah they're constraints. Yeah, exactly so like the ones I have for um.
26:58.98
tylerking
And.
27:05.70
tylerking
Yeah I mean constraints.
27:13.84
Rick
I Used to think that I used when I first did values. It was all behavioral. It was like um, but then I realized like I don't want to hire people that aren't this So I don't like that's like if you get too focused a lot of people focus on like basic values like trust um, you know like reliability doing what you say you're going to do.
27:28.16
tylerking
The.
27:32.59
Rick
Um, and I used to think like oh if I get values like that then then we'll hire the right people. It's like no no, you just don't hire people that aren't reliable. You don't hire. You don't let people stay at your company that aren't reliable. You don't hire people. You can't trust like yeah and it's like that just just like that's a hiring function like it's not a company value statement. Yes.
27:41.16
tylerking
Right? Yeah, that stuff's almost a given. It's stuff that people might disagree with right? No one's going to be like no I don't I don't think Reliability is good. Okay, yeah, but.
27:51.31
Rick
Yes, yes, no exactly and but but a lot of people aren't reliable.
28:00.39
tylerking
You writing that down is a value doesn't matter because nobody thinks they're not reliable. Yeah.
28:00.62
Rick
It doesn't matter. But that's what that's what you see when you see a lot of values. There are like behavioral things like I bought into that where I've um where I've gone with leg Appel I'll just read them to you leg up. Health team members are fully empowered to use the following guidelines to make decisions for themselves clients First that's number 1 we always do whatever would make the client happiest as long as it's not against the law or outrageous simplicity. We keep things simple and only add complexity if it helps us better serve our clients I can think like there are so many times when people.
28:22.95
tylerking
Okay, okay.
28:35.24
Rick
Come to me in the past, not like a pallet but in the past and said like let's try this. Let's do this. Let's do that like what complex that adds a lot of complexity. What does that do for us like that's really hard. No like you have to you have to really like keep it simple if there's if you're going to bring complexity in here. You got to have a damn good reason for it.
28:40.94
tylerking
Yeah, like right.
28:51.57
Rick
And then sustainability we push hard during seasonal open enrollments. That's a very important thing like you come here, you expect to work during open enrollments. Um, and we give ourselves time to recover and enjoy personal passions during the offseason. Those are the only 3 have right now but like they're very very strategic and very very like.
28:55.61
tylerking
Down.
29:03.96
tylerking
I Like that. Okay.
29:11.31
Rick
I Don't want people like people need to understand those things before they come work here.
29:12.24
tylerking
Yeah I like the last one most just because it it. It makes no one could misinterpt I feel like this the complexity thing you probably have to get in there and see the decision get made before it makes sense but I assume the plan like put all 3 of those on every job listing and so someone comes in and they're like well.
29:21.29
Rick
And here.
29:26.87
Rick
M.
29:31.36
tylerking
You know I'm taking the whole week of Thanksgiving off you can be like ah you know don't make me tap the sign here that that you agreed to I like that we've okay so what I'm talking about here. It would be an interesting exercise for us to come up with that style of values.
29:38.28
Rick
Yep.
29:47.91
tylerking
We've been taking a slightly different approach here and I'm not even sure values is the right term for this but like who do we care about what do we care about is the approach we've been taking because one of the problems we've been having. There's this employee led group called idea which is an acronym that stands for stuff. Um. That basically decides like they have a certain amount of time to just like do stuff that furthers. The company's kind of like non-business objectives if that makes sense like the coding fellowship potentially is an example of this. Um, they've just been like awash and uncertainty about what are we supposed to be doing here and so what I was starting with is like. Like what things do we care about Um, so like we as people probably care about homelessness but like we as a company that's not 1 of our issues you know and so like let's write it down and so the list we've got right now is like customers employees St Louis Diversity equity and inclusion and ah environment I know that's like everything that's the full list of all things in the world. But um, there are other constraints that I want ah that that and that I have like this all prepared but within those how do we decide what things to do, but. I guess those aren't like values by your kind of definition of them.
31:02.48
Rick
Yeah, and I guess like what? what are you trying to my goal with the values kind of or stated above them which is like please don't ask me what to do if you are doing one of these 3 things like you have you are empowered to do any of these 3 things you are empowered to make.
