Podcast Transcript

[00:00:00] Sean: G’day everyone, and welcome to the ScaleUps Podcast where we help first time Founders learn the secrets of scaling so they can fulfil the potential of their business, make bigger decisions with greater confidence, and maximise the value and impact they can have in the world. I'm your host, Sean Steele, and my guest today, not guest, but guests are Wayne and Scott Findlay from the room. How are you fellas?

[00:00:19] Wayne: Yeah, good, Sean.

[00:00:21] Scott: Good, Sean.

[00:00:21] Sean: Excellent mate. These are the New Zealand brothers. As I talk about you to my wife, as the audience knows, I guess in terms of a bit of a context for today, I interview Founders who've scaled, experts on scaling. But this year we've started following a group of Founders who are still striving for scale. And so, you know, businesses that are going well, but that are scaling up. And a few weeks ago, we had Hitesh from Tech Force Services. They've grown to about 80 team members in the last four years or so. They're scaling and they're going well, you guys are the second business that we're going to follow over the next three years, and that means I'm going to be interviewing a couple of times a year. So, we get to follow along with the highs and the lows of your journey. Kind of fly on the wall, reality TV in a podcast style. How does that sound? Are you guys happy to be on that journey with me?

[00:01:05] Wayne: Yeah, sure. Sounds like a good journey.

[00:01:08] Sean: I think it'll be fine. Well, look, let me just set up a bit of context and background for our audience. First of all, you guys are clients of mine, so I provide mentoring and advisory and support to you guys to help you develop your growth strategy, execute it, and build the foundations of your business so that you can continue to scale successfully as you are doing. Now in relation to the story of the back room, I'm going to have a crack at it, and you guys let me know what I miss. So, obviously you’re brothers, you grew up in the sort of deep south of New Zealand, and you built and sold an accounting firm together called Finlay and Co. And when you were building that business, one of the things that you were doing was offshoring. So, you had, you know, some team members in lower wage environments and places like the Philippines. as a strategy to help you ensure that your higher paid team members were getting to focus on higher value and more complex work, and therefore outsource some of the more transactional work, if that's the right word to team members in place of lower wages. Just making the overall business more efficient and helping everybody get to focus on what they do best. And then post sale of your business, you realise that was something you could do for other accounting firms. And so. you set up the back room about five years ago. At the moment, you guys are up to about 500 team members, so that's, you know, people who are supporting other clients. I don't know actually when you hear that number, it's a big number, right? Like five years, 500. And the majority of those people are in Asia who are supporting clients typically in Western markets like New Zealand and Australia and the UK and the US And the core of your team are accountants and bookkeepers who are supporting mid-tier accounting firms doing a similar thing, but you are also expanding into marketing and administration, other expertise areas, but kind of the core is finance. How did I go? How close am I?

[00:02:48] Wayne: You're pretty close. We're probably getting closer to 600 actually at, you know. We've had a busy start to the year. And yeah, the core is accounting and bookkeeping. But yeah, we are expanding into marketing and sort of other interesting services as well that flow on from accounting.

[00:03:11] Sean: Awesome.

[00:03:11] Scott: And just further that as well. Sean, it's exactly what you said. It was when we first looked at it, it was about creating capacity because we wanted to get out and do, do some of this cool stuff with our clients. But typically, as with most accounting firms, they're all too busy doing compliance work and so they can't get out. There advisory, so we kind of, one of the conferences, we went on this sort of, this option come up and, and we liked it. Yeah. And then we thought, oh, well we could do it our own way.

[00:03:45] Sean: Love it. Love it. And you guys are definitely doing it your own way. So maybe just to give people a sense of the trajectory, obviously they know that five years ago you were at zero people, and right now you're at almost 600. Where do you think you'll be in a year's time and, and three years’ time? Like, just to give people a sense of the growth momentum in the business?

[00:04:05] Wayne: You know, we've set a goal this year, not financial, we'll call it the calendar year to get to a thousand staff, which is, you know, we we're on the right track for a start. And sort of three years’ time, you know, we've set some pretty lofty budgets, but we want to be around two and a half thousand.

[00:04:25] Sean: That's amazing. Which will have been, you know, eight years from zero to two and a half thousand. Incredible journey. Well, we look forward to following that journey and seeing what happens. Before we get into the sort of the business stuff, I am dying to know what it is like working with your brother every day. Because that's quite a unique relationship, you know, A) Co-Founders, you know, just having co-Founders is always an interesting relationship. And then B) When you add the family complexity, but also I guess the depth of history to it. It's a really interesting combination. How does that work for you? Do you get on each other's nerves? How do you manage conflict? Like, talk to me about what it's like working with your brother.

