Cultivating Success Through Consultative Selling with Robbie Butchart

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
First of all, I'd start with where are their
developers?
That's one of the bestquestions I've been asked.
Man, Did you plan?

Speaker 2 (00:04):
That's high praise.
Actually, that was one that wasnot planned.

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Wow, I don't know how to summarize this.
This is crazy.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
Welcome to Sell Me this Podcast, the show where we
explore the art, science andstrategy behind successful
selling.
In today's episode, we'rediving into the fascinating
journey of Robby, a seasonedprofessional who's navigated the
world of sales and businessgrowth from selling commodities
to co-founding a successfulsoftware development company,

(00:35):
launch Code.
Robby shares invaluableinsights on building trust in
sales, the power of asking theright questions and the
importance of aligning with yourcustomers' needs.
Get ready to uncover actionablestrategies, hear about the
lessons learned from coldcalling to consultative selling,
and gain a deeper understandingof how innovation and curiosity

(00:56):
can drive success.
Let's jump into theconversation and learn from
someone who's mastered the shiftfrom selling products to
solving problems.
Amazing, robbie.
Thank you so much for joiningus today.
We're going to dive right intothings.
Why don't you share a littlebit about your story and how you
arrived where you are today?

Speaker 1 (01:13):
Sure, yeah, cool.
First of all, thanks for havingme.
This is an exciting littleecosystem you've created here.
Yeah, it's been a journey, man,it's been a lot of fun the last
I've been in growth.
My entire professional careersold everything that nobody
liked.
I always like to say Commodity,price-driven, no value, that
kind of thing, All the fun stuff, All the fun stuff, but that's
the stuff that kind of gets theskin thickened.
And then about nine years ago Ihad an opportunity to get

(01:36):
involved on the side of thingswith a good friend of mine
starting a software developmentcompany.
Did it on the low key for abouta year or so and then following
I don't know, a couple ofverbal yeses on some potential
deals.
I thought this is great.
This is a great opportunity tostart something really unique
that solves problems that peoplecan't find off the shelf

(01:57):
solutions for Really getscreative thinking going.
You get some solution-basedconversations happening where
it's not like.
Here's my speeds and feeds kindof idea.
And that was the birth ofLaunchCode, and that's been.
It's been a ride, man.
It's been a ride, A lot of fun.
But that's the Reader's Digestversion.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
All right, so we're going to.
I want to dive into LaunchCodein a second Yep, but one of the
things that I think is probablyTell me a little bit about what
print guided you towards,because I feel like that's a
foundation that a lot of peopledon't really understand, how it
can set up a lot of your career.

Speaker 1 (02:31):
Yeah, on the print side of things, yeah, you're
right, it's something thateverybody hates, it's a
necessary evil, it is what it is.
It's such a great teaching tool.
Yeah, teaching tool.
But you look at theprofessionalism that came out of
the print industry with theXeroxes of the world and Ricohs,
and then the smaller kind oflike WBMs not so small now, like

(02:52):
that kind of concept where youhave to really stand out to make
a difference.
And I owe a lot of my success,fun career conversations, all
the fun things to two people inparticular within the Rico world
, and that's Kara Hubik and StanBarmeshkin.
The name drop because they'regreat people.

Speaker 2 (03:12):
The shout out's real 100% it is.

Speaker 1 (03:13):
I learned a lot specifically from Kara as I grew
through my professional career,but I think, getting your head
around, you're not sellingspeeds and feeds, you're selling
outcomes.
You're selling the values andfeeds.
You're selling outcomes.
You're selling the values andthe challenges and outcomes your
clients are looking to achieveand this is a component of it.
In sales, I like to say there'sthree different variations of it
.
There's product, like speedsand feeds, and then there's a

(03:35):
evolution to that where you'retalking about a solution-based
product sale where you stillhave a product but you're trying
to twist it into the outcomesyour clients are looking for.
And that's really what theXeroxes and the Ricohs in the
print space as a collectivereally help you hone.
And then you get into thethings like we do, like what
you're doing with DeliverDigital and with what I do with
LaunchCode.
Is, it's true, solution-basedsales?

(03:57):
Because you're not walking inwith an agenda or portfolio
necessarily.
You're going in to understandwhat your clients and the
challenges they've got are, whatthe initiatives and goals they
have and how do you help supportthat.

Speaker 2 (04:09):
Yeah, and I feel like there's something special that
exists about having to and Ithink we both have this shared
experience go and cold call adoctor's office in front of a
whole bunch of sick people.
I think it builds thisresiliency.
But you're right, like that,switch over to okay, I'm selling
something that's real, that'stangible, that I can touch, that
I can press the buttons, I cando a demo on it to something

(04:32):
that really you're ultimatelyselling trust and you're selling
your understanding of theirchallenges.
How did you find thattransition going into LaunchCode
, as you were moving from moreof that solution-based sales to
really that consultative salesat LaunchCode?

Speaker 1 (04:45):
Wow, that's a really good.
That's one of the bestquestions I've been asked man?

Speaker 2 (04:49):
Did you plan that, that's high praise.
Actually, that was one that wasnot planned.

Speaker 1 (04:53):
Wow Looks and brains.

Speaker 2 (04:54):
I tell you what no?

Speaker 1 (04:56):
joking aside, that's a fantastic question.
I think that for anybody thatmoves into a sales career, trust
is the baseline for anyrelationship that you create.
That's what sells right Is theability for you to say no, the
ability for you, short-term, tounderstand.
You know what.
I'm not going to do this, eventhough it'll benefit me, because

(05:16):
long-term I'm going to see somuch more of a return because
I've done the right thing, dowhat's right, integrity.
At the end of the day, and insales you got one chance right.
Trust is very fragile and youbreak that and it's a real
challenge for you to ever goback to any of those clients
that you've worked so hard toget, to maintain, to grow, and
I've always had that as a beliefin my professional career and

(05:39):
I've taken that and I wasfortunate to be able to go back
to all of my old clients that Ihad in my Ricoh days and tell
them about the new cool thing wewere doing with LaunchCode.
And without that baseline oftrust, none of that would have
happened.
So it's fundamentally thecatalyst for the success of what
LaunchCode became.