31:14.65
tylerking
Yeah.
31:22.90
Rick
To treat to put clients First you're you're empowered to prioritize simplicity. You're empowered to um, like work your ass off during open enrollment and and and take time off during outside of it like do you need to ask permission.
31:33.33
tylerking
Yeah, yeah, okay yeah, I'm not sure I like yeah the problem that we have is needs that answerness so that that makes total sense to me I like what you're doing Maybe I'll just.
31:43.94
Rick
What do you? What? what are you trying to do I Guess like what's what I its one so clear to me is like.
31:51.67
tylerking
Yeah, so I want this group to be able to meet and agree on what what? So right? now. It's just like everybody has random projects and there's no continuity and I want them all to be able to get together and be like our top priority is a company should be this not not related to selling Crem software. So like we're gonna. Work on a certain aspect of diversity in the recruiting funnel or whatever instead of just running around random things so this is a multi There's a lot to this more than just these values. Maybe I'll I'm I'm trying to be' I'm being coy because I'm like I haven't said of the company yet. But whatever they're they're all going to hear it I'll just say right now I don't think anyone listens to this anyway.
32:22.31
Rick
Yeah, yeah, it.
32:28.67
tylerking
Ah, ah so like what what? I'm the main thing the main crux of what I'm planning on saying is like here's the constraint anything that we have our mission of like or purpose or whatever we make see our we make software for small businesses. You don't have to work anything that furthers that we're good. You don't need to worry about that. All this other stuff. It needs to be 1 of 2 things. It either needs to be a byproduct of our core mission like the fellowship I think is we teach people a code because it's like it's kind of related to our recruiting and we already have the tech like ah everything works together where're like yeah, it's sort of a waste of time if it's you're strictly trying to maximize profit. But. It's not like a huge it's still in our sphere of influence or we are reducing harm that we directly cause so for example, like employees started a composting thing and it's like we were creating food waste you are reducing the harm from that but like you can't just go out.
33:23.55
Rick
Me yeah.
33:24.77
tylerking
The restaurants next door and be like we're going to start composting your stuff. We're not causing that harm. Ah so that's like the constraints I was planning on putting on this.
33:32.39
Rick
Yeah I mean it sounds like the problem that you have is yeah, you've got ah you don't have enough clarity for people to to make good decisions and and like prioritize correctly. Um and so you're trying to like narrow in on some some some.
33:48.29
tylerking
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
33:49.17
Rick
Rules for lack of a better word of like how to prioritize you may have a separate issue with that particular group of like sometimes when there's no owner, There's no leader like you end up like with like this like this revolving door of like ideas that you know, no one ever actually like everyone's just talking. No one's actually doing.
34:06.87
tylerking
Yep I 100 % agree so that's another thing we're doing where there is sort of like they have a representative on the leadership team and I am working with them on formalizing their role as more of a. Leader at the company and not just like an employee advocate who happens to be in the meetings. Um, and then I think that will flow back the other direction of like then they can go in and be like all right I'm running these meetings. You know that's what I'm hoping for so this probably all is like completely inapplicable to everyone listening and like.
34:31.48
Rick
Go.
34:39.53
tylerking
Still probably too abstract, but this is helpful for me. So thank you.
34:40.58
Rick
So just so you know if you ever want to look at my company overview I have it written this is what I have up on my board for legup health. Um I mean this is like at the core like what JD and I aligned on like when when we brought him on and ah.
34:50.84
tylerking
Yeah, yeah.
34:56.26
Rick
I do have one other component that might be of interest to people so like purpose vision values then I have a 3 year plan which is sort of our plan to get to accomplish our vision. So here's our here's why we exist as the first section. The purpose here's what it looks like when we've accomplished our purpose. The vision here's how we're going to act and what we're going to prioritize. While we're trying to accomplish this purpose and vision. Um, that's our values and then I have the 3 year plan like of getting there and basically it's but yeah, it's all right? It's already here. Yeah, very concise. Yeah and this sits on my wall and it's like.
35:23.57
tylerking
Does that fit on that same sheet of paper the 3 year plan okay so pretty pretty concise Rick is holding up 1 single sheet of paper with all of this.
