Now, there are plenty of us out there who follow frameworks and we're responsible about that. But truth be told, it's not everyone, right? The reality is is this is where community comes into play because community can create unofficially at least a standard. Hey channel insiders, welcome back to Channel Insider Partner POV. I'm your host Katie Bavoso and my guest today is Atal Bagot, president and CEO of managed service provider Based Solutions.
Today you'll hear how Atal's unique background in law firm IT helped him not only launch his own company, but carve out a trusted spot in this coveted industry. But as he'll explain, it wasn't an overnight success. Plus, Atal digs into why community is so important for stability in an unregulated industry like managed IT services and why consolidation could put that stability at risk. Welcome at >> Thanks Katie. Well, thank you for having me. >> Thank you so much for being here.
Full transparency to the audience, I have known you for probably going on like seven years now. You were one of my first friends in the channel. So, I'm very excited to be able to feature you on the show. What have you been up to lately? It's been a bit of a crazy 2025 over there at Bass. >> Absolutely. you know um just we're really full much in growth mode and trying to you know make strides on that side and then also you know I've put a lot of effort and energy into the community as a whole from a IT perspective and you know the whole MSP community and really trying to put that energy back in that you know we've been blessed in a lot of ways in the last 15 plus years of having a lot of people come along and help me grow and now I want to give that back now that we have more of that bandwidth to do that and so now that's become come a big priority for me as well.
But, you know, from a base solution standpoint, business is great. We've got nothing to complain about. Um, things have been fantastic. We're going to continue to grow as as we go into 26 hopefully and no real issues there and just see where things go from there. >> You're teeing me up for all the questions I got planned. So, perfect. I'm excited to dig further in. So, as I said, and as you said, actually, you've been going for about 15 plus years now at Base Solutions.
You're a managed service provider founded in 2009. You're based in Virginia and here in the United States. So could you kind of describe for our audience to kind of get to know you the kinds of solutions and services that you offer and the kinds of customers you typically serve? >> Sure. Absolutely. So we are primarily SMB uh sub 100 I would say as far as our primary target market. We do have a couple clients that exceed that. Um but for the most part that's where we sit.
We're about 45% law firms. Um, which is why, you know, that's a I've, you know, recently spoke about that and the strategies around finding a specific vertical and how you really help that for your growth projections. Um, but you know, beyond that, we're kind of all over all other industries. We kind of spread ourselves away from that. And, you know, it's kind of what happens is you get those referrals from your law firm clients and they end up going to their clients and then next thing you know, you're everywhere.
Um, so that's kind of how that happened organically. It wasn't something that we planned. It's just the way it worked out. From a security perspective, we're heavy on cyber security obviously. So from us, you know, our solutions, we weigh heavily on products like threat locker. They've been a fantastic partner of ours. So that's someone that we utilize pretty much their entire catalog from a security perspective. And then beyond that, you know, based on compliance and needs, we have certain solutions that we put into place with other vendors as well that we've learned to really, you know, work with.
And we've really worked hard on our relationships with those vendors and really make sure that we have a presence on advisory boards and such because we want to have a voice in any product that we're using. That's another thing we believe in >> is if you're going to partner with a vendor, you want to have a voice. You want to know that what your experiences are are actually being heard and they're making changes around those. Sometimes things don't work perfectly and you need to have those relationships to be able to talk to people.
Otherwise, you're just a number calling in support and that's not the most efficient way obviously to work in these things. >> Do you find that most vendors welcome you being a voice within their organization and about their solutions or is that kind of a a twisting of an arm and a wink wink nudge nudge? How do I get into the meeting via the person that I know on the board? >> Um, I'd say it's a little bit of all of those. It's not always easy. It took me a long time to get there.
I'll be the first one to admit it. I mean the first 10 years I probably had no presence like that. So it is making those contacts and really you got to nourish those relationships and work through them. And you know, it starts with going to events and getting in front of these vendors and making sure you're not just someone on the other end of the phone and just dealing with a rep. And you start to really build those relationships and then you kind of tee it off from there.
And then you establish that rapport with their, you know, development channel development managers or even their channel chiefs or whoever it may be and they start to respect you in what you bring to the table and that's how you get involved in those things. um they're not going to just some guy who buys a 100 licenses of a product is not going to just get voted in to you know be a part of the advisory board. But you know the goal is to really do that and I think it's really important and that's something actually I learned from other people in the industry that said you know if you're looking at new products and stuff you really need to make sure that you have that voice because as MSPs you know it's important for us to be driving the direction the product is going in.
