July 31, 2024 • 15 mins
Welcome again to Remotely One’s Not Safe For Remote Work, where employees at all levels share their most outrageous moments while working remotely!
In this episode, we chat with Kristin Bass, CEO of AbstractOps, a company that eliminates the stress, uncertainty, and financial risk of state compliance. From Kernersville, North Carolina, now living in Auburn, Alabama, Kristin shares her wild journey from fintech to startups and her rapid rise to CEO. Hear about her adventures managing payroll tax compliance and scaling back-office operations.
Tune in for hilarious stories involving her loyal Labs, Duke and Dixie, a shotgun scare that'll leave you laughing out loud, and a memorable sales call interrupted by some unexpected behavior. Don’t miss this fun and unforgettable episode with the charming and resilient Kristin Bass!
Learn more about Kristin:
- Kristin’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristinlbass/
- AbstractOps webpage: https://abstractops.com/
More about us:
- Remotely One’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/remotelyone
- Remotely One’s Webpage: https://www.remotelyone.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Rick (00:32):
Welcome to remotely ones NSFRW, which is an acronym for
not safe for remote work, wherewe invite employees at all
levels to share their mostoutrageous moments while working
remotely.
Do you have a story to tell?
We want to hear it.
You can submit your story atremotelyone.
com forward slash podcast.
(00:54):
Today's guest is originally fromKernersville, North Carolina,
and now resides in Auburn,Alabama.
She's worked with companiesranging.
From fintech to startups and isnow the CEO of Abstract Ops,
which is a payroll taxcompliance company.
Kristen Bass, come on down! Woohoo hoo!
Kaleem (01:27):
Oh, settle down.
That's
Rick (01:28):
I swear by Duke and Dixie, if y'all don't shut up, we can't
start the show! Come on, y'all!
Kaleem (01:36):
that's great.
That's great.
Rick (01:38):
Well, Kristen, thank you so much for joining us and
agreeing to come on the show.
We are super excited to hearyour story.
Kristin (01:44):
Howdy howdy, I am excited to be here.
I am super excited to tell mystory.
Um for context I am currentlythe ceo at abstract dots.
We are a payroll tax compliancecompany So we help companies Set
up their payroll tax accounts,their secretary of state
accounts, make sure they arefully compliant and can run
(02:06):
payroll with no headaches, andthen keep their company up and
running with no headaches fromthe states coming down the pipe
if they forgot to do somethingor have a fine.
We help them out with all ofthat.
Um, we've been doing this forpretty much our whole setup.
However, we've pivoted into thisback, January of 2023 full time.
(02:31):
Prior to that, we were a backoffice operations company, so
helping folks scale their backoffice, which is how I got my
start with Abstract Ops.
I was an operations partner,working with other companies,
helping them with their backoffice and making sure that they
were doing what they needed todo.
That ranges from helping themwith equity, payroll, HR
(02:51):
compliance, just, you name it,we probably did it.
Rick (02:55):
Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, your accolades arereally impressive and you know,
as I understand it, you wentfrom being a manager to a CEO
within two years.
I mean, as, as one, as one wouldexpect, definitely some learning
experiences and you know, highsand lows, however you want to
put it, share with us one thatreally sticks out in your
(03:15):
memory.
Kaleem (03:16):
Or two.
You can share two.
I think we might
Kristin (03:18):
you know what?
I will do y'all a justice and Iwill tell you one from when I
first started and was anoperations partner.
And then I've got 1 from when Iwas in my cOO slash coming into
my CEO role here.
Kaleem (03:33):
Okay.
Here we go.
Here we go.
Listen
Kristin (03:36):
you know, as one would imagine with the backgrounds
here, I'm a little, a littleSouthern, just tiny bit.
And, and some might even stretchthe word to redneck depending on
the situation.
So when we moved our house thatwe bought here in Alabama has a
lovely, lovely security systemthat likes to go off when a door
(03:58):
opens, closes.
have two dogs.
At the, at the time I had oneand he It is my pride and joy.
I love, love my two dogs.
They're both labs.
But my male he was my first dogand has known nothing other than
me working remotely.
So, of course, you can imaginehe's used to calls.
He's always in the background.
