In our latest episode, guided by Kaleem Clarkson and guest co-host Josh Morse, we dive deep into the fascinating path of Joshua Parkinson, founder of Post Planner, a SaaS platform revolutionizing social media management. From street performer to philosopher to tech entrepreneur, Joshua’s journey embodies adaptability, creativity, and resilience. This conversation explores his unconventional path, philosophies on work and leadership, and strategies for building a thriving remote-first business in the digital age.
Joshua’s story begins with a degree in philosophy, which continues to shape his worldview. These academic interests fueled his creativity during a transformative period living in Europe, where he supported himself by rapping on the streets. This phase, filled with spontaneity and cultural immersion, also brought personal growth and love—it was during this time that he met his French wife.
Flash-forward to 2009, when Joshua embarked on his entrepreneurial journey with the inception of Post Planner. Inspired by the rise of social media platforms like Facebook, he identified a gap in the market for scheduling tools tailored to marketers. What began as a suite of Facebook apps quickly evolved into a flagship product, now serving businesses across eight social platforms, with Facebook remaining a core focus.
A significant part of Post Planner’s success lies in Joshua’s ability to forge meaningful partnerships. Early on, he collaborated with Slav, a Bulgarian developer who built the platform’s first version. This partnership not only provided technical expertise but also demonstrated the value of leveraging global talent. Today, Post Planner’s development team remains based in Bulgaria, a testament to the enduring impact of this early collaboration.
Post Planner’s innovative approach to work centers on asynchronous communication, offering a refreshing alternative to traditional, meeting-heavy environments. By minimizing interruptions and embracing tools like Slack, the fully remote team maintains a strong focus on output while preserving work-life balance. This model eliminates time zone conflicts—like late-night calls for overseas colleagues—and replaces micromanagement with trust and autonomy.
Joshua, as the company’s founder, champions this method, driven by his distaste for inefficient synchronous workflows. While acknowledging initial concerns about team cohesion, he highlights how written communication fosters thoughtful contributions and builds a culture of autonomy. Employees are free to balance personal and professional priorities without rigid oversight, fostering loyalty and engagement. For startups, he argues, this flexible model reduces costs, unlocks global talent, and drives efficiency—key advantages in today’s remote-first world.
Discover how Joshua’s philosophical roots and global experiences shaped his approach to entrepreneurship. Hear insights into Post Planner’s innovative asynchronous work model and learn how he leverages global talent to build a culture of trust and autonomy. Tune in to hear how Joshua’s journey can inspire your own path and transform your approach to work and leadership!
🔥 Get a Post Planner Promo Code!
CODE: REMOTELY25 🚨
This coupon will get you 25% off the signup fee on any of their plans! 🔥
Learn more about Joshua:
- Joshua’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuaparkinson
More about us:
- Remotely One’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/remotelyone
- Remotely One’s Webpage: https://www.remotelyone.com/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Joshua (00:00):
I moved to Europe after graduating from getting my
(00:04):
degree, and started spittingrhymes on the street to support
Kaleem (00:07):
Here we go.
Keep here.
This is what, this is what we'relooking for.
Let's go.
What do you mean spitting rhymeson the street?
Joshua (00:16):
in the process, I, uh, met my wife, who's French, and,
uh, yeah, lived a life there forabout, five years in Germany
Kaleem (00:26):
So you became a French rapper.
Joshua (00:27):
No, I was, I was a English rapper and singer in a
band, but I was in Germany.
Yeah, but don't ask me to sing'cause I ain't singing.
Kaleem (00:36):
I mean, you, do you remember any of your dope ass
verses?
Give me something.
What do you got?
You remember any verse?
Joshua (00:43):
Oh yeah.
I remember a lot.
Uh, man, it's been a whilethough.
Fiction, unpredictable flows ofnonfiction.
I present like a pro.
May you riff on your world, yourfingers in your toes.
Vibrate cycles.
The sign wave that smile out.
Woes like the sand in the dunes,in the desert.
It roses.
Rolling cycles of Sam Ebbs,Chris Samples, yes I'd like
(01:05):
every man on the planet to knowand each one I mean I have I'm a
bunch of shit but I mean I don'tparticularly want to
Kaleem (01:12):
Okay,
Joshua (01:13):
want to rap
Kaleem (01:14):
in there.
You're in there.
You're in there.
All right, cool.
Josh (01:24):
Welcome back to remotely one I'm, your guest co host josh
morse joined by my esteemedcolleague Kaleem Clarkson.
Kaleem (01:30):
What's happening, man?
What you up to?
Josh (01:32):
Good to see you again, man Thanks for the invite good to be
back
Kaleem (01:35):
Look at that beard though.
That beard looks lovely.
It's filling in nice.
Josh (01:40):
I started putting the nuts and berries back in because i'm
going back to maine Kaleem So Ihave to have that like really
full beard look to be acceptedback across the border
Kaleem (01:51):
Shit, what the hell is in that?
Is that an ultra perm?
Nah, just juices and Bettys.
Just juices and Bettys.
Shit ain't nothing but an ultraperm.
Oh
Josh (02:02):
So since you know how to find us now, do us a favor and
go to rate this podcast.
com backslash remotely one andleave us a review.
Again, it's rate this podcast.
com backslash remotely one.
If you could do that for us,we'd be forever thankful.
Since 2015 remotely one is oneof the largest communities of
remote work professionals withover 3000 slack members and 5000
(02:25):
email members.
It's free to join.
So go check it out at remotelyone dot com.
With that, I will throw it yourway, Kaleem.
And you can tell us abouttoday's esteemed guest.
Kaleem (02:37):
gosh, Mr.
Morris.
I get real nervous when we haveguests like this that are just
really intimidating.
I mean, bro, what type of personcould just rock a fedora and
still look pimping?
You know what I'm saying?
Josh (02:51):
I mean, you asked me yesterday to co host and I went
to his LinkedIn page and saw thefedora and immediately started
sweating.
I had to change shirts.
Kaleem (02:59):
I mean, I mean, for a moment there, I was like, dog,
this, this, this is a brotherover here, man.
Is a brother got his fedora on?
I mean, dang.
So our guest today, Mr.
Morris, is originally from,Well, I'm going to try to
pronounce this Ogden, Utah.
Is that right?
Guess Ogden,
Joshua (03:15):
Aud Cap?
Kaleem (03:16):
Ogden, Ogden,
Joshua (03:19):
I do like aud gin.
I'm gonna use that one movingforward.
Josh (03:22):
He's also a notorious for screwing up people's hometowns.
Well, there's another episode,which I will replay for you.
It's hilarious.
Kaleem (03:30):
listen, it's not about me.
Okay.
It's about our guests, but ourguests also currently resides in
the Bay.
Okay.
AKA San Francisco for all youpeople over the pond that may
not know what the Bay is.
Let's see.
What else?
Oh, Mr.
Morris.
This is something about ourguests that just blows my mind.
Our guest knows some shits.
(03:51):
They got some brains and somethoughts.
They graduated from theUniversity of Utah in like the
most important degree in theworld, philosophy.
They got that BS in philosophy.
Josh (04:02):
I don't think anyone on your show has had as much
knowledge as this guest has, so.
Kaleem (04:07):
I mean, there's been a lot, there's been a lot.
I don't know about how much,because I mean, you know,
philosophy, I'm pretty surewe're going to find out.
I mean, his ass was definitelybroke for a minute.
I'll tell you that, but he gothis master's wasn't, he wasn't
done though.
He wasn't done.
He's like, you know, I want tolearn some more shit, gets his
master's in literature.
Okay.
Oh wait, oh wait, I'm not doneyet.
(04:28):
I'm not done yet.
I need to learn some more stuff.
Then he goes back and gets hismaster's in business.
Yeah.
So yes, our guest knows somestuff.
Let's see, what else do we have?
Oh, after that, he decides tokind of save the world a little
bit.
So not only is an educator andhe just learns everything.
He decides to then go overseasand teach the troops overseas as
(04:50):
a faculty member of theuniversity of Utah or no
university of Maryland.
Is that right?
Guest
Joshua (04:57):
ha.
Kaleem (04:58):
years.
So he's overseas teaching ourtroops philosophy.
I got to do something.
I got to do something.
Not only that, Mr.
Morris, our guest, they moved toEurope.
Most people don't know this, butour guest.
They moved to Europe to bust outsome dope rhymes for the people
(05:20):
in the streets.
Our guest was an MC where theymet his now French wife.
So it worked out.
It worked out.
It
Josh (05:31):
Must, Must, have been good show.
