Episode 33: Pandora’s Jewel Box

Erick and Rich discuss why MSPs should give outsourcing some of their tech work overseas a second look, and the secrets to preventing project creep and seep. Then Rich is joined by MJ Shoer, CompTIA’s Chief Community Officer, and CompTIA members John Harden and Carrie Green to discuss the power of community in the SMB channel. And finally, one last thing: the surprisingly long tail enjoyed by floppy disks in Japan and Germany.

Discussed in this episode:

Channelholic: Going global gets a look

The Secret to Building Winning Global Teams: How to Leverage Offshore Talent to Exponentially Increase Profitability and Valuation, by Sunny Kaila, CEO, IT By Design

5 Questions with John Harden: 2024 CompTIA Community North America Future Leader Award Winner

5 Questions with Carrie Green: 2024 CompTIA Community North America Community Leadership Award Winner

CompTIA ChannelCon 2024 home page and registration

Transcript:

Rich:

Welcome to another Episode of the MSP chat podcast, your weekly visit with two talking heads, talking with you about the services, strategies, and success tips you need. To make it big and managed services. My name is Rich Freeman. I am the chief content officer and channel analyst at Channel Master, the organization responsible for this podcast.

I am joined as I am every week by your other cohost, Erick Simpson, our chief strategist Erick, how you doing? Doing great this week, Rich,

Erick: but more importantly, how you doing? You’ve been traveling in the last week or so, but not your usual travels.

Rich: Yes, and thank you for asking Erick, as we record this this is my first work day back from a one week vacation in California’s wine country perfect weather, wine tasting, hanging out with friends and eating too much and drinking too much.

And it was phenomenal. And I it, you know what, everybody needs to take their vacation time and I’m glad I have taken mine.

Erick: Yep. We’re glad to have you back, Rich. Awesome. Let’s dive into the top story of the week as you get back into fight and trim

Rich: As it happens too, I the blog channel all like my blog never takes a week off So this came out just last friday as we’re recording this right now it’s based on a conversation I had with sunny kayla sunny is the ceo of it by design they describe themselves as a talent solution specialist for MSP and other channel partners.

So they do temporary staffing and permanent staffing. They also do outsourced services, particularly overseas. They’re a specialist in outsourcing help desk roles in India and the Philippines. And it was very, I should say Sonny, the part of why we spoke is Sonny has written an entire book about what we’re going to discuss here and it’s called the secret to building winning global teams, how to leverage offshore talent.

To exponentially increase profitability and valuation. It comes out in a couple of months and September, I believe during the the build it live conference that I keep I design hosts which I will be attending, but it’s an interesting story. Erick, because you go back in time just a few years to 2019 pre pandemic times, as there was a very widespread belief among MSPs that you pretty much want.

Your employees and your techs may be in particular to be in the office five days a week. And of course that winds up meaning that everybody you employ is going to be within driving distance of the office. They’re going to be local. COVID comes along. Everybody is working remotely. That turns out to be Pretty effective for most MSPs out there.

And because of that, it starts getting people to thinking, why am I limiting the hiring pool just to folks who are within driving distance of the office? Maybe I should be recruiting people in the next county over in the next city, the next state, people start getting comfortable, not just with having staff who work remotely three, four, five days a week, but having remote staff from all over the country.

And all over the world. And this is what Sonny wanted to speak with me about basically. Cause he’s been in this global outsourcing world for a long time and he freely concedes there are a lot of reasons why a lot of MSPs didn’t really consider it in the past. It’s not just a lack of familiarity and a lack of confidence.

That the talent pool available overseas wasn’t necessarily as fluent in the English. Or as fluent in American culture if you’re based here in, in the U. S., there were certain compromises that you had to make in terms of the communication standards. And a lot of MSPs who experimented with it weren’t really comfortable with the results.

And Sonny really wanted, he’s written an entire book, basically, to make sure people understand that has all changed. India, he’s from India. India is where they do a lot of their outsourcing. A little bit over 1. 4 billion people in India right now, some 800 million of whom are under the age of 30.

And Sonny points out, anyone under the age of 30 in India was born with a phone in their hand. They’ve been watching American TV. They’ve been on, Tik Tok, watching American videos. They are fluent, not just in the English language which they learned through their leisure activities, but also at school.

They’re fluent in the English language. They’re fluent in American culture. There is a very deep talent pool of people who would fool you basically. Into, believing you’re just talking with somebody with slightly accented English based here in the U. S. And the thing that he also wants MSPs to understand is the powerful financial benefits Of outsourcing some of your help desk work again [00:05:00] people were aware of these benefits before but uncomfortable with some of the compromises they had to make but sonny in this book has a whole series of case studies that he’s going to provide He gave me a chance to peek at some of them with the names covered up, to protect the privacy of his clients But I was able to get into the weeds and the details And by outsourcing some or all of that help desk work these MSPs Sunny works with were able to reduce their labor costs anywhere from 15 to 60%.

And for most MSPs, labor is the number one expense. Every dollar you remove from that expense goes straight to the bottom line. In doing so, that makes you more profitable. It adds to your EBITDA. The higher your EBITDA, the higher your multiple, if you’re looking ahead to selling the company.

There are some pretty substantial rewards to reducing your labor costs in that way. And it was just It was a good opportunity for me to get a refresher, an eye opener on the state of that global outsourcing opportunity today. And I just wanted to pass it along. I wrote about it in the blog, Channelholic, as I said, but I also wanted to get your thoughts, just in terms, Of maybe prodding people in our audience who have ruled that out and not really gone back to reconsider in a while to just take a second look at whether or not it could make sense for them to outsource some of their work globally.

Erick: Oh, Rich, what a timely topic and a great conversation with Sonny and my hat’s off to you. To him for writing a book that brings us into today’s economy about outsourcing and how far we’ve come in the last 20 years. Rich, some of our listeners may not realize this, I was one of the first MSPs in the industry back in the early, I’ll call it 2004, is when we transitioned our IT practice into, we called it flat rate IT services, right?

Silly me. I should have just understood that it was going to be called managed services later, but I didn’t at that time. When we were building our practice, rich, we had the same challenges that today’s MSPs do in terms of staffing, in terms of cost of labor and things like that, things were a lot different now, but back then we still had the same challenges and we were one of the first partners that signed up with, you may remember this this organization out of India, rich Zenith info tech.

Zenith Infotech the leadership came out, visited us multiple times, pitching us on the opportunity to have, their team in India support our NOC team in the US. And I got to be honest, Rich, I was not feeling it, but they wore me down, right? They wore me down and they said, look, let’s just try it.

And this wasn’t a scenario where what you just described and what Sonny has described. And his journey and his book that the, the workforce is growing up on American culture and TV. And with a phone on their hand, remember this is the early two thousands, right? So there was none of that.

In fact, there was such a language barrier at that time, rich, that we were having trouble understanding the communication between. The, our Indian knock team, and that’s what they were. They were not, we were outsourcing our knock and we were, they were supporting our internal it team. We were not having this team engaged directly with our end user clients because of, language, culture, the things that are so much different today, right?

But I’ll tell you, Rich, through that partnership. And then we became fans because we had to figure out basically what Sunny is teaching in his book today to everybody. We had to figure it out with no guidance. Like we had to figure out how to sell flat rate it services, right? How to not think of this outsourced team as their service desk or Their NOC.