(04:18):
Um, I'm hanging out on a workcall with my team, talking
customer work, talking all thatgood stuff, seeing where people
are
Kaleem (04:27):
Is anyone, is anyone
Kristin (04:28):
No one's home.
No one's home.
I'm sitting in my office here,which is in the back of the
house.
My dog's laying under me.
All of a sudden, mid call, Ijust hear, back, door.
And I'm like, what the?
Kaleem (04:42):
Oh shit.
Kristin (04:43):
house.
So, I'm like, okay, I don't havetime to pull up the cameras.
I don't have time to doanything.
Duke, my dog, is sitting therebarking, standing at the door of
the bedroom, which is theoffice, refusing to go out.
And I'm like, I tried to cut offmy camera, and I'm like, Duke,
who's here?
Go.
Like, defend me.
Kaleem (05:04):
defend me, dude.
Kristin (05:05):
he gets
Rick (05:06):
bite some shit,
Kristin (05:06):
under me.
He's like, he's like, Under meat the time, and I'm like, what?
Dude, you're supposed to be myguy, my protector.
So, I naturally, being myself,reach behind my office door and
pull out my home defense shotgunand just rack it.
I'm like, who the hell is in myhouse?
(05:30):
And I'm just like, all right,
Rick (05:31):
you have this on camera?
Kristin (05:32):
so my camera's facing this way and I'm going this way
so you can
Rick (05:35):
Oh, ho
Kristin (05:36):
can hear the shotgun.
You can hear me talking to Dukeand I'm like, I don't even care
what's going on on camera atthis point.
I have don't care.
So.
You know, I'm sitting there andI can hear people laughing
because at this point it's like,what the hell is going
Kaleem (05:51):
Cause you got your AirPods in too, right?
You have your AirPods
Kristin (05:54):
Yeah, it's like, what the hell?
what is going
Rick (05:57):
Click, click, boom! Tell me you blasted at least one more
wall of sheetrock away.
Kaleem (06:02):
happened?
So
Kristin (06:03):
Oh no, luckily, luckily no shots went off.
Duke finally decides to kind ofmeander through the house and I
go and There's no climax to thestory.
The door just blew open from thewind, scared the absolute hell
out of me.
And I'm walking through my housewith a shotgun, like, am I about
to hit somebody with this?
Kaleem (06:22):
So did you, like, when you walk down, were you scared?
Did you say, I'm armed?
Kristin (06:27):
Oh my God, I was, I was legitimately like heart racing,
scared to death that someone hadcome in my house.
I was like, you've got to bekidding me.
Kaleem (06:36):
Is that Duke behind you doing
Kristin (06:38):
That, that is Dixie.
That's our newest member.
Uh, she's only a year old.
Yeah.
Rick (06:45):
I seen that door open and I blasted it to bits.
I blasted the wind, didn't
Kristin (06:49):
you, if someone had been in this house, I, Fear to
goodness.
What the heck would have
Kaleem (06:55):
Oh my gosh.
Good for you that you'reprotected.
So you sit back down.
I'm curious.
You sit back down, your heart'sbeaten.
You turn the camera back on.
What are your colleagues
Kristin (07:05):
God.
People were just like, what are,are you good?
Are you not good?
I'm like, like,
Rick (07:13):
We see that you're protected.
Kristin (07:15):
I'm good.
We're good.
Kaleem (07:17):
Holy
Kristin (07:19):
And then later that day I call my husband and I'm just
like, you don't understand whatI just did.
I was like, do you know?
How embarrassed I am, becauseI'm one, a big scaredy cat, and
two, sitting here probablylooking like the biggest frickin
redneck with deer heads on thewall and a shotgun in
Kaleem (07:37):
Good for you.
You're well protected.
So that's a pretty good story.
So kristin, let me justunderstand this So at this
moment, you're just on the teamas like a manager or coo and
they're like damn Kristen's gota shotgun.
She's trying to you know, shootsome people if they come into
Kristin (07:55):
Oh, God.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Kaleem (07:57):
forward.
What?
You Six months now, like fastforward how much time and you're
now the CEO.
Kristin (08:02):
Yeah.
So from that situation to mynext story, fast forward about a
year, actually a year and ahalf.