[00:05:08] Scott: Oh, I'll go first. I'll get first shot at this. Well, to start off, he's a freaking pain in the ass. But no, in jest, of course we actually work really well together. Yeah, to be fear Wayne is sort of the good ideas man, and I'm quite a more of a sounding board to these ideas. And we both work on the same ideas of give things a crack. The kaizen theory, always improving. Pretty much not too many fights. We get on pretty well. I tend to probably let Wayne get away with a few things and then eventually just chip away and then I'll get what I want. We're still mates.

[00:06:04] Sean: … like a sort of pick your battle strategy in the same way as you do with your kids? Right. You can't fight about everything, so you have to go and I go, okay, I know what I'm actually going to dig my heels in on and I know where I'm just going to have to create some space and somebody else to own some stuff and make their own decisions. Is that kind of how it plays out?

[00:06:20] Wayne: Sort of, he's got a bigger temper than me, so I sort of can tell when things aren't right, so we sort of scale back from the issue.

[00:06:29] Sean: Yeah, you can read the room. Love it. Okay, so from a business perspective, one of the things that I think's really interesting for Founders who maybe haven't done, haven't had any team members overseas or actually sort of done business overseas, but maybe thinking about it, what have you learned about how to, you know, because you've got two challenges there. One is, you've got to lead people in the Philippines, as a one of your core places. And you know, the Philippine culture is very different to the New Zealand culture or the Australian culture, or the US or the UK culture in terms of leadership. And then of course you are deals in the US or in the UK and Australia and New Zealand. So, you've got all these different cultures. What have you guys learned about how; A) To lead in a different culture and then, B) I guess the sort of the sales process or the business deal making process in other cultures?

[00:07:21] Wayne: I might start on that Scotty. The Philippines is definitely a different culture from a leadership perspective than New Zealand.

[00:07:30] Sean: In what way?

[00:07:31] Wayne: Well, you know, 90% of the population is Catholic. You know, two boys off the farm from Tuatapere. You can't swear. It's a bit hard. And yeah, you have to be caring and nurturing, the work-life balance is big here. Yeah, it's more than just showing up for work. There's a lot more that you need to do from a benefits and just really looking after your staff more than what you probably would in New Zealand. So, it's more in nurturing. The talent we have here is different.

[00:08:12] Sean: How have you found that lane in the context of being able to, you know, sometimes we grow up in environments where you're able to give quite direct feedback. You know, like you are quite, you know, my experience in working, having done a lot of work in the Philippines is you don't need to be able to give feedback sometimes in quite a different way. Or it can be a, you know, received a little bit differently. How have you learned how to do that better?

[00:08:35] Wayne: Well, I think, with direct feedback, you got to give the good with the bad. You just can't be, you won't get away with being confrontational in the Philippines. It's just going to end up intense. And actually Scott's wife, Phillipa had a good way of doing that. I remember back in the accounting days when you know, you would ask someone, do you understand? And you know, people lose face if they say, I don't understand. So, they would say, I understand. And Phillipa would say, Is that a “no, I don't understand”. Or is that a “yes, I understand.” So, she would make fun of it. And that's the way to do it in the Philippines is sort of a bit, I jest people love humour and so it is just the way you attack it.

[00:09:21] Sean: Mm. Okay.

[00:09:22] Scott: And if I can add to that, I think humour is, they have great sense of humour and we do use it a lot. And we have to and I think creating that culture has been really key for us. And even in our accounting firm, I think some of our background have been the Southern boys from Tuatapere as Wayne mentioned, Tuatapere was New Zealand's sausage capital of New Zealand or just dead. And so that helped. And I think also Wayne too, isn't it? You know, creating those roles of account managers. We, we sort of developed some new roles, which is real in between, which was our Philippine, our own Philippine staff who work with the staff. Not just the, from more HR side, but culture side and also are working with their clients. So, that's been …

[00:10:15] Sean: So, they're trying to help the team member in the Philippines kind of understand what's required culturally on the New Zealand or US or UK side. Okay. So not just sort of technical support, but actually.

[00:10:25] Wayne: And educating the client too, Sean. Because you know, you can have confrontational clients.

[00:10:34] Sean: Of course. And they are used to lead in certain way in a certain environment and may never have dealt with anybody in the Philippines. Yeah.

[00:10:38] Wayne: Correct. So, you have to educate them as well. So, it's too-pronged.

[00:10:43] Scott: Yeah, and we won't take on a client if we know they're not right client.

[00:10:49] Sean: Yep.

[00:10:49] Scott: So, and we've learnt that, we weren’t perfect at the start.