I totally agree on that because you're the ones that are working directly with the clients and giving them these solutions and and managing them for them, making sure these are what's actually addressing those challenges. Knowing that, it's funny you mentioned they're they're not just going to, you know, take somebody that bought a 100 licenses. Do you find it more difficult or did you find it more difficult to be able to get them to take you more seriously being an SMB provider?
And I asked that respectfully knowing that there are MSPs out there who serve enterprise who it feels like doors just open for them. But SMB is really those are the businesses. Those are the businesses that make up the workforce. So what is it like trying to convince them of that? Do they understand about that or has that been challenging? >> I think there's a little bit of I I I'll put it this there is an understanding. It's like they know it but they don't always open their doors to it if you will.
So they're aware that we drive the market, but I think they look at unfortunately on the vendor side, there is that mentality of it's a numbers game. So if we get enough of these small guys, it's going to equal that enterprise guy, but that enterprise guy has more experience because he's got maybe 150 clients. So his the assumption is is that their exposure and what they can see might be the same. Now, truth be told, the ones that we've had the most success with vendors wise are the ones that actually realize those experiences are not going to be the same.
They never will be. And you need to have both brought to the table. So, you need to have those per those personalities there that are saying, "Yeah, this is how enterprise experience this product. Well, this is how the six person company's going to experience this product. Is this really what you want or is it maybe not a market you want to go after?" And that's okay. And then from that other side, I think another part where even I'm starting to get involved with certain vendors that I'm not even using their product now.
So I think it's important for vendors to even have presence on their boards and their advisory boards of people who were never who may never use their product but can give you a fresh set of eyes and look at the product and say well this is what's wrong with this is why I'm not using it today >> and these are the things that need to change for that to happen. And that gives you a new perspective on how can I how do I need to reapproach our solution sometimes because sometimes you know let's be honest we know how the market works right it starts in enterprise and usually trickles down nine out of 10en times that's how you know the market comes through and so when that happens usually sometimes there's a struggle in how do we get into that SMB MSP market or what does our messaging need to look like or what's the approach we should be taking and you have to rework things and so You need those external parties involved to say, "Hey, look, you need to rethink how you're doing this.
It's not it's you're tonedeaf almost to what the MSP market really needs or how they need to be presented this solution. It's a great solution, but we need to find a new way to approach it. >> I can absolutely tell that you're the head honcho over there from the phone going a couple of times, but >> you know, actually, I need to because I'm not the one that's supposed to be getting the phone call, so I need >> And don't worry, we'll get into why.
We'll dig into that, too. So, I I love that. I love that you are out there really making a concerted effort to get onto these boards to influence the way that their solutions are made and designed and how they're used because you're right, you are coming from the side of where those six person shops, those 100 person shops or below who are using this, their voice still matters because collectively they make a difference. If you have a hundred businesses with 99 people in them, that makes a difference if none of them are going to use a solution because it just doesn't work for them.
Imagine changing that overnight. That works out for you, that works out for the solution provider or that works out for the vendor in this case. So, I think that's so important to do. I want to back up for a moment to talk a little bit more about your customer base because as you mentioned earlier, you've really started to carve out that niche in the law firm space, which I think is awesome. So let's let's talk about that a little bit more. Tell me again about how much of your client base is made up of law firms today about 45% of our client base.
So I mean it's a pretty good chunk of our business. Um and really how it started to be very transparent. I mean I started in law firms. So I learned early on how to communicate with them, how to communicate with lawyers, how to just understand their technologies. there's a unique set of products that law firms use that other industries don't. And so I learned how to talk to them and really get to know how lawyers see things, if you will. And the challenge, I mean, honestly, this is a challenge in every business, but technology is never considered a profit center, >> right?
And law firms are all about profits. It's that's just how their their numbers work. And it makes sense. And I mean, most businesses should be, but when you look at a law firm, it's billable rate, right? It's all about how do I get the highest billable rate and biggest return on that billable rate. And I learned early on that I had to start presenting to partnerships in that way of, okay, I understand you see this as a $100,000 cost to do this migration to whatever.