So the shotgun incident happenspretty early on in my career
here.
So love to set the stage of mypersonality.
Kaleem (08:17):
So you're shotgun bass.
You're shotgun bass.
That's your nickname.
I get that.
Kristin (08:21):
you got it, you got it.
So the other story is actuallyquite embarrassing, probably
more so than that one.
So I stepped into my COO role inOctober, stepped into my CEO
role in December.
So literally halfway through inNovember, my husband decides to
go on a hunting trip for tendays, cause, cause you know, why
(08:43):
not?
Well, one day into his trip, myfemale, Dixie, goes into heat.
Kaleem (08:49):
Well, what's that?
I don't understand.
Like it's hot out obviously.
Kristin (08:53):
Yeah, no, so both of my dogs are unfixed.
She went into her female cycle,where she can then, yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah, and my male is notfixed.
Well, that means my male is nothappy.
Ah.
So I'm not sleeping one becausemy male is constantly wanting
(09:17):
his girlfriend's here.
She's in a diaper because that'show we treat our dogs around
here.
We put them in a diaper whenthey go into heat, cause she's a
house dog.
So I get a high stake sales callfor a company that I really want
to land.
And I have done customer calls,but I had just stepped into
(09:37):
doing sales calls.
Cause we were in between salespeople.
Kaleem (09:41):
Okay.
Okay.
Kristin (09:43):
I'm sitting here, chit chatting, having a good ol time.
You see Dixie back here in adiaper.
Because that's normal to see ona call.
That, that didn't bother mequite as much.
Until, I'm sitting and myscreen's wide and behind me I
see Duke.
Try to ride her.
Just start, like, hardcorejumped on her, and I'm sittin
(10:06):
here, like, you, there's not,no, nothin's goin on in the
back, like,
Kaleem (10:12):
But so like When you say, so the dog jumps up on top
and one dog has a diaper on.
Kristin (10:19):
Huh?
And the male is, And and, and,the male dog's trying to scrape
her up and mount her.
And, and like, I'm like, you,you can't see.
There's nothing here.
Nothing to see.
And I'm just
Kaleem (10:34):
say scraper up and mount?
Kristin (10:40):
you cannot do this.
I
Rick (10:42):
Oh, yeah.
Kristin (10:44):
just hiding it, like?
and thinking on the floor.
And
Kaleem (10:50):
Oh no, and what about the noises?
What about the noises?
Are there lots of noises
Kristin (10:54):
are.
Duke is just like, he was justgoing, and I'm like, stop.
And Dixie's just looking at melike, please God help me.
Kaleem (11:08):
Oh,
Kristin (11:09):
And I'm like, mid sales call, trying not to talk to my
dog, trying not to bringattention to it.
And one of the guys on the salescall, I shit you not goes, Well,
dang, I didn't realize we weregetting a show the day too.
Rick (11:26):
Oh, you get more than you bargained
Kristin (11:28):
like,
Kaleem (11:30):
I shit you not, bub.
I shit you not.
Kristin (11:33):
is, this is like, this is not what people expect to see
on a sales call,
Kaleem (11:39):
Wow.
Kristin (11:41):
COO.
Kaleem (11:41):
I mean, I think if one dog did not have the diaper on
to me, that's the part thatmakes this story the best
because
Kristin (11:50):
hilarious.
It was hilarious.
I mean, Dixie's sitting there ina bright pink diaper just like,
like, and she's a chocolate lab.
So the bright pink really popped
Kaleem (12:02):
Yep.
Yep.
Kristin (12:02):
like really called attention to it.
I was just like, what?
So I learned from that.
I now drug my dog when the otherone is in heat.
So Duke takes a Gabapentin and aTrazodone.
Daily when she's in heat andironically she's like three days
from going into heat I wasthinking y'all were gonna get a
(12:25):
show too because it's like this
Rick (12:28):
That would have been something.
Kaleem (12:30):
that would have been perfect.
So Kristen, out of curiosity,did you land the deal?
Kristin (12:34):
I did, andd they are fantastic customers.
I love them Um, so landed thedeal, but it was just I mean my
face was redder than a freakingtomato It was I was like how?