Kaleem (05:33):
I mean, you know, he already busted some rhymes for
us in the pre show.
last but not least, he's now thefounder and CEO of post planner,
which is a social mediascheduling platform.
Listeners.
And viewers, please give a warmwelcome to Josh.
(06:03):
We're getting crazy.
We're getting crazy.
Settle down studio and settledown, settle down.
They can't help it.
They can't help it.
They can't help it.
Thank you for coming, Josh.
Thank you for coming.
Joshua (06:12):
Hey, man, pleasure to be here.
Kaleem (06:15):
Oh man.
So we got so much stuff to getinto, man.
You know, your resume isimpressive.
Your product's impressive.
That's how we connected.
But I'm going to pass it over toMr.
Morris, Mr.
Morris, kick it off with ourfirst interview question.
It's real deep.
Josh (06:31):
Can you take us back to the beginning of your career,
what was it about philosophythat had you so intrigued?
Joshua (06:37):
Oh, man, that's a big question.
I mean, I just loved literaturefrom the get go.
I loved, um thinking about thebig questions in life and, from
junior high onward.
And once I started college, Ijust gravitated toward.
Toward those kind of classes andmy friends were into it as well.
(06:58):
And we like to have those thosedeep conversations.
and read the, you know, theclassic stuff.
And yeah, one thing led toanother and I just wanted to
continue and I still continue tothis day to really dive into
that stuff.
So, you know,
Kaleem (07:14):
Josh, I got a question for you.
So like, what, who's yourfavorite philosopher?
I mean, you studied all thattime.
You taught it.
You got to have one or two.
Joshua (07:20):
You know, I was really into Nietzsche in college and,
and, uh, ended up writing mysenior thesis on him.
I still am a big fan.
Uh,
Kaleem (07:30):
Well, what's Nisha about?
I don't know this.
I don't know this guy.
Joshua (07:33):
he's a German philosopher from the, uh, 19th
century.
Um, you know, existentialphilosopher, super deep all
about individualism and, and atleast that's what I thought was
the most important thing.
But, you know, I've haven'treally got been into Nietzsche
for a while.
Recently, I've really gotteninto David Deutch.
(07:54):
I don't know if you know who heis, but he's written a couple of
books in the last 20 years thatare just mind blowing.
And those are the two I'd nameright now.
Kaleem (08:02):
Pretty cool.
Pretty cool.
Josh (08:04):
They didn't have any classes at, about Nietzsche at
Worcester State, Kaleem?
There
Kaleem (08:14):
quality institution, sir.
Okay.
I didn't take one philosophyclass because you know, I'm too
deep as it is, you know what Imean?
Like I was, I was too deep, youknow, like Snoop Dogg was my
philosopher and you know, hestill is, you know?
Nice.
Josh (08:30):
the second question I had was what was the spark that that
led you to create post planner?
Joshua (08:35):
Well, I would say that during my MBA, I started, kind
of interning at a venturecapital fund in, um, Salt Lake
city.
And I just really discovered thewhole startup world there.
I didn't really know much aboutit at all before then how it all
worked.
And so that's really when Ifirst got the.
(08:56):
You know, idea that, oh, okay.
This is the ecosystem.
This is how it works.
And that was right around, thiswas in 2009 ish.
So that was right around thetime when Facebook's really
coming up.
Social media was coming up andyeah and once I graduated and
actually moved out here to SanFrancisco, I just knew that I
(09:17):
wanted to, you know, do somekind of software startup.
And at the time I was, I kind ofdoing a agency type business
where I was creating Facebookpages for businesses.
This is right when Facebookpages were starting as a thing.
And, you know, I startednoticing that there are apps to
(09:39):
do various things on Facebookpages.
And that led me to think, okay,well, why don't I create an app
to do this or that?
And, originally I wanted to havea whole suite of apps that do
all kinds of stuff on Facebook.
And the first one was going tobe a scheduling app for posts.
And that just turned out to bethe.
(10:00):
The one I stuck with and becamepost planner.
And, you know, that was, and nowwe're here 13 years later and
I'm still doing it.
Josh (10:08):
It's awesome.
Kaleem (10:09):
that's crazy.
So like, do you recall any otherproducts that were out at that
time?
I mean, you're talking 2009.
It's pretty damn early as far asscheduling is.
What was it like HootSuite orsomething?
Some shit like that.
Like what was
Joshua (10:23):
Yeah.
Yeah.
HootSuite was there.
Buffer had just started andthose are still, the two of the
biggest competitors that I have.
But there were, you know, backthen it was all about, you know,
they were trying to convincebusinesses to create basically
their own website in a way onFacebook, on a, on their
(10:44):
Facebook page and.
And a lot of businesses weregoing in that direction where
you know, they'd kind ofduplicate their website inside
of Facebook on their Facebookpage.
So there were these thingscalled tab applications where
you could create tabs on yourFacebook page and then, you
know, add HTML and CS, you know,HTML to it and create a website.
(11:05):
And that kind of went away in acouple of years.
It was really, really big from2010, 2011.
And then it kind of started tofade away in 2012, 2013, 2014.
And you still have, obviouslyFacebook pages are still huge,
but they're not reallydestinations anymore.
They're just ways to, sendcontent to the feed, because the
(11:26):
feed became paramount, you know,after 20, 20, 11, 2012.
but yeah, those are the kind ofbusinesses that were being
started at the time insideFacebook.
And Facebook was, you know, thenumber one, pretty much from
that point forward, Now, we nowpost on a post to 8 different
social networks.
(11:46):
But we started on Facebook andFacebook still are big, you
know, most our users, their mainthing is Facebook.
Instagram is kind of a close2nd, but it's definitely still
Facebook.
So
Kaleem (11:57):
That's pretty cool.
So let me ask you, you're aphilosopher.
You have a philosophy degree.
Yeah.
You go back to San Francisco.
How the hell did you getstarted?
I mean, did you teach yourselfhow to code or did you say, nah,
I'm not even going down thatroute.
Like, so how did you handle thetechnical aspect of post plant
in the early days?
Joshua (12:15):
that's pretty interesting story.
You know, I had ideas forvarious apps to do, and 1 of the
1st ones I had a connection witha person who is in local
politics in Utah, and they wereall these politicians were
starting to come on to Facebookas well.
You know, start their Facebookpages.
(12:36):
And, you know, I'm talking aboutlocal legislators and my 1st
idea was to do, like, a kind ofapp that would allow them to
kind of to pull theirconstituents and get their
opinions on various politicalissues.
And I basically went to Facebookand looked around for apps that
(12:57):
were doing something similar andfunctionality.
And I found one and thathappened to be created by this
guy in Bulgaria.
And I reached out to him to seeif he wanted to, I don't know,
kind of partner with me toprovide this service for these
politicians.
And he said yes.
And that became my he became myco founder, my technical co
(13:18):
founder for Post Planner.
He's the one who built theoriginal version of Post
Planner.
And still my Entire dev team tothis day is in Bulgaria and
really I've met them all throughSlav, who was my co founder.
Slav's no longer withPostplanner, but he's, you know,
always a friend of Postplannerand he's got his own startups
(13:41):
now, but that was the original,story.
Josh (13:44):
That's really cool.
Joshua (13:45):
Yeah.
So it's kind of a good, youknow, bit of advice for business
founders who are looking fortechnical co founders is go out
and see, you know, findapplication software that's kind
of in the corners and not reallysuccessful and reach out to the
founders say, hey, I have anidea about how we can improve
(14:07):
your software.
I'm a business guy.
I'm a marketing guy.
I think we can do somethingtogether.
It's a good way instead of justbeing, you know, the typical
thing is that you're a, you havea business idea and then you're
gonna go out, you're gonna tryto convince some technical guy
to help you.
Often you can kind of go theopposite direction and find
something they've alreadycreated.
(14:27):
And then sell them on the factthat you're going to, you can
help make this big and transformthe product as well.
Kaleem (14:33):
That's good advice.
Got to have a technical person.
Josh (14:36):
So you started in 2009?
You've also, you've obviouslyrode the wave of covid and
remote work and all the funthings that have happened to all
of us.
How did, because this show isobviously ultimately about
remote work.
How did remote work impact youand how did, you know, COVID,
(14:56):
all those things that happenedkind of impact you throughout
the business growth.
Joshua (15:00):
man, COVID didn't affect my business at all, except for
positively.
We have been a hundred percentremote from day one.
As I mentioned, my, my cofounders was in Bulgaria, and
the only way we could work isonline remotely.
Um,
Kaleem (15:16):
So it was remote by force, basically.
Like you needed to
Joshua (15:18):
and yeah, yeah, it's true.