35:34.97
Rick
This reminds me of like this is like my my 3 year constraint basically on what what leg up health can do and you know I well I just had this stuff like I think this stuff is really important. So I don't think there's it's too early to do this stuff I disagree.
35:37.70
tylerking
Yeah, damn you were ready for this conversation I didn't even prep you for it.
35:48.78
tylerking
So you think like a solo founder should should have that sheet of paper figured out for themselves.
35:53.92
Rick
I think she had private market fit. Yes I think like to getting getting to private market fit is like it's pretty wasteful to do this probably Premark Private market fit but we chef assumptions here like that you're testing. Um and I don't know like once you have private market fit. It's like this is what you need like this is why you focus.
36:12.13
tylerking
The reason I Mun Yeah, it sounds useful and if you if you use it as a tool to help you make decisions I think that's probably useful. The the thing I am nervous about is like there are so many great things about lessening cerm like culturally and just like who we are as a company that I couldn't like if you'd asked me.
36:13.13
Rick
Um, I find it peaceful.
36:31.54
tylerking
2 years in to write it down I would have been like completely wrong which maybe is fine as long as you like leave yourself open to changing those things but um, yeah, yeah.
36:38.29
Rick
Oh yeah, I'll change this tomorrow if I need to um so the 3 year plan says um the 3 year plan has become the agency of record for 1000 Utah marketplace consumers assuming an average commission of $50 per client per month this will generate 50 k in monthly recurring revenue. Or 600 k and error are this plan is quite doable given that one more than 200000 utons by coverage of the marketplace and 2 the primary competition is do it yourself without an agent but what's the whole plan now what does this have in it. It's like a lot It's got.
37:10.19
tylerking
That's the whole 3 year plan for.
37:15.42
Rick
The consumer units. It's got the key variable for the business plan on revenue per customer per client then it's got you know the how that translates into monthly recurring revenue and andrecurring revenue like this is like the basic business plan and and then you've got like I've got milestones by year which is like.
37:28.82
tylerking
Yeah.
37:34.60
Rick
By the end of 2021 when hit 40 marketplace clients check we did that by the end of this year we want to hit 400 marketplace clients. That's a huge stretch. We might not get it. But we're gonna try and then by the end of next year we want to hit a thousand clients. We're in year two of our 3 year plan
37:44.57
tylerking
Got you cool. That's different from how like I think of a plan in my head That's more like goals like I was expecting like we're going to run this marketing campaign and you know stuff like that. But yeah, cool.
37:56.21
Rick
Oh gosh, No no, no, no yeah now that so I don't know that I That's my thing it hangs up on my my wall and I see it every day and I wish I was working more on it. But I'm not.
38:08.17
tylerking
Yeah, awesome. Well ah a I'm impressed how but how far ahead you are of me on this given that I'm twelve years in and you're still pretty new. Ah, but yeah, that was cool that was helpful.
38:20.81
Rick
Yeah, hey well I will trade revenues with you any day.
38:25.26
tylerking
Ah I'll give it all up to have a good a good mission vision values statement. Ah all right? Well I kind of turned into a deep dive without me really intending on it but ah great I I Guess that's the name of the episode mission vision values. Um, yeah, back to you? what's.
38:28.34
Rick
Yeah, yeah, exactly that's fun, fun conversation I thought mission mission values. So 2 things. Um.
38:44.49
tylerking
What's next.
38:47.47
Rick
So I don't know if I told you this? um but we were you know we've been building out our prospecting funnel for consumers in Utah we've talked a lot about leg up health today. So everyone should know what I know what I mean when I say leg of health. But basically we ah Jd's been building out I really want to figure out an outbound prospecting. Um.
38:58.94
tylerking
So.
39:07.29
Rick
Customer acquisition model so reaching out directly to u to consumers profiling them if figuring out they're an icp and a ideal customer a ideal client profile and if they are a deal client profile trying to figure out how to get them to become an agent or client of ours. Um, we identified a offshoot of that first prospecting funnel. Once we profile someone and they don't we find out that they don't offer. They don't have health insurance. They are an icp I'm sorry they don't have group health insurance. They buy their own marketbplace policy. They are an icp right? We then can look at what their who their employer is and that creates an employer funnel and so what we now have is like. 2 tracks Jd's primary track is adding 50 new prospects to this machine that we have going and then anytime we get. We have ah a new profile that becomes an icp we we look at their employer and go does that employer have. More than one employee than this one employee and if so that becomes an employer prospect for him to reach out to.
