Jon Shanahan's Journey: How Businessolver Redefined Employee Benefits and Entrepreneurial Success

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[00:00:41] Hey, this is William Tencup and Ryan Leary. You are listening, hopefully watching, Inside the C-Suite Podcast. Today we have Jon on. We're going to learn his story, his journey. Jon, how are you doing today?

[00:00:53] Jon Jon- Doing great. How are you guys?

[00:00:54] Jon- I'm doing well.

[00:00:55] Jon- Wonderful.

[00:00:57] Jon- Ryan, how are you doing?

[00:00:58] Jon- I'm fantastic, man. I'm excited to record today.

[00:01:04] Jon- Yes.

[00:01:04] Jon- Actually record today.

[00:01:06] Jon- Actually hit the button.

[00:01:07] Jon- So, Jon, tell us a little bit about yourself.

[00:01:11] Jon- I'm a founder and CEO for Business Solver. Business Solver is very popular this time of year. We do provide the software and service for our employee benefits and a lot of annual enrollment's going on this time of year.

[00:01:25] Jon- That's right.

[00:01:25] Jon- What is annual enrollment? Never heard of it.

[00:01:27] Jon- Oh, yeah. Do tell.

[00:01:29] Jon- Yeah, it's that torture chamber that we put employees through once a year, typically, in November, where they have to go out and make all their elections around their employee benefits.

[00:01:41] Jon- Yeah.

[00:01:41] Jon- So, all those acronyms and fun things we call them because they're insurance benefits, typically, but all kinds of benefits. We send employees out there and they've got to use our software to figure out what's right for them. And hopefully, they make great decisions. We try and help them make great decisions, but it's a big decision tree for sure.

[00:02:06] Jon- It is. And because they're looking at their employees, their audience, if you will, and they're changing all the time. What they need is changing. What they consume is changing. And you're the software layer for the benefits enrollment folks, benefits administration, if you will, and HR, and the employee base. So, do the employees go into Benefit Solver or Business Solver and then select things that they want to select?

[00:02:35] Jon- Yeah, we're like the gateway. So, we help them get through. Think about it like TurboTax for benefits. We try and take the complex, make it more simple. And then, really, from there, everything happens behind the scenes.

[00:02:51] Jon- Right.

[00:02:52] Jon- Right.

[00:02:53] Jon- Right.

[00:02:55] Jon- Right.

[00:02:56] you know, audited. And then we're saying it to every individual carrier. And then we're

[00:03:00] reconciling back to the employer's payroll, making sure those deductions are right. And then

[00:03:06] dealing with all the billing elements so that employers pay correctly as well. And then that

[00:03:11] happens, you know, 24-7, 365 for new hires, acquisitions, mergers, things like that.

[00:03:18] Um, and then of course this time of year, that's when a lot of employers choose to

[00:03:25] open up their employee benefits period so they can go and make elections for next year.

[00:03:31] So we're going to spend today talking about you, learning all about you, what makes you tick and,

[00:03:36] and how you've gotten to where you've gotten. But I have to ask where in the world did you come up

[00:03:43] with this idea and, and why did you jump into this? I mean, I, I'm feeling kind of anxious

[00:03:49] right now, just knowing that you reminded me, I need to go in and make my selection. My wife,

[00:03:55] God forbid, finds out that I'm saying this live because she thinks it's probably done already.

[00:04:00] A hundred percent. A hundred percent.

[00:04:03] Yeah. You know, I mean, Ryan, there's so many, I mean, there's, you know, if you go all the way

[00:04:08] back and you know, a lot of this started with, um, when I was first introduced to it, uh, you know,

[00:04:13] it was like, you know, paper and pen and you were actually as an employee writing your elections.

[00:04:19] And then you're, you were also doing the funniest thing I found really funny is you're doing your

[00:04:24] own calculations around. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. You know, how much disability or life insurance you

[00:04:30] wanted. And then you had that little worksheet, you had a little worksheet to work through. Yeah.

[00:04:34] Yeah. Yeah. Right. Which is a nightmare. Think about how many times people get the math wrong.

[00:04:39] Oh, I'm not sure I ever got it right. Right. I know. And so, yeah, it's a, it's a funny story.

[00:04:46] You know, I didn't, uh, start out thinking I wanted to be in insurance. Right. Um, I thought

[00:04:51] insurance was like, you know, old guy's job. I don't know what I thought. I've had a similar

[00:04:58] thought. So if you're good. Yeah. Yeah. I thought like a bowler cap and like a, you know,

[00:05:04] briefcase. Um, but you know, I ended up going to graduate school at Iowa state university.

