Letting Go To Grow with Francisco Perez van der Oord

What do lawnmowers, cricket commentary, and scaling a tech company have in common? More than you’d think . . . 

In this lively episode of Get Amplified, Sam and Vic bring the banter before catching up with returning guest Francisco Perez van der Oord, founder of ITQ. Five years after discussing his journey as a founder, Francisco shares how the business has skyrocketed and expanded internationally.

 At the heart of the conversation is a bold question: what if the biggest barrier to your company’s growth is you?

Most importantly, Francisco offers insight into selecting the right successor, highlighting the critical balance between complementary skillsets and shared values to preserve culture and drive long-term success.

And the secret to making the new successor successful? Completely removing himself from the decision making process. This shouldn’t be underestimated, and took 12 months of Francisco saying “don’t ask me”.

The conversation explores the distinction between running an organisation and transforming it, and why successful scaling often requires leaders to evolve their role.

Along the way, you’ll get stories, laughs, and real-world lessons on scaling a business, letting go, and focusing on what truly moves the needle.

We would love you to follow us on LinkedIn! 

https://www.linkedin.com/company/amplified-group/

Transcript

Optimism And A Returning Guest

Sam 0:10

Welcome to Get Amplified from the Amplified Group, the podcast about the people that power the tech industry. Well, it's a bit gloomy where I am today, Vicky. I'm disappointed. I thought the sun was going to be out. How are things in deepest, darkest Oxfordshire?

Vic 0:23

Well, we've just been talking about optimism, haven't we? And so we're optimistic that it's going to burn through this cloud and it's going to come up.

Sam 0:29

Yeah, that's what I'm hoping to get out with me lawnmower later on.

Vic 0:34

I don't know about you, but my hubby, John, it's his favourite thing to do in the world is to get out on the lawnmower.

Sam 0:40

Oh, I absolutely love it. That's my happy place, poopling around on my lawnmower with test match special in my ears, listening to a bit of cricket. Happy days, happy days. Maybe we should do a podcast on lawn mowing.

Vic 0:54

Well, maybe that's a question that we should ask.

Sam 0:56

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Talking to podcasting, who's joining us today?

Vic 1:00

We've actually got a guest today that was one of our very first guests, and it was six years ago that had in mind. So we've got, oh, and I'm going to apologize in case I pronounce your name wrong, Francisco. So if I'd get it wrong, will you please correct me when when uh when I've done it? So we've got Francisco Perez van der Oord. Ah, hello. Here we go. He's founder of ITQ, which is , blimey, I don't even know how to give the accolades to the success that you guys have had over the last six years, so you can share it with us. But the podcast that we did with you last time, you talked about being the founder and when you should stop being CEO. And my God, what a decision that was. And the success that you've gone to. And we were just speaking, as you can hear, from the the beginning of the intro about optimism, with the energy that we have with Sam and Francisco today. Blimey were in for a good one.

Sam 2:05

Let's hope so. Let's hope so. Fantastic.

When The Founder Becomes The Blocker

Sam 2:10

So, Francisco, do you want to just just give us? I know we've had your career history before, but just a little recap and then take us back to when you made that decision to step down and what made it hard.

Francisco 2:23

Yeah. So I started ITQ when I was 24. So this year uh we are 25 years off ITQ, so I'm 49.

Sam 2:31

Wow. So you mean you must looking at you, you must have started it when you were 14.

Francisco 2:37

No, thank you. So um, before that, I was six years in IT. Uh, I started as an engineer, I did some project management. Uh somewhere in the process, I decided to go for myself. So, together with my partner in that time, who's now retired and lives in Spain, we decided to build a company based on culture and our people and our quality. That were the three main main drivers. Pretty successful for the first 10/15 years. But yeah, in that process, the company was growing, it was getting better, but it was also staying behind through the competition in a way. So we were making money, we were doing nice things, but we're not taking everything out of it. So that was the moment, uh, the first time I was thinking to myself, what's wrong with us? Because the culture is super strong, everybody's fighting very hard to make the company successful, the customers are super happy with us. So that was the first, and I was triggered by the fact that maybe I was the issue. So uh I was the CEO, I was running uh as an MDD organization, uh, responsible for like say everything. But I'm not really a manager, I'm more an entrepreneur, I have some leadership skills, I know how to build a strategy, but executing that it's a different game. So that was the first time that I was playing around in my head with the fact that maybe I'm the biggest blocker of the growth of the company. What is interesting because you were asking the question what was the moment you made the decision? Um is I got this kind of questions a lot about a lot of things that I do. So when did you decide to go to Belgium or when did you decide to do A, B, or C. But running a company is not like a movie, that there is like this one moment that everything happens.

