Does your organization take advantage of all its data? In this episode of People Heroes Rising podcast, William Tincup learns about leveraging analytical data from Tom McKeown, Product Owner for Predictive People Analytics Solutions at isolved.
Live at the isolved Connect roadshow in Palm Springs, Tom talks about his journey from a homegrown product owner to becoming full blown part of isolved after his company was purchased. McKeown gives insight into the company's new initiative of embedding analytics throughout the platform, making analytics easier and more accessible for users. McKeen also talks about future plans for integrating AI technologies into the platform, primarily natural language processing.
Improvement through leveraging data, customer feedback, and planning for the future is an important mindset if you want to keep everyone happy. If there's aspects of your organization that are not performing well, you could just be one data set away from actionable insights. Listen in to learn more.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
William Tincup (00:06):
Ladies and gentlemen, this is William
Tincup and you are listening tothe Recruiting Daily podcast.
We're here with Tom at isolvedconnect in Palm Desert, Palm
Springs.
This is my second connect andlast year we were in Nashville
and it was fantastic.
This year.
Better than fantastic.
It's crazy.
Yeah.
Uh, so Tom, do us a favor andintroduce yourself.
(00:26):
Tell us a
Tom McKeown (00:27):
little bit about you.
Okay.
So I'm Tom McKeen.
I'm, uh, currently the productowner at isol for the predictive
people Analytics solution.
Um, my company was actuallyacquired by Isol back in, uh,
June of, uh, 2021.
Yep.
Um, and uh, this is my thirdconnect.
I went to the first one, uh,Miami.
Yeah.
Missed Miami.
Miami.
Missed Miami.
Miami.
Yeah.
That was, dang it.
(00:47):
Yeah.
Was I was just outta the gate asan Isol employee.
But, um, uh, just the, um...
You know, they've all beengreat, and each one better than
the other.
The life of the customer baseand the enthusiasm, both of them
and the employees, it's createdan electric atmosphere.
It's
William Tincup (01:03):
crazy.
First of all, I think theacquisition was really, really
smart of them.
Really really smart.
Because you were doing greatwork.
And, uh, you were I think, apartner with them, uh, before
Tom McKeown (01:13):
Well, we were actually pursuing a partnership.
You were?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's why I knew there
William Tincup (01:17):
was, there was, I knew there was a, there was
something there.
Mm-Hmm.
And they're, and they're like,you know what?
We like this so much.
But, uh, they also, they also
Tom McKeown (01:24):
liked you.
Yeah.
That was, it was, that was it.
It was a chemistry between the.
The, uh, people running here andmyself, and it really worked out
well.
Well,
William Tincup (01:33):
I've known you forever.
Yeah.
We won't say years, Tom.
Yeah, exactly.
Because at a certain point inlife, we just don't say years.
Yeah, for a while.
I think we were chasing arounddinosaurs
Tom McKeown (01:41):
at I always, I always make the joke that, uh,
you know, we're both fromDallas, but I see you more times
outside of Dallas.
100%.
William Tincup (01:48):
I, I, that's true of a lot of my friends.
They're like, you know what?
I have to see you in Vegas.
Yeah.
To actually sit down with you,I'm like, I know, I know.
Um, so I've talked to people.
Ryan and I got to sit down witha bunch of customers yesterday.
And we went through kind of alitany of just kind of what's
going on, what do you like, whatcould you change, this, that,
the other.
(02:08):
Analytics came up.
A lot of what they'd like to do.
You know, like, they've got alittle nibble, they've got a
little taste, and they're like,they want to do more.
And, and, I didn't get thefeeling that they were
terrified.
I got the feeling like this isexciting
Tom McKeown (02:23):
for them.
No, and, uh, one of theinitiatives that, uh, we're
rolling out, uh, this year inone of our, I think, four
pillars is analytics everywhere.