[00:05:13] Um, yeah, the cyclones were having a good football season. You are having a good football season up

[00:05:20] until last weekend. No, I was crazy, crazy. I don't know what happened. Um, and, uh, it

[00:05:29] was, um, summer of my second year and I had a good friend in the program was like, I think

[00:05:35] this job is more your style. Uh, I was doing, uh, a little known degree called industrial

[00:05:41] relations. Oh yeah. Yeah, exactly. And, uh, he said, there's this insurance agency that has a

[00:05:50] consulting practice. And so I, I took a job there. Um, I started as an intern at the end

[00:05:59] of the internship that hired me and, uh, I had no idea what insurance was about. Right.

[00:06:06] Like, and the consulting was really kind of more in the HR side, but ultimately that pulled

[00:06:11] you into all the insurance problems as well, because you were solving both. Right. Um, and,

[00:06:17] uh, you know, I was introduced to the CEO there of that agency and he was like, listen,

[00:06:24] eventually this took a while. He was like, you know, listen to this. I think you can do

[00:06:28] something different. I'm going to introduce you to another smart guy and you guys should

[00:06:34] figure out a company because you're both smart and you'll figure something out. And so Sean

[00:06:40] McMurray, my, uh, friend and partner in the business, and he had another partner as well.

[00:06:46] Um, the four of us, um, sat down and said, what, you know, what can we do? What's possible

[00:06:52] and how can we get funding? So we came up with a whole bunch of solvers. Like we were solving

[00:06:57] everything, uh, anything and everything around insurance and HR problems. And the one that ultimately

[00:07:04] we committed to in stock was benefit solver, you know, as you mentioned the platform that

[00:07:10] now is very different than where we started. Um, but we really, it was just a pain. Like, so

[00:07:16] you know, you were trying to find pain points and one of the big pain points was just what we talked

[00:07:23] about, which is this time of year you had HR departments, benefits departments had stacks

[00:07:29] and stacks and reams and reams of paper. It was like, you know, this time of year, the way to think

[00:07:34] about it, the way I think about it is trying to process a whole bunch of balance. You're trying

[00:07:37] to process a whole bunch of elections and then you're trying to get it into the carrier system.

[00:07:42] So employees can actually use their benefits. Well, the fact of the matter is that kind of

[00:07:46] election process was so bad that you would get to the next year and the carriers were just wrapping

[00:07:53] up what you did last year. And cause you know, I mean so many errors on those election forms,

[00:08:00] so many times going back, you can't read the handwriting. So the data was bad. The elections

[00:08:04] were bad. Employees would find out when they went to use their benefits. And so it was just

[00:08:08] really messy and that has nothing to do with the dollars and cents that are attached to that.

[00:08:12] Right. So just the election process was a mess, but then all the dollars deductions,

[00:08:18] what to pay carriers, what to get money back retros. Think of all the retros, like got it wrong

[00:08:22] and then you had to fix it. And so we just, you know, we looked at it and it was messy and there

[00:08:28] was a great desire to do it. However, the thing that we got out in front of that we're probably a

[00:08:34] little early on cause this was 1998, 99 was, we believe that the internet was the right place to

[00:08:41] launch this, to do this, not on-prem kind of software. And, you know, I think we take for granted

[00:08:50] now, back then we're basically just selling that the internet was safe and that you could put your

[00:08:55] social security number in there and this was possible and this was the thing, right?

[00:09:00] Oh yeah.

[00:09:00] It's always possible.

[00:09:02] Yeah.

[00:09:02] Oh yeah.

[00:09:03] But people were afraid of it. Like they're going to take all of this.

[00:09:06] Oh yeah. Yeah.

[00:09:07] It's like AI. I mean, there's a lot of similarities between the two. It's like, we know the AI is great.

[00:09:14] We're also terrified that they are.

[00:09:16] Yeah. I trust AI more because of what we went through back then. Like I remember my parents like,

[00:09:24] like flipping out on me when I made my first purchase on eBay. Like forget it. I was,

[00:09:29] I was public enemy number one.

[00:09:31] Yeah. You gave us social security. You gave your credit card.

[00:09:35] You gave your credit card to those.

[00:09:37] Oh my God.

[00:09:38] They're going to sell it.

[00:09:39] Yeah.

[00:09:40] Yeah. So, so John, what I love about what you're describing here is, and maybe you could talk

[00:09:44] to it a little bit. You, you, you graduate, you were in graduate school, took an internship.

[00:09:49] You got a job. You were really good. You excelled. Someone thought you were smart enough that you

[00:09:55] should be introduced to some other smart people to go solve a problem. It sounds almost like

[00:10:01] a business class where you're put together into a group, come brain, you know, go, go and

[00:10:06] brainstorm, you know, a new business or solve a problem and bring it out to market. And a lot of

[00:10:13] people that listen to this show might be in that situation where they're going to school or they're

[00:10:21] in school or they don't kind of know where they're, where they're headed when they leave school,

[00:10:25] internships, et cetera. Maybe talk to that experience a little bit and how that shaped

[00:10:29] where you're at now.