40:05.47
tylerking
Cool how how automated is all that like you're using like a third party service to get data. Is it just like the cost the the employer name pulls down the not the size of the employer pulls downer is like j d go and researching all this himself.
40:19.17
Rick
Ah, great question. So um, there's kind of 50 new prospects added per day that's pretty manual in terms of building the list. So there's like targeting the people and then it's like enriching that list with email addresses and contact information. Most people are on Linkedin or.
40:28.64
tylerking
Um, yeah.
40:39.16
Rick
Available online so you can find their professions pretty easily and you can research the profession but that goes into pipe drive which is a less annoying Crm competitor. Um, and then we um, he he then uses.
40:46.20
tylerking
Boo Pipe drive now that that's what I would use.
40:53.71
Rick
He pushes those from pipe drive into http://reply.io which is our prospecting tool outreach tool um, and then once from there, it's pretty automated. Um, because it's all on pipe drive and you just like spin up a new a new opera.
41:04.54
tylerking
But like are you using it you you said? Data enrichment is does a service say like this company has this many employees. Okay, so but it's manual.
41:12.70
Rick
Yeah, that would be Linkedin just teasing. Ah yeah, like it's well it's not because like I mean yes, it's manual, but there yes yes, sort of because like some you can do Linkedin overlays of on like within reply I o and.
41:19.48
tylerking
Like j d's looking up their Linkedin profile and then clicking through to the company and seeing what's up with them.
41:31.95
Rick
And Linkedin where you are pulling in data. There's Chrome extensions you can use like contact out to to enrich Zoom info may have an integration for example with like Zoom info integrates with salesforce we're not using this one. But as an example, you click a button and it enriches the the leads. Um, so there's there's elements of that happening. But yes.
41:33.92
tylerking
Okay.
41:49.40
Rick
To answer your question. It's it's it's.
41:51.47
tylerking
It's like heavily ah tools heavily making this efficient but still manual. Yeah cool. Sorry.
41:57.00
Rick
Manual but very repeatable. Yeah, and ah, so so anyway, it's got. It's a an hour and a half a day sort of keeps adding people to it and it now offshoots both that 50 people a day turn into either an icp that we.
42:12.94
tylerking
This is.
42:13.74
Rick
Can become a client or and or a an employer opportunity of an employer prospect that we know doesn't offer benefits to their employees.
42:18.17
tylerking
Um, great. That's that's obvious when you say it and like very cool. So What do you do with that is J D gonna start. Figuring out how to sell to them or is are you just putting that on hold for now.
42:35.40
Rick
So we remember we had those 4 questions a couple episodes ago where was like we want to. We're not gonna set goals. Well our goals are to answer these 4 questions and the next like however long it takes like we we we're gonna do it by the end of March but we've extended to the end of April and it's working so well like that.
42:42.29
tylerking
Yeah.
42:52.63
Rick
Might go like let's do this. Another. Let's stay focus on these questions for another month because just leading to such good progress. Um, but like 1 of those questions is how do we can. We can we generate ah clients by reaching out to people cold. One of them is like how do we um, identify employer prospects. Um, and. That's how we're doing that. Um, so yeah, he's going to reach out to these employer prospects and ah figure out both like from a consumer standpoint like we want to our core hypothesis is that we if we get the business owner to become a client then that's naturally going to lead to referrals within the company. But it's also going to lead to potentially an employer opportunity either to sell leg up benefits the subscription service that we have or leg up health. Um, concierge ah service um of some kind so more rep it's definitely going to lead to more leads but potentially even more revenue sources.
43:40.58
tylerking
Yeah.
43:47.86
tylerking
Cool. Yeah I mean are you considering like a almost freemium offering to employers where I know this is kind of what you said with the referral network but where you say like you can tell people you have a health benefit solution and all it is is we'll call them up and talk to them.