So, you know, we sell PPA,Predictive People Analytics as a
separate application and itaggregates data from all the
different, uh, uh, solutions,but we're starting now to like
embed parts of it within theisolved core product.
(02:45):
Oh, smart.
Yeah.
Yeah.
William Tincup (02:46):
And is that just given, that's just a part of
Tom McKeown (02:48):
what that is?
Yeah, just a part of it, a partof it in, um, an, um, an ROI
dashboard and, um, um, a, Um, anexecutive dashboard, and then
down the line, uh, we're goingto be, uh, putting in a, uh, a
benchmark dashboard.
I love that.
Yeah, because, uh, we've, uh,one of our newest offerings in
PPA, and it's not by any meansgoing to be limited in PPA, is
the, uh, Benchmark Insights, uh,product.
(03:10):
So, um, yeah.
Like me, type
William Tincup (03:11):
stuff, if they're a grocery or a
franchisee
Tom McKeown (03:15):
or whatever.
You can give them benchmarksalaries, tenure, turnover
rates.
Oh, I love all of it.
Yeah.
Well,
William Tincup (03:19):
first of all, you're making, you're making
analytics.
You're lowering the threshold orthe barrier to entry.
It can be, not for you, becauseyou've been doing this for a
while, but for the averagepractitioner, it can be
intimidating.
They might not trust their data,they might not trust their own
skill set, etc.
And so you've made it kind ofeasy for them to just hit a
button.
It's the
Tom McKeown (03:39):
easy button.
You know, it's funny, when Ifirst started out doing this, I
used to always be astounded atOne of the answers I get, why
people wouldn't want to do it,they say it's too advanced for
us.
Right.
Yeah.
And it's like, we're trying tomake it easy.
And that has really kind offaded away.
And a big part of it has been,um, partly working with a group
(04:01):
here that knows how to makethings easy and familiar.
Um, you know, of course you wantto talk about the stuff that are
unique and, you know, futurefacing.
But you, you know, you got tobring it home so people can use
it and are not intimidated byit.
William Tincup (04:15):
I think that, I think the, uh, the, the idea of
Analytics Anywhere is genius.
Yeah.
Because then you meet them wherethey are.
If they're in recruiting, ifthey're in performance, if
they're in whatever, at onepoint, they might need some
inside the four walls of thatthing.
Exactly, yeah.
They might need some analytics.
Boom, hit a button, be able tosee what's going on, to be able
to tell a story about it, etc.
Tom McKeown (04:35):
Like, I love that.
Yeah, and the first place we, wedid it was actually we, we, we
rolled out our compensationplanning product.
And, uh, yeah, we put a reallyrobust dashboard in there with,
uh, comp ratios and all sorts ofbreakdown stuff.
Yeah.
William Tincup (04:50):
Yeah.
That's genius.
Yeah.
You know, I really lovecompensation and, um, the
relationship that usuallydoesn't happen, but, but can
happen between recruiting andtalent acquisition and comp.
Yeah.
Because they both care on onelevel or another, they care
about offer letters.
Mm hmm.
So, recruiters have to get themout, but they've also got to be
(05:10):
right.
They've got to be accurate,right?
So, they can get them out, butif they're not accurate, now
you've got a problem.
You've created a problem forcomp.
So,
Tom McKeown (05:19):
bringing those two together...
And that split second of messingup a letter could cost you a
candidate.
They took another offer.
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
William Tincup (05:24):
Especially, especially these days when
candidates are, are really...
Gauging people in speed andquality.
It's like, okay, you've gottaknow, or that for that, you
know, let's say that datascientist that you want to hire
Yeah.
What they're worth, whatthey're, what they're going to
get.
Yeah.
What internally, yeah.
You, you're paying the otherdata scientists, et cetera.
So I
Tom McKeown (05:44):
love, and in the time it takes to reprocess a
letter, they usually havemultiple offers on the table.
A hundred percent.
William Tincup (05:49):
Yeah.
Or have accepted a job somewhereelse.
