The Panel

Justin and Jordan talk about how Jordan made a change to their funnel and increased sign ups dramatically, improving team communication, conducting better employee reviews, and developing better workflows for project handoffs between employees when AI is being used.

Timestamps:
00:00 Intro
02:45 Taking control of your funnel
05:24 Why trust matters in e-commerce
08:18 Optimizing the customer experience
19:10 Doubling sign-ups
23:08 Customer demand wins
25:34 Putting the credit card upfront
29:26 Customer demand and the funnel
31:56 Question your assumptions
35:00 Reviews, pay, and philosophy
44:14 Surviving survival mode
46:40 How we think about pay
49:00 Motivation and career growth
54:05 AI and developer ownership
01:00:54 Keeping the quality bar high
01:03:51 Building a culture of accountability

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Creators and Guests

Host
Jordan Gal
Cofounder of Rosie
Host
Justin Jackson
Co-founder of Transistor.fm
Editor
Chris Enns
I edit podcasts so you don't have to.

What is The Panel?

When it comes to bootstrapping and building software, there's rarely one right answer. We want to dive into the nuance. In every episode, veteran founders Justin Jackson, Brian Casel and Jordan Gal tackle thorny topics – from pricing and product strategy to work-life balance. No gurus, no easy answers – just real conversations we'd normally have behind closed doors.

Justin Jackson:

Welcome to the panel where founders discuss how to build a better business and a better life. I'm Justin Jackson, cofounder of transistor.fm.

Jordan Gal:

And I am Jordan Gal, cofounder at heyrosy.com. Just the two of us today.

Justin Jackson:

Right, Brian. The two of us. Can make it if we try. Are we doing a singing bit now?

Jordan Gal:

I mean, look, I can't you know, I got called out on it actually this week. When I get on a call Mhmm. I've realized that the energy that I bring into a call is really important.

Justin Jackson:

Yes.

Jordan Gal:

Right? We're we're like, we're not in person. When we're in person, like, my whole vibe, like, radiates outward. Mhmm. You know, happiness, positive, aggressive, fun, let's go, but remote.

Jordan Gal:

You lose that.

Justin Jackson:

Yes.

Jordan Gal:

And and sometimes I find myself, I don't know, not that energetic. And I come into call and I'm like, hey, it's actually up to me. Yeah. To to to set this energy level. And so when I get into a call, I'm I'm usually doing some mm-mm, pumping my fists.

Jordan Gal:

And I did it on an agency call and they were like, man, we love every call. Every time we get on a call, you're just, like, pumped pumped up. I'm like, yeah. I guess I'm doing it now with outside vendors also.

Justin Jackson:

That's right. I mean, you gotta do you can't be demure, you know? That's the thing. If you get on a call and everyone's kind of demure, people want energy. That's the whole thing.

Justin Jackson:

Mhmm. And if you bring the energy, they'll generally respond positively. Yes.

Jordan Gal:

They they kind of meet you where your energy is. Mhmm. And the other thing that I have I have been a lot better at over the last few months than in the past is also decisiveness in meetings.

Justin Jackson:

Okay. So

Jordan Gal:

just, you know, kind of being very free to go with the opinion that I have and argue for it and kind of because I'm I'm a middle sibling. And my nature is generally consensus driven.

Justin Jackson:

Okay.

Jordan Gal:

You know, what do you think? What do you think? Defer. And I I think it's important to defer, especially if it's like a product question. Like, I I wanna defer to Jessica.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. I don't have the easiest time being super decisive around especially around things that aren't directly in my wheelhouse.

Justin Jackson:

Yes. But over

Jordan Gal:

the last few months, I've I've done that. Sometimes it has come across a bit harsh. Yeah. And I've had to apologize.

Justin Jackson:

Sometimes Well, let's talk let's talk about that because I think it leads into you you wanted to talk about all caps, take control of your funnel. I want you to get into that, but maybe just I'm interested about this your energy in meetings because I've been thinking about this a lot as well. There is this balance. Like, what's the balance of of being able to be clear, being able to set a clear direction, being able to make decisions? You know, it seems to me that consensus is not always the best approach, but sometimes it is.

Justin Jackson:

So I what's the balance?

Jordan Gal:

I wish I could say I have, like, a system or a framework, but a lot of it is, like, mood driven and situation driven. Okay. So I think what's defined the last, call it, two months or so has been impatience. Yeah. And, you know, that that has driven my mood.

Jordan Gal:

Yep. And and that'll make you a little cranky and a little straightforward and and a bit harsh. I have let myself do that and be okay be okay with it.

Justin Jackson:

What what does the team think?

Jordan Gal:

They know what I'm trying to do. Mhmm. They know that my, you know, my goal is in the right place. And if I ever cross any type of a line or say something rude or something, then I I'm gonna apologize. But it doesn't need to be rude.

Jordan Gal:

It just needs to be forceful. Mhmm. We work with a an an outside contractor that helps us.

Justin Jackson:

Okay.

Jordan Gal:

Not like name any names or give any hints or anything. And we had this conversation a few weeks ago and I felt myself going toward consensus and then being like, no. Actually, that's not what I mean. I I I don't want it that way. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

Here's why. And and then they kinda came back with like, okay. I get it. So what what you wanna do is x. And I was like, no no no no You you you're not getting it.

Jordan Gal:

I want it this way and here's why. Mhmm.

Justin Jackson:

And I almost had

Jordan Gal:

to, like, drive it home a few times. And after the call, he pinged me and was like, everything okay? Like, are we are we good? Yeah. And I had to be like, yes.

Jordan Gal:

Here's why I behaved that way or said it that way or taken this point of view. Okay. Let's pause. It's important at times.

Justin Jackson:

Let's pause right here.

Jordan Gal:

Okay.

Justin Jackson:

I want it that way. I've been thinking about this so much.

Jordan Gal:

Okay. Okay. Okay.

Justin Jackson:

I want it that way. I think this is I think this is the thing. Yes.

Jordan Gal:

Yes. Yes. Okay. No. Okay.

Jordan Gal:

I wanna I wanna push back to you though for a second. Yeah. I think you I I don't wanna, like, put too many words in your mouth, so I I want you to explain it. But here's my

Justin Jackson:

Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

Hypothesis. Yeah. You are in the middle of an experience around this video

Justin Jackson:

Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

Element to your product Yeah. Where you took too long Mhmm. To make your strong opinion known Yeah. And now that it's being followed according to the way that you want it Yeah. It's working out the way that you want it to work.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. And it gives you this feedback that comes back and says, you should do that more often.

Justin Jackson:

Yes. Yeah, that's probably true. I think also just realizing, like, this is my company. John and I have this company. And we started off saying, we are gonna build this company and this product in the way that we want.

Justin Jackson:

And I think it's easy to lose sight of that. It's easy to get swayed by, like, what does the Twitter crowd want? What do our peers expect of us? What do our employees want? What do our even, like, what do certain customers want?

Justin Jackson:

More and more like, when I've gotten lost, I think it's all been around me deferring and not being honest about, first of all, identifying what do I want, and second, making that known. And I think since I've gotten more clear about that, I think everything gets more clear. Because employees are like: Well, what do you want? Like, where's the company going? And so John and I had to articulate: Where are we going?

