Small Changes, Big Impact: How Simon Marcil Uses Continuous Improvement to Scale

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One, two, three, four.
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Because to grow the business, you have to change.
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Right, Because your business is changing.
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We have 100 people in our business today.
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I told you we hit the wall at 50.
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We didn't know what we were doing.
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The only way to get past those roadblocks is actually for you to grow and to learn.
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And I know that, OK, we have 100 person, $20 million MSP today.
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But to keep growing this thing, I need to learn and I need to change.
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Welcome to Now.
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That's.
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It stories of MSP success, where we dive into the journeys of some of the trailblazers in our industry to find out how they use their passion for technology to help turn managed services into the thriving sector it is today.
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Today's guest is the incredibly multi-talented Simon Marcel, co-founder of S3 Technologies and creator of Propel your MSP, a strategic planning platform built by MSPs for MSPs.
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Simon was one of the early adopters of the VCIO services, turning internal innovation into scalable tools, as his journey started supporting clients while still in university, and since then he's been navigating every major shift in the MSP landscape.
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Today, simon is helping shape what modern client engagement, strategic alignment and AI-powered services can look like for MSPs and end users everywhere, all while running and skiing across the globe.
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Simon, welcome to the Now that's it podcast.
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So excited to have you tell your story today.
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Yeah, thanks for having me Excited to be here.
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Yeah, it's great.
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So, just like a lot of our partners that we've had, tell our stories a lot of our guests, your computer and IT days started pretty early on, right, and for you it wasn't just tinkering, you had a real business early on.
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Yeah.
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So I guess I got my first computer in high school and kind of learned computer by myself and also in our computer classes.
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And before university I started a business with one of my partners still a partner today and that's how we got into it.
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So I guess our first computer business we were 18.
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Wow, yeah, and you ran that for a number of years, sort of through university, through school.
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You finished school and you kind of think to yourself you're not getting what you want necessarily out of the existing business.
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So you say, hey, I've done this before, I can do it again.
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Let me start something new.
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How did that happen?
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Well, it's not, it's not exactly that.
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So we had started a business the summer before university and it actually worked, which was surprising for us at the time.
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And we started at first.
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It was, you know, like I said, we were 18 years old, so it was a lot of family friends.
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We started at first.
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It was, you know, like I said, we were 18 years old, so it was a lot of family friends, that kind of thing and some small businesses started being clients.
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And then, as university started, we were starting computer engineering and we realized that we wouldn't have enough time to take care of our clients properly.
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So through a contact we knew somebody who had basically a VAR who sold a lot of hardware to small and medium-sized businesses and we were able to transfer our clients to him, or to that business, I should say.
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And we worked there part-time through university and while working there this was in the time of it was like 1998, 1999.
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So there was the year 2000 or Y2K bug coming, so people are changing their computers like crazy and basically the price of hardware was going down.
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So working there I kind of realized that it was crazy that all they were doing is really selling hardware and almost giving the service away.
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And I remember going to see my boss at the time and saying every time I go because I was doing installation.
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I was doing everything installations, that kind of thing.
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So I was like, every time I go see a client, their backups are screwed up, everything's a mess.
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Why don't we sell them some kind of proactive maintenance plan?
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And he at the time said, yeah, but he was a VAR guy, he was a smart guy for sure.
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But he was like, yeah, if you want to do it, try it out.
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So I was like, okay.
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So I kind of built the program, sold it to clients and it worked and the clients were excited.
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So to me it was clear that the way forward was definitely on the service side and to accompany these businesses that didn't have IT people internally.
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So when we finished university, the vision was already set and it was like we are starting a service business IT consulting which at the time managed services, or at least we had never heard that term before.
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So we really started a managed service business in 2003.
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And that was the beginning of S3?
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.
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That was the beginning of S3.
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And so talk a little bit about who were your customers at that point in time, early on, and what sort of problems were you solving in the early days?
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Yeah, so our customers we weren't very picky, I'll be honest.
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We were really lucky.
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So what we did is we went to see some VARs who were selling hardware but who couldn't install it or maintain this stuff properly.
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So we were subcontracted quite a bit and we were lucky because one of the bigger ones ended up well, they closed.
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I don't know if they went bankrupt, I don't know exactly what happened, but they were out of business.
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So we ended up well, they closed.
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I don't know if they went bankrupt, I don't know exactly what happened, but they were out of business.
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So we ended up with all those clients that were our clients, that really, really helped us out.
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Sometimes you need to get lucky.
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The kind of problems we were solving for clients initially was just stuff was not stable.
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As you know, right, in businesses people were running Windows 98.
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There was Windows NT.
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At the time I remember we met like a law firm who had had their exchange server be down for almost two weeks, you know.
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But we had met them and uh, I guess this happened a couple months before and we were 23 or 24 at that time and you know, they signed up as a client.
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Now I think of that.
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I'm like that's insane today, if you had a sizable law firm, they were maybe 50 users, but they had so much pain with stuff being unstable.
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Like I said, their exchange server had been down for two weeks in the past.
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So really I think in those years like 2003 to 2006, maybe even 2007,.
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it was really all about making sure there was no downtime yeah.
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You talk about not being picky.
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I remember in my early MSP days you said yes before you realized if you could deliver the service or not.
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How often was that sort of figuring it out in the early days?
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Oh man Novell, oh, yeah, sure, We've got a guy yeah, our attitude was, if it can be done, we'll figure it out.
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So basically we would.
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So we would search online like, can this be done?
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Whatever it was?
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And then, if it could be done, we're like, yeah, we'll figure it out.
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We've changed our ways in a massive way today.
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Sometimes I think we're a little too corporate.
