Golden Rules for MSP Excellence: It’s Business Time!
With just over a month till VISION ’24 (register here), it’s time to get into the spirit of this year’s conference theme: Achieving the Gold Standard as an MSP. We’re excited to share the first installment in a special 4-part blog series: Golden Rules for MSP Excellence. In this first article, we’re looking at the number one rule MSPs should follow in the pursuit of greatness…
Before we get to our first golden rule for MSP excellence, let’s talk about what MSP excellence even means. When we talk about ‘achieving the gold standard’ as an MSP, what are we really talking about?
The easy answer is that ‘achieving the gold standard’ means doing what the biggest MSPs do.
But it’s not the best answer. That’s because big MSPs aren’t always shining beacons of operational maturity and service excellence. And while achieving the gold standard helps with growth – undoubtedly – it’s not just copying large MSPs. It’s doing things the right way – not just growing, but scaling; not just winning new clients, but keeping them (and keeping them happy); not just solving technical problems, but core business challenges.
A lot of larger MSPs are good at these things – that’s a big part of how they became larger MSPs! But achieving the gold standard isn’t exclusive to the major players with many millions in annual revenue. In many cases, the gold standard is something you can start working toward right away, regardless of your MSP’s size.
This is especially true of our first golden rule for MSP excellence…
Golden Rule #1 – Be About Your Business
Be about your business. What does this mean? On the surface, it just means you should, as an MSP owner (and really any business owner), be focused, disciplined, diligent, professional, and so on. But there’s a deeper meaning…
To be about your business is to conceptualize your MSP as a business, first and foremost, and not, say, as a source of technological expertise or an excuse to geek out about computers while making a little money.
Thinking about your MSP business as a business doesn’t mean you have to stop being passionate about technology, or that you should think purely in terms of profit. In fact, both of those sound like a recipe for disaster.
So what does this conceptual shift involve? How do you think like a business owner and approach decisions accordingly?
Good for Business
One of the best ways you can ‘be about your business’ is by habitually asking: Is this good for business?
This might sound obvious, but as the following two examples reveal, determining the overall impact of a decision on your MSP’s health as a business is anything but straightforward.
Example #1 – The Right Tool
You’re considering making a change to your MSP’s tool stack. But you really like your tools! From a purely technical perspective, they rock!
But what about from a business perspective? Would switching to a new tool stack be good for business?
Answering that question actually requires answering a whole bunch of other questions: Are my tools scalable enough for my growth goals? Are they preventing crucial integrations? Are they backed by heathy vendor relationships? Would switching tool stacks open new doors?
And let’s not forget about what is arguably in this context the most important and salient question of all: Which tools best serve my client relationships?
You might like your current stack, but when you’re striving for the gold standard, it’s not about you. It can’t be. It’s about your operations, your employees, your clients – in short, your business.
Example #2 – Just Say No
Imagine one of your clients demands a complex system migration in a week. You might be able to pull it off, emphasis on might…
When you’re first starting out as an MSP owner, it’s only natural to say yes. New client? Yes! Custom request that falls outside your core capabilities? Sure! Unrealistic timeline that will likely make your technicians hate life? Bring it on!
While understandable, saying yes to everything isn’t a sustainable business practice, and in fact, strategic no‘s are a hallmark of a mature, forward-looking MSP.
So, getting back to that complex migration, while the engineer in you might jump at the opportunity to showcase some serious technical wizardry, the business owner in you should be wary. Depending on the details, you might decide to take on the project, but it shouldn’t simply be because you can do it (albeit with a lot of stress and overtime). It should be because, all things considered, taking on the project will be – you guessed it – good for business.
A Matter of Time
As the above two examples show, making decisions that are good for business, while simple in concept, is pretty darned complicated in practice. That’s because it requires ‘zooming out’ – seeing the big picture and considering the cascade of effects a single decision is likely to have.
This zooming out business is especially challenging when you’re busy. When you’re up to your neck in day-to-day work while constantly putting out fires, it’s almost impossible to step back and consider things coolly, with an eye to the overall health of your company.
To perform that kind of objective assessment, what you really need is time. This is why one of the most important things you can do as an MSP owner is find ways to protect your time. Creating repeatable, scalable processes backed by robust documentation is one way to protect your time. Delegating core business functions to trusted partners and experts is another. Becoming a member of a group like The 20 and off-loading the bulk of your tickets to an acclaimed 24/7 help desk – that frees up time too!
However you choose to free up your schedule, prioritizing high-impact activities and strategic planning will help drive your business forward. Just ask Greg Padgett, an MSP owner who joined The 20 back in 2018:
“When I met him [Tim Conkle, CEO of The 20], I had determined I was tired of just making myself a job; I wanted a business. Joining The 20 helped me to get out of that hole that I had built for myself, and be able to stand up above the company and look into it and see what needed to change, and make those hard decisions to make those changes.”
That’s what it’s all about, folks – getting out of the daily grind and assuming your rightful position as the visionary leader of your company.
It’s VISION Time!
If you enjoyed this piece, look out for the next installment in our 4-part blog series, Golden Rules for MSP Excellence. And don’t forget to register for VISION ’24, taking place next month (Aug 27-30) in sunny Dallas, TX.
The MSPs you’ll encounter at VISION are some of the most motivated, process-driven, and business-savvy companies in the game. Want to know what it takes to make it in this competitive industry? Come hang out with the best of the best at VISION ’24!