Justin Jackson:

What's important to us? And so then when things come up, like, well, we should be building this company so that we can get acquired by a big company and all make millions of dollars. And John and I are like, we don't want that. We don't want to build that kind of company. And so we just need to be clear about what we want.

Justin Jackson:

And I'm I'm I'm not that easy. Not that easy.

Jordan Gal:

Not as easy as it should be.

Justin Jackson:

I I think I'm realizing more and more, like, this is our boat. Like, we started the boat. We set the direction. If you want to come with us where we're going, jump in our boat. If you don't and this goes for everybody.

Justin Jackson:

Again, customers, employees, partners, whoever. If you don't like our boat, if you don't like where we're headed, that's fine. Go get your own boat. And I I'm just realizing, like, if you've ever been in a canoe and everybody's trying to paddle a different direction, it is it it doesn't work. It's chaos.

Justin Jackson:

And so understanding that and now having this metaphor in my head of, like, I have been in canoes where everybody's trying to pull a different direction. And then eventually, it's like, sorry. Like, there's one person steering this boat. It's the steersman. They're going to set our direction, and everybody else is going to follow and listen to what they want to do.

Justin Jackson:

If you're up in the and you see something up ahead and you need to report back, hey, boss. We gotta be aware of this. That's fine. Or if you have an idea of, like, hey, we could paddle more efficiently if we do it this way, great. But you can't have too many cooks in the kitchen.

Justin Jackson:

You can't have too many people steering steering things. We're getting comments in the chat saying that this this canoe example is too Canadian. But

Jordan Gal:

Yes. Yeah. We are too used to the ideas around democracy. Yeah. Companies are not a democracy.

Justin Jackson:

Companies are not a democracy. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

That's right. It's closer to dictatorship than it is democracy.

Justin Jackson:

And even in even in democracy, the whole point is that you're hiring a leader to set the vision and the direction. In a democracy, you're saying, Okay, we got this leader, this leader, this leader. Who do we think is going to do the best job of taking us where we want to go? And ultimately, it's up to them. They get elected, and then they have to say they have to tell their government, listen, we're going this way.

Justin Jackson:

And it's the the weak, ineffective leaders are the ones that are just like, well, let's play it safe. Let's wait and see. Let's Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

What do people want? What what will keep me popular? That's right. Especially especially in in in the founder operator. Right?

Jordan Gal:

Very different from, like, a CEO that's brought in that doesn't have the same DNA Mhmm. With alongside the company. Yeah. Yeah. So if we if we kinda take this and bring it down into like this practical level of day to day Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

I I have felt a lot better over the last few months taking more ownership and more control and being comfortable doing so. I find some inspiration in, you know, other founders. I I I try to look for the right inspiration.

Justin Jackson:

Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

Not who's getting the most attention or who raised the most money or who's the coolest or whatever else. I almost I I like like behavior. That that's inspirational. My my latest inspiration is is Ryan Cohen.

Justin Jackson:

Okay.

Jordan Gal:

The CEO of GameStop. Right? Was was the was the founder of Chewy Mhmm. That got acquired for $800,000,000. And then became CEO of GameStop and is now making a bid to merge slash acquire

Justin Jackson:

eBay. Canadian, by the way. Canadian Montreal.

Jordan Gal:

That's right. Canadian Jewish guy in Montreal. That's right. Grew up with his dad as an entrepreneur. Learned a lot from him.

Jordan Gal:

Now he lives in Miami, actually, in my in my friend's neighborhood. Wow. And and I love the chutzpah. Mhmm. Like like, it's almost like a like, you're gonna die.

Jordan Gal:

Like, it doesn't matter. Just just literally just do whatever you want.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah. Do some things. I I've really been liking Tony Fidel. Do you know him?

Jordan Gal:

No. Tony. I think you

Justin Jackson:

would love his energy, dude. Just look up some Tony Fidel YouTube videos. Search for him on YouTube. He's the founder of Nest. He was one of the original product designers behind the iPod.

Justin Jackson:

So worked with Steve Jobs. But he embodies this clarity of vision and, I think, team building. I think he has the right mix where he's defining the direction. He's defining what is expected. He's defining the levers that he thinks are important.

Justin Jackson:

So, for example, he's a big market first guy. Like, the market is going to respond to this because of this. And we're gonna build a prototype, and we're going to build it in a way that helps us realize all the hard parts, and then we're gonna actually lean into doing the hard stuff. Okay. And, yeah, he's got a few talks on YouTube that are just great.

Justin Jackson:

Highly recommended. Cool.

Jordan Gal:

Alright. I'm I'm gonna check it out. So you you wanna talk about the funnel?

Justin Jackson:

Tell me the story first. I wanna hear the story

Jordan Gal:

about how this came up. Fine. I got stories. You know? You asked me to tell a story.

Jordan Gal:

I'm I'm game,

Justin Jackson:

Justin.

Jordan Gal:

Let's let's go. Story time. Okay. It starts fifteen years ago. How's that first story?

Justin Jackson:

I wasn't expecting that.

Jordan Gal:

Okay. So about fifteen years ago, I ran an e commerce company with my brothers. We Yep. You know, we we were merchants. We sold physical products online.

Jordan Gal:

We used Volusion as our platform. That's you you can, you know, date it back to that.

Justin Jackson:

Yep. What was the name of the company? Gal Bros Limited? What was it?

Jordan Gal:

Yes. Okay. Was called the company was called YCA, which is the three three initials of the three brothers. I'm the c, that's for my my Hebrew name. Okay.

Jordan Gal:

Yep. And so in that company, we each had areas of responsibility. One brother was responsible for marketing, getting people to the site. I was responsible for converting people once they got to the site. And another another, my younger brother was responsible for everything that happened after the purchase.

Jordan Gal:

Okay. The shipping, the customer service, the delivery, the reviews, all that stuff. So we kinda split up literally into the funnel. Like Yeah. The top of the funnel, the middle of the funnel, and and the back end.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. And what that did is it made me stare at a website and say, how do I get people to do what I want them to do? Mhmm. How do I get them to click the buttons that I want them to click, to make the purchase, to do make the decisions that I want them to make? And that really worked.

Jordan Gal:

It really worked. It was an education, like, you know, curve. Had to work my way up. But along the way, I realized the things I think in my mind and then act out on the page have a very, very real impact on the business. Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

Can you

Justin Jackson:

give can you give an example of that?

Jordan Gal:

I I one of my favorite examples. We used live chat software that allowed us to see who was on the site and their, like, bread crumbs. Basically, which pages they had gone to, how much how long they spent there. And so I would watch that. You know, there's always I don't know.

Jordan Gal:

During the day, it's four, five, six people at a time browsing and you're looking at their behavior, trying to figure out what are they doing, where they going. It's also exciting to see someone add something to the card and you're rooting them on and oh no sale came through and then you said, you know, okay cool. Just very like visual visceral Yeah. Experience. One thing that I kept noticing is that people would get to the site, they'd they'd land on the product page, which is where we sent the ad, they would add it to the cart.