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I'm exaggerating, but that's the entrepreneur in me.
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But yeah, it's funny how it really really helps you in the beginning to do that sort of, to be ambitious and kind of take on these challenges.
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But as the business grows and gets bigger, you have to uh, you know, stay focused on on what you do.
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That's something that you learned out, not necessarily the hard way, but over the time as you grow.
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You have to be in order to scale.
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You've got to be a little bit.
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You've got to be much more standard and a bit more strict and you have to redefine your ICP right your who, your clients are.
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So talk a little bit about what S3, you know, those early days you were sort of saying yes to everything.
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How long did it take before you started to say we really are just looking for this type of industry or this type of client.
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What are just looking for this type of industry or this type of client.
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What was that like?
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What was that maturation like?
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So we grew the business pretty quick.
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I think when we got to about 50 employees we really hit a wall.
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We were pretty young and I don't know that we really knew what we were doing in business.
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Actually, I know we didn't know what we were doing and, yeah, that was a hard point for us to get through.
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So I think once we got there is when we really started reading books and looking at methodologies to run our business, like we use EOS.
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But back then we had read Rockefeller Habits and I think that's something we had sort of implemented and started really thinking about okay, what are our services, who are we offering them to?
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And just having a structure.
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But it definitely I want to say probably 2009-ish, so a good five to six years of us kind of hustling.
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Well, I see MSPs, it's hard to say no to revenue, right.
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I mean for a while, when you're growing, anything coming in the door is great, right, that helps your top line.
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But as you get to that 50 mark, you start to say not all revenue is good revenue, right.
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And so you guys in your brain had to say we want to do something special here, something in these four walls.
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Yes, there's exceptions, but in order for us to continue to grow this, we have to scale it a certain way.
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So I think that's really, really important.
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Talk a little bit about your sales team.
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Did you have a sales team?
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We did not have a sales team.
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We still do not have a sales team, which makes us a bit of an anomaly.
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So we have a $20 million MSP, which is organic.
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So we haven't done any acquisitions yet.
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We would love to do it.
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It's fantastic, thanks.
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We have half a salesperson which is one of my partners.
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I say that because he manages our account managers.
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At some point he was doing it full time.
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So we have one or half a salesperson, so it's really important for us to have really low churn.
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Yeah, that's kind of the trick, which is a great lead in.
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You focused so much on retention.
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Why is that equal growth?
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Why is that so important?
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So as an MSP, I mean there's really I guess there's three numbers right there's your sales, your new clients, there's your churn and then there's how much you're raising your clients.
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Those are the three numbers you can focus on.
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Sales is definitely the hardest one to go get new clients and then for us, churn is kind of sort of the low hanging fruit.
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One to go out and to make sure it's as small as possible, but it's also in line with our philosophy.
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For us, what's really important is to bring value to our clients and to feel that it's kind of silly.
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But I think the thing that we I say we like myself and my partners enjoy the most is when a client just thanks us and it's like hey guys, you know, we had a client recently when we started with them and they were about I think they were a hundred or 115, and they've almost tripled their business.
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They're like 300.
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And they were like we just really want to thank you, guys.
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We could not have done this without you, and that means everything to us and it's kind of why we got in business to help people.
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All that to say that reducing the churn is also in line with what we want to do, so that's really why we attack that.
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That's amazing.
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So follow up on this.
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You were very invested in what I would consider high sort of time intensive, cost, heavy things like road mapping out, three year plans, things like that for your customers.
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Why was that so important?
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At whatever stage that happened, we how did that start?
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I'm trying to think.
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So we started that quite early.
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I was the one who started it myself and it was just.
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Yeah, I was just thinking about.
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I don't remember if it actually came from a client the first time we did it, but it just seemed natural.
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I'm guessing it probably came from a client who want to know a little like, give us a budget and um, but it happened organically and really quick, like we were a small company, cause I was doing it for all of our clients and pretty quick we got into.
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You know, we would onboard a client and get back to them with a three-year pretty detailed plan in terms of the projects that were coming and also their budget, and it's something that our clients loved and it was definitely a differentiator at the time and I still think today there's a lot of room to do that properly.
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Yeah, talk a little bit about what one of those engagements looks like and again we'll get to the sort of VCIO service that you have as well.
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But what types of questions are you asking and answering, and what does success look like in one of those engagements?
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Yeah, that's a good question.
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We like to have what we call a strategic alignment session with our clients.
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So once a year and we definitely do this at the beginning of the engagement with the client we will have a session with them where we're just asking them the questions, typically about their business, and we're taking notes and that's it.
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We want to basically speak like I don't know 3% of the time.
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The rest of the time we're just taking notes.
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So the questions are open-ended and we'll ask where are you going for your business?
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What is it?
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What are the next three years, five years, look like for you?
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What are your biggest challenges?
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We'll dig into are there some departments you're looking to grow, some services you're looking to add?
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What kind of clients you're going after?
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And then we'll touch IT and see is IT working?
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Where are the challenges there?
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And then we will actually ask them what does success look like for you in a year from now?
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And that, I think, is a super important question for MSPs to ask all their clients.
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Because basically you're telling the client hey, in a year from now, tell me what it is that you're going to be super stoked about us.
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And then they will tell you, and then you about us, and then you know, and they will tell you, and then you do that and you just cycle that every year and I mean that's been the key for to our retention basically that's fantastic.
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Starts to make sense why you don't necessarily need a sales team when you're having those sort of strategic conversations with your clients right, yeah, I mean you could.
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Yes, as long as your retention, your retention is high or churn is low, you don't need a huge sales team unless you really really want to grow quick.
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But we were never about high growth, I think we struggled to.
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There were some periods where you had a little bit of faster growth, but 15% growth is kind of just perfect for us.