Yeah.
and it's still a great way to gois to go overseas and find, you
know, like, it's just so muchmore economical.
To hire technical guys inEastern Europe or around the
world, than it is to hiresomeone.
I never could have afforded.
I still can't afford to pay.
So an engineer from SanFrancisco, or even in the US or
(15:41):
in, you know, Western Europe,it's just way too expensive.
So.
Yeah.
When COVID happened, it's just,it, there's nothing changed in
the operations of my company.
It's just, it just kept on goingand really in, in fall or a
spring of 2020 and summer 2020,we had a wave of a lot of
signups because, you know, itdrove, I think a lot of.
(16:03):
People, you know, to, to try newmarketing channels and try new
things and.
You know, social media marketingwas 1 of those and post planet
benefited from that wave
Kaleem (16:15):
Yeah, for sure.
You know, there are a lot ofreturn to offices and there are
a lot of headlines, ever since.
March of 20.
It seems like there's just beenthis conflict between employee
and employer employee want, gota taste of something that, you
know, we are a lot of peopleenjoy the flexibility, the
(16:37):
autonomy.
Right.
And then now, you know, postfive years or so, four years or
whatever.
And it's like.
We're seeing a lot oforganizations kind of return
back to the things that they'remost comfortable with.
Right.
And organizational change isnever, never easy, especially if
you're a larger company.
So my question to you is, islike a lot of startups do kind
(16:58):
of follow what is being done Thelarger companies, especially out
there in San Francisco.
And you might have a better, amuch better view on this than I
do.
Right.
You have Salesforce say, no,we're all going back to the
office.
You know, um, so some startupswho get funding and things like
that may kind of fall into this.
Where do you actually see thiskind of thing heading as far as
(17:21):
remote work, even hybrid work inthe startup space, moving
forward.
I mean, you're right there inSan Francisco.
You must be seeing San Franciscoand New York are still.
The two largest cities with thelowest, return to office
percentage.
Joshua (17:37):
Yeah.
San Francisco by far.
Kaleem (17:38):
Yeah.
Where do you see this happening,man?
see this going.
Joshua (17:42):
I mean, to a certain degree, I don't really care what
the big corporations do.
They, I don't really have anopinion whether it's better
thing for their businesses ornot.
It might be.
I know it's not what I want todo in my business.
I've crafted the culture of postplanner to be so easy and, and
(18:02):
lifestyle friendly, um, for myteam that, we literally don't
even have meetings anymore.
We used to meet once every twoweeks for a sprint call, and,
you know, discuss the upcomingsprint, but we decided to even
ask that, and just do it as athread in, in, in Slack because
(18:23):
it's not really, we don't wantto be on the phone, we don't
want to be on a call if, unlesswe absolutely have to be, and me
as the, as the CEO and owner ofthe company.
I never want to be on calls.
I didn't even want to be on thiscall of the day with you guys,
but I'm doing it.
Kaleem (18:43):
I love it with the fedora
Joshua (18:46):
dude, when I, when I wake up in the morning and I
have a call that day, I'mdepressed, man.
I'm like, shit, I have to geton.
I got to get on this podcast at1130.
It kind of what?
All right.
Damn.
All right.
I'll do it.
You know, like, I don't, I don'twant to be on any calls.
I don't want to have any callson my calendar ever.
(19:07):
So,
Kaleem (19:07):
good for you, man.
Like why?
Where did that come from?
Speaker (19:10):
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(21:16):
And now, back to the show.
Joshua (21:18):
well, a few things.
I personally, I don't think Iever work well, I work more
efficiently when I'm in a roomwith other people or on calls
with other people than I do whenI'm alone.
Kaleem (21:31):
Research says that focus you, you have high concentration
is alone.
So you, you're not, you'reright.
Okay.
Mm.
Joshua (21:37):
when you're around, when you're around people or you're
on calls, it's great for thesocial side of it, but in the
end, you devote so much energyto the kind of social,
interactions.
That it really makes you muchless efficient in my opinion.
(21:58):
Um, And, you know what, I mean,this is obviously it's not for
everyone, but I also want I wantmy team.
Because I know they're the same,they don't want to get on calls
either.
You know, at their time.
It's like.
We're doing a call at 9 am inCalifornia and in Bulgaria, it's
like, 7 PM dinner time.
(22:19):
They don't want to be on a call.
And I'm trying to.
And I think what we have donethis that we, like, they
couldn't get a better lifestyleat another company.
Right?
Like, they know that I trustthem that we've worked together
for years.
I'm never going to make them geton a stupid call that they don't
(22:40):
need to be on.
And I trust them.
So they get the work done andthe work is in is obvious.
It's in the results.
I can either.
The tool either has theseimprovements that come through
or it doesn't.
It's obvious if they're workingor not, so they don't have to
pretend, there's no, none ofthat.
And, my goal is like, I don'twant to lose these guys to other
(23:02):
companies.
And, you know, I can't reallycompete with a lot of companies
when it comes to how much theycan get paid.
I'm sure all my guys could getpaid more if they moved to
another company.
But they wouldn't get thelifestyle they get with
Postplanner.
They wouldn't get no meetingsever.
And, you know, a real chill bosswho, doesn't expect, bullshit
(23:24):
from them.
So
Josh (23:26):
an interesting, that's an interesting pitch for like
employment.
I mean, like there's so manypeople like trying to find
people to work.
There's a group of people thatare like, shit, I don't want to
be in meetings all day.
I want a guy that alsoappreciates that and like lives
by it.
So I think that's an interestingway to recruit, man.
I love that.
Joshua (23:46):
of my best buddies here.
He works in education and hespends his entire day on calls.
Like,
Kaleem (23:54):
Most people do most, most organizations do.
I mean, like,
Joshua (23:58):
zoom all day long, you know, with 10 faces on the
screen and.
And it's just like, it kind ofblows my mind.
I'm like, 1st of all, like, thatsounds miserable to me.
And 2nd of all, how is that.
Productive.
Yeah,
Josh (24:13):
I think for certain organizations, like if you're a
sales organization, you have tobe on zoom a lot to present.
But I think you, but you bringup an interesting point.
Like I always think about thisand clean and I've talked about
this, our flop, the onlyphilosophical conversations we
have are about remote work,Josh.
But the philosophical point Ithink here is, No one has time
to actually just sit back thinkabout the work that they're
(24:36):
doing and think about the nextday, the next idea, how to, how
things went, just like instrategy, just in general, but
it sounds like you've put inplace an environment that's
pretty open to that.
That's awesome.
That's great.
Joshua (24:52):
Yeah, it works.
Josh (24:53):
Kudos to you.
Joshua (24:54):
Thank you.
Josh (24:56):
was looking at your profile, Josh, before we started
the call and the experience thatyou had, I think you mentioned
this earlier, but it was withstartups.
And how did that help?
So it looked like you werebehind the scenes, like, looking
at how startups got funded andthe types of questions they get
asked and the diligence and allthose things.
I've been a part of that withthe 3 startups that I've been
(25:18):
at.
How did that help formulate?
Your plan as you move forwardwith your startup, like hot,
what were like some of thetidbits that you grabbed that
you're like, man, I gotta makesure I have this together when I
start my plan here.
Joshua (25:33):
Well, I mean, it just taught me how the whole
ecosystem works.
But it also showed me, you know,I also knew that it's not the
only way to go.
I mean, Post Planner, we nevergot VC funding.
We never even got really angelfunding.
We've been, funded by customercredit cards, as I like to say
from day one, right?
Uh, so I, yeah, bootstrapped.
(25:56):
Um, so, yeah, I learned how thatall works and.
But I gotta say, I don't thinkI, I'm not sure I learned
anything in business schoolthat, you know, I explicitly
apply to or applied to mybusiness, business is common
sense, dude.
You know, it's trial and error.
(26:17):
It's common sense.
It's the ability to learnquickly.
It's the ability to, to seewhat's working, to communicate
with customers.
Try to build things that bringvalue to their lives.
It's not rocket science.
It's a lot of, it's a lot ofhard work and, yeah, I just, I'm
skeptical that that experiencedid anything other than give me
(26:42):
a window into possibilities,right?
I'm looking at these companies.
Various types of companies fromfrom software to, you know,
software, the service to likebiotech to all kinds of things.
And, some of them, they can'teven exist without BC, right?
They have to have funding to getoff the ground.
(27:04):
But a SAS business, like postplanner doesn't, I mean, you
just need to get some customersfrom day one and get them paying
you and get, start gettingfeedback from them and building
what helps them.
So yeah, that's how I'd answeredthat.