Vic 4:18

Yeah.

Francisco 4:19

It's it's way more processed. The process starts with the fact that you start thinking more and more about the fact that maybe you are the issue, and uh then you come to start to think about why is that? And then you trust people, you say to people, Listen, um, I think I'm the issue in the company to bring it to the next phase. What do you think? And then there are some people who say to you, Well, you're a great guy, you're fantastic, you should keep doing it. Those are the people you have to put them on the side, and you try to find some people who give you more honest feedback and say, Yeah, well, I understand why, because, and then you start having conversations about what is it to execute an organization in the next level, what is the difference between running an organization and changing an organization? And that's the the moment, slash period. I made the decision that it was time for a big change, and it was uh finding a new CEO to running the organization, and I could have more focus on the strategic part. Making that decision is maybe not the most difficult part. What I found way more difficult is uh going back to the management to tell the management listen, if we want to stay alive for the next 20 years, I think we need to do some big changes, and that also means I have to change. And and then you have to ask the management, what do you think about that? And that also realize the management, the existing management, that they are also a part of the issue. So that that was not an easy phase. So I think making the decision to do it for myself was was handable, but having the discussion with the existing management, uh, that was way tougher. It cost me, I think it cost a year to convince them. And then you need a year to find a new CEO.

Finding A CEO With Shared Values

Sam 6:01

So well, and how how on earth do you find somebody to take over your baby? You know, I remember Peter, the founder of SoftCat, used to describe SoftCat as his fifth child. He had four he had four others, by the way. Just yeah, they were multiple other businesses. So he had four four actual kids and then Softcat. We were the unruly teenager, I guess. Um but how on earth do you find somebody to take over your baby?

Francisco 6:28

Yeah, and I have three daughters, so the so the company was my first child. Yeah, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, because I had a lot of feedback from people, uh, I also understood what I have to find. Yeah, so I realize that we should be uh four hands on uh one belly, yeah. That's what we say in the Netherlands. Um, so we have to be very, very close with each other. Uh we have to what was that phrase again? Four hands on one belly.

Sam 6:56

Okay, never heard that before.

Francisco 6:58

No, meaning that meaning it's a Dutch expression, but it means that you have to think the same, act the same. But it's also it's also super important that you are not the same. Um, so I have to try to find somebody who is completely different with me, but we are looking to things completely the same, like how you should build in culture, how you should uh think about customers, why it's important to be a very good employer for your people. That that kind of things, it's super important to have the same philosophy. Yeah.

Vic 7:29

Can I just ask on this? So for me, what you just described there is a different work style, but same values.

Francisco 7:37

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. And that's a thing. So what you then normally do is just you can do two things. You can go to a headhunter, uh, but with the size that we are having, I don't I didn't believe in that.

Sam 7:52

Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. Yeah.

Francisco 7:53

Yeah. So you just go through everybody you know, and um you start with 25 people, you go back to 20, you go back to 15, and then you make your five. You think, well, this would be great. And then the first person I went to was uh the ex the Robert Hellings, our CEO, yeah, who was a customer, who was running the the uh used to run the IT for a big insurance company. After that, for the same insurance company, he was the he was running the pension funds. Uh it was an insurance, so pensions are making their money. I just went to him and just having a conversation, uh, told him what my struggles were, what I was looking for. But then he said no, because he just had a new assignment in the in that company, and then I was lucky that the assignment that they gave to him didn't really fit with him. So after a few weeks, he called me back, he said, well, maybe we should talk again. Uh, then we had discussions for hours and walks for hours, just try to explain how I think and how I act and how I work and how he's doing things. But the good part was that I already worked for him because he was a customer, so I knew how he was thinking and how he was handling stuff. And that's where the decision was made to bring him in. Bringing him in is one thing, then bringing him in position is another thing, yeah. So I think in that time we had like 40, 50 colleagues doing uh rough five, six million. So the organization was still small, yeah. So if somebody had had a question about his telephone or about something, I don't know what, they just called me and said, Francisco, uh I need a new telephone, I need a new car, uh, I need a race or whatever. Everybody called me.

Vic 9:31

Yeah.

Francisco 9:32

So then you bring him in position, and the the big challenge there is, of course, they have to call him, not me anymore.

Sam 9:38

Yeah, yeah. And they all they all still call you because everybody's calling you because you know you're the presumably at least a 50% shareholder, if not a majority shareholder.

Francisco 9:48

Exactly.