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Faster than that it almost feels like the wheels are starting to not fall off, but just you know.
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So yeah, it works for us, but the key is really the retention.
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Thank you, guys.
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We talked a little bit ahead of time.
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I think your net profit is very high as well, and when that number starts to get really large, that's when it starts to feel like the wheels might fall off.
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And so you've done things very efficiently, even with the staff that you had, and so now it's about when do we hire, or how do we hire versus how many more clients do we take on?
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Right?
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Yeah, early on.
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It's funny when you were talking at the beginning and I was telling you we hit the wall at about 50 people.
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We also hit the wall of profitability, where at some point if you have clients that you're not making money on, you can't outsell that problem.
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You have to go back and either make those clients profitable or move on.
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It's not going to work.
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So that's a lesson we learned too at that moment and kind of went back and cleaned up those skeletons in our closet.
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That's great, and it's really something that stuck to me.
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It's like if you have unprofitable clients, you will never outsell that problem.
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One of the best pieces of advice that I think anybody gave us was you know, look at the profitability of every single one of your clients, measure that on a month to month basis, understand why things went up or why they went down, and if they continue to go down consistently, then it's time to have that conversation with the client.
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Absolutely, yeah, we, we track that?
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Yeah, we.
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We track that on a monthly basis for every single client and, of course, we look for trends, right, you're not.
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You know, every client will have some difficult periods.
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So something really interesting that you shared with us, stephen with Stephen and I ahead of time, simon was you mentioned the importance of engaging every single user at a client organization.
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How do you offer such a white glove service and also scale that?
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I think it's a mindset and it's not one.
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It's something we've come across, I'm going to say, recently, relatively recently.
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It's been years now.
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I think MSPs and we were guilty of this will often think about their client as their point of contacts at the client and we decided to what if we think of every single user as a client, and what does that user's journey look like with us?
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And really the goal is, if you do a good job with every single users, these users move around and again, this all comes down to us not having many salespeople.
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These users move around and you get referrals and you can get referrals from any single user at a client.
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But I would challenge MSPs to think about how many of these users actually know who you are and understand your services and do you have a relationship with them.
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So when we started the business and up until I want to say maybe five years ago like onboarding a new user wasn't something we did we thought, well, that's our client's job, they have a new employee, they should onboard them, tell them this is how you reach S3, and so on.
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So we had some clients who did a great job at that and some clients who didn't do such a great job at that, so we decided to basically take over that process.
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So when a new user starts at a client, we have an onboarding for that new user.
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It's mostly digital, depending on the user, but we want to have points of contact with these users, so welcoming them, explaining to them basically what we do, how they can reach us, and then some tips in terms of the tools we're using.
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Basically, give them some training and then keep in touch with them.
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That's great.
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So you're doing this really great thing, this VCIO role, your strategic planning.
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You're having these conversations, but you identify a pretty apparent gap, right.
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It was hard to scale this without automating it in some fashion, right?
00:18:30.437 --> 00:18:33.083
And so you saw an opportunity.
00:18:33.083 --> 00:18:34.164
And what happened?
00:18:34.164 --> 00:18:41.863
How did these meetings with your customers turn into this VCIO offering that you're delivering to other MSPs now?
00:18:42.414 --> 00:18:48.304
Yeah, so there's a couple of things in this actually, and this is something we help MSPs with.
00:18:48.304 --> 00:18:54.974
So a lot of people have a hard time scaling the VCIO services they offer for a number of reasons.
00:18:54.974 --> 00:18:57.783
The first one is normally it's owner-led.
00:18:57.783 --> 00:19:09.564
In our case, I was the one doing it at first and a lot of people struggle to find good VCIOs and for us what really made this thing scalable is when we split the role of VCIO and account manager.
00:19:10.066 --> 00:19:20.185
Typically in a lot of MSPs you'll have a VCIO, which is basically an account manager, a VCIO and a project manager all in one, and those skill sets are very, very different.
00:19:20.185 --> 00:19:39.726
So a VCIO for us is somebody that's very technical, creative, that can really explain technical concepts to clients, and an account manager is somebody, on the other hand, that's very organized, nothing slips through the cracks, the follow-ups, and who's also there to have the tougher conversations.
00:19:39.726 --> 00:19:42.684
So your VCIO is that trusted advisor.
00:19:42.684 --> 00:19:53.308
But it's a funny role when you're the trusted advisor but also getting into like disputes but conversations over billing, that kind of thing.
00:19:53.308 --> 00:20:03.685
So splitting that role made it really a lot easier to go and find good VCIOs and good account managers and to stop looking for a unicorn.
00:20:03.685 --> 00:20:04.867
So that's the first thing.
00:20:05.055 --> 00:20:15.528
The second thing after that is yeah is how much time it took to actually build these roadmaps, and so we started automating the process and that's how we started Propel your MSP.
00:20:15.528 --> 00:20:29.624
So a good friend of mine, Dominic we did computer engineering together and he had just exited a SaaS company that he had started, so it felt like the perfect time to start Propel your MSP to, basically.
00:20:29.624 --> 00:20:31.783
But at first it was let's start this thing.
00:20:31.783 --> 00:20:38.788
We know it's really going to help us and, of course, it'll help other MSPs, and it was the only way we could build a software like this.
00:20:38.788 --> 00:20:41.584
It would be too expensive to build just for S3.
00:20:41.844 --> 00:20:45.424
Yeah, so you build this software platform.
00:20:45.424 --> 00:20:50.185
Talk about some of the early MSPs, or your early customers.
00:20:50.185 --> 00:20:55.567
How different did they look than maybe your early customers in your S3 days?
