March 5, 2025 • 34 mins
Christopher Kim, founder and CEO of Numeral, shares how his company automates complex accounting processes, particularly revenue recognition and cash reconciliation. He reflects on his personal journey and the lessons learned from his previous entrepreneurial experience.
• Simplifying complex accounting concepts
• The inspiration behind building Numeral
• How Numeral automates revenue recognition and cash reconciliation
• Personal finance's influence on Kim's entrepreneurial vision
• The challenges and breakthroughs in scaling a startup
• Looking ahead: changing the future of accounting
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Numeral aggregates, all revenue and cash impacting
data from disparate systems.
These are very commonly paymentprocessors, billing platforms
and bank accounts.
These are the three most commonsystems that we integrate with.
We ingest all the financialdata from these systems and then
we cleanse, curate, organizeall this data, which we call
numeralizing the data set, whichis the foundation for all that
(00:23):
we do.
And once we have a numeralizeddata set within our platform, we
apply accounting automationlogic.
So the example I just gave youof like prorating the revenue
recognition schedule for AmazonPrime, for RevRec, we would
automate all that.
But you can imagine, if you tryto do this for millions of
transactions and spreadsheets,it's just impossible to do so.
(00:43):
That's where we come into play.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Welcome to today's episode of Seat to Exit.
I'm Rhys Keck and I'm excitedto speak with Christopher Kim,
the founder and CEO of Numeral.
Numeral is transformingaccounting through automation,
with a focus on revenuerecognition and transaction
level cash reconciliation.
Before founding Numeral, chrisfounded Clean AF Club and gained
experience in sales and fintech.
We'll dive into his journeyfrom the early days of Numeral.
Chris founded Clean AF Club andgained experience in sales and
fintech.
We'll dive into his journeyfrom the early days of Numeral,
(01:07):
including his decision to sleepin his car to make the company's
vision a reality.
We'll also discuss the problemNumeral is solving for the
accounting teams, the importanceof servant leadership and the
lessons he's learned whilebuilding a fintech startup.
Thanks for listening and let'sgo ahead and dive into the
conversation listening and let'sgo ahead and dive into the
conversation.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
Welcome to Seed to Exit, the podcast where we
uncover the stories, strategiesand insights that power the
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I'm your host, rhys Keck,founder of MindHire, a talent
acquisition firm specializing inhelping startups build
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Each week, I sit down withfounders, investors and industry
leaders to explore the journeysbehind iconic companies and
game-changing ideas.
Whether you're building,investing or just curious about
(01:49):
what it takes to succeed in thestartup world, I want this
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and inspiring conversations.
Now, if you enjoy the show,please don't forget to subscribe
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Your support means the worldand really helps bring more
incredible conversations to life.
Chris, welcome aboard.
Thanks for coming on.
Absolutely, reece.
(02:10):
Thanks for having me.
You got it, so I'm superexcited to talk to you.
I'm a little bit of anaccounting nerd myself, even
though I'm not formally anaccountant.
The first thing I really everdid out of college was start
recruiting accountants, so Ilearned a whole lot more about
it than I thought I ever would.
But for those of the audiencewho are not accountants, they
(02:31):
might need a little bit ofexplaining what it is that
Numeral does.
So, before we get intoeverything else, if you could
just explain the concept ofrevenue recognition, cash
reconciliations and what thoseare.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yeah, absolutely so.
Reese Numeral is a fullyautomated revenue subledger that
automates revenue recognitionand transaction level cash
reconciliation.
For those who don't have anaccounting experience, which I'm
sure is the majority oflisteners, revenue recognition
is very simply an accountingprinciple that states that
revenue must be recognized whenit's earned, not when payment is
(03:04):
received.
To illustrate that in anexample, do you use Amazon Prime
?
I do, okay, same with me.
So let's just say you knowAmazon Prime.
For easy math purposes, let'ssay it was sold at $120 a year.
If you bought Amazon Prime inJanuary of 2022, the revenue
recognition principle statesthat you know Amazon Prime can.
January of 2022, the revenuerecognition principle states
(03:26):
that Amazon Prime can onlyrecognize $10 of revenue in
January, $10 in February, $10 inMarch, so on and so forth, as
opposed to $120 in January forwhen the payment was received.
This is a very, very simple,elementary example.
It could get much more gnarlierthan that, but that's what
revenue recognition is at a highlevel For cash reconciliation,
(03:47):
cash reconciliation is verysimply the process of comparing
accounting records with the bankstatement, basically to ensure
that everything is properlyaccounted for.
So if we use the Amazon Primeexample once again, let's just
say Amazon Prime made $500million in January of 2025.
They sold $500 million worth ofsubscriptions, right.
(04:09):
Well, if in their bank accountfor that same period of time
they received $480 million,there's that $20 million delta,
right.
So cash reconciliation isidentifying the variances, why
that delta exists andattributing those variances
those that delta exists, andattributing those variances,
those differences, to differentbuckets.
Wouldn't that be like taxes,transaction fees from payment
(04:32):
processors, currency conversionrates, all of that?
So that's hopefully to helpsure, non-accounting listeners,
but yeah, that's a very simplyhigh level.
What RevRec and CashRec is?
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Okay, so now that we have that out of the way and
we've got the definitions inplace, so what is it that
specifically that Numeral doesthen?
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Yeah, numeral aggregates all revenue and cash
impacting data from disparatesystems.
These are very commonly paymentprocessors, billing platforms
and bank accounts.
These are the three most commonsystems that we integrate with.
We ingest all the financialdata from these systems and then
we cleanse, curate, organizeall this data, which we call
(05:13):
numeralizing the data set, whichis the foundation for all that
we do.
And once we have a numeralizeddata set within our platform, we
apply accounting automationlogic.
So the example I just gave youof like prorating the, you know
the revenue recognition schedulefor Amazon prime, for RevRec.
Uh, you know we would automateall that, but you know you can
imagine if you try to do thisfor millions of transactions and
(05:33):
spreadsheets, it's justimpossible to do so.
That's where we would come intoplay.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
So you're not an accountant yourself.
So I'm curious where and thisis a pretty specific problem
that you're solving.
So I'm just curious where theinspiration for this came from.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
Yeah, no, I'm not an accountant and I'm not a CPA
Never have been but theinspiration for Numeral came
about where my biggest personalpassion outside of work has
always been personal finance.
I'm first generation immigrant.
My parents were firstgeneration immigrants.
I'm first generation born inthe US and I don't know if
you're you know in a personalfinance.
(06:06):
But uh, there are tools like uh, there was a tool called mint.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Uh, before it was discontinued by I was gonna say
it's gone now, isn't it yeah?
Speaker 1 (06:12):
yeah, but there's a personal capital, which is now
in power.
There's rocket money, there'sall these tools that are
essentially net worthaggregators and they give you.
There's the they're supposed togive you a view of your net
worth aggregators and they giveyou.
There's the they're supposed togive you a view of your net
worth in real time, and that wasthe inspiration for Numeral.
From the very onset,essentially, when Numeral was
started, I thought of hey,what's what's at the
(06:34):
intersection of what am I mostpassionate in, which is personal
finance, which is, and alsolike, what am I strongest in,
which is, you know, b2b,go-to-market and go-to-market
and B2B software teams?
So, yeah, that was theintersection where and really
all accounting is is justpersonal finance for businesses.
It's obviously much morecomplex, with a lot more
(06:54):
calculations, but it's reallynot that difficult once you
understand the terminology andcan speak the lingo.
Speaker 3 (07:01):
And so, you know, typically when you have an
accounting system, you can justlog in and you can see your
balance sheet right, which willshow all of your assets and
liabilities.
So that also, almost in a way,is already like a, a show of net
worth.
So where, where is thedifference between that and
numeral?
Is it because numeral is realtime and then, with with the you
know accounting statements, youhave to go back and close the
month?
Speaker 1 (07:26):
No, no.
So the example you justmentioned that's just like
simple adding and subtractingbank account balances, and
that's simple.
What we do is we are ingestingthe data directly from these
different sources like billingplatforms, payment processors,
bank accounts, and then we'redoing a lot of calculations in
between as the middleman.