Sam 9:49

You know, it's your baby, but you absolutely need to hand all that stuff over.

Francisco 9:53

Yeah.

Sam 9:54

Yeah.

Francisco 9:55

Yeah. That that the process cost me a

Getting Everyone To Stop Calling You

Francisco 10:00

year. It's not cost, it cost me a year to explain everybody that they have to go to him. But I have to train myself a year long every time that somebody asks me a question, that I say, I'm not going to help you. And then they come back and I say, Listen, but they don't want to do it, they don't know what to prove it, they don't they don't understand me, or whatever they said. And then I said, Okay, but it's still your issue. Uh, you have to go that way. I'm not going to help you with anything. That was not the most funniest process in my life because I'm a fixer and I'm also a pleaser. Uh so but that helped extremely hard to bring in fast imposition.

Vic 10:38

So I am listening to you, absolutely fascinated because gosh, the number of clients that we've worked with since we last did a podcast with you, where the leader needs to do, so they might not be the founder, but they need to let go. It's so easy to dive deep in. And I keep saying to them many people that we work with that actually the people that you need to work with is your leadership team, and all these people further down the organization, like two or three levels down, that keep coming to you. You can't keep responding to them because it doesn't scale. So, how how did you keep yourself? I know you're a really strong person, but how did you keep yourself so on that correct path?

Francisco 11:28

Yeah, first of all, you have to buy a mirror and uh you have to look into it and uh ask yourself, what am I doing? And it's a super simple question. So, so we have multiple offices and multiple countries. I visit them all, but there is this one office in near Amsterdam that I uh the most of the time, two floors, maybe uh between 15 and 100 people are sitting here. Every time I'm coming in, it doesn't matter what time, I go to every floor, I say hi to everybody, I shake everybody's hands, I say thank you to everybody for what they are doing for us. Yeah. Um but every time they have a question for me, I tell them, I think you have to go to that person or that person, he can help you. Yeah, I never fix any issue anymore for anybody.

Vic 12:07

Wow.

Francisco 12:08

Um, and I also tell people that during a lunch or during a dinner. So you can ask me questions about the strategy, you can ask me questions about technology, you can ask me questions about how I look to the world, I can give you answers, but don't ask me anything to do for you because it's not my role, it's not a responsibility, and it is also disrespectful to somebody else.

Vic 12:30

Yes.

Francisco 12:30

Um, then then still things happen. It's always those different things, like uh, I'm playing with a local football team and I need a sponsor. Uh, can you help me with that? And then you go to say, oh, they have to go to marketing for that, and then say, Yeah, but marketing, uh, they they're not coming to help me, you know that, uh, because everybody's asking for that. But you know, there is this guy you know from school and he would love to you to sponsor, blah blah blah. And then still you have to say, no, no, no, no, this is not what I'm doing. You have to go there. Yeah.

Vic 12:58

So what's really interesting is that although you're not CEO anymore, you're still very much in the business, aren't you?

Francisco 13:08

Just with a different goal. Yeah. So formerly I'm the president of the board, but to be honest, we have a board, but it's like uh we come in together every month uh to talk to how our things are going. But uh that cost me two hours a month, yeah. So that if that would be my role, I uh I have too much time. So Robert, the CEO, he is a run, he's doing the run of the organization and the change. We split at that. So the change is about growing and bringing new innovation to the company, and the run is about everything else. So, what is my role then? So I have to understand where the music is playing the next year, the next two years, the next three years. I have to understand where the market is going through. And to understand that, I have to talk to all the vendors, the partners we are having. I have to do a lot of customer uh meetings. I'm probably dining every every evening with customers just to listen to what's happening. And I'm talking a lot to our employees. Uh, and that last part I'm doing the most. So I go to all the countries, I'm just sit on a table with four or five people, tell them, tell me everything you're doing in the projects. I want to understand what's happening in the market.

Vic 14:16

And all the listening. So you're doing a lot of listening.

Francisco 14:20

Exactly. And I'm making some notes about it, try to bring the notes to the next level, and then go back to the management team and tell them, listen, and this is what I see, and this is what I smell, and this is what I hear.

Vic 14:33

Wonderful.

Francisco 14:34

And that and and that and that's my role. Um of course I'm also involved with small acquisitions or other things, but my but that still counts as strategy, you know.

Sam 14:46

You're not gonna you're not gonna acquire somebody just for the fun of it, you know. That's gonna be part of the strategy to grow into a new area, whether geographically or technology or whatever.