[00:10:30] Hey everybody, I'm Lori Rudiman. What are you doing? Working? Nah. You're listening to a podcast

[00:10:36] about work and that barely counts. So while you're at it, check out my show, Punk Rock HR,

[00:10:41] now on the Work Defined Network. We chat with smart people about work, power, politics, and money.

[00:10:48] Are we succeeding? Are we fixing work? Eh, probably not. Work still sucks, but tune in for some fun,

[00:10:54] a little nonsense, and a fresh take on how to fix work once and for all.

[00:10:59] Yeah. I mean, it's, it was, it was a very different time, right? The internet was new.

[00:11:05] I recently talked to an entrepreneur and she was like, tell me your story. I'm like,

[00:11:12] gosh, I haven't done this. I haven't done this recollectional. And, you know, I mean, I think

[00:11:19] that, you know, it's one thing to have a good idea. It's another thing to find funding and it's

[00:11:24] another thing to then turn it into a business. So I think, you know, I think having a good community

[00:11:31] or having a good team. And then there's just hard work and good fortune, you know? I mean,

[00:11:37] I think it's all those things. You have to have a good idea. You have to tirelessly work at it.

[00:11:41] If you want to make it happen, you have to take the risk. And, you know, ultimately timing,

[00:11:47] you've got to, you've got, timing is everything. You've got to be, you've got to be surrounded by

[00:11:52] good people that are committed to the idea as well. It's never one person, right? It's always a,

[00:11:56] my view is always a team. Did I hear you say you had three partners? So there's four of you?

[00:12:02] Yeah. Yeah. At the, at the beginning, is it still four of you 20 something years later?

[00:12:08] Unfortunately, the, uh, our, my good friend and mentor, uh, just passed. So it's, it's just,

[00:12:15] yeah, yeah. So yeah, I mean, there's, there's three of us are really passionate about making it work.

[00:12:21] Right. Uh, I was the only one that made it my complete day job. Uh, right. So that was a big,

[00:12:29] it was a big risk. Um, so I resigned or, or, you know, left the insurance agency and ran with this.

[00:12:37] Uh, and it was, uh, you know, when you start with zero clients and kind of zero, you know,

[00:12:43] or I guess I had one employee to start it's, uh, you feel pretty naked on the future.

[00:12:50] Sure. Were you married, were you married or were you in a relationship at the time?

[00:12:54] I was not married at the time, but yeah, of course it was in a relationship and.

[00:12:59] I could see some pressure there. Uh, yeah, I think, I mean, I was young enough. So it was like,

[00:13:05] you know, I mean, I can go get another job, but do I want a job? I want to, I want to try this.

[00:13:10] And once we got funding, it was, you know, it was like, okay, it's real. Now we need to make this

[00:13:17] vision happen, which, you know, that was just tireless kind of, you know, getting client number

[00:13:22] one, getting the software built, refining the software, then getting client number one

[00:13:27] through 10 was, you know, it was an interesting, interesting dream. You're selling yourself and

[00:13:34] the vision and the pain, and you're hoping that they buy him. You're pushing a boulder uphill at

[00:13:39] that point. Yeah. Yeah. So we, we, we, we do a lot of advisory where the, a lot of these

[00:13:47] companies are going after their first customer and we see the pain and I'm kind of like, you

[00:13:53] know, love to give advice, but I'm glad I'm not doing that right now. I feel you brother. Like I feel

[00:14:02] the pain. Well, Ryan, when you're in staffing, you deal, you deal with a lot of rejection management.

[00:14:07] Yeah. Right. Because as a recruiter, you, you put a job in front of somebody and they're

[00:14:12] like, yeah, not me. Okay. So you deal with that a lot, but this is different because it's

[00:14:17] your baby. Like if it's a job, yeah, somebody says yes. Somebody says no, you can kind of

[00:14:23] gotcha emotionally disconnect from it. But when it's your baby, you built the software and you

[00:14:30] architected it and someone says, yeah, I don't get it. Yeah. That's like a stake through

[00:14:37] the heart. Like it's hard to shake that off, especially, you know, if you've laid out the

[00:14:44] entire, cause it's in, when you initially did it still to this day, you took a very inefficient,

[00:14:50] ineffective process and made it eloquent, made it easy. You made it eloquent. But back then

[00:14:58] the, I could see customers going, you know what? I think we're good. Yeah. I think the

[00:15:03] reams of paper, you know, it works. Yeah. Not really, but it works and everybody seems

[00:15:10] happy. It's like, okay, neither of those are true, but, but you know, it's hard to argue

[00:15:17] with, with a, with a CEO or CFO. It's hard to argue with that.

