Scale up. The podcast for driving growth in your MSP, delivered by industry experts. Welcome back to Scale Up podcast. We're here again today with Mit Patel and also Paul, the CEO of Halo. Mit, what are we going to go through today? So, a lot of MSPs are talking about selling their business at the moment. So, I thought it would be good to get some understanding from Paul about the successes and the journey that Halo has been on over the last several years. And also just understand a bit about what could I do apart from selling my business? Like, what are the other options that hopefully we're going to talk a bit about today. So, Paul, great to have you here. Um what we're seeing in the MSP marketplace is a lot of MSPs are being acquired. Um the word on the street is sell your MSP to this company or that company, merge your MSP to this company or that company. And it seems like a lot of chatter and talk is all about M&A and it's all focused on selling your company. Um so, one of the questions I've got for you is you've you've done something quite bold, actually. You've put into your contracts, I understand, that you will not sell for a minimum period of of 10 years and it's on a rolling basis on your contract. So, obviously you're quite against not against, but you're you're not going to sell uh at least for the a 10-year period. Yeah. Why did you do that? I think it was So, just to go back a few years, um and I think I guess for my business philosophy uh as well, I've never I'm a kind of I'm an I'm an all or nothing kind of guy, personally. So, if I'm doing something, I'm like I'm doing it for life. Um so, that's one part of it that it this is a very long um you'll hear me talk a lot about um the long-term thinking nature of of Halo as a business. Uh we've always been like that. It's always been in the DNA is that there is almost like no and people don't believe me when I say um that honestly there is no exit strategy. We're in this for the long haul. Um and we were almost particularly in an industry where acquisitions, mergers they are left, right, and center. Um and it is almost in nobody's interest. You end up with a I mean you can there's numerous examples now that's kind of different ecosystems that you see from our competitors where is the whole greater than the sum of the parts. I think often it's not and you you you So we very much approach it the other way where we we do um have technology partnerships where um the set of tools you then get when we work with other companies um it ends up being a a kind of far superior and best of breed in all the different areas and it comes together in a bundle and it's it it's much better for for a customer is but but yeah, so there's a there's a there's a lot of advantages I think in retention um of of an organization for the long term and we weren't telling the world about it at all. No one really knew. It Well, we knew internally. Everyone As I say, everyone hears me going on about it all the time. It wasn't like a big thick new thing we were doing. We always had this mindset but we thought, "Do you know what? We're kind of missing a trick by not telling the world that this is part of what Halo is all about." Is that long-term thinking? I mean we see that in MSPs that actually you've got a really good USP and you're delivering it as part of like you said as a DNA. You're delivering it internally as part of your DNA but you're not actually making any mileage out of it. And actually there's a lot of value in making mileage out of that DNA statement. 100%. and I think what you're talking about there is like that success criteria. So what we're seeing a lot at the minute with a lot of partners we're working with, the success criteria is I've succeeded when I sell. Mhm. So I think it's interesting when you do start digging into it because I mean, why do people sell? It's either monetary um yeah, kind of like the realization and a big payout, big sum of ways, big check. Um and it's often life-changing sums of money. Halo's so so so for Halo, I mean, we we fortunately I mean, I'm passionate about efficiency. Just like for as long as I can ever remember, even when I was like the cyber, I was just always like a I wouldn't do stuff unless it was in the most efficient manner possible. And that comes cost-efficiency as well comes into that. And the the just seeing money like burnt like the when you see these companies that raise hundreds of millions and it's just burnt through in no time and it's there's such wastage. Um and there's so much wastage that goes on in the world right now and I think So right from when it was I guess well, when I started employing people in 2011, um and you start off with a couple of people in the office just down the road from here. Um and then you slowly grow but we always maintain that score as I say, like I say in our DNA just to be really lean, really efficient. And it's really gratifying by the way as well. Like I mean, it'd be very easy to just spend millions on marketing campaigns or whatever it could be, but in some ways it's like it's a bit cheating and it's like it's to actually do it organically, slowly, um and in a much more stable uh process. Um we're in I don't know, much more control of your road map. Um I get where the software company maybe a little bit different from your typical sort of managed service provider, but I think it everything holds like in terms of the arguments of why people should think long term. And so what I'm getting to with the the whole efficiency thing is because we've grown the business to be so efficient and our gross profit margins compared to what the competition is like unreal. Um that has allowed us to raise a lot of like internally just to have a lot of money that we can use for if we do Well, I mean you you've seen some of the campaigns we're working on now and it's um yeah, they're they're high ticket items and uh uh but we have the the cash reserves internally now because we have always run we're running at like 50% margin. It's crazy for for software company. Um and but it allows us to have the the cash and it's as I say it's because we are everybody throughout there's so much credit to all the the staff at Halo because it I mean it we really do like hammer that into people like with from the moment they come through the door on the first day um they've and it's one of our sort of core leadership principles really is frugality. Um and we share that actually with AWS our cloud partner um who again I'm I'm quite vocal about how uh how much I love the guys at uh at AWS and um yeah, we share a lot of values and and kind of leadership principles as well. And frugality is is one of them. Yeah. So, I think one of your success criteria that we've talked about before, Paul, which I love is mini Pauls. Like you your success criteria is how do you create mini yous across the business and you see that in just droves across the business. Mhm. You know, so I think many MSPs could could learn a lot from that. You know, how do you how do you create mini yous as a success criteria cuz that then allows you to step away from the business. Yeah. And that's one of the reasons why people want to sell. People want to sell because they've done the 60 hours a week. They're driven down to the ground. Their energy's burned out. And the only way they see out Mhm. to a success criteria which is I want more time sitting on the beach is to