Francisco 14:58

Exactly, exactly. Based on all the all that information. So that's how uh that's how the rose. That's also means that I'm really into the company still, but not but but I'm not in the run of the change because it's done by other open sections.

Strategy Through Listening To The Market

Vic 15:14

Can we ask just before we go any further, can you just kind of give us because you talked about five to six million and forty to fifty people within ITQ. What does the business look like now?

Francisco 15:26

Yeah. Well, that's interesting, eh? Because sometimes sometimes I make a joke against our CEO that since he's there, everything is going so much better.

Sam 15:35

So because of him or because of me. But that was that was the point of what you chose to do though, wasn't it?

Francisco 15:41

Exactly, exactly. So to give you some numbers, the the amount of people is ten times bigger. So our order intake last year was not five, six million, but uh 122. We used to be in one country, we are having multiple offices in multiple countries, but uh, we are total in eight countries. Uh like in the UK, we also have very nice customers, but we don't have an office over there. Yeah, um, we have 500 enterprise customers, and we executed uh only last year 1100 projects.

Sam 16:13

Good, great. But maybe I should maybe I should come out a retirement and set up a UK office for you, for instance.

Francisco 16:19

You can you can call me. So what we also did, we went from two propositions to five. So next to the fact that we are doing something with data centers and a digital workspace. We also uh uh building cloud native platforms, AI platforms, and we have a security practice. And in the past, the only thing we did was a professional services organization, say consultancy organization, but we also have a very big managed service organization at the moment, and our managed our managed services is almost the same size as our uh consultancy organization. So, yeah, we we transformed the company completely.

Vic 16:53

Wow, yeah, what what a story.

Francisco 16:56

Yeah, because of the CEO.

Sam 17:00

Well, yeah, but you know, you you've obviously by freeing yourself up from the the day-to-day of running the business, you've clearly been able to do a better job of pointing the strategy in the right direction. And then you've got somebody who is there to sort of help execute your vision, really. So you know it it just makes perfect sense. I I remember a time when I thought I would want would want to be managing director of SoftCat and the that was my aspiration. Um and then I realized that you know that I wasn't something that I wanted to do because there was lots of stuff that you had to do as as MD that I wasn't really interested in. I think, you know, there was stuff that I you know, I was interested in the tech and what the tech did for our customers and how we could improve our offering, you know, which it clearly would be part of an MD's job, but the sort of the daily grind and all the financial stuff and all of that sort of I just wasn't bothered by. And I wouldn't have done a very good job of it. Yeah, it's not the same thing as what you chose to do, but I guess it's vaguely analogous to it, uh, in the in that you know, I made a conscious decision not to go down the route of applying of trying to position myself into that MD role, you know, as that role became available and to focus on the solutions and services that we provide and aspire more to the CTO role that I eventually ended up in. And you know, but the that was definitely the right choice for me. Maybe we are to some extent slightly similar characters in that regard, in that you know, we're better deployed on strategy and rather than um the minutiae of the business.

Francisco 18:48

Yeah, it's super interesting, yeah. So it's not that I don't believe in things, I believe in a lot of things and I can support a lot of things, but I don't get any energy out of it. So let me give you some let me give you some examples. So the work at council. So we have worker councils in every country, we have an uh European working council. I'm very happy with this group of people, they're doing an amazing job for the company. I'm not made for it. So though the level of details, I have to inform them in in certain situations on certain moments. I I simply forget it. I see an opportunity, I cover it, and it's an acquisition, I forget to inform them. That's terrible to do, and it's also terrible that I have that habit. But it's it's yeah, but it's also the reality. Um, so uh the same is for the ESG council. Uh it's it's it's it's not mandatory, but we have it because we think it's very good, and I believe in it. Yeah, I'm not I'm not the person to have could to have conversations with them. It's I'm I'm my mind goes somewhere else. So, but it doesn't mean that I don't believe in it. It's it's different.

Vic 19:52

Yeah, I'm absolutely loving this. So um I've just been thinking if if I like fast forward where I want amplified in in another 10 years' time, I want your job in amplified. When you were talking about going and talking to people and listening and what's happening, um listening to customers, that's where I get my energy. I absolutely love doing that and steering the direction about what we're talking about and what we're doing. But all the minutiae and the deal, I've I've surrounded myself with such a solid team to do those things for me because it's just it's the energy is is definitely the and it's not myself, it's really I really like that thing about where do you get your energy from. Yeah.

