Managing Remote Developers as a Non-Technical Founder - Ep#5 Shanna Huber

This is a transcript from my recent SaaS podcast interview Episode #5 with Shanna Huber.

Shanna is the owner of MyJunna.com - a SaaS tool for Case Managers and Patient Advocates.

She also own Ripple Life Care Planning, a care management company and is also co-founded the Life Care Management Institute and co-author of the The Life Care Management Handbook.

Shanna started with a services business and then used the revenue from that bootstrap her SaaS business until it was profitable enough to go full-time on it - in this interview she details exactly how she did it.

Watch the full interview here: Managing Remote Developers as a Non-Technical SaaS Founder - with Shanna Huber

In this episode you can expect to learn about:
In this episode you can expect to learn:
 - How to manage a remote dev team as a non-technical founder
 - How to organize your time between running a SaaS and a consultancy at the same time
 - When the right time is to expand into a new market
 - The right way to use an advisory board effectively

Here's a short 5-minute clip from our conversation.

 

Also you might be interested in these:

• 3 Quick and Dirty SaaS Revenue Sources You're Probably Overlooking
• 11 Important SaaS Metrics You Need To Be Tracking
• SaaS Content Marketing Hacks - Ep #4 With Uwe Dreissigacker

 

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[00:00:00] Shanna Huber: Make a quick decision. If it's the wrong decision, quickly make another decision. What 

[00:00:05] Ryan Wardell: is your spicy take on building a SaaS business? 

[00:00:09] Shanna Huber: You don't want to be the same software. You want to be innovative and come up with awesome things because it's what your customers want, not what, because you're trying to match your competition.

[00:00:21] Shanna Huber: Most of your time, you know, make your customers happy. Do 

[00:00:26] Ryan Wardell: you have any other advice? For SAS founders, whether they're technical or not, 

[00:00:31] Shanna Huber: I think my biggest advice is just Shana 

[00:00:33] Ryan Wardell: Huber. Welcome to the show. 

[00:00:35] Shanna Huber: Hi, thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here. 

[00:00:38] Ryan Wardell: Let's start off with something spicy. So what is your spicy take on building a SAS business?

[00:00:47] Shanna Huber: I think something spicy is that you don't have to be in tech to found a SaaS business, which I think is, um, can be controversial. Or if you're not tech that other people will say, Oh, but you have to like partner with someone and, um, you know, split your business and share your business with someone who's actually techie in order to be successful.

[00:01:12] Ryan Wardell: What do you think? People say that or what what makes you kind of go against that that conventional wisdom. 

[00:01:17] Shanna Huber: Um, well cuz I'm doing it But I think anyone Cuz I think anyone can do it like I'm not, you know, always I'm not the smartest person in the room But it's important to have smart people around you.

[00:01:35] Shanna Huber: And I, I was one of those people that thought I had to have a tech person to start my business. And I actually started out with bringing in someone that I didn't know very well and said, Hey, let's split this 50 50. I already had my product. It was already ready to go, but I felt like I needed someone. And then long story short, he, um, Was stealing money, taking advantage, and then I had to get it back.

[00:01:59] Shanna Huber: And it was a big ordeal, but, um, I'm so glad that I'm the only founder now. And I don't think I would have been successful even having a partner like that. And I would encourage other people who are not techie, like you can do this. You can figure it out. Um, you have the skills. There's great people out there that don't have to be the owner to support your business and help you grow and get to where you need to be.

[00:02:29] Ryan Wardell: And I think, I think a lot of people think, you know, I need to have a co founder who is a developer. You can hire someone who's a developer to, to, to build it for you. You can work with agencies, you can outsource it. Like there are lots of different avenues to building a tech product. Now, um, you don't have to immediately give up a huge chunk of equity to take on a technical co founder.

[00:02:50] Ryan Wardell: Um, I've actually seen some seem like a really interesting thing. Even there are a lot of business, even when they take on a technical co founder, uh, they end up with someone who can code as opposed to someone who can lead a team of, you know, Developers. And so they, they end up having to bring in a more experienced CTO later on.

[00:03:08] Ryan Wardell: And it causes all sorts of problems. And I think it's so much easier if there's just one founder and you've got control over, over the whole direction. Um, but let's, let's segue into that. So, so tell me about MyJuna. Like, so who, uh, what is it and who is it for? 

[00:03:24] Shanna Huber: Uh, so it's a software, um, as a service cloud based, it's, um, basically to help nurses.