Tom McKeown (05:51):
Exactly.
Yes.
So
William Tincup (05:53):
what's 2024 look like for you?
What do you see?
What do you want to, uh.
What do you want to do at 24?
So
Tom McKeown (05:59):
a couple of things, um, uh, the, the, the analytics
anywhere is kind of the, thefirst part of it.
Right.
Um, but, uh, you, you talked alittle bit about people not
being as intimidated byanalytics.
They're not as intimidated as,from the AI as much either.
Right.
So we're looking to do a lotmore with, other than just kind
of the machine learning bar ofAI.
Uh, we, we've dabbled a littlebit with, um, natural language
(06:22):
processing in our product, butuh, it's, it's, it's been more,
you know, um, Picking out wordsfrom the phrase, so we're
starting to work a little withChatGBT, and we're hoping to put
more integrated narratives inwith the product.
Oh, nice.
It's like a, you know, you see agraph, this is a graph, what
does the graph tell me?
Press a button, there comes anice dialogue.
Right.
Well, you can see
William Tincup (06:41):
that in performance.
I mean, you can see kind of anatural, there's things that
happen in performance, there's abunch of what's not said.
Yeah.
What's said, or what's stated,okay, there's this form, or
there's this thing, and okay,here's what's stated.
What was the intent?
What was meant by that?
Tom McKeown (06:56):
Yeah, what was, you know, gleaned from that, that is
plain to one person, but maybeanother person.
William Tincup (07:01):
So you, if you went, uh, you started with the
analytics everywhere with oneproduct.
Where do you, you want to tryand proliferate all throughout
the platform?
Tom McKeown (07:10):
Yeah, absolutely.
And kind of also in a manner oflike, you know, giving them the
taste where they stilleventually come back.
But it's more of a, where wouldit do the most good, you know?
One very basic place we startedout, we started with the org
chart, putting an org chart inthe product.
We've come full circle.
William Tincup (07:29):
You and I have
Tom McKeown (07:29):
come full circle.
That's right.
We were back selling org chartsin the late 2000s.
Well,
William Tincup (07:35):
it was a genius plan then.
I mean, it was genius then, it'sgenius now.
Nothing's changed.
Still gotta know where peopleare, and how to get to them, and
how to get in touch with them.
Tom McKeown (07:46):
Exactly, and nothing tells you where, that,
you know, like, people aren'treporting to anybody than seeing
it.
Right.
William Tincup (07:52):
Dotted line.
Okay.
No line.
Tom McKeown (07:54):
Um, maybe that's a bad thing.
So these ten people have not hada manager for six months.
Yeah.
Or a review.
Yeah,
William Tincup (07:59):
exactly.
Or any, I don't know, guidance?
Yes.
I don't know, simple stuff likethat.
Well, what's your, what's yourfavorite part of this Connect?
What's, what do you point towhen you go home and talk to
your friends, family, what not,or you're going to say, you know
what, that was really cool?
Tom McKeown (08:13):
Uh, I've been joking about this with both my
colleagues and clients.
It's seeing people in 3D again,you know, we're just, we're
just, uh, you know, I'm notteamsed out, but it's like,
yeah, you just, um, there's justsome, some things you don't
glean from getting on one ofthose remote calls.
And we, we, uh.
We have such phenomenalcustomers that, uh, you know,
(08:34):
that share, and we get them intorooms together, and they know
each other too, and uh,someone's talking and says like,
we could really use that.
Oh, you know, here's how we doit this way, and it's like, uh,
you know, they're helping eachother.
Um, I sat down at a table withtwo partners, partners
yesterday, and one of them soldthe other one another thing,
just cause, yeah, that's cool,do you want a commission?
(08:56):
No, no, this is why we do thesethings.
Oh no, that's great news.
Yeah,
William Tincup (09:00):
yeah.
You know what's, Tom, we won'tuse names or any of that type of
stuff, but again, we've been inthe industry for a long time.
