765 Chris Keith: Hire Smarter

[Uncle Marv]
Hello friends, Uncle Marv here with another episode of the IT Business Podcast, the show for MSPs and IT professionals where we talk about all things tech and try to help you run your business better, smarter, and faster. Thank you all for joining. This is our Wednesday live show and my guest coming up just a little bit is going to be Chris Keith, Hirexe.

He was on just a few days ago for kind of what we call part one, the introduction, and we're going to have him back and kind of recap what we talked about before, maybe do a little bit of clarifications. And for those of you that are joining us live in the chat, I encourage you to answer any questions, ask any questions that you have, and I'll have Chris actually answer those. So that is what is on tap for now.

If you did see the video, even if you're watching behind, you would have seen the intro. And just to give you a quick recap of what's happened in the last week, the last couple of days, I've been participating in the IT Expo, big conference that happens down here in Fort Lauderdale every year. And I always tell people, if you are here in my city, you need to let me know.

And because of that, we had some people over at our office today for a nice little luncheon. They are all showing up in the pictures there, and I have tagged them on the appropriate social medias. So thank you to everyone that showed up.

I heard that the food was good and the company was even better. So thank you to all of that. And I'll have those all tagged in the show notes there.

I also was on a MSP panel yesterday. Actually, I know I posted it today. Some of you were like, oh, I want to hear it.

Sorry, you missed it. That was yesterday, 10 a.m. in the morning. And actually, some friends that you might know from our channel were on there.

Josh Liberman was there, Corey Kirkendoll, and then another local MSP, a guy by the name of Rick. I'm going try to get him on the show a little bit later and talk about his MSP. He is a few miles north of me in Deerfield Beach.

So that was what's been happening here. I know that I talked about my client last week that we were doing the 365 migration. Yes, it is still going.

And part of reason it is going this week is because they actually realized that they owned another domain name that they wanted to use for their email address instead of the one that they have. So I told the IT person that I'm working with at that place that, well, you need to get the domain name set up in 365 and get all the DNS information set up and all of that. So this morning, he emails me and says, all right, we're ready to go.

And I said, oh, okay. So I went into the 365 portal. The domain shows up there, but he had not yet finished setting up the DNS, which means he had to obviously go to the control panel of where the domain is, put in all the DNS settings for the MS records and all that.

So I had to shift it back to him once again to go and get that stuff done. So hopefully this will be done soon. We're now into month two of a 365 migration, and some of you have tried to chastise me.

I get it, but not my fault. Not my fault at all. And we will keep you updated.

I did put together my list of PowerShell scripts that I used through all of that process. So I promise I will get that out to you. I think I'm going to put that into a PDF form and make it available to download and you guys can look at it, tell me what's right and what's wrong.

And I'll do a little bit more exclamation about that. Let's see here. I'll do a little bit more housekeeping later, but that's pretty much it.

And yes, this is live. I just got a text about the live show. So here we are.

All right. So coming up, folks, I told you Chris Keith from Hirexe is going to be joining us again for part two of his show. So he is coming to the stage now.

And Chris, welcome to the show.

[Chris Keith]
Marv, how are you?

[Uncle Marv]
I am good. How are you, sir?

[Chris Keith]
I'm excellent. I'm actually in an excellent mood right now. Do you have any idea why that may be?

[Uncle Marv]
Why is that?

[Chris Keith]
I don't know if you watch football or if you heard that the Superbowl was over the weekend, but the Philadelphia Eagles won, my friend.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah, I heard something about that. I heard Swiftie Nation was not happy.

[Chris Keith]
You want to know another fun fact, though?

[Uncle Marv]
Okay.

[Chris Keith]
So it's funny. Oftentimes when I stand up and give keynote speeches at events and things like that, you know how everyone always likes to start off with some sort of a fun fact. My fun fact is we are family friends with the Swiss.

Really? Yeah. Our dads actually used to work together.

She's originally from Pennsylvania before they moved down to Nashville.

[Uncle Marv]
I knew that.

[Chris Keith]
And our moms are still in touch. So way back in the day, we went to the beach together. We have a bunch of photos together.

So I know Taylor very distantly.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. Any benefits now that she's worldwide famous? Can you just call her up and say, hey, Taylor, I need you to come help me out at a conference?

[Chris Keith]
She's pretty big time at this point. So that ask has gotten progressively more difficult. And I'm still a Birds fan deep down, too.

But I guess you could say it was a win-win for us this weekend. But I'm happy that the Eagles pulled it out.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. I wasn't happy with that, so we're not going to talk about it anymore. So for those that are watching live or listening to the audio version of this and for some reason you skipped episode 763, that is when Chris was on before.

We talked about the new company, which is not new anymore. It's about a year old. Hirexe and about the great benefits of being able to hire some South African labor.

I shouldn't really say labor. Some staffers to help augment your organization at a very reasonable price. So Chris, let's kind of just go back.

And my first question to you is sometimes my guest gets feedback on their show. So did anybody reach out to you with any questions or comments from that show?

[Chris Keith]
Ooh. So yeah, I actually, I had gotten a couple folks that reached out. I think one of the interesting pieces is when people follow along from a distance, every time that they get a little bit more intel or a little bit more specificity, it always surprises them.

So I actually had a handful of people reach out and they reference like, Ooh, so it's not that you just do, you know, it help desk, like, you know, L1, L2, L3 techs. Like you, you could do a chief of staff sort of a higher or, man, I've had a really tough time. You know, another person had a tough time finding a marketing type of person and they were really specific about, Hey, I don't want this person to be just design related.