[00:03:32] Shanna Huber: mostly nurses and social workers who have their own like small consulting businesses run their business. So it has components for like care management and health. It's like a mini electronic health record. Um, that also is HIPAA compliant that also does invoicing. So it's like an all in one application for, uh, um, it's actually a very niche market that I went into from having experienced Living in that market.

[00:04:01] Ryan Wardell: So what's, what's the origin story? You were working in that, in that market beforehand. Like how, how did it come about? 

[00:04:08] Shanna Huber: Yeah. So I'm very entrepreneurial. So I actually started out as a nurse. I was a nurse since I was very young, 20 years old. Um, always wanted to start my own business and. My kids were like middle school age and um, like my passion was really business.

[00:04:29] Shanna Huber: So I started a consulting business, um, helping seniors and their families, um, kind of navigate the healthcare system. helping them in their home, you know, older people, they didn't want to leave their home. And it wasn't home health aides that would go in and like, um, you know, we would connect them with those people, but it's really getting to, you know, the nursing, like, what is the underlying issue?

[00:04:54] Shanna Huber: Why are they declining? How can they remain in their home? So I started out doing that, and I didn't have a system that could run my business well. So I was using actually my competitors Um, software and, you know, other apps kind of piecing things together and it wasn't, um, I needed, you know, something with resources or something that I needed that wasn't even out there at all.

[00:05:20] Shanna Huber: So I hired, um, I had a friend who also did development, so I hired him to develop some things for my business and that kind of was my passion and I didn't even, you know, Think about selling my software to other people. It was just a tool that I needed to run my business. So it took about four years to like, um, piece together my system that I needed to run my whole business.

[00:05:47] Shanna Huber: Um, and then I was like, Oh, this is, this is a pretty good system. Like, I think this is, um, better than my competitor system. I think my, um, people in my industry would love it. So I had a lot of friends and, um, colleagues in the space. So I started showing it to them. And is this something that you would use?

[00:06:09] Shanna Huber: And, um, yeah, it went from there. So it kind of, um, I don't want to say I fell into it, but. You know, it wasn't on my roadmap. I always tell people, God will guide you. You don't always see the whole picture. If something is in your heart to do it, just do that step. And it's like, another door will open.

[00:06:29] Shanna Huber: Another door will open. You don't see 10 steps ahead of you. A lot of times you just see what you need to do for the next step. 

[00:06:38] Ryan Wardell: Absolutely. And, and we, you, um, so I've seen a really interesting model where. A lot of people will start with an agency or a consulting business or something else, and then do exactly what you did and spot, you know, Hey, I need this for myself.

[00:06:53] Ryan Wardell: Build a software product and then realize, Hey, there's, there's a lot of other people that would benefit from this. Um, do you, were you running the consulting business alongside the SAS business for a while, or did you leap straight into the SAS business? Like how, how did you navigate that, that transition?

[00:07:09] Shanna Huber: Yeah. So I, um, launched in 2019, my product. And then it was just last year that I stopped doing the consulting and I still have some little pieces. Um, cause some of it was expert witness work and that. So I still have some little pieces that are, you know, keep popping up that are kind of annoying. I'm like, Oh, I want to be done with that.

[00:07:32] Shanna Huber: But I was officially done last year. Um, so now I'm in the software full time. Um, But it is hard to manage. I would say recommend, you know, other people that are listening, just, um, hire great people and have them be your support. You can't do both full time. And one is always going to be lacking. So I feel like the software now that I'm focused on at full time is doing a lot better.

[00:08:04] Shanna Huber: You have to take the leap at some point. 

[00:08:07] Ryan Wardell: And, and did you like, did you, did you chunk up your week? So that was, you know, Monday I'm working on my Juno, Tuesday I'm working on consulting. Did you kind of mix both into the same work day? Like how, how did you structure So I 

[00:08:25] Shanna Huber: had employees on both sides, so I had employees in my consulting business and my Juna.

[00:08:31] Shanna Huber: So I did as much as I could with the employees. So it was kind of like random. Um, yeah, I wish I had some system, but it was kind of like the wild west, like, ah, what needs done today? Do I need to work Saturday? Do I need to work 12 hours today? Do So consulting is kind of like this. So there was some point where I was focused on the software and then all of a sudden everything would pile up and then I would just disappear from the software and just focus on the consulting.

[00:09:03] Shanna Huber: So it's, it's hard to juggle all those pieces. 

[00:09:07] Ryan Wardell: Absolutely. So 

[00:09:07] Shanna Huber: I don't have any wisdom besides just you have to like, work hard and, um, yeah, figure it out as you go. Yeah. 