00:20:57.456 --> 00:20:59.540
You're talking about MSPs using Propeller.
00:20:59.642 --> 00:21:00.002
MSP yeah.
00:21:00.163 --> 00:21:05.964
Yeah, well, there was a mix.
00:21:05.964 --> 00:21:13.187
So we were a larger MSP, so we really built a platform originally for larger MSPs.
00:21:13.187 --> 00:21:23.065
I'm not saying we built it for large MSPs, but we had thought about a lot of the details that are important for when you're a large MSP and when you have some larger clients.
00:21:23.065 --> 00:21:26.503
So a lot of our clients were actually larger MSPs at first.
00:21:26.503 --> 00:21:30.997
So that for us made a lot of sense because we knew that business really well.
00:21:30.997 --> 00:21:48.120
It was more for the sort of the growing MSPs that maybe our platform was maybe too customizable, you know, and we realized that a lot of MSPs want to be a little more guided in terms of hey, how do we scale these VCIO services?
00:21:48.120 --> 00:21:49.765
What do the processes look like?
00:21:49.765 --> 00:21:50.956
Those things Awesome.
00:21:51.356 --> 00:22:01.706
So talk about how S3 has evolved since Propel has become a product, and then how have each business helped each other grow?
00:22:05.076 --> 00:22:09.646
S3 has definitely evolved in a massive way.
00:22:09.646 --> 00:22:13.880
It's probably helped, maybe, that I am sort of spending a lot of time in Propel.
00:22:14.415 --> 00:22:16.262
It's actually helped me delegate a lot more.
00:22:16.262 --> 00:22:21.673
So that's been really really good and it's helped me only focus on the strategic part of S3.
00:22:21.673 --> 00:22:25.922
So for me, that's who are clients, what are the services we're providing to them?
00:22:25.922 --> 00:22:42.488
So S3 recently I think we've done a really really good job at improving a lot of our efficiencies, so, like our internal processes also of refocusing on our clients' needs.
00:22:42.488 --> 00:22:53.789
I would say and by that I mean I think we've had I mean everybody's been hit with called the tsunami of cybersecurity, and it's something that we've always been really good at cybersecurity.
00:22:53.829 --> 00:23:10.567
We have a cybersecurity team, but I think that maybe I don't want to say we over-focused on it, because it's super important and it always will be, but I do think the basic, like the reason our clients have computers, is to make themselves more productive, more efficient.
00:23:10.567 --> 00:23:12.718
It's not to secure them right.
00:23:12.718 --> 00:23:17.247
So I think MSPs maybe have lost a little bit.
00:23:17.247 --> 00:23:27.264
They've lost sight of this a little bit and I think so we've had to refocus on bringing our clients basically productivity, efficiency, while still focusing on cybersecurity.
00:23:27.264 --> 00:23:35.123
I think is super important In terms of Propel, while having S3, like for me, I'm in the game, like I'm in the MSP game.
00:23:35.123 --> 00:23:37.708
I've been doing it now for 23 years.
00:23:37.708 --> 00:23:45.555
We wouldn't be able to propel the way we build it without having that exposure, so it's definitely helped propel a lot.
00:23:45.555 --> 00:23:50.207
And then for me it's interesting to meet other MSPs too and see how they're doing things.
00:23:51.255 --> 00:24:07.112
But we've always sort of been in we're in a peer group called TPGpg, so we've always interacted a lot with msps so it's kind of a continuation of that I hear a lot of msps say like joining a peer group early on was a big game changer, right the minute that you, you sort of know what you know.
00:24:07.112 --> 00:24:13.477
But the minute you get into a group with other msps that feel comfortable enough sharing, well, this is where our pricing's at.
00:24:13.477 --> 00:24:15.000
This is how we do things.
00:24:15.000 --> 00:24:16.242
These are the mistakes that we've made.
00:24:16.242 --> 00:24:17.727
You can really change your MSP.
00:24:17.727 --> 00:24:21.105
You feel the same thing about TPG A hundred percent.
00:24:23.621 --> 00:24:26.347
It was game changing and I don't use that lightly.
00:24:26.347 --> 00:24:38.747
And a big shout out to Gary Pica, who hooked us up with TPG and we actually I think we ended up taking his role because as he exited his company he was in TPG and then obviously he started True Methods.
00:24:38.747 --> 00:24:49.107
But we met him and he referred us to them because he was I think he was surprised at the time by how large of an MSP we had, without kind of knowing what we were doing.
00:24:49.107 --> 00:24:57.434
We'd kind of done this on our own and we're Canadian from Quebec, isolated and he was like okay, I think I've got the right peer group for you.
00:24:57.434 --> 00:25:00.906
And he hooked us up with TPG and it was mind-blowing, really good.
00:25:01.389 --> 00:25:03.556
So back to the question before.
00:25:03.556 --> 00:25:09.949
So you stepped away from not stepped away, but you refocused on Propel versus S3.
00:25:09.949 --> 00:25:12.039
It allowed S3 to sort of grow.
00:25:12.039 --> 00:25:24.003
So for MSP owners out there, you either go and start your own business or maybe spend a little bit more time focusing on the business right, being a bit more strategic than having your hands in.
00:25:26.501 --> 00:25:29.194
Yeah, I think it depends on your strengths.
00:25:29.194 --> 00:25:42.195
But for me in S3 now, you know, when they talk about working in the business versus working on the business, and there's a lot of talk about that, and I think for a long time I was kind of like, yeah, come on, you need to do some work.
00:25:42.195 --> 00:25:55.442
But now I've kind of embraced this a lot more and everything I do at S3 is I'm not working on one client, I'm working on all our clients at a time, so I'm really working on projects or things we're putting in place.