I'm actually hoping that they can help out with SEO and hoping that they can help out with, you know, pay-per-click ads, things like that. I said, sure enough, we were able to give them great resources. So I would say, you know, just sharing that additional context, people, people like that, they were excited.

And we had some great conversations on that front.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. There you go. Not always, you know, support desk tech is what we need.

So good. Glad that was able to work out. So I did a little bit of research.

I know that I don't think we talked about it on the air. I think we talked about it afterwards that I had mentioned that another podcast that I listened to actually talked about overseas help. And before he had talked about, you know, somebody in the far, far East.

And I, for some reason, it stuck out to me that his last few episodes, he's actually mentioned the South African market as well. It's not necessarily anything specific. His is just overseas staffing.

And I don't want to, you know what I'm going to say it. So somewhere.com, which seems like a weird name, but he specifically talks about finding amazing employees that cost 80% less. And he specifically mentioned South Africa as the, as the source.

And it's kind of struck me is, is Oh, here we go. So yeah. So it was the Philippines before and now it's South Africa.

So what happens that all of these countries, all of a sudden people start tagging them as resources.

[Chris Keith]
Yeah. So was that, was that Nick Huber?

[Uncle Marv]
You know, Nick? Yes, it was
[Chris Keith]
Of course. Yeah. I loved it.

What more would you say more of what's your favorite social media platform?

[Uncle Marv]
My favorite?

[Chris Keith]
Yeah.

[Uncle Marv]
I will say right now that the most engaging is LinkedIn.

[Chris Keith]
Yep.

[Uncle Marv]
The most amusing is the Facebook. Is the Facebook. Gotcha.

[Chris Keith]
So I would, I think I'm with you. I like, I like in engaging and audience building on LinkedIn, but I think if I had to go with one favorite Twitter is just such a fascinating platform. There's, you can use it for good and get a lot of information there.

And then of course, there's a bunch of noise. If you go, if you want to go down the noise rabbit, right. I really like Twitter and he's pretty active on Twitter.

[Uncle Marv]
He is, he is. And I've, I don't know what made me start listening to his show, but it's interesting sometimes.

[Chris Keith]
Yeah. Yeah. But back to your question.

So he so he actually acquired somewhere from, from Marshall who started gosh, I forget what the, what the name of Marshall's was before they rebranded it to, to, to somewhere. But Marshall had started the company. I want to say like 2019 Marshall Haas started 2019 and he had just kind of started off, like, you know, gotten a few virtual assistants over in the Philippines and realize, Hey, I think that there might be a business there.

Fast forward. He exited last year, I think for like a decent chunk of change. But when Nick came in, he realized a handful of things and that was number one.

Okay. Like this, this global talent pool isn't going away. I don't think he would have bought the business.

Right. If he didn't believe in, in the long term, like success and well, you just like the over, like the rising tide lifts all ships. Right.

So I think he realized that number one, but then number two, he realized because, you know, he had been in this game, he had hired like a handful of people as well. He realized, man, like, like South Africa is really, really where the talent is at. Right.

So I think, you know, through his personal experience, he like interacted, like got to see, you know, the dialogue, he got to understand that the sophistication of their workforce, he got to understand, you know, like that, that the time change wasn't that different, like cultural affinity is really, really close as well. So I think for all of those reasons, he has, he's leaned into, or they've opened up, I want to say the South African operations of, of that particular branch. Now, what I'll also say is their business, their bread and butter, and I think over 80% of their revenue is still coming from the Philippines.

So that's frankly like where their operations are set up and where, what they're best at. I am joking around, but I started, or I'm a native South African company. My roots go very, very deep here.

As I mentioned before, that ranges from, you know, prior employees of mine who have scaled their organizations to over 1500, 2000 overseas employees, and then labor lawyers on staff, et cetera, et cetera. So I'm not jumping on South Africa because it's the new shiny penny, right? I'm building my base, my business foundationally from this space.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay. So a sidebar question, since I, you know, it's rare that I've mentioned another podcast and people have heard of it because for some reason I, you know, I go outside of tech. Is it common for entrepreneurs like yourself and Nick, you know, that have started multiple companies, you guys like end up running around in some of the same circles, even if you're not in the same industry?

[Chris Keith]
I would say definitely. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah. So, so he and I aren't like ultra close, but I'm really good friends in New York with a couple of people that are close with him. He's actually in, he's in this organization called Hampton that, that Sam Parr founded.

And I know a bunch of guys in that actually one of like an MSP that's based down in Louisiana that I'm really, really close with is also a Hampton member. So inevitably, yes, a lot of, a lot of us kind of run around in similar circles and we share some secrets behind the scenes and whatnot.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay. And a question that I did get that they wanted me to ask you in terms of clarification on your, the vetting process. And the question was, can you elaborate on the specific steps involved in that process and what key qualities you look for beyond technical skills?

[Chris Keith]
Yeah, gosh, that's a, that's a great question. And frankly, I guess a little story that I would tell as to one of the reasons why I was so passionate about getting into this space or this industry is like Marv, you and I both know that so much of, of really what we hire for and what we look to build out teams isn't necessarily something that you can put on a resume, right? It's, it's dynamic aspects of people's personalities.

How do you present? Are you engaging? Do you ask the right questions?

Did you prepare for the call? All of the, all of those sorts of things. And I think all like those aspects, which frankly are more qualitative, right?

They're not as quantitative, was really difficult for us to, to capture. And frankly, I think this is one of the reasons why the recruiting industry has been able to stick around for as long as it has at the margins that it has as well, was it was tough to quantify personality aspects, personality aspects prior to AI. And now with AI, we have, we have the ability to just, you know, quantify a lot more information, aggregate it, and then make it useful.