[00:10:53] Sean: Yeah. No, that makes a lot of sense to me. And what about I mean, you've grown to 600 staff in five years. That's an incredible trajectory. What are some of the things that you, I mean, there's so many things, of course, that go into the success of a business. Like, you know, there's never like one thing, oh yeah, we just did one thing and everything completely changed, but sometimes there are key ingredients that you think actually that. a really important decision that we made, or that was a really important, you know, product that we developed, something that kind of really helped you succeed. What are one or two of the things that you feel like have most contributed to your success so far?

[00:11:31] Wayne: It's sort of a delegations one, Sean. Don't be afraid to delegate. And I forget where I heard the terminology. If you can delegate and it gets 80% done as good as what you would do then, that 80% changes over time to a hundred, but you have to delegate, so don't try to do it all yourself. So, we've built a good team, which is key and shared the different roles around. Another one is implementing. A lot of people come up with the ideas, but don't implement. So, Scott and I, we always will have a crack and, you know, heart's back to the old days with Rob Nixon, I think where he had that D times A equals R. Decisions times Actions, equals Results. That's something that may not be good results, but you learn quickly from your mistakes. And so, yeah, that's one of the other things is we're not afraid to, if we see a good idea and it makes sense, we'll implement.

[00:12:38] Sean: You go after it. Yeah. Okay. And then learn and adapt as you go.

[00:12:43] Scott: One.

[00:12:44] Sean: Yeah, please go ahead.

[00:12:44] Scott: I'll like to chip in now, to get on this way. I think one of the key things too, was back in the early days when we had our accounting firm and we were still running. We were running the accounting firm and doing this at the same time. So, we had a sort of foot in two camps. As soon as, we got rid of Wayne, we got him out of the accounting firm and got him sort of full-time on the offshoring. It really helped. So, it's like good focus. It's what you tell your clients, isn't it? And you sort of, you got to give things a hundred percent full focus. And that was certainly one of the key things that helped with a quite substantial trajectory in early years.

[00:13:27] Sean: But I guess, I think there's a couple things in that, you know, one is, it sounds like if you think about the concept of, and it sort of ties into what you said about the fact if you see an idea, you'll go after it, you'll have a crack at it and see, you know, whether it's getting traction before you then decide whether you should keep it, improve it or abandon it. And so, you know, you're building the offshoring thing at the same time as you are, you know, you were firing a bullet essentially before you decided whether you were going to go all in with the full artillery and cannibals and so on; which sounded like it was part of it. Like once Wayne was in there and you go, okay, this thing's actually got legs. Maybe we should give it more time. And I think that's also a real opportunity for Founders when it comes to things like, you know, going offshore. I think you really have, whether if you are going to start exporting or you're going to go into a country, a new market, you might fire a bullet, but you then have to make the assumption that you're actually going to have to fully commit to that thing. Like, you're going to have to have some resources. Somebody who is focused, accountable, and going to make that thing work as opposed to just, you know, because there's such a risk, isn't there of like putting your toe in the water and maybe getting a bit of negative feedback and then just going, oh no, you just don't get enough feedback because you haven't actually fully committed to it. So, it's a tricky balance, isn't it, to figure out like, is the bullet not working? Do we pull back or do we actually go in harder because we haven't given it enough resource?

[00:14:52] Scott: I think for us, when we fired those bullets, it was probably a good stage and certainly accounting where there was a lot of pressure at that time on accountants doing more. But they couldn't because they're too busy. So, it was kind of like a must in my mind, you to be able to do these things. You couldn't do it in the sort of the typical accounting firm at that time. You are just too bloody busy doing compliance and typical accountants, we can't, we're shocking at it. So timing was good. It's always good for that sort of stuff. And we got some early traction, and we had some great clients early on that sort of went on the journey with us, to be honest. And you know, our sales was pretty hopeless, I'll be honest. Like we've just relied on hopefully doing a pretty good job and referrals in those early days sort of only now, we're getting a heat around a proper sales system.

[00:15:53] Sean: But I think that's wonderful, right? Like you haven't gone out and gone, okay, I think we've got a good product. Let's go really hard on sales and marketing to acquire customers. You've gone; no, no, like, let's get this thing right. Let's make sure we've got some happy customers, that's really refined our offering. And off the back of that, the business has grown and you've been able to get to this size before you've gone, okay, we probably not need to start doing a bit more in making our marketing and sales efforts more sophisticated because there is only so far usually that you can take a business off the back of just organic referral account growth. It's still important yet if you want to continue to keep the same trajectory, you do have to start to really fire up sales and marketing. But doing that on the back of a subpar, not quite the right fit kind of a product is a great way to lose a lot of money, or to waste a lot of money, at least.

What about challenges? I am sure there has been a lot of challenges so far. What are some of the big ones that really … I can see your faces, it’s beautiful. What are some of the ones that really jump out to you that?