This is the first time I can, Ithink that this is, like, you're
part of a movement.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
Like, you know, there wasmomentum at other firms.
Yeah, yeah.
Got that.
But,
Tom McKeown (09:17):
like, this is, this feels different.
It does feel different, um, uh,particularly, I've, I wouldn't
say I'm like a serialentrepreneur, really Trend Data
was the only company I started.
I was at a couple of mid sizedcompanies that got bought, but
the journey always kind of diedafter I got bought because the
acquirer just didn't know how todo things.
Here I just feel like it's like,you know, you're like a...
(09:39):
Uh, a toddler, a preteen, ateenager, I just feel, like it's
a company on this great, uh,journey and it's, it's, uh,
doing special things and onlymore special things in front of
it.
Well, you, because
William Tincup (09:52):
you've been, uh, other places, the, again, they
were with the road shows, youand I were in Dallas, um, ISOL
doesn't run from theircustomers.
No.
Okay.
So they don't run aftercustomers.
And so when the customer says,Hey, I got this question and
this question, this question,this question, they're like,
okay, cool.
Yeah.
Let's go through those, whereasother software companies, not
just in our past, but othersoftware companies that we know,
(10:15):
man, they run.
Yeah.
They're waiting three months tothe renewal, and then they'll
call, and then they'll talk tothem and kind of
Tom McKeown (10:21):
hammer through.
Yeah.
We had a few, you know, again,not to mention names, but, you
know, we've talked about othervendors they've been with, and
it's like, uh, you know, theyfeel like a number, and it's
like...
If that.
Yeah.
If
William Tincup (10:30):
that.
That's a compliment if they're anumber.
No, here, they, they, theythink, the customers think of
isolved as an extension of theirteam.
Yeah.
Like they're family.
Mm hmm.
Okay, where that just doesn'thappen.
You know this doesn't happen.
In software.
No, no.
We went to HR Tech.
Yeah.
There's not that many companiesthat are great at HR.
Mm hmm.
They're great at creatingadvocacy with their customers,
(10:51):
and again, not afraid to puttheir customers together.
Put them all in one room, andokay, what
Tom McKeown (10:55):
do we know about them?
And I'll tell you, this is myfirst real exposure, even though
we're doing this with a payrollcompany.
And...
There's always going to beproblems with payroll, you've
got to address them, you know,you can't run away.
You're doing nobody a service byrunning.
Exactly, and, uh, yeah, we take,they take them head on, and they
talk to them, and, you know, thefix, fix is for everybody, and
(11:16):
it's, uh, that's why they gotthe loyal base and everything.
William Tincup (11:19):
Well, I view, uh, the success of, of the
acquisition, not just of buyingthe software, which I think was
genius, but of keeping you.
Be having the ability to keepyou because you could do again.
You could flip and do anotherdeal You could go be CRO at name
a company At their ability tothen keep you engaged and keep
(11:41):
you on the team because they'vegot a great team You're part of
a great team, but the theirability to keep you engaged.
I think is it speaks volumes ofyou know The CEO their his
vision, but also the rest of theexecutive team.
Tom McKeown (11:54):
Yeah, and and not Not quanch, quashing like the
entrepreneur because it's likethey allow me to build right and
you know, I Joke with peoplethey say, you know, like, you
know when I was running mycompany I was selling I was
doing the books I was raisingmoney.
I was building the product and Isaid, what do you do with your
time?
I say throw it all into theproduct.
Yeah, I'm still working full butthere's so much more.
(12:15):
Oh, yeah.
Oh,
William Tincup (12:16):
yeah You get to actually be an entrepreneur in
residence.
That's
Tom McKeown (12:19):
well, well
William Tincup (12:20):
stated.
Well, I think of you that way.
Like, I think of you as thatway.
You're an entrepreneur inresidence.
Under a well funded startup.
Exactly.
Extremely, well, we won't saynumbers.