What if I told you that $100,000 investment would improve your billable rate and your billable hours and present it in that way? And it was having to shift that if I'm not just telling you to spend money. I'm telling you to spend money because it's going to make you more efficient down the road. I promise you it will. And this is how. And breaking that all down. Even now as we look at cloud solutions, what we started to do recently, we'll do, especially with some of these larger firms that we're now talking to, we will literally say, "Okay, what is the cost per employee on average?" They'll give us a salary.
We'll break it down. We'll go all the way down to the hour. Okay? We'll say, okay, so you're telling me that each employee costs you $30 an hour. We'll just say as an example. So if you have 100 employees, that's $30,000. So that means your cost to lose your service for an hour is $30,000 in revenue you've lost. It's not including profit. That's $30,000 that you've lost that you've paid people to work that they can't work. So now you're going to tell me that it costs too much to do your transition to the cloud because of the sunk cost that you're sitting at or what's more important?
So how many times can you afford to go down for multiple hours in a given year? And quickly that number just starts to calculate and they're like okay we get it. >> That was so good. >> Even me I'm starting to get like of like sweaty palms thinking about that. That makes such a difference. >> It was but it was it was approaching it from that perspective. It was a different perspective than we had ever approached when we were talking to cloud and it happened to be that we hit a large client that was kind of resistant to the idea and we reapproached it entirely and we said you know why don't we approach it with what is your cost to be down because they were looking at the capital cost and they're like oh my god we would spend all this money upfront plus this monthly cost that we never had before to be in the cloud and it was well the reason why you're doing that is because you can't afford to be down for four hours.
That's a lot of money lost. And once you broke it down that way and went in that direction, the perspective changed and it was like, "Okay, now we get it." >> And just to to clarify, because you mentioned you spent about a decade working in law firms that was in the IT department, right? You didn't have you don't have a law degree that I don't know about. >> No, no, no, no, no. Um I I don't have a law degree. Um although if it was up to my father, I would have been.
Um but uh he he was a lawyer also. But yeah, I spent 10 years in law firm IT. Started literally from the help desk all the way up to IT management. And then in 2009 is when I decided I wanted to do this on my own. Didn't even know what an MSP was. Didn't even know what I was honestly getting myself into. I just knew I wanted to be out on my own doing something. Um, and then it kind of evolved into an MSP kind of honestly. I didn't even realize I was doing it.
And then I realized, oh, this model is what I was doing. Okay. And then we just kind of ran with it from there. You guys, we have a name now. We have a definition for what we are. >> Exactly. We didn't have one. I think it was just like, oh yeah, we do technology consulting for law firms or whatever it is or I just want to be an IT consultant or I remember the generic term was I just want to have a consulting business. In it, it was always like I just want to have a consulting business.
That was like the thing everyone said and no one knew what that really meant. It was just like I want to be a consultant and it was like to what degree, right? And so I think it was at a young age I didn't understand it even but now I understand that there's so many different facets. So now when people come to me and say I want a job in IT and I'm like what does that mean to you? >> Yeah. >> What does that really mean? Right? Because there's people want to do programming, there's people that want to do cyber security and then there's such a generic thing around that even.
So you have to get more granular in all these things and all things that we're doing. As an MSP, we're fortunate we get to touch a lot of different technologies, but when you look at people specializing, they like the generic thing coming out of college is I want a degree in cyber security. There's a lot of things you can do with that. >> It's a wide swath. Yeah, >> it's a big net. And it's like what does that really mean? Like are you going to be the guy sitting there staring at logs of firewalls or are you the guy who's looking at strategy for a small business?
It's very different. So, it's just it's that kind of conversation you have to have with people. talk to me about what it was like getting your first law firm on board onto your customer base. What how did that come about? Was that just a connection that you were able to make? >> Yeah, so you know, I I was fortunate um I'll say in that sense um I had a a lawyer uh who was working for the firm I had been IT manager for previously reach out to me and say, "Hey, I'm starting my own firm.
I'm leaving the firm and is this something you can set up for me?" And I said, "Yeah, sure." So, I started to set them up and quickly, very quickly, I think within months, realized one that this is something I can do on my own. I don't need someone else and I don't need to work for someone else to do it, but two that I had to quit my job to do it >> because I couldn't do it on the side. You can't support clients Monday through Friday during business hours if you're working for someone else. uh at least not consciously although there are now people who have multiple jobs but that's a whole another story.