And I think later that night Icalled my husband.
I said hey Like, I've cried, Ihaven't slept, I don't know if
I'm gonna land this deal,
Kaleem (12:55):
right.
Kristin (12:55):
I,
Kaleem (12:56):
I'm going to be announced CEO in like two weeks.
I just did a sales call with thedog.
It's just the best.
Oh my gosh.
Kristin (13:05):
like, seriously, if my dogs, now, every column on my
dogs are in the background, andthose people are just like, so
how's it going?
Kaleem (13:14):
That is
Rick (13:14):
they're like, they're like looking, they're like, what's,
what's
Kristin (13:17):
Yeah, it's like,
Rick (13:18):
know, How you been?
Kristin (13:19):
going on?
Now, now I'll say, the, thereason they're not fixed is we
do plan to breed our dogs andhave puppies, so there's an
actual reason I don't have my
Kaleem (13:29):
yeah.
I mean, you don't have toexplain.
Some people just don't want, putthem, put the dog through that.
So we get it.
So Kristen, what a great story.
It definitely was not safe forremote work.
It's the, one of our beststories.
We appreciate it so much.
Kristen, where can our listenersand viewers find you on the
(13:50):
interwebs and abstract mops, ofcourse?
Kristin (13:53):
yeah.
So they can find me on LinkedIn.
They can find Abstract Ops onLinkedIn.
And then if you just want tochit chat with me, Shoot me a
DM.
I love, love meeting people,love talking to people, but
Rick (14:07):
That was such a Southern Belle thing to say.
Kaleem (14:09):
Yeah.
Rick (14:10):
If y'all just wanna chit chat with
Kaleem (14:12):
I mean, it was great.
It's great.
I'd say the Southern accent iskilling it Keep it going.
Keep it going.
Kristin (14:18):
I love people.
I love my job.
I love helping people.
It's fulfilling.
It's rewarding.
It lets people focus on theirjobs versus having to deal with
The backward DAS laws that thestates have when it comes to
setting up a new company orscaling your company.
So it's a lot of fun.
(14:39):
I would not trade it for theworld and I wouldn't trade my
dogs for the world, even thoughthey love to embarrass me.
Rick (14:45):
That's a great answer.
Kaleem (14:46):
a great answer.
Well, Kristen, thank you so muchfor coming by the show.
We appreciate it.
It was an awesome story.
More people need to hear storieslike this because remote work.
And hey, it's comical too.
So thank you so much.
Come back and see us anytime.
Kristin (15:03):
Absolutely.
It was great to meet y'all.
Thank you so, so much.
Kaleem (15:07):
Peace.
Welcome to remotely ones NSFRW, which is an acronym for
not safe for remote work, wherewe invite employees at all
levels to share their mostoutrageous moments while working
remotely.
Do you have a story to tell?
We want to hear it.
You can submit your story atremotelyone.
com forward slash podcast.
(00:54):
Today's guest is originally fromKernersville, North Carolina,
and now resides in Auburn,Alabama.
She's worked with companiesranging.
From fintech to startups and isnow the CEO of Abstract Ops,
which is a payroll taxcompliance company.
Kristen Bass, come on down! Woohoo hoo!
Kaleem (01:27):
Oh, settle down.
That's
Rick (01:28):
I swear by Duke and Dixie, if y'all don't shut up, we can't
start the show! Come on, y'all!
Kaleem (01:36):
that's great.
That's great.
Rick (01:38):
Well, Kristen, thank you so much for joining us and
agreeing to come on the show.
We are super excited to hearyour story.
Kristin (01:44):
Howdy howdy, I am excited to be here.
I am super excited to tell mystory.
Um for context I am currentlythe ceo at abstract dots.
We are a payroll tax compliancecompany So we help companies Set
up their payroll tax accounts,their secretary of state
accounts, make sure they arefully compliant and can run
(02:06):
payroll with no headaches, andthen keep their company up and
running with no headaches fromthe states coming down the pipe
if they forgot to do somethingor have a fine.
We help them out with all ofthat.
Um, we've been doing this forpretty much our whole setup.
However, we've pivoted into thisback, January of 2023 full time.