00:25:55.442 --> 00:26:05.298
That impacts all our clients and that has helped S3 tremendously and it's also something I really, really enjoy doing, instead of being in the minutia of one client.
00:26:05.298 --> 00:26:06.240
I don't know if that makes sense.
00:26:06.240 --> 00:26:16.179
And then I realized that that's really what it is when you work on the business and I think it's important and I was having this conversation actually with my partners just a couple of days ago.
00:26:16.720 --> 00:26:23.221
We are becoming a bit of a product company at S3, in the sense that our manage, like you know, we've been in this for 23 years.
00:26:23.221 --> 00:26:34.681
At the time we were always just we consider ourselves a service company and now, like our managed service is a product we're delivering to our clients and we need to have a roadmap on how we're improving this.
00:26:34.681 --> 00:26:37.428
What are the tweaks we're doing and what's our long-term vision?
00:26:37.428 --> 00:26:54.505
And we're starting to have more and more people working on, like I said, efficiencies, but also the roadmap of our managed services, what they're going to look like Do you have a product manager or someone that sort of oversees the direction of the managed services business?
00:26:55.046 --> 00:26:55.507
under S3?
00:26:55.507 --> 00:26:58.163
Yeah, so we have a team now that does that.
00:26:58.163 --> 00:27:00.963
I think I'm the product manager.
00:27:03.319 --> 00:27:04.644
Or at least the decider.
00:27:05.816 --> 00:27:10.761
We've got somebody who does more of the detail planning, but that's not something we used to have.
00:27:10.761 --> 00:27:12.220
But there's so many things.
00:27:12.220 --> 00:27:24.666
Now We've integrated a bunch of automation, obviously AI, chat, support, all these things, portal and all these automations and it's kind of like, okay, we really need a roadmap.
00:27:24.666 --> 00:27:27.710
We have so many initiatives and it's you know where are we heading in those.
00:27:27.710 --> 00:27:28.515
So we're becoming.
00:27:28.515 --> 00:27:32.226
It's funny and Propel, in a way, has helped that, because in Propel, we are a product company.
00:27:32.615 --> 00:27:33.415
So, yeah, that's great.
00:27:33.415 --> 00:27:45.570
All right, speaking of sort of better client relationship and retention, this is the section I like to call advice, because I think you've you're pretty unique in the industry, simon, where you've been around for a long time.
00:27:45.570 --> 00:27:53.328
You've you've built your own MSP to a level that most MSPs don't get to, but you've also gone out and created this, this amazing product.
00:27:53.328 --> 00:27:55.940
On the side, let's talk a little bit about AI.
00:27:55.940 --> 00:28:02.026
How do you see AI, what role do you see AI playing for MSPs going forward?
00:28:03.937 --> 00:28:08.683
I think everybody needs to embrace it and if not, you will be sort of left behind.
00:28:08.683 --> 00:28:14.805
We've done a lot of it ourselves, but I think there's some products now that are popping up that can do a lot of it.
00:28:14.805 --> 00:28:19.916
So we use AI to do a lot of sort of repetitive.
00:28:19.916 --> 00:28:23.525
It's a mix of automation and AI, but I'll give you a couple examples.
00:28:23.525 --> 00:28:34.944
So for us, every ticket that comes in, basically AI will auto-categorize it, assign a priority reply to the client, possibly ask for more information.
00:28:34.944 --> 00:28:36.448
We have auto-escalation.
00:28:36.448 --> 00:28:40.803
So if it sees that, oh, it's a cybersecurity issue, it will be escalated to our cybersecurity team.
00:28:40.803 --> 00:28:45.424
If it judges, oh, this is an issue that's a bit tougher for our level one, it'll be escalated.
00:28:45.424 --> 00:28:49.654
We have some custom stuff for some larger clients too, which gets escalated.
00:28:49.654 --> 00:28:55.164
So I think there's a lot that can be done in triage communication, that kind of stuff.
00:28:55.164 --> 00:29:01.115
We then use it, of course, for all our client communication internally to make sure that is cleaned up.
00:29:01.335 --> 00:29:04.325
We also are in a bilingual market.
00:29:04.325 --> 00:29:22.286
So we're from Montreal, so there's French and English and we kind of have a mix of these clients and weirdly we have employees who are more comfortable in French and some who are more comfortable in English, so the AI can do this auto-translation too, so it makes it easier to respond to clients in that sense.
00:29:22.286 --> 00:29:35.545
So yeah, and I think there's the right mix of you don't want to be a too early adopter and put too much time and effort into it, but you don't want to be left behind either.
00:29:35.545 --> 00:29:37.281
So it's a really it's kind of a.
00:29:37.281 --> 00:29:40.182
It's a bit of a tricky road to navigate.
00:29:40.203 --> 00:29:40.423
It is.
00:29:40.423 --> 00:29:44.706
I've heard a lot of smart people give very similar advice.
00:29:44.706 --> 00:29:51.105
Just use it right, Use it in your MSP, find places for it.
00:29:51.105 --> 00:29:52.361
You've been a bit more strategic.
00:29:52.361 --> 00:29:57.765
You've found places where it gives immediate help right, Whether it be on the service desk side or the end users.
00:29:57.765 --> 00:29:59.540
But get comfortable with it.
00:29:59.540 --> 00:30:06.785
You know, is there a service around it yet Maybe, maybe not, but just get comfortable with it, Get used to it.
00:30:06.885 --> 00:30:07.807
Yeah, I think for us.
00:30:07.807 --> 00:30:10.825
So continuous improvement is really huge at S3.
00:30:10.825 --> 00:30:19.322
And the idea is for me, anyways, it's small changes, often quickly, and I'm really strict on this.