Speaker 2 (05:58):
That's amazing, and so, when you think about the
types of customers that you weredealing with, how did you find
that transition of theconversation as well, because I
feel like they're differentconversations.
You have the trust, you havethe foundation in place.
Were you dealing with the samepeople?
Were you creating newrelationships?
What were those engagementslike?

Speaker 1 (06:14):
Yeah, it's started with the same people, always,
like when we started.
Like when you're starting acompany and I remember telling
you the same thing when you werestarting this out you have to
literally talk to every singleperson.
You know, every single I'm notexaggerating Literally I called
people that I hadn't talked toin 15 years.
Hey, jeff, been a while, how'sit going?

(06:35):
They're like whoa, robbie.
I'm like, yeah, it's been awhile, I know, but it's really
going through your entire phonebook, your LinkedIn, your
Facebook, your whatever othersocial channel.
You got to go and have theseconversations and tell people
the good news and obviously it'sthe connection and re-engaging
in the human to human element,but ultimately going through and

(06:56):
asking for help, beingvulnerable and willing to ask it
.
And that's what I did.
Started it with literallyeverybody, all of the exact same
clients I dealt with, and thatevolved.
A lot of people are willing tohelp, they want to help, and we
got connections into some greatfollow-up conversations with and
without them and the evolutioncame from that and fun
conversations came after that.

Speaker 2 (07:17):
So was there a specific challenge that you were
looking to solve?
Was there a gap in the market?
Or was there just feedback thatyou were receiving from the
folks who were talking to thatthey just weren't getting what
they were getting.

Speaker 1 (07:28):
Yeah At the time and you got to keep in mind.
This is now when it started,about seven years ago, so things
have evolved yeah.
Man, yeah, it certainly doesWith that, though at the time
there was a lot of off the shelfsolutions that existed still to
this day, but there was alwaysgaps.
And I remember, with Rico I waswe were selling everything.
We were selling hardware andsoftware and people and all the

(07:50):
things.
Yeah, it was crazy, right, andwith that, the software.
Every time there'sconversations, it was always
like, okay, we need to do this,can I do this?
And all salespeople, they'relistening to this.
No, you never want to say no,you just don't.
And I felt I was having to sayno more and more and it was
really limiting my ability to Ahelp my clients and B grow what

(08:12):
I was responsible for on theRicoh side, and so I was like
there's got to be somethingdifferent here.
And that's when LaunchCode cameto be.
And so when we were going intothe conversations with people,
it was very, it was very open.
I was just going in andunderstanding their business,
understanding the challenges,the pains, and I didn't have an
agenda right, it was justlearning.
And it was being very curiousand, well, tell me more, oh, why

(08:34):
, and just being veryintentional on that curious
questioning, and through that itcame into you know what.
I think there's something wecan probably do to help with
that.
If you're open to a follow-up,I'll bring some smart people
with me when I can continue toentertain, but let's bring some
smart people that can really befingers on keyboard and help
have a better conversation.
And that's really all it was,and so I didn't have all the

(08:56):
answers.
I didn't even really know ifthere was an answer, but it's.
Yeah, there's gotta besomething here.
It sounds about right, andthat's how it evolved.
I don't know if that answersyour question.

Speaker 2 (09:05):
Yeah, so did you.
You followed your customers alittle bit and you were just
curious and you asked somequestions and then were able to
surround them with the rightpeople to help solve those
challenges.
Is that fair?
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (09:15):
it is fair and I didn't.
I wasn't attached to an outcomeand you hear true sales
professionals out there, andthat's the commonality in all of
them is detached from theoutcome.
If I can solve for a problem,great.
If I can connect you withsomebody that can solve for a
problem, awesome.
If I can do it, even better.
But I wasn't intentional.
I got to close a deal.
I got it.

(09:35):
That's what really allowed forit.

Speaker 2 (09:37):
And I feel like there's two elements that I want
to build on from that.
First of is the culture thatactually allows it.
I think that there's so manydifferent organizations that I
think force a whether it bemetrics or whether it be
specific KPIs that just guidepeople away from doing the
ability to do the right thingand the ability to just be

(09:57):
curious, listen to theircustomers and help them with the
idea that at some point it'llwork out.
Yeah, absolutely, man.
Do you see the world in thesame way on that, or is there
something?

Speaker 1 (10:06):
Yeah, I think we come from similar backgrounds.
When you're publicly traded,there's a little bit more
pressure right.

Speaker 2 (10:12):
All of a sudden, the shareholders have a voice.

Speaker 1 (10:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and that's real.
There's definitely arequirement for that to be you
have to be cognizant of thatlike you comes down to doing the
right things and that comes.
That's your activities, that'syour outreaches, that's your
connects, and the more you cando that, the more that becomes
less of a pressure cooker.
Right, because you're givingyourself many opportunities and
you're not hinging everything onone thing, closing one

(10:35):
opportunity, getting across theline.
Now it's a different pressurebecause and you as you're
growing you'll see this.
And I felt it too withLaunchCode is I've got people
with mortgages to pay.
I've got car payments, I've gotfamilies, I've got.
They all sit on my ability.

Speaker 2 (10:49):
It's a different accountability.

Speaker 1 (10:51):
It's another level of accountability.
It really is and that's whereit's I go back to.
One of your initial questionswas if I didn't have that
pressure cooker, I wouldn't havebeen able to handle the
elevated pressure cooker thatcomes with that added level of
responsibility.

Speaker 2 (11:10):
Yeah, and there's so many people that I talk to that
come from some of those and I'llcall them very transactional,
entry-level sales roles thatjust set such an incredible
foundation for some of theeither challenges or hardships
or these different scenariosthat they face down a lot.

Speaker 1 (11:25):
Yeah, and it's funny, a lot of people look down on
that, right yeah, they look downon those industries but, like
it's the one sales is lookeddown upon and it's the one
industry that's not taught inany educational institution and
it's the one industry that everyorganization on this planet
needs.
It's the school of hard knocks.

Speaker 2 (11:46):
Dude, it's hard, so turn me in the corner a tiny bit
.
I think that you've Great intro, by the way.
That was really good.

Speaker 1 (11:51):
Thank you, you're so intelligent, you're questioning.