I think it was a greatexperience.
I really enjoyed it and it was areally good thing to do right
before coming to San Francisco.
(27:26):
Because as you can imagine, thiswhole.
Peninsula is just, you know,driven by that whole ecosystem,
but in the end, you know, Ididn't end up using it.
I just bootstrapped to mystartup and it was fine.
But I gotta say, I mean, Icouldn't have done that without
my wife, you know, like, becausein the early days.
We had very little revenue,obviously, and we had to build
(27:48):
it up.
It took 2 years really to get tothe point where.
You know, I was making goodmoney.
And yeah, my beautiful Frenchwife supported me, in there in
those 2 years
Kaleem (28:06):
You know, it seems like though that experience in school
did help you because it made yourealize VC funding It's great
for certain people in, and, butit probably made you realize,
(28:27):
wow, you're giving up a lot, alot,
Joshua (28:31):
a life trade offs, you know, like, I have a bunch of
friends here in, in, in the citywho.
Who did take VC and many of themare, you know, 10 times as
wealthy as I am now, you know,so I'm not saying that.
Kaleem (28:46):
right?
It's not all about wealth.
Like post plant is your babypost plant.
It was something that you cameup with.
Like, there's a lot of emotionattached to a business that you
create.
and
Joshua (28:55):
and it's lifestyle like we talked about.
Kaleem (28:58):
Some people want to sell it.
I do have one last question,kind of jumping a little bit
back to.
You thinking about workasynchronously, because I think
a lot of people, when they hearyou say, I can't stand meetings
and I don't even want to be on acall probably blows people's
minds that you can run a companythat's competing against buffer.
(29:20):
That's competing against, youknow, a hoot suite that like
you're competing.
Right.
I left buffer for you.
Sorry, buffer.
But like, the reality is, islike.
You're competing because you'reproviding a lifestyle to your
employees and other things, butthen you also said, Hey, look, I
(29:40):
want to get rid of this typicalway of working that most people
know.
What were some of your biggestchallenges or what are some of
your biggest challenges of beingcompletely asynchronous?
Like if somebody is going tomake the switch, tell me what I
have to be concerned about.
Like, what do I have to beconcerned about?
If I'm like, you know what?
I'm done with meetings.
Joshua (30:01):
I mean.
You know, it all comes down inbusiness.
It all comes down to the peopleyou work with.
You got to get a team togetherthat where this works, that, you
know, that you trust each otherreally trust is number one.
You can't really do what we'redoing.
If I couldn't do what I'm doing,if I was constantly worried
about, oh, this guy's pretendingto work and not really working
(30:23):
and this guy's, free riding and.
And he's getting paid, you know,like I have zero patient for
that right now at this point,and I don't need to worry about
it at all with my team.
And it's, you know, and that's ahard place to get to.
It's not easy to find those kindof people and, you know,
assemble a team that kind of allagrees that this is the kind of
(30:44):
lifestyle and work environmentand culture that they want to be
in.
Some people love office politicsand going to go into the water
cooler and go into the officeevery day.
I get that it's a different kindof lifestyle.
But, you know, what I wanted tosay is that I think that when
you talk about async synchronouswork.
(31:06):
For me, I think that in termsof, you know, the kind of
business I'm in creatingsoftware and really, really what
I'm doing is I'm creatingsoftware and I'm creating
marketing.
That's it.
Right?
I'm building a software productand I'm trying to get people to
use it.
And those 2 things,\ in myopinion, really work well with
(31:26):
asynchronous communication.
You have these goals, you havethese tasks that you need to do.
You got to build, you know, somecampaign.
You got to build a new featurein the app.
You got to describe that newfeature so that your engineers
can build it.
These things, you don't needmeetings for these things.
Kaleem (31:46):
Right.
It's all documentation.
Joshua (31:48):
you need, you need, threads, like you need a thread
in slack.
We can talk about it.
I think humans tend tocommunicate more precisely when
they write than when they talk.
And you know, it kind of is away to, I think a written
communication kind of weeds outa lot of fat bullshit, you know?
(32:10):
and you know, I think that lendsitself well to the kind of work
that we do.
like you said, sales, all kindsof other businesses, it wouldn't
work.
I definitely wouldn't claim thatthis is for all businesses, but,
um, I really do preferasynchronous work.
I love to like, wake up in themorning and have a couple of key
(32:30):
things that I want to do thatday and like, sit back on my
couch and really focus and like,and kill it, right out exactly
what I need to do.
And no one's there to look overmy shoulder.
No one's there to distract me.
I don't have to.
Ask them, my co workers, how wasthe weekend and all this kind of
stuff.
(32:50):
Like, I have friends for that.
You know, I don't need to dothat with my co workers with my
co workers.
I just want to, like, get thejob done, and give us all paid
at the end of the day, you know,so that we can go out with our
friends and our family and talkabout the weekend and talk about
what you're interested in andall this stuff.
I don't want, I don't want to dothat and in the business
(33:12):
environment, and I know my teamdoesn't either.
So, we don't even we don't evenhave off sites in a post.
I know that a lot of SAScompanies, they all bring the
whole crew together for some bigtrip.
And I'm sure that's cool.
I'm sure that they have a goodtime, but we, I mean, I'm just
saying that we have not done itand I don't think it's really
(33:33):
hurt, hurt our, morale or ourteamwork.
We did talk a little bit about,you know, when we first started,
and this is only about 6 monthsold that we completely ended all
calls like bi weekly calls.
We all kind of said that when wesaid, when we did that, all of
this could be, you know, alittle bit dangerous.
(33:55):
Maybe if we never hear eachother's voices that, you know,
might be over a long period oftime.
It might be degrading to ourrelationships and that's this.
The jury is still out on that,but so far, it just really
hasn't made a difference.
It's just made it even easierfor all of us now.
They don't have to skip a dinneronce every 2 weeks to jump on a
(34:16):
call.
When they could just write downeverything in a thread.
So
Kaleem (34:21):
Awesome.
Awesome.
So it sounds like trust acircuitous work, trust.
You gotta be able to measurewhether they're getting the job
done.
I would say, as long as you havethose things there, right?
Cause software work is you havetickets, so you can see what's
being done.
You can see what's being workedon as long, no matter what tasks
you have as a business, as longas you can figure out a way to
(34:41):
measure whether they're gettingthe job done, that includes
sales.
Cause you have sales numbers,you have number of calls, you
have all sorts of things thatyou can utilize.
To determine whether they'remeeting their objectives.
So as long as you have somethinglike that and you trust your
employees, it sounds likeasynchronous work can work for
you.
So I appreciate you kind ofgoing over that.
Mr.
Morris, Josh, we're at the pointof the show.
(35:04):
It's all you, Mr.
Morris.
Josh (35:05):
Tell us about a comical or inspiring moment in remote work,
asynchronous work.
Joshua (35:12):
I mean, I don't have a really comical story so much.
I I, I do have a prettyinteresting one where, you know,
like, um, I told you about myco-founder, Slav, I met him
online on Facebook on, in 2011,let's say.
It was like February of 2011,and I ne I never met him in
person until.
(35:33):
What three and a half ish yearslater, and he came to San
Francisco, he flew into SanFrancisco because he wanted to
go to Burning Man.
And so I had to go pick him upfrom SFO, the airport.
It was such a, strange feeling,I was super nervous.
Probably, a lot of people canrelate to this where, you know
(35:55):
someone that you've worked withfor a while online and you meet
them in person for the firsttime.
It's always a little bitawkward, a little bit, you know,
you're a little bit nervous, butI went there to the airport.
And man, he was like, he waslate.
He was so late.
His plane was like three hourslate.
So I sat there, and I wasnervous when I got there, and I
(36:16):
sat there for three hours, like,being nervous, you know, and it
sucked so bad.
And he finally walked out, andhe turns, I didn't realize how
tall he was.
He's like this huge dude.
And, uh, I'm like, yo, what'sup?
And we, you know, we hit it offpretty well.
We jumped in my car and we droveout.
At that time, we had an officein this little town south of San
(36:38):
Francisco called Pacifica.
It's a little beach town.
And so we drove out to the beachand we stopped at a cool
restaurant and had some food andwe started.
You know, bonding in a way thatyou can't really do remotely.
And it was cool, but it wasdefinitely, uh, you
Kaleem (36:56):
So did you go to
Joshua (36:56):
experience.
He did.
I had gone to Burning Man theyear before, so he came in and
he went to Burning Man.
And then he came back the nextyear again and went to Burning
Man again with his newgirlfriend, who now is his wife
and they have like four kids.
So it worked out, but yeahthat's the experience.