Sam 20:37

Because that you know, there are some tasks that you do find fulfilling, and you literally you get a buzz off. Yeah, and there's some stuff that just grinds you down. And if you can get yourself into a position where you I mean, you're never gonna only be able to do the stuff that you enjoy, but you know, position yourself into a role where you know 75% of your time or 80% of your time is spent on the stuff that you you enjoy and therefore gives you energy, then you're gonna do a better job, aren't you?

Francisco 21:05

Yeah, exactly. So just to give you an example, about two days ago, I was in this fine dining restaurant. I think they even had a restaurant of a Michelester. Yeah, and I'm there with the customer. I have already a relationship with him for like 10 years. Yeah, I'm asking him from okay, what what are you doing with AI at the moment? Because everybody's talking about it, but I know you're smart. So he's the CIO of this government organization. Yeah, he tells me, Yeah, I'm uh we are working a lot with no code and low coat, and we're building things with agents, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I uh he said to me, Francisco, I can see in your eyes that you're you don't get me. I said, No, no, sorry. He said, Wait, and he he he walked to the car, he got his laptop, and he came back in the restaurant. And we were sitting like in this Michelet restaurant with our laptop open. He's showing me what they built to make the organization smoother, smarter, better. So I think it was like Like 12 30, and that's not the normal time to be in a restaurant anymore in Netherlands. They asked us, Can you please continue the conversation somewhere else? Because you have to have to leave. And I I couldn't I couldn't sleep. So I was I was so surprised and energized about what he was telling me. Yeah. There were some things I was thinking, okay, I'm not sure this is really going to work, but the energy he he gives in this assignment and in it in his vision, it gives me also a lot of energy about how I should be studying.

Vic 22:26

Yeah. But that says a lot about your partnership relationship with him too, which is what I think is what I hope differentiates us with our customers. It's it's absolutely that. But I just want to touch on this energy thing just a little bit more because um when we start with a leadership team, we map the team dynamics and the disc to see where everybody is and where the different work styles is and where they come from. If I've got a team that's all the way around the disc, it's like people are getting their energy from all the different things, and it's such a balance, more balanced leadership team. I've got a leadership team that I've worked with for a couple of years now. They're nearly all at the top, they're nearly all in the same place as us. Yeah. And there's so much stuff that doesn't get done and that doesn't get executed on because they haven't got the right skills around the table, really. Yeah, they come naturally.

Sam 23:19

And that that that execution is is something that you absolutely either need to be able to force yourself to do or have people around you. Or inspire people, or yeah, or or or a mix of both. And yeah, two points, I think, on that from my my softcap time. One was I remember um, you know, relatively early on to my sort of career in the vaguely senior bit, you know, when I started running services and so on at SoftCat, I remember Martin taking me aside and saying, Look, Sam, you know, you're great, you're full of energy, you're full of ideas, we love all that. But you absolutely need to follow stuff through to its logical conclusion, or you're you know, you're gonna be less effective. And you know, he was right. There's quite a few, quite a few things Martin took me to task for that uh he was right about, and definitely you know, definitely improved me through his his guidance. Um, and you know, the other thing was, and I've talked bit before about having um in fact, I think I talked, I think we might have dedicated our first ever podcast to him, you know. Gareth, who was my ops manager, you know, he he was kind of the other half of my brain, you know, I was 90% vision and 10% execution, whereas he was 10% vision and 90% execution.

Vic 24:40

Yeah.

Sam 24:40

And between the between the two of us, we created something that was that was really really pretty cool. Um you know, we and we still we still work together these days. You know, he has set up a uh yeah, he he runs the brewery that I'm I'm

Building A Trust-Based CEO Partnership

Sam 24:56

involved in.

Vic 24:56

So Francisco, uh Francisco, I'm I'm really curious to understand how your relationship is with Robert and how much time you spend together. And like Sam's just been talking about his relationship with Gareth. How how does it work? I know this wasn't in the questions, but I'm very curious.

Francisco 25:15

Oh, I know I don't mind. So he was you know he was sitting on this desk this morning. Um so first of all, like a lot of other managers, we are also being being coached. So we have two ladies who are coaching us already for a while. Yeah, um, before that, our relationship was also already very strong. Yes, but what our coaches learned us is that we should organize it more. So not only dropping in when there is something. Yes. We can sit next to each other and talk for a day, yeah. We learn a lot from each other, but also just planning the time spending on each other is super, super important. Yeah, but how we work is that Robert tells me what he thinks and I tell him what uh what I think, and sometimes it's not nice, but we don't mind. So you don't have that with everybody. I've got people around me, I have a lot of respect for them. I'm really relaxed with them, but if I say if I really say to them what I think about them, they can't take it. They cannot take it. It's it's too hard for them. So I always you always have to make it a little bit more kind of work a way around. I don't have to do Robert. And Robert also doesn't have it with me. So it's trust.