So it's just a lot morecalculations, a lot more edge
(07:48):
cases versus, as opposed to just, if you think of like a net
worth aggregator, it's justaddition and subtraction, right,
like how much do I have in mybank account versus how much do
I have for my credit card bill,right?
So it's just the complexity ofthe calculations.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
Gotcha.
Okay, I see what you mean, so Iunderstand where the
inspiration for it came from.
How did you go about actuallygetting it off the ground and
getting your first customers?
Speaker 1 (08:12):
Yeah, getting our first customers, that was a fun
time.
I don't think we created thewheel.
I think we just did what wastried and true.
I come from a go-to-marketbackground.
I started my career as a salesrep so I've made a ton of cold
calls in my time, so it was allfounder-led sales at the very
beginning.
You reach out to earlyprospects.
(08:34):
You reach out and look foradvisors to give you feedback on
these wireframes, this visionyou have for them.
But yeah, honestly, all of ourearly customers, first customers
, literally just cold calling me, cold calling them saying, hey,
this is the founder and CEO ofNumeral.
I wanted to receive yourfeedback on X, Y, Z.
Yeah, nothing out of the norm,I would think.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
And who exactly are you selling into?
Is it higher level, likee-commerce businesses?
Is there a specific verticalthat Numeral is the best fit for
?
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Yeah, at the highest level.
We sell to companies that havehigh transaction volume, which
means they have, like self-serverevenue streams.
So this is in juxtaposition tothink about.
Like sales-led companies, right, like Oracle.
Like you can't buy Oracle byswiping your credit card.
You have to talk to a sales rep, right?
So we work with companies thathave high transaction volume and
the majority of their revenuestream comes from self-serve uh
business models.
(09:29):
Um, yeah, e-commerce brands isone of them, right.
Like is one uh area in whichwe've seen a lot of success, but
it really varies.
Like we have.
We work with direct-to-consumere-commerce brands, like
birchbox.
We work with subscriptionconsumer subscriptions, like
Scribd.
We work with app store appslike Captions, consumer
(09:51):
electronics like Gap Wireless.
Even companies that provide afinancial instrument, like
Payzen.
So it's really as broad as doyou allow your customers to buy
your product or service withouttalking to a sales rep and you
just let them use a credit cardand swipe?
If so, then obviously you havehigh transaction volume and we
can potentially be a benefit tothem.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Gotcha Okay.
So before I get too far downthe rabbit hole of the progress
that you've gotten so far withNumeral, this is not your first
entrepreneurial venture, sobefore that you did uh, clean af
, which is obviously completelydifferent.
Um and I and I've seen theyoutube video you sent.
I'm 100 putting that in thepodcast description link.
You can't get out of this one,unfortunately.
(10:34):
Um sounds good.
So what?
What was that experience like?
What did you?
What did you take from that?
Speaker 1 (10:41):
that helped you build numeral yeah, um, you know for
the in regards to the naming,you know these are things that
you know, you think about whenyou're in your mid-20s and you
have a lot of youthfulexuberance.
I'd say the biggest takeawaysfrom Clean AF Club.
So, just for some context,clean AF Club was I got
inspiration from Dollar ShaveClub.
I got inspiration from DollarShave Club.
(11:01):
Essentially, clean AF Club wasproviding eco-friendly, organic
bamboo toothbrushes as well asfluoride-free toothpaste and a
subscription, direct-to-consumermembership where every three
months that's the frequency inwhich you should be replacing
your toothbrush we would shipthis to our customers.
(11:24):
My biggest takeaway from thatexperience was I learned a lot
about how e-commerce companiesand what e-commerce brands face
from an accounting pain pointproblem, because when you have
high volume like that, when youhave these different
subscription models and youallow customers to upgrade,
downgrade, cancel, when youallow them to buy gift cards, it
introduces a ton of revenuecomplexity.
(11:45):
So that was my firstintroduction into what is
revenue recognition, what iscash reconciliation.
So a lot of the lessons I tookfrom Clean AF Club.
Obviously we apply to numeraland a lot of the customers we
serve today are direct toconsumer subscription e-commerce
companies like Birchbox,battleboxbox, elysium all true,
(12:05):
they're basically the same typeof business funnels that I had
at clean af club.
So, um, learned a ton aboutaccounting and uh kind of
processes there.
Uh, the second thing I learned,I would say, is that stick to
areas in which you're more youknow are naturally more
proficient in.
So like b2c, for example, I'venever had any experience there,
it was just you know.
When you're more proficient inso like B2C, for example, I've
never had any experience there,it was just you know, when
(12:26):
you're in your mid twenties, youhave unlimited energy and you
just have an entrepreneurialitch, you just you just got to
scratch it Right.
So I just saw an opportunitythere and took advantage of that
.
But yeah, the biggest takeawayfor me from my clean AF
experience was sick to B2B.
B2b is what I know.
B2b is what I'm the strongestin, what I do with the least
(12:47):
amount of effort, and obviouslythat's why I'm here, that's why
we're doing this at Numero.
Speaker 3 (12:52):
Yeah Well, and I imagine that also really helps
when you're talking to I imagineyou're selling into controllers
or CFOs at these differentcompanies where you're like,
I've literally been in your seatand I know how hard it is to
keep all of this revenuerecognition together Of course,
of course.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Yeah, that's certainly is helpful, especially
when you are first starting thecompany and you have no social
proof or no pedigree.
Speaker 3 (13:16):
Yeah, so what, if you don't mind me asking, what did
you ultimately end up doing withwith cleaning AFCO?
Did you, did you wind it down?
Did you, did you sell?
Speaker 1 (13:24):
it.
We sold it, but it was not forany meaningful amount.
Let's just say that much.
Yeah, I sold that.
And keep in mind, while CleanAF Club was operating, I was
still working full-time.
I was still working tech sales,go-to-market leadership at
startups the entire time inparallel.
(13:45):
So it was a great experience,but certainly not any
life-changing amount of money.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
Sure, sure, yeah.
What did it feel like actuallywinding that down?
Was there a little bit of anelement of sadness?
How did you feel?
Speaker 1 (14:00):
After that many years of running it, I felt a little
bit of relief mainly because itwas in the area in which I was
not super knowledgeable aboutand proficient in which direct
to consumer subscriptions.
It was simply a matter of hey,I know I need to start
businesses and I know I need to.
(14:20):
I'm going to be starting otherbusinesses.
Uh, let me, let me get thisfirst at bat.
Let me, let me just let melearn how to grind.
Let me learn how to, you know,literally lie to China to
negotiate with manufacturers fora weekend and be back in office
by Monday, like it just teachesyou a lot how to grind.
Yeah, so yeah, that that was myand be back in office by Monday,
like it just teaches you a lothow to grind, yeah.
So yeah, that was my maintakeaways Okay and so.
Speaker 3 (14:40):
Yeah, I actually I had seen that, that you were at
Balto and then you went straightfrom that to Numeral.
What was the decision that madeyou decide to go all in on
Numeral as opposed to, you know,maybe starting to scale it up
as a side project, like how youdid with the other company?
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Yeah, I'm 11 years into my career almost 12 years
and as you progress in yourcareer I mean if you make the
smart financial decision, like Itold you, personal finance is
my biggest passion outside ofwork.
You build yourself a littlesafety net there so you can take
more risks and those risks canbecome more ambitious as your
career grows.
So it was just at a point whereeverything was going well at my
(15:20):
former company, Balto, but anopportunity presented itself
where there was a technicalco-founder and there was
opportunity to start thisbusiness and you just jump at it
and take the chance.
And, of course, if perhaps Iwas in a different position
financially, maybe you don'twant to take that type of risk.
But, like I said, personalfinance has always been my
(15:42):
biggest passion.
When you're the firstgeneration born here and your
parents immigrated from adifferent country, you tend to
do well with money.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Where are your parents from?
If you don't mind me askingSouth Korea, South Korea.
What did they think about youboth starting this and your
other entrepreneurial journey?
Speaker 1 (16:00):
You know my, my parents since high school, I
think they've learned to justkind of let Chris do what he
wants to do, because he has justthat type of mentality where
it's probably best just let himdo what he wants to do instead
of arguing over it.
So it wasn't always like that,I'll tell you that much.