Jordan Gal:

So exactly what we want them to do. Yeah. Right? They saw an ad, they looked for a product, they got to the product page, the product satisfied their needs, conveyed the right information to give them enough comfort to add to the cart. And then they would get on the cart and then I would see them go to the about page or go to, you know, the home page and then drop out before purchasing.

Jordan Gal:

Mhmm. And I kept noticing people going to the about page. I was like, what? What is that? Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

And then what you realize is that's because they don't know you or trust you yet. They just saw an ad. They're about to pull their credit card out. Mhmm. And they wanna understand who they're doing business with.

Jordan Gal:

Mhmm. So what we did is we optimized the about page. We put a picture of the three of us, basically, you know, leaned into our differentiation which was this is a family business. There are real people behind the thing.

Justin Jackson:

And then we

Jordan Gal:

had like our five point customer pledge, you know, Always free shipping and this thing and customer service and whatever else. And then I would see people add something to the cart, go to the about page, come back to the cart page, go to the checkout page and buy. I was like, oh. We It worked. We we yeah.

Jordan Gal:

It worked. So that's like an example among Mhmm. Many others. Like removing things from the header once they get to the checkout page. And changing the button colors.

Jordan Gal:

And making sure that you set up front that shipping is free, not waiting until the reveal of the shipping being free.

Justin Jackson:

That's the Alright.

Jordan Gal:

So that, I mean, that formed the basis of the next company which was CartHook. Yeah. Because all CartHook was was building a tool that I wanted as an ecommerce merchant that I like I didn't have. Which was just let me control the damn funnels. Just let me send people where I want, and then buy however I want them to buy, and then just send the order into the back end.

Jordan Gal:

It's not making me putting me in this little box of a front end around the store. That's what Cardic was. Yep. Okay. So this is in my past.

Jordan Gal:

Right? And Rosie now is self serve software. It's the time I've really done fully self serve. And one of the things you realize, especially if you're spending a lot of money on ads, is it really matters. The conversion rate of every single step matters.

Jordan Gal:

Mhmm. And that combined with my impatience over the last few months because we have been doing we've been doing well.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

This thing just keeps growing. Yeah. Awesome. But I know I know we could be doing better. I I feel it.

Jordan Gal:

I'm like, this thing could be a rocket ship. This thing could add 50 k a month to MRR. I know it.

Justin Jackson:

Dude, you are feeling the same things I'm feeling.

Jordan Gal:

Yes. Okay. Okay. So so what that did is it kind of like it like it it made the volcano erupt. Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

It was like, I've had enough. I'm just gonna take control. And so what I did was I looked at our funnel and I was like, hey, buddy. You know how to optimize the funnel. Yep.

Jordan Gal:

Like, take the gloves off, push everything out of the way, and say, this is how I want our funnel to be. Let's go. Yep. And two weeks ago, on Tuesday, we ran the first experiment in this new funnel. Okay.

Jordan Gal:

And oh my god. It worked? It doubled.

Justin Jackson:

Wow. It doubled. So you did something that doubled sign ups?

Jordan Gal:

Doubled sign ups. Not just sign ups. Sign ups with a credit card on file, which is the most important metric for us.

Justin Jackson:

That's what you want. That's the most important metric

Jordan Gal:

for anybody. That's right. Because we we convert 85% of trials that put a credit card on file. So it's like Wow. It's basically everybody.

Jordan Gal:

Everyone that puts a credit card on file, you're gonna convert.

Justin Jackson:

Dude, I thought we were high. We have 75% and that's high. But 85 is that's incredible. It's it's great.

Jordan Gal:

There's a bunch of factors mixed in there, you know, it's only seven days. Some people convert without fully adopting, whatever. But but before the experiment, we were converting 85% of cards on file. But our onboarding was in such a way that people created an account, went through onboarding screens, and then put their card on file. And the theory was let's like these people just saw an ad.

Jordan Gal:

They've never heard about us before. They sign up. Let's give them value. Let's show them how awesome this thing is before we ask them for a credit card on file. And that that worked for a while.

Jordan Gal:

But the market has changed. Our reputation in the market has changed. Our marketing in general. Our maturity. The market's maturity.

Jordan Gal:

So I said, maybe we shouldn't be bound by this assumption Mhmm. That we need to provide a whole bunch of value before someone puts a credit card on file.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah. I love that question even. Like, let's just question this assumption. What are we bound by? What are we artificially maybe putting more friction in front of us?

Jordan Gal:

We're just convincing ourselves. Yeah. Any of these things, the exact price, what to call the plan name, all these things have so many factors that you you can't know. You really you don't know. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

But you start to assume and then there's this weird element of like everything is kinda working really well. So that makes it, that can convince you to look elsewhere. Like the funnel's working, Leave that thing alone. Go fix other stuff. Go put stuff put more at the top of the funnel.

Jordan Gal:

Try new channels, whatever else. Yep. But I guess this kinda came back into focus and and these assumptions just got, you know, questioned. Mhmm. And so we made one change, which is to force a credit card addition before you get into the admin.

Jordan Gal:

That's it. That's it. Mhmm. We just said everything remains the same, but after the account creation page, we just put you right into a credit card page. That's it.

Justin Jackson:

So essentially credit card upfront. Credit card upfront.

Jordan Gal:

So there's always a trade off. Right? Yep. Some people are not going to do that.

Justin Jackson:

They're gonna say,

Jordan Gal:

oh, I don't like I have to put a credit card upfront. I'm gonna leave. So Yeah. So you're gonna have some number go down in the number of people, the percentage of people who are willing to do that. Okay.

Justin Jackson:

Fine.

Jordan Gal:

But the question is, does the does the fact that a lot more people see the credit card

Justin Jackson:

Yep.

Jordan Gal:

Upfront, does that make up for it by having more people will just come across it and put their card in before they go through the onboarding and and it's double? That that's the number. The number is exactly double.

Justin Jackson:

You know what? This is this relates perfectly to that Rob Snyder quote that I pulled, which, you know, people are always asking him, like, what is an example of a market pulling for a solution? What does customer demand look like in practice? And he says, it's people actively trying to buy. So what does that look like?

Justin Jackson:

It means the product's not done, but they want in. It means you put a credit card in front credit card sign up in front of them, and they're like, yes, fine. Is what true customer pull, true customer demand looks like. And it's so easy to delude yourself when you're an entrepreneur, a founder, into thinking, well, know, like people are signing up, we're getting some usage. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Justin Jackson:

But you haven't shown that people want this. And people are always like, well, I'm gonna finish the product first, and then I'll launch it. Or I'm gonna I'll let them be free first. And then no. No.

Justin Jackson:

No. No. If you wanna prove at the beginning and you really wanna keep proving this, customers trying to buy like, right now, our video feature has a waiting list of over 1,500 people. 1,500 people have said, We want to do So the second step is to say, Okay, well, see how many of them try to buy. Let's email them and say, Hey, you can do this, but you got to upgrade your account or you gotta sign up for an account.

Justin Jackson:

Mhmm. And that's gonna cost $49 a month or $490 a year. How many people do that? And there's a lot of people just knocking on the door saying, let me in. I have money.