Kaleem (37:16):
Pretty, Pretty, cool.
Josh (37:18):
So where can our listeners find you?
Joshua (37:20):
Hey, go to post planner.
com first of all and sign up forthe, uh, most powerful tool,
Kaleem (37:25):
Get it.
Joshua (37:26):
in social media.
and you know, as far as me,honestly, I'm not really that
online.
I do have a Twitter account atfake hacker.
com or fake, fake hacker.
App fake hacker.
But, you know, I don't reallypost much.
I'm kind of a, I lay low.
All my social relations areright here around me.
(37:47):
So I just, I just, I just buildreally good software and, uh,
and then that's it.
Kaleem (37:54):
That's awesome.
Well, thank you so much forcoming on the show.
I really appreciate it.
thank you, Mr.
Morris for being a guest co hosttoday.
Where can our listeners findyou, Mr.
Morris?
Josh (38:06):
Uh, soon to be a new handle and a website.
I will have to get thatinformation to you when it is
fully formed.
But new, new co is coming.
Kaleem (38:16):
Okay, cool.
New Co.
New Co.
It is.
so much.
Remember that.
And you know what?
You can find him right now.
Josh Morris.
I'm like,
Josh (38:24):
Yeah.
Kaleem (38:26):
awesome.
Well, thank you so much.
I appreciate you both.
Joshes, Josh is squared.
Josh is in my life.
Awesome, man.
I'll talk to you guys later.
Peace.
I moved to Europe after graduating from getting my
(00:04):
degree, and started spittingrhymes on the street to support
Kaleem (00:07):
Here we go.
Keep here.
This is what, this is what we'relooking for.
Let's go.
What do you mean spitting rhymeson the street?
Joshua (00:16):
in the process, I, uh, met my wife, who's French, and,
uh, yeah, lived a life there forabout, five years in Germany
Kaleem (00:26):
So you became a French rapper.
Joshua (00:27):
No, I was, I was a English rapper and singer in a
band, but I was in Germany.
Yeah, but don't ask me to sing'cause I ain't singing.
Kaleem (00:36):
I mean, you, do you remember any of your dope ass
verses?
Give me something.
What do you got?
You remember any verse?
Joshua (00:43):
Oh yeah.
I remember a lot.
Uh, man, it's been a whilethough.
Fiction, unpredictable flows ofnonfiction.
I present like a pro.
May you riff on your world, yourfingers in your toes.
Vibrate cycles.
The sign wave that smile out.
Woes like the sand in the dunes,in the desert.
It roses.
Rolling cycles of Sam Ebbs,Chris Samples, yes I'd like
(01:05):
every man on the planet to knowand each one I mean I have I'm a
bunch of shit but I mean I don'tparticularly want to
Kaleem (01:12):
Okay,
Joshua (01:13):
want to rap
Kaleem (01:14):
in there.
You're in there.
You're in there.
All right, cool.
Josh (01:24):
Welcome back to remotely one I'm, your guest co host josh
morse joined by my esteemedcolleague Kaleem Clarkson.
Kaleem (01:30):
What's happening, man?
What you up to?
Josh (01:32):
Good to see you again, man Thanks for the invite good to be
back
Kaleem (01:35):
Look at that beard though.
That beard looks lovely.
It's filling in nice.
Josh (01:40):
I started putting the nuts and berries back in because i'm
going back to maine Kaleem So Ihave to have that like really
full beard look to be acceptedback across the border
Kaleem (01:51):
Shit, what the hell is in that?
Is that an ultra perm?
Nah, just juices and Bettys.
Just juices and Bettys.
Shit ain't nothing but an ultraperm.
Oh
Josh (02:02):
So since you know how to find us now, do us a favor and
go to rate this podcast.
com backslash remotely one andleave us a review.
Again, it's rate this podcast.
com backslash remotely one.
If you could do that for us,we'd be forever thankful.
Since 2015 remotely one is oneof the largest communities of
remote work professionals withover 3000 slack members and 5000
(02:25):
email members.
It's free to join.
So go check it out at remotelyone dot com.
With that, I will throw it yourway, Kaleem.
And you can tell us abouttoday's esteemed guest.
Kaleem (02:37):
gosh, Mr.
Morris.
I get real nervous when we haveguests like this that are just
really intimidating.
I mean, bro, what type of personcould just rock a fedora and
still look pimping?
You know what I'm saying?
Josh (02:51):
I mean, you asked me yesterday to co host and I went
to his LinkedIn page and saw thefedora and immediately started
sweating.
I had to change shirts.
Kaleem (02:59):
I mean, I mean, for a moment there, I was like, dog,
this, this, this is a brotherover here, man.
Is a brother got his fedora on?
I mean, dang.
So our guest today, Mr.
Morris, is originally from,Well, I'm going to try to
pronounce this Ogden, Utah.
Is that right?
Guess Ogden,
Joshua (03:15):
Aud Cap?
Kaleem (03:16):
Ogden, Ogden,
Joshua (03:19):
I do like aud gin.
I'm gonna use that one movingforward.
Josh (03:22):
He's also a notorious for screwing up people's hometowns.
Well, there's another episode,which I will replay for you.
It's hilarious.
Kaleem (03:30):
listen, it's not about me.
Okay.
It's about our guests, but ourguests also currently resides in
the Bay.
Okay.
AKA San Francisco for all youpeople over the pond that may
not know what the Bay is.
Let's see.
What else?
Oh, Mr.
Morris.
This is something about ourguests that just blows my mind.
Our guest knows some shits.
(03:51):
They got some brains and somethoughts.
They graduated from theUniversity of Utah in like the
most important degree in theworld, philosophy.
They got that BS in philosophy.
Josh (04:02):
I don't think anyone on your show has had as much
knowledge as this guest has, so.
Kaleem (04:07):
I mean, there's been a lot, there's been a lot.
I don't know about how much,because I mean, you know,
philosophy, I'm pretty surewe're going to find out.
I mean, his ass was definitelybroke for a minute.
I'll tell you that, but he gothis master's wasn't, he wasn't
done though.
He wasn't done.
He's like, you know, I want tolearn some more shit, gets his
master's in literature.
Okay.
Oh wait, oh wait, I'm not doneyet.
(04:28):
I'm not done yet.
I need to learn some more stuff.
Then he goes back and gets hismaster's in business.
Yeah.
So yes, our guest knows somestuff.
Let's see, what else do we have?
Oh, after that, he decides tokind of save the world a little
bit.
So not only is an educator andhe just learns everything.
He decides to then go overseasand teach the troops overseas as
(04:50):
a faculty member of theuniversity of Utah or no
university of Maryland.
Is that right?
Guest
Joshua (04:57):
ha.
Kaleem (04:58):
years.
So he's overseas teaching ourtroops philosophy.
I got to do something.
I got to do something.
Not only that, Mr.
Morris, our guest, they moved toEurope.
Most people don't know this, butour guest.
They moved to Europe to bust outsome dope rhymes for the people
(05:20):
in the streets.
Our guest was an MC where theymet his now French wife.
So it worked out.
It worked out.
It
Josh (05:31):
Must, Must, have been good show.
Kaleem (05:33):
I mean, you know, he already busted some rhymes for
us in the pre show.
last but not least, he's now thefounder and CEO of post planner,
which is a social mediascheduling platform.
Listeners.
And viewers, please give a warmwelcome to Josh.
(06:03):
We're getting crazy.
We're getting crazy.
Settle down studio and settledown, settle down.
They can't help it.
They can't help it.
They can't help it.
Thank you for coming, Josh.
Thank you for coming.
Joshua (06:12):
Hey, man, pleasure to be here.
Kaleem (06:15):
Oh man.
So we got so much stuff to getinto, man.
You know, your resume isimpressive.
Your product's impressive.
That's how we connected.
But I'm going to pass it over toMr.
Morris, Mr.
Morris, kick it off with ourfirst interview question.
It's real deep.
Josh (06:31):
Can you take us back to the beginning of your career,
what was it about philosophythat had you so intrigued?
Joshua (06:37):
Oh, man, that's a big question.
I mean, I just loved literaturefrom the get go.
I loved, um thinking about thebig questions in life and, from
junior high onward.
And once I started college, Ijust gravitated toward.
Toward those kind of classes andmy friends were into it as well.
(06:58):
And we like to have those thosedeep conversations.
and read the, you know, theclassic stuff.
And yeah, one thing led toanother and I just wanted to
continue and I still continue tothis day to really dive into
that stuff.
So, you know,
Kaleem (07:14):
Josh, I got a question for you.