Speaker 2 (11:54):
I don't even know where to take that, I know.
No, you just take it.
Yeah, take it, man.
Thank you, you're welcome.
I appreciate it.
So if you were to describe thework that LaunchCode does today,
what have you ultimatelyarrived at and what you're
delivering for customers?

Speaker 1 (12:05):
Yeah, the whole premise behind LaunchCode was to
help organizations when theycouldn't find things off the
shelf to solve for a problem,let's build it for them, right?
That's the baseline for theorganization, and the premise
around how it's evolved has beenvery interesting.
As the markets evolved, we'vegotten more into creating
development teams and providingthose as a service, and that's
where the business ultimatelyended up evolving to, and that's

(12:29):
what also is supporting thesecompanies when they're trying to
create products and create anew line of the business, or
it's a startup and they've gotthis wonderful idea for a
product.
That's the premise of thebusiness.
There's a bunch of companieslike that out there that are
doing the same thing.
It's an interesting businessmodel because it's project-based
.
It's hard to scale, but that'sthe baseline of, ultimately,
what LaunchCode was created todo.

Speaker 2 (12:50):
And so do you work both with kind of larger
corporate entities that areestablished that have some of
these needs that can't be met byoff-the-shelf stuff as well as
startups, or was there aspecific leading that you had
more experience with?

Speaker 1 (13:25):
no-transcript.
Oh man, we got to change thewhole process and that's the
last thing they want to dobecause they put so much effort
into that.
So that's where there's a realneed in that space, or there was
a real need in that space, andthe evolution to that even
further is now we want to createa company.
There's a problem we can solve.

(13:47):
We want to create something tosolve for that, and that's where
we saw some of these.
I would say they're very rare,more rare companies that are
your more traditional enterprisethat have this kind of we'll
call it like spunky startup kindof flair internally.
It's not common, and there's acouple of them that we did some
work with along those lines andthat was a lot of fun because

(14:08):
they got that creative mindlet's go and they got funding, a
lot of funding for it.

Speaker 2 (14:13):
So and so this is a and I could probably spend the
entire time talking about thisone specific topic.
But there's this hugedifference.
I mean, in Calgary, we'reincredibly blessed to have this
startup scene that is full ofenergy, full of life, they're
doing incredible things, they'regrowing, they're starting to
get really a spotlight on theglobal stage, and then you have

(14:34):
this established enterprise,which I think has some of these
aspirations but approach thechallenges in different ways,
different ways.
And so when you talk about someof these organizations that
have this kind of spunky startupDNA, is that across the whole
organization or are thesepockets of the organization that
you're working?

Speaker 1 (14:51):
with it's pockets.
It's got to have somebody nearthe top, has got to be driving
it, because you could havesomebody even like a senior
leader if they don't havesomebody at the executive level.
That's really got thatcreativity, yeah, and I would
say they have to have a tryingto use the right term they have
to be willing, they have to be,they can't be so risk adverse

(15:14):
and I think that's a really rarething, specifically in canada
as a whole.
We're very we're not risktolerant people right, so they
have to be more tolerant.
Yeah, maybe I said thatbackwards, but I think you get
what I'm saying there.
I know I get a complete way ofsaying it.

Speaker 2 (15:27):
And I think, that idea of risk as well.
If you think about eventraditional technology teams,
most of the work is being how doI avoid risk?
How do I make it so we don'tget hacked?
How do I make it so that ourservers don't explode?
Yeah, you're absolutely rightman, it's a different DNA.
Yeah, are you finding and youcan choose to pass on this

(15:47):
question Sure, are you findingthat most of those leaders and
those change makers come fromthe traditional technology side,
or are they more on the kind ofrevenue side of the business
that are driving that change?

Speaker 1 (15:55):
I think it's a blend.
I'm just trying to go throughmy head like… the conversations
I've had, I think you'restarting to see, as the younger
generation is coming into moresignificant roles, they're
pushing the envelope more thanthe traditional people that are
there now and that might rufflesome feathers, but it's what
I've seen.
Yeah, it really is.

(16:15):
We've seen people traditionallywanting to always do it that
way and that like we've lived itright.
And you're starting to see thatshift now and it's not
necessarily just from therevenue side or from the growth
side of the business.
You're starting to see it morefrom an operational standpoint
and it's exciting to be part ofthose conversations.
When you get somebody that'slike that, you're like oh man,
this person gets it.
This is exciting, let's go.

(16:35):
And that gets fun fast.

Speaker 2 (16:39):
So if you're, you have one of these change makers,
you have some of these bigideas.
I feel like the next question alot of people ask is how do we
even get started?
There's so many technologies,there's so many startups, there
are so many options for them topick from.
What advice would you have forone of these change makers and
organization of how to evenorganize their thoughts or
simply get started on some ofthese initiatives?

Speaker 1 (17:02):
Yeah, good question it's.
I think the first thing you gotto identify is what problem
you're solving, yeah, and if youknow the outcome you're looking
to achieve, it's okay.
That's the biggest thing, firstand foremost.
If you've got that nailed,awesome, okay.
What do I need to do to makethat happen?
And now it's about creatinglists of okay in order for, if
everything's paper-based orcarbon, like even the carbon

(17:24):
paper, remember three or four itstill exists.
but okay, if we, if I'm tryingto automate my entire floor, if
my I'm trying to speed somethingup, or I'm trying to drive more
opportunity top line or createmore profitability in the
business whatever that is bysolving a problem that's out
there, that is an ultimatedelivery into my business from
one of the things I justmentioned creating, then, okay,

(17:47):
what do I need you to make thathappen?
Who do I have on staff?
Who?

Speaker 2 (17:50):
don't I have on staff .

Speaker 1 (17:51):
More importantly, what organizations do I know in
the marketplace?
Who do I know in themarketplace?
Who can I start leveragingconversation with and just
exploring what that looks like?
And there's one of the clientsin particular that I'm thinking
of that's done this in a verylarge enterprise, has created a
company within the company,right, and it's more or less
what he and he just went.
He didn't go through months andmonths of like analysis on it

(18:14):
and like pros and cons and doinglike a SWOT and like none of
that yeah Went through peoplethat he trusted.
Going back to what we mentionedearlier Do what you say and say
what you do, and there were sometimes we went through it, he's.
I remember the story is like itwas.
It was over a game of squash inthe office and we had a game of
squash, we had some donairs andHopefully the donairs were

(18:35):
before.