(02:31):
Prior to that, we were a backoffice operations company, so
helping folks scale their backoffice, which is how I got my
start with Abstract Ops.
I was an operations partner,working with other companies,
helping them with their backoffice and making sure that they
were doing what they needed todo.
That ranges from helping themwith equity, payroll, HR
(02:51):
compliance, just, you name it,we probably did it.
Rick (02:55):
Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, your accolades arereally impressive and you know,
as I understand it, you wentfrom being a manager to a CEO
within two years.
I mean, as, as one, as one wouldexpect, definitely some learning
experiences and you know, highsand lows, however you want to
put it, share with us one thatreally sticks out in your
(03:15):
memory.
Kaleem (03:16):
Or two.
You can share two.
I think we might
Kristin (03:18):
you know what?
I will do y'all a justice and Iwill tell you one from when I
first started and was anoperations partner.
And then I've got 1 from when Iwas in my cOO slash coming into
my CEO role here.
Kaleem (03:33):
Okay.
Here we go.
Here we go.
Listen
Kristin (03:36):
you know, as one would imagine with the backgrounds
here, I'm a little, a littleSouthern, just tiny bit.
And, and some might even stretchthe word to redneck depending on
the situation.
So when we moved our house thatwe bought here in Alabama has a
lovely, lovely security systemthat likes to go off when a door
(03:58):
opens, closes.
have two dogs.
At the, at the time I had oneand he It is my pride and joy.
I love, love my two dogs.
They're both labs.
But my male he was my first dogand has known nothing other than
me working remotely.
So, of course, you can imaginehe's used to calls.
He's always in the background.
(04:18):
Um, I'm hanging out on a workcall with my team, talking
customer work, talking all thatgood stuff, seeing where people
are
Kaleem (04:27):
Is anyone, is anyone
Kristin (04:28):
No one's home.
No one's home.
I'm sitting in my office here,which is in the back of the
house.
My dog's laying under me.
All of a sudden, mid call, Ijust hear, back, door.
And I'm like, what the?
Kaleem (04:42):
Oh shit.
Kristin (04:43):
house.
So, I'm like, okay, I don't havetime to pull up the cameras.
I don't have time to doanything.
Duke, my dog, is sitting therebarking, standing at the door of
the bedroom, which is theoffice, refusing to go out.
And I'm like, I tried to cut offmy camera, and I'm like, Duke,
who's here?
Go.
Like, defend me.
Kaleem (05:04):
defend me, dude.
Kristin (05:05):
he gets
Rick (05:06):
bite some shit,
Kristin (05:06):
under me.
He's like, he's like, Under meat the time, and I'm like, what?
Dude, you're supposed to be myguy, my protector.
So, I naturally, being myself,reach behind my office door and
pull out my home defense shotgunand just rack it.
I'm like, who the hell is in myhouse?
(05:30):
And I'm just like, all right,
Rick (05:31):
you have this on camera?
Kristin (05:32):
so my camera's facing this way and I'm going this way
so you can
Rick (05:35):
Oh, ho
Kristin (05:36):
can hear the shotgun.
You can hear me talking to Dukeand I'm like, I don't even care
what's going on on camera atthis point.
I have don't care.
So.
You know, I'm sitting there andI can hear people laughing
because at this point it's like,what the hell is going
Kaleem (05:51):
Cause you got your AirPods in too, right?
You have your AirPods
Kristin (05:54):
Yeah, it's like, what the hell?
what is going
Rick (05:57):
Click, click, boom! Tell me you blasted at least one more
wall of sheetrock away.
Kaleem (06:02):
happened?
So
Kristin (06:03):
Oh no, luckily, luckily no shots went off.
Duke finally decides to kind ofmeander through the house and I
go and There's no climax to thestory.
The door just blew open from thewind, scared the absolute hell
out of me.
And I'm walking through my housewith a shotgun, like, am I about
to hit somebody with this?
Kaleem (06:22):
So did you, like, when you walk down, were you scared?
Did you say, I'm armed?
Kristin (06:27):
Oh my God, I was, I was legitimately like heart racing,
scared to death that someone hadcome in my house.
I was like, you've got to bekidding me.
Kaleem (06:36):
Is that Duke behind you doing
Kristin (06:38):
That, that is Dixie.