So like, what, who's yourfavorite philosopher?
I mean, you studied all thattime.
You taught it.
You got to have one or two.
Joshua (07:20):
You know, I was really into Nietzsche in college and,
and, uh, ended up writing mysenior thesis on him.
I still am a big fan.
Uh,
Kaleem (07:30):
Well, what's Nisha about?
I don't know this.
I don't know this guy.
Joshua (07:33):
he's a German philosopher from the, uh, 19th
century.
Um, you know, existentialphilosopher, super deep all
about individualism and, and atleast that's what I thought was
the most important thing.
But, you know, I've haven'treally got been into Nietzsche
for a while.
Recently, I've really gotteninto David Deutch.
(07:54):
I don't know if you know who heis, but he's written a couple of
books in the last 20 years thatare just mind blowing.
And those are the two I'd nameright now.
Kaleem (08:02):
Pretty cool.
Pretty cool.
Josh (08:04):
They didn't have any classes at, about Nietzsche at
Worcester State, Kaleem?
There
Kaleem (08:14):
quality institution, sir.
Okay.
I didn't take one philosophyclass because you know, I'm too
deep as it is, you know what Imean?
Like I was, I was too deep, youknow, like Snoop Dogg was my
philosopher and you know, hestill is, you know?
Nice.
Josh (08:30):
the second question I had was what was the spark that that
led you to create post planner?
Joshua (08:35):
Well, I would say that during my MBA, I started, kind
of interning at a venturecapital fund in, um, Salt Lake
city.
And I just really discovered thewhole startup world there.
I didn't really know much aboutit at all before then how it all
worked.
And so that's really when Ifirst got the.
(08:56):
You know, idea that, oh, okay.
This is the ecosystem.
This is how it works.
And that was right around, thiswas in 2009 ish.
So that was right around thetime when Facebook's really
coming up.
Social media was coming up andyeah and once I graduated and
actually moved out here to SanFrancisco, I just knew that I
(09:17):
wanted to, you know, do somekind of software startup.
And at the time I was, I kind ofdoing a agency type business
where I was creating Facebookpages for businesses.
This is right when Facebookpages were starting as a thing.
And, you know, I startednoticing that there are apps to
(09:39):
do various things on Facebookpages.
And that led me to think, okay,well, why don't I create an app
to do this or that?
And, originally I wanted to havea whole suite of apps that do
all kinds of stuff on Facebook.
And the first one was going tobe a scheduling app for posts.
And that just turned out to bethe.
(10:00):
The one I stuck with and becamepost planner.
And, you know, that was, and nowwe're here 13 years later and
I'm still doing it.
Josh (10:08):
It's awesome.
Kaleem (10:09):
that's crazy.
So like, do you recall any otherproducts that were out at that
time?
I mean, you're talking 2009.
It's pretty damn early as far asscheduling is.
What was it like HootSuite orsomething?
Some shit like that.
Like what was
Joshua (10:23):
Yeah.
Yeah.
HootSuite was there.
Buffer had just started andthose are still, the two of the
biggest competitors that I have.
But there were, you know, backthen it was all about, you know,
they were trying to convincebusinesses to create basically
their own website in a way onFacebook, on a, on their
(10:44):
Facebook page and.
And a lot of businesses weregoing in that direction where
you know, they'd kind ofduplicate their website inside
of Facebook on their Facebookpage.
So there were these thingscalled tab applications where
you could create tabs on yourFacebook page and then, you
know, add HTML and CS, you know,HTML to it and create a website.
(11:05):
And that kind of went away in acouple of years.
It was really, really big from2010, 2011.
And then it kind of started tofade away in 2012, 2013, 2014.
And you still have, obviouslyFacebook pages are still huge,
but they're not reallydestinations anymore.
They're just ways to, sendcontent to the feed, because the
(11:26):
feed became paramount, you know,after 20, 20, 11, 2012.
but yeah, those are the kind ofbusinesses that were being
started at the time insideFacebook.
And Facebook was, you know, thenumber one, pretty much from
that point forward, Now, we nowpost on a post to 8 different
social networks.
(11:46):
But we started on Facebook andFacebook still are big, you
know, most our users, their mainthing is Facebook.
Instagram is kind of a close2nd, but it's definitely still
Facebook.
So
Kaleem (11:57):
That's pretty cool.
So let me ask you, you're aphilosopher.
You have a philosophy degree.
Yeah.
You go back to San Francisco.
How the hell did you getstarted?
I mean, did you teach yourselfhow to code or did you say, nah,
I'm not even going down thatroute.
Like, so how did you handle thetechnical aspect of post plant
in the early days?
Joshua (12:15):
that's pretty interesting story.
You know, I had ideas forvarious apps to do, and 1 of the
1st ones I had a connection witha person who is in local
politics in Utah, and they wereall these politicians were
starting to come on to Facebookas well.
You know, start their Facebookpages.
(12:36):
And, you know, I'm talking aboutlocal legislators and my 1st
idea was to do, like, a kind ofapp that would allow them to
kind of to pull theirconstituents and get their
opinions on various politicalissues.
And I basically went to Facebookand looked around for apps that
(12:57):
were doing something similar andfunctionality.
And I found one and thathappened to be created by this
guy in Bulgaria.
And I reached out to him to seeif he wanted to, I don't know,
kind of partner with me toprovide this service for these
politicians.
And he said yes.
And that became my he became myco founder, my technical co
(13:18):
founder for Post Planner.
He's the one who built theoriginal version of Post
Planner.
And still my Entire dev team tothis day is in Bulgaria and
really I've met them all throughSlav, who was my co founder.
Slav's no longer withPostplanner, but he's, you know,
always a friend of Postplannerand he's got his own startups
(13:41):
now, but that was the original,story.
Josh (13:44):
That's really cool.
Joshua (13:45):
Yeah.
So it's kind of a good, youknow, bit of advice for business
founders who are looking fortechnical co founders is go out
and see, you know, findapplication software that's kind
of in the corners and not reallysuccessful and reach out to the
founders say, hey, I have anidea about how we can improve
(14:07):
your software.
I'm a business guy.
I'm a marketing guy.
I think we can do somethingtogether.
It's a good way instead of justbeing, you know, the typical
thing is that you're a, you havea business idea and then you're
gonna go out, you're gonna tryto convince some technical guy
to help you.
Often you can kind of go theopposite direction and find
something they've alreadycreated.
(14:27):
And then sell them on the factthat you're going to, you can
help make this big and transformthe product as well.
Kaleem (14:33):
That's good advice.
Got to have a technical person.
Josh (14:36):
So you started in 2009?
You've also, you've obviouslyrode the wave of covid and
remote work and all the funthings that have happened to all
of us.
How did, because this show isobviously ultimately about
remote work.
How did remote work impact youand how did, you know, COVID,
(14:56):
all those things that happenedkind of impact you throughout
the business growth.
Joshua (15:00):
man, COVID didn't affect my business at all, except for
positively.
We have been a hundred percentremote from day one.
As I mentioned, my, my cofounders was in Bulgaria, and
the only way we could work isonline remotely.
Um,
Kaleem (15:16):
So it was remote by force, basically.
Like you needed to
Joshua (15:18):
and yeah, yeah, it's true.
Yeah.
and it's still a great way to gois to go overseas and find, you
know, like, it's just so muchmore economical.
To hire technical guys inEastern Europe or around the
world, than it is to hiresomeone.
I never could have afforded.
I still can't afford to pay.
So an engineer from SanFrancisco, or even in the US or
(15:41):
in, you know, Western Europe,it's just way too expensive.
So.
Yeah.
When COVID happened, it's just,it, there's nothing changed in
the operations of my company.
It's just, it just kept on goingand really in, in fall or a
spring of 2020 and summer 2020,we had a wave of a lot of
signups because, you know, itdrove, I think a lot of.
(16:03):
People, you know, to, to try newmarketing channels and try new
things and.
You know, social media marketingwas 1 of those and post planet
benefited from that wave
Kaleem (16:15):
Yeah, for sure.
You know, there are a lot ofreturn to offices and there are
a lot of headlines, ever since.
March of 20.
It seems like there's just beenthis conflict between employee
and employer employee want, gota taste of something that, you
know, we are a lot of peopleenjoy the flexibility, the
(16:37):
autonomy.
Right.
And then now, you know, postfive years or so, four years or
whatever.
And it's like.
We're seeing a lot oforganizations kind of return
back to the things that they'remost comfortable with.
Right.
And organizational change isnever, never easy, especially if
you're a larger company.
So my question to you is, islike a lot of startups do kind
(16:58):
of follow what is being done Thelarger companies, especially out
there in San Francisco.