Cause that was the first thing that I identified with my internal team, which was, whenever there’s a problem with a ticket or it had to get escalated back and forth. It’s their team, their service desk, they’re NOC. And I quickly had to say, listen, it’s not theirs. It’s ours. So start treating it like that was the first thing I learned, which was you’ve got to treat them like they are part of your team, like they’re right down the hall and I won’t go through, maybe for another topic, we’ll get into some of that, maybe after I get my hands on this book and read it and we can do a review together, it’d be fun.

To compare notes even further, but ultimately we were saving at least 60 percent on our labor costs, just on NOC services with that. And it was a game changer for us. I was able to retask three and a half people out of my NOC to do project work, rich, the most valuable, profitable services we did at that time.

What we were trying to figure out how to become [00:10:00] MSPs for the first time. So I’m looking forward to getting my hands on a copy of when it’s released. And love to do an update with you and maybe even, have Sonny on the show and chat about it.

Rich: Yeah, no, that’s a great idea. And like I said I’ll include a link.

It’s actually available. I believe for pre ordering on Amazon right now, include a link in the show notes. It comes out during the build it live event. That the IT by design folks are going to be doing in September. I don’t want to guess at the dates and get them wrong, but I will be attending that event, and maybe we can get Sonny to come on the show, if you can spare us a few minutes in the middle of that show, or if not, maybe we’ll just invite him on for an interview segment and get into the numbers a little bit with him and his his experience.

It’s very interesting to hear your story, Erick, because it points out This was a very viable, helpful model 20 years ago and per sonny that the options, the range of roles that you can potentially outsource that has grown. It’s a different picture now, but it was actually a more viable picture 20 years ago, maybe than some folks realize.

So interesting topic, food for thought, people, something to think about. And we will revisit it next time. On the show in a future episode. But for right now, Erick, it’s time for your tip of the week. And you’re going to be spinning it in terms of its applicability to MSPs, but it’s a topic that I think all of us I know I can relate to as well.

What is that topic, Erick? Thanks, Rich.

Erick: The topic today is eliminating project scope creep. And I say scope seep, right? So there’s scope creep and there’s scope seep. So there’s three, three mini tips that I’ll share in delivering this rich, and I learned how to manage projects in the enterprise before I ever thought that I would start my own it practice and later, become an MSP and all this.

And I learned this under the tutelage of an amazing it director at the place I was working at that time. And we were able to take a project. It was a move for the organization. It was a 6 million project. We were moving a campus of three buildings with about, I think, 15 to 1700 people on site.

And there were 17 international locations that were all tied to this. Removing these folks supposed to take nine months, nine months, 6 million. I think is what it was. And we went over budget and timeline significantly. We went over budget, a million dollars. We went over timeline 90 days, but at the end, our, the stakeholders, the C level executives, very happy with how it went.

And it was all down to how the project was scoped and managed. There was, I think, 68 different contractors involved in this project. You can imagine it was a brand new facility. That was empty. And we had to go in and do the TI, the HVAC, the electrical, the data center downstairs, every floor, everything that had to do with this move.

It involved data comm, it involved telecom, it involves HR. It was big. It was massive. And what I learned, Rich, was three were three fundamental, three fundamental techniques. The first one is. Scope and sometimes, if you’ve never done something like this before, so here’s a tip for our audience.

If you’ve done projects before, how difficult and challenging it can be when you find out you scoped the wrong solution or the wrong part of a solution in a larger project, you’ve got to go back and have a difficult conversation with a client. And hope that they’ll pay for that change when in fact it might have been your fault all along So that’s a difficult conversation rich.

I had a situation, in my msp practice where we were swapping out a bunch of Firewalls from a client. They had six locations and we were going to be Upgrading their firewalls to create vpn connections with a certain encryption level between all the locations vendors told us Oh, yes. Here’s our brand new firewall.

It does exactly what you need this encryption etc You We got the firewalls in, we deployed them and it did not work at all. So after, a weekend cut over talking to the vendor, finding out that, Oh that particular protocol that you’re asking for will be released on the next software update.

So we were sold the feature and benefits that were vaporware at the time, because somebody wanted to make a sale, I think. And so we had to go back and explain to the client, Rich, Hey, This was what we were told by, the vendor, we assumed it was going to work. Luckily, we had a bunch of firewalls from another project that we had done from another client that went to a different vendor.

But that those firewalls actually had this protocol that we can deploy. So we actually put those in temporarily when the other firewall update software came in, we flashed the firewalls, we tested [00:15:00] them, then we redeployed the client, did pay us for the labor because it wasn’t our fault. But sometimes it is our fault by not scoping properly.

Now, if you’re a an IT provider, rich, and you are asked by a client, can you do this thing? My experience, the sales team is always going to say yes. And the technical team is always going to say, what did you say that we could do? So when you’re getting those situations where, boy, it’s a lucrative opportunity, if you can make it work, but you have never done this before.

My recommendation is to sell a proof of concept, right? So you get the client to say, look, we’re going to test this maybe in a business unit or a small group of users, if you can, and work out all the kinks and details. And we’ll charge you X to do that. But when we do, then you agree to pay for us to roll it out to the entire You know, infrastructure or whatever that is, and we’ll quote you on that.

So at least you get paid for scoping it and figuring it out. So you’re not doing it on your time, rich, but the client agrees. Okay. We’re in this together. Let’s figure out if this upgrade to our, fill in the blank solution or process or application will work. And then if it does, then we will deploy to the rest of the campus or whatever that may be.

So scoping accurately, and if you’re not sure proof of concept, that’s the first The second tip rich phasing properly. And conducting phase reviews. So when we’re phasing a project out and not getting into the, the discussion about What’s a project and what’s a what’s just a user setup, right?

But if it’s a project to me It means that it has multiple phases you have risk And you have to implement change management in case something goes wrong you roll back or you do the change It’s like the firewall situation. It was change management that allowed us to work with the client To get them to approve the change and pay us to do that.

So phasing properly means to me, rich, not just logical points in time where you say, okay, this phase is done. We moved to the next one, but it’s also managing risk in a point in time when you have to make sure that new server reboots and comes up. So at that point, that’s a good point to say, okay, that’s the end of that phase.

Not like in between stuff. So you can roll back. In case something goes wrong and then attack it again and have the ability to roll back and go back to business as usual Until you figure it out. Now when I talk about phase reviews, this means that you’re scoping It’s a cadence. So if you have a project that’s 30 days, let’s say 45 days.

Let’s say 60 days rich. I want a nice cadence of phase reviews in there So not only am I managing my risk over time with these phases and when they begin to the next phase But I also want A nice spread of check ins with the client. So I might say instead of having two phase reviews I might say hey We’re going to do three or four because I want to get the client to approve that this phase was completed To their satisfaction according to the success criteria of the project, right?

So I might give a little bit of a cadence in there to give me enough times to check in and I write my project agreements rich to say that If every phase of the project is deemed successful according to the success criteria and the client signs off on it, that means that the project can be officially closed and be deemed a success.

Taking the power out of the client’s hands, Rich, they always want to say when the project is done or not. No, you control when the project is done or not within this box, as long as you’re managing change properly, which is the third mini tip here. Manage change fiercely identify what your change management process is I’ve got templates on my website at msp mastered, that folks can download for this, but basically it’s Identifying what the success criteria of the project is what the phases are And what constitute change when something forces us to deviate from the established and agreed upon project plan Then we’re going to raise our hand and ask for change rich that means that you know for a client And this is how we eliminate scope seat when the clients sees that when the client sees the technicians on site rich Deploying the project and they go.

