061 Brett Barlow - Effectively Leading a Virtual Team

In our SaaS Fuel™ Founder Episode, Jeff is joined by Brett Barlow, the CEO of Everee, a fintech firm that is revolutionizing the traditional bi-weekly payment cycle by providing a simple way to instantly pay workers.

Brett brings over 25 years of experience in leading SaaS firms and consumer brands. He stresses the significance of developing a mission-driven company with a positive workplace environment. He highlights the importance of employees feeling valued, having stability, and being trusted. While making a profit is essential, having a sense of purpose and community is equally vital. Brett also underscores the significance of selecting the right individuals for the team to prevent any hindrance in accomplishing the company's objectives.

Key Takeaways

00:08:31 Missed Opportunity Leads To Valuable Career Insights

00:10:20 Utilizing Past Lessons and Resulting Policies To Steer A Company

00:11:55 Importance Of Learning From Mistakes In Job Requirements

00:12:45 Transition From Executive Member to CEO

00:14:59 Choosing Board Members With Operating Experience

00:17:39 Recruit People That Provide You Independence

00:20:22 Pressure To Increase Spending As Inflation Decreases, Return To Fundamentals In Sas Industry, And Dislike For The Term Unicorn

00:22:01 A Reliable, Committed, and Passionate Workforce is Crucial

00:23:20 Developing a Mission-driven, Healthy Firm

00:24:48 Remote Work Increases Talent Pool

00:27:38 A More Diverse Workforce Improves A Company

00:31:40 Importance Of Intentionality In Remote Work: Fostered Better Behavior And Communication Practices

00:33:53 Socializing Outside of Work Can Boost Productivity

00:35:03 The Importance Of Humanizing Relationships In The Digital World

00:35:31 It’s All About Balance

00:36:44 Mission Of A Payroll Platform: Paying People Their Earned Wages Promptly

00:38:16 How Everee Works and its Benefits

00:40:26 Everee is Paying People What They've Earned Quickly and Affordable

00:43:33 Workers Deserve Access To Their Funds

00:44:16 What inspired Everee?

00:45:37 Personal Connection To Financial Empowerment

Tweetable Quotes

“Humanizing the relationship instead of digitizing.” - 00:35:26 Jeff Mains

“But I think a baseline level of health of an executive team or even a business is trust.” - 00:34:46 Brett Barlow

“And the more we know each other, the more we spend time with each other.” - 00:33:19 Jeff Mains

“As a CEO, you can be in control of your destiny if you manage a healthy business.” - 00:17:25 Brett Barlow

“That's important to have that choice. It is that you're not desperate and have to take whatever offers on the table.” - 00:33:19 Jeff Mains

SaaS Leadership Lessons

1. Employing good people and being around both experienced and kind individuals from whom you can learn are important.
2. Pay your employees on time.
3. Productivity can be greatly impacted by building relationships and trust with employees.
4. One bad hire can set a company back, making hiring an important aspect.
5. Teams should be built to solve tough problems.
6. Maintaining company culture and personal interactions can be challenging with remote work.
7. Returning to basics has helped SaaS overall. Fundamentals and creating a profitable business matter.
8. It is critical to have a stable, devoted, and passionate staff on whom to lean and trust.
9. Establish a goal with a purpose, vision, and values that people understand.
10. Being remote can help you find new talent. For all of the usual criteria of diversity, we have been able to expand the diversity of thought and experience.

Guest Resources

Brett Barlow (Linkedin): https://www.linkedin.com/in/barlowbrett

Everee (Website): https://www.everee.com/

Everee (Linkedin): https://www.linkedin.com/company/everee-pay

Everee (Twitter): https://twitter.com/EvereePay

Resources Mentioned

Neil Patel: https://neilpatel.com/

Chris Sue: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-j-sue

Anthony Kennada: https://www.linkedin.com/in/akennada

Nathan Latka: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nathanlatka

Jason Tanner: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasontanner

Luke Hohmann: https://appliedframeworks.com/presenters/69-luke-hohmann/

Pluralsight: https://www.pluralsight.com/

HP: https://www.hp.com/us-en/home.html

SkullCandy: https://www.skullcandy.com/

Medicare: https://www.medicare.gov/

Everee: https://www.everee.com/

Appliedframeworks.com: https://appliedframeworks.com/

Ron Ross: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ron-ross-0b7963bb

Slack: https://slack.com/

Zoom: https://zoom.us/

Patrick Lencioni: https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrick-lencioni-orghealth

Uber: https://www.uber.com/tw/en/

Brene Brown: https://brenebrown.com/

Episode Sponsor

This week's episode is sponsored by a brand new book Software Profit Streams by Jason Tanner & Luke Hohmann. It's all about pricing your SaaS. When I first heard about a pricing book I kind of groaned. Yes, very useful, necessary sure, like eating lots of vegetables. I'll do it, but there are 100 other things I'd rather have. Then I saw it. Wow! It's nothing as I imagined - visual, interactive, well thought out, and beautifully designed. There are no walls of text to put you to sleep. It isn't a Ph.D. dissertation or authors trying to prove their intellect. Straight up, this is the best book about pricing your SaaS that I've ever seen! If you priced like your industry or copied a competitor's pricing page, you need this book! It releases on April 4, I'll have Luke on the show on release day. You can learn more at appliedframeworks.com and I'll link to it in the show notes and on SaaSFuel.com Software Profit Streams - check it out.

Small Fish, Big Pond – https://smallfishbigpond.com/ Use the promo code ‘SaaSFuel’

Champion Leadership Group – https://championleadership.com/

SaaS Fuel Resources

Website - https://championleadership.com/

Jeff Mains on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffkmains/

Twitter - https://twitter.com/jeffkmains

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/thesaasguy/

Instagram - https://instagram.com/jeffkmains