Extremely well funded startup.
Brother, I could talk to you allday.
Yeah, same, same.
Tom McKeown (12:37):
Thank
William Tincup (12:38):
you so much for coming on and being on the
Tom McKeown (12:39):
show.
Yeah, always good, and like Isay, we'll have lunch in Dallas
someday.
At some point.
William Tincup (12:45):
At some point we will, I promise.
Thank
Ladies and gentlemen, this is William
Tincup and you are listening tothe Recruiting Daily podcast.
We're here with Tom at isolvedconnect in Palm Desert, Palm
Springs.
This is my second connect andlast year we were in Nashville
and it was fantastic.
This year.
Better than fantastic.
It's crazy.
Yeah.
Uh, so Tom, do us a favor andintroduce yourself.
(00:26):
Tell us a
Tom McKeown (00:27):
little bit about you.
Okay.
So I'm Tom McKeen.
I'm, uh, currently the productowner at isol for the predictive
people Analytics solution.
Um, my company was actuallyacquired by Isol back in, uh,
June of, uh, 2021.
Yep.
Um, and uh, this is my thirdconnect.
I went to the first one, uh,Miami.
Yeah.
Missed Miami.
Miami.
Missed Miami.
Miami.
Yeah.
That was, dang it.
(00:47):
Yeah.
Was I was just outta the gate asan Isol employee.
But, um, uh, just the, um...
You know, they've all beengreat, and each one better than
the other.
The life of the customer baseand the enthusiasm, both of them
and the employees, it's createdan electric atmosphere.
It's
William Tincup (01:03):
crazy.
First of all, I think theacquisition was really, really
smart of them.
Really really smart.
Because you were doing greatwork.
And, uh, you were I think, apartner with them, uh, before
Tom McKeown (01:13):
Well, we were actually pursuing a partnership.
You were?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's why I knew there
William Tincup (01:17):
was, there was, I knew there was a, there was
something there.
Mm-Hmm.
And they're, and they're like,you know what?
We like this so much.
But, uh, they also, they also
Tom McKeown (01:24):
liked you.
Yeah.
That was, it was, that was it.
It was a chemistry between the.
The, uh, people running here andmyself, and it really worked out
well.
Well,
William Tincup (01:33):
I've known you forever.
Yeah.
We won't say years, Tom.
Yeah, exactly.
Because at a certain point inlife, we just don't say years.
Yeah, for a while.
I think we were chasing arounddinosaurs
Tom McKeown (01:41):
at I always, I always make the joke that, uh,
you know, we're both fromDallas, but I see you more times
outside of Dallas.
100%.
William Tincup (01:48):
I, I, that's true of a lot of my friends.
They're like, you know what?
I have to see you in Vegas.
Yeah.
To actually sit down with you,I'm like, I know, I know.
Um, so I've talked to people.
Ryan and I got to sit down witha bunch of customers yesterday.
And we went through kind of alitany of just kind of what's
going on, what do you like, whatcould you change, this, that,
the other.
(02:08):
Analytics came up.
A lot of what they'd like to do.
You know, like, they've got alittle nibble, they've got a
little taste, and they're like,they want to do more.
And, and, I didn't get thefeeling that they were
terrified.
I got the feeling like this isexciting
Tom McKeown (02:23):
for them.
No, and, uh, one of theinitiatives that, uh, we're
rolling out, uh, this year inone of our, I think, four
pillars is analytics everywhere.
So, you know, we sell PPA,Predictive People Analytics as a
separate application and itaggregates data from all the
different, uh, uh, solutions,but we're starting now to like
embed parts of it within theisolved core product.
(02:45):
Oh, smart.
Yeah.
Yeah.
William Tincup (02:46):
And is that just given, that's just a part of
Tom McKeown (02:48):
what that is?
Yeah, just a part of it, a partof it in, um, an, um, an ROI
dashboard and, um, um, a, Um, anexecutive dashboard, and then
down the line, uh, we're goingto be, uh, putting in a, uh, a
benchmark dashboard.