Oh while you guys are here Can you also do these three things right may or may not be related to the project if they’re not related to the project That’s a ticket if it’s under your agreement handle it that way But if they say oh, can you also configure this what this then it’s okay, we’re gonna have you know, Erick You know reach out to you And see if that’s a change request and if it’s outside the scope of the project We do a change request whether we build the client or not for that which is up to us, right?

I always try to give a client a little bit manufacturer change just so that we take them through the process that says hey, you know What we’re going to move the deployment date from this date to this date or something else that doesn’t materially impact the cost Of the project or the outcome of the project just to it’s almost like a fire drill So when the real change comes that we expect Then the client says, okay, you’re doing your job.

You’re telling me that [00:20:00] there’s A reason for a change you’re justifying that and you’re asking me to approve it I’ll approve it and then we can move forward So there’s a lot that I left out in there rich, but just things to think about just manage change fiercely Scope accurately don’t get into trouble over promising if you haven’t done something before Get the client to agree to a proof of concept and then phase Act properly with a good cadence and then conduct those phase reviews.

So the client has those check in points and is approving and being satisfied at each point that you’re doing what you promised you would deliver for them.

Rich: And I really want to, it’s all good advice. I really want to hone in and underscore that phase management. A piece of advice that you offered there because it’s reminding me of a job I had very early in my career in I.

T. I’m talking like 30 years ago. Now I work for a solution provider and the local area here in Seattle where I live. And that was the key lesson that the two co founders of that company learned this lesson the hard way earlier in their careers. And basically I, I did a lot of marketing writing for this company and we would always position it basically as, we’re not going to move on to the next phase of this project until you are absolutely delighted with the current phase.

Like this is part of our service to you, but really what we were doing is making absolutely certain that we got signatures. Verifying we have done the work that we agreed to in advance would constitute phase one and on your way through the project there so that you don’t wind up in that situation at the end of the project where the customer is saying no, you’re also supposed to be doing these eight other things.

And it’s very clear to me that was part of the scope, etc. Or I’m not happy with this thing you did for me early on. It really is important to. Get that agreement up front in writing about what the scope of the project is. And then as you said, even if you have to manufacture them, get those checkpoints built in there to, force that the way my colleagues company used to put it, it was like slapping the cuffs on the customer.

Basically, as you’re, you are making the customer say, yes, you have fulfilled your responsibilities and it just made life a lot easier, really, especially for the, for us, but even for the customer, there was just a lot more clarity About what was or was not within the scope of the project.

Erick: Yeah. Great insight, Rich. And of course, you’re going to have a kickoff meeting with the client, so everything is understood. I even have a two page agreement that says, here’s the project kickoff agreement. So we all know who’s responsible for what, like the client’s responsibility basically is to approve change quickly.

That’s their responsibility, right? So we’re in this together. You approve change quickly. And, for those of us that are. Are doing payments over time or progress payments It is so important to tie those to these phase Reviews because at that point the client when they agree that they’re satisfied There should be nothing holding them up from paying you and again If you have a five phase project rich and at the last phase review the client says i’m satisfied that you’ve achieved The objective of this phase Then finish your billing right?

The project is now done.

Rich: Good stuff. Good stuff. Indeed important stuff whoever you are, however much mrr you’re making you’re going to be doing project work and this is advice that will go directly to how profitable that project work is okay. We’re going to take a quick break here when we come back on the other side Erick’s going to step away for a few minutes here.

I will rejoin you in just a moment with M. J. Shoer, he’s the chief community officer at CompTIA, as well as John Harden of Auvik and Carrie Green of Alt Tech and MSP in Canada. They are members of CompTIA. In honor of the CompTIA ChannelCon event coming up, at which you and I will actually be speaking Erick, just a few weeks from now, we’re going to have a conversation about one of my favorite topics in the channel, which is community and the power and the importance the unusual degree to which we in the channel.

Believe in and benefit from a community. So stick around. We will be right back

And welcome back to part two of this episode of the msp chat podcast our spotlight interview segment where I am pleased to be joined By not one not two, but three members of the CompTIA community for a conversation about community generally, the CompTIA community specifically. This is a topic near and dear to my heart.

I’m a CompTIA member and participant in the community. Looking forward to a big community gathering coming up in just a few weeks, which we’ll talk about in a moment. But M. J. Shoer, you are the Chief Community Officer at CompTIA. John Harden, you are the Director of Products for SaaS Management at Auvik.

And, Carrie Green, you are officially you wear many hats, I know, but you are the SVP of Operations, I believe at OutTek. Kerry, why don’t I start with you? Just introduce yourself to the audience. Tell folks a little bit about you and what you do and Alt Tech.

Carrie: Sure. It sounds good. Thanks [00:25:00] Rich.

I’m Kerry Green. As mentioned the SVP of operations at Alt Tech. I’ve been in the IT industry for a little over 20, 25 years now. And specifically in the MSP channel for just over 10 years now. Love the community aspect. It’s near and dear to my heart and something that’s, I bleed the colors of, because I truly believe in helping others and making sure that we all can give each other that hand up and that hand down.

Rich: John, you you’re in the vendor world now, but you haven’t been there forever. So tell folks a little bit about what you do today and your back wrap.

John: Yeah, rich. Thanks for having me today. Yep. I represent the vendor side of the triangle on today’s conversation, but I spent about 16 years of my life in the MSP industry, whether it is the previous nine or 10 years I spent actually at an MSP or the last six to seven years where I spent building technology for the MSP side of the house.

And currently run a line of business here at Albeck focused on SaaS management and helping shepherd that in for MSPs.

Rich: Now, M. J. You too, like John, you are what my co host Erick Simpson likes to call a recovering MSP as well. Tell folks a little bit about what you do today, but also what you used to do.

MJ: I guess I’m recovered. But unlike John and Kerry, I didn’t start in this industry in elementary school. I started when I was a little bit older, but yeah, I had my own MSP for just shy of 20 years, sold it nine years ago. Now, almost 10 years ago. It’s crazy how time flies. Went through a couple of additional acquisitions and then decided to do some consulting and wound up where I am now, which is the chief community officer for CompTIA, which is just a.

An absolute privilege to to serve the industry in this role.

Rich: So I’m going to stay with you for a moment here, MJ, because there was a whole lot going on in the community organization that you run. And so just to familiarize people in the audience who don’t actually know very much about the CompTIA community, just give people an overview about what it’s all about.

Sure.

MJ: Sure. So the CompTIA community is a global. Global membership community made up of companies in the I. T. Channel. So our members are primarily M. S. P. Solution providers. Pick whatever acronym you want for for those types of organizations. Vendor organizations Ovic and and distributors as well as associate organizations.

Organizations like yours, rich that provide services to you. IT channel companies, but currently we have somewhere over 2100 member companies globally that represent about 80, 000 individuals. Those are the employees of those companies who have registered to take advantage of their member benefits.

The CompTIA community is, as I mentioned, global. We have We have active regional groups in North America, the UK and Ireland, the Benelux region of Europe, the Doth region of Europe the A and Z region in the South Pacific and the ASEAN region in the Asia Pac arena. We continue to expand, wherever there is a concentration of IT channel activity, we will.

Start up or establish a new region. Those regions come together, meet in person, meet virtually. Everything we do is member led. We are a vendor neutral non profit trade association. So we totally view ourselves as the industry’s open tent. All we ask is that you leave your logo and ego at the door and you come together to collaborate.

In what’s best for the entire industry, because I personally believe very strongly that our industry serves a vital and unique role that’s unprecedented in human history and that we really do help power the global economy through all of the technology products and services that are delivered by our members.