sell. Yeah. Well, what you've created is mini Pauls. Mhm. Yeah, it's um it's vital. Like if you do want to do it for the long term and not get burned out, you need to you need to clone like the the the skill sets and the the relationships and and and to properly scale, absolutely, you need people you can depend on throughout the business um who can just like you need leaders throughout. Um and and and unfortunately, uh at Halo, we've got so many great leaders um and just people that can I don't know escalations. Like, sometimes things don't go perfectly and um you need to have people that kind of just step up and are accountable and take responsibility. And in terms of terms of how you do it, I think the the key word for me is trust. Like, you the with delegation and trust. So, you got to learn to delegate. Get out of the way. But, you need to really delegate. I don't just mean like ask someone to do it, but then micromanage them and you end up just kind of doing yourself anyway and and completely like shutting them down and all that stuff. You You need to totally empower your staff. Um uh we really promote shadowing as much as possible. And I honestly, when I find myself doing a task and then I'm I'm like, "Oh, hold on a minute. I'm by myself doing this task." I'm like, "That's a wasted opportunity." So, any any task throughout the business, whether it's we've just had an example just this week where we 72-hour trip to um South America. So, included a night in night in Miami, night in Panama, night in Mexico City, um night in Cancun, and then back to London. Uh and one of our most senior people went on that trip. So, this is to pitch to a very large um prospect and to meet up with a partner. Um very very valuable trip like for us, but also if anyone were able to share that experience, not just the fact it's in such exotic places and it's a Spanish fully Spanish speaking um relationships as well with the clients and partners. And we basically brought so one of our newer recruits who's um fluent Spanish um invited them along to go on that trip. And it's And it's not just the the face-to-face time when you actually kind of in the meetings that's that's that's valuable. If anything, the most valuable bit about that trip will be when you're sat on the plane next to the person with all the experience and just having conversations. Just like learning about life. Like, it's And that honestly is so valuable. And that's what we promote as In terms of how you create these like mini CEOs Yeah, I tend to call them mini CEOs rather mini poles, but um Mini poles does sound a bit weird, actually. Does it? Mini CEOs is much more professional. But um yeah, it's it's the time for the long term. Spend this it's invest it's it sees someone and then it's like, right, you're going to be Halo forever or that's what you're That's obviously the the ideal because um it is expensive when people leave um and you invest so Well, we invest so much in in new people when they come through the new starters when they come through the door. Um and we want people to stay forever. We want people to enjoy their careers and to um Yeah, and so it it is really important. The best way to upskill and to I don't know, give for people to kind of understand what what Halo's all about and um to for their careers to be like gratifying and to get everyone needs a sense of purpose and it's uh Yeah, so having time with the most experienced people is is so such a good way to do it. Um that's great. Um so one of the things we always touch on was was kind of the structure of your your organization. Um one of the things that Darren spoke about then is people get burnout being the CEO or being the managing director of their companies and after a period of time they're like the only way they think they can get more time back with their family is to exit, right? To sell. Um, but one of the things that you could do um, is bring in a CEO or bring in a managing director or actually elevate someone to a CEO or managing director. And I've noticed in your company you've got two CEOs that you you work alongside, right? Um, for for both products. When did you make the decision to put those CEOs in place and and how did you actually find them? So, yeah, it and um, again, important bit of Halo's DNA is internal promotion. Like we rarely hire um, external experience. Um, we we get offers all the time from people who have been very successful, I'm sure, and very highly skilled and they've been amazing in terms of what they've achieved. Um, yeah, some of the biggest software companies in the world. Um, where they've taken them from, I don't know, 100 million subscription revenue to 2 billion perhaps, like some crazy numbers. Um, as the the CRO perhaps um, or just and uh, and and as you say, yeah, CEOs as well and but so all these these offers are like external skill sets and and yeah, honestly, if we were looking to probably in the next 3 years have the highest valuation possible, then I think we probably would go to market and look for the absolute best people out there. It's kind of a bit of a fast track catalyst type solution, I would say. But, long term, and again, it goes back to long term thinking. For me, long term, it's not the best solution because you going back to gratification, like if you if you can trust someone and but from my experience people can achieve like more than they ever think they can. Probably about half the people that that I've ever recruited have gone on to become like world-leading at what they do, whether it's like selling, implementing, developing, um marketing, um all and it's just like any area of business. Like I just think anyone who's just about that And I think Morgan um spoke about this in the previous uh podcast, but it's just about aptitude, it's about attitude. It's all the things that um you can't really teach. Uh but these are the things that when you go from as a as a new graduate and you've got all these like all these skills, you're driven, you're ambitious, you're you're passionate, um you're personable, you've got a growth mindset, all these things, which as I say, really difficult to teach. I I wouldn't say never possible, but certainly a challenge. Um so that's a big part of our interview process. Um but if you take someone who ticks all those boxes, and then they you trust them and delegate them kind of tasks and um which is that of like I don't know, like our Richard is does the marketing at the moment, um who started doing that uh over a year ago now, but um complete like free slate to kind of do whatever he wants there in that department, and um and he's learned a hell of a lot over the last sort of year, and um sure if some stuff's worked, some's not worked, but the gratification you get from that process of just being trusted and being able to figure it all out. And what you end up with, yeah, it might take a little bit longer to kind of get there, but boy, is there like way more like satisfaction and gratification that you get from And it's just again, it comes back to trust. Like the fact that an organization has trusted people to almost like elevating elevating people to positions that they almost have no right to be at in the conventional sense of how business and corporations work. Um but at Halo we've got people throughout that have been totally elevated that are now like absolutely smashing it at by any metric in business um and