Justin Jackson:

Like, I and we say, oh, but, guys, it's not quite done yet. There's some bugs. I don't care. Let me in. We don't have distribute to video to Spotify yet.

Justin Jackson:

I don't care. Let me in. That's the energy you're looking for.

Jordan Gal:

Yes. But it requires you also to act confidently.

Justin Jackson:

Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

Right? As opposed to like differential or overly differential. Yeah. And ironically, that confidence actually ends up being more attractive also. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

So just the company and the page and the messaging having a confident approach

Justin Jackson:

that says, this is

Jordan Gal:

a seven day trial. Like, we're not gonna charge you. But if you wanna walk in, put your credit card on file to show you're serious. Yeah. It ends up so here's here's the the funny thing.

Jordan Gal:

It doubled the number of accounts with credit card on file. Yeah. Right? Because now everyone that walks into the admin has a credit card on file. Yep.

Jordan Gal:

And that number is double what it was prior to the experiment. So first, let's just let's just talk about that math real quick. Because whenever I see something like this, I go to the math. Mhmm. I'm gonna use hypothetical numbers.

Jordan Gal:

So I I I'm not talking very specifically about our numbers. But let let's just say this for example. Yeah. Let's say before the experiment, we had five cards on file per day. Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

Five times 30 is a 150. 150 times our ARPU, call it a $100. $15,000 in new MRR. Great. What happens when it doubles?

Jordan Gal:

It's 10 per day times 300. I forgot to I forgot to add the 80% or 85% conversion rate. Yep. Yep. But let let's just go with it.

Justin Jackson:

Go with it.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. Good. So now 300 times a 100, all of a sudden 30 k in MRR. Like, you you change your life, man. Like, that that is a that is a different set of calculations entirely for your entire business.

Jordan Gal:

Mhmm. And and here's what happened alongside it. Not only are there more cards on file, but because the person put a credit card on file, they become more more motivated in their onboarding. So our activation metrics went through the roof. Now everybody tries it.

Jordan Gal:

Everyone's using it. Not only that, but because we separated out the plan choice from the credit card. Those used to be together at the end of onboarding. Okay. You've gone the onboarding.

Jordan Gal:

Your agent's ready. Choose a plan that's right for you. And then and put your credit card on file when you do that. Mhmm. Having those that those two decisions lumped together made people more cautious.

Jordan Gal:

When we separated them out, because the user already put the credit card on file, they go through the onboard and they're like, this thing's awesome. I'm already here. So now, like, a huge percentage are choosing the higher plans. So, like, I just, like, transformed my business Wow. In the span of, like, three weeks.

Justin Jackson:

That's incredible. I I love that you actually have because that's we get them to choose a plan when they put their credit card on front. And for our model, you probably have to do that. But it's interesting to think about that from a customer's perspective. Right?

Justin Jackson:

So I am in motion. I have a to do list that I'm trying to solve. It leads me to heyrosy.com. I'm, like, trying to get in. I'm knocking at the door.

Justin Jackson:

I sign up with my credit card, but now I'm using it. I'm highly motivated to use it. Mhmm. It's increased my motivation that I already had. And then I get to the end of my trial, and it's like, Okay, wait.

Justin Jackson:

I've used this product now. I know how good it is. Where do I want to be here? Well, now I want to be up here because I've already experienced how great the product is. You kind of get the best of freemium without being freemium.

Justin Jackson:

Like, it's like the best version of the trial, really, because now they're opting into their own plan.

Jordan Gal:

Everyone everyone comes in at the lowest tier. Yeah. And then we and then we show the base features during the onboarding. And at the end of the onboarding, we reveal the premium features. And then when you select the premium feature, that's when you are shown that that feature requires a higher tier.

Jordan Gal:

And people are like, I'm already in. It already has all my info. Already I already tested it. Like, yes, I want those other things too. And I'm also in a trial, so it doesn't cost me anything to try those.

Jordan Gal:

So let me just let let me get them. Let let me get

Justin Jackson:

the higher features. This is actually a very cart hook Check reference. Yeah. Because it's like it's like, hey. You've already got this.

Justin Jackson:

Do you want this? We already got all your info. And it's like, yeah. Sure. Add on a couple more sticks of deodorant.

Justin Jackson:

Like Yes. Give me the extras. Yes. That is dude, that's awesome. I think it's also it reveals cause what's above that?

Justin Jackson:

This is the thing I think people still don't quite get, is somebody could hear what you just said and say, Well, I'm going to do that. I'm just going to require a credit card and I'm going to expect that it's going to double everything. It's going to double my MRR. But what's above that in the funnel, the top of every funnel that people forget, people look at funnels and they're like, you know, visitors to the website is always the top of the funnel or whatever. Well, what's above that is how much customer demand is there?

Justin Jackson:

How many people are in motion searching for this? The top of the funnel is number of people searching. That's Right.

Jordan Gal:

Outside of of your website.

Justin Jackson:

It is. Outside of your website. Yes. They're in motion. They're looking like Rob Snyder says, it it's a priority on their to do list, on their mental to do list.

Justin Jackson:

It's like, right now, I'm trying to solve this problem. I know I need a solution for this. And when it's the day, like, all business owners have the day where they're like, you know what? Fuck this. And then they just go into Google.

Justin Jackson:

I'm gonna find a solution. I'm gonna find a service provider. I'm gonna find some software. I'm gonna hire somebody. This is getting done today.

Justin Jackson:

Like, I am in motion. I am yeah. I am highly motivated. That's top of the funnel. The top of the funnel is people want to buy.

Justin Jackson:

People are trying to buy because there's something pushing them. Right? Like, they're pulling the product from you, but they are getting pushed by their own circumstances.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. Yeah. Their need. So I think the important lesson is everyone's funnel has a wide range of nuances. Right?

Jordan Gal:

Our funnel is the way it is because we launched into a market with an enormous amount of skepticism. So a year ago, showing value before asking for an account creation, let alone a credit card, made a lot of sense. And so making this change is is not the right thing for everyone to to do. It depends on your funnel. It depends on your market and your audience, where the traffic is coming from.

Jordan Gal:

Mhmm. We we have a bunch of paid traffic coming through. And so these points in the funnel have a ton of leverage. Yeah. Right?

Jordan Gal:

Because if it's like a 100 visitors a day and 20 go to this step and 10 get to this step and five get to the last step or whatever that is, if you can increase the percentage at one of those junctures, it Yeah. Makes a it's it's like an outsized difference. Like, oh, you've increased this by 20%. You can increase your revenue by a lot more than 20% because Mhmm. So exactly what we did is specific to our situation.

Jordan Gal:

But the the the lesson is take control Mhmm. Of your own damn funnel. Mhmm. This there's a lot of leverage in these individual steps. And whatever has been working for a long time and you just assume your numbers are the way they are Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

Should be questioned regularly. So of course, next week, another experiment on the way. Right? I mean, I changed the h one today. We changed the pricing page the other day.

Jordan Gal:

We changed the background color.

Justin Jackson:

Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

The, you know, more sign up experiments next week. And and now it's like like, I'm high. Like, oh my god.

Justin Jackson:

Oh my god.