But, um no, they were verysupportive, of course, as any
(16:20):
parents would be, and um yeah,uh, they've been uh definitely
uh supportive, uh shoulder,during tough times as well.
Speaker 3 (16:28):
Nice, so okay.
So I, when I was prepping forthis, I watched another podcast
interview and you mentioned youslept out of your car at the
start of numeral.
Now, you clearly weren'thomeless because you had the bad
guy, so overall that justsounds terrible.
So why were you sleeping inyour car?
What filled me in on that?
Speaker 1 (16:46):
Yeah, I was quite observant of you, by the way,
noticing that other podcast.
But you know, all roads lead toRome, right, there are multiple
roads to get to the samedestination and I have always
been a very strong proponent ofburning the boats.
I'm not sure if you're familiarwith that metaphor, but, yeah,
(17:08):
so in every major life decisionI've made, when I have quote
unquote burned the boats, whereI have no backup plan, where I'm
just all in on something, andwhen you're all in on something,
by definition you're cutting alot out, right.
And when you sleep out of yourcar, you're cutting out social
(17:28):
life, you're cutting out,obviously, anything dating,
you're cutting out All you'reoptimizing for is the
survivability of the businessand making sure the business
grows and is successful.
So it's almost like I look atit, it's like a hack, right,
like if you sleep out of yourcar and you know there's a
hundred, you know 68 hours in aweek, right.
(17:49):
And I don't know about you, butme personally, I sleep eight
hours a week or a day, so youknow that's 56 hours there.
So you know I work out, youknow two hours a day.
So, um, you know that's 56hours there.
Speaker 3 (18:02):
So you know, I, I work out, you know, two hours a
day as well, so that's 14 hours.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
So, basically, like you work out two hours a day, I
work out twice a day.
Yeah, okay, yeah, it's, it's uh, nothing is more therapeutic
than working out every singleday.
But, um, that leaves, you know,if you do that, that leaves uh,
like 100 hours, roughly 98hours left in the week.
So I mean, if you live it, ifyou're sleeping out of your car
like you don't want to doanything, you just want to work,
right, you don't want to,there's nothing.
You don't want to go home,right, you don't want to, right,
(18:24):
you're just sleeping out ofyour car, and all that 98 hours
a week is that you have leftover is just is put towards work
.
And I mean, reese, like, thinkabout it, if you're anybody,
anybody who's conscientious,who's any high caliber
individual that you know, if youare putting close to 100 hours
a week on anything, it'simpossible for you to fail, like
(18:47):
you're just not going to fail,like if you actually put that
amount of time, it's just it'svery difficult to, of course,
you know.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
To sustain that, but sometimes that's what you got to
do.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
Yeah, you know, to sustain that, but sometimes
that's what you gotta do, yeah,and also just make that like
deliberate, intentional decisionto do that.
But, um, yeah, I did thatbecause you know that's.
That's that's what it.
Uh, I've learned personallythat's always what's worked well
for me.
Like I said, there's multiplepaths to get to the same
destination.
For me it's maybe it's moreextreme than other folks, but,
uh, I've always approachedthings and major life decisions
that way and, uh, it's alwaysworked for me.
Speaker 3 (19:22):
Well, I mean, that's the, that's the, the founder
mindset, right and it's.
It's.
Oftentimes it's not asglamorous as uh as others make
it out to seem from the outside.
Sometimes you're just sleepingin your car, working a hundred
hour weeks Um, um, also for, foranyone who's not familiar so
the phrase burn the boats nowwas that?
Was that the greeks or theromans?
I think it was the romans,wasn't it?
You know?
Speaker 1 (19:42):
maybe we can ask chat gbt, but uh, but uh.
For my recollection it's fromuh, like a, I think, a spanish
conquistador.
Who was it the con?
I think it's.
The context is no, they land ona new land.
Yeah, they land on newfoundland.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
You know wherever they're going and they burn the
boat so they can't go back.
The only way forward is tosucceed.
But you know what?
You're right.
It was Cortez, okay, never mind, I thought it was the Romans.
Sounded good, okay.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
So I credit the Romans for everything I know
right.
So credit the.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Romans for everything I know right.
So how long did you pull offthose 90, 100-hour weeks?
Speaker 1 (20:20):
I did it until we raised our seed round.
It was over a year.
Oh wow yeah, and, like I said,it's not for everyone.
It's unhealthy in a lot ofregards, but I'm not optimizing
for work-life balance when I'mstarting a company and I'm
optimizing for Don't you live inBoston too?
Speaker 3 (20:36):
Isn't it freezing?
Speaker 1 (20:37):
No, when we started the company it was in San
Francisco.
Okay, all right, that's alittle bit more doable.
Yeah, it would have been alittle tougher in Boston, but it
still would have been done.
Yeah, fair enough.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
Okay, so you raised your seed round and you
mentioned that it took about ayear.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
How has the company changed since raising that
initial round?
Since raising that round?
So we raised that.
We had a 1 million pre-seedbefore, which got us started,
but that seed round helped a tonright.
It helps us with scaling ourteams.
It helps us with actually beingable to work on the
architecture of our product,versus just trying to cobble
things together for the customerwho needs things by this
deadline as soon as possible.
(21:17):
It helped us grow ourgo-to-market team right.
Instead of me doing everything,me selling, me doing customer
success, we have somebody whohandles that now right, both
individual those areas.
So, no, it's definitely helpedus scale and helped us grow.
Speaker 3 (21:32):
Was there a pivotal moment, and maybe it was the
fundraise, maybe it was closinga certain customer where you
really felt like it was abreakthrough for the company.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
I would say there's been two major breakthroughs
since the inception of Numero,the first being, within five
months of starting the company,we signed our first significant
six-figure deal and prior tothat, like you know, we were,
you know we sold like a smaller10K, 20k, 30k, those type of
(22:02):
deals.
It was incredibly validatingwhen one of our earliest
customers said hey, we've beentrying to build something like
this internally for two and ahalf years.
It didn't work out.
We're going to write you thischeck and I know you don't have
a solution fully baked out, butyour problem that you're solving
is exactly what we try to solve.
Solve it for me and I'm goingto pay you to help you build it,
(22:27):
even though the software is notfully live yet.
So that was incrediblyinvigorating and was a
monumental moment for us.
The second thing, I would say,the second moment which I recall
, which was a big breakthroughfor us, was when we got our
first customer live and usingthe numbers that Numeral is
(22:48):
producing.
So to have a business rely onyour software and the numbers
that we produce that Numeralproduces.
They use it to close theirbooks, they use it to report to
investors, they use it toforecast, they use it to make
strategic company decisions.
That was a huge life of ahamoment for us, like wow, okay,
(23:12):
now it's real, now a company isactually reliant on us and trust
us fully with this.
And, yeah, those are the two, Ithink, pivotal breakthrough
moments for us.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Yeah, no, I can imagine that must have been a
great feeling.
I'm curious with that firstcompany, since they had been
trying and failing to solve itfor two and a half years.
Why were they confident thatyou could do it when they
couldn't?
Speaker 1 (23:31):
Well, I mean, when you are doing founder led sales,
it's all about conviction, it'sall about, I mean, it's a
typical sales process, right?
And I think the reason why theybet on us is we had a very
strong team.
But also, you know, they theybelieve in what I'm asking,
right, they believe in what I'msaying.
They believe that, hey, youknow, chris will ensure that we
(23:54):
get, he gets this built and hewill serve us and, uh, and
that's what I promised andthat's what we've gone on to do.
So, um, yeah, when you'reselling so early stage like that
, when it's literally just youand maybe a couple engineers,
it's really just all relational,right, it's do I believe that
this person is going to deliverwhat they say they will.
And fortunately, you know, Iwas able to convince some folks
(24:20):
of that.
Speaker 3 (24:22):
And here we are, nice , and obviously you still are
continuing to take a primary,you know leadership on the sales
component, but also being afounder you still have to think
about you know the engineering,the products, components of the
business.
What was that adjustment likefor you as you shifted your
mindset a little bit?
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Yeah, engineering and product are different worlds
when it comes to sales.
So it wasn't a crazy adjustmentbecause if you are leading any
go-to-market team organizationat any high-growth startup, you
are rowing in the same directionas product engineering.
