The Chamber Member's Podcast Episode 4: Sean Hetrick from SBS Consulting Systems

Welcome to the Chamber of Commerce podcast, where we bring you the fourth episode filled with valuable insights and interviews. Join us as we engage with a new chamber member every week, delving into their journey and experiences in the business world.

In this episode, we have an exciting lineup for you. Get ready for a power-packed session featuring our co-host, Sean from SBS Consulting Systems. Sean kicks things off with our Business Tip of the Week, where he dives into the topic of threats that businesses face. Discover how external risks such as supply cost increases and malware attacks can significantly impact your business. Sean emphasizes the importance of creating a comprehensive list of potential threats and, more importantly, developing effective strategies to overcome them. He shares invaluable advice on creating robust backup plans and implementing timely updates to safeguard your business from unexpected disruptions.

As we continue, Sean sheds light on the significance of backups and updates in protecting your business from cyber threats. His expertise in IT systems and process improvement shines through as he emphasizes the critical role of staying proactive and vigilant in the face of ever-evolving challenges.

Join us in this episode as we also delve into an intriguing interview with Sean, the owner of SBS Consulting Systems. With a strong background in IT and business administration, Sean shares his career journey, including his decision to start his own company. Gain insights into his experiences working with global organizations and his commitment to delivering top-notch IT solutions for clients across Northeast Ohio and beyond.

Discover the flexibility and advantages of remote work as Sean shares his firsthand experiences and success stories. Whether it's helping struggling businesses thrive or leveraging e-commerce and online marketing to drive sales, Sean's expertise and passion for technology shine through his entrepreneurial endeavors.

Don't miss this captivating episode filled with valuable tips, expert advice, and inspiring stories. Tune in to the Chamber of Commerce podcast and join us on this insightful journey into the world of business, entrepreneurship, and innovation.