Speaker 2 (18:35):
No, it was after.
You don't be throwing up on thesquash court Like it's messy
little grooves in the floor Likeit's gross.

Speaker 1 (18:40):
And what we ended up doing after that was like what
do you guys even do here?
And I said to him we buildthings that don't exist Really.
Okay, so many more.
And so that that's all it was.
And then it was identifyingwhat we don't do Right.
And so he then said, okay, Ihave a problem that I can solve,
for he identified the fourthings of paper and the manual
processes and everything.

(19:00):
And then he's okay, who do Iknow in my network?
And he started havingconversations with people,
jumped into where he got a goodenergy exchange right and trust
was built quickly and then juststarted.
And then you can iterate and goand there's.
But the problem that I've runinto time and time again is
everybody waits for it to beperfect and there's no such
thing and they let perfect getin the way of good, and that's a

(19:21):
real, that's a problem, becauseyou'll never get anywhere if
you're waiting for perfect.

Speaker 2 (19:24):
That's a long-winded answer.
I don't know if that.
No, that's perfect, becausethey're always in pursuit of
this thing that doesn't exist.
They're always going to.
There's always one more thingthey can do.
I don't know about you, but themore that I learn about
problems yeah, because moreknowledge just creates more
questions?

Speaker 1 (19:44):
Yep, absolutely.
And then you just sit there andcycle in your own desire of
what you think this thing shouldbe and you never get anywhere.
And the other thing that's veryinteresting and the common
thing that I hear a lot of ispeople think they know the
answer without talking to thepeople buying Like they're
sitting there oh, it's going tobe great, it's going gonna do
this, it's gonna do this andit's gonna do this.
Have you talked to the peoplethat are going to use it, like

(20:05):
your clients?
well okay, so that's a no not,yes, go right, go and talk to
them, because you probably needa fraction of what you think,
yeah, and then you could iterateas you get feedback when it's
already live and it probablyshifts very differently than
what you would assume.
It would start as and theexecution.

Speaker 2 (20:22):
I feel like there's so many people with great ideas,
but taking it from A to B orzero to one, that's a great book
by Peter Thiel.
Yeah, yeah yeah Is that's thehard part is actually getting
started, and so I.
What advice do you have forpeople to actually go and get
started?
I know that sounds like an oddquestion.

Speaker 1 (20:39):
No, it's not, though.
Like it's really not, because Iremember starting LaunchCode.
I remember sitting down and Ihad left Rico.
I sat down.
I'm like what did I just do?
You're like you leave somewherewhere you're doing well, and as
you sit down you're like I'mstarting something from nothing,
so what do I got to do?
Pick there's something Totally.

(21:01):
And you hear it like you'restarting to see more people
realize it.
You just got to start yeah,Just make one phone call and see
what happens.
Make a second phone call.
It's literally, it's one stepin front of the other, not
thinking oh my gosh, how am Igoing to get a million dollars
in sales or whatever.
The number is Right.
Just start with one phone calland just start.

(21:22):
Right, that it's literally thatsimple.
It doesn't need to be any morecomplicated.
You don't need to solve theworld's problems.
You don't have nothing.
None of that needs to befigured out.
Just make a phone call and havea conversation, Just get
started.
I feel like if I had a mic I dohave a mic I could drop.

Speaker 2 (21:39):
I shouldn't do this one.
Layla will get mad at you ifyou drop the mics.
We don't want to do that.

Speaker 1 (21:41):
I promise I won't do it.

Speaker 2 (21:43):
But literally it's that simple, yeah.
So if you think about thetransition, then from OK, maybe
they've taken a couple steps.
They realized either the gapsthat they have or the skills
they have on their team, theyrealize what they need and they
decide to go shopping.
Yep, there are so manydifferent options for people to
help conceptualize some of thosedreams, and we won't even open

(22:05):
the can of worms around.

Speaker 1 (22:06):
AI.
Yet it's a big can, Nope let'snot.

Speaker 2 (22:08):
But even in the time when you started LaunchCode,
there's a lot of competition inthat app dev side of things.
What were some of the thingsthat set organizations apart
from each other and what weresome of the big buy-in criteria
that people found reallyimportant from each other?
And what were some of the bigbuy-in criteria?

Speaker 1 (22:23):
that people found really important.
Yeah, that's another goodquestion.
The big thing is communication.
It sounds so simple.
It is something that not a lotof organizations in general, not
even an app dev, don't do.
Well, they don't communicate.
Like an email gets sent, noreply, a phone call no callback,
there's fires and's nocommunication, like those are

(22:43):
things that are so simple.
Just call somebody back, likehow would you feel on the other
side being that individual nothearing?
But so that to me, is theeasiest, quickest win and,
especially in the bad and theugly times, run at the fire and
make sure you're overcommunicating.
So that, to me, is the numberone thing Hard stop.

(23:05):
I will argue all day longafterwards Nothing.
It's not that everything elseI'm about to say is not
important, but that is like justlet the client If we stop there
, you're fine.
Yeah, I would be, cause now atleast your client knows that's
it Good, bad or ugly?
They know right, and thenactions can be taken on their
side, cause they're probablyreporting into other people that
are part of the project andthey're not looking good because
they don't have answers.
Like just communicate, and itsolves a lot of problems right.

Speaker 2 (23:29):
One of the things that I've said over and over
again it sounds like we'recompletely on the same page
about this is the tech actuallyusually isn't the hardest
problem to solve.
No, generally not.
There are some things that arevery complex technical
challenges, but 90 of the usecases out there are not hard
technical problems, they're hardchange management problems.
They're hard communicationproblems, the people side.