That's our newest member.
Uh, she's only a year old.
Yeah.
Rick (06:45):
I seen that door open and I blasted it to bits.
I blasted the wind, didn't
Kristin (06:49):
you, if someone had been in this house, I, Fear to
goodness.
What the heck would have
Kaleem (06:55):
Oh my gosh.
Good for you that you'reprotected.
So you sit back down.
I'm curious.
You sit back down, your heart'sbeaten.
You turn the camera back on.
What are your colleagues
Kristin (07:05):
God.
People were just like, what are,are you good?
Are you not good?
I'm like, like,
Rick (07:13):
We see that you're protected.
Kristin (07:15):
I'm good.
We're good.
Kaleem (07:17):
Holy
Kristin (07:19):
And then later that day I call my husband and I'm just
like, you don't understand whatI just did.
I was like, do you know?
How embarrassed I am, becauseI'm one, a big scaredy cat, and
two, sitting here probablylooking like the biggest frickin
redneck with deer heads on thewall and a shotgun in
Kaleem (07:37):
Good for you.
You're well protected.
So that's a pretty good story.
So kristin, let me justunderstand this So at this
moment, you're just on the teamas like a manager or coo and
they're like damn Kristen's gota shotgun.
She's trying to you know, shootsome people if they come into
Kristin (07:55):
Oh, God.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Kaleem (07:57):
forward.
What?
You Six months now, like fastforward how much time and you're
now the CEO.
Kristin (08:02):
Yeah.
So from that situation to mynext story, fast forward about a
year, actually a year and ahalf.
So the shotgun incident happenspretty early on in my career
here.
So love to set the stage of mypersonality.
Kaleem (08:17):
So you're shotgun bass.
You're shotgun bass.
That's your nickname.
I get that.
Kristin (08:21):
you got it, you got it.
So the other story is actuallyquite embarrassing, probably
more so than that one.
So I stepped into my COO role inOctober, stepped into my CEO
role in December.
So literally halfway through inNovember, my husband decides to
go on a hunting trip for tendays, cause, cause you know, why
(08:43):
not?
Well, one day into his trip, myfemale, Dixie, goes into heat.
Kaleem (08:49):
Well, what's that?
I don't understand.
Like it's hot out obviously.
Kristin (08:53):
Yeah, no, so both of my dogs are unfixed.
She went into her female cycle,where she can then, yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah, and my male is notfixed.
Well, that means my male is nothappy.
Ah.
So I'm not sleeping one becausemy male is constantly wanting
(09:17):
his girlfriend's here.
She's in a diaper because that'show we treat our dogs around
here.
We put them in a diaper whenthey go into heat, cause she's a
house dog.
So I get a high stake sales callfor a company that I really want
to land.
And I have done customer calls,but I had just stepped into
(09:37):
doing sales calls.
Cause we were in between salespeople.
Kaleem (09:41):
Okay.
Okay.
Kristin (09:43):
I'm sitting here, chit chatting, having a good ol time.
You see Dixie back here in adiaper.
Because that's normal to see ona call.
That, that didn't bother mequite as much.
Until, I'm sitting and myscreen's wide and behind me I
see Duke.
Try to ride her.
Just start, like, hardcorejumped on her, and I'm sittin
(10:06):
here, like, you, there's not,no, nothin's goin on in the
back, like,
Kaleem (10:12):
But so like When you say, so the dog jumps up on top
and one dog has a diaper on.
Kristin (10:19):
Huh?
And the male is, And and, and,the male dog's trying to scrape
her up and mount her.
And, and like, I'm like, you,you can't see.
There's nothing here.
Nothing to see.
And I'm just
Kaleem (10:34):
say scraper up and mount?
Kristin (10:40):
you cannot do this.
I
Rick (10:42):
Oh, yeah.
Kristin (10:44):
just hiding it, like?
and thinking on the floor.
And
Kaleem (10:50):
Oh no, and what about the noises?
What about the noises?
Are there lots of noises
Kristin (10:54):
are.
Duke is just like, he was justgoing, and I'm like, stop.
And Dixie's just looking at melike, please God help me.