Um but you know for me it was I can't do this this way. I can't service them effectively if I don't take this risk now. And so I kind of that's kind of where that started. And so that's when in 2009 I said you know what I'm just going to see what happens. Uh give it a couple years and see where I end up. I'd be the first one to admit the first year was very scary. Getting new business was not easy. Um, and so I think for the first few months I remember being like, "What am I doing?
Why am I doing it this way?" But, you know, and I I I at times debated going back into the workforce and luckily I stuck it out and, you know, made my way through. But, you know, there are times where you really start to question it and you go because as anyone who's looking to start any business, but and even in the MSP side of things, the first few years are going to be tough. If you're walking into it expecting to make your salary those first two few years, you're you're kidding yourself.
And many don't make their salary per se for 10 years. Let's just say I bring in half a million dollars of revenue on the first couple years, but then I got to hire people. I've got to overhead. I got to deal with all this other stuff. So, a lot of you hear the stories of a lot of MSPs that are in the red even 20 years in >> not not running efficiently. And that's because of, you know, they don't understand their books quite the the way they should or they don't have the right guidance in that sense from other MSPs or some sort of peer group to help them kind of understand things and how operationally you need to be a certain maturity you need to carry from an operational standpoint.
And that took us years to figure out too. I mean, I'm not saying we were perfect. We we were probably doing the same thing for the first 5 10 years almost. It's understanding those things and going through those learning curves and those growing pains and understanding like, oh, I have to understand what this cost does to my numbers and am I charging the right amount? As an MSP, when we first start, you want every client you can get. You're going to lowball.
You try and do all these things. But the problem with that approach sometimes is that you end up hurting yourself in the long run. >> Because if you lowball now and then you try and go up to like this premier number five years from now, even your your clients from day one are like, why are you charging so much all of a sudden? Like what is this? And they don't understand it. And so there's so many different aspects that you have to understand as a business owner to fully make sure that you're running in the most optimal way possible.
I love the the fact that you started that story with I got lucky and it's I had 10 years of experience in this specific area and then I took a big risk and then I stuck it out even though I wasn't making money. >> I mean I don't think it's easy. I you know and it's I hear from people now who like for instance have been in the industry but they don't they're not owners >> and but they want to be but they're so deep in it's hard to become an owner now, right?
I took a risk. I had no kids. I had no wife. I had nothing but myself. And luckily, I had parents also who were supportive of my decision and they were like, "We'll help you out, whatever you need." Without that, I don't think I would have taken that risk. >> It's very different. And it's hard to take a risk like that, to go out and say, you know what, >> I'm not going to be making any money anymore. I'm just going to go try and start a business.
It's it's a big risk, you know, and I think that's where it gets very challenging for people to make that change and that pivot. And it's easy to to from the outside looking and say, "Oh, yeah, I can do that. I can run this MSP. I don't need to I don't need anyone else." And I, "Oh, I'll just follow this." And it's not that simple. That's all I can say. It takes a lot. And I'll say like, you know, for the first seven years, it was kind of like you were lonely on an island almost.
You had a couple people working for you. You're just kind of running through things. And ironically, my shift started when I started going to events. my mental shift as an owner. Um, so 2016 I remember this um was my first well I went to one before that but this is the one I remember uh was my first nextG in LA was a channel company event that's when I met certain owners who kind of helped me understand things already just from meeting people and talking to them and understanding how they operated their business.
I started to, you know, internalize these thoughts and like, okay, this is how they do things. This is why they do them. And I, you kind of started to shift how we approached our business. And then going into, you know, postco after those five years of kind of trying to mature it. Then postco, I have a core group of, you know, owners that I tend to socialize with more than anyone else. Um, as you know, we started a peer group community, tech degenerates.
And so from that group, it built another level of maturity because you can be more honestly vulnerable with that group. You can be more open. You start to talk about things in more detail and you start to understand things and you start to do knowledge sharing. And I think that's where it's so important for every MSP to find that group, find your tribe. Don't be afraid to share information with other MSPs. Um because everyone's there to help each other.
And I think that's something where we fail as an industry, we we automatically assume everyone is our competition. And truth be told, even the guy down the street is not. I have one colleague who's also a founding member of our tech degenerates. Literally is 15 minutes down the street. We've come up once against each other in 15 years and it was me taking his client. That's life from the story. But um but I mean it worked out. He didn't he was like, "You know what?