And what do we know? We know that if economies are strong, freedom and opportunity abounds for individuals. In those regions. We feel very strongly about unlocking the potential of every individual and organization in this great industry that we’re so lucky to work in because we know it will make things better on the ground.

It has the power to change the economic conditions and local communities and, Countries and counties and provinces globally. And so it’s a, as I said at the beginning, it’s a privilege to be in this role. It’s a privilege to meet folks like you and get to work with you and hear your ideas.

And engage members like the three of you are lifeblood because you give us the great ideas and then we go out and execute on them. It’s just a, it’s just a very important, meaningful and rewarding. Role to have and service to provide to the industry and really the world.

Rich: I want to talk some more for sure about the CompTIA community specifically, but first I want to ask each of you a question that, that has long fascinated me.

I’ve been writing about the SMB channel for over 20 years [00:30:00] now. And it’s actually, if you work in the channel, if you’ve been in the channel for a while, it’s easy to. Missed to overlook to forget how unusual it is in our world that community plays such a prominent role. It’s such an important concept.

And so I’ll start with you carry. Do you have any theories about why it is? That community as a concept, community as a reality is as, as big a phenomenon as it is in the SMB tech channel.

Carrie: Yeah, I do find it like super interesting, coming from like our local government and where my past life was, right?

Y’all have took courage really close to your body, right? And, joining the community here has been Really interesting and rewarding, in that sense, too. And I love the way that everybody wants to just help each other out, right? Like it’s I was listening to, or in another session at an event, and it was, hand up, hand down.

And that really resonated with me. And in that you really see that in this this industry with, the MSP community itself, and everybody is wanting to help each other out, whether that’s, hand up or hand down, how can I serve you? What do you need? How do we get past that step?

And in return, you’re gaining so much yourself, right? And it’s not just About what can I get for me? And how do I, better myself? How do I scale my MSP? Or where do I go? It’s, we really truly are a community where it’s everybody gets something out of it, right? But how do we share and do this a little bit easier together as opposed to doing it siloed and making the same mistakes or having the same challenges that, the person to your left has already faced and gone through, right?

If we all just share some of that, it just makes that life just so much easier. I definitely think it’s unique unique, but maybe not so unique. I’m not familiar with, the other industries, right? But it’s definitely something I love about this one.

Rich: John, your turn, but what theories do you have about why community is as such a major phenomenon as it is for the channel?

John: Yeah, I think Carrie did a great job chatting about how involved and how much people are involved in the community. I had the pleasure of having a couple minutes to think about it. All I care is chatting there too. And I think it probably boils, there’s one key thing that I think is always salient is the fact that specifically in the MSB and the MSB industry, SMB industry competitive overlap tends to be a bit of geographically constrained.

And so I think that there is no there, there is no negative side effect or, a lot of competitive pressure of helping the folks around you. So I think that has a little bit to play with it. And the fact that. It doesn’t hurt, iron sharpens iron. If there’s an MSB or a small media business in it, that’s based out of Minnesota sitting down at the table with somebody based out of California, they’re not going to hurt each other’s business to collaborate.

I don’t think that’s like the essence of it, but I do think that’s something in the back of the head. Just there’s nobody, right there, right across the way that I, if I share this trade secret or these trade approaches, it’s going to come back. But I don’t think that’s the key thing.

I think the other ones. really boil down to it’s an opt in community. It’s not like you’re forced into this community. The people that choose to be part of this community tend to be the people that, look at this community and go, that’s what I want. And as Kerry said, hands up, hands down, it’s you don’t come to these community get togethers.

You don’t get part of this MSP community, there’s, come to it as an amazing job. There’s a huge breadth of people that they cover and there’s a huge breadth of resources that provide it. I can’t say enough positive things there. But it’s not the entire it’s not every single SMB.

It’s not every single MSP. And I think the ones that opt into these communities really just want to make everybody better. So I think just that little opt in piece. My last kind of take on it is probably truly just the scale of problems to be solved. They’re smaller businesses where, we have less resources.

We have more challenges to solve. I always say. IT is like the galaxy, like nothing in the middle goes away, but it keeps expanding. So like those printer problems that we used to deal with still exist, but now I also have to worry about like cyber attacks from all over the country. And I think it’s because the growing complexity of IT problems.

People just want to lean on each other because everybody can’t be an expert in everything. And I think that general scale of problems to be solved has allowed folks to let their guard down and say I don’t have to be an expert in everything at this person in the community can help me here at this resource in the community that can help me here.

I can lean on this group to help me here. And if we all lean on each other and help each other, we can all together solve those big complex problems. Without having to solve all those complex problems individually.

Rich: MJ, you have the advantage here of having been an active part of a community as a member and now as a manager.

What’s your take on what it is that makes the concept of community so powerful for the channel?

MJ: I think it, boy, there’s so many thoughts here, Rich and, what John and Carrier shared really resonates, I two or three years ago at one of our events, I mentioned from the main stage that, that [00:35:00] this industry reminds me of the environment around my college fraternity.

Which was quite a good many years ago and our fraternity model was give expecting nothing thereof. And I see that loud and clear in this industry. There is something about this industry, maybe because we’re still in our initial evolution as an industry, right? We’re still very much in our infancy.

We’re not an established manufacturer. We’re not an automobile manufacturer. We’re not, a legacy industry of any kind. We’re still very much an upstart industry. And I think that attracts a unique personality And I think that though that personality is just far more tuned into that giver mentality and that need for community and that desire for community that we can be competitors, but we can also come together to help one another and that there’s enough business out there.

For everyone and that we’re better together than we are as our own individuals, either in our careers or as individual organizations. I think it’s just a very unique environment that, as I’ve said several times, it’s a privilege to be a part of. And I think people really enjoy. The act of giving back to an industry that gives each of us so much.

I think that’s really, I think it’s that simple. I think it’s just a unique community of individuals and I think it’s got something to do with where we are as an industry. I think our challenge is to instill this in all those of the younger generations now coming into the industry to maintain this as we become.

a mature and established industry over the decades and centuries to come. Technology is not going anywhere. But I think the best thing we can pass on to our colleagues is this strong sense of community and why it’s so important to this, This being such a vital and important industry with what we all do.

Rich: So this next question is more for John and Carrie and MJ. You’ll get to just soak in all the good stuff. I’m sure they’re about to say I’ll start with you, John. J ust to make this a little bit more concrete for people. Just talk a little bit about how being an engaged member of the CompTIA community has benefited you personally, and maybe professionally.

John: How long we got Rich? I joke, CompTIA’s resources in general. I’ve been a member, established member for over a handful of years now. I still am finding new things about CompTIA. I’m still learning things about CompTIA. And, I go back to that comment on iron sharpens iron, and we have to rely on, this group here and this group here.

And in my head, I was thinking, And another great resource, for instance, like CompTIA has the, the MSP 911, where if you’re part of a data breach event or something like that, you can call this group and have a resource here, or like CompTIA Spark, where they’re putting together mentors and individuals and all these different pro or not necessarily a mentor program, sorry, CompTIA Spark, but the high schoolers and the education program.

And to that degree, there’s just so many different things that like CompTIA is doing. And leading and guiding that, you feel like you’re behind the curve, if you’re not in CompTIA, like there’s just so many resources that you get access to. And there’s so much you get to learn when you’re a part of this community.

So personally I’ve just met and learned so much about the industry and met so many amazing people. All these opt in people, we talk about hand raisers, as Carrie said. The community of people that want to be there and the community of people that want to be better. So the people have helped me personally and professionally.