I love that.
Yeah, because, uh, we've, uh,one of our newest offerings in
PPA, and it's not by any meansgoing to be limited in PPA, is
the, uh, Benchmark Insights, uh,product.
(03:10):
So, um, yeah.
Like me, type
William Tincup (03:11):
stuff, if they're a grocery or a
franchisee
Tom McKeown (03:15):
or whatever.
You can give them benchmarksalaries, tenure, turnover
rates.
Oh, I love all of it.
Yeah.
Well,
William Tincup (03:19):
first of all, you're making, you're making
analytics.
You're lowering the threshold orthe barrier to entry.
It can be, not for you, becauseyou've been doing this for a
while, but for the averagepractitioner, it can be
intimidating.
They might not trust their data,they might not trust their own
skill set, etc.
And so you've made it kind ofeasy for them to just hit a
button.
It's the
Tom McKeown (03:39):
easy button.
You know, it's funny, when Ifirst started out doing this, I
used to always be astounded atOne of the answers I get, why
people wouldn't want to do it,they say it's too advanced for
us.
Right.
Yeah.
And it's like, we're trying tomake it easy.
And that has really kind offaded away.
And a big part of it has been,um, partly working with a group
(04:01):
here that knows how to makethings easy and familiar.
Um, you know, of course you wantto talk about the stuff that are
unique and, you know, futurefacing.
But you, you know, you got tobring it home so people can use
it and are not intimidated byit.
William Tincup (04:15):
I think that, I think the, uh, the, the idea of
Analytics Anywhere is genius.
Yeah.
Because then you meet them wherethey are.
If they're in recruiting, ifthey're in performance, if
they're in whatever, at onepoint, they might need some
inside the four walls of thatthing.
Exactly, yeah.
They might need some analytics.
Boom, hit a button, be able tosee what's going on, to be able
to tell a story about it, etc.
Tom McKeown (04:35):
Like, I love that.
Yeah, and the first place we, wedid it was actually we, we, we
rolled out our compensationplanning product.
And, uh, yeah, we put a reallyrobust dashboard in there with,
uh, comp ratios and all sorts ofbreakdown stuff.
Yeah.
William Tincup (04:50):
Yeah.
That's genius.
Yeah.
You know, I really lovecompensation and, um, the
relationship that usuallydoesn't happen, but, but can
happen between recruiting andtalent acquisition and comp.
Yeah.
Because they both care on onelevel or another, they care
about offer letters.
Mm hmm.
So, recruiters have to get themout, but they've also got to be
(05:10):
right.
They've got to be accurate,right?
So, they can get them out, butif they're not accurate, now
you've got a problem.
You've created a problem forcomp.
So,
Tom McKeown (05:19):
bringing those two together...
And that split second of messingup a letter could cost you a
candidate.
They took another offer.
A hundred percent.
Yeah.
William Tincup (05:24):
Especially, especially these days when
candidates are, are really...
Gauging people in speed andquality.
It's like, okay, you've gottaknow, or that for that, you
know, let's say that datascientist that you want to hire
Yeah.
What they're worth, whatthey're, what they're going to
get.
Yeah.
What internally, yeah.
You, you're paying the otherdata scientists, et cetera.
So I
Tom McKeown (05:44):
love, and in the time it takes to reprocess a
letter, they usually havemultiple offers on the table.
A hundred percent.
William Tincup (05:49):
Yeah.
Or have accepted a job somewhereelse.
Tom McKeown (05:51):
Exactly.
Yes.
So
William Tincup (05:53):
what's 2024 look like for you?
What do you see?
What do you want to, uh.
What do you want to do at 24?
So
Tom McKeown (05:59):
a couple of things, um, uh, the, the, the analytics
anywhere is kind of the, thefirst part of it.
Right.
Um, but, uh, you, you talked alittle bit about people not
being as intimidated byanalytics.