Jordan Gal:

My god. I want more. I want so I'm up last night.

Justin Jackson:

You know,

Jordan Gal:

Claude Claude design is good.

Justin Jackson:

You've been making some mock ups? Yes. Making mock

Jordan Gal:

ups to hand over to the designer. Yeah. But it's so responsive to the prompts that it is really like a conversation with the designer. Like when I have a conversation with a designer, I send them a screenshot. I like, you know, cobble something together.

Jordan Gal:

And then I I what I'll say in Slack is, can you move this here and move that there and give this more space and try this thing over here. You can just say that in Claude and it it will just change the copy and keep everything the same and move this other stuff there and make it smaller. It it takes real direction effectively. And so the mock up that I handed over today to the designer was like, this is done. Like, we can use our exact colors and exact fonts, but, like, the copy is the way it is.

Jordan Gal:

The spacing, the color, like, the trust symbols, like, they're exactly the way I want them because I did a bunch of work on my desk before handing it over, which Mhmm. Might be a good topic for after your update. Yeah. I I have another topic around what what should happen on each person's desk around using AI. But that's it.

Justin Jackson:

Oh, interesting. Okay. Yeah. I mean, yeah, that's that's awesome. I love all that stuff.

Justin Jackson:

I I, as a response, I'll say, I am if you're if you if you're challenged to people is to look at their final and maybe make a change, that is frightening for me. It's just like just because it's been working. It works so well right now.

Jordan Gal:

Oh, dangerous.

Justin Jackson:

I know.

Jordan Gal:

Dangerous. The fact that it's working is dangerous.

Justin Jackson:

It's it's I I mean, there are things that for example, adding video as a feature that requires you to sign up on a higher plan is already a change to the funnel in the sense that now we're going to have people opting in to a higher priced plan right off the bat, which has never really happened before. Almost everybody starts on the starter plan. So now to have people choosing from the beginning, Oh, no, no. I'm a video podcaster or I want to do video. So that will affect the funnel already.

Justin Jackson:

That'll be interesting to see. You do have me thinking, though. There's so many scenarios. There's a big difference between somebody switching from another provider than starting a brand new podcast. So someone who's been podcasting for ten years, they're coming.

Justin Jackson:

They're like, I'm fed up. I've heard good things about Transistor. I'm switching. That energy and momentum and what they care about is very different than somebody saying Starting new. I wanna start this.

Justin Jackson:

You know? So Mhmm. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

There's there's there's a cosmetic, psychological, visual elements of the funnel, and then there are, like, mechanical elements. Like, you do this, then you do that. You Yeah. You know, you onboard in this way. You get to this screen.

Jordan Gal:

You have to get through that screen first. You have to choose a plan versus not choose a plan. Think all of it matters. Mhmm. But at least recently it feels like the mechanics of the funnel, like, how it works.

Jordan Gal:

Like, when do you create an account? When do you add your credit card? When do you invite a team member? When do you, like, do these things in the product? Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

Feel like they're harder to change, but but can have a bigger impact. Yeah. Yeah. Like changing copy can improve conversion rate. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

You know, adding trust symbols, adding testimonials to the sign up page, what all these things. But it does feel like the the way people experience going from your website into your product as a paying customer, that that feels like there's a lot of leverage there.

Justin Jackson:

Lot of opportunity. Pascal asks, Justin, do you feel like having video as

Jordan Gal:

a

Justin Jackson:

starting point creates a vacuum for a new top anchor? Yeah. Yeah. I think so. I think that's the part that we're still figuring out.

Justin Jackson:

There'll be a huge benefit for us just if more people are starting on the the mid tier plan. That will already be a a big change. I think what we're going to do with the $99 plan is still I'm still trying to figure that out. But what's clear to me is up till now, haven't had enough value in the higher tiered plans aside from number of downloads you get in each tier. But there hasn't been enough stuff in there that's encouraged people to upgrade.

Justin Jackson:

I think it's like if you start on Starter, your likelihood of upgrading over the lifetime of your account is 4%. That's what it was before. And I think we're gonna get a big increase just from folks now wanting to do video.

Jordan Gal:

Right. And then you can also think about how that process looks Mhmm. And how they how they experience that process. Yeah. So there's one path for new users to choose the higher plan, upgrade to a higher plan during their trial, whatever else.

Jordan Gal:

And then there's a different path for existing customers to upgrade. Mhmm. Right? So it's email and notifications inside the app and and and revealing the value of the new feature and putting case studies in front of them. Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

And also layering that into new users that come in at the bottom tier. And then, you know, sixty days later, that's when you start the upgrade path around here's why you should consider this higher tier. Yes. Percentage people using watching video. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

It's a lot of work. It's a lot of work,

Justin Jackson:

but You got me fired up about the funnel. I'm gonna I'm gonna go and look at all my onboarding emails. I'm gonna be like yeah. I'm I'm in. I'll report back.

Jordan Gal:

Cool. Hell yeah.

Justin Jackson:

So I think what I want to talk about next is and really get your input and actually anybody in chat as well, this would be interesting. I'm wondering how do you do employee reviews? So we're right now, our current cadence at Transistor is we have an annual review. We we used to do them on their their individual anniversary, but they're all kind of around the same time. And so we just said first week of July or second week of July, we just schedule them all that week.

Justin Jackson:

Everybody gets the review the same time. Helps John and I just be in that mindset. Typically, we schedule a call, we review the year, how did it go for you, what are some things you are really proud of, what are some things that energized you, what are some things that drained you, where are you kind of going in your career that you think we should should know about? Anything else we can do better as leaders? And then, you know, typically, we review compensation and benefits and things like that during that time.

Jordan Gal:

So those are tied? Those are tied right Compensation, Compensation, title.

Justin Jackson:

Yep. That's right. Yeah. I mean, there's only six of us, so we're doing this with four people. It's formal for us, but it is informal in a sense.

Justin Jackson:

What I'm thinking about doing is outside of like I think that's a different question. It's like, how do you figure out pay raises and all that? I've I've reached out to, like, 10 founders, and every year I do this, I reached out to, like, 10 people, say, how do you do this? What's your scale? All that.

Justin Jackson:

I've got a pretty good sense of how we could talk about that, actually. It's interesting to see how different it is. But for the review itself, the the different the thing I'm thinking about doing differently this year is sending them a pre interview survey just to give them some things to write down. Have one of those questions as a self assessment on how they think they did on a linear scale in terms of completing the requirements for their job. Like, did you meet them?

Justin Jackson:

Did you exceed them? Do you feel like you fell short? And then using that as the basis of our conversation. But, yeah, I'm curious how you think about this, how you do this stuff.

Jordan Gal:

So first, I just wanna commend you on the the the different aspects that you just described. That's the right way to do it. What you mentioned in the reviews ranging from what can we be doing better as managers, what are the highlights for you that you feel that you've done well on where Mhmm. So if so like bravo. That that's all all the right stuff.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. And it doesn't matter how small your company is. People care about their compensation, obviously. They also care about their title. Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

Cannot you cannot separate those two from anything around reviews. Mhmm. I think compensation philosophy matters.

