Rex Frank - Winning MSPs Follow A Process

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Rex Frank on the Process-Powered MSP: Why Heroics Aren’t a Strategy

In this episode, Carrie Richardson sits down with Rex Frank, VP of PAX8 Academy, to unpack the real reasons most MSPs stall out. 

From the dangers of hero culture to the strategic misuse of vCIOs, Rex shares decades of insight on what separates mature MSPs from the rest. He doesn’t pull punches—and he doesn’t believe talent alone is enough. If you're tired of duct-taping your business together with hustle, this conversation is your roadmap to building a resilient, scalable MSP.

Topics Covered:

• Why “doing it all yourself” is holding your MSP back
• How to reposition the vCIO role for long-term client impact
• The one thing your org chart says about your growth ceiling
• Why PAX8 Academy is reengineering the MSP maturity model

Find Rex Frank onsite at Pax8 Beyond! 

Read the article inspired by this interview on the Fox and Crow Group blog.

Carrie Richardson and Ian Richardson host the WIN Podcast - What's Important Now?

Serial entrepreneurs, life partners and business partners, they have successfully exited from multiple businesses (IT, call center, real estate, marketing) and they help other business owners create their own versions of success.

Ian is certified in Eagle Center For Leadership Making A Difference, Paterson StratOp, and LifePlan.

Carrie has helped create and execute successful outbound sales strategies for over 1200 technology-focused businesses including MSPs, manufacturers, distributors and SaaS firms.

Learn more at www.foxcrowgroup.com

Book time with Carrie here!

Be a guest on WIN! We host successful entrepreneurs who share advice with other entrepreneurs on how to build, grow or sell a business using examples from their own experience.

Episode Transcript

Carrie Richardson (00:00):
Good afternoon everybody.
My name is Carrie Richardson.
I'm your host for win.
And with me today is Rex Frank,VP of PAX 8 Academy.
Rex, how are you doing today?

Rex Frank (00:10):
I am thumbs up.

Carrie Richardson (00:11):
As always, I am glad to hear it.
Thanks for joining us.
So for people who are coming toPAX 8 for the first time, and
who maybe just became PAX 8partners, tell us about Academy.

Rex Frank (00:26):
I started in the industry in 1988 doing Novell
networks and rode through a lotof different business
transitions from sellinghardware to selling services, to
managed services to, this wholecloud transformation.
And now we're onto the AItransformation after security,

(00:47):
It's been quite a ride.
I was with several MSPs over 25years I started Sea-Level
operations in 2010, initiallyfocused on teaching that
technician promoted to servicemanager how to stop being a tech
and start being a leader of theservice organization and
ultimately become that serviceexecutive role.
We added some financial coachingand security coaching and a few

(01:11):
other things.
Coaching, helping companiesbuild their valuation that
they're targeting, a couple ofyears out.
And then in May of 21, PAX 8 wastalking to some of its fastest
growing partners.
working with C level was one ofthose common denominators.
they were like, we would likemore of that for all of our
partners.
six months later we.

(01:33):
Became part of PAX 8 Academy, wewere celebrating our four year
anniversary with PAX 8.
One thing I'm super proud of isthat every person that came with
me four years ago is still hereat PAX 8 today, so that's pretty
exciting.
The reality is this is a groupof people focused on helping
partners grow, mature, drivetheir businesses to be better.

(01:56):
And we've continued to have theopportunity to do just that.
So everybody's still, from whatthey tell me, living their best
life.
So I love that.

Carrie Richardson (02:06):
What was it like going from the owner of
Sea-Level and being responsiblefor everything at Sea-Level to
going to PAX 8, having Academyand having a team of people to
support you?

Rex Frank (02:19):
So I remember, talking with some of my mentors
through that transition and, itwas made clear to me that the
average tenure of an acquiredCEO is like 8 months.
It's not so much that the, CEOwanted to quit, it's more the
acquiring company is done withtheir bs.
I took it to heart.
It was interesting.
People think that theacquisition was about money, but

(02:41):
it really wasn't.
Nick Heddy came to me and heunderstood what drove me and
Sea-Level is making ameasurable, positive impact on
businesses.
And he painted a picture of howwe're gonna be able to do that
10 x making a.
10 x impact on businesses andthat's what drove the
acquisition.
And that's why we're all stillhere.

(03:04):
And it's interesting Carrie, youcould probably relate to some of
this, right?
When I started my consultingpractices, it was me impacting
one company or tens ofcompanies, And then through the
years.
C level was impacting the numberof companies measured in the
hundreds.
And now coming to Pax 8 we'reimpacting companies measured in

(03:25):
the thousands at any givenmoment.
And that satisfaction reallydrives me.