And fundamentally, I said earlier on the vendor side of the triangle here just being able to be have access to all of the hard work and effort that CompTIA puts into to understand the channel, like they’re say the channel surveys they do every year where they share data to help us understand how we can better serve our customers and as a vendor, being able to have a central place to join. And learn from peers and have that colleague conversation and have vendors sitting next to vendors and all be friends. It’s something really special, MJ said the word fraternal and it does feel a little fraternal in the fact that everybody’s there working together and I think everybody’s gone through the same fires or the same gauntlet, we’ve all got the same battle scars.

And we all get to get together and we all get to have better outcomes for the next generation, as MJ says of leaders that are coming into the, in the competitive community. And fundamentally, hopefully if you join the community. Just get involved with all the resources and all the things that are involved out there.

It’s an endless trove. Once you open up that Pandora’s box,

Rich: carry over to you to help people understand in a more specific way the sort of personal and professional ROI, if you will, of being an engaged member of the CompTIA community. What kind of impact has that made?

For you.

Carrie: Yeah. John, I really like [00:40:00] that. The Pandora’s box, comment there because it really is. It’s every link you click on, it opens somewhere else. And, more resources and more things to share with, your colleagues and your organizations, as well as your peers that are out there that maybe aren’t members yet.

I love doing that little, Hey, have you seen this resource? You should really come on members so that you can get access to the whole thing because there’s just, There’s so much, right? I will shout it from the rooftops that, personally, CompTIA has been pivotal in my growth of where I am today.

For me, before standing on a stage or in front of people or, in a room full of people, even, and having those conversations and, sharing my knowledge was definitely outside my comfort zone. Now it’s outside my comfort zone, but I’m comfortable with being uncomfortable.

And that was something that I was taught through, the work that I’ve done with ComTIA, I’m so proud to be a member and be able to give back and to share and just want to Build a shelter from the rooftops, right? Don’t make it a secret. Let’s show what resources we have.

Let’s show the work that we’re doing, on the North American EC, we put so many people together and, or keep pulling people in and being able to elevate those around us and share some of that knowledge, share some of that opportunity that’s out there because there’s just so much of both of that and all of that really to be able to elevate everybody around us as opposed to just ourselves, right?

So being a part of the Comtia membership and involved in the community as deeply as I am, I think it’s just incredible, just things from being involved in the different events that Comtia puts on, or I’ve recently done mock interviews with, the a plus students and helping them, navigate as they start their journey in I T being able to share what I’ve learned to what I’ve gotten out of it is incredible.

Rich: You know what, MJ, I will give you a shot at this question after all speaking either as as a member when that was chiefly how you interacted with CompTIA or in your current role as a leader in the organization. What. What would you add about the ROI of being an engaged community member in terms of your own life or just what you hear about from CompTIA members?

MJ: Yeah it’s, look, John and Carrie represent, the best of our membership, right? It’s, for those who are looking to aspire to role models and, mentors or people to look up to, you’ve got two right here that are just, as genuine and caring as, You’d expect.

And Carrie keeps talking about being in her uncomfortable space. But boy, I’ll tell you, you look awfully comfortable in an uncomfortable spot. I’d love to look that comfortable when I’m in an uncomfortable spot. But, when I was an MSP, it was, I was in a tertiary market in the small market and I really, Our company, a membership in those days really differentiated me from my competition.

I used to download the research and co branded compliments of my business and I’d share it with my customers during our meetings and show them that I wasn’t just trying to sell them something for the sake of selling them something that, that here was this, neutral, independent research from the industry, the global industry trade association that, Oftentimes was backing up the recommendations that I was making to all of the different trainings that I took advantage of I went to my very first CompTIA event 20 years ago and was hooked never missed one since because for all of the reasons that john and carrie have shared It’s an incredible experience and I took a lot of personal pride In being part of something that was much bigger than me and much bigger than my business and, now fast forward.

sticking my hat on as chief community officer. One of the things we hear about all the time that most people probably don’t think about, but I love hearing from our members is that giving back aspect that both John and Carrie have talked about, but, we give hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in philanthropic donations to organizations around the world that are helping to spread Technology and techno, technical opportunities for folks.

We invest millions of dollars in this community. We invest millions of dollars and come to a spark to educate young kids about technology, to hopefully inspire them to pursue careers that are either very technically heavy or in the industry itself to help close some of the workforce issues that we’ve got, all of these things are our gift back to the industry.

And by being a member, you’re. Part of that. You’re part of giving this back to the industry. So it’s just it’s a phenomenal platform for a business of any size to be part of something that truly is bigger than that. And that’s not even touching on all of the discreet benefits that John and Terry have mentioned that provide very distinct and very valuable resources to our members.

It’s We’ve got just, I’ve [00:45:00] got the best team out there. I wouldn’t trade them for anything in the world. They come to work every day, motivated to give back to our members and help our members be the best that they can be. And it’s just, it’s a great, it’s a great place to be. It really is.

It’s as I, as people probably have heard me say, if they’ve heard me speak before, it’s the right thing at the right time for all the right reasons and And so we continue to do what we do and take our lead from our members. And if our members come up with good ideas, we will move heaven and earth to implement those ideas because we know if it comes from the members, it’s going to have a positive impact and that’s what’s most important.

Rich: As you were talking about John and Carrie as best of the best a moment ago, and it occurred to me, I really haven’t pointed out. It’s not a random thing that those are the two members joining us here on the show. Both John and Carrie are award winners, actually, within the CompTIA community. John, what was the award you won?

I was

John: the industry council award or future leader, rather. Sorry. It was the future leader award. And what was yours? Carrie?

Carrie: Complete community leader.

John: Yes. And then that goes to our spotlight awards. Yeah.

Rich: Perfect segue actually to the next thing I wanted to talk about, because I wanted to ask each of you about something specific to your participation in CompTIA that I think might be Help people understand even more directly how being a part of the community can be so beneficial.

Carrie, you have been involved in the the community mentorship. Program at Comp TF, if I’m not mistaken, tell folks a little bit about what that is, your role there how it helps people.

Carrie: Oh, it’s such a cool program. It’s new. We’re only in our second, or finishing up our second cohort now, but what an incredible member benefit.

That’s out there. So I’ve been involved from the start of it first as a mentor. And then this cohort, I actually joined as a mentee. I really believe that we don’t just have something to give. We have something to learn too, right? If we’re not learning, then where are we going? So I took a look at myself and where do I want to develop and chose something and was paired up with a mentor to help me work on some of my goals in gaining that, expertise from them.

So I, I think it’s a really cool opportunity to be able to sit on both sides of that and, it’s not just the veterans who can be the mentors. It’s anybody has something to share and some way to give back. And, we all have so much knowledge inside of us. We just need to tap into it, to find that. And sometimes it just needs to be awoken. So a program like the mentorship program, I think is absolutely incredible. And to have that included in a member benefit, it’s for me, it was a no brainer. We have, a couple people in our organization who are part of the program To me, it’s how else can you get something like this with some of the most amazing, like you said, MJ, the best of the best out there. It’s a fabulous program.

Rich: John, you are an active participant in one of CompTIA’s advisory committees if I’m not mistaken. So tell folks a little bit about, what committee that is specifically, and then also maybe paint a picture of how those various committees out there serve CompTIA members.