[00:15:20] Yeah. I mean, it was, it was like a three-step process. First step was you have to sell that

[00:15:26] the internet's safe and this is a way of becoming more efficient. Right. And, and that, you know,

[00:15:33] the by-product is once you've got those elections that you could, the carriers would, carriers

[00:15:38] would actually receive them. I mean, this is going to date me, but I do remember, uh, you

[00:15:46] know, some of the smaller carriers, literally they would say, well, we're not a big fan of this

[00:15:50] because we have keyers that are union keyers and literally we don't want to file. Uh, so this is

[00:15:58] that. Yeah. So you had to get through that, you know, like, okay, I got them to adopt. Now they

[00:16:03] have, you know, a bunch of different carriers. Can we actually send data to those carriers? Will

[00:16:08] they, will they accept it? Um, and figure that out. Um, and then the, the second phase was,

[00:16:15] okay, well, who's the user of this software and that we accept it now just easily. Right.

[00:16:21] That employees are going to go in and go in and do this. But I literally remember sitting,

[00:16:26] sitting down with the, a large teaching association that had a benefit plan. And then

[00:16:33] me in a room of administrators looking at me like I was crazy because they were like, no,

[00:16:38] we do that. That's, that's, that's, that's our job. That's our job.

[00:16:43] And employees will, employees will never be able to figure this out and your software

[00:16:47] won't be good enough. So we're still going to take the forms and then we'll key them into

[00:16:51] your system. And, and that makes a lot of sense. Oh yeah. Well, some of that, some of that's

[00:16:57] also job security. Yes. Some of that had nothing to do with the employees and everything to do

[00:17:03] with, they were really good at their job. They liked their job and they want to keep their

[00:17:06] job. And they felt like, you know, they were helpful. It would sit down with employees

[00:17:10] and they would counsel them and, and they got value out of that. And they felt like it was

[00:17:14] effective. And, you know, perhaps at the time the software wasn't as good as it is today from

[00:17:19] a consumerism perspective. Right. But you know, it goes to the kind of any technologist dilemma,

[00:17:28] which is you're always future fighting as I like to call it. If you get too far out there

[00:17:33] or they don't get your concept, you'll be fighting the future because they just can't see it

[00:17:39] that way. So Ryan, you want to go back? Go for it. High school ish. What did you, what was the

[00:17:46] dream? What did you want to be? I mean, I don't know. I mean, you know, you've talked to a lot of

[00:17:51] founder entrepreneurs. I was in the thick of just, um, working hard and surviving. Um, and I was a

[00:18:02] cross country and track. So it was two seasons, but you're running all the time, all the time.

[00:18:08] And, you know, I think it made me appreciate a work ethic, get through a lot of pain. Um,

[00:18:15] I don't understand the runners who don't find it painful.

[00:18:18] You lost me at running. Like that's where you lost me in this conversation.

[00:18:22] I got a 14 year old, same thing. Although he has basketball in the middle of those two,

[00:18:26] yeah. Same. And then I, you know, go to college and get through college. When I was in college,

[00:18:33] it was like, you know, I think I want to understand how people think. I want to get a

[00:18:37] psychology degree. And I think my parents like, you want to do what? What are you going to do with that?

[00:18:42] What are you going to do with that? I had that same thought, John. It was really interesting to me.

[00:18:48] And I got that same response. So I never did it.

[00:18:51] What are you going to do? What are you going to do with that? Which is crazy to think of now

[00:18:55] because so many of the people that have humanities degrees, uh, you know, degree in philosophy or

[00:19:01] something like that, they're actually poised better to do AI and gen AI than some of the folks in the

[00:19:09] hard sciences. So what are you going to do with that? Shouldn't be, it shouldn't be a parental

[00:19:15] question, but I mean, it was a, it was a practical question, right? And I probably didn't have a good

[00:19:22] answer, but I just felt like if I can figure out how people think and how people tick, then I'm

[00:19:30] probably going to be in a better position to do many things. And that was kind of my theory on

[00:19:36] industrial relations, which is if I can figure out organizational psychology and if I can figure out,

[00:19:41] you know, kind of the mix of business and economics and it's like, you know, it's a multi

[00:19:46] discipline degree. Uh, I'm going to be in a better spot. Um, I know how people think.

[00:19:52] Yes. And organizations, everything. Yeah. Yes. And leaders. And then I think it helped me a lot

[00:19:59] from a, you know, you've, when you start out with one employee and you go to, you know,

[00:20:04] we said it's something like 2000, you have to think about culture and motivation and how you

[00:20:10] get a team to come along with you. So I think everybody should do it.

[00:20:16] This could be a, that could be a me thing, but my undergrad was in art history and I remember,

[00:20:22] cause I'd seen my parents, you know, through the year. Um, but I remember coming up with a story,

[00:20:28] like having a story ready-made. So when they, anybody brothers or anybody else asked, what are

[00:20:33] you gonna do with art history? I knew exactly what I'd tell them. I don't know if that was true.

[00:20:38] I just knew what I would tell them just to stop the conversation. Yeah. So I, I think some folks

[00:20:44] that got English degrees or feminist degrees or whatever, um, they had stories on what they were

[00:20:51] going to do with it. And again, they were just stories, whether or not that ever played out that

[00:20:55] way. I feel like we should do a role play and ask you, what are you going to do with this art history

[00:21:01] degree, William? I'm a curator of a museum. I want to be a curator of a modern,

[00:21:07] modern art museum. So I'd have to start off with a master's, an MFA, possibly a PhD,

[00:21:15] then work on the gallery scene and then go into curating.