00:30:19.322 --> 00:30:31.281
People like to scope, creep things and I'm like, no, guys, we're doing this small improvement, we're going to test it, make sure it actually works and it gets adoption, and then we'll move on to the next thing.
00:30:31.281 --> 00:30:38.789
So, whether it's AI or whatever you're doing, I would recommend not, you know, like what's a good example.
00:30:39.039 --> 00:30:49.631
Sometimes, let's say, you're talking about tweaking your documentation or maybe automating something, and right away somebody will bring up oh well, is our documentation system the right one?
00:30:49.631 --> 00:30:50.512
Maybe we should look at it.
00:30:50.512 --> 00:30:52.045
I'm like guys, guys, guys, guys.
00:30:52.045 --> 00:30:54.070
What is the problem we want to solve here?
00:30:54.070 --> 00:30:56.246
What is the smallest improvement we can make?
00:30:56.246 --> 00:31:02.980
That'll just bring us to the next level and just do those as often as possible and those will add up.
00:31:02.980 --> 00:31:08.732
I find if you try to do something that's too big, it gets really complex.
00:31:08.732 --> 00:31:28.603
You do a ton of work, you haven't really tested to make sure it works and, yeah, it just becomes really hard to do, whereas if you do these small things, very often it's unbelievable when you look back how much progress you've actually made you mentioned simple like GPT use cases around employee handbooks.
00:31:28.943 --> 00:31:32.192
Yeah, and like how do you introduce ideas like that to clients?
00:31:32.192 --> 00:31:33.040
You know this.
00:31:33.040 --> 00:31:35.608
Hey, we can help you with something like your employee handbook.
00:31:35.868 --> 00:31:36.510
Yeah, totally.
00:31:36.510 --> 00:31:54.961
So I think the first thing is for AI is to use it internally, see what works, and then see oh my god, like employee handbook is a super easy one, like custom gpt, where you feed it a handbook so that employees can obviously, um, just you know, ask questions too and then you can offer that to your clients.
00:31:54.961 --> 00:32:01.133
Um, so that's that's kind of how we've always done things.
00:32:01.133 --> 00:32:06.150
We love business, we love our clients' business, we like improving ours and we like improving our clients' business.
00:32:06.150 --> 00:32:10.889
So for us it's like let's improve our business and the things that have worked for us, we kind of bring them to clients.
00:32:10.889 --> 00:32:12.105
That's great, that makes sense.
00:32:13.081 --> 00:32:25.051
So you've described this cybersecurity gold rush that we're in right now as a little bit of a catch catch up, right, and I think you even said you've warned MSPs not to lose focus.
00:32:25.051 --> 00:32:28.904
I've heard you say that a couple of times in some different podcasts and different sessions.
00:32:28.904 --> 00:32:35.086
You've done and I think I even quoted you no one's installing computers to secure them, right.
00:32:35.086 --> 00:32:39.483
I don't know, I don't know, but how is S3 focused on?
00:32:39.483 --> 00:32:41.789
You know, what are you guys focused on right now?
00:32:41.789 --> 00:32:45.026
For the now, for the immediate term, and then for the future?
00:32:45.227 --> 00:32:50.487
Yeah, so I say that, but cybersecurity, you know, I don't want to say we don't focus on cybersecurity.
00:32:50.527 --> 00:32:51.690
It's one of our core values.
00:32:51.920 --> 00:33:02.405
It's actually cybersecurity and everything, so super important, but and I'm saying this for ourselves we definitely, I think, lost sight a little bit of where things went.
00:33:02.405 --> 00:33:07.451
So for us it's again it's making our clients have success.
00:33:07.451 --> 00:33:08.925
We want to be part of that success.
00:33:08.925 --> 00:33:17.385
We want to understand what success means to our clients and what's our role in that, and mainly that's about how can we make them.
00:33:17.385 --> 00:33:20.402
Usually it's more productive, more efficient, those kinds of things.
00:33:20.682 --> 00:33:31.834
Yeah, I think and that's what I think is so neat about your platform is being able to position team members, vcios roles in more strategic business conversations.
00:33:31.834 --> 00:33:40.048
It makes you such a stickier MSP for your partners, right Like you're able to speak to them at the business level.
00:33:40.048 --> 00:33:42.951
This is how we can drive your business forward, grow your business.
00:33:42.951 --> 00:33:46.283
You become a different level of value than just their IT provider.
00:33:46.283 --> 00:33:47.285
A hundred percent.
00:33:47.485 --> 00:33:54.806
So, yeah, so this is something we talk to MSPs about in Propel, so I think QBRs.
00:33:55.769 --> 00:34:09.022
So there's two kinds of contacts at your clients, right, there's the people you sign the contract with, which is normally the management of the client, and then there's your kind of your day-to-day contact, which is typically an office manager or an executive assistant, whoever it is that's going to manage IT.
00:34:09.886 --> 00:34:22.014
What happens to a lot of people, I think, is they lose that relationship with the executive who hired them and they become sort of their primary point of contact becomes that day-to-day contact at the client.
00:34:23.159 --> 00:34:38.221
And so having that strategic conversation and not going into what people do as a typical QBR, which is number of tickets they had and response times and all these things and, yeah, your day-to-day contact might be interested in this, but the people who signed the contract anyway, in our experience they don't really care.
00:34:38.221 --> 00:34:42.849
What they want to know is that you're helping them get to where they want to go.
00:34:42.849 --> 00:34:56.333
So by having that meeting once a year where you really, really understand their needs and then you come back to them, present a plan which addresses those needs, will ensure that you never lose that relationship that you have at the executive level.