And you might have a better, amuch better view on this than I
do.
Right.
You have Salesforce say, no,we're all going back to the
office.
You know, um, so some startupswho get funding and things like
that may kind of fall into this.
Where do you actually see thiskind of thing heading as far as
(17:21):
remote work, even hybrid work inthe startup space, moving
forward.
I mean, you're right there inSan Francisco.
You must be seeing San Franciscoand New York are still.
The two largest cities with thelowest, return to office
percentage.
Joshua (17:37):
Yeah.
San Francisco by far.
Kaleem (17:38):
Yeah.
Where do you see this happening,man?
see this going.
Joshua (17:42):
I mean, to a certain degree, I don't really care what
the big corporations do.
They, I don't really have anopinion whether it's better
thing for their businesses ornot.
It might be.
I know it's not what I want todo in my business.
I've crafted the culture of postplanner to be so easy and, and
(18:02):
lifestyle friendly, um, for myteam that, we literally don't
even have meetings anymore.
We used to meet once every twoweeks for a sprint call, and,
you know, discuss the upcomingsprint, but we decided to even
ask that, and just do it as athread in, in, in Slack because
(18:23):
it's not really, we don't wantto be on the phone, we don't
want to be on a call if, unlesswe absolutely have to be, and me
as the, as the CEO and owner ofthe company.
I never want to be on calls.
I didn't even want to be on thiscall of the day with you guys,
but I'm doing it.
Kaleem (18:43):
I love it with the fedora
Joshua (18:46):
dude, when I, when I wake up in the morning and I
have a call that day, I'mdepressed, man.
I'm like, shit, I have to geton.
I got to get on this podcast at1130.
It kind of what?
All right.
Damn.
All right.
I'll do it.
You know, like, I don't, I don'twant to be on any calls.
I don't want to have any callson my calendar ever.
(19:07):
So,
Kaleem (19:07):
good for you, man.
Like why?
Where did that come from?
Speaker (19:10):
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And now, back to the show.
Joshua (21:18):
well, a few things.
I personally, I don't think Iever work well, I work more
efficiently when I'm in a roomwith other people or on calls
with other people than I do whenI'm alone.
Kaleem (21:31):
Research says that focus you, you have high concentration
is alone.
So you, you're not, you'reright.
Okay.
Mm.
Joshua (21:37):
when you're around, when you're around people or you're
on calls, it's great for thesocial side of it, but in the
end, you devote so much energyto the kind of social,
interactions.
That it really makes you muchless efficient in my opinion.
(21:58):
Um, And, you know what, I mean,this is obviously it's not for
everyone, but I also want I wantmy team.
Because I know they're the same,they don't want to get on calls
either.
You know, at their time.
It's like.
We're doing a call at 9 am inCalifornia and in Bulgaria, it's
like, 7 PM dinner time.
(22:19):
They don't want to be on a call.
And I'm trying to.
And I think what we have donethis that we, like, they
couldn't get a better lifestyleat another company.
Right?
Like, they know that I trustthem that we've worked together
for years.
I'm never going to make them geton a stupid call that they don't
(22:40):
need to be on.
And I trust them.
So they get the work done andthe work is in is obvious.
It's in the results.
I can either.
The tool either has theseimprovements that come through
or it doesn't.
It's obvious if they're workingor not, so they don't have to
pretend, there's no, none ofthat.
And, my goal is like, I don'twant to lose these guys to other
(23:02):
companies.
And, you know, I can't reallycompete with a lot of companies
when it comes to how much theycan get paid.
I'm sure all my guys could getpaid more if they moved to
another company.
But they wouldn't get thelifestyle they get with
Postplanner.
They wouldn't get no meetingsever.
And, you know, a real chill bosswho, doesn't expect, bullshit
(23:24):
from them.
So
Josh (23:26):
an interesting, that's an interesting pitch for like
employment.
I mean, like there's so manypeople like trying to find
people to work.
There's a group of people thatare like, shit, I don't want to
be in meetings all day.
I want a guy that alsoappreciates that and like lives
by it.
So I think that's an interestingway to recruit, man.
I love that.
Joshua (23:46):
of my best buddies here.
He works in education and hespends his entire day on calls.
Like,
Kaleem (23:54):
Most people do most, most organizations do.
I mean, like,
Joshua (23:58):
zoom all day long, you know, with 10 faces on the
screen and.
And it's just like, it kind ofblows my mind.
I'm like, 1st of all, like, thatsounds miserable to me.
And 2nd of all, how is that.
Productive.
Yeah,
Josh (24:13):
I think for certain organizations, like if you're a
sales organization, you have tobe on zoom a lot to present.
But I think you, but you bringup an interesting point.
Like I always think about thisand clean and I've talked about
this, our flop, the onlyphilosophical conversations we
have are about remote work,Josh.
But the philosophical point Ithink here is, No one has time
to actually just sit back thinkabout the work that they're
(24:36):
doing and think about the nextday, the next idea, how to, how
things went, just like instrategy, just in general, but
it sounds like you've put inplace an environment that's
pretty open to that.
That's awesome.
That's great.
Joshua (24:52):
Yeah, it works.
Josh (24:53):
Kudos to you.
Joshua (24:54):
Thank you.
Josh (24:56):
was looking at your profile, Josh, before we started
the call and the experience thatyou had, I think you mentioned
this earlier, but it was withstartups.
And how did that help?
So it looked like you werebehind the scenes, like, looking
at how startups got funded andthe types of questions they get
asked and the diligence and allthose things.
I've been a part of that withthe 3 startups that I've been
(25:18):
at.
How did that help formulate?
Your plan as you move forwardwith your startup, like hot,
what were like some of thetidbits that you grabbed that
you're like, man, I gotta makesure I have this together when I
start my plan here.
Joshua (25:33):
Well, I mean, it just taught me how the whole
ecosystem works.
But it also showed me, you know,I also knew that it's not the
only way to go.
I mean, Post Planner, we nevergot VC funding.
We never even got really angelfunding.
We've been, funded by customercredit cards, as I like to say
from day one, right?
Uh, so I, yeah, bootstrapped.
(25:56):
Um, so, yeah, I learned how thatall works and.
But I gotta say, I don't thinkI, I'm not sure I learned
anything in business schoolthat, you know, I explicitly
apply to or applied to mybusiness, business is common
sense, dude.
You know, it's trial and error.
(26:17):
It's common sense.
It's the ability to learnquickly.
It's the ability to, to seewhat's working, to communicate
with customers.
Try to build things that bringvalue to their lives.
It's not rocket science.
It's a lot of, it's a lot ofhard work and, yeah, I just, I'm
skeptical that that experiencedid anything other than give me
(26:42):
a window into possibilities,right?
I'm looking at these companies.
Various types of companies fromfrom software to, you know,
software, the service to likebiotech to all kinds of things.
And, some of them, they can'teven exist without BC, right?
They have to have funding to getoff the ground.
(27:04):
But a SAS business, like postplanner doesn't, I mean, you
just need to get some customersfrom day one and get them paying
you and get, start gettingfeedback from them and building
what helps them.
So yeah, that's how I'd answeredthat.
I think it was a greatexperience.
I really enjoyed it and it was areally good thing to do right
before coming to San Francisco.
(27:26):
Because as you can imagine, thiswhole.
Peninsula is just, you know,driven by that whole ecosystem,
but in the end, you know, Ididn't end up using it.
I just bootstrapped to mystartup and it was fine.
But I gotta say, I mean, Icouldn't have done that without
my wife, you know, like, becausein the early days.
We had very little revenue,obviously, and we had to build
(27:48):
it up.
It took 2 years really to get tothe point where.
You know, I was making goodmoney.
And yeah, my beautiful Frenchwife supported me, in there in
those 2 years
Kaleem (28:06):
You know, it seems like though that experience in school
did help you because it made yourealize VC funding It's great
for certain people in, and, butit probably made you realize,
(28:27):
wow, you're giving up a lot, alot,
Joshua (28:31):
a life trade offs, you know, like, I have a bunch of
friends here in, in, in the citywho.
Who did take VC and many of themare, you know, 10 times as
wealthy as I am now, you know,so I'm not saying that.
Kaleem (28:46):
right?
It's not all about wealth.
Like post plant is your babypost plant.
It was something that you cameup with.
Like, there's a lot of emotionattached to a business that you
create.
and
Joshua (28:55):
and it's lifestyle like we talked about.
Kaleem (28:58):
Some people want to sell it.
I do have one last question,kind of jumping a little bit
back to.