[00:09:17] Ryan Wardell: I think that's, that's kind of the thing. Like there's a, um, they talk about like you pay for it one way or the other. If you, you either hire people who are expensive or you end up having to spend more time managing them, or you don't hire people at all and you just have to work Harder and longer hours to, to, to make it all work.

[00:09:38] Ryan Wardell: Like there's no real shortcut there, but, um, yeah, I know a lot of people are sort of doing that, you know, I've got the software thing on the side or I've got the software thing, but I need to bring in a bit of extra cash somewhere to pay all the bills or, you know, they'd started off with a service business and now they're stepping into software.

[00:09:54] Ryan Wardell: And so there's a lot of people that sort of running two at the same time. I used to do that and I used to find, I used to feel really guilty about it cause I used to feel like, I'm not giving my full attention to either one of these things. And it sort of felt like if I could just focus on one thing, then I could, I could, I'd rather be really good at one thing than trying to juggle both.

[00:10:12] Ryan Wardell: But you know, the reality of running a business, especially at an early stage is you kind of need to keep, keep both plates in the air. Uh, you, you, you mentioned a while back that you are expanding into a new market. Um, how, like, When is the right time to expand into a new market? And, and, and how do you go about making that decision?

[00:10:32] Shanna Huber: Um, I think you just have to be really solid in one market. I, if you spread out too thin, then you have too many people wanting, um, too many features and it's like, who's my target. So I think once you get really established in one market, and then we started seeing, um, seeing sales. Slow down a little bit because we are now saturated in that market.

[00:10:57] Shanna Huber: I feel like we're not growing like this anymore. We're just kind of growing a little bit slower because It's a niche market. We marketed to all the people that are going to switch. We're not growing at the same rate. So then researching different markets, you really have to research it before you just jump into it.

[00:11:17] Shanna Huber: So we looked at who do we align best with? Who do we have? Like, do we have a few customers in that market? Cause we did explore like totally different markets that were like, well, I think we could fit into this. So for instance, we looked at, um, we have A couple of customers that do the care management, but they also do consulting or, um, counseling.

[00:11:40] Shanna Huber: So we looked at counseling and really researched that. Cause that's a huge field. But then we're like, well, you know, simple practice is awesome. It's a great application. And they're like 30, they start at 30 a month. So the price is low and. Um, we would have to build out a lot to even compete with them and we're not their niche to that.

[00:12:05] Shanna Huber: So, we're like, that's probably not the best fit. So we just kind of looked around at different things and how could we scale in a different market? Where are we more closely aligned with? And Where is there opportunity? So the market we're going into, there's not a lot of people in that market. We have customers already in that market.

[00:12:30] Shanna Huber: They're very closely aligned with what we're currently doing. 

[00:12:33] Ryan Wardell: So you're not just leaping into something completely different. You're starting with, Hey, we've already got a few customers there. It's another market that we feel like we could. We could dominate pretty quickly or we could build up a sizable kind of presence fairly quickly.

[00:12:45] Ryan Wardell: And, um, and, and there's an opportunity there away from, and, and, and you said that the, the, the trigger point for that decision where it's like, Hey, it's time for us to look at expanding into a new market. That was when you started to max out your, your existing. You started to see the growth dropping off.

[00:13:02] Ryan Wardell: We started to see saturation. Like what does, what does saturation look like? Was it that you'd already contacted every single person in, in, in your space? Cause that happens. Was it, was it something else? 

[00:13:12] Shanna Huber: Yeah. We learned from a recent conference we went to that, um, you're saturated in a market when you hit about 10 percent 

[00:13:19] Ryan Wardell: of 

[00:13:20] Shanna Huber: customers within that market.

[00:13:22] Shanna Huber: So we looked at our current market and there's, um, 2000 people in our market. We have over 200 of those organizations. So we're like, okay, well, that makes sense now that we're at 10%. Um, and we're not seeing like huge sales. We're seeing like people kind of trickling over now. Um, so it's, yeah, so it's the slowness as well as looking at, um, You know, 10 percent of that 

[00:13:52] Ryan Wardell: market.

[00:13:54] Shanna Huber: And then also we, you know, that's part of the research too, going back to what market are we going into? We looked at the next market we're going into and we're like, well, we only have, you know, I think five or eight of those customers, something around there. So we're like, that's a good opportunity. Cause it's another niche market.

[00:14:14] Shanna Huber: That we can like jump into and saturate that next. 

[00:14:18] Ryan Wardell: Fantastic. What is an advisory board and how do you use it? 