Everyone's rowing in the samedirection and you're in lockstep
.
At least that's been myexperience with strong and
(25:04):
well-run organizations like that.
I think the biggest adjustmentis a shift in mindset
(25:36):
no-transcript, like a customerwants it yes, you know this, you
want this feature, yes, andthen it's balancing that which
with product engineering, which,to simplify it, for me it's
just understanding and saying alot of no, and balancing, like
(25:58):
you're juggling engineering,bandwidth, customer deadlines
and product roadmap versusadditional revenue and scope
creep, and preventing scopecreep is a huge part of of that
process of juggling all thosedifferent functions, um, as the
founder and ceo.
So, yeah, I think, like I said,I think the biggest adjustment
is just a mentality shift,though in sales it's, like I
(26:20):
said, daily, weekly, monthly,quarterly.
In product engineering it's hey, how can we, how can we build a
, you know, scalable, long-termsolution while factoring account
existing and current customerneeds and demands?
So it's balancing all that.
Speaker 3 (26:37):
Yeah, it's almost like using just two different
parts of your brain, more orless, and also the other part
where you may have to do alittle bit of balancing is at
one time.
Or one time or, on one hand,you're the, you are the founder,
you're the CEO and you know,you're, of course, responsible
to investors and you have tohave a vision for where the
company goes over the course ofthe next few years, but then, at
(26:58):
the same time, you're stillsmall enough where you have to
be pretty tactical in your, yourday-to-day operation.
So how do you balance the twoof those?
Speaker 1 (27:05):
It's not easy, but I would say the key to balancing
those, at least for myself, is adelegation and trust.
So essentially I am finding andvetting folks that can be
strong functional owners intheir respective areas and
execute on the tactical detailswhich obviously frees me up for
more of the high-level stuff andmaking sure that we're on
(27:27):
course.
So at the same time, you don'twant to lose sight of the nitty
gritty details and you don'twant to be so far away from the
weeds.
So I think one thing, somethings I like to do, is
literally we'll have dailyengineering standups and I will
still join, I will stillliberally ask questions on
double-clicking into the weedson certain implementations, and
(27:49):
then, on the go-to-market side,like I'll literally still listen
to cold calls, like everymeeting that's booked, I'll
listen to it.
When we have a new businessmeeting and it's recorded, I'll
listen to that game film andthen I'll provide feedback to
the rep immediately after.
So I think a way to likebalancing that is kind of just
roll up your sleeves, right.
I mean, common sense is notalways common practice, but it's
(28:12):
just being able to being opento, you know, still being in the
weeds with your, with yourteammates.
Um, you know, we're a startuphere.
Right like there's no one.
No one lives in the ivory towerhere.
Right like you don't want anyof that type of mindset going on
.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Yeah and on that and on that note of just hiring the
right people and vetting them,how have you done that
successfully thus far, or haveyou made any mistakes on that
side?
Speaker 1 (28:35):
we've certainly made some mistakes, right.
I think every everyone makesmistakes along the way.
When you're a startup,especially when you're trying to
balance immediate need, like ohmy goodness, we have a burning
need for this person, I'm kindof overlooking some other
potential red flags because tosolve that burning need, yeah,
we've made those mistakes before, but all mistakes are good, all
(28:58):
mistakes are lessons, right?
So, yeah, I mean, in terms offinding the right folks for the
roles I learned this very earlyon it's just finding the folks
that are high caliber,self-starter, take the
initiative and are ambitious andthat you can trust and they
work well with others and thenget the hell out the way.
(29:18):
That's it.
So you know, like for the folks, like for the first sales um
rep we hired on our team, youknow I trusted him because he
used to work, you know, on aprevious team of mine and you
know all those qualities youknow were already previously
vetted for um.
But yeah, you try to just vetfor those uh qualities as much
(29:39):
as possible.
But when you, when you findfolks that are that want to be
founders themselves, right, well, when they want to, when they,
when they show that initiative,when they're just immediately
responsive on slack.
There's all these like littlesignals that you see, which
which give off the impression oflike, ah yeah, this this
individual is is on, it has it,and uh, and if you can trust
(30:00):
them and if they're a good teamplayer, right, which is not
always the case, right, you can,you can have those qualities,
but not get along with everyoneelse.
But if they have thosequalities, it's it's fitting for
that and get along witheveryone else.
But if they have thosequalities, it's it's fending for
that.
Speaker 3 (30:13):
And, like I said just , empowering them as much as
possible and getting out theirway Love that.
So I'm curious, now that you'veyou know again to go back to
the crazy hours you were pulling.
You know, hopefully you're andobviously you're not doing that
anymore.
What do you do now outside ofthe office that enables you to
perform better at work?
Speaker 1 (30:30):
I mean, I, I, what I do now is the same thing I've
done for like a decade plus.
Uh, I mean, I don't know aboutyou, reese, but for me I just
like to go to the gym everymorning.
Um, you know, my gym opensweekdays at 5.00 AM.
So I'm there 5.00 AM, you know,work out for two hours.
Nothing is, uh, it's like avacation every morning.
You almost don't need to go onvacation.
You go get a really goodworkout.
You go to the steam room, youtake an ice cold shower.
You feel better than you canhandle anything.
(30:55):
No, it doesn't matter what.
So that's, yeah, I'm notnothing special there, just go
to the gym every single day.
It's incredibly therapeutic.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
Yep, yep.
Well, I'm getting better.
I'm about five days a week, butbaby steps.
And then I guess, one of thelast questions I'd have for you
just single best piece of adviceyou've gotten in your career
thus far?
That's really helped you.
What would that be?
Speaker 1 (31:19):
The single best piece of business advice you're
asking, not personal advice, yepor either, whatever you think
is more impactful.
The single best piece of careeradvice I've ever gotten is to
seek input to maximize output.
What I mean by that is I meanI'm sure you've heard of, you
know, the number one rule ofleadership is people are much
(31:42):
more likely to want to dosomething if it's their idea or
if they've had their, if they'vecontributed to the idea.
So, before any major decisionsare made, I've always learned to
seek the stakeholders' input.
It doesn't matter if you're thefounder and CEO, it doesn't
matter if you set the course forthe company and this is what
(32:02):
we're going to do you can haveconversations and wordsmith
things in a manner which allowothers to chip in and be a part
of that.
And, yeah, when they contributeto that decision-making process
, you know they're much morewilling to support the resulting
plan and you know that's goingto lead to just greater
commitment and motivation.
So, yeah, I would say seekinput to maximize output.
(32:27):
That's the best piece of careeradvice I've gotten, yeah.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
So I guess then, final question just how do you
see Numeral evolving over thecourse of the next few years?
What is your ultimate goal interms of building this company?
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Yeah, our ultimate goal here at Numeral is to
advance the profession ofaccounting by standardizing and
normalizing a daily closedprocess as opposed to monthly
closed processes.
So, if you know any accountants, if you know any folks in the
profession, month end close isterrible.
It's just that it's everycompany, every accounting team
(33:04):
that is the norm.
That's what's done and we areempowering and enabling
accounting leaders and financeleaders to do a daily close, as
close to a real time close aspossible, starting with revenue
and cash, and when you conveyhey, this is what we're working
towards.
You know it's a foreign concept, right, like the concept of a
(33:26):
daily close to most accountingleaders accounts right now.
It's just they don't think it'spossible.
There's like that sounds kindof farfetched but, as with all
you know, major industry changes, it's it's a gradual.
You know gradual, gradual andthen all of a sudden thing.
So that's what we're working onand that's what we.
That's how numeral will impactthe accounting profession in the
(33:48):
future.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
Awesome.
Well, I'm rooting for you guys.
I'm excited to follow along inthe journey and just to wrap
things out today.
I really appreciate you comingon.
Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (33:58):
Likewise.
Thanks so much for your time.
We appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (34:00):
Thank you for tuning in to this episode of Seed to
Exit.
I hope you found today'sconversation insightful and
valuable.
If you enjoyed the episode,please take a moment to
subscribe, leave a review andshare it with your network.
Your support means the worldhelps us continue to grow and
bring more incredible guestsonto the show.