[00:21:20] That makes sense. I bought it.

[00:21:22] So yes, I had it, I had it laid out to where it's like, I'm just going to tell you a story.

[00:21:27] Now I have no idea if any of that will play out. However, neither do you. So, uh,

[00:21:34] so that's how I get out of those conversations. I just preempt it.

[00:21:40] Yeah. So, so John, you're at 2000 employees now ish. Yeah. It's about 2000.

[00:21:46] Okay. So I'm, I'm fascinated with decision-making. Um, I'm always trying to get better at it and be,

[00:21:53] be snappier at it, which I need some work obviously, but how do you handle decision-making?

[00:21:58] I'm always fascinated with that question.

[00:22:01] Uh, I mean, I think it, it, right. It changes a lot. It changes a lot as the company grows,

[00:22:07] you know, in the beginning it has to be, you know,

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[00:23:14] That's, that's probably the knock on founders, right? Founders are passionate about their company

[00:23:19] and they tend to want to have control and they tend to want to be very involved and they've got their

[00:23:25] fingerprints on a lot of things. And that can hurt companies from scaling and making decisions and

[00:23:32] making decisions quickly and effectively. I think so. It's a, it's a, it's a tough, it's a tough thing because,

[00:23:41] you know, you want to stay involved because, uh, it is your baby. Um, but you have to recognize

[00:23:48] where you can let go and it, you know, it kind of evolves and changes depending on,

[00:23:56] you know, who you have for shareholders, what stage of the company you're in, um, what stage

[00:24:02] your leadership is in, how fully developed is your leadership team? You know, now we have a fully

[00:24:08] developed leadership team for a while, you know, we had no C titles, you know, you couldn't afford C

[00:24:16] titles. Um, and you know, you didn't, you had a much smaller decision making set of folks around

[00:24:23] you. And so it's very much changed. I think at this point in the evolution of the company,

[00:24:29] you've got really strong people at all levels in the organization and it's, we're fortunate to,

[00:24:34] to have those individuals. But I think at the end of the day, still,

[00:24:38] as a founder, you know, I'll get in there on things that I think matter, especially as

[00:24:43] relates to customers, employees, et cetera. And, and let my, let my voice be heard. Um,

[00:24:49] cause ultimately, you know, with a, with a board and professional investors, I mean, at this point,

[00:24:55] we have three private equity partners, uh, you have, you have to be accountable to your

[00:25:01] shareholders and you have to make sure the company's driving to their outcomes. You know,

[00:25:05] all three constituents, shareholders, employees, and clients.

[00:25:10] It reminds me, uh, Ryan of the, uh, the CEO and founder of LoveSag was saying, I, I, I'm, I need to

[00:25:19] be the weakest link. And so, you know, I remember hiring someone in supply chain, you know, a chief

[00:25:26] supply chain officer or whatever the bit was. And like, they know more about supply chain than I'll

[00:25:30] ever know. In fact, I don't want to know what they know. I just want them to be able to do what

[00:25:35] they can do better than anybody else. And it seems like at one point you transcended into that space

[00:25:41] and just said, I need to hire these different positions that augment, you know, what my skillset

[00:25:48] is, whatever that may be. And I need the best. I need smart people. I need them to be able to do

[00:25:54] things without me. It becomes a, it becomes a relief when you find, you know, like, I mean,

[00:26:02] but is it, is there a sense of like, so, and I, and I ask this question all the time because I can

[00:26:08] kind of, I feel like people want to say one thing and they don't, but I'm going to ask you anyway.

[00:26:12] So it's a sense of relief, but is there also a sense of, dang, I'm no longer needed here?

[00:26:19] No, not at all. Like, do you ever get that feeling? Like I could go away, which is a good thing,

[00:26:24] right? Like you could go on a three week vacation and nothing changes. The company doesn't miss a beat,

[00:26:29] but is there, is there that feeling of, hmm, am I as valuable as I thought I was?

[00:26:36] Like, do you, how do you, how do you, how do you wrestle with that?

[00:26:39] Yeah. I mean, I won't, I won't BS you. I mean, I've got lots of employees from lots of

[00:26:43] different generations than company and they would tell you like when I got, I, you know,

[00:26:49] we took our first private equity partner, part of what they were trying to provide was structure.

[00:26:53] I think we were something like, you know, uh, you know, 15 million in revenue. And, uh, I'd never

[00:27:00] had, uh, a CFO before. Never. I mean, I had a controller, right. Uh, and that was about it.

[00:27:08] All the accounting staff and all that stuff. Yeah. And so, you know, effectively I was managing

[00:27:12] accounting and finance, probably not the best use of my skills. And I, no judgment, no judgment.