Justin Jackson:

Okay.

Jordan Gal:

Almost more than compensation because without a compensation philosophy, you get lost around compensation questions. Yes. And you don't have anything to fall back on. Okay. Tell me about it.

Jordan Gal:

You need, like, a compensation ideology. Otherwise, you're you're you're kinda lost.

Justin Jackson:

What's an example of that? What's what's, like, what's your what's your philosophy?

Jordan Gal:

Our our philosophy is pay pretty high up on the scale. So call it top, you know, 90% and then no bonuses. And then we increase based on cost of living adjustment for the social security pub published number.

Justin Jackson:

Okay.

Jordan Gal:

So people know, like, we're you're you're not gonna get a, you know, gigantic increase in your compensation unless you're changing titles. Mhmm. Then then you get into, like, a different, you know, role that has its own bands. Yep. But everyone knows we're not doing bonuses.

Jordan Gal:

We just we just pay you more. Mhmm. And we pay ourselves more. And we don't take bonuses either as as leadership. Yep.

Jordan Gal:

And then we look at, you know, at the beginning of the year, January, and we look over Administration and their published number on the cost of living increase. And if that says, you know, 4.4%, everyone's salary is going up by 4.4%.

Justin Jackson:

Got it. So you're really you're really connecting it with cost of inflation, and that might be three to five percent increase every year. That that's right.

Jordan Gal:

And so that that makes sense for us because we are we're we're still in survival mode. So we're limited in what we can and can't do, but we also don't wanna pay people too little. Right? The the the three executives in our company are in their forties with kids. All three of us.

Jordan Gal:

And we were I'm not I'm not taking a 100 k, you know? Mhmm. It it doesn't make sense. So I Yeah. I gotta pay myself well so that I can focus without being stressed.

Justin Jackson:

Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

And and that, you know, you obviously want any compensation philosophy you have to be distributed fairly Yeah. In terms of, like, everyone gets treated the same way. Mhmm. So a while back back after Rally raised a bunch of money, we had a chief of staff, Claire, who's so helpful. She had a ton of HR experience And she helped me learn a lot of these things around something like compensation philosophy and communicating it and setting I will say, since we did the pivot to Rosie, it's been so survival mode that we have thrown a lot of this stuff out the window.

Jordan Gal:

Not the compensation philosophy, but we don't we're not nearly as formal as we should be on one on ones. We don't do annual reviews. We're just kinda like full survival mode. Yeah. And it does feel like it's it's soon time to come back.

Jordan Gal:

So I do think it makes sense where you are. It wouldn't have happened without you proactively getting the company there.

Justin Jackson:

Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

But you're you're where you should be. It's it's a mature company. It's been around a while. Yeah. Stability is important.

Jordan Gal:

And it's not just fly by the seat of your pants, and it's not just make stuff up as you go along. So I I think you're doing the right thing. I I need to catch up to where you are over time. Yeah. To to settle things on that front because I don't mind chaos, but most people that are not founders are not that into chaos.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah. So in in your model, you are paying high at the beginning. So you're offering a job and you're because you said top 80% or something.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. You you can right. You can do something like fiftieth percentile and then people are motivated by bonuses. Yeah. So if someone who wants to make $200,000 a year gets paid a $150,000 a year, but their total compensation with bonuses if they hit all their targets can be $2.50, That's one philosophy.

Jordan Gal:

Mhmm. Let's give you kind of the bare minimum and then the rest is incentive based. Yeah. We decided not to do that because that is a very, like, sales oriented approach. Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

And you have engineers. You have product people. You have, like so it didn't make sense for us. We're not a sales driven organization. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

And so what made sense for us was, let's just pay people well. We're already asking a lot of them. Mhmm. But then you can't also get paid really well and then also get bonuses on top of it. Then it's just kind like, well, we're now just overpaying everybody.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. So that give and take around, like, a higher level of your role Mhmm. Like, you're probably making more at our company than you would somewhere else with the exact same role. Mhmm.

Justin Jackson:

But then no bonus. Like big companies? Like Google?

Jordan Gal:

No. Big companies.

Justin Jackson:

No. Okay. So you're you're you're you're pegging this to, like, some sort of startup index. Yes.

Jordan Gal:

Yes. Okay.

Justin Jackson:

Interesting. We certainly have a philosophy. Think in a small company, what's really tricky is to figure out because I can remember working for small companies and being quite ambitious, partly because I had four kids to feed. So came into a company getting paid this. And I was very clear, like, with everybody, like, listen, I wanna make more money.

Justin Jackson:

Like Yep. I'm here. I I have four kids. I wanna make more money. And so, you know, my first job in tech was in customer support.

Justin Jackson:

But I was clear with my boss. I said, listen, I wanna do whatever it takes. I'm gonna be asking you. I'm be noticing things, problems you need to have solved. I am going to be trying to solve those problems and moving up the stack and agitating a little bit, you know?

Justin Jackson:

I got myself to a certain place where I was like, you know what? I'm not where I need to be. I'm gonna go interview a bunch of places. Got some offers. Came back to my boss, said, I'm leaving.

Justin Jackson:

He said, no, stay. I'll give you a raise and a and a new title. And, you know, that was a small company. I I can understand there's different things that motivate different people. Yeah.

Justin Jackson:

It's and it's tricky to go it is tricky to figure all this stuff out. Like, especially when I No

Jordan Gal:

no one just tells you the info. It's tough to find it.

Justin Jackson:

Yes. Yeah. I I did get some founders to share with me their actual scale that they've used. Okay. A lot of it feels overly formal.

Justin Jackson:

Like, it's just like, man, for six people, like, it's like, we don't often, have there are these grids. You know, I think everybody in the chat's probably seen these, but there are these grids of, like, you know, meeting this thing, da da da da da, and then there's, like, six kind of responsibilities underneath it. And then in each box, there's, like, a description of whether you're meeting it or not meeting it. I tried to create something like that. And as I was going through it, I'm like, this just doesn't feel right for me.

Justin Jackson:

Like, I have a sense of, like, are you killing it or are you not killing it? You know, are you at the top of your game or like, I think you kinda have an intuitive sense about that. Right. There's only a few of you.

Jordan Gal:

It's not like you they're four layers away and you'd never see them. Yeah. You know, you really should have a pretty tight control over things and a feel because any element of unfairness Yeah. Any element of injustice between employees Yeah. Favoritism, that that that's the poison.

Jordan Gal:

I think the hardest part for me for a very long time was empathizing with motivation that I that I didn't quite grok myself. My motivation is in the equity in the company that I want to sell and have a payday. Yep. And, yes, we give everyone. Everyone in the company has stock options.

Jordan Gal:

But that's not the main motivation for for most employees. Right? So it took me a little while to wrap my head around what does that mean, what does that look like, how do I empathize with that if that's not the way I'm built. And that was really important to understand. Now the way I think about things and the way I communicate them, especially when someone new is joining the company, is oriented toward them and their needs.

Jordan Gal:

Mhmm. Right? Like, I I I like saying in the interview process, I know this is not the last job you're ever gonna have. Mhmm. What I want for you out of this experience is to have an incredible challenging time where you learn and when you walk away, you have a hell of a story to tell.