Vic 26:31

It's it's based on trust.

Francisco 26:32

Yeah, it's yeah, 100% trust, and we know that we say things to each other to make each other better and not be another nice guy or another nice person. So that's for us super important. I'm not sure if that is necessary for everybody, but for me it's important. So that also means that I if Robert is doing something that I don't understand, it doesn't hurt me at all because I know he's doing it with all the right mindsets, and I can also share what I think about it without hesitation. And um that that means that if he screws something up, it's also fine.

Vic 27:09

Yes.

Francisco 27:10

Because I because I'm doing the same sometimes too.

Vic 27:12

Yeah.

Francisco 27:13

So we're planning our time together. We also split the time between operation, tactical, and strategic uh discussion. So really to so if there are management meetings, I'm not in the management meetings anymore. So that means that I'm missing some information. Uh so we spent an hour on some highlights, what was discussed in the management, so then on an operational level, I'm uh I'm there again. Then we have the technical things the next three to six months that we want to reach.

Vic 27:39

Yeah.

Francisco 27:39

Discussions about there. Then we have the strategic meetings, and next to that all, we also have our walks. We just walk in the in the gym.

Vic 27:47

I love that. You said part of the interview process, or it wasn't really an interview process, but getting to know each other is you you did a lot of walking together. What a wonderful way of really getting to know some the real person.

Francisco 28:00

It is yeah, just walking in nature and uh don't you don't see each other, but you have to keep the conversation going.

Vic 28:07

Yeah, it's great.

Sam 28:08

Yeah.

Vic 28:09

I I work with a few a few of my exec clients that I coach, we go for walks.

Sam 28:14

Yeah. Yeah, that works. I I wonder. It does. Yeah, yeah. I think it's a great, great way of um catching up with people. It can be so sterile sitting across a desk or a table or something. Yeah, it is.

Vic 28:29

Yeah, yeah. No, it is. Or the other thing we do is we'll we'll go on a walk and we'll both be on the phone talking to each other, but we're both walking, but we're just not next to each other. So we do that claim too.

Francisco 28:40

Yeah, that works too. Yeah. Moving the body is uh important.

Vic 28:43

Yeah, it is. Well, you do a lot of that, don't you?

Francisco 28:46

Well, I'm going to do something crazy in June because we exist 25 years, so I made a decision together with somebody uh in the office to uh play Padel. You know the game Padel? Paddle, yeah, yeah, yeah. Pedal, pedal, you call it that. I'm going for pedal for 24 hours.

Vic 28:59

I've seen that. I'm gonna sponsor you today.

Francisco 29:02

Okay, yeah.

Sam 29:02

Oh, send me the link. I'll for charity, presumably.

Francisco 29:06

Yeah, we already raised 55,000 euros. Uh and um, I don't know why I did it, but to make that 24 hours, I'm now training six hours a day. Oh my god. It's very early in the morning and in the evening. I'm playing two sets of three hours, but uh but I also so I'm my my weight is always too high because I'm always I'm living in restaurants.

Vic 29:27

Yes, yeah.

Francisco 29:28

I need this sport challenge to balance a little bit all the eating and uh can I can I intercept?

Vic 29:34

Are you gonna sleep in that time?

Francisco 29:36

No, no, no. We start on Friday morning 10 o'clock, and we will keep playing Padel until Saturday morning 11. Oh my god. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like crazy. Uh last year I did a three at one for the first time, 13 hours and seven minutes, and now I made a decision to do this. I I need these kind of challenges to keep the the the fitness slash sport thing going. That sounds great.

Vic 29:58

Yeah, I don't think I've ever seen you smile so much on a podcast.

Francisco 30:02

Yeah, but yeah, because I'm looking forward to it and I'm training every day. Yeah. And I don't and I to be honest, I don't know why I'm doing it. It's very nice for the charity program, of course. I think it's going to raise like 75,000 euros. It's uh the the charity is uh make a wish. Oh, wonderful. Yeah, it's it's really really great. But uh yeah, uh but I think sport is also important if you're in business.

Sam 30:25

Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Do you ever play sport with your with your customers? We we talked about walking and talking, but you know, I there was a point in time a few years ago where I thought there might be a development whereby instead of going out for dinner or going out drinking together, we might go play, uh have a game of squash together or something like that and catch up over sport. And I'm not sure that's necessarily developed, but it feels like it it could do.