[00:14:25] Shanna Huber: So at first, um, when I was first starting out, I knew what the industry, cause I worked in it and I knew what my business needed, but I'm like, well, maybe my business, you know, if I get eight, 10 other businesses together, they're probably doing things slightly different and maybe I'm missing something that they're all doing that I'm not doing.

[00:14:48] Shanna Huber: So I, um, put out like a newsletter and said, who wants to be on my advisory board? And I think I enticed, you know, it was one hour, once a month, I enticed them with, um, like, Oh, I'll pay for your conference. Um, the following year, we're going to do a drawing and, um, one person's going to get that. And I think I gave them each a gift card anyways, at the end of the year.

[00:15:11] Shanna Huber: Um, but they just really advise you on ideas, Things, you know, helped me kind of see like, what's the product doing well, what could be better? What kind of things are you guys needing that the software doesn't do? 

[00:15:30] Ryan Wardell: And 

[00:15:30] Shanna Huber: then we would prioritize those. And then once we started developing it, I would be like, well, what do you think of the look of this?

[00:15:37] Shanna Huber: Is this the right spot? How easy is this to use? And, um, we went from there. 

[00:15:43] Ryan Wardell: So, so wait, so you got, you got, you got all the, how many people were on the advisory board? 

[00:15:47] Shanna Huber: I think like eight or 10 people. 

[00:15:49] Ryan Wardell: Okay. And so you got, you got eight or 10 people all on, on a call or met up face to face once a month, or did you meet with them individually or how did, how did you structure that?

[00:15:59] Shanna Huber: Yeah, great question. So we did a zoom cause they're from all over the U S um, and then we would get on a zoom. And at the time I had my developer meet also, which probably. I shouldn't have done. Um, looking back. So don't do that. But, um, just getting on a zoom and then having everyone like come with ideas and everyone would share.

[00:16:25] Shanna Huber: So we had, you know, you always have that one person. We had the one person that wanted to, uh, You know, do a gazillion things. And then we created the roadmap and now they had another gazillion things. And I think that was really helpful too, for them to all see, like, how quickly things get built, 

[00:16:42] Ryan Wardell: you 

[00:16:43] Shanna Huber: know, okay, we have these ideas.

[00:16:44] Shanna Huber: We're going to stick with those. Um, and I think that also helped us grow because people on advisory boards love when you use their ideas and they think it's so awesome. And then they tell all their friends and those people on my advisory board originally from four years ago are all still with me, um, today.

[00:17:07] Shanna Huber: And so last year, We didn't do an advisory board because we're just too big now to get 10 people's ideas. Now we do a big survey and everyone gets a say in what gets developed and then we analyze that. Um, but then we are starting a new advisory board because we're going into this new market. And this is hard because I'm not in this market.

[00:17:32] Shanna Huber: So there's, um, some financial pieces that they need that I have no idea. What that need is. So it's kind of cool. Our first meeting is this week, actually, and we asked them to submit like what tools they're using now, like Excel spreadsheets or things like that. So they're all like we asked all I think it's nine people.

[00:17:55] Shanna Huber: We asked nine people and, um, all but one was they're all excited. They're like, yeah, like, I can't wait. And one was like, I wanna be on this so bad, but ah, this is a bad day for me, or I'm gonna be on vacation and I'm gonna join anyways. So they get so excited too. So. I feel like, um, for the audience out there, if you're afraid to, like, ask people and infringe on their time or whatever, it's one hour once a month and people get so excited.

[00:18:26] Shanna Huber: They just love giving ideas and being a part of development. 

[00:18:30] Ryan Wardell: And it gives them a sense of, I guess ownership too, because if they, they contribute an idea and to have the, you know, the founder of a business say, actually, yeah, that's a great idea. We can do that. And then it actually gets done and they can see that, you know, an idea that was in their head gets turned into a, you know, an actual feature of the product.

[00:18:45] Ryan Wardell: Um, yeah, I think that's such, such an underrated strategy. Um, like you hear the, you know, the conventional advice that everyone talks about in the SAS world is, you know, go and talk to your customer, go and talk to your customer, but you actually did it and you've got this very formal process for, uh, Getting ideas from customers and getting them really engaged with with what you're doing.

[00:19:05] Ryan Wardell: I think that's so clever. That's that's fantastic How did you get your first hundred customers and and and how do you get customers now that you've grown beyond that? 

[00:19:15] Shanna Huber: So the first hundred I always tell people it's when you're starting. It's such an uphill Battle because you're not known in the space You're new so people are weary of that You So it does get easier.