Speaker 1 (23:47):
It's all about the people.
It's all about the people andthat's always going to be the
hardest part.
It always is right we'recomplex.
So I would say that is thebiggest thing that I would say
right off the hop.
But outside of that, when youstart getting into the actual
development of things I'mthinking of all the projects
that we took over when there wasissues it comes down to taking

(24:08):
your time in terms of the earlystage of stuff, due diligence,
going through and really havingcertainty on what the client's
looking for can be done right,and having certainty and
communicating that back to them.
If it's not an option, providealternatives, be a partner.
Put yourself in the position ofthe client and what they're

(24:28):
trying to solve for, and whatwould you want your partner to
come and tell you?
So be that partner.
You know what I mean.
So if there's things that couldbe done better, or if they have
alternative ideas around whatthe outcome could be based off
of the technology abilities Likethere's, just communicate.
Again, that's going back tocommunication.
Crazy enough, but it really is.

(24:49):
It's going through and takingyour time and doing the due
diligence.
I think it's also havingchallenged the client.
Challenge them in situations.
Don't be a yes man or woman.
Challenge them and that willultimately bring a more stable,
secure, robust and betterexperienced solution.

(25:11):
On the other end of it all, Ifyou go through and ask the hard
questions, Communicating againWeird.

Speaker 2 (25:17):
That makes sense, so weird.
What are some of the thingsthat people rush through too
much?
So you mentioned that, one ofthe things that people are too
quick to get to the finish line.
What are the, from yourexperience, the areas, over and
over again, that if people onlyspent more time there, that they
would get way betterdeliverables?

Speaker 1 (25:39):
It comes down to not assuming that if I'm the client,
don't assume your partner knows, be intentional, be thought
thorough and it's we'll justhave a dropdown and we'll.
It'll be this and like theygive very generalized statements
and you're laughing Cause Ithink it's just it's a lot of
generalized, with assumptionthat you're aligned on the other

(26:01):
side of it.
So it's being intentionallyvery deep on what the experience
is, what the interaction needsto be, and it's putting that
effort into that, because themore you can be clear and
concise, the more the otherperson that's coding something
that doesn't exist knows what'swanted.
And so I would say that hasskipped over a lot in a lot of

(26:22):
the conversations we've had andthat it's an assumptive state.
We talked about that six monthsago.
Sure, yeah, we talked about it.
No, be intentional and haveclarity around what you want.
That comes up a lot in a lot ofconversations and we're not the
only ones when we were doing it.
I know that's a commonalitythat's out there amongst a lot
of organizations.
You're creating something thatdoesn't exist and you have

(26:43):
experience Yep, a hundredpercent but you don't have that
exact experience because itdoesn't exist.

Speaker 2 (26:53):
Yeah, and every organization has their own
nuances, every industry hastheir own nuances, their own
terminology, their own language,and it can only just snowballs,
and snowballs too, especiallyif you're not aligned up front.
Yeah, is that an area where yousee a lot of misalignment, too
is in that initial discovery,because I think that's
especially when it comes down tocost.
That's an area that always getspushed back on a little bit.
Is you want to spend X amountof time up front to understand

(27:14):
those intricacies?
But I feel like often, when itcomes down to negotiations,
that's the first thing thatoften gets pushed back on or cut
.

Speaker 1 (27:21):
Yeah, you're right, You're absolutely right, it is.
And I think that's where when westarted to evolve things at
LaunchCode and when we were inthat time and I see it now as
well and I like the model betterwhere, if the client can have
an on-staff project lead like aPO or like a technical lead,

(27:41):
somebody that understands how itcan be done, companies that can
provide these development teams.
So from the partner side, mystatement of work is a team.
Right, it's not this neverending scope of work that
constantly evolves, changes andwhat you start with is never
what you end with and that'salways what it is, because

(28:02):
things change, client requestscome up mid cycles, like it
always evolves and changes, aswe know.
So I think that's where theevolution.
If I'm somebody listening tothis and I'm like, oh, I got an
idea and like, how do I do this?
Have somebody in house as aninternal, like specialist under
the product or technical orarchitect or whatever the case
may be, and then have a teamthat person can lead and develop

(28:24):
to an internal project ratherthan outsourcing the entire
thing.

Speaker 2 (28:29):
So is that one of the reasons that you made that
shift from the more deliverablebase to more of the staff-on
base?

Speaker 1 (28:34):
Yeah, and because what we found at the time was
that when we started launching,I wanted to create a different
experience for people.
Right, I wanted to have anamazing client experience,
communicate weird and it's sosimple but then have an amazing
delivery cycle, have amazingexperience from the UI UX.
That was the whole goal when westarted that and as we got

(28:57):
through projects and itcontinued, we had some great
deliveries, for sure, but therewas always friction because the
project scope would alwayschange and no matter how much
due diligence you do up front,it still changes to where what
you talked about originally itnow evolves into something like
very different.
So that means architectdatabase.
There's a bunch of stuff thathas to change to support said

(29:18):
new environment and then thechange request comes along oh my
gosh, no one's happy with theno.
And then it's more time and moremoney and so, like it's really
it's, it creates points offriction and that's not why we
started it when we did so yeah,that was one of the reasons was
to evolve it into a moresimplified delivery on our side.
It was still a great clientexperience and still changing
the status quo, but just lessfriction less friction.

Speaker 2 (29:44):
I love the feedback that you've given and that
advice you gave around havingthat kind of product lead on the
really the customer side.
Is there a specific role whenyou think about those initial
leader champions that had thatbig, bold idea?
Are they the product lead or isthere a specific role that they
should be playing, or does itreally depend on the
organization?

Speaker 1 (29:58):
I think it depends on the organization.
But at the same time, they needto be involved.
It's their vision, they're thevisionary behind this, they're
the ones thinking through whatthat outcome is that they're
trying to solve, for they knowthere's a problem, so they have
a generally like a vision laidout.
They're never going to be inthe weeds on it, but that's
where I think having somebodythat truly understands the
product side and that userexperience is so important.

(30:24):
Like developers, everybody justthinks my devs a dev that's got
like some UI UX, like nodevelopers are phenomenally
brilliant individuals when itcomes to what they do.
It's very rare that they havethat ability from my experience
anyways, to be really great atdesign and user experience at
the same time.
They just they typically don't,Not to say it doesn't exist,
but but that's fairly typical.
So that's why, bringing thebest of both worlds, when you
get like a UI UX designer andthen a developer, you bring that

(30:47):
together and that's a beautifulmerriment of some very creative
thinking and you get an amazingproduct at the end of it that
solves the problem that you werelooking for at the beginning.
So you have to be involved fromthat leadership standpoint to
have certainty on where thatvision is trending and going and
what deliverability looks like.
But the day-to-day it'sgenerally bringing in experts in
those areas.
So how much?