Transcript

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Welcome to the fouth episode of the Chamber of Commerce podcast, where we interview new chamber member every week. During this episode, we'll have a business tip of the Week chamber announcement and interview with our co-host Sean from SBS Consulting Systems. First up as our business tip of the week by SBS Consultanting Systems. Sean, What do we got? Hi there, Sean Hetrick SBS Consulting Systems. Last week we talked about opportunities. This week we're going to talk about threats. So what threats are defined as external risks to your business? Some of these might be like an increase in your supply costs or a malware attack, different things that might really adversely affect your business. And then I would take it, you know, make a list of this. But I would take it one step further and look at developing strategies to overcome these threats. You know, developing a good plan for your backups and updates is a very important one. We had space consulting. I always like to talk to companies about making sure that they have good backups and they have good updates because the malware attack will take you down in a second along with just, you know, looking for those other threats and just coming up with strategies to overcome them. Again, this is Shawn from MVS Consulting Systems. Sean, thanks for the tip of the week. For those of you who don't know Shawn yet, he's the owner of Space Consulting Systems. His office is located just south of Ken, but he's able to service pretty much all of northeast Ohio. All right. Yeah. Yeah. Accent? Yup. All Northeast Ohio. I even have a couple clients outside of the state. Do nice wherever the job takes me. The flexibility of remote work. Yeah, I love it. Exactly. Yeah. So I know we've talked many times before. I know you stepped into your stepped out on your own and launch Enterprise consulting systems three years ago. Can you kind of walk us through your IT career and give us some insight how you knew it was time to start your own company? Sure, absolutely. So really, the best way to kind of give you a history of me, because the company really revolves around my business experience and kind of what I've learned over the years. So I started off I was a graduate of Minerva High School in 1996, and I went to Kent State University and got my undergraduate in business administration. As I was graduating in business administration, I realized that I did not know enough about computers, so I started to take jobs in the IT industry. So I took a couple of jobs with companies that did like point of sales, computer systems where I would set up the systems, configure them, make sure that they worked for like Advanced Auto Parts, subway, those type of things. In the early 2000, I also did the system installs and refreshes for companies like State Farm and Disney and a couple of other Burberry couple other companies like that. And that really helped give me an understanding of like the different areas of I.T., understanding hardware, software and kind of health systems I developed and put together. Then I decided I wanted to take it a step further and I got my first job at Jones Day law Firm in Cleveland. It's a large global law firm that's headquartered out of Cleveland. There, I got dramatic exposure to not only just locally, but how a global organization works, how it and how they can share data between offices, how they keep things backed up, updated. You know, how the whole system works really helped to grow my knowledge. At that same time, I finished up my MBA at Cleveland State, so I really got started to get some more understanding of business and really how business work around that time, which would have been about 2001, my parents had purchased a business in Minerva, Ohio, and it was struggling, so I built a e-commerce website for them and put about 1500 of their products online. Wow was during the infancy of AdWords out there. Paper clicks out there in the world and we sold products all over read like tripled business doing that that way, but realized that I still needed to be there to kind of do other things for the business. And that's where I really started to learn some of the systems development and process improvement things because I would go down there and I stuck my head in QuickBooks, stuck my head in their inventory process and, you know, their expenses, you know, categorizing expenses, figuring out what product lines or so on which ones are really develop and reporting for that and really got involved there and helped grow that business, took it from dramatically negative to positive in a couple of years, which was great for me personally because it gave me some confidence in what I was doing and how it was going. So then I started to get involved in the area in Minerva, started to go to different groups and talk to people about the area there. It was really struggling. It's a small community and at that point in time there was the downtown was pretty empty. So talking to people and people had an interest in the arts and all these artists were leaving the area. So I formed a51c3 nonprofit, brought these people together and we started throwing events in the empty spaces downtown, which generated buzz and generated economic development in the area. Now there's a full time theater downtown there. The whole downtown is filled. It's multiple restaurants, bars, brewery Yeah, there's an old theater that they just renovated, so it really made economic growth happen. But I saw about 2008, 2009, the collapse. I was, yeah, yeah, exactly. So I went back in and I started working again for Squire Sanders and Dempsey, which now is Squire Patton Boggs, another attorney law firm, global law firm in Cleveland. You know, doing it again, getting into that, really understanding that and decided I wanted a change after about six years there and got a job with an environmental company and can afford and started off as a network administrator and then ended up in the controller within a year. They were about $7 million, about 45 employees. We grew from 7 to 10 million just in a couple of years and built the I built these systems that help them automate and streamline processes within their business things they were doing paper and pencil. It's really important to get accurate, accurate data, you know, and to be able to process things efficiently and quickly. Because for them to grow without having to add staff, you have to be able to process things quickly, you have to invoice quickly, you have to go to process accounts payable quickly. You know, you have to be able to look at profitability reports quickly where you're not spending all your time developing these reports. So we've developed all these systems to do this really quickly and they went from like 7 million to 10 million, didn't have to add administrative staff because of the systems that were in place. Yeah, it's a huge value to the company. Yeah, definitely helped them go through a buyout of their original owner and then just decided that I think I can do this on my own. And so so that was about three years ago. And right before COVID, there had been September 2019 that I left and decided to do it on my own. I knew some people that I could get some subcontracting I worked through and then just started to develop my clients from there. And yeah, it's all history from there, I guess it's amazing. It's I mean, I think I t I'm like, I mean, I know how to work my iPhone fairly so and people, you know, throw out words and like hardware, software, infrastructure. I'm like, uh, I don't know. So but there's just a lot that goes into it with the way you do backup data and data transfers and yeah, well, that's what sets me a little bit apart, is that I'm not an I.t guy per se, so I can sit down and talk with people that don't have quite the knowledge and it and kind of explain to them what these systems are doing, what little tweaks we can make to get them to work better for you to be a really a competitive advantage for you. Yeah. And then really understand from the business side to, you know, what they need, because just because it works with the ones and zeros doesn't mean it helps them and improves their performance. So, so having that understanding on both sides really, really helps. And so what's services does SBC Consulting provide? Yeah. So we're complete i.t. So everything, everything it was we, we can take care of. I like the things that no one else can fix. I like to solve problems, so I like when someone's like, this never has worked. Right. I'll come in and fix that because I can usually figure it out. I've thousands and thousands of pieces of software, hardware, different pieces of software, however I've worked with over the years. So I have a vast understanding of it. And I love the problem. The problems? Yeah. And I'm sure you're good at reading code and writing it and fixing it and. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We're getting getting there and it's nice, but the systems that I design are real lightweight, real customizable, so we can really design it for your business as opposed to something you buy off the shelf that doesn't really fit. It doesn't fit. Yeah. Yeah. So what are the like, the main reasons customers choose SBC Consulting over other firms? Like what's your competitive advantage? Yeah, I think one of my biggest competitive advantages is just my knowledge and understanding. Over the years, i I've experienced a lot through a lot of i.t. A lot of business. So when i come into a situation, I can pretty quickly assess it and kind of figure out what they need and where we need to go from there. And I think, I think that just helps. I like to fix problems. I'm not a person that likes to, you know, just let it linger, let it linger. I want to get it fixed because you need to be back working and, you know, making money for for your company. So my goal is to get you back there as quickly as possible. Awesome. So how do you how do you people how do you charge for your service? You know, is it a long term contract, short term contract projects hourly, Like how you know, how do you how do you build out your costs? Yeah, absolutely. So it's simple. I like simple. I don't like to be complicated. I want to be as simple as possible. So I'm easily $100 an hour from the work that I do. Although if we do projects, if we decide we want to build a system or we want to come in and do a server upgrade or network upgrade, I'll give a quote for that along with I have a general services agreement and, you know, certificate of insurance and all that kind of stuff just to kind of legitimize it or give it some some legal backing, too. Awesome. So tell us about the biggest risk you've taken is as a business owner, what's the biggest risk is running your own business, starting your own business, you know, kind of jumping into that pool. Yeah, there's lots of risks, you take, no doubt. But the biggest, I'd say, was just doing it in general. I had done it before in the early 2000, so I kind of had an idea, but I left a six figure, very stable job to go out on my own. And you know what? I'm so glad I did, because it's rewarding. It's rewarding to to see how where I've come from and also just to know that the effort that I put in, I will get back here. A lot of times you work in a company and you put in effort and you don't always see the benefits that you think you should from it. And just being able to control your own destiny is just a great thing for me. And I'm sure I need exposure to a lot of different businesses too. So yeah, make an impact on a lot of small business. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's always nice to see you. Yeah, it is. It's fun. It's fun to design something for a company that never existed before. And, you know, and then they're using it and help them for sure. Awesome. So I know your business has been growing. Are you still looking to hire? Yeah, I'm right now. I'm looking for a part time person that can do it. I would love if they could do a little bit coding to be by about 15 to 20 hours, but half on site, half I'll say no, but I can train people on almost anything. They just need to have just a little bit of experience. Would be good, would be helpful in that nice. So as you know, members of the regional chamber always looking to promote and support and do business with another with one another. Are there any chamber members you'd like to give a shout out to? Yeah, definitely. I would like to give a shout out to Jeff and Amy Berner. They just from Keller Williams and Amy has a million sweet shop and they from the very beginning I met them right at the beginning of the chamber events and they've just been so friendly to me and invited me. And every time I come to an event, they come up and talk to me. They invited me to help volunteer with different items, and Jeff and Amy themselves volunteer so much time with the whole theme and with other chamber kind of events. They're just great resources to have. And really, I just really appreciate everything they did for me and it makes a big difference. I know like most people, probably it's it's nervous too. Like, you know, you come into a tip club and it's like I'm the new guy in a group of 20 and you don't know who to talk to and everybody's already having a conversation. So it's nice to have people that, you know, can draw you in like that and absolutely, you know, make you feel comfortable because we're all here, you know, support each other and network, pitch all the clubs. We do a lot of networking, learning about each other's businesses. We can, you know, keep each other top of mind and refer each other. So, yeah, it's nice when you know, you welcome new people in and you know, get them connected to volunteer. Yeah have a great luck with the tip clubs too. As far as meeting new people and just growing my network for sure. Nice. So I mean, that's pretty much Jeff I guess today. I mean, I really enjoy going to learn more about your background and your experience in I.T and kind of all the services you provide. And I'm grateful to have a high tech guru on my team, this podcast. I mean, I was like, I don't know how to, you know, post something on, on YouTube. Sounds like I'll get that done. All done town time release everything I'll say okay good now my four day Yeah know I'm happy to Verrone So I'm next Star Timber announcements. First I'm going to focus on July 12th. We have a business after hours hosted by Drive Social events going to be held at the Cast Iron Bar and Grill in Caernarfon. I think last time we had like 6070 people, I think it was closer to 100, 100. Yeah, it was a lot. The club. Yeah. Yeah. I think for us it was a lot of fun. Entertaining. Yeah, it was good. The comedian was hilarious. Yeah. Food is always good. That's, that's the reason to go to is for the food and for the just the social aspect of it. Cause it's really good to meet people outside of just a tips or just at your office, you know, just to kind of get to know. Yeah. Relax. Yeah, yeah. And then July 19th, we have another quick connect and this one's going to be a breakfast. So it's gonna be the Embassy Suites in North King. I think last time it close to like 80 people. So, you know, make sure you sign up for that. Brexit references are nice because you can, you know kind of get your day started some nice speaker and some good food and then you can finish out your day. So, yeah, it's usually a little bit different crowd than the lunch. One person. Yeah, some different people. Yeah, for sure. All right. Well, that wraps up our show. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next week. Thank you.