Now for more content andupdates, follow me on LinkedIn
(34:24):
or Twitter, or you can check outMindHire, where we help
startups build exceptional teams.
Thanks again for listening andI'll see you in the next episode
of Seed to Exit.
Numeral aggregates, all revenue and cash impacting
data from disparate systems.
These are very commonly paymentprocessors, billing platforms
and bank accounts.
These are the three most commonsystems that we integrate with.
We ingest all the financialdata from these systems and then
we cleanse, curate, organizeall this data, which we call
numeralizing the data set, whichis the foundation for all that
(00:23):
we do.
And once we have a numeralizeddata set within our platform, we
apply accounting automationlogic.
So the example I just gave youof like prorating the revenue
recognition schedule for AmazonPrime, for RevRec, we would
automate all that.
But you can imagine, if you tryto do this for millions of
transactions and spreadsheets,it's just impossible to do so.
(00:43):
That's where we come into play.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Welcome to today's episode of Seat to Exit.
I'm Rhys Keck and I'm excitedto speak with Christopher Kim,
the founder and CEO of Numeral.
Numeral is transformingaccounting through automation,
with a focus on revenuerecognition and transaction
level cash reconciliation.
Before founding Numeral, chrisfounded Clean AF Club and gained
experience in sales and fintech.
We'll dive into his journeyfrom the early days of Numeral.
Chris founded Clean AF Club andgained experience in sales and
fintech.
We'll dive into his journeyfrom the early days of Numeral,
(01:07):
including his decision to sleepin his car to make the company's
vision a reality.
We'll also discuss the problemNumeral is solving for the
accounting teams, the importanceof servant leadership and the
lessons he's learned whilebuilding a fintech startup.
Thanks for listening and let'sgo ahead and dive into the
conversation listening and let'sgo ahead and dive into the
conversation.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
Welcome to Seed to Exit, the podcast where we
uncover the stories, strategiesand insights that power the
startup ecosystem.
I'm your host, rhys Keck,founder of MindHire, a talent
acquisition firm specializing inhelping startups build
exceptional teams.
Each week, I sit down withfounders, investors and industry
leaders to explore the journeysbehind iconic companies and
game-changing ideas.
Whether you're building,investing or just curious about
(01:49):
what it takes to succeed in thestartup world, I want this
podcast to be your go-toresource for actionable insights
and inspiring conversations.
Now, if you enjoy the show,please don't forget to subscribe
, leave a review or share itwith your network.
Your support means the worldand really helps bring more
incredible conversations to life.
Chris, welcome aboard.
Thanks for coming on.
Absolutely, reece.
(02:10):
Thanks for having me.
You got it, so I'm superexcited to talk to you.
I'm a little bit of anaccounting nerd myself, even
though I'm not formally anaccountant.
The first thing I really everdid out of college was start
recruiting accountants, so Ilearned a whole lot more about
it than I thought I ever would.
But for those of the audiencewho are not accountants, they
(02:31):
might need a little bit ofexplaining what it is that
Numeral does.
So, before we get intoeverything else, if you could
just explain the concept ofrevenue recognition, cash
reconciliations and what thoseare.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yeah, absolutely so.
Reese Numeral is a fullyautomated revenue subledger that
automates revenue recognitionand transaction level cash
reconciliation.
For those who don't have anaccounting experience, which I'm
sure is the majority oflisteners, revenue recognition
is very simply an accountingprinciple that states that
revenue must be recognized whenit's earned, not when payment is
(03:04):
received.
To illustrate that in anexample, do you use Amazon Prime
?
I do, okay, same with me.
So let's just say you knowAmazon Prime.
For easy math purposes, let'ssay it was sold at $120 a year.
If you bought Amazon Prime inJanuary of 2022, the revenue
recognition principle statesthat you know Amazon Prime can.
January of 2022, the revenuerecognition principle states
(03:26):
that Amazon Prime can onlyrecognize $10 of revenue in
January, $10 in February, $10 inMarch, so on and so forth, as
opposed to $120 in January forwhen the payment was received.
This is a very, very simple,elementary example.
It could get much more gnarlierthan that, but that's what
revenue recognition is at a highlevel For cash reconciliation,
(03:47):
cash reconciliation is verysimply the process of comparing
accounting records with the bankstatement, basically to ensure
that everything is properlyaccounted for.
So if we use the Amazon Primeexample once again, let's just
say Amazon Prime made $500million in January of 2025.
They sold $500 million worth ofsubscriptions, right.
(04:09):
Well, if in their bank accountfor that same period of time
they received $480 million,there's that $20 million delta,
right.
So cash reconciliation isidentifying the variances, why
that delta exists andattributing those variances
those that delta exists, andattributing those variances,
those differences, to differentbuckets.
Wouldn't that be like taxes,transaction fees from payment
(04:32):
processors, currency conversionrates, all of that?
So that's hopefully to helpsure, non-accounting listeners,
but yeah, that's a very simplyhigh level.
What RevRec and CashRec is?
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Okay, so now that we have that out of the way and
we've got the definitions inplace, so what is it that
specifically that Numeral doesthen?
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Yeah, numeral aggregates all revenue and cash
impacting data from disparatesystems.
These are very commonly paymentprocessors, billing platforms
and bank accounts.
These are the three most commonsystems that we integrate with.
We ingest all the financialdata from these systems and then
we cleanse, curate, organizeall this data, which we call
(05:13):
numeralizing the data set, whichis the foundation for all that
we do.
And once we have a numeralizeddata set within our platform, we
apply accounting automationlogic.
So the example I just gave youof like prorating the, you know
the revenue recognition schedulefor Amazon prime, for RevRec.
Uh, you know we would automateall that, but you know you can
imagine if you try to do thisfor millions of transactions and
(05:33):
spreadsheets, it's justimpossible to do so.
That's where we would come intoplay.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
So you're not an accountant yourself.
So I'm curious where and thisis a pretty specific problem
that you're solving.
So I'm just curious where theinspiration for this came from.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
Yeah, no, I'm not an accountant and I'm not a CPA
Never have been but theinspiration for Numeral came
about where my biggest personalpassion outside of work has
always been personal finance.
I'm first generation immigrant.
My parents were firstgeneration immigrants.
I'm first generation born inthe US and I don't know if
you're you know in a personalfinance.
(06:06):
But uh, there are tools like uh, there was a tool called mint.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Uh, before it was discontinued by I was gonna say
it's gone now, isn't it yeah?
Speaker 1 (06:12):
yeah, but there's a personal capital, which is now
in power.
There's rocket money, there'sall these tools that are
essentially net worthaggregators and they give you.
There's the they're supposed togive you a view of your net
worth aggregators and they giveyou.
There's the they're supposed togive you a view of your net
worth in real time, and that wasthe inspiration for Numeral.
From the very onset,essentially, when Numeral was
started, I thought of hey,what's what's at the
(06:34):
intersection of what am I mostpassionate in, which is personal
finance, which is, and alsolike, what am I strongest in,
which is, you know, b2b,go-to-market and go-to-market
and B2B software teams?
So, yeah, that was theintersection where and really
all accounting is is justpersonal finance for businesses.
It's obviously much morecomplex, with a lot more
(06:54):
calculations, but it's reallynot that difficult once you
understand the terminology andcan speak the lingo.
Speaker 3 (07:01):
And so, you know, typically when you have an
accounting system, you can justlog in and you can see your
balance sheet right, which willshow all of your assets and
liabilities.
So that also, almost in a way,is already like a, a show of net
worth.
So where, where is thedifference between that and
numeral?
Is it because numeral is realtime and then, with with the you
know accounting statements, youhave to go back and close the
month?
Speaker 1 (07:26):
No, no.
So the example you justmentioned that's just like
simple adding and subtractingbank account balances, and
that's simple.
What we do is we are ingestingthe data directly from these
different sources like billingplatforms, payment processors,
bank accounts, and then we'redoing a lot of calculations in
between as the middleman.
So it's just a lot morecalculations, a lot more edge
(07:48):
cases versus, as opposed to just, if you think of like a net
worth aggregator, it's justaddition and subtraction, right,
like how much do I have in mybank account versus how much do
I have for my credit card bill,right?
So it's just the complexity ofthe calculations.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
Gotcha.