So that's, that's a long-term play, what I'm looking at building out with the platform, but just to keep it extremely simple right now, we run them through a handful of tests. So when we first engage with applicants, we send like a very quick email that has a couple of things that you just have to pay attention to. And you'd be, you'd be amazed that you send simple instruction instructions, people just fumble those, right?

So that's a, that's a little bit of a, you know, that's not necessarily you're disqualified, but it's a, it's a nice leading indicator. Then my team, actually, we have, we have video recordings. So every single person that we send to you, you're going to at least have them answering, you know, one question.

And if they make it the final stages, like it could be more than one question about why their applicable for the job, like a significant challenge or problem that they had to overcome in the future, just so that you get a feel for how people present, you know, how they communicate, all those sorts of things. And then on the backend, we're also taking a look at a bunch of like personality sort of, sort of check, check boxes. So energy is there, there's effort that's associated prep preparedness for the call.

And a handful of, of those like, like engagement sort of metrics, we have a, we have like a really, it's actually a really intense database on the backend where we are, you know, kind of, you know, quantifying some of those, some of those sorts of metrics. And then of course, putting them all together and you need to meet a certain threshold or baseline for us to even, you know, recommend you or be included in the talent pool.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. Nice. So you mentioned the video stuff.

I, I imagine this hasn't happened to you yet and hopefully it won't happen, but what was it that company know before that got bamboozled by somebody in Korea with a deep fake video and stuff? I'm assuming that some of your testing will thwart that type, that kind of thing, right?

[Chris Keith]
Oh yeah. Yeah. Without a doubt.

So we're, we're having multiple touch points, multiple areas of engagement, having people fill out multiple forms, like it's, think of it as like a, it's true, like a funnel type of progression. So there's a lot of applicants at the top of the funnel every time that they progress down that funnel. And it's, there's quite a few steps we're talking, you know, eight to nine steps.

There's going to be some sort of, you know, at least like we, we joke around internally, we call it two-factor authentication. So if it is technology that's, that's leading the charge of doing the majority of the heavy lifting, there's always going to be someone from my team getting eyes on things, double checking, making sure that, that things are real. And then before we actually start engaging directly and set people up for interviews, my team is, you know, WhatsAppping, they're on phone calls, they're texting these people, you know, back and forth just to make sure that, you know, everyone is who they, who they say they are and who we thought that they were.

[Uncle Marv]
Right. Another question that I got was along the lines of the 30 days that we talked about, the month to month commitment that everybody was so excited about. And then all of a sudden, somebody thought of the fact, well, how in the world can you ensure, you know, consistent performance and get a commitment when they can leave within 30 days, just the same way you can cancel within 30 days?

[Chris Keith]
Yeah. Yeah. So I think that's, it's a totally valid question.

But I think that gets back to almost like the Genesis or frankly, this like truly win-win sort of situation that, that we're putting together for folks. So when we are bringing someone online or when we're, when we're bringing them into the platform, there's a handful of vetting that we're vetting that we're doing. But one of those things is we're ensuring that whatever they were making before or whatever, you know, like salary they're currently drawing, there is not like we're giving them at least a 20 to 25% pay increase.

So that is just like right off the bat. Oftentimes people are getting paid a lot, a lot more handsomely and just putting them in a better spot, which is extremely exciting. The other thing that we have to keep in mind is like all of our roles are obviously completely remote.

A lot of the folks that we are grabbing, you know, I don't know if you saw like JP Morgan this week, they're trying to push back on going to the office five days a week. A lot of the folks overseas, you know, they currently have jobs, they're commuting. It's, you know, it's not uncommon for hour plus long commitments to be a part of that.

Of course, we're totally removing that aspect as well. And then lastly, we just, one of the huge aspects with us taking the full staff augmentation route is we really take care of people. So we're really big on, you know, we call it handholding in the beginning, but just making sure that people feel comfortable, they're onboarded.

A lot of times for our channel partners, we're getting, you know, new hardware setups, making sure that they have dual monitors and everything along those lines. So I think it's like, it's the full, full experience that people really appreciate. So what I can say is, you know, up until this point in time, if someone is on board for, you know, over that four to six week period or so, our return has not been an issue whatsoever.

[Uncle Marv]
Nice. All right. So a question that I did not prepare you for at all in any way is when we got off of the last podcast, did you have any thoughts that you're like, Oh, I should have said that?

Or I should have said this differently? Anything like that?

[Chris Keith]
Oh, no, I didn't have anything too, too badly. There wasn't there wasn't any, any negative feedback unless there was something that you got that I'm unaware of.

[Uncle Marv]
No, I didn't. But I just sometimes I like to just throw that out there that, you know, whenever we do the debrief and stuff, they're like, Oh, I should have brought up that point. But I don't remember us having anything like that.

But I just thought it's been what, almost a week and a half, two weeks, I thought, you know, maybe there's something there.

[Chris Keith]
The one aspect that I that I did that I would bring up that I'm happy that we chatted about is I got a few feedback or a few comments on the hanger company. So you did appreciate it. Do you bring in the entrepreneurial endeavors to life and everything along those lines?

That was fun.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. So I told my wife that that came up and I went ahead and confessed to her that I said that, you know, she laughed at me when, you know, she met me and saw my colored anger set up. So we talked about that.

[Chris Keith]
What a wonderful connect for us to have that. That hasn't happened to me on the air just yet, but there's a first for everything.

[Uncle Marv]
There is. Another thing that I found out once somebody realized that you were going to be on the show, they said that I had to ask you about your ASCII connection. And apparently you've got some sort of ASCII benefit that is started or is coming.

Is that true?