John: Thanks Rich. I’m a the chair over here in the SAAS ecosystem industry advisory council and from our perspective, the industry advisory councils there’s about, what is there? Seven of them. Is that correct? I believe. Yep. Yes. Seven industry advisory councils. I sit on the SAAS ecosystem side of it, where we predominantly focus on practices and using procuring, securing, managing everything around SAAS. Though there are other councils like blockchain channel development cybersecurity and other groups. And the way that we interact predominantly is pulling together thought leaders to help generate content. We talked a lot today on the topic about content and availability of resources out there for businesses like MJ’s 10 years ago, or for businesses like maybe carries today or others out there today.

And a lot of that content ends up getting created in these industry advisory councils, my industry thought leaders and their industry thought leadership topic. And my role in the SAAS ecosystem council is predominantly to help work with the other 10 members of our council and guide us towards producing strategic resources for the MSPs and the MSB SMBs.

That’s a mouthful. Always the MSPs and the SMBs that are out there so that they can leverage those resources. So that they can be better. And so that when they buy that car, become a member of comp T and they spend that money they can get even more resources and more availability. And it’s my job and the way that I look at it with the South ecosystem council to create really high quality contents and resources.

So that an MSP that decides to start tomorrow that has all the right intentions, that wants to really drive and elevate up the services for their customers and help their customers and their business to be better, has access to this treasure trove or the Pandora’s box from the callback earlier of resources and so that they can start [00:50:00] that business and so that they can be successful.

I always advise startups and specifically in the SMB, MSP, or in the vendor side serving the MSP community, like CompTIA is the best thing. It’s the best kept secret as you’re launching your business because the knowledge is just, you’re not going to get it anywhere else.

Carrie: How cool is it to have something like that available?

Sorry, Rich. No,

John: wait. It’s awesome. It’s amazing.

Carrie: I

John: just want to say that Pandora’s box, it’s more akin to a Pandora jewelry box, right? It’s not open and there’s a nugget of 24 karat pure gold in there. I

Rich: love it. And I think we’ve got our our episode title right there. So I’ll have to jot that down. MJ you probably know, there are members like John and Carrie who are enthusiastic and engaged and they’re taking full advantage of the resources that come with being part of the community membership. There are also probably other people out there who are missing out on some of what they could be getting from their membership or even just sending the dues check in once a year and really not, you capitalizing on all of the resources and benefits.

What advice would you offer to anyone in the audience here about really getting the maximum impact, the maximum value out of Comptia’s community?

MJ: Sure. It’s interesting, Rich. I’ve often commented that, being a member of the Comptia community is never about the dudes because we are a self funded nonprofit trade association.

We are in a very fortunate. Position that we take very seriously and that, are we sell a significant amount of certifications and training out in the world. A lot of people know CompTIA for our industry leading. Technology certifications that brings in sufficient revenue to fund what we do here on the association side.

And because we are a charter trade association, we have to charge dues. But those dues are heavily subsidized. So it’s if it’s ever about, The amount of the dues check, then the point is truly been missed because it’s the value that you receive for the money that you pay is on orders of magnitude that sound completely unrealistic, but literally, if you download and read just a single research report.

You’ve paid for your dues. Just take one of the over 30 educational courses that are offered, that are targeted to the type of member that you are, and you’ve paid for that membership. Attend one event and you’ve paid for that membership. Certify a couple of your staff and take advantage of the discount that you have available and you’ve paid.

So it’s not about the dollars. It’s just about engaging. And while the dues are heavily subsidized, the dues serve a purpose. It’s a little bit of skin in the game. And if you pay for something, shame on you if you don’t take advantage of it. And so you just have to dip your toe in the water and just take a little bit of advantage of what you have available and you will find a treasure trove of resources and a community of.

Tens of thousands of individuals like John and Carrie that are ready and willing to help you with any questions that you may have about your business. And along the way, you will make some lifelong friends. I am still close with people that I met 20 years ago in the CompTIA community. This is a unique community.

It’s a unique industry, as we said before. It’s like anything you have to be willing to put in a little elbow grease as my dad used to say if you want to get, a good outcome, you can’t just look at a block of wood and have it turn into a beautiful piece of furniture. You do need to, you do need to pick up a tool and try a few things and be willing to make a few mistakes because you know what?

There are a whole bunch of people and a whole lot of experience there to cushion that mistake so that you can learn from it and benefit from it and don’t suffer from it. But you’ve got to be willing to put your toe in the water if you want to learn how to swim. And I’d love to add one thing if I could for us, Rich just having gone through the experience recently.

First off I was a bootstrapped entrepreneur. If I can say the dues are affordable, they’re affordable. So that should never be a conversation. But the best thing I always recommend, it’s easy. You’re going to get reached out to by a CompTIA member. If you join and Kevin Leeson was my CompTIA member, the one that managed my account and helped me through it.

We talked about Pandora’s box. What you really need is a navigator. When you get that reach out, sit down and meet with that person. Tell them about your business. Tell them about your problems. Tell them about your challenges. Don’t miss that opportunity because they’re your navigators. I’m sitting here holding an imaginary flag and trying to, you can’t figure it.

You don’t see me, but I’m a group leader over here. They’re navigating you through that pandoras box and helping you get to the resources you need. And so that is the one thing I say to take advantage of, [00:55:00] because there’s a million resources, but work with the person that you get assigned on your account and talk to them.

And they’ll help you get to all the highest value nuggets. That way the dues never become even a consideration. Yep. Good point.

Rich: Carrie over to you. As a, as an experienced member and insider here, any tips on really getting a peak value from your membership? For either current members or people who join after listening to this conversation.

Carrie: Yeah, I think you know to just to echo john right and you know find somebody in the membership pool in the community, right? You can maybe introduce you to somebody that you’ve been too intimidated to talk to Or can make an introduction to someone who can help solve a problem that you’re experiencing The one thing that I think is unique about the content community is it’s a level playing field You It doesn’t matter where you sit, both within your organization, as well as if you’re a vendor or an MSP, we’re all on a level playing field and equal and that I think has been one of the biggest eye opening pieces for me within the community is that everybody is just a person.

We There were people that I was like, Oh, I can’t talk to them. Like they, they’re way out of reach and really they’re not. And we’ve become good friends, to this day. So if you need someone to, hold your hand and help you through some of those conversations to start off, use it. I bet you, if you just ask, they’d be willing.

MJ: Rich, two things I’d like to just quickly clarify on, on, on what’s just been said. And first I want to comment on the award that both John and Carrie won. Those are our spotlight awards. We award them currently in three regions, North America, the UK and Ireland and Australia, New Zealand.

And what’s important is John and Kerry weren’t recognized because They know who I am or their buddy with staff or other members because when they submit their applications for the north America awards Those awards are judged by leaders from other regions. These aren’t pay to play or crony awards where it’s who, the judges came from outside of North America.

And and the nominations are anonymized and they’re only viewed by three CompTIA staff people to make sure that they’re complete and passed on properly. I don’t look at them. I never know who the winners are until. Until we get to announce them and that speaks to the high level of integrity of the awards that their peers who don’t even know them.

Selected them based on the merit of what they give to the community. So I think that’s a I just wanted to call that out that was a really important point and amplify that feather in john and carries cap. And the other thing is carries comment about that level playing field. That’s probably the number one thing we hear from members, especially newer members, especially when they come to an event like channel con, where we have a technology vendor floor.

And this year at our event coming up at the end of this month, it’s our largest ever 174 booths, I believe it is, but every booth is the same size. It doesn’t matter if you’re the largest or oldest. Vendor in the industry, or if you’re the newest bootstrap startup vendor, you have the exact same size booth.

So it’s up to you how you present your value to prospective partners. And what our members tell us is that level playing field is so comfortable for them because they’re used to going to events where you’re sold from the stage or you’re sold in. In small group settings and you’ve got the big booths with, tons of salespeople to, to try and encourage you to come and talk to them.