particularly in the software world. We've had competitors like reach out to us looking at us as like industry leading at marketing. Like what? Yeah. In terms of like the switch point really um cuz you've got a lot of MSPs out there that maybe a point where they're thinking maybe I don't want to do this forever. Maybe I do. Um like you said, if you can find the right people and put trust into those people, they could they could maybe get there. What was your switching point to say actually now I think I need to get CEO in place to run the PSA side. What was that switching point for you? So back in 2017 uh we were at a point where we realized the technology was was good. Um and we had to Well, we didn't have to, but it's like, okay, well, let's think a bit more now about on the strategic side of the business. Um I love business. Like that's I'm passionate. I've read all the every book under the sun about um business and how I I've never done like an MBA or anything like that. I'm not actually that I kind of I did a joint honors degree in economics, but so I've always I guess I've learned a bit of the traditional academic side of business, but um for me um I was I was aware of that there was a a need to segment the business to we were almost like a jack-of-all-trades. We were doing we were one ticketing system that we were set we had one website that was selling it to anyone who wanted it. We never said no to anything. Um it was a hustle. And we had to like just get Okay, let's let's let's approach this with a bit more strategy. Um let's actually think seriously about who are what audiences do we actually serve. Um The messaging's very different um between like So, there's obviously different bits to Halo and we got the the PSA um platform for the the managed service providers. You got the the ITSM or ESM platform for um internal service management in in enterprises and mid-market. And you've got the the CRM side as well, which is um Salesforce alternative. Um And for me, you cannot properly segment and and people would actually maybe say, "Oh, we're crazy. Like, why don't we just pick one thing and specialize in that?" But there's so many reasons why we don't, by the way. Um there's so many overlaps and synergies and it's just one service management engine. It is one core platform. It's just that, as I say, the the audiences are so different, so they need completely different websites with different um narratives, different messaging. Um Yeah, one in ITSM ESM industries probably like you're if you got, I don't know, 100 logins, that's probably an organization with several thousand staff. Or if it's 100 logins in an IT department. If you got 100 logins as an MSP, you're probably what, 110, 120 staff maybe? There's only a few more of maybe some admin staff perhaps and payroll and the like. And so, it it's and senior management perhaps wouldn't log in maybe. But so, almost all the staff in a managed service provider they are logins. So, but it's the same kind of size deal for us. Um so, the in terms of who you're selling it to, it's it's so different because one has many layers of bureaucracy and you don't really speak to the the budget holder or the the decision-maker initially. Takes quite a and there's often like a whole start off with eight vendors maybe and then you shortlist three of them and then you get to a final two and then it can take it can take years in some cases to get through that. But, on the MSP side, it's very different. It's like quite often you're literally first first interactions with the business owner, or somebody's maybe just just one level away from the business owner, and then it just happens so quickly. It cuz some of our deals we'll do a deal within a week, or it's it's so it's very very different. Um and obviously the out-the-box configurations are very different, the the terminology's different. Um so, we needed we need And I think to be successful in business, you need focus. Um and that you just cannot share all these different I mean, as you can see with the the the leadership on Halo PSA side, like they know that the MSP industry inside inside out. Like, all the technologies, all the um the partners that that that we work with, and they're proper experts in that field. And if you ask them to go and pitch to, I don't know, HSBC, or whoever, then they'd be terrible. And vice versa. Like, if you took So, and as I say, it's just and it's about it's different languages even. It's it's so crazy how different they are. But, at the end of the day, like it is the same. If you If you actually look at all like the automation workflows, the the service man- service management processes and everything, so many similarities and overlaps. It's just that it's kind of uh yeah, different different audiences that's that's it's And it's very nuanced as well. Um so, anyway, going back to the original question, I have a tendency to just go off on a tangent. Um but, yeah, we needed focused people who like one to lead on the PSA side, one to lead on the the ITSM as it was back then, but we're now very much a full full-blown um ESM platform. Uh and on the the CRM side as well. Uh and in terms of what the future looks like at Halo, from what it looks like, uh yeah, we do see that they'll be sort of many other mini CEOs popping up throughout the business and even just if going up away from the product side. So we obviously were a service company as well. We do professional services ourselves and we have I would say a mini CEO like leading up the whole professional service division and it's just it's people that take who are totally accountable and motivated to to make their bit of the business kind of just successful. So I'm just thinking to myself I can bet that there's owners out there that have said I've tried that and it failed. So now I've changed and I'm sure you've probably been through that situation yourself where you text someone along that journey and for whatever reason it could even be if you turn the mirror on yourself some learning for yourself but what they do is they then change tact and say actually that strategy doesn't work. So how have you managed to stay on that course? It's tricky this one. Um I can only I mean be honest I don't know what it is that has allowed me to be successful at delegating CEO responsibilities to other people and as I say creating these mini CEOs everywhere and why other people are not able to do that. I can only think that it is that they're not truly relinquishing control and that's so important like you've got to properly relinquish control to whoever it is that you're elevating to that position where you're wanting them if you want someone to completely run your business and you want to be able to take a backseat or do whether it's just working more on maybe a bit less hands-on in the day-to-day and more on the strategic. Playing a bit of golf. Maybe. Possibly playing golf. Whatever it is you want to do. Go watching F1 maybe. Yeah. And you cannot like if if things aren't going as as you planned like you can't blame people like this and probably there's a bit too much blame going on and blame culture because then people won't want to take risks and figure out what works what doesn't work and um Honestly, I don't know. I I think I'm I'm I'm a very passionate person when it comes to uh business as you you can probably tell and I think and posi- positivity I'm very much a half