[00:19:32] Shanna Huber: So I always tell people just stick to it like it. Starting out as like this and then it goes like this and then like this, what does get easier as you're trudging up your hill. So my first handful of customers were just people that I knew. Um, friends, colleagues that I would show, Hey, what do you think?

[00:19:52] Shanna Huber: And I just, um, gave them super cheap product because you just want people using it at first. So. Uh, they paid like less than half of what my current user price is now. And then I would lock them in. Sometimes they'd be like, I'll lock you into this price for three years. And it was so ridiculously cheap just to get them using it, feedback, experience.

[00:20:19] Shanna Huber: Um, and then after that I go, um, I swear by conferences for my market, cause it's you know where they're going to be. Um, and I started doing that off the bat and that really helped and we continue doing that now. So that didn't change. And we also do email marketing with newsletters. So once you go to the conferences, you have that list of people 

[00:20:44] Ryan Wardell: and then 

[00:20:44] Shanna Huber: you can, um, Send them newsletters.

[00:20:48] Shanna Huber: And it's not always about marketing because people get annoyed with that. Like they've seen you, they know, but because they're like, yes, I know my Juneau, like you and they'll unsubscribe. So give them some, um, I'm in the industry, so just giving them, you know, some helpful tips or links to other sites or helpful things so that you become.

[00:21:12] Shanna Huber: Known and kind of that I've heard in the industry as well. 

[00:21:16] Ryan Wardell: Well, that's kind of the thing because they they know who you are They know what you do So you, you've still got to keep in touch with them somehow. Cause you, you've got to stay top of mind, but if it's just marketing, marketing, marketing, they're going to tune out exactly.

[00:21:30] Ryan Wardell: So you take a very kind of helpful approach with the content that you're sending them. Is that the strategy? 

[00:21:35] Shanna Huber: Yeah. I give them helpful and also let all of your customers sell for you. Like when we go to conferences, we also. Bring gifts for our customers and we're like stop because you want your customers to also stop at your table You don't want to be like I know you you guys because you're sitting there at your booth Selling and then you have a customer walk up and you hand them a little present and they're like, oh, we love you guys So much.

[00:22:01] Shanna Huber: We're so happy and everyone hears that And then they carry that around or, you know, we get a lot of people stopping by and they're like, Oh, Susan or whoever we sat next to her at lunch. She was bragging so much about you guys. So I would say just make the most of your time. You know, make your customers happy 

[00:22:23] Ryan Wardell: Out of curiosity like what what kind of gifts do you give them?

[00:22:27] Ryan Wardell: I'm And and a full disclosure. I am awful at buying presents for people. So this This this is for my benefit more than anyone else But what what kind of gifts do you like are appropriate? What kind of gifts are appreciated? Like what would you do? 

[00:22:39] Shanna Huber: I was gonna say too. I'm looking forward to your gift bonsai Hit a million, they can cut this out, but 

[00:22:47] Ryan Wardell: I'm looking forward to that too.

[00:22:49] Ryan Wardell: That's going to make me super happy when I can say, yep. So it's like for anyone, anyone listening. So in, in the startup source community, we kind of have this, this unofficial tradition that when you hit, when you hit your first million, um, we send people. Bottle of wine, a bottle of whiskey, a bottle of whatever.

[00:23:03] Ryan Wardell: Um, I had, I had one guy who, who didn't drink. So I sent, sent him some very fancy sparkling water. It doesn't matter. But the point is like, it's, it's a milestone. You got to celebrate these things. Um, I think, I think, and I'm going to be stoked when you get there. That'll be fantastic. 

[00:23:17] Shanna Huber: Me too, Argentina wine, uh, yeah, I'm like, that's, that's the only reason I want to hit that, really.

[00:23:28] Ryan Wardell: Now you're putting the pressure on me, what if I send you a bad bottle of wine? I'll have to, I'll have to get some of my friends, give some advice. 

[00:23:34] Shanna Huber: Okay. I forgot the question now. What was the question? 

[00:23:38] Ryan Wardell: So, so when you're at conferences and you talked about giving gifts to your customers, which I've never heard of that before, that, that makes so much sense.

[00:23:44] Ryan Wardell: That feels like, cause the way you described it, when someone comes up to your table, you give someone a gift. Oh, wow. That's amazing. That's awesome. And you're starting all this positive word of mouth at the conference itself. That, that seems so clever, but, um, but what kind of gifts do you give them? 

[00:23:57] Shanna Huber: So this conference, I gave them juggling elephants.