Francisco 30:55

Yeah, maybe I don't I don't see it a lot. Uh last week we had this pedal uh tournament and distributor and uh their customers, but most of them were partners. I I don't see it that much. And even after corona, the amount of times that you're sitting with a customer is also still the half. Yeah, if you compare it with before. Maybe it can be something. What I I tried to do something, but in the organization, they sh they they told me we're not going to do it. I had this crazy idea to uh create an uh a hiking/slash walking event every two months. So you go to this amazing place somewhere in Europe, you invite some customers, you're bringing in some guides who know something about the area. You come to walk, you walk the whole day with each other with a great lunch and a great

Sport, Charity And Customer Relationships

Francisco 31:40

dinner.

Vic 31:40

Yeah.

Francisco 31:41

Um, and uh you bring all the peers together in an like 15 or 20 peers in a real walk, like six hours, seven hours. Uh true nature. Um everybody at marketing loved the idea, but at the end they said it's way too much word to organize it. But I still think that's gonna be something.

Vic 31:59

Uh so I've got a contact for you for that. So talking about Germany, Ben, who wonderful guy that you've just hired to run Germany for you, somebody else that worked for me based in Germany is a lady called Uta Haller. You asked her.

Francisco 32:14

I know her. You know Uta. I know her, I know her.

Vic 32:17

So Uta, um Uta in her spare time is a hiking guide and she loves it and she has so much energy. So she's at work day now, but I bet Uta would jump at the chance of organizing something with her.

Francisco 32:33

I should contact her as she should just be both now.

Vic 32:36

You should.

Francisco 32:36

By the way, we hired Benny to run our sales organization in Germany, not our complete organization.

Vic 32:41

Oh, sorry.

Francisco 32:42

Just to make sure that uh misunderstanding. And I'm going to contact her because it's good, it's going to be uh it's a super, super good idea.

Vic 32:49

Yeah, right. Good, excellent. We have gone free flow on here today, haven't we?

Sam 32:53

Yeah, we have free flow is good. Free flow is good. I like it. I guess the one thing that that you know we should maybe talk about outside of the the wonderful free flow chat is uh if you're a founder in your position, Francisco, as as you were all those years ago, what's the trigger point? What's the signal? What's the what should people take note of to make them decide to consider going down that route? Um and what you know, what happens if you just leave it and let it run and carry on doing what you're doing? Maybe you don't know that because you made the right decision.

Francisco 33:36

Well, I I see competition around me that stay what it is. Uh also other companies that I'm sometimes advising, or I just see them around me because I'm interested. But I think what's going to happen, they will grow a bit, uh, like 5% a year, 10% a year, but that's what it is.

Vic 33:53

Yeah.

Francisco 33:53

Because the the the founder doesn't understand that he's the biggest issue. Yeah. Is that a big problem? I don't think so.

Sam 34:00

It's it's well, it's it's perfectly legitimate to run what in what in the UK we call a lifestyle business, you know, with bit maybe just ticks along, throws off a nice little you know, dividend each year for the the founder and the shareholders, and that that's fine. You know, we don't all need to be the next Amazon or whatever, do we?

Francisco 34:21

But it's not my driver. So yeah, the driver for crow, uh, there is there is a there is an important driver behind the crow. So I I believe in relevancy. You know what I mean with relevancy?

Vic 34:31

Yes, completely. That I'm sitting here saying it, thinking exactly that. I want Amplified to grow because I believe in what we do for tech teams.

Francisco 34:38

Yeah, exactly. And I and I'm 100% convinced that if we want to stay relevant in the future as a company for our customers, for our partners, for our employees, we have to grow. We have to make the company bigger and better. Yeah, um, otherwise, there is no relevancy for for us in the in the long run. And sometimes you see that with companies, yeah, or with whole branches. They are keep doing like uh newspapers, printing papers. Everybody sees that it's going down and down and down, and everybody who doesn't invest is gone now.

Vic 35:08

So it's innovation,

Relevancy, Culture And Long-Term Growth

Vic 35:10

it's the continuous innovation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, one question that we didn't ask you was what have you and the team been celebrating? And I know you've kind of talked about the growth in the company. Were there any things else that you you uh want to want to cover there?

Francisco 35:26

Celebrating.

Vic 35:28

Yeah.

Francisco 35:28

It's a good question because I got a lot of complaints internally that we never celebrate anything. Um it's it's not true because every year we go with the whole company to some place with a nice hotel. This year we come to to Spain with uh with a few hundred people. So we celebrate things, but we don't celebrate explicit things. But more than we're drinking something and we're having a great three, four days.