[Chris Keith]
Yeah. Yeah. So, geez, we talked about the ASCII team, but I mean, Jerry over there is absolutely a rock star.

Jesse, the entire team, their events are always, I think, second to none. And what I really like about the ASCII folks is they always there are huge believers in leading with knowledge based type of type of thing. So it doesn't feel salesy every time.

Every time you go to their events, the vendors are talking about, you know, like what they're presenting is relevant. I think Jerry and the team, they do a great job of hosting panels. So they actually talk to you guys, MSPs and get real time feedback.

I think I think one of the things that some of us could sometimes be guilty of, like in the in the in the vendor sphere is, you know, you talk in a little bit of a circle and then there's some projection that's going on, whereas like I mean, you brought up even earlier just speaking with like with Nick and other entrepreneurs. I think oftentimes, Marv, there's nothing more valuable than, you know, being in a group of being with a group of people that are in the similar spaces to where you are. So they understand your problems, understand your business, your pain points, things like that.

And then you're able to be a little bit vulnerable with folks, too, because oftentimes, like if someone's having that problem, it's just like the famous question that everyone's afraid to ask, but everyone wants to ask. Right. If someone someone's having that problem, other people may be as well.

So I think ASCII does a does a phenomenal job of engaging, you know, the their entire membership and with the forums and stuff like that, too. But yes, I'm actually extremely excited. I am hosting a chat with them.

I believe it's next Tuesday in the afternoon, I think two o'clock Eastern Time. And then I do have an ASCII benefit that's set up with them right now, too. So if you're an ASCII member, you get a certain percentage off your first month when starting with Hirexe, too.

So by all means, be sure to call that out and attend next week if you can.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. Yep. The ASCII event, Costa Mesa, is the first event of the year.

I will not be at that one, but I will be at a couple of them coming up, maybe three or more. I will be at the second one that is coming up in March in Orlando because it's in Florida. Costa Mesa is a bit much for me.

But those are going to be great events. And yes, if you're an ASCII, look for the Hirexe benefit. Excuse me.

All right. So let's do this. Let's take a quick break and let me recognize some partners and sponsors and then we'll come back.

I want to. Let's see here, if you are watching the video and you saw the beginning screen, I usually will have the sponsors there and I'll have sponsors on the outgoing screens as well. You noticed there's not a lot there yet.

I have had commitments from sponsors, but no checks have arrived. So we are here in February and I'm going to lay the gauntlet down that if I don't get a check soon from those that committed, I'm going to open those up to other sponsors. And there were a couple that asked about sponsorships that we had to hold off on.

So if you're a sponsor out there, a wannabe sponsor, a vendor, somebody that wants to get your name out and use the IT Business Podcast as a platform, hit me up and let's talk about it. But of course, our premier partner, that ally is with us. They are your trusted ally in network testing and analysis, where you can get fast, reliable solutions for your network deployment, management, and security.

So they are on board. And when you see me out at events, that is a terrible logo. I've got to get that changed out.

I don't know. People can't see it. We changed the background.

Do that. I don't know if I have a better background. Maybe that.

There we go. Explicit context content. So Steve Copeland is explicit.

So Rhythms is my internet sponsor. So when I am out on events, doing live shows and stuff, they will be providing the internet for Uncle Marv with carrier agnostic 5G solutions, boost bandwidth and redundancy for business and events. And let me get that off.

So now I can go to a new sponsor that we have with us. Designer Ready, white label web design and SEO services provide your clients with the ideal website and boost their online presence. So they are a new sponsor, and I'm going to have them on the show in probably a few episodes to go more into that.

But if you are looking to provide websites to your clients, they're going to be the way to go. Let's see. Somebody in the chat here.

Chris looks familiar from somewhere.

[Chris Keith]
I've been to a bunch of events.

[Uncle Marv]
You weren't. That's right. You were out on the channel scene for a long time and you'll be back out beginning soon.

So for all the links to the sponsors, they will be in the show notes and they are on the website at itbusinesspodcast.com slash sponsor. Support them. And while you're on the website, click on the Amazon store link.

That is the easiest way to support the show without making it feel like you're doing anything special. You shop as you normally do. Prices are the same.

Amazon gives me a little kickback on the backside for being an Amazon affiliate. So thank you very much. All right.

Let's see here. The chat. Who else?

Let's see. That was Aspect07. I don't recognize that name, by the way.

And I don't see our usual suspects. I don't have all the screens up, I can't see who's in which chat because we're all over the place. But if you are watching and you've got questions or comments for Chris or for the show, go ahead and throw them in the chat there and I will bring it up and read them.

Chris, let's see. I know I had some other follow-ups for you, but I don't know that they're actually that big of a deal somebody had talked about. So this is an interesting thing.

We talked last week about the MSP focus channel and stuff. The IT Expo that I was at, that actually came up in one of the panel discussions. And it's very interesting that MSPs are shocked that vendors are...

I don't want to say they're going around us to get to our customers, but obviously there are some vendors that are not exclusive to the MSP channel. Some of them are direct. Some of them are actually opening up to other markets, whether they be residential integrators or they do both enterprise and SMB and stuff like that.

Your business model is not going to be just to the channel either. Have you had any comments or feedback from anybody in our space that has said, man, you left us?

[Chris Keith]
No, no, luckily not. Just because the channel has been really, really good to me, Marv. I think one of the...

because as we chatted about the last episode, I've jumped around a little bit in industries. But one of the constants has been, I've been really lucky and I've worked with a bunch of small to medium-sized business owners all throughout my time in my professional career. And what I like most about SMB owners and frankly about the channel is, man, you're just around a self-made really sharp guys and girls.