[00:24:01] Shanna Huber: It's a book. Um, really good book just about juggling. Um, like, Oh, here we go. Alex is just handed me the book. So it's the yeah. And we Yeah, like you have to think about cost. You can see it's not that big. And then we bought them all at thrift stores. So then we got them delivered and had to scratch off the price tag and some of them were ruined.

[00:24:24] Shanna Huber: We had to, you know, return or written into, but, um, it was a cheap way. And then we just put it in a nice little bag. So, and then we've done bracelets for people before cause our market is women. And then we had to think of like, uh, our two guys, like, what are we going to give them sort of thing? Um, so we just try to look at things that our customers would like that aren't.

[00:24:49] Shanna Huber: Going to break the bank, you know, they're not getting gold necklaces or anything like that, but just a little token. 

[00:24:57] Ryan Wardell: So it doesn't, it doesn't have to be expensive, but it just thoughtful, something that would actually be resonate with them. Yeah, that's, that's clever. I really like that. Um, uh, what challenges have you had with competitors and how have you resolved those?

[00:25:16] Shanna Huber: So at first our competitors, so they weren't happy that we were, um, of course, coming up in the niche market. There's not a lot of space for new people. Um, so they gave me a really hard time at first, just talking really negative about us. And, um, it, it got a little personal 

[00:25:38] Ryan Wardell: and we 

[00:25:39] Shanna Huber: just, um, stayed positive and did our thing and we're like, we're not gonna.

[00:25:45] Shanna Huber: Exchange with that negativity. We're just going to do our thing and focus, you know, just on forward and being positive and that's worked for us. And I know since we're now leading, um, in the industry, now they're like copying all of our stuff because we have good ideas. Um, I guess we listen to our customers.

[00:26:07] Shanna Huber: So now like, you know, you do market research. So we'll kind of go one step and see what's new. And then we'll be like, Oh, first off, but I'll just take it as a compliment. And I would say it's good to know what your competitors are doing. So you can talk about the differences, but don't get so focused on keeping up with copying everything.

[00:26:32] Shanna Huber: You don't want to be the same software. You want to be innovative and come up with. Awesome things because it's what your customers want, not what, because you're trying to match your competition. I feel like if it's focused on your own, what you're doing, you're going to have a better product than.

[00:26:50] Shanna Huber: Copying someone else's stuff. 

[00:26:52] Ryan Wardell: There must be a good feeling though, when you've got an established competitor, you're the new kid on the block and then you run rings around them so much that now they're copying what you're doing. That's, that's a win. I love that. But, but, but you're absolutely right. Cause I think, I think.

[00:27:06] Ryan Wardell: So many people get fixated on, what's my competitor doing? Oh, they've rolled out this new feature. We've got to build this thing too. Or they've changed their pricing. We've got to change our pricing too. And they just, everyone ends up copying everyone else. And, and, and I think you brought up a really good point, which is like, if you just, you know, go and talk to your customers, figure it out exactly what they need instead of trying to just, you know, all build the same software, um, Build something that your customers prefer or that your customers need more.

[00:27:31] Ryan Wardell: I think that's a really good strategy. How do you manage dev teams as a non technical founder? 

[00:27:37] Shanna Huber: Oh boy. Um, um, so we, we had, that was a challenge. We've had some challenges. We've hired some consultants to help us manage dev teams. And now like we just, um, so Nate, someone from startup sauce. So I can't say enough about startup sauce.

[00:27:58] Shanna Huber: They've been so awesome. And let's just connecting with techie people that provide guidance and, um, suggestions. And so, um, Nate from startup sauce actually connected us with our current team. And we just love them and they're an organization. We've kind of tried everything like consultants, individual people, organizations.

[00:28:22] Shanna Huber: Um, so we've kind of tried them all and we're in a really good spot right now with an organization that they provide. Oversight, but then we also have one person that does the, um, DevOps more like the server stuff, but he's also a developer, so he helps us also with some techie stuff. So I have to say, I don't have like great wisdom.

[00:28:46] Shanna Huber: I would just say, you know, what your product needs to do. Like I have to share one story. We had a, Developer that, um, we had, um, do a feature and he argued with us, like, no, it, it needs to be done this way. And I was like, no, it needs to be done this way. And it came out and it was his way. So then we had to like undo it.

[00:29:10] Shanna Huber: So, and then they didn't stay with us long. So I would say if someone, if someone's not working with you and they have their own ideas, like I welcome ideas, I'm like, sometimes I'm like, I don't know, what do you guys think? How do we do Like this is what we need to accomplish. I, I welcome ideas, but sometimes you're the founder, you know, what needs to be done.