44:04.00
Rick
Yep, if you go to legup http://health.com/ I think it's employers or something like that or referral program or something like that or employer referral program. There is a freemium employer service available. They get a full concierge service for their employees. That's like an extension of their hr team.
44:11.76
tylerking
What do they get if they pay though. Got you cool all right. We'll keep us updated. Yeah for that. That's from back when you were running things right? Jd hasn't yeah.
44:21.42
Rick
Plus stipend management and we have 2 of those customers by the way. So yep and j d so but j d rent services those and and hands handles ads deletes that sort of thing. But yeah, that's i.
44:35.61
tylerking
Great cool. That's it man you just you just keep hitting wins on the ah the growth front. That's awesome.
44:39.27
Rick
That subscription revenue it's all J D man like it's just what what I love about it is you know what it is I You remember the infinite game book it when you play the long game you can do things like.
44:49.49
tylerking
Um.
44:56.74
Rick
And you don't care about like urgency. You can just do things systematically and when you do things thoughtfully and and repetitively and systematically good things end up happening over time because it compounds it just is just as a matter of time and I just I feel that right now where it's like yeah this week was okay, but like it didn't result in in dollars.
45:14.50
tylerking
E.
45:16.31
Rick
But it resulted in so much learning and and ah slight iteration and momentum that like if we just keep doing this just poop compounds compounds compounds and it might take 3 years but this is going to turn into something.
45:28.99
tylerking
Yeah, yeah, I I have kind of been saying that to Alex and unice on my team who are doing like the growth push we're we're doing right now because there are a lot of failures along along the way. But I think the key thing is having confidence that the channel can work. Because there's a separate side of the like you know like I don't think either of us have any doubt that what you're doing has the the potential to work but like we're doing some stuff where it's like like eunice is experimenting with Facebook ads right now and it's like I think it's possible. There's just no way to make Facebook ads work. You know.
46:04.40
Rick
Ah.
46:05.48
tylerking
Ah, so you can keep it. You can be methodical and keep working on it. It's just like Nope never going to work. Maybe I don't know but we'll see cool.
46:08.81
Rick
Yeah, yeah, it does definitely helps like to believe that this will work in time um versus like is like yeah exactly yeah.
46:17.50
tylerking
As long as you're right? You don't want to be wrong about that and then three years later you're like well okay.
46:23.78
Rick
Yeah, but like so there's a difference there which is like we are having like momentous wins we are having wins and then we are also like getting better um like the employer prospecting funnel added to what we were already doing just like supercharges it like it's such a. It's a giant leap forward. Um, and then you like.
46:31.60
tylerking
Who.
46:38.71
tylerking
Yeah.
46:43.11
Rick
Like we were We were laughing the day. It's like you know once we get this employer one figured out. It's like we find out who their cpa is and then we have a cpa funnel and that but it's anyway, we're building this system that I think like if we can figure out how it works um and have repeatability on it. We can like so we can. Do it a lot more than we're doing it and it will grow the business predictably which is what I want. It's boring but like it. It works. Yeah now so we'll see maybe maybe it won't work. Um, last thing I had was.
47:05.84
tylerking
Yeah I think almost any entrepreneur would kill for the the funnel that you're building. Yeah.
47:20.37
Rick
Um, we had some new regs come out in the Health insurance space have I told you about the family glitch before. Okay, so when the affordable care act came out it introduced this concept of Premium tax credits which basically reduces and caps the cost of someone's health insurance as a percentage of their income.
47:26.63
tylerking
I Don't think so.
47:39.98
Rick
If you qualify Um, there's this really weird rule in glitch that says like if you are offered health insurance by an employer that is affordable then you're disqualified from this premium tax credit.
47:51.56
tylerking
So.
47:54.30
Rick
To put this in perspective like to realize how much this is we have clients who are getting $20000 a year in a premium of taxx credit from the federal government to pay for their family health insurance so that they pay like 50 bucks a month for health insurances significant money here's what the family goodch did.
48:02.97
tylerking
Um, wow.