So that means that you get in rooms and you can feel the energy. It's like stuff is going to happen or it already is happening. So that aspect I really, really like.

I think the other thing that's nice is things move fast. So I've also worked with enterprises and went down that road and the enterprise sales cycle can take months or oftentimes years. And you have to talk to multiple levels of management and you think that one person is a decision maker.

They act like they're the decision maker, but they're not actually the decision maker. What I like about the channel is, man, things move quickly. I think that we're tough critics, right?

As we should be on the technology piece. If your product or service doesn't do what it says it's going to do, you're going to hear about it, right? Because we're power users and we're going to put you through the paces and put you through the ringer.

But what I have found is if you understand and you can talk the talk, you understand how quickly things move and then you have that quality product or service, man, the loyalty is there. And that is something that you can't buy, you can't replicate and it's very, very real. So it's absolutely the reason why the channel is the foundational aspect or industry that I'm leaning into.

I'm also a huge believer in if you try to boil the ocean, that's a fool's endeavor, right? So what I've done and frankly, what we've invested a ton of time, effort and energy and dollars into is figuring out the product, frankly, that works really well for the channel and building up that bullpen. So I think that also comes back to one of your earlier questions, Marv, is how do you feel if someone were to leave or you lose one of these resources?

And the good news is that I have as of earlier today, almost 200 highly vetted, highly qualified, highly capable people. So I'm also excited to continue to scale into the channel too. So my numbers are exciting and we've seen a lot of growth the past few months, but we're not at a thousand resources just yet and that's quickly where I want to get to.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay. You said the word exciting and that brought me back to, so when I go back and I'm looking at the notes and the transcript and I'm trying to figure out how to summarize what we talked about, one of the things that comes through is that you are clearly passionate about what you do. Now, I'm going to qualify this because you seemed passionate when you were with Zorus when I met you.

So I'm going to ask, is that your personality or is it something where this is your new baby? So of course there's the honeymoon excitement stage or is that just you, man?

[Chris Keith]
Yeah. Well, thank you. I think that's a compliment, even if it's a backhanded compliment.

[Uncle Marv]
I'm just observing and asking.

[Chris Keith]
So what I'd say is it's both. I think by nature, you could ask my family, you could ask my close friends, that I'm the eternal optimist. So I'm always going to find a good mood to be and I'm going to find a reason to be thankful, to be happy.

I think that that's just who I am at my core. I also think that that's the background or the outlook that you need to be an entrepreneur because it's hard. Marv, you know, the highs are high, the lows are low.

And in order to make it through and create something, build something from nothing, you have to have that optimistic outlook. And I think it's just healthy going through life.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah. And you also have to have the determination, the grit to grind. I mean, you got to love the grind to some degree.

And, you know, listen, I was, you know, I had the dinner last night with some folks, some lunch here with some folks. And, you know, a lot of them were asking me the questions about, you know, dude, 28 years, how are you doing it? I'm like, it's life.

I mean, you got to do something, you know, why not try to just enjoy what you do? Yeah.

[Chris Keith]
Yeah. And I think so one of the reasons that, frankly, why I am so passionate about Hirexe and frankly, why I chose to solve this problem, right, is I think that there's a lot of people that just have jobs, you know, and they have jobs because, you know, they started their career in a certain path or, you know, they just, you know, this is what they picked up right out of college. And, you know, the long-term angle or the solution that I'm trying to provide with Hirexe is, okay, now we have, we have this ability to, you know, find personality information and we're able to match that up with the right job at the right company in the right industry with the right boss at the right time.

And I think that like that is certainly like an idea worth pursuing and a problem that's worth solving. Right. And I think on the flip side of that, right, from a hiring manager standpoint, man, like who, who isn't looking to add a killer team member onto their staff, like tomorrow to solve a particular problem.

Right. I would argue any single business owner, assuming that they have, you know, headcount or they're looking to expand. That's a problem that every single person is trying to solve it.

And Marv, you know, when you bring on the right person, everything changes. If, if you brought on a customer success manager and man, for the past, for the past few months, like customer success has been difficult because, you know, there's, there's been a couple of product problems and you've had to reach out to and have and have a bunch of conversations with the different business owners and things like that. And man, there's no metric.

So I don't know how quickly we're responding to these people or if the, if they've been waiting for a few hours or something like that, then you bring on this customer success manager. Not only does this person field all those calls, but they develop better relationships with your clients because they have the time to do so. Not only do they, you know, quantify or figure out which metrics they should be tracking.

They build live dashboards in your CRM and make that problem completely go away. So I think, man, what a, what a fun problem to solve and what like a, what a beautiful future to manufacture. If I can be a part of creating this, this marketplace, this matching system that puts the right people in the right places at the right times.

I think that's, I think that's something worth dedicating, you know, your life or at least certainly the next 10 to 15, 20 years too. Right.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. So let me, let me, let me dive a little deeper into that. And I'm going to ask you to go back, let's say two, three years.

So you're at Zorus, you're dealing with MSPs and, you know, you're dealing with a product service that you're trying to sell them. And you're recognizing that a lot of us are trying to solve problems, are frustrated, and your comment about a lot of people just have jobs. I want to ask this, I'm going to ask it in a delicate way, but I want to ask it in a way that people understand why I'm asking it.

There are a lot of MSP business owners, IT business owners that think they're running a business, but it feels like a job. And it sounds like some of what you're saying today was born out of what you saw while you were at Zorus. Am I correct in thinking that?

[Chris Keith]
Absolutely.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah.

[Chris Keith]
Yeah. So I I'll dive in here and then please like dive, you know, jump in with me, but this is perfect. So one of the things, frankly, Mark, that I saw is there were a handful of people that were doing things that were like that were technician mode or technician type of, of jobs or day-to-day tasks.