00:34:56.333 --> 00:35:05.967
You're working at it every year and that you are actually providing what the client wants for their business to move forward and not just closing tickets.
00:35:05.967 --> 00:35:12.481
And yeah, you can show them a bunch of stats on cybersecurity and this kind of stuff, but for them that's table stakes at this point, I think.
00:35:12.682 --> 00:35:13.804
Yeah, very good.
00:35:13.804 --> 00:35:17.452
So let's talk personal growth just for a minute.
00:35:17.452 --> 00:35:23.742
Simon, you've got two businesses and you've cross-country skied on all seven continents.
00:35:23.742 --> 00:35:26.048
Backcountry skied, backcountry skied.
00:35:26.048 --> 00:35:28.481
How the heck did you have you done that?
00:35:29.865 --> 00:35:31.228
Yeah, two businesses is tough.
00:35:31.228 --> 00:35:32.490
It's really really tough.
00:35:32.490 --> 00:35:51.108
I think I don't know if my recommendations for people to do that I, you know, when we started Propel your MSP, I don't think I really thought about what will things look like if this works, you know, um, so it's really hard and what's difficult, I find, is just the mind space they both use.
00:35:51.108 --> 00:36:08.585
Like I'm sure all MSP owners are always thinking about their business the way I am, like when they're showering, when they're doing whatever it is Um, so it's really hard to kind of split your time on on both of these.
00:36:08.585 --> 00:36:17.271
Yeah, so I do a lot of trail running and a bunch of back country skiing, which I put a lot of time into, but so, but running is really one that I do a bunch of stuff at the same time and it really helps me in the business, which I know sounds weird.
00:36:17.271 --> 00:36:19.023
So I run to work every day.
00:36:19.023 --> 00:36:20.347
So I commute while running.
00:36:20.347 --> 00:36:27.012
While running, I listen to audio books, which are, I listened to, so many business books I can't even tell you.
00:36:28.320 --> 00:36:34.463
So I'm running, so I'm, you know, I'm working out training, I'm commuting and I'm listening to audio books and that adds up.
00:36:34.463 --> 00:36:35.525
You know, I run to work.
00:36:35.525 --> 00:36:41.440
It's probably like an hour and a half I do.
00:36:41.440 --> 00:36:42.605
I run to and from work probably an hour and a half I do.
00:36:42.605 --> 00:36:43.771
I run two in front work Probably an hour and a half a day.
00:36:43.771 --> 00:36:44.574
You listen to audio books at 1.5.
00:36:44.574 --> 00:36:45.237
Like that adds up pretty quick.
00:36:45.237 --> 00:36:45.860
Wow, yeah, it's impressive.
00:36:45.860 --> 00:36:46.561
But it's been.
00:36:46.702 --> 00:36:48.646
But for me it's actually funny enough.
00:36:48.646 --> 00:36:54.501
It's been, it's been fundamental to grow the businesses.
00:36:54.501 --> 00:37:00.762
Because to grow the business, like you have to change right, because your business has changed.
00:37:00.762 --> 00:37:03.724
Like we have a 100 people in our business today, I told you we hit the wall at 50.
00:37:03.724 --> 00:37:04.648
We didn't know what we were doing.
00:37:04.648 --> 00:37:09.748
The only way to get past those roadblocks is actually for you to grow and to learn.
00:37:09.748 --> 00:37:13.965
You know, and I know that, okay, we have 100 person, $20 million MSP today.
00:37:13.965 --> 00:37:17.961
But to keep growing this thing, I need to learn and I need to change.
00:37:17.961 --> 00:37:18.762
So I need to learn and I need to change.
00:37:18.762 --> 00:37:19.282
Great advice.
00:37:19.983 --> 00:37:21.483
All right, talk a little bit about the future.
00:37:21.483 --> 00:37:23.326
What does the future look like for S3?
00:37:23.326 --> 00:37:25.407
Or at least what are you anticipating?
00:37:25.407 --> 00:37:26.329
How are you planning?
00:37:26.329 --> 00:37:27.909
And then same for Propel.
00:37:28.911 --> 00:37:29.130
Yeah.
00:37:29.130 --> 00:37:36.836
So, like I said, for us there's a huge refocus on productivity, what we can do to just help our clients on that side.
00:37:36.836 --> 00:37:40.900
There's a bunch of simple things that I think we were guilty of.
00:37:40.900 --> 00:37:43.905
The clients on that side there's a bunch of simple things that I think we were guilty of.
00:37:43.905 --> 00:37:45.648
The first is, for me, microsoft 365.
00:37:45.648 --> 00:37:46.931
Like, it's a huge platform.
00:37:46.931 --> 00:37:48.153
There's so much that can be done.
00:37:48.153 --> 00:37:53.469
Clients, I think, do not use I don't know how much of it.
00:37:53.469 --> 00:37:56.521
I was going to say like 30, they use maybe 30% of it.
00:37:56.521 --> 00:38:01.333
So there's basically showing the clients, training them on how to use it.
00:38:01.333 --> 00:38:06.081
I think is huge and I think if you don't do it, you'll be left behind because somebody will do it for your clients.
00:38:06.081 --> 00:38:08.746
Um, and then ai.
00:38:08.746 --> 00:38:12.576
So helping clients use ai, um is huge.
00:38:12.635 --> 00:38:18.507
And then the other thing in productivity, which is going to sound really, really silly, but a bit of a refocus on the device.
00:38:18.507 --> 00:38:24.581
So I think in today's world, the device people use is so important.
00:38:24.581 --> 00:38:36.786
Like, if you're going to ask, like a typical user, at one of your clients what's more important to them Like a laptop that's really fast and that works really well, or like amazing service They'd probably say you know what I want?