Speaker 2 (31:08):
should those leaders be focused on the economics of
it versus the creativity of it?
And I once again recognize thatthis is very subjective.
Yep, it is.
But what are some of theguardrails that you'd recommend
putting in place to make surethat they don't just become
large science projects?

Speaker 1 (31:23):
Yeah, that's a good question.
So if we're going down thescope work, have an MVP.

Speaker 2 (31:28):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (31:29):
Have something where you're not solving.
You know the homelesspopulation problem of the entire
universe right, have let'sstart in V1 core problem to
solve for and then deliver on itand then get clients using it.
And then get feedback.
And what we found time and timeagain literally every single

(31:49):
one of our projects getting theMVP out the door as quick as you
can, getting client feedbacktransitions into a different V2
than what you thought.
So you're getting a betterproduct at the end of the day
for the people that are buyingit.

Speaker 2 (32:02):
So this really feeds into your.
Don't try to conceptualize whatthe world looks like in 40
years.
Try to ship as quickly aspossible and then continue to
iterate.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (32:10):
Yeah, iterate and go, iterate and go, iterate and go.
If we always joke internally,I'm like okay, for a
presentation or a product orwhatever we needed to show a
client or whatever.
I need a V 0.1.

Speaker 2 (32:19):
You know what I?

Speaker 1 (32:20):
need.
You just need a framework andI'll do the rest.

Speaker 2 (32:22):
Then we'll go to the napkin drawing.
Totally yeah, start there.

Speaker 1 (32:25):
Like really, cause then you're getting things out
as quick as you can, you're notwaiting two years to deliver on
something, cause it's this, thecomplete and aid, is that
product that you've created,when all you need to do is A to
D yeah, and then you maybeneeded to go like four to that.
You're not even in the alphabetanymore.
You know what I mean.
Like it happened a lot, itreally did.
So I think that would be mybiggest suggestion in that

(32:47):
situation would be to minimize,take what you think and then cut
it down and then ask yourpotential clients see what they
say and then you go from there,and constraints drive curiosity
as well.
Ooh, that's a good line.

Speaker 2 (32:58):
I actually, so I stole it from Layla.

Speaker 1 (33:00):
I could tell because you looked right over, I looked
right over, so we were talkingabout it right before the show.

Speaker 2 (33:03):
Yeah, and so I stole it from Layla, that's good.

Speaker 1 (33:06):
Nice job, Layla.

Speaker 2 (33:07):
Nailed it.
Yeah, nailed it.
I feel like you're becomingpart of the show now.
You know what.

Speaker 1 (33:12):
I'm like that little voice in your head.

Speaker 2 (33:16):
You can't see me, but occasionally I'm there.
So then, when some of thesethings, so you have the MVP in
place and you start to iterate,you start to learn.
What are some of the pitfallsthat you see organizations make
as they take these MVPs?

Speaker 1 (33:33):
and start to bring them out to the world?
That's an interesting question.
I haven't seen that a lot inthe projects we specifically
worked on.
What I found was I think here'sa misconception that I think-
Okay, I love misconceptions.

Speaker 2 (33:47):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (33:48):
I think people think it's easier to scale a product
than it is, because when youhave an idea and you bring
something out, I believe fromsome of the conversations we've
had with a couple of partners,we're just going to, we're going
to release this and we're goingto get a bunch of clients
closed and we're going to expandthis, and then we're going to
do this.

Speaker 2 (34:05):
We're going to.

Speaker 1 (34:06):
are you now Like it's like?
I don't know Like it's?
It seems easy in theory buthard in practice and and so it's
less development related, moreof the product and the business
side of things.
To scale that, because Ibelieve people don't do enough
due diligence by asking thepeople that are buying enough
questions.

Speaker 2 (34:23):
I think it gets glorified right now too right
you hear all these stories ofokay, we have these crazy
valuations.

Speaker 1 (34:28):
We have these.

Speaker 2 (34:30):
There's so much money being thrown at some of these
organizations that have thisnapkin drying and are changing
the world with X, y and Z.
But it is hard, right, it's not.
It doesn't just flip a switch.
And you hear so many of thesuccess stories around funding,
around things that are goingwell, but you don't hear the
flip side of it, which is all ofthe challenges and all of the
horror stories about whathappens when it doesn't.

Speaker 1 (34:50):
Yeah, even where it takes to get there, like all
this overnight success that'staken 10, 20, 30 years.
Yeah, like it's not that easy.
And people, it's a glorifiedenvironment.
Yeah, like it's.
Yeah.
Anyways, that's a whole nothersubject.
I feel like that's anotherpodcast episode.

Speaker 2 (35:06):
Yeah, a hundred percent, yeah, so when people
are picking these partners tohelp walk them through this
process, yeah, once again, Iknow we touched on it a little
bit, but there's some of thealignment components that people
should be looking for as well,because there are different
types of organizations withdifferent philosophies around

(35:28):
how to approach some of thisdevelopment work.
Is there questions that youcould think of?
If you were to say here's thetop two or three questions that
I should be asking my potentialdevelopment partner, what would
you think those would be?
That's an interesting question.

Speaker 1 (35:42):
I partner.
What would you think thosewould be?
That's an interesting questionI would.
I've.
First of all, I'd start withwhere are their developers and
how?
What's the communicationstructure and how does that look
like?
That was something that we tookover a lot of projects when they
were overseas somewhere.
No cameras didn't engage inconversation, communication,
they would just deliver thingswithout.
So there was a lot of, therewas a lot of challenges around

(36:04):
the engagement model betweentheir Canadian, their Canadian
lead, if you will the client,the Canadian lead on the partner
side and then the actual teamdoing the work.
So I think it would look at thecadences on how you communicate
and how I how do I, as theclient, have transparency on
what's happening on theday-to-day and what does that
look like?
Like, we provided dashboardswhen we were doing that and we

(36:25):
would give insights on all ofthe that the client could log in
at any time see the dashboard,see what the sprint was, see
what the burndown was, see whateverything was, budget time, all
of it.
We had it all there because wewanted to create a transparent
environment.
Not a lot of organizations didthat out there, so that would be
key.
How do I?
I think that first and foremostis understanding where's the
team, what's the communicationstructure and how does that look
like?
How are sprints structured andset up?