[00:16:58] Wayne: Well, you're doing business in the Philippines, and I compare it to, I reckon New Zealand back in about 30 years ago. It's just everything is bureaucracy. There are layers upon layers, the banking system, you know, we're still writing out cheques here, Sean. It's just trying to get, move money across borders. Yeah, it is challenging and you need to get the right people to help look after all, I can't handle it. I just hate bureaucracy and it just does my head in. But luckily, we've got good people that can deal with all that sort of stuff. So, that's been challenging. So, you got to set yourself up right.

[00:17:43] Sean: So, the solution to that was, finding somebody who did have the capacity or the knowledge to be able to kind of unblock that rather than going, that's too hard, let's pull back. I just can't do business in that environment.

[00:17:55] Wayne: Yeah. You would, as a CEO sort of thing. If I got dropped into that, I'd be there forever today trying to sort things out. So that's where you need someone that's got the skills to go and do that.

[00:18:09] Sean: Yeah. When we set up, you know, my last company, we set up a, a joint venture in the Philippines and we established a business there with shared ownership. And one of the most important things for us up front was, just how to navigate the business environment, the legal environment, the regulatory environment to your points, like the difference between you getting something approved in 18 months or three weeks is the relationship, the knowledge, the level of influence, the understanding of how to work the system, having somebody who understands that makes a big difference. Scott, what were you thinking between your biggest challenges that you feel that you've faced over the last five years.

[00:18:40] Scott: Oh look, there's always, Wayne's sort of covered them off all, but you know, of course there's the usual one, like, just pretty much Wayne and I have been the original Founders for most of it until we took them out of the partner. You obviously cash flow was one, and probably still, you know, it's still is, where it is a bit of a machine and then it, and it takes a bit of running cash flow wise. So, that's certainly one. And after Covid…

[00:19:09] Sean: Just on from a cash flow perspective, did you guys, in terms of… Like you know, there's not a Founder who's listening to this who hasn't experienced cash flow crunches at some stage in their business. So that doesn't mean you're running a bad business far from it. It probably means you're growing and you're trying to figure out how on earth I'm going to fund this growth based on the way that cash comes into my business, and how much needs to go out of the business at any given time. How did you navigate that? Did you have to put in different kinds of capital structures? Was it tipping in additional money for yourselves? Like how did you manage some of those cash flow crunches?

[00:19:39] Scott: Pretty much, it's pretty much shareholder funding. Or, you know, up to now it's only sort of now that we're looking at some other options for this next sort of stage of scaling really, which is quite exciting. So it's been a bit of roll your sleeves up and a bit of hard work to get there, and yeah, just again, like most businesses…

[00:20:04] Sean: And that's definitely something I'd love, you know, in our subsequent, when we do our next check-in with you guys, one thing I would absolutely love to chat about is the capital structures. You know, there's a lot of Founders that are getting to a stage where the Founders that tend to get anywhere up in the usually 8 to 12 million range, quite a few can get there just off the back of organic cash flow, but that tends to be the time where all of a sudden people really start thinking about, should I be taking on debt? Should I be taking on some kind of equity instrument? You know, what's the ideal, you know, and there's probably 15 or 20 different options easily available to you from ranges of debt instruments to equity instruments to blended ones to, there's a lot of options, but thinking about what's the right one for you? What suits what you're looking for, your timelines, you know, the way you're thinking about exits and things. It's a complicated area, but I'd love to maybe unpack that a bit with you. Uh, the next time. What about mindset? You know, it may, you know, I think, quite often we don't talk with Founders. You know, we might be talking about strategy or we're talking about challenges and they're quite often, operational, if you think, you know, like cash flow is an issue or you know, it's dealing with the business environment, that's the kind of operational issue. But all of these things affect you as a Founder from a mindset perspective. Like, you have to have this, you know, you have to deal with your own stuff as part of this. There's no separation between you and your business when you're a Founder and you are all into it, you know, it's like your money and it's your house on the line, et cetera. What sort of things, what's got you through these periods from a mindset perspective? Have there been any particular advice that stuck with you or principles that have really helped you deal with the harder times?

[00:21:45] Scott: Oh yeah, there's been a few. There's certainly been a few. I guess there's been a lot of determination, like we're pretty much the type that will start something we want it to finish. I think Wayne talked about implementation, like if I tell anyone any bit of advice when they've got any sort of business, have someone there that, sure you might have the ideas, but make sure it's implemented, whether it's yourself, probably not the greatest idea, but, or you can delegate that through and you've got someone who's in your business that's good at implementation and getting stuff done for you, you know, that's been real key.