48:10.57
Rick
So in order to avoid the employer Mandate penalties. Um, if you're an employer if you have more than 50 employees. You have to offer health insurance the rule around like whether you offer affordable health insurance to an employee is based on the employee's affordability as an individual. So um, the employee. What? what. Companies are doing is offering like what's basically affordable for an employee to avoid the penalty but because of this glitch it disqualified the whole family from their premium tax Credit. So if you were a family and you qualified for these premium tax credits and your employer offered Coverage. You.
48:37.69
tylerking
Ah.
48:49.00
Rick
Most families were getting screwed out of these premium tax credits and not even realizing it because they don't know that this whole thing exists still. But anyway the Biden Biden administration put out a new reg proposed reg that is correcting this and making it so that the affordability calculation is separate for the employee and from the um ah from the and the family and if the family is if if. Family members um aren't it's not affordable for family members then the family members can get their portion of the premium tax credit which is huge because it means like when an employer offers group health insurance. We're going to see a lot more like employees staying on the plan but then their family members going to.
49:23.60
tylerking
Yeah, so like ah if if an employer says we'll pay 100% of your insurance but zero percent of your dependence. The employer takes the free health insurance. The dependents go on individual plans and get the premium tax credit.
49:26.15
Rick
But marketplace.
49:34.95
Rick
And get their premium tax credits whereas right now they were dis golf before that we were disqualified huge and but the big. That's what the the reg does but you know what? what got me most excited wasn't the reg change. It was the language and sort of of sort of. Commentary around the reg change. It's changed so much in 2014 when this all came out everyone was scared that companies were going to drop their health insurance. Everyone was like trying to like do everything they could to like make it hard for employees and and employers to take advantage of these premium tax credits the language in these regs is like yep. We expect like what's the you know in regs when they put them out. They put like what's the economic impact of this reg and they're like yeah we expect a lot of small businesses to drop health insurance and they use the word drop health insurance I'm just like it's like they don't care anymore and it's so good and anyway, um, there's just like I just feel like this. It's taken 10 years since like that.
50:25.53
tylerking
That's great. So.
50:33.42
Rick
12 years since the affordable care act was passed in 2010 and it's just now getting around to like some of the language like oh yeah, we're going to accept that the employer. The employer market is going to start eroding and I really am really happy about it.
50:45.70
tylerking
Yeah, that's that's great every time we talk about the specifics of what you do on this podcast I get kind of embarrassed because I'm like anyone not in America is listening to this and just like what is going on over there.
50:55.89
Rick
Yeah, exactly. Um, yeah, it's a dumpster fire. So I have 1 more topic that I'll preview for another time but like I would love to for you to think about for the next episode. What is the marketinging.
51:00.69
tylerking
Like that's a step in the right direction and still. It's a dumpster fire. That's cool though.
51:13.94
Rick
What is the marketing channel in 2022 that is most like Seo was in 2010 for us. We got on the seo train both I feel like you did with less knowing serium. We did it with za benefits and I think we've benefited greatly from like these organic sort of being kind of a first mover on being discoverable online.
51:31.37
tylerking
Yeah, yeah.
51:33.71
Rick
And just want to know what that is today I feel like we just like kind of like born at the right time um to take advantage of that.
51:41.60
tylerking
We'll save that. But yeah I have I have a lot of thoughts and no answers about that but real quick before we leave you mentioned Seo open up a new tab and search for crm um, and go to the second page which doesn't matter. No one ever goes to the second page but less knowing serm for most people should be on the second page which I'm very excited about.
51:43.48
Rick
M.
51:59.51
tylerking
Ah, anyway, unrelated well related in that it's Seo who no that just got just got pointed out to me the other day we like in the well I don't think we're getting any customers from that. But anyway, no yeah, ah very. And yeah.
51:59.88
Rick
Yeah, they are did you know that or is that something. It's huge So you're learning. You're learning how you're acquiring customers.
52:17.50
tylerking
I Think you could ask that question about technology in general like were we just born at the right time. Ah, but I think that'll be a fascinating conversation to be continued if any listeners I I know that I don't have an answer to that question. So if any listeners want to suggest something before the episode love to hear. But.
52:19.28
Rick
Um.
52:29.79
Rick
Feel free to um if you'd like to review past topics and show notes visit star to last dot com see you next week
52:36.60
tylerking
See ya.