Right. And so just to take a couple of steps back, I think of, I think of any role, any business, any organization really at three levels, right? You have the entrepreneurial level, the manager level, and then the technician level at the entrepreneurial level.

That is, you know, the business owner, that's the founder, that's the CEO. That is the dynamic we're setting the vision. We are figuring out where we're, where the organization is spending time.

We are figuring out like what, what the, what the product roadmap looks like, like what our service, what that delivery stuff looks like. That's the highest, the highest level, you know, vision setting. That's the entrepreneur.

That is, you know, that's, that's thousand dollars an hour work, right? That that's stuff that frankly you, you can't quantify. But that's, that's what the business owner should be thinking about.

That's what should be operating on. So think, think like you're making very few decisions on a yearly basis where you're thinking about them for a long time and they're the right decisions, you know, then you have the manager level. Now the manager level, generally there's, they're specialized.

So you're going to have, you're going to be responsible for a business unit. It could be product. It could be, you know, technology.

It could be, maybe it's people management, whomever, but those in those managerial roles, you know, generally you have a few people that are working for you, but you're specialized. You're putting together like KPIs, you're being held accountable to those KPIs. But you know, you have, you have some latitude, but not everything.

So like maybe you're managing a P&L, maybe you're not. But that manager level, I'd say that's generally, you know, that's like a hundred dollar an hour work or so. And managers are there.

And then you have technician level and technician level. That's like, you know, that's, that's, that's more entry level. And that is, you know, like you kind of have a job, like you're showing up, you're doing that job.

It's vital to the business, but there isn't a ton of latitude, right? Like you're, you're, you're not managing anyone. You're an individual contributor.

And, and, and that's, you know, like, like that's the, that's that, that technician role. What I, what I saw, Marv, and what, like one of the primary things that I'm trying to fix with this, with this role is what I'm, what I'm able to do, you know, if, if you'll let me, or, or when you work with us, we're able to help more of these business owners truly be entrepreneurs and focus and focus on that entrepreneurial level. So that vision that, that, that, you know, like that, that mission statement, and we can supplement and help build out your team and take and get those technician level, or even sometimes manager level tasks off of your day-to-day plate at a price point that's reasonable.

So if you thought that it was going to cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars, it might cost you tens of thousands of dollars or, or even considerably less than that. And I think that like having that realization, because it's something that I realized really early on in my career, and frankly, why I continue to build overseas teams, but having that realization and also coming to the, you know, you know, coming to the, and seeing the light, I guess that, oh my gosh, this is, this is a message that I can take to the masses. And it's so, so relevant for this industry, for these people in these roles was like, was something that like, that I'm obviously like excited and, and as you said, passionate about.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. I mean, I certainly identify with everything you talked about it. At first, I thought you were going to start bringing in, you know, Michael Gerber's e-myth book, it's the entrepreneurial spirit with the, the technical mind.

What did he call it? The entrepreneurial seizure that technicians get into. But yeah, a little teaching lesson there.

Didn't think you'd do that, did you?

[Chris Keith]
I didn't, I didn't. Thank you for pulling it out of me. You teed me up.

I just had to swing the bat.

[Uncle Marv]
Well, I mean, it's something where, yeah, when you see a problem and you have a solution and you know, that's, that's what we're all about. So nice.

[Chris Keith]
I think the other thing that I realized Marv, just really quickly, if I may, is because I was responsible for so much of the hiring over, over at Zorus. And I just, I quickly realized, you know, man, we, we can get a lot of applicants, but the type of person that we're looking for in the channel is very, very specific. And it was like, it felt like it was 90% of my job was just sifting through resumes and like getting to know really quickly with people that were applying for roles.

But yeah, like think about it. And it applies to all aspects of the business. Obviously help desk is the easiest.

If you, you know, there's a huge difference between being like in an enterprise IT help desk and then being in the channel IT help desk. The tech staff, tech stack is different. The velocity at which you have to respond to inquiries and stuff like that is completely different.

So that's one thing, but it's all aspects. It's, it could be sales or go to market. It could be marketing, how you communicate just again, the velocity at which deals come the messaging that you have to use to folks in the channel.

It's, it's very, very unique. So what I also put together is, man, there's, there's really no one that has this sort of an overseas solution that has a bullpen of talent built where like, man, like I could, I could take my efforts that I felt like I was starting over at ground zero with every time I put up a new job at Zorus. If we just, you know, I took this approach and man, instead of starting over at ground zero, truly building up these, these bullpens, letting people know that they exist and then letting them capitalize on, on all the fruits of our labor.

Again, with the, with a really, really high quality product that we know people are looking for. So that too.

[Uncle Marv]
Right. I'm going to ask another, I hope this isn't divisive, but you know, I get to interview a lot of vendors and we have a lot of sidebar conversations. And most of those I keep private because those are private conversations.

But I noticed that there are a lot of applicants, I should say, that are either MSPs looking to make the jump up to a vendor. And then there are a lot of people outside the channel that are sales oriented that come into the channel and stuff like that. There seems to me like there is a huge pool of applicants in our space, but there's a disconnect with either the expectation of pay or the expectation of job commitment level.

There's a lot of travel with certain vendor positions that people like, I can't travel that much. There's a lot that goes with it, but it feels like there's a lot of people looking for work in our space that aren't getting it. Is it because of those things I mentioned where, they're expecting too much pay or they're expecting too much leeway in other areas?

Can you talk to that or should I not have asked?

[Chris Keith]
No, no, no. Of course. I guess what I would say is I do think that the workplace is changing.

