IAM1587 – CEO Enhances Customer Experience Through Digital Transformation

CEO of Netsurit, a $30M MSP firm. Grew to 100+ people and $30M in revenue through acquisitions and organic growth. Globally awarded Dreams program as a key part of the Netsurit aspirational culture. Went to 9 schools as a kid. Only got expelled from 3. So 6 / 9 is not a bad result. Enjoys swimming, traveling, and wine.

• CEO Story: Orrin got to University and did everything from selling books and magazines from his brother’s business to selling shoes and clothing at restaurants and building sites, eventually a friend at University invited him to sell computers and calculators, long story short, that’s how Orrin’s journey started over 25 years ago.
• Business Service: Supporting the dreams of the doers. Taking the client's business knowledge and then making recommendations and services to have a meaningful impact on the success of their business. Managed service, Security, and innovation ( finding the best ROI for your business. Subscription basis.
• Secret Sauce: Having a dream plan. Protecting the culture. Focusing on what people really want in their lives. The need to differentiate.
• CEO Hack: Gratitude journal every day. 3 things you are grateful for, 3 things you want to get done today, and then an affirmation statement. Meditation.
• CEO Nugget: Appreciating people as often as possible publicly. Show gratitude.
• CEO Defined: A huge sense of accountability. A massive honor and a privilege.

Website: netsurit.com/en-us

LinkedIn: orrinklopper

Full Interview:

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Transcription

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00:28 – Intro

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harkless values your time and is ready to share precisely the information you're searching for. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

00:55 – Gresham Harkless

Hello, this is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast. I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Orrin Klopper of Netschurrit. Excited to have you on the show.

01:06 – Orrin Klopper

Thanks so much, Gresh. Excited to be on the show.

01:08 – Gresham Harkless

Yes, absolutely. Should be a phenomenal time. Before we jump into the interview, I wanted to read a little bit more about Oren so you can hear about some of those awesome things that he's doing. CEO of Netshirt, a 30 million MSP firm, grew to 100 plus people and 30 million plus dollars in revenue through acquisitions and organic growth. Globally awarded Dreams program as a key part of the Net Sherritt aspirational culture. He went to nine schools as a kid and only got exposed to three. So six out of nine is not that bad. He enjoys swimming, traveling, and vino or wine. Excited to have you on the show, Orrin. Talk about all the awesome things you're doing in your journey. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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01:49 – Orrin Klopper

Yes, thank you, Gresh.

01:51 – Gresham Harkless

Yes, absolutely. Six to nine is definitely not bad at all the awesome things that you're doing. So I guess to kind of kick everything off, let's rewind the clock a little bit here. A little bit more on how you got started with your CEO story.

02:02 – Orrin Klopper

No, sure. I think if I look back at my time at school, I thrived under teachers that I, that I really respected and where I didn't necessarily connect and, and respect the teacher. I didn't really. Well, let's just put. So I was, I was trouble and a problem in that class and I realized pretty early on I, I probably need to navigate and architect a way that I can travel the entrepreneurial journey and did various things.

I got a student loan to pay for my university degree, and during that time did everything to make money from selling books and magazines for my brother's business on Sundays, to selling shoes and clothing at restaurants and building sites, to throwing parties. Eventually, a friend at university invited me to come and sell computers and engineering calculators. Long story short, that's how the journey started. I suppose over 25 years ago, that's where the journey started and here we are today.

03:20 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. I definitely appreciate those. Those teachers that actually were able to connect and have that opportunity for you to grow. But I love that you had that entrepreneurial spirit, it sounds like, from day one, and being kind of it sounds like no matter what it is, you were able to seem like excel with it.

03:38 – Orrin Klopper

Yeah, it was always, always supported by great people and friends. I've never been one of those entrepreneurs, Grish, who's just done it on my own. Always had people around me or close to me that believed in me and gave me a chance long before the imposter in me would have believed I deserved it.