I'm actually happy that they're going to someone else that that he knew he it was a very mutual thing like and but like literally one time in all these years. So when you look at it from that perspective, you're like, you know, there's plenty of business. There's plenty of that. And unless they're doing literally the exact same thing you are, chances are you're not going to bump up against them that often. And if you do, you do respectfully and you handle it respectfully and you you create that rapport.
And I'm not saying to go and divulge every little detail, but you need to have that commonality that you can have those conversations and be vulnerable and say, "Hey, look, I'm struggling with this or I'm it's even something as small as I'm looking at set product to change our stack. Has anyone had experience with it? How much are you charging your clients for it? Are you getting how much are you getting away with? Like what do your margins look like on that?" Because these are all factors that we have to consider as owners is you know when we're looking at a new solution that we want to bring in because it brings a whole new level of security for instance for our clients and it makes sense but what is it going to cost a for me to implement and b for me to resell because that's part of it too and is it something I have to put into my stack or is it something I tier on?
These are all different things you have to consider when you're looking at stuff. I want to keep pulling on that thread that you brought up about kind of helping the next person in line and not looking at them as competition. For the entirety of the time that I've known you, that's just very much been who you are. You mentioned the tech degenerates. You mentioned the folks in that. By the way, how many of you do I have to interview before I finally get like an like an honorary seat?
I'm just asking. >> I mean, there's no seats, per se. Um, I'll get you a pin. I'll make sure that comes to you. Um, I'll send that out tomorrow. But um there are 10 of us founding members. We actually had a few more initially, but because of conflicts and stuff, they had to step off. But you know, we're all still very close. But you know, it's been a journey in in essence of understanding and respecting the need for that community side of things.
Um I think one of the things though that our industry lacked were agnostic communities. a lot of the communities that existed early on and you still hear about them are driven by the vendors if you will in some way or another that you know the vendors are supporting it or you know they're the ones that are kind of propping it up. So then and this is not a knock on it. I think it's great to have them but the messaging tends to then go towards that in some way or another, right?
Whereas now you're starting to see these agnostic communities come up that say, you know, we're just here for the common goal of building a stronger community. Whether that's Tech Degener, it's MSPGeek, they're all looking at that from that perspective. How do we raise the bar for the community, right? And GTIA in a lot of ways is very similar in what they are, what they represent now that, you know, things have kind of split off. It's it's it's actually made it more defined from what they're trying to do.
Um, and so I think that's where we're starting to see things really percolate from a knowledge share standpoint and people really starting to realize the importance of that and knowing that, you know, you can give your all, if you will, um, in when you're communi communicating with other partners or other MSPs, you can continue to do that and it's going to be fine and you're going to be able to share that information, you're going to gain something out of it, too. >> I agree on that.
And I think you you brought up GTA. I think their splitting off from KTIA was a real lightning moment for the channel and realizing, oh wow, this is actually something we've been wanting and we've been calling for and it's happening where we want those more agnostic groups and and this is being listened to. So I totally see where that vision comes from. How do you think having that community behind you and kind of banding together helps you be a better provider to customers?
How does it connect you more on that end? You know, I I think you and I have talked about this before. We're in a unique place as MSPs that we're not formally being held to any standards, right? >> Like no regulation, no federal >> regulations, nothing. No one's saying MSPs need to do X, Y, and Z. They need to have >> X Y andZ approach to things or anything like that. Now, there are plenty of us out there who follow frameworks and we're responsible about that, but truth be told, it's not everyone, right?
The reality is is this is where community comes into play because community can create unofficially at least a standard. Let's create a gold standard of what the MSPs in the world should look like. Let's create a gold standard of of what we should be doing for each other and what we expect of each other as MSPs. And I think that is critical as we move forward into our industry over the next 5 10 years. We have to create that. And I do think there will be regulation at some point.
I I do believe that's inevitable also. Um but where I do think we need to do until then is at least start to hold each other accountable and say, "Hey, look, like I've done this. I, you know, I take on clients and I'll look at, you know, the way things are set up and I'm like, "This is weird. Why was this done?" And I will call the owner of the MSP and say, "Hey, just so you know, this wasn't done right." And luckily the client didn't get affected by it.
But I hope this was just an errant mistake and not something you're doing from a standard practice because if you are then that's making us all look bad because you're you're one day away from being breached and >> we're all going to get in trouble. And it's holding each other accountable like that. Like I'm not knocking you. I'm not going to go tell the client that you did this, but I'm telling you so you make sure you don't do it down the road.