00:38:36.786 --> 00:38:38.791
A really good computer and the service can be.
00:38:39.721 --> 00:38:45.420
So a bit of a refocus on are we making sure that every single user is getting the right device and the right accessories.
00:38:45.420 --> 00:38:55.702
So, a user that travels, maybe a mobile screen so they can have a two screen setup even when we're here at a conference right, you're at a conference and that you can work properly if you sit down in your hotel room.
00:38:55.702 --> 00:38:57.728
Good docking stations.
00:38:57.728 --> 00:39:03.726
If you've got maybe an owner that has, um, obviously works from home a bit, and maybe from the cottage, so just.
00:39:03.726 --> 00:39:05.612
And then accessories like headsets.
00:39:05.612 --> 00:39:13.731
So a refocus on, like I was saying, every user is a client and a focus on their devices, which is really basic.
00:39:13.731 --> 00:39:19.307
But I think and we've been guilty of it of maybe um of not focusing on that enough, gotcha.
00:39:19.608 --> 00:39:20.630
And then how about for Propel?
00:39:20.630 --> 00:39:26.146
Obviously, you continue to build your client base, the MSPs, the larger MSPs.
00:39:26.146 --> 00:39:34.846
I heard you say you've gone back and obviously taken some of the flexibility out of the platform for the smaller MSPs that need a bit more.
00:39:34.846 --> 00:39:39.000
This is the way that it should be done, but how do you anticipate that evolving?
00:39:39.000 --> 00:39:44.123
I assume AI is a piece of that and more Totally, Maybe one last thing.
00:39:44.123 --> 00:39:46.807
I've got on the S3 side the other thing is automation at clients too.
00:39:47.079 --> 00:39:49.867
It's just looking out for automation opportunities.
00:39:49.867 --> 00:39:52.313
Propel yeah, no, it's not.
00:39:52.313 --> 00:39:56.190
We definitely didn't take out any features of customizing.
00:39:56.190 --> 00:39:58.688
It's still a platform that can be massively customized.
00:39:58.688 --> 00:40:02.869
It's maybe guiding them a little more, doing a better job at onboarding.
00:40:02.869 --> 00:40:08.206
I think that's been really important, so we want to continue to improve there.
00:40:08.206 --> 00:40:12.170
The next thing for us is, or that we want to continue.
00:40:12.380 --> 00:40:15.108
So our platform we've built what we call Propel Live.
00:40:15.108 --> 00:40:18.168
It's basically a web presentation view that's this interactive.
00:40:18.168 --> 00:40:33.889
It's like an interactive presentation that you're putting together with your clients so that when you're presenting the roadmap, you're working with the client to see what they're interested in, what they're not interested in, and the budget is basically being done real time.
00:40:33.889 --> 00:40:35.253
So it's participative.
00:40:35.253 --> 00:40:38.021
So that's been really, really powerful.
00:40:38.342 --> 00:40:42.505
What we want to do is give access to the clients for that, so that they have a portal.
00:40:42.505 --> 00:40:54.548
Right now it's a presentation and you can send them kind of a leave behind report, but give them access to that and then just some more tools that the clients can access in real time as well.
00:40:54.548 --> 00:40:58.666
But we have some cool I mean, in the short term, we have some really cool features that are coming out.
00:40:58.666 --> 00:41:05.500
Or something I think that's super important to all MSPs is the stack and making sure that you're standardizing that stack for all your clients.
00:41:05.500 --> 00:41:25.284
So in Propel we've got this stack module that we'll launch in maybe two months and it kind of automatically detects the stacks at your clients and gives you a stack alignment score and really kind of because we can do it now but this kind of puts a focus on the stack in the presentation.
00:41:25.304 --> 00:41:32.875
It's cool, awesome and for any of our listeners that uh don't know about propel and want to learn more about propel your msb.
00:41:32.875 --> 00:41:34.721
Uh, how do they get more information?
00:41:34.940 --> 00:41:36.443
yeah, propel your mspcom.
00:41:36.443 --> 00:41:44.856
We do a ton of podcasts uh sorry, webinars so I think that's a great way to check us out.
00:41:44.856 --> 00:42:08.907
There's a lot of information on our website, but also, if anybody's interested, just propelyourmspcom and we're happy to give you a demo, show you around the product and then and like I said, we've gotten a lot better at onboarding people so then, making sure that we set it up so that you can test it with a client and then, once you've tested it with one client, we're very confident you'll see the value and then you can sign up.
00:42:08.907 --> 00:42:11.012
So there's no commitment Awesome, simon.
00:42:11.641 --> 00:42:14.048
All right now for our favorite question that we like to ask.
00:42:14.048 --> 00:42:15.726
This is the Now that's it podcast.
00:42:15.726 --> 00:42:25.061
So, simon, I just want to ask you when did you know?
00:42:25.121 --> 00:42:25.461
now that's it.
00:42:25.461 --> 00:42:35.271
Well, for me it's actually when I started being really strategic at S3 and getting out of the day-to-day operations and really working on.
00:42:35.271 --> 00:42:39.257
Like I said, when I work on an initiative, it's for all clients.
00:42:39.257 --> 00:42:43.684
And, yeah, for me I was like, yep, this is it, this is what I should be doing.
00:42:43.905 --> 00:42:45.449
That's a great one, man.
00:42:45.449 --> 00:42:48.284
It was a real pleasure, simon, to have you on the podcast today.
00:42:48.284 --> 00:42:54.349
I thank you for your time, thank you for everything you've done for the MSP industry and look forward to staying in touch with you.
00:42:54.550 --> 00:42:55.860
Yeah, thank you so much for having me.
00:42:55.860 --> 00:42:56.322
It's great.