There’s no selling from the stage at a CompTIA event because we’re a vendor neutral trade association. The vendors get their booths as part of their membership. Nobody’s buying the most expensive booth. Everybody’s got that same level playing field and it creates a very unique, comfortable environment.

For people to engage with prospective business partners, people, they don’t know, as Carrie mentioned, colleagues, the stories from these encounters are endless and inspiring. And so I really wanted to call that out as something that’s very unique about when you get engaged with CompTIA’s community.

Rich: Once again perfect segway, you guys were making this really easy for me to ask about ChannelCon and you just brought it up for us, MJ. Tell folks a little bit about that. The dates, the location, and just what ChannelCon is. And I will preface that by saying, I go to a lot of industry events over the course of a typical year.

There’s a very small handful of them that I absolutely will move heaven and earth to attend. I do not wish to miss ever. ChannelCon is one of them. MJ, tell folks what it is, when it happens, where it’s happening this year.

MJ: Sure. Thank you so much for that kind endorsement, Rich. [01:00:00] Anyone who knows you knows how, what a person of high integrity you are.

So that, that’s a truly appreciated endorsement. So ChannelCon is our largest event of the year. It’s held every summer. This year it will be July 30th. To august 1st in atlanta. It’s our first time ever in atlanta. It is a us based event So we move it around the country typically east central west and then reverse Last year we were in las vegas, but this year we’re in atlanta.

It’s at the hyatt regency downtown Registration is off the charts. It’s ahead of Ever since we came back to live events from the pandemic and even some years before. So we’re super excited about that. It’s just, it’s a wonderful event. It is a coming together of the industry in that big open neutral tent that I talked about.

The quality of networking is incredible. There’s an opportunity to participate in what we call our genius cafe which. Gave birth to the mentorship program idea from people who Make time with geniuses. These are members who volunteer their time you can sign up for free for a slot to talk with an expert and any one of a number Of subject areas that may be of interest to you and that led to hey Could we do this year round which led to our mentorship program?

we actually announced our intention to do it at channel con last year and This year at channel con we’ll graduate our second You Cohort, which is more than double the size of the first. I think it’s over 50 participants. We just launched it in the UK and Ireland region last month as well. But as I said, there’s a technology vendor fair with 174 or more booths that you can visit.

Kara Swisher is our keynote speaker this year. She’s a phenomenal phenomenal journalists with quite the edge when it comes to technology and insight. So we’re really looking forward to that. We will name our 2024 member of the year, which is always an exciting time. We will have our our CEO will give his keynote and take on the industry as well as an interactive.

Q and a with Kara Swisher. And then we’ve got four educational tracks with just incredible content. We have a vendor education track. We have an MSP success track, which is all about education for MSPs and solution providers. We have a community track all about the activities of our community. Our North America community will meet new resource guides and MSP guidebook.

A vendor guidebook will be released. And we have our cyber security track, which is chock full of great sessions. We’ve got several three day workshops around cyber security and other topics. It’s just, it’s a packed agenda with tremendous value to be had. And of course, we always have. Our channel con party and this year it’ll be at the georgia aquarium I understand there will be some special guests perhaps In the water i’m not i’m not at liberty to disclose whether those may be human Animal, mammal, whatever, but should be an interesting our events team always knocks it out of the park.

I’m sure it’ll be great. They never tell me the details, so I can be pleasantly surprised. But it’s just, it’s a great few days of coming together as an industry and really focusing on Best practices, trends in the industry, where the industry is heading. Our industry advisory councils will meet release content as well.

It’s just a phenomenal way to really take in what the CompTIA community is and find opportunities to get engaged.

Rich: Shameless plug here. Erick and I are actually presenting. We have a half hour session we’re doing on Thursday, August 1st about working with the media, which is a topic I know a little bit about.

And vendors could use some lessons about. So if you are part of our audience here and would like to say hello to Erick and me, look that up on the agenda. We will see and we’ll just see you start to finish at the show. Carrie, over to you. I don’t know if you remember specifically, but give us maybe one memory from your first ChannelCon.

Can you remember something that happened that left you feeling I have got to come back to this event again next year?

Carrie: I’m going to go back to the community aspect. Just that level playing field and just being so welcomed. As somebody who really hadn’t gone to one before and walking in and just Linking arms and, walking together and making some really great friends.

The networking is outstanding. There’s really something for everyone.

Rich: John, do you have a memory from your

John: first ChannelCon? I think I’ll get my first CCF and into ChannelCon. I’m going to take two for one here. My first CompTIA event was a CCF the year prior, a couple of quarters prior to ChannelCon.

And I’ll echo what Kerry said, my memory of walking away from there was the people. I can’t even remember where we were, what we were doing or anything else. All I can remember is the amount of people that I got to meet that took the time, that [01:05:00] listened, that shared, that educated, that, that cared.

About being there and that’s what brought me back to channel God. And that was the first time I was there as a vendor on that neutral playing ground as a startup. And I can, I just remember looking around and thinking, wow Compte is doing something amazing here. The floor is a sea of venders sea of people that are all there trying to help the community members that are there.

I remember looking out and just seeing everybody and everybody there. And just that, taking a snapshot in my mind there of that event and that floor and thinking, wow, like this is where it’s happening. This is where they, for me, this is where business feels like it’s really starting to go.

I’m standing as MJ said, I’m standing next to a Microsoft who has the same size booth or a, anybody else who has the exact same size booth and it was an amazing feeling as a vendor just to be able to be part of that community and to be felt on a neutral ground and to be able to, as Carrie alluded to earlier, meet those people who you regard as folks that are out of your bounds or you’re not allowed to, they’re, they’re up on a pedestal and everybody was just neutral and it was such a great feeling, which I’m with you.

I echo that I I’ll move heaven and earth to find ways to hit every channel count as I can moving forward for that reason, because it’s something special that’s in a bottle that you can’t replicate and so I’ll keep going as Cogtea’s been doing. Got it bottled out

Carrie: that feeling of belonging

Rich: and I’ll just follow on to what you were both saying there the thing I always say about channel con to people who ask me about it is it’s a big event It’s not the biggest event out there.

It’s a big event There are bigger ones though. The thing that’s unique about channel con to me is Everybody you need to meet in the industry is there, and they are all there to share. It’s an unbelievably valuable opportunity, if you understand what you can accomplish there. And it’s rewarding personally, it’s rewarding professionally, but I really can’t think of a more strategic event, just in terms of everybody who matters in the channel.

Coming together for that week, every year.

MJ: Said registration is still open. I’d be remiss if I didn’t plug that. It’s if you go to connect. com TIA. org forward slash channel con, you can still register. And if you’re a company, a member, every single member of your staff can come at no charge.

By all means register, get your colleagues to come divide and conquer on the agenda. It’s amazing. I was just thinking while you guys were talking this year will be my 20th. I started going before it was called channel con back when it was called breakaway. And I’m dating myself, but so be it.

I think I think my beard color is dating myself probably more than anything.

Rich: We will make sure to have that link to the registration site and the show notes for this episode in case you missed it there and yes, by all means check that out. If there’s any way to be there, I’m telling you, you’ll thank yourself for doing it.

MJ. John, Carrie, thank you so much for joining us and and talking about community and CompTIA. Thank you, Rich, and

Carrie: thanks John

Rich: and Carrie. So we are going to take a quick break. When I come back on the other side, I will be rejoined by Erick for the final part of the show. We’ll talk a little bit about the conversation I just had here about community and CompTIA.