04:03 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, I appreciate you sharing that. I think so many times when you see people with so much success and you don't see that imposter, you just see the highlights of all the things that they're doing. But I'm a big believer that a lot of times to reach certain altitudes, you have to have a great environment around you. I'm biased in the sense that I don't feel like we go through this journey alone. Especially when you reach success, I think there are at least some people who have sacrificed or done some things, even maybe holding the door open in some form, shape, or fashion for you to get to where you should be.

04:31 – Orrin Klopper

Yeah. I have such a long list of people and it's in my mind, and just hearing you say that, I almost think I actually need to just go and write all of them down that I want to thank and just go through a full gratitude exercise over time to make sure I explicitly thank the immeasurable number of people that have. That has helped me hold the door open and give opportunities.

04:57 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. So I wanted to drill down a little bit more here, a little bit more about what you're doing with Netsure. Can you take us through how you're serving your clients and making that impact?

05:05 – Orrin Klopper

Yeah, sure. Our purpose as a business is to support the dreams of the doers. The primary pillar of that is really around the aspirations of our culture and our people. We've created and aspire to create a culture that really is the infusion of both your work and your personal life and allows you to pursue what you really want in your life while still doing truly great work. We believe if we can find and keep great people through that, we in turn will be able to find and keep great clients. What do we do? How do we support our clients in achieving their goals and objectives?

We take our knowledge of their business, where we've got various ways in which we grow our knowledge of their business, and in turn, we put forward technology recommendations and services that have a meaningful impact on the success of their business. From a service perspective, there are three core One is our managed service, which is really a monthly retainer that we are paid to look after their technology environment. From the way the users access their email to how they might be experiencing the speed of their technology environment, we become that one point of contact to support them.

The second piece is from a security perspective, we are looking to really shore up any potential risks in their technology environment that could potentially result in them being hacked. Then the final piece of our service, which is a piece that we are probably the most excited about from a differentiation perspective, the service is called Innovate. It's also a monthly engagement where if you're paying us $5,000 a month, we will find a $60,000 ROI in your business based on leveraging the adoption of the technology already have by your team, reducing the risk and automating whatever processes can be automated using predominantly the Microsoft technology framework.

We're not really in the Google space. That's just really exciting because what it's doing is it's taking the risk out of it for our customers. What it essentially does is enable them to see the return on the technology investment they've already made and a typical customer for us is kind of 25 to 1000 user environments.

07:59 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. I love and appreciate you breaking that down. Especially I love that Innovate piece and how exciting that is because I think so many people probably, and you probably experienced that with clients where organizations only maybe even scratch the surface of the opportunity they have with the tools that they have. So to be able to delve deeper and provide those value adds that you do, I imagine that's extremely attractive.

08:23 – Orrin Klopper

Yes.

08:23 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. So I think you probably already touched on this a little bit. I usually ask for your secret sauce, and it could be for the organization, yourself, or a combination of both. But is it that innovation piece that you guys have launched? Do you feel like that has been a strong part of what sets you apart?

08:38 – Orrin Klopper

So I think there are two parts to this in my mind. One is at the heart of our culture and the people dynamic within Netshirt is us aligning. What do you really want in your personal life and your life overall, and can that be realized by being part of the Netshirt team and family? So at the heart of my personal secret sauce has been, I mean, I've been doing a dream book, which is really your top 10 personal goals and dreams visualized since about 2004 and we introduced it in the business in about 2008, Grish.

We've had the Dreams program ever since then. So in my mind, that's definitely part of our secret sauce. When we look at the fast growth that we've gone through and the fast growth that we are planning, protecting the culture is probably the single most important thing. I think this, our dreams program, and focusing on what people really want in their lives is a part of our secret sauce. I can tell you now, that there have been times where we've done acquisitions, and the interpretation has been that this is some grand scheme to manipulate them. Eventually, people realize it's not a fad or it's not a gimmick. This is in our DNA.

Then the second part of our secret sauce, I think, is as an entrepreneur, and I'm sure you've seen it in your journey too. We never arrive. So if I go back 10 years, how easy it was for us to find customers and close new business, when I look at the level of marketing investment, it has exponentially changed. So the need to differentiate is more important for my type of business than ever before.