[00:29:31] Shanna Huber: And if someone's arguing with you and given pushback, it's time to move on quickly to someone else. Don't be afraid to change. 

[00:29:39] Ryan Wardell: It's a bit of a balancing act, isn't it? Because on the one hand, you don't want total robots. You want people who are actually going to think about it. Hey, is this going to work?

[00:29:47] Ryan Wardell: I've got this idea. You want people to contribute ideas, but at the end of the day, you're the one with the domain expertise, you know, your customers, you know, your space. Um, It must, yeah, I can see it being really frustrating if you've got a developer who's no, no, no, no, no, I'm, I'm going to do it my way, but I know the way that needs to be done.

[00:30:03] Ryan Wardell: It needs to be done like this. Just listen to me. Yeah, I, I understand that. Um, but, but just for, for anyone out there who's, um, not, not technical. And I say this, I'm, I'm not, not a technical guy. I, I tried teaching myself to code once and I got far enough to realize I'm never going to be good at this. I'm gonna have to get someone else to do it.

[00:30:21] Ryan Wardell: Um, but, but I, I sort of learned a few little. Tricks and tactics had some mentors who kind of helped me out to on how to, how to work with developers and how to manage them. So do you have like when, when you're dealing with your, your developers, do you, do you have a call with them once a week? You, you have your, your roadmap.

[00:30:38] Ryan Wardell: Do you break that down into individual tasks? Like, like, can you do a bit of a deeper dive into how you actually work with them to get a feature built? 

[00:30:46] Shanna Huber: Yeah, so that was a learning curve because I'm like, I just started out doing videos like it needs to do this. And then I had to learn from my development team, like, okay, if you need.

[00:30:57] Shanna Huber: To me, it's easy. It's just like, it's just, we always tease about that too. It's just a button. It's just one button. Like how hard is that? Just put the button there. And that needs to be broken down so much into little tiny pieces. So that was a learning thing. Um, to break it down. So we do sprints, we use Trello on our board and we do sprints.

[00:31:21] Shanna Huber: So every two weeks, um, we have our roadmap of what tickets need done. And then we, um, estimated, and then we put those into like. Sprints. So I like, um, I think it's important that you have your development team estimate what they can do in two weeks and not you to dictate. And that's probably more for techie people 

[00:31:47] Ryan Wardell: that they 

[00:31:48] Shanna Huber: dictate what can be done.

[00:31:49] Shanna Huber: But, um, non techie people, I listen to my developers and what needs done. They say two weeks and it gets to be four, five, six weeks. You need to be like, okay, what's going on here? Why is it taking so long? And just, um, have a conversation and not, not hammer them, but just, you know, have accountability. 

[00:32:13] Ryan Wardell: That's something that I, I struggled with a bit too, because like as a non technical founder, you think, okay, let's, let's just add a button and it does this.

[00:32:20] Ryan Wardell: And in my mind, That's, that's really simple and straightforward. But what I'm not realizing is, okay, when you click this button, it does this other thing and that breaks this other thing over here. So I need to go and fix that. And then this other thing happens over here. So I need to update that as well.

[00:32:34] Ryan Wardell: And sometimes it's legitimately more complicated than, than what, what a non technical founder might think. Um, but, but there are also other situations and this is where it gets tricky, where a developer can kind of go down this rabbit hole and they go off on this massive tangent. And it's like, no, no, no, let's bring you back to earth.

[00:32:52] Ryan Wardell: Like, this is all it needs to do. It doesn't need to do these other five different things. It just needs to do this thing. And I think sometimes that's, I found that as a non technical founder, I found that really difficult to be able to tell the difference between when is it that I've underestimated the amount of time that's, that's involved in this, or when is it that the developer has just gone down this massive rabbit hole?

[00:33:15] Ryan Wardell: Um, and, and like, for me, like having a regular touch point once a week, you know, whether it's a, I like phone calls. Maybe that's. Maybe it doesn't need to be a phone call. You know how they say, you know, lots of, lots of meetings could be an email and lots of emails could have just been a Slack message or something, but I like doing a quick call with, with developers sort of once a week, just to, you know, at least just to touch base with them.

[00:33:36] Ryan Wardell: But, um, yeah, I, that sounds like, uh, um, something that, yeah. A lot of people underestimate, especially if when I was a non technical founder coming into it for the first time, I thought, yeah, it's a button. How easy, how hard could it be? But then I really like your approach of ask the developers to estimate how much time it's going to be.