(36:47):
Can I be involved in thestandups, even if you want, like
seeing what the willingness isfor them to allow you to engage
in the project itself?
We wanted our clients it's apartnership we wanted them in
the standups, we wanted them inthe scrums, like we wanted them
involved, because then you avoidassumption through the process
and so involvement where theyare and then how transparent are

(37:08):
they with the process.
And I think if you can getthose three things covered, the
rest of it can be worked outpretty easily.
But those are the three areas Iwould say are very important,
especially if they're not likeyou can't do this eyeball to
eyeball thing.

Speaker 2 (37:20):
How important is the technical side of it?
You know you talked about thearchitecture and stuff but I
feel like there's a lot ofpeople that got hung up.
In what language are wedeveloping?

Speaker 1 (37:29):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (37:29):
Are we using waterfall or agile Like there's,
that's a whole notherconversation.

Speaker 1 (37:34):
I know that's what that.

Speaker 2 (37:35):
I think I feel like we have four or five episodes.

Speaker 1 (37:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (37:37):
What is some of the things that people get hung up
on that are inconsequential orlike I think it depends?

Speaker 1 (37:43):
Yeah, you're right.
Yeah, that's a good question.
Do they matter?
What depends who you're talkingto at the client.
If you're having conversationswith CEO, coo, the president
like they're not going to carewhat, they don't care what the
technology is, does it work withwhat we got?
Yeah, cool, like they don'tcare.
But when you're getting intothe team around it, that's when

(38:04):
that's going to be a point ofconversation.
I believe that the modernlanguages are required in order
for them to have the same lookand feel as what they're
expecting, cause what they useevery day is now what they
expect their internals to looklike.
So I do believe, like yournetsand those types of things are
maybe not as common, we'restarting to see more now.
So that's where I think itmatters in some of those
situations.
And then integrations is itgoing to work together?

(38:25):
Is it going to?
We all know what APIs are.
If we don't, it's handshaking,two, two systems.
Is it going to work?
And that's what the people thatare making the decisions, that
are signing the checks, careabout.
And then the intricacies ofhaving a lead dev or a lead
architect supporting therequirements that are there.
Yes, they're important, but thedecision makers generally in
the projects that we worked on,didn't care, it's you make sure

(38:48):
that it works on.
My team Got it.
Yes, sir, yes, ma'am, that typeof thing.

Speaker 2 (38:51):
And then there's people that are concerned,
obviously, about the scalabilityand bringing the MVP into
something where you're nothaving to do rework after rework
and not having to do reworkafter rework, and I think that's
where you got to do duediligence up front as the client
.

Speaker 1 (39:01):
What projects have they done?
How do they make sure that itcan scale?
Where is it going to be used?
How many users are?

Speaker 2 (39:07):
going to be there.

Speaker 1 (39:07):
What type of redundancies do we need to be in
place?
There's a lot of pre-workthat's the due diligence stuff
that has to come together inorder for you to avoid the
rewrites.
And You're right, it's a messwhen that happens, and that's
what I found.
If you don't do the duediligence up front and ask all
those questions, then you buildit for failure at the end of the
day, so that's also on thepartner as well.

Speaker 2 (39:28):
That makes sense.
What kind of financial modelscould people expect as they're
embarking on some of thesedifferent evaluations?

Speaker 1 (39:36):
I don't know, 50 to 5 million, that kind of thing,
and then.

Speaker 2 (39:38):
So yeah, cost I guess is different, but are most
projects, time and materials.
We talked a tiny bit about therisks of some of the yeah, yeah,
if you're going to go scoped.

Speaker 1 (39:49):
It's interesting, there's no one answer.
I guess that's why I'm tryingto get my thought wrapped around
this, because there's not justone answer to this.
Earlier days we'd give rangesbecause you don't know until and
sometimes doing as much duediligence, you still don't know
until six months down the roadwhen you're like, oh, that's
actually how it went, becauseit's all hypothetical until that
point in time, even if you havea ton of experience.

(40:09):
So we would give ranges but,like our clients would just go
for the top end anyways.
We're like, okay, so I got abudget for the top anyways, yep,
because we just don't know, andwe would only bill for the time
that was used.
So back to transparency.
We would track all of ourteam's time that was involved in
the project.
We would provide reports on amonthly basis and show hours and
then direct billables to hours,all directed towards the

(40:31):
overarching scope of that highend of the budget that they've
accounted for.
And I've heard situations andwe never did it this way, but
I've heard situations of billingper sprint.
I've heard situations and wenever did it this way, but I've
heard situations billing persprint, and that's great and all
but from the the from my side,from like the launch code hat
side or the delivery team side.
How do you scale an organizationwhen you don't have certainty
on the, the way your billablesare coming in every month?

(40:54):
You don't, so how do you have ateam around that If I don't?
If I have, this is going totake 25 sprints, but we only
build per sprint and you canwalk away at any time.
I carry a lot of the risk then,so we never went down that path
, but I've heard of some peopledoing that.
That's where I now go back,though, to that evolution, to
the staff walk flat rate.
It is.
We believe it's going to benine months.

(41:15):
You have certainty on yourbudget every month coming
through.
It's a per person.
Do on your budget every monthcoming through, it's a per
person.
Do what you want with thesepeople.
Right Now I've got a lot more.
I have a lot more certainty onwhat my P&L is going to look
like internally and what myspend is on the project.

Speaker 2 (41:28):
So you can both manage that risk as the person
that's consuming those servicesBecause I can also imagine from
a customer standpoint.
It's incredibly scary to go ona road trip if you don't know
how far you're driving Totally,and that's a great analogy.

Speaker 1 (41:40):
And if you think about it too, who you're selling
to?
They might be okay with anagile approach and a purse
sprint, but the CFO won't be.
Yeah, they want waterfall.

Speaker 2 (41:47):
They want predictability.
It'll be somewhere between $1and infinity, yeah.