Okay, I see what you mean, so Iunderstand where the
inspiration for it came from.
How did you go about actuallygetting it off the ground and
getting your first customers?
Speaker 1 (08:12):
Yeah, getting our first customers, that was a fun
time.
I don't think we created thewheel.
I think we just did what wastried and true.
I come from a go-to-marketbackground.
I started my career as a salesrep so I've made a ton of cold
calls in my time, so it was allfounder-led sales at the very
beginning.
You reach out to earlyprospects.
(08:34):
You reach out and look foradvisors to give you feedback on
these wireframes, this visionyou have for them.
But yeah, honestly, all of ourearly customers, first customers
, literally just cold calling me, cold calling them saying, hey,
this is the founder and CEO ofNumeral.
I wanted to receive yourfeedback on X, Y, Z.
Yeah, nothing out of the norm,I would think.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
And who exactly are you selling into?
Is it higher level, likee-commerce businesses?
Is there a specific verticalthat Numeral is the best fit for
?
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Yeah, at the highest level.
We sell to companies that havehigh transaction volume, which
means they have, like self-serverevenue streams.
So this is in juxtaposition tothink about.
Like sales-led companies, right, like Oracle.
Like you can't buy Oracle byswiping your credit card.
You have to talk to a sales rep, right?
So we work with companies thathave high transaction volume and
the majority of their revenuestream comes from self-serve uh
business models.
(09:29):
Um, yeah, e-commerce brands isone of them, right.
Like is one uh area in whichwe've seen a lot of success, but
it really varies.
Like we have.
We work with direct-to-consumere-commerce brands, like
birchbox.
We work with subscriptionconsumer subscriptions, like
Scribd.
We work with app store appslike Captions, consumer
(09:51):
electronics like Gap Wireless.
Even companies that provide afinancial instrument, like
Payzen.
So it's really as broad as doyou allow your customers to buy
your product or service withouttalking to a sales rep and you
just let them use a credit cardand swipe?
If so, then obviously you havehigh transaction volume and we
can potentially be a benefit tothem.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Gotcha Okay.
So before I get too far downthe rabbit hole of the progress
that you've gotten so far withNumeral, this is not your first
entrepreneurial venture, sobefore that you did uh, clean af
, which is obviously completelydifferent.
Um and I and I've seen theyoutube video you sent.
I'm 100 putting that in thepodcast description link.
You can't get out of this one,unfortunately.
(10:34):
Um sounds good.
So what?
What was that experience like?
What did you?
What did you take from that?
Speaker 1 (10:41):
that helped you build numeral yeah, um, you know for
the in regards to the naming,you know these are things that
you know, you think about whenyou're in your mid-20s and you
have a lot of youthfulexuberance.
I'd say the biggest takeawaysfrom Clean AF Club.
So, just for some context,clean AF Club was I got
inspiration from Dollar ShaveClub.
I got inspiration from DollarShave Club.
(11:01):
Essentially, clean AF Club wasproviding eco-friendly, organic
bamboo toothbrushes as well asfluoride-free toothpaste and a
subscription, direct-to-consumermembership where every three
months that's the frequency inwhich you should be replacing
your toothbrush we would shipthis to our customers.
(11:24):
My biggest takeaway from thatexperience was I learned a lot
about how e-commerce companiesand what e-commerce brands face
from an accounting pain pointproblem, because when you have
high volume like that, when youhave these different
subscription models and youallow customers to upgrade,
downgrade, cancel, when youallow them to buy gift cards, it
introduces a ton of revenuecomplexity.
(11:45):
So that was my firstintroduction into what is
revenue recognition, what iscash reconciliation.
So a lot of the lessons I tookfrom Clean AF Club.
Obviously we apply to numeraland a lot of the customers we
serve today are direct toconsumer subscription e-commerce
companies like Birchbox,battleboxbox, elysium all true,
(12:05):
they're basically the same typeof business funnels that I had
at clean af club.
So, um, learned a ton aboutaccounting and uh kind of
processes there.
Uh, the second thing I learned,I would say, is that stick to
areas in which you're more youknow are naturally more
proficient in.
So like b2c, for example, I'venever had any experience there,
it was just you know.
When you're more proficient inso like B2C, for example, I've
never had any experience there,it was just you know, when
(12:26):
you're in your mid twenties, youhave unlimited energy and you
just have an entrepreneurialitch, you just you just got to
scratch it Right.
So I just saw an opportunitythere and took advantage of that
.
But yeah, the biggest takeawayfor me from my clean AF
experience was sick to B2B.
B2b is what I know.
B2b is what I'm the strongestin, what I do with the least
(12:47):
amount of effort, and obviouslythat's why I'm here, that's why
we're doing this at Numero.
Speaker 3 (12:52):
Yeah Well, and I imagine that also really helps
when you're talking to I imagineyou're selling into controllers
or CFOs at these differentcompanies where you're like,
I've literally been in your seatand I know how hard it is to
keep all of this revenuerecognition together Of course,
of course.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Yeah, that's certainly is helpful, especially
when you are first starting thecompany and you have no social
proof or no pedigree.
Speaker 3 (13:16):
Yeah, so what, if you don't mind me asking, what did
you ultimately end up doing withwith cleaning AFCO?
Did you, did you wind it down?
Did you, did you sell?
Speaker 1 (13:24):
it.
We sold it, but it was not forany meaningful amount.
Let's just say that much.
Yeah, I sold that.
And keep in mind, while CleanAF Club was operating, I was
still working full-time.
I was still working tech sales,go-to-market leadership at
startups the entire time inparallel.
(13:45):
So it was a great experience,but certainly not any
life-changing amount of money.
Speaker 3 (13:51):
Sure, sure, yeah.
What did it feel like actuallywinding that down?
Was there a little bit of anelement of sadness?
How did you feel?
Speaker 1 (14:00):
After that many years of running it, I felt a little
bit of relief mainly because itwas in the area in which I was
not super knowledgeable aboutand proficient in which direct
to consumer subscriptions.
It was simply a matter of hey,I know I need to start
businesses and I know I need to.
(14:20):
I'm going to be starting otherbusinesses.
Uh, let me, let me get thisfirst at bat.
Let me, let me just let melearn how to grind.
Let me learn how to, you know,literally lie to China to
negotiate with manufacturers fora weekend and be back in office
by Monday, like it just teachesyou a lot how to grind.
Yeah, so yeah, that that was myand be back in office by Monday,
like it just teaches you a lothow to grind, yeah.
So yeah, that was my maintakeaways Okay and so.
Speaker 3 (14:40):
Yeah, I actually I had seen that, that you were at
Balto and then you went straightfrom that to Numeral.
What was the decision that madeyou decide to go all in on
Numeral as opposed to, you know,maybe starting to scale it up
as a side project, like how youdid with the other company?
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Yeah, I'm 11 years into my career almost 12 years
and as you progress in yourcareer I mean if you make the
smart financial decision, like Itold you, personal finance is
my biggest passion outside ofwork.
You build yourself a littlesafety net there so you can take
more risks and those risks canbecome more ambitious as your
career grows.
So it was just at a point whereeverything was going well at my
(15:20):
former company, Balto, but anopportunity presented itself
where there was a technicalco-founder and there was
opportunity to start thisbusiness and you just jump at it
and take the chance.
And, of course, if perhaps Iwas in a different position
financially, maybe you don'twant to take that type of risk.
But, like I said, personalfinance has always been my
(15:42):
biggest passion.
When you're the firstgeneration born here and your
parents immigrated from adifferent country, you tend to
do well with money.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Where are your parents from?
If you don't mind me askingSouth Korea, South Korea.
What did they think about youboth starting this and your
other entrepreneurial journey?
Speaker 1 (16:00):
You know my, my parents since high school, I
think they've learned to justkind of let Chris do what he
wants to do, because he has justthat type of mentality where
it's probably best just let himdo what he wants to do instead
of arguing over it.
So it wasn't always like that,I'll tell you that much.
But, um no, they were verysupportive, of course, as any
(16:20):
parents would be, and um yeah,uh, they've been uh definitely
uh supportive, uh shoulder,during tough times as well.
Speaker 3 (16:28):
Nice, so okay.