[00:27:18] It made it. And when you, you know, how do you make a pivot table? I don't understand.

[00:27:26] You know, when you, when you, when you get to the place where, you know, I'll never forget,

[00:27:30] like, I think we had 13 employees and we had to do a layoff. We had to make a decision back

[00:27:34] to all those solvers. It was like, we got to commit to one thing that we're going to be

[00:27:38] good at and just run with it. Or we're going to run out of money. Right. That sticks with you.

[00:27:44] And so you never want to let control of, you never want to be in that spot again. And so I was

[00:27:49] literally signing every check that was going out the door to stay on top of everything that was

[00:27:55] happening. And back to my relief point, when you get somebody that, you know, shares that vision of

[00:28:03] we've got to be good stewards of the company, we've got to watch, you know, what we're doing here.

[00:28:09] Yeah. Yeah. It becomes hard because it's not so much you have a fear of being replaced. It's like,

[00:28:15] oh my gosh, I let go of that control. Are they going to share the same view as me? Or are we going

[00:28:22] to go back to that bad place? And so when they, when you get them on board, you can see that they're

[00:28:29] making a difference in the company. And then it's a sense of relief. Like, I don't have to worry about

[00:28:34] that anymore. They've got that. But by the way, if you want to be an entrepreneur and founder,

[00:28:39] I've never taken a three consecutive vacation.

[00:28:42] No, there's no such thing.

[00:28:44] Never.

[00:28:45] No such thing.

[00:28:46] I don't even get to do that in corporate. So if you do that on your own, that's a problem. Yeah.

[00:28:52] It's, it's fascinating. I think the, I think the, the, about giving up control,

[00:28:58] because you were signing every check and if the company was small enough, you were probably

[00:29:02] checking the mail way back when, when mail was a thing and all of a sudden they drop it in your

[00:29:08] office and then you'd be like, cause it was a way to kind of keep up with what's going on.

[00:29:11] Yeah.

[00:29:12] It was a weird, weird way to kind of like, okay, who's sending us mail?

[00:29:16] Yeah. And now we just don't want any mail.

[00:29:18] 100% don't.

[00:29:21] For the love of why.

[00:29:23] Please, please, please no mail.

[00:29:25] No mail. No, not at all. That's hilarious. And you've rounded out your, your leadership team.

[00:29:31] So you've, you've, you're, you're good there. You've got other, two other private equity partners.

[00:29:36] What's a kind of, what's the next iteration of the company you think?

[00:29:39] Well, I mean, I think that it's, you know, we've had a lot of success. I mean, we had,

[00:29:44] we had the COVID years as I'll call it. Right.

[00:29:47] Everybody just kind of like froze. Like, what does this mean? You know? And it was a lot of,

[00:29:53] you know, what I'll call yo-yoing between start, stop, you know, like, are we going to get back

[00:29:58] to normal? Are we not going to get back to normal? And kind of everybody in the benefits world kind

[00:30:02] of hunkered down and benefits were very important, but people didn't want to make, you know, changes

[00:30:07] because budgets were uncertain. Everything was uncertain.

[00:30:10] Right.

[00:30:10] I would say that, well, we've had, you know, we had decent years through it. I would say this year

[00:30:17] is our first kind of back to normal year. One way to get your question, but we're back in what I

[00:30:22] would say is significant growth mode, significant change in adoption by, you know, especially enterprise

[00:30:28] employers saying we do need more modern technology. We do need to have a solution that has AI running

[00:30:35] in the background to serve our employees better. I mean, give them better answers, quicker answers

[00:30:40] and it needs to be 24 seven. And we're not going to staff people to take calls 24 seven. So you've got

[00:30:46] to have, you know what you should know? You should know that. You should know podcast. That's what you

[00:30:54] should know because then you'd be in the know on all things that are timely and topical. Subscribe to

[00:31:00] the you should know podcast. Thanks.

[00:31:04] Better solutions by mobile, better solutions in chat and, you know, kind of those off hours, you know,

[00:31:10] ironically through COVID employees and employers move to doing things later and later in their day.

[00:31:18] And so they're making these decisions later in the day and they expect the same level of support.

[00:31:23] The long answer to that is, you know, we're just trying to become the dominant market leader.

[00:31:29] And part of our domination is also driving a better solution, which is people, you know, for a long time,

[00:31:36] we've been working on how can we give them software that helps them be better consumers and be more confident

[00:31:41] in their selection because you spend a lot of money on this and employers spend a lot of money on these

[00:31:46] things we call benefits. The second phase of it is really help working with the carriers to help

[00:31:52] employees better use their benefits. So working with the insurance carriers to anticipate when you've had

[00:32:00] a claim so you can make sure that your insurance benefits actually work. And then the next level of

[00:32:06] this we've been talking about for a long time, but we get better and better at it is

[00:32:10] marketing the benefit program to employees. That's part of a, you know, kind of dual sided coin.