[00:22:26] Wayne: We sort of had those themes, didn't we Scott, like, you know, the, you know, up until I'd say last year was all about improving our systems automation, making sure, because it's easy here in the Philippines. You can just man it with labour if you want. And a lot of clients, a lot of other BPOs do that. They just have a lot of labour to run things, but it doesn't work in the long run. So, we've looked at automation, so where systems or software can do a better job with them invested.

[00:22:59] Sean: Okay.

[00:23:00] Wayne: And you know, we have a dedicated team and that's what they do is implement systems and processes for us, which has been a big help.

[00:23:07] Sean: Yeah, there's a couple of things that I think are really important. So first of all, you know, Scott, you are saying that the determination, yes, in general, but actually to ensure that things that you start, get finished. I always think that, you know, if you think about IT projects like, you know, I have overseen big IT projects, you know, millions of dollars of spend, hundreds of thousands dollars of spend. And it continues to baffle me that even in large companies, that people will implement the thing. And the success of the thing is like the features that have been implemented as opposed to actually what's supposed to change in the business. Like, what's the value we're trying to create by doing this thing? And have we actually got to the point where we got the value as opposed to just implemented the thing. Like, you know, we always see some kind of system solution as some holy grail to solving a problem to solving a problem, but ultimately if we're making an investment, we want some metric to change. We want, you know, it might be that a gross profit should change or the time that it takes to serve that customer should change or whatever. Like there's something that we're trying to achieve that's of value, and we've got to make sure that we actually get all the way through that implementation to it being to the value being created as opposed to it just going, okay, project's done, the system's in, let's move on to the next thing. Have we actually got the value yet? So, I think that's one thing, and I'm hearing that in the context of your systems led approach, is how do we ensure that our systems are actually going to support our scalability? Because there's a, typically an inflection point, particularly around 10 million, usually around 10, around 25, and around 50. Again, each one of those transitions, depending on the nature of the business, often requires a step change in leadership and also a step change in systems, to get you to the next level.

[00:24:47] Scott: And I think, yeah. And some of the stuff which I guess, the Kaizen Theory's always been a big one. You're always learning. And some of the stuff that we're, I'll give you a pat on the back here, Sean. from coming and working with yourself is the stuff that you've taught us more recently and that we could, we've improved on in terms of our KPIs and lead and lags and the rhythms and how you're reporting as big on that. So, you've always got a result, and you've always sort of looked at what the result will be for and to tick it.

[00:25:20] Sean: And just to unpack that a bit for people, I think it's, some people who are technically minded will think about the systems and the processes to build scalability, but the biggest challenge in building scale is actually communication, feedback loops, how to teach people what success looks like, how to give people feedback, how to make sure you know what's going on with your customers and your team. And the further you get away from the front, the less connected usually you are with your customers, with your frontline team members, and if you don't have systems or have a set of business rhythms that ensure that the way that you plan, the way that priorities from the organisation flow down to individuals, the way that people understand what success looks like for them on a daily and weekly basis, if you don't actually have a process for all of that, the business can really become exceptionally difficult once it gets to a certain size because all of those interactions essentially become a bit random and a bit ad hoc. You know, people are having the same conversation in 17 places because the groups aren't well structured and the agendas aren't organised and they're not thought of in the context of what the priorities are for the business. So that's, this whole building of rhythms is really about kind of unpacking, you know, making sure that we get freedom through framework, you know, because we love framework, but because actually we want the thing to be organized and efficient and ensure that it continues to scale regardless of what size we get to. You're obviously in the UK and the US from an international market's perspective, but it's still relatively early days, fair to say, in terms of the opportunity size for you guys there, how are you thinking about how to succeed in those markets differently, perhaps to New Zealand and Australia, which maybe have been, you know, you obviously got relationships and they're closely connected countries and culturally they're very similar, how are you thinking differently about the UK and US and what’s going to take for you guys to succeed there?

[00:27:09] Wayne: We're big followers to xero. So, to follow on their footsteps a bit in the UK would be helpful. Attending the conferences, the road shows, and I suppose narrowing their client focus a little bit to the zero accountants who we have something in common with. And the same in the US would be that. And we also have a good affiliation with a big accounting firm in the US who we can leverage off as well. So, there's a couple of ways.

[00:27:44] Sean: Ah-huh. Yep. So, I really like that. So how do I follow the partners in, and write on their coattails in some way whilst I'm establishing myself.

[00:27:53] Scott: Yeah. The UK, the outsourcing in the UK has predominantly been Indian based as well. So, we're certainly a point of difference with the Philippines. And. again, sort of back to where higher focus on training as well. We'll certainly, you know, seems to be quite a bit different than other companies in the UK.

[00:28:19] Sean: Right. Okay. So, they're finding that in relation to their alternatives, there are other people that do similar things to you, but they may be using team members out of India, but we're also train, perhaps volume of staff or, you know, if you're not happy with someone, we'll just supply with somebody new, as opposed to that there's a big investment going into the training of those team members to actually ensure that success occurs. Is that what you're saying?