So I, when I was prepping forthis, I watched another podcast
interview and you mentioned youslept out of your car at the
start of numeral.
Now, you clearly weren'thomeless because you had the bad
guy, so overall that justsounds terrible.
So why were you sleeping inyour car?
What filled me in on that?
Speaker 1 (16:46):
Yeah, I was quite observant of you, by the way,
noticing that other podcast.
But you know, all roads lead toRome, right, there are multiple
roads to get to the samedestination and I have always
been a very strong proponent ofburning the boats.
I'm not sure if you're familiarwith that metaphor, but, yeah,
(17:08):
so in every major life decisionI've made, when I have quote
unquote burned the boats, whereI have no backup plan, where I'm
just all in on something, andwhen you're all in on something,
by definition you're cutting alot out, right.
And when you sleep out of yourcar, you're cutting out social
(17:28):
life, you're cutting out,obviously, anything dating,
you're cutting out All you'reoptimizing for is the
survivability of the businessand making sure the business
grows and is successful.
So it's almost like I look atit, it's like a hack, right,
like if you sleep out of yourcar and you know there's a
hundred, you know 68 hours in aweek, right.
(17:49):
And I don't know about you, butme personally, I sleep eight
hours a week or a day, so youknow that's 56 hours there.
So you know I work out, youknow two hours a day.
So, um, you know that's 56hours there.
Speaker 3 (18:02):
So you know, I, I work out, you know, two hours a
day as well, so that's 14 hours.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
So, basically, like you work out two hours a day, I
work out twice a day.
Yeah, okay, yeah, it's, it's uh, nothing is more therapeutic
than working out every singleday.
But, um, that leaves, you know,if you do that, that leaves uh,
like 100 hours, roughly 98hours left in the week.
So I mean, if you live it, ifyou're sleeping out of your car
like you don't want to doanything, you just want to work,
right, you don't want to,there's nothing.
You don't want to go home,right, you don't want to, right,
(18:24):
you're just sleeping out ofyour car, and all that 98 hours
a week is that you have leftover is just is put towards work
.
And I mean, reese, like, thinkabout it, if you're anybody,
anybody who's conscientious,who's any high caliber
individual that you know, if youare putting close to 100 hours
a week on anything, it'simpossible for you to fail, like
(18:47):
you're just not going to fail,like if you actually put that
amount of time, it's just it'svery difficult to, of course,
you know.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
To sustain that, but sometimes that's what you got to
do.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
Yeah, you know, to sustain that, but sometimes
that's what you gotta do, yeah,and also just make that like
deliberate, intentional decisionto do that.
But, um, yeah, I did thatbecause you know that's.
That's that's what it.
Uh, I've learned personallythat's always what's worked well
for me.
Like I said, there's multiplepaths to get to the same
destination.
For me it's maybe it's moreextreme than other folks, but,
uh, I've always approachedthings and major life decisions
that way and, uh, it's alwaysworked for me.
Speaker 3 (19:22):
Well, I mean, that's the, that's the, the founder
mindset, right and it's.
It's.
Oftentimes it's not asglamorous as uh as others make
it out to seem from the outside.
Sometimes you're just sleepingin your car, working a hundred
hour weeks Um, um, also for, foranyone who's not familiar so
the phrase burn the boats nowwas that?
Was that the greeks or theromans?
I think it was the romans,wasn't it?
You know?
Speaker 1 (19:42):
maybe we can ask chat gbt, but uh, but uh.
For my recollection it's fromuh, like a, I think, a spanish
conquistador.
Who was it the con?
I think it's.
The context is no, they land ona new land.
Yeah, they land on newfoundland.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
You know wherever they're going and they burn the
boat so they can't go back.
The only way forward is tosucceed.
But you know what?
You're right.
It was Cortez, okay, never mind, I thought it was the Romans.
Sounded good, okay.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
So I credit the Romans for everything I know
right.
So credit the.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Romans for everything I know right.
So how long did you pull offthose 90, 100-hour weeks?
Speaker 1 (20:20):
I did it until we raised our seed round.
It was over a year.
Oh wow yeah, and, like I said,it's not for everyone.
It's unhealthy in a lot ofregards, but I'm not optimizing
for work-life balance when I'mstarting a company and I'm
optimizing for Don't you live inBoston too?
Speaker 3 (20:36):
Isn't it freezing?
Speaker 1 (20:37):
No, when we started the company it was in San
Francisco.
Okay, all right, that's alittle bit more doable.
Yeah, it would have been alittle tougher in Boston, but it
still would have been done.
Yeah, fair enough.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
Okay, so you raised your seed round and you
mentioned that it took about ayear.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
How has the company changed since raising that
initial round?
Since raising that round?
So we raised that.
We had a 1 million pre-seedbefore, which got us started,
but that seed round helped a tonright.
It helps us with scaling ourteams.
It helps us with actually beingable to work on the
architecture of our product,versus just trying to cobble
things together for the customerwho needs things by this
deadline as soon as possible.
(21:17):
It helped us grow ourgo-to-market team right.
Instead of me doing everything,me selling, me doing customer
success, we have somebody whohandles that now right, both
individual those areas.
So, no, it's definitely helpedus scale and helped us grow.
Speaker 3 (21:32):
Was there a pivotal moment, and maybe it was the
fundraise, maybe it was closinga certain customer where you
really felt like it was abreakthrough for the company.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
I would say there's been two major breakthroughs
since the inception of Numero,the first being, within five
months of starting the company,we signed our first significant
six-figure deal and prior tothat, like you know, we were,
you know we sold like a smaller10K, 20k, 30k, those type of
(22:02):
deals.
It was incredibly validatingwhen one of our earliest
customers said hey, we've beentrying to build something like
this internally for two and ahalf years.
It didn't work out.
We're going to write you thischeck and I know you don't have
a solution fully baked out, butyour problem that you're solving
is exactly what we try to solve.
Solve it for me and I'm goingto pay you to help you build it,
(22:27):
even though the software is notfully live yet.
So that was incrediblyinvigorating and was a
monumental moment for us.
The second thing, I would say,the second moment which I recall
, which was a big breakthroughfor us, was when we got our
first customer live and usingthe numbers that Numeral is
(22:48):
producing.
So to have a business rely onyour software and the numbers
that we produce that Numeralproduces.
They use it to close theirbooks, they use it to report to
investors, they use it toforecast, they use it to make
strategic company decisions.
That was a huge life of ahamoment for us, like wow, okay,
(23:12):
now it's real, now a company isactually reliant on us and trust
us fully with this.
And, yeah, those are the two, Ithink, pivotal breakthrough
moments for us.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Yeah, no, I can imagine that must have been a
great feeling.
I'm curious with that firstcompany, since they had been
trying and failing to solve itfor two and a half years.
Why were they confident thatyou could do it when they
couldn't?
Speaker 1 (23:31):
Well, I mean, when you are doing founder led sales,
it's all about conviction, it'sall about, I mean, it's a
typical sales process, right?
And I think the reason why theybet on us is we had a very
strong team.
But also, you know, they theybelieve in what I'm asking,
right, they believe in what I'msaying.
They believe that, hey, youknow, chris will ensure that we
(23:54):
get, he gets this built and hewill serve us and, uh, and
that's what I promised andthat's what we've gone on to do.
So, um, yeah, when you'reselling so early stage like that
, when it's literally just youand maybe a couple engineers,
it's really just all relational,right, it's do I believe that
this person is going to deliverwhat they say they will.
And fortunately, you know, Iwas able to convince some folks
(24:20):
of that.
Speaker 3 (24:22):
And here we are, nice , and obviously you still are
continuing to take a primary,you know leadership on the sales
component, but also being afounder you still have to think
about you know the engineering,the products, components of the
business.
What was that adjustment likefor you as you shifted your
mindset a little bit?
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Yeah, engineering and product are different worlds
when it comes to sales.
So it wasn't a crazy adjustmentbecause if you are leading any
go-to-market team organizationat any high-growth startup, you
are rowing in the same directionas product engineering.
Everyone's rowing in the samedirection and you're in lockstep
.
At least that's been myexperience with strong and
(25:04):
well-run organizations like that.