glass full person rather than half glass empty and I think like positivity in business um is massive. Um and negativity is is massive in the other way as well like and I think so we do and it's infectious like it just it it's really really important to Like these people they they live and breathe Halo. Like they can't Yeah. I mean I mean you can see that when you come in the office. They can't stop thinking about Halo. Like in a good way. They love it. Like this and you've heard me talk about like Maverick a lot and the inspiration I took from uh Ricardo Semler. Um his follow-up book was uh The Seven-Day Weekend. And the whole kind of point of that book was to just explore this whole idea that like what's the opposite of work? Is it leisure or is it idleness? Um is work work if you're having fun? Like We love what we do. Um and and all these like key leaders in Halo they love what they do. Um And every so often I will hear someone if like if you hear someone say something like oh I'm not paid enough to to do that or whatever. Like it's like well that's not really the mindset we're looking for but I mean not everyone's going to be a leader and want to take all the responsibilities and and challenges, but if someone's ambitious and they do want to have a a very successful career, but they're also saying things like I'm not paid enough to do that. How are they ever going to get there? And I think so it's about approaching it in the right way cuz you and it things happen so fast at healer. Like if someone does show a desire to want to get somewhere very senior um and important and valuable, then uh they absolutely can, but you need to again, just like trust the system. Like okay, that word trust um is a two-way thing. But equally though, I think here what what I see is that passion, that energy, that love. So I think when you build that type of culture, somebody would stand out like a like a mile. Like you know, if they're not going to follow suit, very very quickly they're going to just going to like jump out, aren't they? Oh, definitely, yeah. And uh peers around them as well um and you just you just you'd end up feeling like like you don't fit in properly and you just naturally it it's not going to be much fun working around. The end of the day, why do we love it so much? And then someone said this chatting recently, it's like if I didn't enjoy the people I work with, would I would I have sold open now? 100% like absolutely that the main reason I I do what I do is cuz I love doing it with the people I do it with. Um and if you so you have to and maybe this is part of it. Maybe people in terms of why it goes wrong and when they say oh yeah, I've tried that, it still didn't work. Still have to keep stepping back in. Maybe it's that they're not actually they're focusing too much perhaps on like things like grades and experience like the CV rather than like in the in the principles of it's just like if if would you just enjoy a social meet meet up with this person? Like like do you get on well with them? Would you go to the pub test? Yeah. Would you go to the pub with them? Yeah, they're in now they're not. But uh yeah, so I think that whole personality fit um cuz you need everyone on your team No one works in Well, very few people here will work out in an isolated fashion. Everyone works in teams. Um and work is so much more fun when you're doing it in a team of people you love working with and you've got this sense of achieving something together. Um I should think there's people making this podcast probably um in terms of a a team achieving something together. Um With have now got a team that are working like it used to kind of just be a bit of an isolated uh role that uh and I should think it's way more fun now than it was cuz it's yeah, that sense of doing something in a team that is so important. Um can't stress that enough. I think you're probably right there though. I mean that's a really great comment, isn't it, about technical people probably started the business off cuz it was fun. They probably started because they wanted some sort of fun, some sort of reward of delivering something. And then 20 years in they're burned out, the energy's gone, the fun's gone. Yeah. And actually someone started cuz that what I see is there's almost like this brainwash scenario that people have been brainwashed into the only success is a sales. Mhm. Well, I think if that's yeah, it's interesting and I think what people don't they get caught up in the moment of selling and receiving a large sum of money and they may not actually realize or take enough time to think about what does life look like on the other side. So, the next question I'm going to ask and you'll probably say it's not enough, but let's just go with it for theory. I've got a check for 750 million pounds. I'm going to buy your your company now. What are you going to think about in terms of not just the decision that you love working here and everyone's great? What are the things you start to think about about what life would be like after Halo? What are the things that would go through your mind to say, "Oh, I'm not going to do this or yes I am."? I mean, I have had all these thoughts I guess many years ago now. Um So, so for me it goes back to well, what's a a life-changing sum of money? So, it's something far less than 750 million. I'd say it's probably like I can 10 million probably. Is it too late to change my offer? You want the business. Yeah, I know. I know it happens. Uh yeah, and I think uh Yeah, I I probably got past that point. Many years ago where I I realized, but again, it was such an organic process where I got to the point where Yeah, I was Um I never actually extracted that much from the business, but if I wanted to, I could. Um and so in terms of how cuz it And I think it it it might it must be very scary and just um that moment of having to make that decision and think about these things like what would I do? What I will tell you is that out of almost all the business owners that I've ever spoken to in my life, I've spoken to to many um who have either sold out or taken on maybe private equity investment, um diluted, uh maybe because they not so much because they needed the money at the time to for to raise whatever reason, but because they wanted to extract money for that exact thing you're talking about where it's I don't know, buying your dream villa or a yacht or of whatever, go on any fancy holidays you want or a dream car or all this kind of thing. Um and you know what? Almost everybody regrets the decision they made um because I think we all know that I think um going out and and buying a fancy um purchase even if it's like a designer handbag or whatever it is that is your dream um material item, it never quite meets that whatever you whatever you think it will do to your kind of happiness. It's It doesn't quite ever It's not a magic switch. It doesn't quite You're always a little bit disappointed, I think, with the the impact that has on your life and the happiness you think it will Yeah, it's It's quite fleeting, I think. Um and within I don't know, a few weeks or whatever, it'll just the novelty wears off and then Yeah, it doesn't really mean as much to you as it did when you first um acquired that item. I mean, what one of the things this this this uh I'll help you out by here. Let's think about kind of your purpose at the moment in life and what