And I think that's the kind of community we need to build amongst each other is like, you know, hey look, I came across this or I ran some scan and your company came up and you should know so that way you make sure not all your stuff is covered, right? And I think that's kind of where we want to see things go from that standpoint. >> How do you feel about the consolidation happening within the MSP space right now? We're seeing a lot of mergers and acquisitions.
We're seeing a lot of MSPs that were already large start to combine and consolidate to what you know we respectfully have called mega MSPs across the space. We all refer to them. We can think of a few. I'm sure there are names that stand out in your head as much as they stand out in mine. >> How do you think that impacts though this communitydriven regulation that you're that you're thinking about? And just how do you think it impacts the space that you're in in general?
Do you think that it makes you closer or kind of brings you further apart? Just ruminate on that a bit for me. >> There's good and bad to everything. >> Okay. There's good to M&A and there's bad. Okay. The good is that, you know, for the those that want to roll off and are looking to retire, it's a great exit strategy. And I guess, you know, from the way I look at it, it's it's better they do that versus not serve their clients as they start to wind down.
So, I'm looking at from that side of things from a from a messaging standpoint. The challenging side is the larger ones tend to become more on how do I say this in a nice way, but actually I'm just going to say it and then I'll deal with the repercussions of it. Um, the bigger you get, the harder it is to stay keep your pulse on your clients and the everchanging flows that are happening with them. So, in essence, you can become tonedeaf in a lot of ways. the same way a vendor can, as they grow and get bigger, so can an MSP.
Um, and so when the bigger one when you start to become this massive super MSP, as we call it, do you really have a pulse on what the SMB market really is anymore or are you just so driven by numbers and what your numbers need to look like? And I I have seen this, you know, in detail with an MSP that got bought and became this big conglomerate of MSPs. And when we hear about it, they're saying, you know, the VCs are driving numbers. That's all they want to see is that profit number because venture capitalists are looking at a 4year return.
That's it. And they want to see that return. And if that's where they're going to push things to really get things, you know, slim out the margins. So then you see a lot more contraction of staff. And that's where M&A gets dicey, too. People are getting let go because they're just trying to hit numbers. It's not about the you lose the community side of it, if you will, in some ways in that aspect then because it's just it's all about numbers. And I don't want to be in a space where that's what I'm focused on is just my dollars and cents.
I want to know that I'm servicing my clients, right? And that they know that I'm taking care of them always. And I know that if we get to that point where we're in that situation, you know, I don't know what we'll do down the road. I know right now we're not looking for M&A. we're not going to sell. But, you know, that's my biggest fear as an MSP is we've driven our business into so much of personal touch and knowing our clients intimately and having having that ability to say, I know so and so's kids are going to college or whatever it may be in our 60 plus clients that we have, I actually know each one and I know what's going on in their lives and stuff.
And it's I don't want to lose that personal touch. And that's going to be the biggest challenge as we continue to grow is at what point do we hit that number where we're like either we stay where we are and start to become more deliberate in the clients we're keeping or we're going to lose that touch. And that's that's got to be that balance that we have to figure out. And I think as MSPs look at things, that's kind of where they have to look and make those decisions.
And to kind of go back to what you were saying about what that does with regulation and stuff, in some ways it's good, in some ways it's bad. You know, a large MSP might have more influence in creating regulation around things because they can say we represent 20 plus MSPs and we know that this needs to happen a certain way. And the problem is is what do you do when the super MSP is not doing things right? That's when things get even more concerning, right?
Yeah. And it's like >> how who do you talk to? Who do you how how do you correct them? What's what's keeping them? >> It's like, "Oh, great. I've got this MSP that literally has presence in every state >> all over the country." And I know they do bad work, >> but they're lowballing everyone because they've now created a volume game and they've decided to take a new approach to MSP work. So, like we've seen that happen, you know, with certain MSPs that exist that literally charge peanuts compared to what any MSP, a local MSP would charge.
But it's because they've built this whole AI engine around how they're going to support users and they've created this whole thing and it's all automated and the client doesn't really talk to anyone but people are buying it because it's cheap and that's the whole thing. So how do you differentiate yourself? That's where the new strategy comes into play is what differentiators do you have in what you're selling? Because we all sell the same service in a lot of ways.