They're not as intimidated as,from the AI as much either.
Right.
So we're looking to do a lotmore with, other than just kind
of the machine learning bar ofAI.
Uh, we, we've dabbled a littlebit with, um, natural language
(06:22):
processing in our product, butuh, it's, it's, it's been more,
you know, um, Picking out wordsfrom the phrase, so we're
starting to work a little withChatGBT, and we're hoping to put
more integrated narratives inwith the product.
Oh, nice.
It's like a, you know, you see agraph, this is a graph, what
does the graph tell me?
Press a button, there comes anice dialogue.
Right.
Well, you can see
William Tincup (06:41):
that in performance.
I mean, you can see kind of anatural, there's things that
happen in performance, there's abunch of what's not said.
Yeah.
What's said, or what's stated,okay, there's this form, or
there's this thing, and okay,here's what's stated.
What was the intent?
What was meant by that?
Tom McKeown (06:56):
Yeah, what was, you know, gleaned from that, that is
plain to one person, but maybeanother person.
William Tincup (07:01):
So you, if you went, uh, you started with the
analytics everywhere with oneproduct.
Where do you, you want to tryand proliferate all throughout
the platform?
Tom McKeown (07:10):
Yeah, absolutely.
And kind of also in a manner oflike, you know, giving them the
taste where they stilleventually come back.
But it's more of a, where wouldit do the most good, you know?
One very basic place we startedout, we started with the org
chart, putting an org chart inthe product.
We've come full circle.
William Tincup (07:29):
You and I have
Tom McKeown (07:29):
come full circle.
That's right.
We were back selling org chartsin the late 2000s.
Well,
William Tincup (07:35):
it was a genius plan then.
I mean, it was genius then, it'sgenius now.
Nothing's changed.
Still gotta know where peopleare, and how to get to them, and
how to get in touch with them.
Tom McKeown (07:46):
Exactly, and nothing tells you where, that,
you know, like, people aren'treporting to anybody than seeing
it.
Right.
William Tincup (07:52):
Dotted line.
Okay.
No line.
Tom McKeown (07:54):
Um, maybe that's a bad thing.
So these ten people have not hada manager for six months.
Yeah.
Or a review.
Yeah,
William Tincup (07:59):
exactly.
Or any, I don't know, guidance?
Yes.
I don't know, simple stuff likethat.
Well, what's your, what's yourfavorite part of this Connect?
What's, what do you point towhen you go home and talk to
your friends, family, what not,or you're going to say, you know
what, that was really cool?
Tom McKeown (08:13):
Uh, I've been joking about this with both my
colleagues and clients.
It's seeing people in 3D again,you know, we're just, we're
just, uh, you know, I'm notteamsed out, but it's like,
yeah, you just, um, there's justsome, some things you don't
glean from getting on one ofthose remote calls.
And we, we, uh.
We have such phenomenalcustomers that, uh, you know,
(08:34):
that share, and we get them intorooms together, and they know
each other too, and uh,someone's talking and says like,
we could really use that.
Oh, you know, here's how we doit this way, and it's like, uh,
you know, they're helping eachother.
Um, I sat down at a table withtwo partners, partners
yesterday, and one of them soldthe other one another thing,
just cause, yeah, that's cool,do you want a commission?
(08:56):
No, no, this is why we do thesethings.
Oh no, that's great news.
Yeah,
William Tincup (09:00):
yeah.
You know what's, Tom, we won'tuse names or any of that type of
stuff, but again, we've been inthe industry for a long time.
This is the first time I can, Ithink that this is, like, you're
part of a movement.
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
Like, you know, there wasmomentum at other firms.
Yeah, yeah.
Got that.
But,
Tom McKeown (09:17):
like, this is, this feels different.
It does feel different, um, uh,particularly, I've, I wouldn't
say I'm like a serialentrepreneur, really Trend Data
was the only company I started.