Kaleem (11:08):
Oh,
Kristin (11:09):
And I'm like, mid sales call, trying not to talk to my
dog, trying not to bringattention to it.
And one of the guys on the salescall, I shit you not goes, Well,
dang, I didn't realize we weregetting a show the day too.
Rick (11:26):
Oh, you get more than you bargained
Kristin (11:28):
like,
Kaleem (11:30):
I shit you not, bub.
I shit you not.
Kristin (11:33):
is, this is like, this is not what people expect to see
on a sales call,
Kaleem (11:39):
Wow.
Kristin (11:41):
COO.
Kaleem (11:41):
I mean, I think if one dog did not have the diaper on
to me, that's the part thatmakes this story the best
because
Kristin (11:50):
hilarious.
It was hilarious.
I mean, Dixie's sitting there ina bright pink diaper just like,
like, and she's a chocolate lab.
So the bright pink really popped
Kaleem (12:02):
Yep.
Yep.
Kristin (12:02):
like really called attention to it.
I was just like, what?
So I learned from that.
I now drug my dog when the otherone is in heat.
So Duke takes a Gabapentin and aTrazodone.
Daily when she's in heat andironically she's like three days
from going into heat I wasthinking y'all were gonna get a
(12:25):
show too because it's like this
Rick (12:28):
That would have been something.
Kaleem (12:30):
that would have been perfect.
So Kristen, out of curiosity,did you land the deal?
Kristin (12:34):
I did, andd they are fantastic customers.
I love them Um, so landed thedeal, but it was just I mean my
face was redder than a freakingtomato It was I was like how?
And I think later that night Icalled my husband.
I said hey Like, I've cried, Ihaven't slept, I don't know if
I'm gonna land this deal,
Kaleem (12:55):
right.
Kristin (12:55):
I,
Kaleem (12:56):
I'm going to be announced CEO in like two weeks.
I just did a sales call with thedog.
It's just the best.
Oh my gosh.
Kristin (13:05):
like, seriously, if my dogs, now, every column on my
dogs are in the background, andthose people are just like, so
how's it going?
Kaleem (13:14):
That is
Rick (13:14):
they're like, they're like looking, they're like, what's,
what's
Kristin (13:17):
Yeah, it's like,
Rick (13:18):
know, How you been?
Kristin (13:19):
going on?
Now, now I'll say, the, thereason they're not fixed is we
do plan to breed our dogs andhave puppies, so there's an
actual reason I don't have my
Kaleem (13:29):
yeah.
I mean, you don't have toexplain.
Some people just don't want, putthem, put the dog through that.
So we get it.
So Kristen, what a great story.
It definitely was not safe forremote work.
It's the, one of our beststories.
We appreciate it so much.
Kristen, where can our listenersand viewers find you on the
(13:50):
interwebs and abstract mops, ofcourse?
Kristin (13:53):
yeah.
So they can find me on LinkedIn.
They can find Abstract Ops onLinkedIn.
And then if you just want tochit chat with me, Shoot me a
DM.
I love, love meeting people,love talking to people, but
Rick (14:07):
That was such a Southern Belle thing to say.
Kaleem (14:09):
Yeah.
Rick (14:10):
If y'all just wanna chit chat with
Kaleem (14:12):
I mean, it was great.
It's great.
I'd say the Southern accent iskilling it Keep it going.
Keep it going.
Kristin (14:18):
I love people.
I love my job.
I love helping people.
It's fulfilling.
It's rewarding.
It lets people focus on theirjobs versus having to deal with
The backward DAS laws that thestates have when it comes to
setting up a new company orscaling your company.
So it's a lot of fun.
(14:39):
I would not trade it for theworld and I wouldn't trade my
dogs for the world, even thoughthey love to embarrass me.
Rick (14:45):
That's a great answer.
Kaleem (14:46):
a great answer.
Well, Kristen, thank you so muchfor coming by the show.
We appreciate it.
It was an awesome story.
More people need to hear storieslike this because remote work.
And hey, it's comical too.
So thank you so much.
Come back and see us anytime.
Kristin (15:03):
Absolutely.
It was great to meet y'all.
Thank you so, so much.
Kaleem (15:07):
Peace.
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