I think that some people that may have been used to a certain way and may or may not be set in their way, there may be a little bit of a rude awakening coming. I think one of the things that we chatted about last week when we talked was I think a lot of the workforce is transitioning to being results oriented. It doesn't matter how many hours you're working.

It doesn't matter where your office is and how much time you're logging. It doesn't matter your years of experience. It doesn't matter how you used to do things.

It doesn't matter what you think you should be paid. Really, what matters are those results. I think that that's just going to become more and more of a thing.

When applying for jobs or when looking for jobs, I think where a lot of people get themselves into trouble, and one of the things that I always joke around with my team on Marv is expectations are the root of all disappointment, and more specifically, misaligned expectations. I think that there's just a handful of people that, based on what job descriptions are and what their expectations are going to be, might not understand the amount of time that is going to be needed or the amount of travel that they're going to need to commit to that role. I think it's just a little bit of a dislocation of expectation management, and then just people having to truly transition to result-oriented type stuff, not maybe what it was in the past.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah, I see that, and I definitely see the fact that, yeah, it's a lot of the jobs, and I'll speak from a perspective of my clients that I see that they're going through is they're changing their mindset that the 40 to 50-hour week in the office is not going to work for them anymore. The workforce is changing, and the people that are profitable for the business, getting those results, they don't care how long you work or how short you work if you're getting from A to B as quickly as possible without mistakes, without kickbacks, without client disappointment. Then, yeah, if you're keeping clients happy, and I'll say this from a legal perspective, I have law firms where they can't get rid of attorneys because their main client is like, no, that's the attorney we want to work with.

That's what we want to do as MSPs because we want our clients to love our technicians so much that, yeah, we want to keep working with you.

[Chris Keith]
Yep, yep, without a doubt. It's interesting too, one aspect along those lines is just as a lot of technology continues to become a little bit commoditized, how you and your company and every single touch point that you have, how those folks interact with your customers or your users when they call in is just becoming more and more important because how someone makes you feel, Marv, that's never going to be automated. Every single interaction that your company or you or your MSP has with end users, that is an extension of the overall experience.

I do think making sure that you're vigilant about, of course, bringing on the right people, having the right product and products and support behind it, that's becoming more and more important, more important than ever.

[Uncle Marv]
It is. It is. All right.

Chris, sorry I took you off the main path there, but I found that fascinating that that came up.

[Chris Keith]
No problem at all. I'm happy we did it.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. Okay, here we're coming up to the end of the show, but before we do, of course, we have got to talk about Florida Man. That is the time of the show, Florida Man versus the world.

And yes, I will be at the Florida Man games coming up here March 1st, and I've got a whole thing coming up about that, so I will explain that more later. But today, Chris didn't have a story, and of course, I didn't probably give him enough time to go look at it, so I'm going to share my Florida Man story, and then you'll answer a random question. And my story comes with a video, and this one is going to be hard to see because it's from the Instagram, but I'm going to bring it up on the screen here and play the video.

And what you can see in the video, if I can, actually, let me see if I can make it the main screen. Here. No, I can't.

But what you see is this past Friday, a Monroe County Sheriff's Sergeant and a homeowner collaborated to remove, and what's funny is they don't know if it was an alligator or a crocodile because of how big it was. It was found in a backyard pool in Key Largo. And yeah, that is one big honking gator.

Let me replay that for people there. So this is somebody's actual pool. It happened in a Pirate Cove's subdivision near mile marker 98.

So if you're heading down to the Keys, that's where you want to stop to see big old gators just lounging around in people's backyards. So I will have a link to that, but you should know the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission was contacted and they have a list of tips on how to stay safe around crocodiles, such as keeping a distance of at least 20 feet and avoiding the water at night.

[Chris Keith]
What was the size of that? Eight feet more?

[Uncle Marv]
They actually did not give the size on that. That looked to me like that was probably a 10 to 12 footer because when you add the tail in there. But the thing I saw, it was it was great.

I think it had just eaten because it was fat. It must have. It's fat.

[Chris Keith]
None of those in New York.

[Uncle Marv]
Not that you know of.

[Chris Keith]
That's right.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. So, Chris, I'm going to give you a random question to answer. So let me pull up my random question generator here.

Click go. And oh, this is a two parter, actually.

[Chris Keith]
OK, here we go.

[Uncle Marv]
So what is your current favorite TV show? And what was it five years ago?

[Chris Keith]
Oh, wow. Good question. How much time do I have to answer here?

Can I get in depth?

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah, go right ahead. Yeah, because I'll probably have follow up questions when I hear what it is.

[Chris Keith]
OK, so are you are you by any chance a Succession fan? Have you ever watched Succession? No.

OK, so premise, high level HBO. It's excellent. It actually it's not current, but it's still it's my favorite show of all time.

And I just rewatched it, so I'm going to call it out. But high level, it's loosely based off of actually well, they don't they don't specifically call this out, but it's loosely based off of off of the Murdoch family and how the leader of the family built this massive media empire. And then he's getting older in the transition to his children.

And it's kind of like the dad is a mogul. He's built this massive empire. They have all these things that are going on.

It's just it's interesting watching the family dynamics, the corporate dynamics. And it's New York City based. So a lot of the places that they go, you know, you recognize and it's just that it's the perfect mixture of the dialogue is so witty and funny.

The characters are just perfectly cast. And it's a it's a really nice mixture of like business, too, because I love working in some business strategy as well.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. Succession on HBO.

[Chris Keith]
Yep.

[Uncle Marv]
Interesting. I actually don't get to watch a lot of those things. So here's my here's my.

So is that your current show? And from five years ago, because you said it was old?