I was at a couple of mid sizedcompanies that got bought, but
the journey always kind of diedafter I got bought because the
acquirer just didn't know how todo things.
Here I just feel like it's like,you know, you're like a...
(09:39):
Uh, a toddler, a preteen, ateenager, I just feel, like it's
a company on this great, uh,journey and it's, it's, uh,
doing special things and onlymore special things in front of
it.
Well, you, because
William Tincup (09:52):
you've been, uh, other places, the, again, they
were with the road shows, youand I were in Dallas, um, ISOL
doesn't run from theircustomers.
No.
Okay.
So they don't run aftercustomers.
And so when the customer says,Hey, I got this question and
this question, this question,this question, they're like,
okay, cool.
Yeah.
Let's go through those, whereasother software companies, not
just in our past, but othersoftware companies that we know,
(10:15):
man, they run.
Yeah.
They're waiting three months tothe renewal, and then they'll
call, and then they'll talk tothem and kind of
Tom McKeown (10:21):
hammer through.
Yeah.
We had a few, you know, again,not to mention names, but, you
know, we've talked about othervendors they've been with, and
it's like, uh, you know, theyfeel like a number, and it's
like...
If that.
Yeah.
If
William Tincup (10:30):
that.
That's a compliment if they're anumber.
No, here, they, they, theythink, the customers think of
isolved as an extension of theirteam.
Yeah.
Like they're family.
Mm hmm.
Okay, where that just doesn'thappen.
You know this doesn't happen.
In software.
No, no.
We went to HR Tech.
Yeah.
There's not that many companiesthat are great at HR.
Mm hmm.
They're great at creatingadvocacy with their customers,
(10:51):
and again, not afraid to puttheir customers together.
Put them all in one room, andokay, what
Tom McKeown (10:55):
do we know about them?
And I'll tell you, this is myfirst real exposure, even though
we're doing this with a payrollcompany.
And...
There's always going to beproblems with payroll, you've
got to address them, you know,you can't run away.
You're doing nobody a service byrunning.
Exactly, and, uh, yeah, we take,they take them head on, and they
talk to them, and, you know, thefix, fix is for everybody, and
(11:16):
it's, uh, that's why they gotthe loyal base and everything.
William Tincup (11:19):
Well, I view, uh, the success of, of the
acquisition, not just of buyingthe software, which I think was
genius, but of keeping you.
Be having the ability to keepyou because you could do again.
You could flip and do anotherdeal You could go be CRO at name
a company At their ability tothen keep you engaged and keep
(11:41):
you on the team because they'vegot a great team You're part of
a great team, but the theirability to keep you engaged.
I think is it speaks volumes ofyou know The CEO their his
vision, but also the rest of theexecutive team.
Tom McKeown (11:54):
Yeah, and and not Not quanch, quashing like the
entrepreneur because it's likethey allow me to build right and
you know, I Joke with peoplethey say, you know, like, you
know when I was running mycompany I was selling I was
doing the books I was raisingmoney.
I was building the product and Isaid, what do you do with your
time?
I say throw it all into theproduct.
Yeah, I'm still working full butthere's so much more.
(12:15):
Oh, yeah.
Oh,
William Tincup (12:16):
yeah You get to actually be an entrepreneur in
residence.
That's
Tom McKeown (12:19):
well, well
William Tincup (12:20):
stated.
Well, I think of you that way.
Like, I think of you as thatway.
You're an entrepreneur inresidence.
Under a well funded startup.
Exactly.
Extremely, well, we won't saynumbers.
Extremely well funded startup.
Brother, I could talk to you allday.
Yeah, same, same.
Tom McKeown (12:37):
Thank
William Tincup (12:38):
you so much for coming on and being on the
Tom McKeown (12:39):
show.
Yeah, always good, and like Isay, we'll have lunch in Dallas
someday.
At some point.
William Tincup (12:45):
At some point we will, I promise.
Thank
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