[00:32:17] Working with the carriers to identify if you had a claim and serving that up, you don't have to figure it out,

[00:32:22] but also letting you know that you have these benefits and letting you know when and how you should use these

[00:32:27] benefits because you kind of forget all that works, right? When do I, you know, I know you've had folks on that are

[00:32:34] working on mental or financial wellness. A lot of employees don't understand that they already have those

[00:32:39] benefits embedded in the program. That's right. And, and it's a very emotional thing, right? Like when I

[00:32:44] need my benefits, am I in the right frame of mind to go do research on my benefit program? Probably not.

[00:32:53] Probably not.

[00:32:54] So that's a big journey to really help the organization evolve from just being

[00:33:00] somebody who helps you get enrolled in your benefits to somebody who's, you're actually smart

[00:33:05] about your benefits because the software and the service is helping you become more intelligent about

[00:33:10] how to use your benefits.

[00:33:12] I can see that, especially with mental health. If you're going through some type of episode,

[00:33:18] the last thing you're going to do is get into your benefits software and then search for some type

[00:33:24] of solution. You're, you're on an Island and you're dealing with something. I wanted to ask you about

[00:33:30] mentoring. So going back to when you were at the insurance company and here, here, I mean,

[00:33:36] this is a big risk actually for your mentor to then say, you're good. You don't need to do this.

[00:33:44] Yeah.

[00:33:44] Cause he could have very well kept you because you were good. You know, a lot of, a lot of

[00:33:50] bad managers, a lot of bad managers, that's what they do. They find really talented people and then

[00:33:54] they keep them in that spot. And it was bold for him to say, you're smart. I got some other smart

[00:34:02] folks. You need to go do this thing. So how's that, how's that changed your outlook on mentoring,

[00:34:09] even with your own company or people that, you know?

[00:34:12] Yeah, it was really bold. I don't think I fully appreciated it until, you know, I was long down

[00:34:17] the journey. Um, but he just had a long tradition of doing that and did it for many, many years.

[00:34:23] I think, you know, in a company where you have employees that stay with you for a very long time,

[00:34:31] I think one of the things you have to be thoughtful about is letting them go or helping them go.

[00:34:40] If their journey has, you know, you know, stagnated, uh, hit a dead end. Uh, and so I think the

[00:34:49] hardest thing is, you know, getting the honest dialogue with employees around, it's a very scary

[00:34:57] thing, right? Yeah. For employees and employers. But I think it's a very good thing if you can have

[00:35:04] an honest dialogue about, I don't think you're going to hit your full potential here. Um, and, uh,

[00:35:11] you know, I want to support you. So I often say, you know, like you'll have a, you know, I've had many

[00:35:15] long time employees move on to something else. And what I always say is like, listen, I'm, I'm happy

[00:35:22] for you, but is there anything I can do to help you evaluate your opportunity now or in the future?

[00:35:29] But you should always feel like you can move to another opportunity, but you should always,

[00:35:34] if you have a good relationship, work with your current employer to say, how can I get the best

[00:35:40] opportunity? You know, I've said to many, like, I will introduce you to one of our best recruiters

[00:35:46] so you can get to the best outcome. But it's amazing to me how many times,

[00:35:54] you know, employees don't do that and don't take the chance to say, I want to have this honest

[00:36:00] dialogue or this conversation with you. And going all the way back, I mean, that is the conversation

[00:36:04] we had, which is I was in a consulting role where I felt like, you know, listen, I'm never going to

[00:36:11] be able to fully maximize my career here or my potential here. But I like the idea of starting

[00:36:20] something new and doing something new. So, you know, I think good mentors push you to do that. And

[00:36:26] it's, it's a, it's a gift really. It's a quick follow up. I think the hardest, hardest thing about

[00:36:34] that is people that are comfortable in their position. Like they love their job. They love

[00:36:41] the team that they're working with. They love their customers, et cetera. And they're just happy.

[00:36:46] So, I mean, it's, it's this kind of conflict of ambition and happiness. And some people,

[00:36:53] you know, you know, are, are very ambitious. And so they're kind of looking to the next place

[00:36:58] that pushes them, et cetera. And some people get to a place, they're just like, they're content.

[00:37:03] Yeah. They're totally competent at their job. Like none of that stuff. Like they're just,

[00:37:08] they're, they're living in their best life. They don't want to do something different. They don't

[00:37:12] want to go and reinvent themselves as an, at a new place and do something else. Like how to know

[00:37:18] which one's, which is, you know, thank God you have a psychology degree. Cause I couldn't figure it

[00:37:24] out. It's, it's, it's, it goes back to like, you know, what's the makeup of your, of your company?

