Scale Like a CEO

Entrepreneurial Journey and HR Insights with Daniel Ordaz | Scale Like a CEO

• Justin Reinert • Season 1 • Episode 26

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What if we've been focusing on the wrong problem in HR technology? While most solutions concentrate on finding new talent, Daniel Ordaz believes the real challenge lies in keeping the people we already have.

As a third-time founder at age 60, Daniel brings decades of perspective to the "Scale Like a CEO" podcast, sharing how his company Sendos is revolutionizing talent retention. With refreshing candor, he explains why we should prioritize creating environments where employees feel secure and valued rather than rushing to replace them with AI or automation.

Daniel's entrepreneurial journey is deeply personal. Working alongside his son as COO, he's built a distributed team of 10 people across the Americas, carefully selecting individuals with a desire to learn rather than extensive experience. "You can hire somebody for much less money and then help them grow, so they're more grateful and they're more engaged with the company," he explains, detailing how this approach creates loyal team members who develop with the organization.

The conversation takes a fascinating turn when Daniel discusses delegation challenges in a remote environment. Despite initial reluctance to relinquish control, he's learned to embrace unexpected approaches from his team: "I'm happy to have delegated and be surprised by the results—sometimes it was even better or just different." This evolution in leadership style has allowed him to maintain work-life balance while pursuing consulting work with global organizations.

Looking ahead, Daniel reveals his vision for Sendos includes a thoughtful succession plan. "Don't tell my son," he jokes, "but I'm really looking forward for him to take over as CEO and for me to be in more of a backstage role." This refreshing perspective on founder identity and company legacy offers valuable insights for entrepreneurs at any stage.

Connect with Daniel on LinkedIn (D-O-R-D-I-Z) to continue the conversation about human-centered approaches to talent development in the age of AI.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to Scale Like a CEO, the podcast where we dive deep into the strategies, challenges and triumphs of building successful companies. Join your host, justin, as he connects with innovative leaders who are reshaping the business landscape. Today we're excited to welcome Daniel Ordaz, a seasoned serial entrepreneur and founder who brings decades of experience in technology and human resources. Get ready for valuable insights on leadership, team building and creating sustainable growth in the modern business world.

Justin Reinert:

Daniel, thank you for joining me on Scale Like a CEO. Before we get started, would you mind just giving me a 90-second intro of you and your business?

Daniel Ordaz:

Of course, glad to be here, justin. Well, I'm a Mexican entrepreneur, third-time founder. I started back in the 90s before the internet was spread out, and then just before the bubble burst, and now for the third time in AI, now that I'm reached 60 years old, so this is my third time around, and now with one of my sons, a second founder. Another of my sons has several disabilities, so I am I take care of him during the day, so I do a lot of home office. I've been with my now wife for the past 45 years. It's been a very productive and joyful ride. We have also two daughters who are crazy, each one on their own way. They do different stuff, not what I expected them to do, so they're very entertaining to watch from the outside.

Justin Reinert:

That's great. So what's the biggest problem you see in your industry and how are you solving it, carlos?

Daniel Ordaz:

Bernal. Well, there's a lot of HR related solutions in the HR tech sector and, regarding AI, most of the solutions that I've seen are focused on talent acquisition, recruiting and finding the talent for the company, but I see the main problem is that we're not being able to keep the talent in-house. People are leaving the company or they're doing silent quitting. They're thinking about leaving, so eventually we need to bring more people in instead of trying to focus on how do we keep these people that we have inside and keep them happy, engaged and productive to it, before thinking of replacing them with AI or automating things, which always causes distress and anxiety between our employees. We need to have them feeling safe at the job. They need to learn what they need to learn in this era. But it's not like I'm really looking forward to replacing you with some robot or AI. I really want you to be here and I want you to be as human as possible, because that's why you're here, because you're a valuable human being, not something replaceable with machines.

Justin Reinert:

That's great, and so you've been building Sendos for a couple of years now. What are some challenges that you have encountered as you've transitioned from being a team of one as a founder and building a team?

Daniel Ordaz:

Well, that's a very good point, because I've been in AR-related roles for the past five years. Before that, I was the director of Mercer, which is an HR consultant the largest consultant company in the world. But the challenge was finding the right people to take things to the next level. How do you find somebody who really knows what they're doing more than myself and who knows the ins and outs of this new technology? Because everybody was talking about AI for a long time, but very few people really knew how to put it into work. So my main challenge was finding that co-founder. So we are three.

Daniel Ordaz:

One is my son, who is COO, so he takes care of all the things that probably I wouldn't be good at at the day-to-day operations and everything. And Federico, who is the other co-founder he studied economics. So if I were looking for a co-founder in an HR AI-related company, I wouldn't choose a guy who graduated from economics. But that just goes to show you that the way we started back when we were 17, 18, what do we knew about what we wanted to do with our lives? We knew nothing. We just chose a career and we hope it was the good one. But that's why many people don't end up in that, so I was able to see through what he was good at, not what he studied. And then he came to the company and brought the knowledge that we needed to scale up and do what we're doing right now.

Justin Reinert:

That's great, and how big is the team now?