your purpose would look like after Halo. Tell us about what the difference is, would be, do you think? So, I think for for as long as I'm loving doing what I'm doing, uh I'll still be doing it. And I think uh So, when people say, "Oh, you must have an exit strategy." I usually go back with, "Well, what's Warren Buffett's exit strategy?" or Richard Branson's exit strategy. People who just love doing what they do and it's they They've amassed like serious amounts of wealth and have they ever seen the need to exit? No, they just love what they do and um I mean, that that's something I hear a lot of people that have sold. They've almost like lost that purpose. Yeah, yeah, and that's a big thing in terms of why Yeah, I said I'll leave it regret the decision. Um They maybe don't. It's not so much about the money side of it. It is exactly what you just said there. Like, they've completely overnight lost the one thing that gave them purpose in uh Yeah, it's uh so, I think it's And it's so important to have like, for me, I don't think anyone could be happy like truly happy in life unless you've got sense of purpose. Like, and that And people get a sense of purpose from all sorts of different things. Like it can be religion, it can be or even following your local football club or which some people say is quite religious in some ways but yeah, it's you can get purpose from from many different places but I think for a business owner that sense of purpose probably is that that journey that you're on. I mean at Halo we're on a journey and we're we're still I honestly I still feel like we're all literally scratch the surface in terms of what our ambitions at Halo and what what we believe we will or where we're going. As long as you're on a journey where and it cuz it's not about the destination. Like it's it's never about the destination. It's the it's the process. It's like having fun um I heard someone recently like what what's what's true happiness? It's it got described as like just enjoying the passage of time. And I think so important. Like if you you can just find a way to enjoy time passing. Like life's life's short. Like we're not we're not here for long. If you think how long the world's been here and how long it will be here when when when you're no longer here. Yeah, it's without getting too deep and philosophical it's uh just it's just about enjoying every day and I'd be able cuz people might think on on the one hand I go on about long-term thinking and everything. Um but then I talk about how in business like we run day-by-day just make decisions based on instinct. It's like well hold on. There's a contradiction. I On the one hand like you don't you don't really have targets. You cuz we don't as a business. We're quite famous for not we don't really set targets. We've grown 100% now this our seventh year. Um we're still on track in 2024 for 100% subscription revenue growth again which is amazing. Um but we kind of turn the taps on and off to stifle demand when we need to and to um increase demand when we need to. So, we're kind of yeah, we're we're not just a grow at any all costs type of organization. So, yeah, I think we we probably could have grown more in the earlier years perhaps and but service is is so important to us and our reputation's important and again, we have so much time like the long-term thinking. We we think 10 years ahead. So, we don't have to hurry this process through like and we but we're all the point is we're all all enjoying this process and although we make decisions based on instinct like literally day-to-day, it's always with is this when we're making that decision, it's is it in the best interest like thinking 10 years ahead. So, it's never like when I said earlier about if we were trying to maximize revenue in the next 12 months or whatever. We There's all sorts of tactics we could use if we wanted to to extract probably yes, many more times what people are currently paying us if we wanted to, but we we don't think short-term and it's all about well, um as we know that's the these tactics are used in the industries where organizations do use quite a dress aggressive short-term tactics to extract um to increase their revenues which really isn't in in the long-term interest for that organization or obviously for the customer. So, So, I've spoken to lots of MSP owners in the last 12 months. A lot of them have been thinking to sell or have been thinking about doing other things. I think I've been involved in about 24 transactions over the last 3 years. So, quite a lot. So, I've seen a lot of people who have sold their business. Um and I've recently spoken to about four or five people who have decided to keep their business versus selling. Um so, one of the the the questions I wanted to ask you is you've you've created these mini CEOs as we call them. Um what impact has that had on your own personal life and how much time you have? Because one of the things that we hear from MSPs is I've got no time. I'm I'm sort of trying to balance my work-life balance and it's way out of kilter. So, by creating mini CEOs, has that had any impact on your personal life? 100% yeah. I think um I think we know that being a CEO can be quite a lonely uh place. I think that's one of the probably the main reasons I think people end up going for a change and selling out possibly is because they have got to a point where they're they're just they're not I don't know. You've got your team and there's a bit of segregation between the CEO and the team, but um from my point of view, when I have like elevated people and created mini CEOs and people that kind of the level I'm operating, you you are then there's this sense of like doing it as a team, doing it together. Um so, from a personal point of view, in terms of my happiness, it's it's it's way more fun. This isn't even to do with like having more time, but just the the work itself is way more fun when you're doing it with people. So, that's one thing is when you you create these mini CEOs that um everything in life is is more fun when you're doing it with people. Um but in terms of the time, I mean, yeah, absolutely. If you have more people if you got twice as much resource and hours in the day to to work on CEO tasks, then great. If you're three times or four times if you've got 10 mini CEOs, then imagine how many uh all the CEO activities that you can work on as a team. So, uh and sharing like what is it? Problem shared is a problem halved, all that. So, it's just sharing the stresses and um the good times, the bad times. Uh I think it's it's really important to be able to share that with people. And I like to think I mean, hopefully people feel that they are operating um kind of at the same level in the same way I do. Hopefully, it's a reciprocal feeling. Um But, I definitely do feel that like that's something worth achieving together. So, so people decide not to sell, and they decide to go mini CEO route and building leadership teams, etc. One thing I see a lot of is they then go for growth. Mhm. And what they do is they go for growth, which then just maximizes their work time once again. So, they've gone from reducing their work time and creating a life style balance, and then they go for growth, and it sucks them into the business. Halo is obviously going through massive growth. You've talked about 100% year seven, which is amazing. How have you achieved that and not got