Vic 35:51

Yeah.

Francisco 35:52

Um if I would make a decision to celebrate something right now, that that's also the two things that I'm the most proud of, it would be our it would be our culture. Yes. So, like I said earlier, sometimes people think that they're running a company is like a movie, there are like this split minute things, they make a decision. It's not the truth, but sometimes there are decisions that you make. Like, let's, for example, somewhere around Corona, the numbers were not that good. And then uh you have to make some decisions. Are you going to fire people? Are you going to pay out bonuses? Uh, are you going to stop investing in studying? And that's where you make the decision if you really think your culture is important, yes or no.

Vic 36:36

Yes.

Francisco 36:37

So maybe you take a bigger loss because you want to keep investing in your culture. Um, and uh the decision that you're then making with your management team, that's where you smell it, that you're doing it for the right culture. Um so it doesn't mean that you have to give everything always away. Uh you have to you have to build a healthy and uh uh and a stable company. But it if but sometimes people come first. Yeah, so yeah, but sometimes you have to yeah, accept uh negative uh consequences uh because the culture is more important.

Vic 37:10

Yeah, yeah, it is. Yeah, yeah, thank you. Francisco is why we do what we do.

Francisco 37:17

Exactly.

Vic 37:17

Yeah, yeah. It really is amazing.

Sam 37:23

Thank you. Anything that we've missed that we have we you know we feel we should uh gosh, I've enjoyed that. Yeah, no, it's always good. It's always good to catch up. You know, I have very fond memories of well, of both of you from uh my time on the VMware Advisory Council. It was good good times. Good times. Have you got any sort of takeaways for last last summaries, maybe?

Francisco 37:47

Growing the company, yeah, it's an important takeaway. Well, I think it's an important uh lesson for leaders who want to grow the company faster. One of the decisions we made is making a split between the run of the organization and the change of the organization. So if you want to like us make the company in eight years ten times bigger, or maybe

Run Versus Change Plus Book Pick

Francisco 38:10

it's even more, um, I think it's super important to understand what is the run of my organization, uh, and what do I need to change the organization? And you have to split it. If you try to do it with the same teams, with the same people, with the same same KPIs. We tried it for two years, it was it's yeah, that's zones to win. Exactly. Zone to win, yeah, yeah.

Vic 38:33

Yeah, yeah, we had him on a while ago talking about it for exactly that reason.

Francisco 38:40

Yeah, yeah, that would be my takeaway.

Vic 38:42

Yeah, perfect.

Sam 38:45

Cool, fantastic. And any probably had a book recommendation from you all that time back when we had you on the podcast first, but have you got any current book recommendations? With all your paddle playing, you've probably not got any time to read, have you?

Francisco 39:00

I still read. So the books I mean, I remember which book I said uh six years ago. It was uh it was a very old book from 1930 something, uh from uh Dill Cornicky. Uh how to how to uh uh make friends with people. Yeah, yeah. I'm still I'm still uh every month reading a few uh pages of it. Um a recommendation. So it's not a management book, but I think if you read it, you understand why I uh I will share with it with you. So there is this guy who plays uh soccer, so it's football. Um and uh his name is Slatan Imreimovic. I'm not sure if you know Slatan. If you're if you're in football, you know him. If you're not in football, you don't know him. He's Swedish, he used to play for Ajax, Barcelona, and other some other great teams. He he wrote a book called I am Slatan. And this this guy is from a former uh war uh region, Yugoslavia. He he went to Sweden. His his childhood was not really nice. Uh he could do two things. He could be a criminal or a football player, uh, and he is uh writing a lot about his emotions, his thoughts, uh situations he was in, and why he's getting aggressive or not, why when he's getting emotional or not, and he's explaining so in detail what's happening in his brains, especially for yeah, that's it. Also, if you lay the book down and you're thinking a little bit about yourself, then you also start thinking, okay, but what is really driving me and why are I doing the things that I'm doing, and what is my background in that my childhood? Wow, and it also helps you a bit to understand some type of people. So uh I am Slatan is a book that I would recommend.

Vic 40:50

That's wonderful, isn't it?

Sam 40:52

Yeah, brilliant.

Farewell And How To Support

Sam 40:54

Well, lovely to catch up. Francisco, just fantastic to see you again. Um, so thank you for that. I'm sure our readers will get an astonishing amount of value out of this. So thank you so much for joining us once again. Um, we really appreciate it. And it just remained for me to say thank you very much for listening. As always, your comments, your subscriptions, your likes are most gratefully received.