I think the biggest adjustmentis a shift in mindset
(25:36):
no-transcript, like a customerwants it yes, you know this, you
want this feature, yes, andthen it's balancing that which
with product engineering, which,to simplify it, for me it's
just understanding and saying alot of no, and balancing, like
(25:58):
you're juggling engineering,bandwidth, customer deadlines
and product roadmap versusadditional revenue and scope
creep, and preventing scopecreep is a huge part of of that
process of juggling all thosedifferent functions, um, as the
founder and ceo.
So, yeah, I think, like I said,I think the biggest adjustment
is just a mentality shift,though in sales it's, like I
(26:20):
said, daily, weekly, monthly,quarterly.
In product engineering it's hey, how can we, how can we build a
, you know, scalable, long-termsolution while factoring account
existing and current customerneeds and demands?
So it's balancing all that.
Speaker 3 (26:37):
Yeah, it's almost like using just two different
parts of your brain, more orless, and also the other part
where you may have to do alittle bit of balancing is at
one time.
Or one time or, on one hand,you're the, you are the founder,
you're the CEO and you know,you're, of course, responsible
to investors and you have tohave a vision for where the
company goes over the course ofthe next few years, but then, at
(26:58):
the same time, you're stillsmall enough where you have to
be pretty tactical in your, yourday-to-day operation.
So how do you balance the twoof those?
Speaker 1 (27:05):
It's not easy, but I would say the key to balancing
those, at least for myself, is adelegation and trust.
So essentially I am finding andvetting folks that can be
strong functional owners intheir respective areas and
execute on the tactical detailswhich obviously frees me up for
more of the high-level stuff andmaking sure that we're on
(27:27):
course.
So at the same time, you don'twant to lose sight of the nitty
gritty details and you don'twant to be so far away from the
weeds.
So I think one thing, somethings I like to do, is
literally we'll have dailyengineering standups and I will
still join, I will stillliberally ask questions on
double-clicking into the weedson certain implementations, and
(27:49):
then, on the go-to-market side,like I'll literally still listen
to cold calls, like everymeeting that's booked, I'll
listen to it.
When we have a new businessmeeting and it's recorded, I'll
listen to that game film andthen I'll provide feedback to
the rep immediately after.
So I think a way to likebalancing that is kind of just
roll up your sleeves, right.
I mean, common sense is notalways common practice, but it's
(28:12):
just being able to being opento, you know, still being in the
weeds with your, with yourteammates.
Um, you know, we're a startuphere.
Right like there's no one.
No one lives in the ivory towerhere.
Right like you don't want anyof that type of mindset going on
.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Yeah and on that and on that note of just hiring the
right people and vetting them,how have you done that
successfully thus far, or haveyou made any mistakes on that
side?
Speaker 1 (28:35):
we've certainly made some mistakes, right.
I think every everyone makesmistakes along the way.
When you're a startup,especially when you're trying to
balance immediate need, like ohmy goodness, we have a burning
need for this person, I'm kindof overlooking some other
potential red flags because tosolve that burning need, yeah,
we've made those mistakes before, but all mistakes are good, all
(28:58):
mistakes are lessons, right?
So, yeah, I mean, in terms offinding the right folks for the
roles I learned this very earlyon it's just finding the folks
that are high caliber,self-starter, take the
initiative and are ambitious andthat you can trust and they
work well with others and thenget the hell out the way.
(29:18):
That's it.
So you know, like for the folks, like for the first sales um
rep we hired on our team, youknow I trusted him because he
used to work, you know, on aprevious team of mine and you
know all those qualities youknow were already previously
vetted for um.
But yeah, you try to just vetfor those uh qualities as much
(29:39):
as possible.
But when you, when you findfolks that are that want to be
founders themselves, right, well, when they want to, when they,
when they show that initiative,when they're just immediately
responsive on slack.
There's all these like littlesignals that you see, which
which give off the impression oflike, ah yeah, this this
individual is is on, it has it,and uh, and if you can trust
(30:00):
them and if they're a good teamplayer, right, which is not
always the case, right, you can,you can have those qualities,
but not get along with everyoneelse.
But if they have thosequalities, it's it's fitting for
that and get along witheveryone else.
But if they have thosequalities, it's it's fending for
that.
Speaker 3 (30:13):
And, like I said just , empowering them as much as
possible and getting out theirway Love that.
So I'm curious, now that you'veyou know again to go back to
the crazy hours you were pulling.
You know, hopefully you're andobviously you're not doing that
anymore.
What do you do now outside ofthe office that enables you to
perform better at work?
Speaker 1 (30:30):
I mean, I, I, what I do now is the same thing I've
done for like a decade plus.
Uh, I mean, I don't know aboutyou, reese, but for me I just
like to go to the gym everymorning.
Um, you know, my gym opensweekdays at 5.00 AM.
So I'm there 5.00 AM, you know,work out for two hours.
Nothing is, uh, it's like avacation every morning.
You almost don't need to go onvacation.
You go get a really goodworkout.
You go to the steam room, youtake an ice cold shower.
You feel better than you canhandle anything.
(30:55):
No, it doesn't matter what.
So that's, yeah, I'm notnothing special there, just go
to the gym every single day.
It's incredibly therapeutic.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
Yep, yep.
Well, I'm getting better.
I'm about five days a week, butbaby steps.
And then I guess, one of thelast questions I'd have for you
just single best piece of adviceyou've gotten in your career
thus far?
That's really helped you.
What would that be?
Speaker 1 (31:19):
The single best piece of business advice you're
asking, not personal advice, yepor either, whatever you think
is more impactful.
The single best piece of careeradvice I've ever gotten is to
seek input to maximize output.
What I mean by that is I meanI'm sure you've heard of, you
know, the number one rule ofleadership is people are much
(31:42):
more likely to want to dosomething if it's their idea or
if they've had their, if they'vecontributed to the idea.
So, before any major decisionsare made, I've always learned to
seek the stakeholders' input.
It doesn't matter if you're thefounder and CEO, it doesn't
matter if you set the course forthe company and this is what
(32:02):
we're going to do you can haveconversations and wordsmith
things in a manner which allowothers to chip in and be a part
of that.
And, yeah, when they contributeto that decision-making process
, you know they're much morewilling to support the resulting
plan and you know that's goingto lead to just greater
commitment and motivation.
So, yeah, I would say seekinput to maximize output.
(32:27):
That's the best piece of careeradvice I've gotten, yeah.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
So I guess then, final question just how do you
see Numeral evolving over thecourse of the next few years?
What is your ultimate goal interms of building this company?
Speaker 1 (32:41):
Yeah, our ultimate goal here at Numeral is to
advance the profession ofaccounting by standardizing and
normalizing a daily closedprocess as opposed to monthly
closed processes.
So, if you know any accountants, if you know any folks in the
profession, month end close isterrible.
It's just that it's everycompany, every accounting team
(33:04):
that is the norm.
That's what's done and we areempowering and enabling
accounting leaders and financeleaders to do a daily close, as
close to a real time close aspossible, starting with revenue
and cash, and when you conveyhey, this is what we're working
towards.
You know it's a foreign concept, right, like the concept of a
(33:26):
daily close to most accountingleaders accounts right now.
It's just they don't think it'spossible.
There's like that sounds kindof farfetched but, as with all
you know, major industry changes, it's it's a gradual.
You know gradual, gradual andthen all of a sudden thing.
So that's what we're working onand that's what we.
That's how numeral will impactthe accounting profession in the
(33:48):
future.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
Awesome.
Well, I'm rooting for you guys.
I'm excited to follow along inthe journey and just to wrap
things out today.
I really appreciate you comingon.
Thank you so much.
Speaker 1 (33:58):
Likewise.
Thanks so much for your time.
We appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (34:00):
Thank you for tuning in to this episode of Seed to
Exit.
I hope you found today'sconversation insightful and
valuable.
If you enjoyed the episode,please take a moment to
subscribe, leave a review andshare it with your network.
Your support means the worldhelps us continue to grow and
bring more incredible guestsonto the show.
Now for more content andupdates, follow me on LinkedIn
(34:24):
or Twitter, or you can check outMindHire, where we help
startups build exceptional teams.
Thanks again for listening andI'll see you in the next episode
of Seed to Exit.
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