Have a little fun, wrap things up, stick around. We will be right back. Right back.

All right, and welcome back part three of this episode of the MSP chat podcast Erick great conversation with MJ, John, Carrie. I really appreciate their, their making some time and sharing their insights. There was a lot of good stuff in there. The question I was most looking forward to asking was one of the first ones that I asked, which is just really, what is it about.

The cannel that makes community. So important. It really does not exist everywhere on the world of business in the same way or to the same degree that it does here. And they all signed on to this idea. I think it was John who brought it up, but, he said, Part of why people who are engaged in the channel community, whether that’s through CompTIA or somewhere else, part of why they’re all generally so enthusiastic about it is that they’re all opt in.

I hadn’t really thought about it quite this way before, but the people who participate in community are people who, Saw some in have some interest saw some potential benefit that they opted into the idea of sharing what they know and learning from their peers and that kind of idea and spirit of generosity.

There are plenty. Of people in the channel who are not maybe as enamored or of community or as aware of its benefits as the people you and I are familiar with having been engaged in all sorts of different channel communities. Through the years but it does say something to me certainly that the most successful msp’s [01:10:00] I know Tend to be people who are active members of one or more communities.

Erick: Yeah, I disagree Wholeheartedly rich and you know it You know, sometimes I think that because you’re right, there’s a lot, there are a lot of different industries out there and I’ve been peripherally, there you go. Engaged in different ones over the years before, I got into it even and things like that, and I have never experienced the spirit of community that I’ve experienced here in the it channel and specifically around managed services, the MSP community.

It is, it’s amazing and I wouldn’t be where I am today without, being involved in community learning. There’s, there’s a small percentage, I think, of business owners that, that guard, their internal secrets and they think it’s some special, formula for nuclear fission or something, I don’t know. Today, Rich, I think best practices for delivering IT services are best practices. If you’ve got something special and unique hopefully you own that IP and you’re monetizing it, to your benefit, but in general we all at a base level and the MSP community deliver the same services, right?

And when you look at what we’re delivering peace of mind to these clients. And the majority of the vast majority of partners that I’ve worked with over the years, rich are go givers. They are givers. They want to serve their clients to their own detriment cases, right? Just trying to make their clients happy.

And I think that that servant leadership, that wiring that most of us in the MSP community have that I’ve worked with, Are the folks that drive this community that say, Hey, we will share with you our secrets. I was one of the early folks that was out, helping other providers as well.

And I connected with them at that level because as I was learning from them, I was unable to reciprocate when we were figuring out, Oh, we found out, a better way to position managed service or here’s a better way to position the value or price it or this or that, or, and it led me on the path.

Where I am today, and I, I joke a lot Rich, you heard me say this, I used to be the people hating engineer in the enterprise, delivering these massive projects and things like that. All we did was build out call centers and service desks for Fortune 1000 organizations. It was grueling work, but as I got involved in the community and I started working with these amazing individuals.

It changed me completely now, even though, I burn out my social battery very quickly because of all the talking and traveling that you and I do. I think you and I are similar in some ways, but I enjoy it. I enjoy the people. I enjoy the community. And I think that’s what makes us unique and special

Rich: and, it came up during the the conversation before.

Part of what makes community so important and so appealing is that this is still a young industry. The managed services space is certainly maturing rapidly around us, but it’s young enough. Entrepreneurially entrepreneurial enough that people really want need crave that kind of peer to peer advice that you can get from a community.

And the other thing I’ll say is you’re reminding me. Erick, I was at a conference once 2, 3 years ago, randomly struck up a breakfast conversation with the guy who runs an MSP in the Chicago area. And he said he’d done a little research. There were 28 other MSPs located within a square mile of his headquarters.

And there was only one of them that he ever came across in competitive situations. And it’s there is a lot of business out there for everybody. People, you are not going to give away the secret sauce that benefits a competitor and puts you out of business and costs you big money. I’ve never, I’ve truly, I’ve never spoken to an MSP who regretted Becoming part of a community for that reason that I gave away trade secrets and it Inhibited the growth of my business quite the contrary so it’s a it’s in some ways a very logical sensible, dimension of this industry that we’re in but also a very rare and interesting one as well and we you and I will get to experience the the wonders of community in person, face to face just a few weeks from now at the CompTIA channel kind of thing

Erick: Yeah, and CompTIA was one of the very first communities we joined in my I.

T. practice early on, so I can say probably from the late 90s, aging myself a little bit, yeah, I’ve been a CompTIA community member in different roles along the way, been on, in different in different areas, and you and I, Rich, have contributed from time to time to help CompTIA deliver better data information tools to its community members.

And it’s just a little bit about giving back and appreciating, everybody that lifted us and got us to where we are today.

Rich: Totally agree. Totally agree. Great stuff. And it leaves us with time for [01:15:00] just one last thing people, and I’ll start it out with a question. What could be more embarrassing, basically, than this particular declaration of victory, which happened in Japan just recently, where the Japanese government declared victory in its war on floppy disks? Because believe it or not all sorts of different important government functions as recently as 2021 required three and a half inch floppy disk. And in fact, there were some of these functions that involve citizens, where if you wanted to apply for financing or, some government program, your application had to go into the government on a three and a half inch floppy disk.

Because that was the only way they knew how to. Consume the information and so they declared war on floppies in japan in 2021 and here we are in 2024 They have finally declared victory. They have eliminated the floppy and like I say, it’s a victory a little embarrassing until you consider That quite recently, some eagle eyed observer in Germany noted that the German Navy has a request for proposals out right now because they have this entire class of frigate, this entire class of naval vessel that relies on, get this, 8 inch floppies.

These ships, date back to the mid 90s. Even then, 8 inch floppies? I don’t know. They like to move beyond the age and floppy era of the German Navy. And I guess the good news is they’ve got the request for bids out there. Who knows, maybe this time next year, no more floppies running the naval vessels.

Erick: Wow. It’s so many memories. We can tell stories about Like loading up Microsoft office. I think it was four dot two. It was like 34 floppy disks or whatever. And the 33rd one always failed after you’ve loaded all these in hours and hours later, Oh, brings back old, bad, old dad jokes. What did one floppy disk say to the other rich want to go out for a bite?

It’s a victory for Japan, Germany still got a little bit of work to do on the navy. Pretty good department, it sounds like.

Rich: But they’re headed in the right direction. Congratulations at least for that. And congratulations to you. Thank you for joining us on this episode of the show.

That’s all the time we’ve got for you this week. We’re going to be back again in a week’s time with another episode. Until then, I will remind you that we are both a video and audio deliverable. So if you are. Listening to the audio version of the podcast. You’re curious to check us out in video, go to YouTube.

You’re going to find us there under MSP chat. If you’re watching the YouTube video, but you’re into audio podcasts, go to wherever it is, you get your audio podcast, look us up as a MSP chat there as well, and you will find us wherever you do find us, please subscribe, rate, review, it’s going to help other people like you find and enjoy the show.

This show is produced by the great Russ Johns. Who’s part of the team with us here at channel mastered. He’d be happy to produce a show for you. If you want to learn more about that and all the many other things that channel master does for its clients, please visit www dot channel mastered. com.

Channel mastered has a sister organization called MSP mastered that works directly with MSPs to help them fine tune grow or find their business. You can learn more about. That organization and the services it provides at www. mspmastered. com. All one word. So once again, we thank you for joining us here on MSP Chat.

We’re going to see you in a week’s time. Until then, folks, please always remember, you can’t spell channel without M S P.