[00:28:41] Scott: Exactly. And just to that, we haven't really talked about, we're big on grads, Filipino grads. We've got a good connection with universities and it's been one of our pointed differences is putting these really cool kids through internships. We're lucky enough to have a guy working for us who's been, was an accountant, and Finley Co. in the days and he's just taken it on board the training side of it. And we've got some pretty amazing programs in terms of education for grads.

[00:29:17] Sean: And so, when you say it's a point of difference for you guys, does that turn to a point of difference for the customers, or is it just a difference in how you're approaching it versus your competitors?

[00:29:27] Scott: Probably more and how us compared to our competitors, really down to the client. They're just going to get a better product but a better person really, working forward.

[00:29:39] Sean: Can we riff on that for a second because this conversation comes up a lot for me. I deal with, you know, the majority of the people that I support privately as Founders are in services businesses. And it's not the same constraint for everybody but one, typically if you're in a services business, you're often selling knowledge or time or a mix of the two, a skillset that's providing a service. It could be automated, it could be software led, it could be software enabled. But one of the big scale constraints that I hear regularly of course is access to talent. How do I get a better access to a pipeline of talent and how do I make sure that I get the best people over and above the competitors getting the best people? And so, you know, I end up talking, there's a lot of examples of this, and I think I probably need to do a separate podcast on it, but there is a real opportunity. And you guys are tackling this in a very direct way, right? You're going downstream, you're going, okay, well we can wait for people to all be available in the market as accountants and who are now out competing with everybody, and we could just wait to see what we get and hope that we get slightly better than somebody else. Or we can go right downstream into the universities talking to the high schools and actually start to build programs that allow us to capture the interest and the opportunity with those people earlier and train them in the way that we want to train them over and above their technical base. So, they've already got a relationship with us. We can get high quality talent earlier, and in a more sustainable long-term way. Because, you know, if you think about universities, like, unless there's a major change coming in demographics, every year they've got fresh students, every year they've got a talent supply pipeline. So, it's almost like this bed. And there are a lot of businesses that have done that really where they have built their own academies, essentially, their own education businesses, where they will take people with no skills or no experience. They will train them up in whatever the industry is, whether it's pest control or being a buyer's agent, or accounting or whatever it is, and groom those people, those people that are the best through the education business usually come into the business and the rest of them go out into the market. And so on the one hand people go, yeah, but aren't, am I going to be supplying good people to my competitors? Like, yeah, but you already took the best ones. So the best ones are going to work for you, and the others will go and work for the competitors. So, you know, I think that's a great thing for an industry, but it's a great thing and it's a competitive advantage for you guys. How are you thinking about, so is it early days on the university graduate programs? Like how far are you into that? Yeah. What have you learned about it so far in terms of how to make it work?

[00:32:15] Scott: We've been doing the, um, internships for over two years now. I think we're onto where. Am I right? 13th or 14th grad, well, we call them batches. It's early days with the really having a sort of a program I guess for our university connecting our universities. We're actually looking at colleges. We're actually sort of looking at starting from colleges and that's part of our first quarter for the training team is to actually get those connections and setting up, kind of cadets we're looking at a cadetship through the schools. Again, this is ideas from their team. You know, some of this hasn't really come from Wayne and I, can tell you that. So, it's sort of, the whole program put together. We've been doing it for two years, but more the college, university sort of program is most of it sort of kicking off this first quarter this year.

[00:33:21] Sean: Okay. It's super interesting. You know, my 14-year-old son is absolutely dead set on being a pilot and he's known since he was five, what he wanted to do. He's fully into it. He's like a plane spotter. He is got his own blog. He takes pictures of planes, that's what he does on his weekends and takes his camera, goes to the airport and takes photos of planes and stuff. And we discovered that there's an opportunity for him to go straight into a cadetship. Essentially the equivalent of year 11 straight in through to an airline. You know, if he gets accepted, he's basically guaranteed a job at the end of that program after 18 months. And you end up thinking about this decision and going well. They've created a program that allows them to get this kid before, you know, a kid who may or may not go to university. He'll be quite happy to go to uni if he's got no alternative option. But he knows he wants to be a pilot. And so, they're now capturing him before he is finished high school. They're getting him into the program. They're grooming him perfectly for their business, and they've done all their upfront assessment and he's got a guaranteed job. It's such a great model if you've got an industry where you can do that kind of training to find, and it doesn't mean you have to do it yourself. You can always partner with a education business to help you. But if you, you know, it gives you the opportunity to capture that supply line.