[00:37:33] What's the DNA of your company? What's the DNA of you? And, you know, we just went through

[00:37:39] our sales kickoff and I'm a big formula one fan. And if you follow formula one,

[00:37:46] total wolf has a pretty cool podcast out there, but you know,

[00:37:49] what he said is high performing teams need to fight complacency and, you know, complacency can creep

[00:37:58] in and then, you know, your winning record kind of goes, goes south on you, which is exactly what

[00:38:04] happened to, to Mercedes. So that was kind of in retrospective, but it depends what you want to,

[00:38:11] you know, I mean, if, you know, there are periods in time in life where if, you know,

[00:38:15] you've got, you know, several other stressors, whether it's dependence or otherwise,

[00:38:23] it might be okay to be in that place. And that's a good place for you.

[00:38:28] And so I think it's, it's about where you are in life. What's your DNA and, you know, what's the DNA,

[00:38:34] the company that you live in. And so I think those are the things you have to balance out.

[00:38:39] So John, final question for me as we come to a close here is more about sacrifice. You know,

[00:38:48] you don't go from four initial employees to 2000 ish employees by mistake, right? There's a lot of

[00:38:57] sacrifice in there. I want to, I want to dig into that a little bit. Maybe, you know, I guess the

[00:39:02] question is, what are the sacrifices that you make or have made that others haven't or aren't making

[00:39:08] in order to get to this success level? You want to have an alphabetical order?

[00:39:14] Yes, please. Alphabetical and chronological. I mean, I'm always, and I'll say, I'm curious because

[00:39:20] so many people like they, they look at success and you probably hit, Oh, must be nice. You know,

[00:39:28] they always, you kind of get that response from people. You're on your boat. Must be nice. Oh yeah.

[00:39:34] And I work 17 hours a day and I've done it for 20 years and I've grown a business from zero to 2000

[00:39:40] people. But like, what are those sacrifices that people don't see? Oh, wow. Um, that's a tough

[00:39:47] question. Do we need another hour? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's a great question. It is a great

[00:39:53] question. I don't know if I call it sacrifices. I'd call it trade-offs. So, uh, my wife, Ray is in the

[00:39:59] business as well and has been, um, you know, for very long time, 2000, 2001, 2000, 2000, 2000,

[00:40:11] very early. Okay. Um, and she's a chief strategy officer. So, um, I think our two boys had to,

[00:40:20] you know, they had to deal with a kid of absentee parents at times. There's no doubt about it.

[00:40:25] Mm-hmm. Um, they know more about benefits than the, than their, than their peers.

[00:40:30] I can tell you that. They inherently know a lot that inherently heard a lot of business discussions.

[00:40:36] Right. Um, and, and, and they definitely get it, but it's time, you know, looking back on it,

[00:40:44] you know, I mean, you think about all the, you know, the baseball games, you missed the basketball

[00:40:48] games, uh, the trade-offs you just had to make cause you had to travel, um, and travel a lot.

[00:40:54] I mean, lots and lots of time away from them, of course, and, and lots and lots of time in the

[00:41:00] business. I mean, my, you know, Ray would say that, uh, COVID saved us, um, because we used to go in

[00:41:08] at, you know, six in the morning and we'd leave at seven o'clock at night and then go have dinner and,

[00:41:15] you know, do it all over again. And we do that over and over again. So we, you know, COVID made you step

[00:41:22] back and find some balance. You couldn't go into the office. It was like non-functional for at least two

[00:41:28] weeks, uh, and figuring out what does it mean not to go directly to my office, but it's probably just time

[00:41:34] and your family sacrificing, you know, around the business, uh, because you don't have a choice.

[00:41:41] Like if you don't do it, it's not probably going to get done. And at different times in the business,

[00:41:48] it's so needy, um, that, you know, you've made a commitment to every employee that's there as well.

[00:41:55] And, you know, for a long time employees knew, you know, I'm in, it took a lot of pride in him. I'm employee

[00:42:00] number 25 or I'm employee number 100. I'm employee number 200. They're very committed to the business

[00:42:06] still are today. And so it's your commitment to them and to your clients. It becomes massive as well.

[00:42:12] And so I would say it's just the trade-offs, you know, it's not for everyone because you are going

[00:42:17] to have to make trade-offs and most of those trade-offs impact your family. And it's not

[00:42:22] just your kids, it's your extended family. It's the, you know, holiday things you can't go to.

[00:42:28] It's, you know, and then on top of it, this business chooses do everything in November and December.

[00:42:32] Yeah. There's no holidays there. No worries. You can skip those.

[00:42:38] Christmas is in July for that family.

[00:42:41] 100%. 100%.

[00:42:42] I remember the first blow up I had when we were on a ski vacation. It was one of our largest clients.

[00:42:51] And he said to me, you chose to have you and Ray in the business. You can't both be going on vacation

[00:42:59] at the same time. I got, I got it. Like, this is a trade-off I need to handle.

[00:43:05] Um, um, but I mean, it's, it's still painful to hear. It is. Yeah. Yeah. Brother, this has been

[00:43:15] absolutely fantastic, John. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you so for so much time and wisdom. Uh, we appreciate you.