Speaker 1 (41:51):
I've never heard a close along those lines.
That's a tough one to sign,that.

Speaker 2 (41:54):
I'm going AI, so another thing that could
probably take up a full episode.
You got the time row, just soyou know.
But from a surface levelstandpoint what are?
Some of the big changes thatare coming to the development
world, especially when it comesto custom dev with the impacts
of AI.
Oh man, you did this questionat the end.

Speaker 1 (42:16):
I don't know how to summarize this.
This is crazy.
I think I was talking tosomebody yesterday, this week
what the new evolution in someof the in the AI verse I'm just
going to call it that Neverexisted six months ago, so it is

(42:39):
wild how fast it's changing.
And so for custom dev, I thinkit's a great enabler, and in
order for clients to see success, you have to partner with
somebody that understands thespace well, and there's a couple
of shops, specifically inCalgary and Alberta, that that
really hone in on on that AI andML kind of experience

(42:59):
experience lean into the onesthat are experts in that area,
because they're the ones thathave people that are constantly
evolving in it.
I will say this you don'tnecessarily need the ai like you
might just need to automateyour manual process yes, when
that would be a massive impactto the business.
So from the partner side ofthings like the launch codes of
the world, it's AI is a greatconversation because it opens

(43:22):
doors, gets people involved inconversation and it also
backfills a lot of potentialwork to help drive business into
your organization.
All these companies will knowthat From the client side, they
think they all need it, but theydon't, I would argue, the fact
of the relevancy in which theyneed it.
So that's, I'm going to goahead.
You got thoughts.
No, I'm going to go ahead.
You got thoughts.

Speaker 2 (43:39):
No, I was going to say there's a little bit of a
frenzy around it.
I think you're right 100%.
There is a lot of AI washinggoing on and I think that is a
dangerous thing.
But also, ai has been aroundfor a long time Decades.
Yeah, the fuel sensor in my carthat says whether or not I need
to get Dude.
Your car is like a 2024.
And 2024.

(43:59):
And it's also an electric car,but I do have a gas car at home.
I have the fuel sensor in thatcar.
That's a form of AI to saywhether or not I need an oil
change, or whether or not I needto fill up my tank, or how far
can I go.
It's not as, anywhere near asadvanced as some of the stuff
out there.
Oh, totally.
But I think that thefundamentals of understanding
the use case, understanding thebusiness problem you're trying

(44:21):
to solve it's just another toolin the tool belt, totally agree,
and I think it's creating somereally strong conversations,
which is really exciting.
But it's not.
The world isn't changingtomorrow.

Speaker 1 (44:31):
No, I think you nailed it and if you look back,
I think it was what like 1972 orsomething.

Speaker 2 (44:36):
No.

Speaker 1 (44:36):
The chess player that first got beat by a computer or
whatever.
I think it was the seventies.
Yeah, I can't remember his name.
I think it was someone.

Speaker 2 (44:43):
I was going to say but, I think it's like a Russian
or something.
I was going to say a GaryKasparov, but I don't know if
that.
See, it sounds Russian.
I think we're on the same page.
Fact check.

Speaker 1 (44:50):
Okay, yeah, layla says any further into that,
because I have no intelligencebehind that and can't back
anything.
I would say further to that,but I've talked to very smart
people and that's the baselineto it.
Like Gen AI Google translatoris Gen AI.
That came out in 2007,.
I think somewhere around thereearly 2000s, so it's been around

(45:12):
forever and I'm a hundredpercent a believer of what you
just said.
Like it's just another tool,right, and it's on us as people
to evolve and use the tool.
And will it take jobs?
Yep, 100%, but it's going tocreate more than it takes, and
I'm a big believer that you'vegot to keep up with the
technology and the space that'sout there and use it to your
advantage and leverage to grow.

(45:33):
So I'm excited for it, man, butyeah.

Speaker 2 (45:37):
I could go on but yeah, so I know we've talked a
lot today already.
I feel like we could keeptalking for a couple more hours.
It's our gift man, it's ourgift.
If you were to leave peoplethat are listening with one last
piece of advice around the waythey can get the most value
through some of theseinteractions with their
different custom dev providers,what would that be?

Speaker 1 (46:05):
One thing man I don't like being limited.

Speaker 2 (46:07):
We just talked about constraints.
Constraints are good.

Speaker 1 (46:08):
Yeah, this is true, constraints are good.
If I had to prioritize it, Ilike the communication.
I really do, because I thinkyou can go through and ask a lot
of questions and do a lot ofdue diligence.
Do your homework, understandthe capabilities of the
organization you're partneringwith, know the clients that
they've done work for, haveconversations with them.
I'm trying to say a lot tosummarize what my thinking is

(46:29):
here, but I've just seen so manyprojects go wrong because of a
lack of that upfront, so I guessthat's it right there.

Speaker 2 (46:37):
So making sure that you have a partner with strong
communication and do your duediligence on it.

Speaker 1 (46:42):
Okay, upfront, understand the problem you're
solving for, be crystal clear onthe problem you're solving for
and then over-communicate withall your potential options from
partners.
I'm going to go with that.
It works Clarity communication.
There's my summary.

Speaker 2 (46:56):
Clarity Almost your 50%, that's 50%, all right,
thanks for taking away from me.
If people want to get in touchwith you, if they want to
connect with you, if they wantto learn more, what's the best
way for?

Speaker 1 (47:06):
them to do that.
Yeah, linkedin I'm prettyactive on there.
It's always the best you canfind me.
It's I'm sure you'll put Iconversations around.
How do we potentially help,give some guidance and support
people as they go down that path, because it can be messy?

(47:27):
Yeah, Amazing.

Speaker 2 (47:28):
Thank you so much.

Speaker 1 (47:29):
This has been an absolute blast.
Yeah, thanks for having me.

Speaker 2 (47:32):
Yeah, thank you again .

Speaker 1 (47:33):
Yeah, we'll do it again.
I hope, I think we will.

Speaker 2 (47:35):
I feel like we have episodes four through five, yeah
, already lined up.

Speaker 1 (47:38):
Yeah, layla's got the notes.

Speaker 2 (47:39):
Awesome.
Thanks so much.

Speaker 1 (47:41):
Yeah, thanks, man Appreciate it.

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