dragged back into the business? Although we have a very lean head count, and we're still considerably smaller than a lot of our competitors, um we do we have grown a lot. Like, our head count has pretty much It's not quite grown at 100%, and we are uh I think in the software world, probably it's a little bit different cuz our business isn't just service based. It's It's very much product based, as well. Um and the development teams, particularly on the software engineering side, you definitely don't want to double that team as you double because that's one of our um uh part of the the magic, really, is the uh the lean-ness and the We're proud of our uh our core development team, how how they've been working together in many years now, and they all kind of code in the same way. A lot of them hadn't even even done any coding before they started at Halo, um and they're now some of the most proficient coders in the world. And again, that whole journey that they're on in their little team and and us as a whole, um but yeah, so I think we have actually grown in numbers quite a lot uh or as we've grown our subscription revenue over the the last seven years or so. Um But, again, it's not just like the C- mini CEOs, it's um it's to have people throughout the business where it is it's not just a job, it's something that again is like part get purpose in life. Talking about purpose earlier, like it's um it's really important to have people that aren't just like coming here and just seeing it as a job and they don't they'd rather be somewhere else. Um and and I think yeah, in terms of going back to the the the point about getting dragged back into it, if you got enough like superstars and brilliant people in your organization um and you keep recruit The secret is to keep on recruiting people of that ilk. Um and as we we we seem to have somehow figured that out and we've been had a very successful uh hit rate, I suppose you could look at it as, but um Cuz if you if you if you look at a typical MSP owner, they're typically a a technical person. Mhm. You look at yourself, you as a developer at heart. Yeah. So it'd be very easy for you to see a fault in development or as an MSP, they see a fault in technical, they see a fault in operations, and they go straight for the the fix. And they almost un- undermined all the authority levels and just go straight for the fix. Yeah. And that's How have you taught yourself not to do that? Oh, I I didn't teach I don't know. I don't don't don't feel like I've taught myself to do it. I just I am a very trusting person. Like just in life, I will I've been known to like like Got to be careful what I say here, but um Yeah, it's This is the tip of the This is the point where you ask for his car keys. Yeah, yeah. How How trusting are you? Um I I'm very very trusting and uh if that trust is breached, then I will absolutely um It's not that I I only give people like one chance, but it's uh yeah, it's but I do give a lot of trust. If I devolve a rule or or a responsibility to someone, I'll just let them get on with it. And you got to let them learn and like make the mistakes and figure it out and um grow themselves by having that first-hand experience. Yeah, and that's that true delegation you're talking about. Yeah, exactly. And and I mean, we're all learning and growing all the time, like every day. Like if every day is a school day. It's we're growing all the time, and it's a the stuff that goes on in in in day-to-day business, where we're all in getting involved in different areas, and we're we're all making mistakes and learning and uh it's it's it's great fun. But yeah, you have to properly delegate and not not, as I say, not just um fake delegation, where you're pretending to devolve a a duty, but then uh you're actually like, oh, all right, thanks for doing that. And then you just end up doing it your your own way anyway, whatever. So, we kind of started our conversation talking a bit about um MSPs, and a lot of them being sold, whether it's to private equity or whatever it may be. Recently, I was at a a dinner sponsored by Scalable, and three of their uh current clients said that what's been happening in their process when they're trying to win new prospects is they're getting asked, are you owned by a private equity company, or are you owned privately, which I found very, very interesting that in the sales process, they're being asked that. So, the question I've got to really ask is that there are lots of software companies, there are lots of software companies that do similar things to to what Halo do. Some of them are privately owned, uh but the most of them are owned by investors, private equity, or whoever that may be. What advantage do you think Halo has versus those companies that are owned by other investors? Oh, a a huge advantage. What are the top three? So, Halo's owned by people in the business. Um if it wasn't then there wouldn't be a sense of I don't know, you're just doing it for some third party that It's almost like nobody There's no personality to the the people doing the So, one one organization is doing all the work and then another organization that kind of owns it that doesn't even have a personality and it's I don't know. So, that I think there's something in just that point that the culture is diluted in some way by the ownership being external to the business. Um So, and that's big. Like that's a As I keep saying, the reason Halo's successful is down to the people and the culture. Um Second point, I'll probably say the agility and the whole speed of decision-making like Halo's famous for like quickly like we no matter what the decision we end up getting involved in, it's the feedback we always get is like we move quicker than anyone they've ever spoken to in the the history of them doing their their their work. So, we're we're known to like if we we don't waste time. Like we we haven't got time to to waste. We're going so quickly and if we want to do something, we just get on and do it and whether that was I think we were the fastest organization ever to negotiate the the Formula 1 partnership or even the Premier League the partnership we now have with with Ipswich Town that that was it all happened like lightning quick. It's Yeah, we're just known to even making decisions on trade shows or whatever, we'll just again, cuz it's just instinct. It's just it's not it's not like people going away, putting a business case together with all the numbers and whatnot. It It's just does it feel right? Um The McLaren partnership felt right. Ipswich Town partnership felt right. These are feelings you're getting from speaking to key people in these organizations. And again, like the core personality fit, culture fit, it it just felt like there was some kind of synergies there in terms of the So, the partners we choose to work with, um whether it's scalable or whoever whichever we got many partners out there, but it's it that whole culture fit is important. Um and yeah, so going back to private equity ownership or whether you're a public listed uh company or So, yeah, agility and speed of decision-making definitely very important. So, you could say that's the second point. Um Third point So, I think again, it it it it could go back to targets and long-term thinking. So, if you're owned externally, the whole motivation like If you think, what is the Like from a private point of private equity, why