What are your differentiators? Are you giving that personal touch? Are you getting to know your clients? Do you understand their businesses as well as you should? Um, I think a lot of times we get caught up in, hey, they're just a client. They're just paying our check. We're good. But like, it's very important to understand what are their business factors, what drives their business, when are they most profitable, when are they suffering the most, what are the economic things that affect them, you know, and understanding those types of things and really getting to know your clients from that perspective.
So that way you can help them grow using the technology that they're buying from you. That's kind of my approach to things is I sit down with our clients every quarter and I sit there and say, "I don't want to talk to you about what what you need to buy from me right now. >> Help me understand your business more and what drives your business. What's going to help you grow in the next six months to a year?" Maybe you're not looking to grow. Maybe you're actually in a contraction phase.
Good for us to know as we wind down. So we know that. But it's also if they're saying, "Yeah, I want to grow. I want to add this many people and this is what I want to do. Then I look at it and go all right well if you're going to do that then you need XYZ solution in place that's going to allow you to do that rapidly kind of thing or we need to put these processes in place to make sure that when you do that it's seamless and doesn't take three months to get there and kind of that kind of approach of things. >> That's also such a it's not a year-to-year conversation anymore either.
It is definitely a quartertoquarter conversation and maybe even more frequently for some businesses. But you you have you know solutions like AI that come into the mix and when I say solutions that's a very broad stroke so I'll just say technology like AI that comes into the mix that changes how they were going to approach something in the first place that can cause them to scale up or down and they were not planning around that last month. So it's it's interesting that you say that.
I was going to ask how you compete with the so to speak mega MSPs and you talking about your differentiators is really important but does it also help to dig into a niche kind of like what you did with law firms? >> Absolutely. I think you know it there is definitely a benefit to if you understand a certain market in a way that no one else does or that not as many people do. You're definitely going to set yourself apart. And when you have that ability to walk into a a law firm for instance with confidence, it's a different level of confidence when you know the things they're going to ask you about.
Like are you aware of document management systems? Do you understand what they use? Do you understand legal accounting that like there's 30 different legal accounting softwares? There's 10 different document management system. But the confidence I can walk in there with because I know what those those are and what they're probably going to ask me is a lot easier than if I was the guy who knew nothing about it and they're like, "Oh, so are you familiar with this?" And you're like, "What?" Um, no, but we'll figure it out.
And when you're talking to a client, they don't love hearing that. They don't they they want to know that their guys are going to be the experts and they're going to know everything about it. And sometimes there are still some that we don't know and we'll say, "Hey, look, you know, we're not as familiar with that one, but we understand the concepts at least." And so understanding the concept of it allows us still to work with it faster than say the guy who's never touched legal stuff.
And in that sense, it's also understanding personalities. It's not even about the technologies, right? So every industry, you know, CPAs have a certain personality to them. Lawyers have a certain personality. So, it's understanding those and knowing how to navigate those and talk to them and training our staff even like, "Hey, look, you know, they're probably going to call when they do call, they're calling heated. You've got to understand that, right?" You know, and I think that's one of the the hardest messages we deal with with our staff is when we tell them we're like, "We are not in a job where people are going to call you just to say, "Hey, you're doing a good job.
Thank you for everything." No, they're going to call us when things are messed up, which means we're probably never really hearing from people when they're happy, unfortunately. And it's training people to have that mentality of understanding like it's it's a thankless job in a lot of ways. And down the road, obviously, sometimes you get lucky and you you'll hear a nice big thank you from someone, but overall, you're always hearing from them when they're most frustrated.
And it's just recognizing that. >> As we start to wind down, I want to talk a little bit about you. I know that this has been the year where you're like, I'm putting my CEO hat on. We're leading. I'm leading and I'm going to take myself out of the technical side, which has got to be hard for you because that's your background. Like that's how you were brought up is very technical. What's been the biggest challenge for you in how to change the way that you lead, focusing more on the business day-to-day rather than addressing all the technical issues? >> I mean, I still do on occasion get pulled into stuff and that's totally fine, man.
Um, I think, you know, the biggest thing for me is trust. When you build something from the ground up, it's really hard to let go. You naturally want to hold on to it. You want to protect it. You wanna, you know, it's like your child. Um, and you kind of want to just hold on to it and say, you know what, don't let's not mess this up kind of thing. But it's coming to that realization that as an owner, if you're going to truly grow, you have to let go of things.