Fortunately, we have quite a detailed, involved strategic planning process that makes us look quite hard in the mirror. So, one, our dreams program and focusing on what our people really want in their lives, I think is part of our secret sauce. Number two, having a strategic planning process. It's not the fanciest process, but it's an honest process where we look at our strategy and what we're doing and decide as a team what we need to change.

11:11 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. So I wanted to switch gears a little bit, and I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an app or a book or a habit that you have. But what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

11:23 – Orrin Klopper

I use a gratitude journal every day. I get to it most days. It's really three sections, at least three points on what I'm grateful for. Then three things I want to make sure I get done today. Then an affirmation statement. So it's. You can buy it in book form either on Amazon. It's called the five-minute Journal. Or you can get it in an app. It's free. I just find it instead of looking at my phone first thing in the morning, I literally go to my gratitude journal. Instead of looking at messages and so forth, the first thought for the day is gratitude.

Then I find myself because that's how I started the day. I find myself almost looking for it in the day because that's how I started and that was the initial seed that I planted. Then the other one that's really just had a huge impact on me and this might be less unique, but when I. I am, when I'm meditating, Whether it be 5 minutes, 10 minutes, or 20 minutes a day, in the morning, particularly in the morning, the quality of my thinking and the quality of my listening is exponentially greater.

12:43 – Gresham Harkless

Absolutely. So would you consider that to be what I like to call CEO nugget? A little bit more words of wisdom or piece of advice. It might be something you would tell your favorite business client or you happen to do a time machine you might.

12:54 – Orrin Klopper

Tell your young business to revise the way we show gratitude publicly. He broke it down into two categories. We kept the wow moments, but he came up with a new category which is called Sao Bona. Sao Bona in Zulu means I see you and it's. I could tell I literally looked at it. Because we run our staff satisfaction server every six months after he implemented that, literally, you saw the gratitude just peak. It reached its high level, the highest level ever in the business and yeah, I think there's a balance.

Some people don't like to be thanked publicly and be aware of that. I think that's the minority. But we have a culture where we. Where people are winning and we want to thank people. We try and do it as often, as publicly, and as authentically as possible, because I think if it becomes too flippant and superficial, then it will lose its value. But I definitely think it's a huge untapped force in a culture that can be leveraged so easily.

14:04 – Gresham Harkless

I absolutely appreciate that. Now I want to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. We're open to different quote-unquote CEOs on this show. So Aaron, what does being a CEO mean to you?

14:14 – Orrin Klopper

A huge sense of accountability. I look at some of the tough decisions that I've had to make and sometimes Gresh, that has meant actually letting people go because of the macroeconomic or business challenges that we are facing. When things are tough and we're getting it wrong, look in the mirror and hold yourself as the CEO accountable. When things are going really well, find someone to really recognize and give credit. I think finally, what does it mean to me to be a CEO? It feels like a massive honor and a privilege. Just the hugest, hugest honor and privilege.

15:06 – Gresham Harkless

Absolutely. Well, Oren, truly appreciate that definition. Of course, I appreciate your time even more. So what I want to do now is pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know and of course how best people can get hold of you to find out about all the awesome things you, your team are working on.

15:22 – Orrin Klopper

We offer a free Innovate Business Automation assessment. You can text me on my mobile. Love responding. I'm very responsive. You can text me at 917-517-7763 and just include Innovate Business Automation in that text. So I'll just read that 917-517-7763 and yeah, just feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn. And Grish, really appreciate the opportunity of having me on your show today.

16:01 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. I definitely appreciate you for your time and all the awesome things that you're doing. Of course, we're going to have the links and information in the show notes as well too so that everybody can follow up with you, text you find out about all those awesome things. I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

16:15 – Orrin Klopper

Absolute pleasure.

16:17 – Outro

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO Podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts, SUBSCRIBE, and leave us a five-star rating grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO Podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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