are private equity doing it? It's to make money. Like that It's pretty much the only reason. They don't do it for fun. culture or fun. It's just They want to And it's literally the service they're it's a they're They're taking money from investors and they're they're they're they're investing that and you want a return. And usually what, 3 years? Possibly five, three to five year kind of horizon you look to buy a lot of assets, increase the value, sell the assets. Um that's the role of private equity companies. Um and I think it's So, it's very very money focused, like financially driven goals. Halo is We've we've never actually ever been about financially um financial driven goals. It's it it it It's very fortunate that we are in an industry that is able to um there's plenty of scope for making large amounts of of money and and margin. Um uh which does allow us to go on and organically um fund. We've We've never had any external ownership or or debt or investment in in the history of of of our company. And it's partly down to the industry we're in, I think, that allows for that. Um but yeah, so I think uh the fact So, in terms of what drives us and what actually from day to day, like we're making decisions, it like we're absolutely obsessed about our customers. We're totally customer obsessed organization that is genuinely So, last month we a couple of months ago we announced that we're giving money back to our clients at renewal if we can see that they're not logging in and using the service. We're only vendor to do that in the industry ever. And it's stuff like that that we're always just trying to think how can like what What does the customer want? And And we think if again, it's just looking 10 years ahead. It's like in in the customer's mind, what would the perfect vendor look like? And that's what we get obsessed about. The financial results, they kind of take care of themselves and you can't really control that in many ways. I mean, we're we're much higher interest rates these days than we were like go back five years and there's completely different markets and to try and set these like arbitrary targets that you're working towards that are financial driven, it just doesn't make sense in in our minds and it's it's it's and it's also not that um not even that gratifying in in in my opinion. It's I think the the mission that we're on and the um the things we do value as a as an organization are are far more kind of wholesome, powerful things to to motivate an organization than than if it were just to be all about money. So. Yeah, I mean, you you me and Matt talk a lot about getting the right people, looking after those people, those people look after the clients, and the clients look after the business. You know, that's actually what you're talking about there, isn't it? You know, you don't need those targets cuz you've got the right people that find the right customers. all about the right people. Get the right people. Every business is a recruitment company at the end of the day. It's just um just about get the right people everything else looks after itself. Um but yeah, it's it's and again I think just the whole a lot of us just been watching the Euros which um England have been on an amazing journey last three tournaments. I'm a Scotland fan so it's uh I've been on a different journey but also I've been enjoying the England journey. It's great to see um been living in England now longer than I have Scotland and follow Premier League clubs and players and whatnot. So it's very very attached to um to British football generally I would say. But that is so that journey and that whole uh the England team and you can see like the the players and the the mentalities and the how much it means to them um that that journey they're on we kind of feel that same journey. It's like I kind of call it sports team mentality but um yeah, okay I probably more like an NFL team with all the with the a hundreds athletes instead of Oh yeah, so it's not obviously it's just 11 players on a on a football pitch but um yeah, there's now several hundred um people in on this journey and on this sports team at Halo but it's still it feels the same. It's like we've we've entered this tournament um and we keep when we come up against competition or whatever it is um win or lose like you you there's a fire burning like and we we just love it and I think uh uh we learn it hurts when we when we lose and we celebrate when we win um and there is this trophy somewhere in the distance that maybe one day we'll win it but you know what it's it's more about the journey than actually the destination. One of the things I'm really picking up on Paul is is that word we and I think a lot of MSP owners struggle to get that repeatability of the we. You know, if for you, it really comes across that this is a we. You know, we are on this journey and we will succeed. Mhm. And I think that repeatability of that that type of communication across the whole business really gels it all. Mhm. You know, how do how do you keep that same message? How do you keep going with that same message and making sure you're using the right words? I mean, it's it's not even about it's not even a conscious thing. It's just and I just think it's about being on the same level as we're a team. Like we are a team and there are no you won't see any like reserved parking spaces out the front of the office for senior directors or anything like that. Um we don't when I first started employing people in 2011, um the whole point of employing that first person was to share I was to developing, selling, supporting. I was doing everything and it was to share that share that role. Um I'd want that person to be able to do everything I was doing. And then you employ your second person and the third and at what point when does a team get big enough that all of a sudden you so you then think, all right, well, now we might introduce like specialist roles and whatnot. But that kind of comes a bit later on. But if you if if you are so in the very this whole startup mentality where everyone does just chip in and it's the hustle and and you're all but you are all on the the same level with that same um achieving the same thing. And because we've never had any point in time where there's not been a overnight like switch where I don't know, we've taken on loads of investment or shifted the ownership or so it has just been we've been able to retain that mentality, that whole sort of whole startup mentality. Um and yeah, we do have specialist roles now, but but you know what? We've still retained that sense of what the the journey is we're on and like why it is that people get so excited win or lose and yeah that that kind of purpose to what and I think that's just about like clarity of the the journey and and vision and and we talk a lot about internally. I think it's it's important that in the first week of whenever anybody we have an an intake every first Monday of every month and we make a point of all the senior leadership spending like many hours with the new starters um and being honest I think probably in fact I just spent I spent quite a number of hours just on on Friday with some of the new people and um it it's infectious like I think that that and it's that process and just investing really early on to make sure that people understand we even show like I've even been known to like go on walk walking