Carrie Richardson (03:30):
So it's been four years.
I still think it's 2020 most ofthe time,

Rex Frank (03:36):
PAX 8 was supposed to have their first beyond event in
2020, and obviously that didn'thappen.
in a lot of ways, we canprobably say that was a good
thing because when we did ourfirst one in 23, we were much
more prepared.
And had just a lot moreresources to bring to the table
to make that happen.
I remember having some meetingswith Jen Bodell before Rob Rae

(03:59):
was around, and she was saying,I want beyond to be a different
experience.
I remember saying, if we reallyfocused on education, that
really wasn't around any vendordriving product.
Let's do education focused onhelping these partners grow,
mature their businesses.
And she went all in and, academywas, three quarters of the

(04:21):
sessions they allowed us toreally say, look, let's not zero
in or focus or promote anyindividual vendor in these
sessions.
Let's focus on helping thepartner grow and mature their
businesses.
ultimately the outcome is theygrow.
become qualified to work withmore clients or larger clients,
and Their spend with PAX 8increases because their

(04:42):
businesses are improving.
the evidence and numbers allpoint to that's working.
the partners really love thatexperience as well.

Carrie Richardson (04:50):
Yeah, we hear great things about P 8 Academy.

Rex Frank (04:52):
One of the cool things is a year and a half ago,
we decided that the professionalservices organization within PAX
8 was closer aligned with,academy than with support.
the idea is if a partner doesn'thave the skillset or the
bandwidth to do a rollout of aproduct in our marketplace we

(05:14):
can do that end user rollout onbehalf of the partner, then both
the partner and us get to startgetting those benefits sooner.
So that organization is nowunder me as well.
And that's been fun to reallymake sure that there's a partner
enablement focus on what we'redoing.
I run the Americas organizationof both Academy and ProServe,
and we're up to about 95 peoplethat are focused on helping

(05:38):
partners, do what they dobetter, more efficiently, drive
more revenue and reduce risk.

Carrie Richardson (05:45):
this year at PAX 8, what are the major
session talk tracks.
How were they divided out?

Rex Frank (05:52):
I put this shirt on today, right?
Because this is the Beyond 24speaker shirt.
it's funny.
Everybody says, how do I get oneof those shirts?
I'm like, oh, it's super easy.
You just have to like ninemonths in advance, submit an
idea for a speaker topic, haveit get through the selection
committee while they design, thesessions that they want for each
of the personas, whether it'sowner, sales service, engineer,

(06:15):
and then get through thatcommittee and work with
marketing for, six more monthson developing your deck and your
talk track, and then show up anddeliver it to a few hundred
people.
And, that's all you have to doto get this shirt.
But I was wearing it because Iwanted to talk about, the
pillars here, the innovationcommunity.
And education is what thatstands for.

(06:36):
And so you're gonna see a lot ofinnovation content talking about
what's happening with the PAX 8marketplace and the platform.
And you're gonna see a lot ofcommunity related activities
happening.
The sharing and the comeraderiethat occurs when you attend an
event like this.
Then obviously The enablementthat you're seeing happen in a
lot of the sessions as well.

(06:57):
Come prepared and just takeadvantage of everything that you
see happening around there.
It's exciting how much we've,put together.
It's amazing the ability to keepa secret.
I still don't know where nextyear's beyond is.
that's being kept as anannouncement that you're gonna
see.
And I still don't even know whothe big show, the musical artist

(07:17):
is.

Carrie Richardson (07:18):
We don't either.
We've been speculating.

Rex Frank (07:20):
there's gonna be a lot of exciting stuff going on.

Carrie Richardson (07:23):
I understand they moved it to the main floor
this year after some.
Floor wobbling last year.

Rex Frank (07:29):
The floor wobbling.
I have a video of, they bringout the carts that are spread
around with all the alcohol onthem.
And I got some video of thatliquid splashing around in the
bottles.
And it's the best thing I'vefound to illustrate what that
floor felt like.
I was sketchy, but yes.

(07:49):
I think we're downstairs.

Carrie Richardson (07:51):
All right.
So we still don't know who theheadliner is.
However, what are some sessionsthat you think are not to be
missed this year?

Rex Frank (07:57):
Our CEO Scott Chason is gonna be talking about the
vision of where AI is going.
Some enhancements to the Pax 8marketplace are coming.
the sessions are laid out byyour role in the company, if
you're in sales, there's a trackspecifically for sales
professionals.
If you're a service manager oran engineer just, zero in on

(08:22):
what the sessions are for thattrack if you're a security
professional.
We've got the entire securitytrack, laid out with Matt Lee
and Dom Kirby running those.

Carrie Richardson (08:30):
And will there be a place where people
can go and learn more aboutAcademy on the floor in the
exhibit hall?

Rex Frank (08:36):
In the exhibit hall, there's I think within the big
PAX 8 booth, there's six kiosksfor if you wanna zero in on,
what's happening in the sales orwhat's happening in academy and
ProServe, what, what's happeningin the, what we call guided
growth out of our partnerexperience group, I believe
there's a Voyager Alliance, ournew partner program, and we got

(08:58):
that launched in in May Theacademy benefits you get by your
Voyager Alliance tier are justreleased.
So there's some fun stuff tolearn there.

Carrie Richardson (09:08):
Thank you for joining us to share about what's
gonna happen this year beyond.
It was great learning about yourbackground, and we're gonna look
forward to seeing you in June.

Rex Frank (09:17):
fun.
It always is.
Thanks.