Daniel Ordaz:

We are 10 people dispersed within several countries between North America and South America.

Justin Reinert:

Okay, great. And at what point did you decide it was time to start hiring and building the team?

Daniel Ordaz:

Probably it took me eight or nine months because this idea started during the pandemic. So at the time it was a lot of uncertainty and you didn't really know how things were going to move and what was going to happen. So I started by myself, but then quickly I realized that I wasn't going to be able. So the first person that came on board was my son. He was on his own startup doing something else, and he said I don't like the way things are going on that company. And he realized that I had something going on.

Daniel Ordaz:

And you know that most of the times it's hard to be a good example at home. Your children not always see you as your role model, but then comes an age when they don't want to have anything to do with you at that age. But now he's 32. And when he was 30, he said I want to join you and we started doing this. So we realized we needed more people and since he's more in the operations side, so he was able to find those other people that we needed. I found the co-founder, but he found the people in other countries that could help us scale up.

Justin Reinert:

Okay, great. And as you then have continued to add people to the team, what are some of the key qualities that you look for in the people that you're hiring?

Daniel Ordaz:

The main one is the desire to learn, because this is changing so much that we have hired people with just the willingness to learn a basic knowledge of technology that we needed, and we were able to teach them what we needed them to do. Generative AI can really help us learn by ourselves, at our own pace, instead of having to go through several years of formal education. The good thing about this is that you can hire somebody for much less money and then help them grow, so they're more grateful and they're more engaged with the company, instead of hiring somebody who already knows everything you need them to know and having to pay what they deserve. This way, we have helped our employees grow, which is basically what we do as a company in Santos. We help companies develop their own talent, have visibility of what they want to do. How can they grow in the company instead of going elsewhere? We took our own medicine and we did that with our own people.

Justin Reinert:

That's great. I think the desire to learn is such a key competency needed in an organization that's growing and scaling. It's great that that's something that you're looking at. I'm curious as you have been growing the team, what's it like to begin delegating tasks across the team and kind of let go of some things?

Daniel Ordaz:

That's a very good point, justin, because sometimes you feel like you need to keep doing this, so things are done right, but then you realize eventually you got to let it go.

Daniel Ordaz:

And then you are surprised by the way things turn out Maybe not the way you want it, but a different way and you accept them and you learn to live with it and then you open up to do more things that you want to do, have more time by yourself. It's been a challenge, especially because most of these people are elsewhere. I don't see them on a day-to-day basis. This is the first time that I work with a team that everybody is elsewhere. Just my son and I are in the same city. Everybody else is elsewhere. That also took a lot of learning and willingness to adapt, but I got to say that I'm happy to have delegated and be surprised by the results, that it was not what I expected. Sometimes it was even better or just different. So I have learned to accept that that is good, because otherwise I won't have enough time in my day to do it all.

Justin Reinert:

It can definitely be challenging to decide what you delegate and kind of give up that control, so it's great that you've made that transition and have been able to do that. Can you talk about a time when maybe you felt overwhelmed by decision-making in the business, and what strategies did you implement to overcome it?

Daniel Ordaz:

Well, we have several of those moments, especially when the runway has been short and we were waiting for money to come from customers instead of just angel investors or my own money. So at that point you knew what you wanted to do. You knew it was not going to be easy and you knew it was going to take some time. So just trust the process. Trust that you made the right decision and put a deadline. If by this time it doesn't happen, then I have to make decisions. In the past, I've done the other way. Is that no, I don't care, I'm going to borrow money or I'm going to put it on loan or whatever, and that goes out of the scope that I wanted to do originally. So my mindset right now is not this has to work no matter what. No, this has to work if this happens. But if this doesn't happen, then that's it. It doesn't have to be life or death anymore and I think that's healthier, at least for myself. And don't go all in when you don't really have to.

Justin Reinert:

Yeah and looking forward. What's your vision for the future of growth within the organization?

Daniel Ordaz:

Well, don't tell my son, but I'm really looking forward for him to take over and him being the CEO and then me be more in a backstage role. I do a lot of consulting for global companies or institutions like the Bank of Development or the Mexican Development Bank. I do a lot of coaching for several divisions of the United Nations and I like that a lot. I also am very involved in other nonprofit organizations, so I would like to be the knowledge base of of of Sendos, but also be able to do other things and then have him direct the business and just be there as a, as a consultant and for him, the companies, and be there for everything, but not be the CEO for forever 60 right now. I think I can be here for a few more years, but I'm really looking forward for him to take over quite soon.

Justin Reinert:

Talk, talk. We won't tell him. Well, Daniel, it was really great to have you on the podcast today. If folks want to get in touch with you, what's one of the best ways to reach out today?

Daniel Ordaz:

If folks want to get in touch with you, what's one of the best ways to reach out? I will say LinkedIn is the best way. D-o-r-d-i-z. That's my LinkedIn. It's also my ex Twitter or Facebook, but LinkedIn is where I'm mostly in habit every day, and Justin very glad to be here with you, very honored to have been in contact with him.

Justin Reinert:

Great Well, thank you so much for your time today.

Daniel Ordaz:

Thank you, take care.