You have to trust people to do things. It's also for for not even just growth, but for your own sanity. like you've got to be able to step away. And if you don't feel like you can step away for like a week even, then that is a problem down the road because that's how you get to burn out. That's how things start to become ineffective. And it also becomes a thing of if your staff doesn't know everything that's happening in the business, then if say whatever reason something happens and you need to step away for even a day, things are a mess and they're completely lost.
And so I think for me it was making that conscious decision like okay I need to trust my staff. Obviously step one was getting the right people in place. Um which took us a long time too and we're finally there and we are we love our team and we found the best group of people that we could possibly have right now. And trusting them and knowing that we can trust them that nothing's going to blow up because I'm not here you know and I think you know big testament to that.
I I you know I was gone for three weeks. I was in Europe over the summer and I probably did a total of 20 hours of work over three weeks. Now that doesn't include responding to emails and stuff but actual >> say I'm proud of you. >> Actual work um you know it was very limited and it's because I trusted them to handle everything and for the most part they took care of it all. And that's where you get to that comfort level. And after that now I feel more confident like hey I can step away and go focus on some other things that do help the business but in a different way right and you know doing things like you know calls and you know webinars and such with you or you know going doing events now and speaking at them and all that and it's just these are different ways to get your name out there.
Now it's a for me it's a twofur. I get to, you know, give back to the community and get my name out there more and establish myself as a true, you know, thought leader in the industry. But like, you know, from that standpoint, it's also given me that time to trust them more, give them more control, help them grow as people. And I think so from that standpoint, it's like everybody wins. >> Oh, I love that. >> Yeah. >> Well, something that I was really curious about earlier, but I think it would make a beautiful way to end on is I always like to ask about success stories that stick with you.
Is there one that you think about over the last year, maybe two years, where you go, this is what it's all about. This is why I do what I do. Do you have a client success story that you could share with me that you really love to talk about? >> That's a good question. Let me think about, you know, actually, unfortunately, it's not a last couple years thing. It's more of a this is how it evolved >> over the last 10 years. So, I had signed a law firm back when we first early on in the business actually.
Um, they were very small. They were 12, not even 12. They were like seven people, I think, when I first signed them up. And over the last 10 years, they're now almost close to 100 people, I think, with offices both here and overseas. And I think for me what resonated was the managing partner, the founder of the firm. Um the first thing he actually said to me was the technology solutions that you put in place at multiple facets of the business, multiple points are why we grew the way we did.
And I think that was very important for me to understand that this goes back to what I was saying. It's making a difference to a business. It's not just about how you're doing, but it's sitting with the client and saying, "What are you trying to accomplish? And how do we find the most efficient way to get there utilizing the technologies that are out there in the world?" Because we can get you to growth a lot faster if we know how what you're trying to do.
And I take that case study a lot and use it now with other clients and I sit there that's why I make it such a point to understand what their plans are so we can help them and really shape their IT infrastructure or their IT approach and really help them grow because there's so much technology available like you said AI is one thing right if you can leverage it there's so much growth that can be done without having to add headcount or more expenses and even internally as MSPs.
Now, if we're leveraging these tools the right way, there are so many ways that we can become more efficient, better as customer service individuals, all kinds of things. Just leveraging these automation tools and AI that are out there and it's being able to trust those things and doing that. I think that's the best way to go. >> Well, at if we want to reach out to you, if we want to reach out and learn more about base solutions or tech degenerates or if we're like, hey, a lot of things you said today resonated with me.
How can I learn more from you? Where can we go and who can we reach out to? >> Yeah. Um, obviously if you want to, you know, check out Techtogenerous, techtogenerous.com and join our Discord and all that. If you want to reach out to me personally, feel free to hit me up on LinkedIn. I'm always there to help anyone and everyone. I that's what I'm here for. And I I love to just talk about things and strategies and all that and help, you know, the community as a whole. >> That's all.
Thank you so much for your time today. It's been such a pleasure getting to talk to you. >> Absolutely. Thank you. I appreciate it. >> Thank you so much to Adel for joining me today and thank you for watching or listening. You can check out every episode of Channel Insider Partner POV on channelinsider.com or watch us on YouTube at youtube.com/ channelinsider_news and trends or listen to us as a podcast wherever you get your podcasts from. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and follow wherever possible so you never miss an episode. Once again, I'm Katie Bavoso and I'll see you next time.
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