Jordan Gal:

Yep. Whatever you wanna do next. Yep. That you're really proud of And and it almost helps to set that, like, you know, moving away from, like, this is a family type of vibe and moving away from, like, the expectation unrealistic expectation that you owe everything to the company and you'll never leave and all all this other So that in my one on ones and and in my empathizing with their point of view, you you mentioned something that I think is critical on, like, where are you in your career? Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

Where where is your interest leading you?

Justin Jackson:

Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

How can we help you? Because ignoring that stuff is I mean, that's why people leave.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah. And and I think yeah. I think that's it's it it is helpful to get a sense of what people want. When I started doing customer support, I was like, I don't wanna do this for the rest of my life. You know?

Justin Jackson:

I wanna I wanna do something else. And I was pretty clear, like, guys, like, I'm kind of biding my time right now. Like, I'm gonna be an incredible employee for the next five, ten years while my kids are young. But as soon as my kids are older, like, I'm gonna start another company. I'm just I'm just that's gonna happen.

Justin Jackson:

That fire is burning right now and I'm, like, quenching quenching it. But I will focus that energy on this company and will you know? But the desire to build your own thing cannot be satisfied when you're an employee. You just can't. I don't think there's such thing as an entrepreneurial employee.

Justin Jackson:

I think entrepreneurs start companies. I think you can be ambitious. I think you can be creative. I think you can be on top of things. I think you could show incredible autonomy and foresight, etcetera.

Justin Jackson:

But for me, the only thing that was going to satisfy that desire to be an entrepreneur. And really, friend Bob Perkins always says, Your fastest horses are always the biggest pains in the butt. So, you got fast horses? Yeah, they're a pain in the ass. And where I was a pain in the ass was, I was like, I'm an owner.

Justin Jackson:

And they're like, no, you're not. You're you're an employee. I said, well, if this was my company and they said, this isn't your company. And it it was it that frustration of being like, dang, if this was my company, I'd be doing this. Well, Justin, you got to go sorry, buddy.

Justin Jackson:

If you're not happy running around this track, we can let you out. We can let put you out to field and you can go do your own thing.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. Just raise your hand. We'll we'll stop the ride for you.

Justin Jackson:

We'll let

Jordan Gal:

you hop out anytime. Yeah. Alright. What else, baby?

Justin Jackson:

What else? Well, why don't we go with your you had one more thing and let's just add on let's just end on that.

Jordan Gal:

Okay. Cool. Yeah. So I these two things. The the post on Victor I think is interesting.

Jordan Gal:

But maybe a better topic is this is this what what happens on your desk.

Justin Jackson:

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I wanna hear. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

Okay. I have found when I have been describing this problem to peers that it's happening to other people also. Okay. Okay. Here's the scenario.

Jordan Gal:

Yep. Engineer works on a feature. Yep. And, of course, it's, you know, June 2026. So a lot of that work is done with AI.

Jordan Gal:

Okay. Yep. So let's say you're using Claude code, you're building out a feature. Right?

Justin Jackson:

Yep.

Jordan Gal:

So you're taking information from linear, and there's a bunch of product requirements and specs and nuances and copy and all that stuff. And you bring that into Claude and Claude's building it for you and then you are getting ready to hand it off. And then it's gotta go back to product to be kind of like finalized and checked and everyone yes, this makes sense. What about timing? Which deployment is it going into?

Jordan Gal:

Okay. So everyone kind of gets that process. Yeah. Two years ago when Claude wasn't a thing, the the the level and depth of familiarity and understanding of each individual feature nuance and every little field Mhmm. The developer just had a much stronger feel for.

Jordan Gal:

Because they built every little thing by hand themselves, and then when they handed it over, they they had an enormous amount of ownership and understanding of every little detail. Yeah. And so in that linear doc, after it's handed back over to product for some testing and review, When a question came up Mhmm. The developer knew it, man. They knew their stuff cold because they just spent a week building it.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. Something happened around these AI tools that created some distance between the developer and the code. Mhmm. And now when it gets brought back into the process as, like, okay, let's get this tested and get ready for deployment. Mhmm.

Jordan Gal:

What we're finding is that sometimes the product person will will have a question for the developer. Developer doesn't kinda know or doesn't kind of understand it the same way they used to.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

And the product person's frustrated by it. Like, hold on a second. You you handed me over something you don't fully understand. Understand. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. And then when I ask you about it, you're going to Claude. And you're asking Claude about that nuance. Yeah. And you're handing that Claude answer over to the product person.

Jordan Gal:

The product product person then all of a sudden has more work to do. Yeah. And so the way we've been thinking about this and talking about this is is hold on a second. You have work product that's on your desk. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

And when you hand over that work product, regardless of your role, what what what you know, this could be copy in a landing page. It could be whatever.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah. You

Jordan Gal:

can't use AI to go super fast and then take that work product and hand it over to someone else and put it on their desk in a way that creates more work and stress and frustration for the person that just received your work product on their desk.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

You gotta you gotta clean it up on your desk first. Mhmm. And then when you hand it over, it's gotta be at the same level of competency and understanding and and depth as

Justin Jackson:

if

Jordan Gal:

you didn't use AI. Mhmm. So I guess what we're really saying is you might need to slow down a little bit.

Justin Jackson:

But

Jordan Gal:

it's not fair for for you to take your work that you're responsible for. Not your work. Your responsibilities and just hand them over to someone else because it looks ready. Yeah. Does this sound familiar or, like, make sense?

Justin Jackson:

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I think that I mean, there's all sorts of versions of this in the popular culture as well, which is like, listen, like, don't give me your Claude readout. Like, that's just lazy.

Justin Jackson:

And you're you are giving me more work. Now I gotta grok this thing that came from Claude. Like and I think also because Claude is so verbose, the other thing people are pushing back on is like and I've tried experimenting with these things. Like, I just created a ticket mostly with Claude. It's so verbose.

Justin Jackson:

And I just kind of was like, okay, well, maybe this is helpful. Let me know if it's not helpful or whatever. But there is a version of that where it's just like, come on. Like, there's obviously a lot of nuance to this, but generally, what I really want is for people to have done as much of the work themselves as they can. And so, like, especially when we're, like, thinking about bugging one of the engineers, It's like, okay.

Justin Jackson:

Before we get there, let's try to figure out every avenue possible to get this done on our own. And that might mean you have to manually do it. Like, what they could write as an SQL query in in three seconds, you it takes you an hour. But you've saved them a bunch of time, and and that trade off might be worth it. Is this kinda what you're talking about?

Justin Jackson:

Yeah. Yeah. I

Jordan Gal:

we see it in multiple places, and that that's what started setting off some alarm bells. I started to send some frustration, and people didn't really have a clear explanation for where the frustration was coming from. Yep. But it but it started coming out in in similar ways. So so we have a lot of emails to write.

Jordan Gal:

Mhmm. We were launching stuff fast now. And when there's a new feature coming out, there's a whole bunch of emails that needs to get rid. Yeah. The announcements.