You thinking about workasynchronously, because I think
a lot of people, when they hearyou say, I can't stand meetings
and I don't even want to be on acall probably blows people's
minds that you can run a companythat's competing against buffer.
(29:20):
That's competing against, youknow, a hoot suite that like
you're competing.
Right.
I left buffer for you.
Sorry, buffer.
But like, the reality is, islike.
You're competing because you'reproviding a lifestyle to your
employees and other things, butthen you also said, Hey, look, I
(29:40):
want to get rid of this typicalway of working that most people
know.
What were some of your biggestchallenges or what are some of
your biggest challenges of beingcompletely asynchronous?
Like if somebody is going tomake the switch, tell me what I
have to be concerned about.
Like, what do I have to beconcerned about?
If I'm like, you know what?
I'm done with meetings.
Joshua (30:01):
I mean.
You know, it all comes down inbusiness.
It all comes down to the peopleyou work with.
You got to get a team togetherthat where this works, that, you
know, that you trust each otherreally trust is number one.
You can't really do what we'redoing.
If I couldn't do what I'm doing,if I was constantly worried
about, oh, this guy's pretendingto work and not really working
(30:23):
and this guy's, free riding and.
And he's getting paid, you know,like I have zero patient for
that right now at this point,and I don't need to worry about
it at all with my team.
And it's, you know, and that's ahard place to get to.
It's not easy to find those kindof people and, you know,
assemble a team that kind of allagrees that this is the kind of
(30:44):
lifestyle and work environmentand culture that they want to be
in.
Some people love office politicsand going to go into the water
cooler and go into the officeevery day.
I get that it's a different kindof lifestyle.
But, you know, what I wanted tosay is that I think that when
you talk about async synchronouswork.
(31:06):
For me, I think that in termsof, you know, the kind of
business I'm in creatingsoftware and really, really what
I'm doing is I'm creatingsoftware and I'm creating
marketing.
That's it.
Right?
I'm building a software productand I'm trying to get people to
use it.
And those 2 things,\ in myopinion, really work well with
(31:26):
asynchronous communication.
You have these goals, you havethese tasks that you need to do.
You got to build, you know, somecampaign.
You got to build a new featurein the app.
You got to describe that newfeature so that your engineers
can build it.
These things, you don't needmeetings for these things.
Kaleem (31:46):
Right.
It's all documentation.
Joshua (31:48):
you need, you need, threads, like you need a thread
in slack.
We can talk about it.
I think humans tend tocommunicate more precisely when
they write than when they talk.
And you know, it kind of is away to, I think a written
communication kind of weeds outa lot of fat bullshit, you know?
(32:10):
and you know, I think that lendsitself well to the kind of work
that we do.
like you said, sales, all kindsof other businesses, it wouldn't
work.
I definitely wouldn't claim thatthis is for all businesses, but,
um, I really do preferasynchronous work.
I love to like, wake up in themorning and have a couple of key
(32:30):
things that I want to do thatday and like, sit back on my
couch and really focus and like,and kill it, right out exactly
what I need to do.
And no one's there to look overmy shoulder.
No one's there to distract me.
I don't have to.
Ask them, my co workers, how wasthe weekend and all this kind of
stuff.
(32:50):
Like, I have friends for that.
You know, I don't need to dothat with my co workers with my
co workers.
I just want to, like, get thejob done, and give us all paid
at the end of the day, you know,so that we can go out with our
friends and our family and talkabout the weekend and talk about
what you're interested in andall this stuff.
I don't want, I don't want to dothat and in the business
(33:12):
environment, and I know my teamdoesn't either.
So, we don't even we don't evenhave off sites in a post.
I know that a lot of SAScompanies, they all bring the
whole crew together for some bigtrip.
And I'm sure that's cool.
I'm sure that they have a goodtime, but we, I mean, I'm just
saying that we have not done itand I don't think it's really
(33:33):
hurt, hurt our, morale or ourteamwork.
We did talk a little bit about,you know, when we first started,
and this is only about 6 monthsold that we completely ended all
calls like bi weekly calls.
We all kind of said that when wesaid, when we did that, all of
this could be, you know, alittle bit dangerous.
(33:55):
Maybe if we never hear eachother's voices that, you know,
might be over a long period oftime.
It might be degrading to ourrelationships and that's this.
The jury is still out on that,but so far, it just really
hasn't made a difference.
It's just made it even easierfor all of us now.
They don't have to skip a dinneronce every 2 weeks to jump on a
(34:16):
call.
When they could just write downeverything in a thread.
So
Kaleem (34:21):
Awesome.
Awesome.
So it sounds like trust acircuitous work, trust.
You gotta be able to measurewhether they're getting the job
done.
I would say, as long as you havethose things there, right?
Cause software work is you havetickets, so you can see what's
being done.
You can see what's being workedon as long, no matter what tasks
you have as a business, as longas you can figure out a way to
(34:41):
measure whether they're gettingthe job done, that includes
sales.
Cause you have sales numbers,you have number of calls, you
have all sorts of things thatyou can utilize.
To determine whether they'remeeting their objectives.
So as long as you have somethinglike that and you trust your
employees, it sounds likeasynchronous work can work for
you.
So I appreciate you kind ofgoing over that.
Mr.
Morris, Josh, we're at the pointof the show.
(35:04):
It's all you, Mr.
Morris.
Josh (35:05):
Tell us about a comical or inspiring moment in remote work,
asynchronous work.
Joshua (35:12):
I mean, I don't have a really comical story so much.
I I, I do have a prettyinteresting one where, you know,
like, um, I told you about myco-founder, Slav, I met him
online on Facebook on, in 2011,let's say.
It was like February of 2011,and I ne I never met him in
person until.
(35:33):
What three and a half ish yearslater, and he came to San
Francisco, he flew into SanFrancisco because he wanted to
go to Burning Man.
And so I had to go pick him upfrom SFO, the airport.
It was such a, strange feeling,I was super nervous.
Probably, a lot of people canrelate to this where, you know
(35:55):
someone that you've worked withfor a while online and you meet
them in person for the firsttime.
It's always a little bitawkward, a little bit, you know,
you're a little bit nervous, butI went there to the airport.
And man, he was like, he waslate.
He was so late.
His plane was like three hourslate.
So I sat there, and I wasnervous when I got there, and I
(36:16):
sat there for three hours, like,being nervous, you know, and it
sucked so bad.
And he finally walked out, andhe turns, I didn't realize how
tall he was.
He's like this huge dude.
And, uh, I'm like, yo, what'sup?
And we, you know, we hit it offpretty well.
We jumped in my car and we droveout.
At that time, we had an officein this little town south of San
(36:38):
Francisco called Pacifica.
It's a little beach town.
And so we drove out to the beachand we stopped at a cool
restaurant and had some food andwe started.
You know, bonding in a way thatyou can't really do remotely.
And it was cool, but it wasdefinitely, uh, you
Kaleem (36:56):
So did you go to
Joshua (36:56):
experience.
He did.
I had gone to Burning Man theyear before, so he came in and
he went to Burning Man.
And then he came back the nextyear again and went to Burning
Man again with his newgirlfriend, who now is his wife
and they have like four kids.
So it worked out, but yeahthat's the experience.
Kaleem (37:16):
Pretty, Pretty, cool.
Josh (37:18):
So where can our listeners find you?
Joshua (37:20):
Hey, go to post planner.
com first of all and sign up forthe, uh, most powerful tool,
Kaleem (37:25):
Get it.
Joshua (37:26):
in social media.
and you know, as far as me,honestly, I'm not really that
online.
I do have a Twitter account atfake hacker.
com or fake, fake hacker.
App fake hacker.
But, you know, I don't reallypost much.
I'm kind of a, I lay low.
All my social relations areright here around me.
(37:47):
So I just, I just, I just buildreally good software and, uh,
and then that's it.
Kaleem (37:54):
That's awesome.
Well, thank you so much forcoming on the show.
I really appreciate it.
thank you, Mr.
Morris for being a guest co hosttoday.
Where can our listeners findyou, Mr.
Morris?
Josh (38:06):
Uh, soon to be a new handle and a website.
I will have to get thatinformation to you when it is
fully formed.
But new, new co is coming.
Kaleem (38:16):
Okay, cool.
New Co.
New Co.
It is.
so much.
Remember that.
And you know what?
You can find him right now.
Josh Morris.
I'm like,
Josh (38:24):
Yeah.
Kaleem (38:26):
awesome.
Well, thank you so much.
I appreciate you both.
Joshes, Josh is squared.
Josh is in my life.
Awesome, man.
I'll talk to you guys later.
Peace.
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