[Chris Keith]
No, no, no. I'd say from five years ago, I would probably go with Californication. Are you familiar with Cal?

[Uncle Marv]
So I've I have seen that. I may have watched a little bit of it, but I didn't watch the series now.

[Chris Keith]
So that's David Duchovny. Yeah, he is. The character's Hank Moody.

He's this writer that lives in L.A. famous, famous writer. Really funny. He's a bit of a beautiful disaster, but it just kind of follows him around in his lifestyle.

And he's madly in love with this woman that he has a daughter with and they're not together, but he's a really good dad. But his life's kind of a mess, but it's just it's really well written, really funny. And David Duchovny does a nice job.

[Uncle Marv]
Interesting. All right. So.

I don't get to watch a lot of live TV, so most of our shows are recorded. So I've we've probably got 10 to 12 shows at any given time that we've got to catch up on. Some my wife makes me watch because that's what you do when you're married.

And some I watch. So my favorite right now is kind of a trilogy. It's the FBI's.

So Tuesday night, I just record all three of the FBI's and watch those. And if I were to have to put on something, the background. It's usually those even on replay and stuff.

And from five years ago, LivePD. OK, that was that was hilarious.

[Chris Keith]
There's a little bit of a trend there, though.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah.

[Chris Keith]
You have a you have a type.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah. But live TV is for a completely different reason, because live TV or live PD, you got to see crazy, stupid people. And it wasn't just Florida man stupid.

[Chris Keith]
It was it's Florida man in real time.

[Uncle Marv]
Yes, it is. It is. And I just found on YouTube.

They have they have a law and crime channel that literally goes through all of the latest crazy news. Right now, they're stuck on, you know, teachers having sex with students, female teachers, male students. I don't know how that exploded, but it seems like every week there's a new story on that.

But there's another channel where they have all body cam stuff and they will literally play the full body cam of traffic stops. Today, I get to watch a teacher that had been suspended and needed to come back and get their stuff, but they wouldn't let him in the school. The school safety officer had to go in and go through their stuff, found cocaine in a bag in the classroom.

And they're literally showing the real life body cam footage. I mean, we're talking traffic stops, DUI stops. And it is just amazing.

I'm actually and I'll go ahead and throw this out there. So if any of you listeners want to reach out to me and let me know if we should do this or not, I'm thinking of having a Florida man watch party where we go through these videos because they are that hilarious to watch. It is something else.

[Chris Keith]
It does sound like if I want to put something like that together, you're my guy.

[Uncle Marv]
Find them up. I got man, I got and half of them are in Florida. I mean, it is amazing.

So those are my shows. All right, let's get off here before we get way off track. Chris Keith, Higher XC, thank you very much for coming back on the show.

And I will be seeing you somewhere, one of these places. For those of you wondering where I'm going to be, of course, you saw that I was at the IT Expo these past couple of days. I think I got to go back tomorrow and check out the swag and see how that is.

Next week, I am going to be in Orlando for Zero Trust World. And that is February 19th through the 21st at the Kareem Royale in Orlando. The website ZTW.com.

There are still tickets and they're only $4.95 to be a part of that. So get your tickets. If you are close by or can get to Orlando next week, I will be there.

I will have my podcast booth up for one day doing some live shows from there. And what else we got going next week, even though I will be in Orlando, I will be doing a live show next Wednesday night. And I'm going to have the 2024 Swag Award winners on the show Move Villa.

And we'll be doing a show there. So that should do it. Oh, Friday, I am going to be on the Incident Corner, which is part three of the Fort Mesa series with Matthew Fish.

And we're going to be back with the attorney, Christopher Regan, talking about this time, right of boom. So what you guys should be doing or what we all should be doing when it comes to cybersecurity after an incident? So that will be part three.

And that is this Friday, 2.30 Eastern, and we'll be streaming on the LinkedIn, I believe. So that's it. Chris, where are you going to be?

[Chris Keith]
On Friday?

[Uncle Marv]
No, any, any time.

[Chris Keith]
Oh, oh, geez. Yeah. So I'll be at the, I'll be at the ASCII event in the Northeast and then- In Jersey?

[Uncle Marv]
The one in Jersey? Okay.

[Chris Keith]
Yep. In Jersey, for sure. I’m so excited for that.

And then I have the ASCII webinar is next week as well. So I'll be chatting- All right.

[Uncle Marv]
We'll need to find the link for that. So I can put that in the show notes and people can sign up for that. I mean, is that an ASCII only webinar or is it anybody?

[Chris Keith]
I believe it's an ASCII internal. Yeah.

[Uncle Marv]
Okay. Check your ASCII forum if you're an ASCII member and get the information for that. And of course, we'll have the link to Hirexe.

And you can go there and find yourself some great labor at ReducedPricingHirexe.com. And we had that other link. What was the other link?

[Chris Keith]
The MSP- MSPChannelJobs.com.

[Uncle Marv]
MSPChannelJobs.com.

[Chris Keith]
That was in there as well.

[Uncle Marv]
All right, Chris, well, thanks for coming on the live show. That went pretty well.

[Chris Keith]
Thank you, sir. I appreciate it. You too.

[Uncle Marv]
All right. We'll see you out on the road. And for those of you watching and or listening, thank you for tuning in.

Be sure to head over to the website, as I mentioned, support the sponsors, check out any other episodes, and sign up for notifications on the social media so you'll know any time we go live. That is going to do it for this episode. And I have to make a note, people have asked about the AC behind me.

That is in honor of my late friend that helped me get started in my business 28 years ago, Amy Koons. So on behalf of my good friend, Amy, and for all of you out there, I will see you all soon. And until next time, holla.