[00:34:30] Scott: Creates a bit of loyalty as well, doesn't it? Whether they are bonded so to speak, or, but it certainly creates a bit of loyalty. They'll vested in you. And if you're that sort of person, you're going to do the same.

[00:34:41] Sean: Can you just explain Scott, the concept of bonding? Because you know, I know it can be quite common in the Philippines, you know, training bonds, where in some other markets it's maybe not as common. Can you just explain how that works.

[00:34:50] Scott: What we do is, you know, pretty much, if we've put any staff, it's even through one of our training programs. Predominantly it's our grad internship. We can have them, they have to really sign them up two years with the backroom essentially they can't leave, but they can leave, you know, if they have to pay.

[00:35:17] Sean: There's the concept.

[00:35:18] Scott: Yeah. They'd have to pay. Yeah. So, it always helps with that, really stickability with your employees. And it helps because you know, it helps us because we've got a high retention rate anyway was sort of 90% and that's even without doing this, and we've only really put these bonding in for the, probably the last six years.

[00:35:37] Sean: Right. Okay. Well, yeah, I think it's a, I mean, it's a really interesting model and of course, you know, people listening, you've got to make sure you do it within the context of your industrial relations framework to make sure that it's done, you know, properly and appropriately. But it's certainly done in lots of different levels. I know that's how I did my MBA or my post-grad studies, it was very clear that, you know, if I left whilst I was during that program, then I would've had to have paid back any of the fees that had been paid. So that was happening even at the executive level. A couple of questions for you before you wrap up. What piece of advice has really stuck with you along the way in business that you think has been…

[00:36:21] Wayne: I had it written on my wall. Was the D times A equals R, you know, that's a simple Decisions times Actions, equals Results. So, you know, that's one thing that I live by, you know, in life as well as at work. So don't be afraid to make big decisions. Yeah.

[00:36:46] Sean: Yep. And you, Scott?

[00:36:49] Scott: Accountability. Sorry, I don't want to steal your thunder on that. Or Wayne, you can always add, remember, we can always add the other A in as well, so Accountability. Put that in there as well, and you can get really good results. Look, can I say two? Am I allowed two? One of them is…

[00:37:07] Sean: There would be a penalty, but that's all right. Go ahead.

[00:37:09] Scott: Oh, okay. A breakaway can be a breakthrough.

[00:37:14] Sean: Okay. What do you mean by that?

[00:37:16] Scott: So, well, it's probably not so real. Probably thinking back in my accounting days, oh, it's even happened here. But a classic for accountants, so you might have a sort of a dodgy client. You want to keep them hanging on for as long as you can, because you think it's a good fee, but you let them go and keeps everyone happy and you can really, it's like that rubber band cut. And that can be on anything in your business. It could be software you're using that you're sticking with. And that's a classic one when we look at some of the businesses around.

[00:37:52] Sean: So, what you're saying is that's a kind of like, you know, sometimes when you, sometimes you're holding onto things too tightly because you decided that that's how it should be, or that was going to work for you or whatever, and then it starts to not work and you're still like, you just desperately like clinging on trying to make it work. And at some point, it's like you don't create enough space for the new thing until you let go of the thing that's not working. And you know, sometimes it's a bit scary and takes a bit of courage, right? But then you let it go. Is that how you are thinking about it?

[00:38:25] Scott: Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah.

[00:38:27] Wayne: We sort of don't pretend to be anything else. We're authentic. And that's when it comes to clients as well, isn't it? Like you got to enjoy work and you got to enjoy who you work with. So yeah, we sort of look at it that way. Yeah.

[00:38:45] Sean: Yeah. What was your other one, Scott? I know we sort of jumped in on you there.

[00:38:52] Scott: No problem at all. And it's one that my dad told Wayne and I, good firm Handshake. And you look a person in the eye.

[00:39:03] Wayne: Yeah.

[00:39:03] Scott: There you go.

[00:39:04] Sean: Well, I think, I mean, you guys have built a lot of your business off the back of relationships, right? And trust, and I know that you guys travel extensively from New Zealand. You're all, every when we chat, it’s like who's in what country today? Oh, Scott is in Australia. Wayne is in the Philippines. Oh no, someone's going to the UK the next week and then someone's in the US and we're always constantly trying to manage time zones between the three of us.

[00:39:26] Scott: It sounds glamorous.

[00:39:29] Sean: Not always that glamorous, that is for sure. Not always that glamorous. But one of the reasons is yes, of course you've got team that you've got to, see and lead in the Philippines, but you're also, I noticed that you really prioritise being with your customers, seeing them face to face, having a personal connection. And so to your point around sort of, you know, shaking the hand, looking in the eye, you guys are very, my experience of you is your very honest, authentic sort of, you know, heartfelt guys. And you build just, you know, quality con connectivity with your clients. And so that's of course, always a real challenge to scale. And so, as you build up your sales and marketing, you know, finding people who, they may have a different style, but finding that level of authenticity and desire to have real relationships, I think will be super important for you guys. Last question for you. What are you, I mean, you've had a big journey so far. What are you proudest of so far in the last five years?