tour to our old office like the Pied Piper and Go and show them the like the Pied Piper but Just uh Yeah and I think it's important just to know for people to understand where we've come from. There's a trade show in London that we've done every year since 2008. We were genuinely the smallest exhibitor at that show is at Earl's Court back in 2008. Moved to Olympia for a couple of years and it's now in Excel. Um did it every year apart from during COVID. Um and this year we had the the largest presence sorry of every every single vendor that was there. In fact we had two stands. Um and uh I mean that's some journey. Have you actually and so we show them like all the the pictures of the different trade show stands over the years and even the different websites over the years and it's I I think it's really important to for people to understand and properly like buy into the the culture and the vision and and why we do what we do without having and it's really hard to if you haven't like you do come in you just think I don't know it's a machine and you're just a very small cog and there's not much opportunity and you can't make much difference um and that couldn't be farther from the truth um really uh and so yeah that's why we do make a point of like sharing all this about the passion and I'd recommend any MSP owner to um make sure that you do communicate with your new starters like just the journey and uh uh cuz I think yeah that that's really important. So I'd like to talk uh about the F1 partnership. Um obviously from a branding perspective it's amazing. My daughter who's 11 years old Mia every time she sees McLaren go around the track and it says Halo she points it out to me. So uh Halo gets mentioned at least six or seven times during an F1 race in our house. Why did you guys decide on the partnership with F1? What drove that? Uh So after spending 20 years working with the technology and getting the technology right and talking earlier about the strategic side and we focus on segmenting different websites. Um obviously demand generation and awareness is a is a big big play um particularly at enterprise level. So we're moving more and more into the kind of enterprise space. Um we now very much operate in in mid-market and this is more on the ESM side rather than the the PSA side um and so the F1 works really well. There's so many software enterprise software uh companies that um are also partners uh of Formula 1 teams um and Formula 1 itself uh in terms of you got Salesforce Workday uh who are Formula 1 level partners as well as McLaren partners with Halo. Um and um so it's a very good space in terms of the the whole community of partners but I mean there's so many parallels like the the power the the speed performance um the technology of that car, uh um and you could say it's all the same things about our software. Like, it's so powerful, there's there's the speed of the the usability of the the technology, um different the API is also such a modern tech stack that Halo's built on. Um and in particularly McLaren, so the British engineering um parallels as well. Uh and it's um So, yeah, it's mainly I'm I'm I'm also an F1 fan, by the way, but um this certainly isn't a vanity project. It's not just the there's Yeah, we wouldn't I wouldn't ever sort of get in involved. And it's quite hard sometimes not cuz there's some stuff that you really want to do to help people out or whatever, but you know that there wouldn't wouldn't be ROI. Um you wouldn't get a return on investment, and it's again going back to that whole maintaining the lean-ness, the efficiency, which is so important, and you without question, it's it's beneficial in the long run. Um But, yeah, I only went into F1 and it it wasn't it it it was very speculative initially. It was like almost a feasibility study, like could we get ROI? Um and we we met with all the pretty much all the teams, and ended up just yeah, there was a good rapport there um with McLaren. And it as I said, it felt right. It's it just felt like the team were going places, and the changes they'd been making, even to parallels from a cultural point of view, like they really empower their their their staff, um speed of decision-making, like it's far there's way more agility now um than there was, and we say we know if you're an F1 fan F1 fan, you will know that uh soon after the the Halo agreement, um Halo went on the Halo of that McLaren. I think it was the the There was a Canada where that first went on the next race was when they brought their upgrades, and it was the the biggest turnaround in Formula 1 history. So, um yeah, it looks like we we were vindicated in terms of we felt like there was something something happened. All the teams say like yeah, the upgrades are coming and it's going to be transformational and you know, of course it never quite is um, like what they're uh, the picture they're they're painting, but um, in McLaren's case it true to their word, it was it was an incredible turnaround. Uh, and these guy, I mean it's the last 12 months it's just kicked on like they're in a way they're up there um, every race now and uh, it's uh, it's brilliant to see um, and getting to know the the the the people in that team um, yeah, again it's just the the passion, it's the journey. So there's so many parallels. Um, same with Ipswich Town as well. So getting to know the the people there. Um, they've done so McLaren fastest turnaround in in Formula 1 history uh, with that single upgrade. Um, Ipswich back-to-back promotions very rarely done particularly with in the way they've done it. I don't think it's ever been done like that in in history. Um, Ipswich Town. So I think obviously it's they're the local football club for us as well and um, but yeah, it just felt right with with Ipswich. They just seemed like a what Mark Ashton's on there in terms of empowering it's all the same stuff and that's so people people might think in fact I so I was talking to someone on Friday and it was an interesting point they made. They said so Halo kind operates in different industries, but you're successful in every industry you operate in. So it can't there must be something else. So I'm sure you all agree this has been a great episode. Uh, what are key takeaways? Paul, what do you think is the key takeaway from this episode? I think it's uh, it's about just uh, trust and delegation. Just um, empower your team and uh, get on that journey like get a team of people on a journey and it's it's unbelievable what you can achieve. Great. Matt? So, I think it's something that I say quite a lot that's actually Paul's echoed. I say in a slightly different way. Um which is kind of like your priorities in business. So, the first thing is look after your people. Second thing is look after your customers. And the results will follow is the third thing cuz the results are always a byproduct of doing those things. I think that just really re-emphasize that for me. I think you just stole mine there, mate, but well done. I think my second key takeaway is is this real positive we that you've got. There's this just a full part of like a stick of rock of you that says we are on this team. You know, we are going to succeed and we're going to do this together. And I think if MS MSPs can take that away and build that inside their teams, it's just so powerful. Thanks for tuning in, guys. As always, don't forget to like and subscribe.