Jordan Gal:

What does the announcement look like for the existing customers? What about for new customers? What about for the main list? What about

Justin Jackson:

the

Jordan Gal:

there's just a bunch of stuff to write. And of course, we should be using AI to help write. Mhmm. But but then when a human reviews the email before it goes out,

Justin Jackson:

because Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

At some point, like, real people are gonna see this thing. Yep. And and what we kept finding was, like, that's not exactly how the feature works. It kinda works that way, but that's not the right way to say it. So let me rewrite this sentence.

Jordan Gal:

And then this paragraph, it's not a 100% accurate. So let me spend my time. Like, hold on. The person responsible for writing the emails, that work should be done on their desk.

Justin Jackson:

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Jordan Gal:

Yes. So we started seeing in copywriting. We started seeing marketing. We started to see it in design. We started to see it in in features.

Jordan Gal:

And we were like, this is this is a thing. Mhmm. People are using these tools. Great. But we need to ask people to be more professionally conscientious.

Jordan Gal:

Yeah. Just because it's done, don't hand that shit over to me. You're gonna be judged on what you hand over. That is a representation of your work product and your bar for excellence. And you're gonna hurt yourself if you keep handing me junk and making me frustrated.

Jordan Gal:

And and what what it took was hearing enough frustration from other people to say, hold on. Hold on. We need a new form of empowerment from me to say to every employee, hey, if someone gives you slop, don't don't do the work to fix the slop. Yeah. Push it back up.

Jordan Gal:

Uh-uh. It can't come off your desk yet. It's not ready.

Justin Jackson:

Yes. If you think about an assembly line, I I've just been listening to the Acquired episode on Walt Disney Company. And Okay. You know, animation used to be an assembly line. Right?

Justin Jackson:

And so you get one cell from the person before you, and then you'd have people that were coloring those in. But if you receive an animation cell and it's not correct, well, I can't start the coloring work until the outlining work has been done properly. So sorry, you got to go back and you got to finish that. I think it's a similar idea. And maybe even broadening this concept, I think, and this is something I'm going to try to figure out how to encourage the team with, is in your role of responsibility, I really want and I think this is hard for John and I both because we like to take on a lot of the responsibility.

Justin Jackson:

But to say, listen, I shouldn't be finding problems with this just haphazardly as I'm navigating my day. Mhmm. You should be on top of that. Like, you are ultimately responsible for this piece. Now, of course, we're all gonna help each other out.

Justin Jackson:

Sometimes we're going to run into things like, oh, Justin, you forgot this. There's a typo on your email. Sure. That's fine. But in general, I think this idea of here's the work on your desk or here's your sphere of responsibility, it doesn't just have to do with the assembly line.

Justin Jackson:

It also has to do with the warranty. It has to do with, like, who installed this furnace? Oh, that was you? Okay. Well, it's your job to maintain the furnace.

Justin Jackson:

Like, it's your job to make sure that thing keeps running. It's your job to make sure that thing is optimized. It's your job to make sure that thing is clean. And I think defining those things is helpful, especially because teams can suffer from this thing of, like, invisible work where some people are just shouldering an enormous amount of work, and nobody realizes it. It's like Yes.

Justin Jackson:

How's all this getting done? You know?

Jordan Gal:

It's one of the one of the trickier things about really good employees often have a very high threshold for pain. Yeah. And and what I ask people is to lower their tolerance for pain. Yes. If something hurts above a certain degree, just raise your hand.

Jordan Gal:

Hey, something's not right. Yeah. Because because the process shouldn't hurt that much. Yeah. Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

It's really like a But team

Justin Jackson:

but what about the reverse of that? Like What's that opinion too much? Yeah. It feels like there's the opposite problem too, which is just like, listen. Like, this is a job, man.

Justin Jackson:

We're not digging ditches here. This is a good job. We got things to do. And

Jordan Gal:

I don't have any any of that in my company, man.

Justin Jackson:

They're going.

Jordan Gal:

It's it doesn't Yes. Yes. Yeah. I I think I've created enough of an environment where as soon as that pops up Mhmm. The people around them have enough permission to basically point out and say, the the same this ain't right.

Jordan Gal:

This is doesn't not. Make sense. This is not how we do things. And my willingness to fire people because they don't fit Mhmm. Has created an environment where people just feel like no one's doing that.

Jordan Gal:

There's no one at the company. This is remote. I never see anyone and I have no worry about people, like, trying hard. Mhmm. So I I think that's kind of like a table stakes for a small company.

Jordan Gal:

Big company, you can't you can't keep that up. But a company under 10 people, there's no room for for

Justin Jackson:

that at all. Yeah. There must still be discrepancy, though. Like, it feels like the the this is what I I I think it is difficult to know. And I this isn't just with Transistor.

Justin Jackson:

I think that any team I've been a part of, I'm always kinda like there is always this feeling of, like, is everyone else working as hard as me? Like, I you know, like, it it's hard it is hard to know sometimes and to to evaluate that.

Jordan Gal:

The evaluation, I agree. Very difficult. What I found is evaluation is impossible because it's super subjective. And evaluation through more objective measures is a lot better. And for me, it's not like measurement like how many tickets are being done, how many lines of code.

Jordan Gal:

It's just is there friction in the process? Because friction just reveals itself.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah.

Jordan Gal:

Friction's like, well, this email is supposed to go out and you're responsible for copy.

Justin Jackson:

Yeah. It's not done.

Jordan Gal:

So like, what what's going on here? Yeah. That that just very rarely happens. Yeah. On one hand, maybe it means we're not going fast enough.

Jordan Gal:

But on the other hand, it's like, it's humming along properly enough that if something pops up, it becomes very apparent very quickly. And then and and then there's just very open minded, what's going on? Everything okay? And then there's almost always, I'm sorry. This week's been crazy.

Jordan Gal:

Here's what's going on at home. My bad. I'll be back to normal next week kind of thing.

Justin Jackson:

Yep. Yep.

Jordan Gal:

And I like, okay. Great. Oh, you're you're human. You know? Great.

Jordan Gal:

Me too.

Justin Jackson:

Yep. Yep. I think that's good, man. I think we did it. I think that's good.

Justin Jackson:

This is a good episode. We got about an hour of chatting. I hope Brian, I hope you're out there on a plane listening to this right now. We missed you, buddy. Hopefully, we'll have you back in the coming weeks.

Justin Jackson:

Are you are you here next week, Jordan?

Jordan Gal:

I am here next week, and I'm heading over to the Outer Banks, but not not until July. Yeah. I'm I'm around the next few weeks.

Justin Jackson:

Okay. Well, next

Jordan Gal:

Of week is course, I fly off to Miami by myself to watch a soccer game with my friends. Yeah.

Justin Jackson:

Well, that could that should happen too, for sure.

Jordan Gal:

I think so too. Absolutely.

Justin Jackson:

Alright. Thanks to everyone in the chat that showed up. I see all you folks. We got TJ the Dev, Dave Jones, Tamer, Tix2. Lots of great comments in here, especially once we started talking about the cognitive debt, employee reviews, really great feedback in here.

Justin Jackson:

You're always welcome to join us when we stream live. Just join our mailing list on panelpodcast.com. We'll see you Thank folks next Bye.