[00:40:25] Wayne: You go, Scott.

[00:40:28] Scott: You …

[00:40:29] Wayne: We're going to say the same thing, but I get really proud when I walk into the office here and you see all the people that may have started with you five years ago and to now, like, because you change a lot of people's lives here in the Philippines with …literally. So, a lot more than what you would elsewhere. And you form a good bond with them, you get to experience their culture and everything. So that's, yeah, I'm very proud of that.

[00:41:04] Sean: I think that to your point, there's a, I don’t know how you describe it, but it's so much more than. Yeah, like Filipinos are so family centric, right? Like, you know, their family are absolutely everything for them. You know, most kids live at home for a really long time. They're still looking after their parents later on, and they spend all their time with their cousins and like that those people are their friends. But so therefore, their work environment, I still really crave the nurturing that comes with family. So, I can imagine circumstances where it actually sort of feels like you're walking into a family environment, doesn't it? Because people are really connected and they want to be part of each other's lives, not just come to work, be transactional, go home. That's cool. Well, last question for you then. I said that was the last question, but this is the double last question. Is there anything that I haven't asked you today that you really wish I'd asked? Do you think if you put yourself in the minds of the audience, right. Our audience are typically Founders of one to 20 million businesses. They're trying to figure out how they can scale to the next stage. What do you think I haven't asked you, or what piece of advice would you like to leave them with that you think would help them, those who are wrestling with, how do I kind of unlock the potential of this business? What would you like to leave them with?

[00:42:25] Scott: I'll go first one. You can finish it off. Just don't be afraid to reach out and get help. You know, like, you know, all, I think all through Wayne and i's working career, we've at different stages. We've always had some sort of mentor or someone. Someone to help us along the way, because you're not, you don't know everything. And it feels good to have someone to can sort of drop some problems on. So, we haven't started yet with you, Sean. You've got some, we've got some good one, we've got some good ones coming. So, yeah, …. [Cross Talk]

[00:43:04] Sean: Love it. Wayne, did you have anything to add there?

[00:43:05] Wayne: … think outside the square. You know, who would've thought we would be running a BPO in the Philippines. You know, we knew, you know, when we were running our accounting firm. So, it's just taking that idea and expanding on it.

[00:43:27] Sean: I love that, that sort of concept that, you know, like I say to my boys all the time, it's like pathways, lead to pathways. Don't worry about, you know, what are you going to be doing in 30 years’ time and 10 years’ time. Like, you just need to get to the next bit, like get through, you know, have clarity of the next couple of years do the thing and then at the end of the thing, something new will open up, but you can't see what those connections are until you get there, so I love that. Okay. Bit by bit. Before we wrap how do people, if people want to learn more about the back room, follow along with you guys are doing, where would you send them?

[00:44:02] Sean: Yeah.

[00:44:06] Scott: Yeah. Pretty simple really.

[00:44:08] Sean: Easy to find. Boys from the back, if they type in the boys from New Zealand, do you reckon they'll find you? If we might have to do some personal branding?

[00:44:15] Scott: Maybe you might see some funny….

[00:44:19] Sean: I'm looking forward to seeing some youth photos that have crept their way into social media. I'm going to have to go and check Facebook now.

[00:44:27] Scott: No, no, don't do that.

[00:44:29] Sean: Well, folks, if you've enjoyed today, I mean, well, first of all, thank you very much for me, Wayne and Scott. I love getting to work with you. It's a real joy. You're very open-minded. You're open to being challenged, and so it's very, makes my job much easier. Folks, if you enjoy the show today and you'd like to get the kind of results that Scott and Wayne are getting, then you should join us actually at our next Scaleups Roadmap Program where I help Founders learn how to build a kickass grow strategy for the next three years. And these guys, even though I wasn't working with them five years ago, have clearly built an absolutely kickass grow strategy that they're executing very well. Doors are opening in May. So if you want to find out more about our first ScaleUps Roadmap Program, go to scaleupsroadmap.com.au, pop your name on the wait list, and I'll give you all the information as we get closer. In the meantime, if you enjoy today, please subscribe, review, take a screenshot, send it to a friend. You know, give it to somebody who you think you would've enjoyed listening to this conversation. You have been listening to the ScaleUps Podcast. I'm your host, Sean Steele. Thanks so much, Scott and Wayne, and we'll see you next week.

[00:45:32] Scott: Thank you.