[00:33:57] Ryan Wardell: I don't know about you. I've always found that. They'll give you the most optimistic estimate, um, and things often end up taking much longer than what they initially estimate. So I usually tell them just, um, you know, give, give me a realistic estimate or give me, give me like a, you know, a best case scenario and a worst case scenario.

[00:34:13] Ryan Wardell: So I've got, I can plan around that. Um, do you, do you do something like that as well? Or how does, how does that work? 

[00:34:19] Shanna Huber: Yeah, I love the best case. That's why I love this group and talking to you. Like I get such good ideas. So I like the best and worst case scenario. We don't do that. We, I tell that just give me the worst case scenario.

[00:34:32] Shanna Huber: I'm always pleasantly surprised when I see tickets moving. I'm so excited. So, and we do meet once a week with the whole team and we get on a zoom and we talk and, um, they also like put, we have Slack, so they'll Slack me things, but. Um, questions and that within the tickets. So I do check those every day, but once a week we do meet and go over any questions they have in person.

[00:34:58] Shanna Huber: And how's everything going? Anything new happening? They give me suggestions and feedback, and that's why it's important to have a development team. Like you said, you don't want a robot that just does what you say, because sometimes what you're saying is. Or they're like, you, have you thought about X, Y, and Z?

[00:35:17] Shanna Huber: And sometimes I'm like, no, I didn't even think about that. So it's important. You have that communication and someone that's okay, asking you questions and calling you on that. 

[00:35:27] Ryan Wardell: Absolutely. Um, you mentioned before you had that, that one developer that was just pushing back all the time. Are there any other red flags that you would see that would kind of tell you that a developer is the wrong fit?

[00:35:42] Shanna Huber: Yeah, if they're like Have a farm and they're, you know, setting you pictures during the day of their sheep giving birth and things aren't getting done. 

[00:35:54] Ryan Wardell: Wait, wait, wait, back, you, you, like, there's a story there. There's a story there. What, what happened? 

[00:36:00] Shanna Huber: So we had an awesome developer. He was just kicking it.

[00:36:04] Shanna Huber: We were loving him. Like. And then all of a sudden, he had a farm, so he would like talk about our farm, very nice person, but then all of a sudden summer came, and you know, summers on the farm are in Canada are much different than winters on the farm in Canada. So then all of a sudden, like nothing was getting done.

[00:36:24] Shanna Huber: And he's like, Oh, look at my baby sheep. I birthed it this morning. And he's sending us. Um, we'd be like, can you meet about something? Something's happening. And he would come in like all sweaty. And he's like, hi,

[00:36:40] Shanna Huber: we're like, this guy's not working. He's working on his farm. I know that's a one off, but just being aware. And, you know, knowing, like, even though we loved him, we weren't willing to wait till winter came back around to like get things done. So don't be afraid of someone rocking it. And all of a sudden something changed.

[00:37:02] Shanna Huber: Maybe it's not you, like, look at the big picture. 

[00:37:08] Ryan Wardell: Um, are there, what, what are some tips that you would give to other SAS founders, especially about their first hires? Um, not just developers, but just, just in general. 

[00:37:17] Shanna Huber: Hire for what you need and what you like. Don't want to do. Um, so Alexis was, um, my first hire, actually, she's still with me today.

[00:37:31] Shanna Huber: So there's things, you know, I would do the demos, kind of the higher level stuff, and I would get the Excel spreadsheets, all the weird little stuff that would take up my time from being focused on the bigger picture. And then once we did our other hire. After that, I asked her, like, what do you like to do?

[00:37:53] Shanna Huber: What do you not like to do? So then she got to do the things she'd like to do. And then we pass on the things that we both don't like to do to the next person. And now we have next to me. So now we have a team of four, four in one part time. Um, and eventually you do like. You start to have these roles, like she's marketing and sales.

[00:38:17] Shanna Huber: We have a customer support and now we have like a finance admin person, but we didn't like necessarily, I didn't hire her for sales. Like she grew into that position. 

[00:38:30] Ryan Wardell: So don't 

[00:38:30] Shanna Huber: feel like you have to have someone that's. Especially being small. You don't want like someone for sales that can do this much.

[00:38:38] Shanna Huber: You want someone that can do this much. And then you fine tune that 

[00:38:41] Ryan Wardell: in my 

[00:38:41] Shanna Huber: opinion. And that's also more cost effective. And then you can. As their position grows, their salary can grow. It 

[00:38:50] Ryan Wardell: must be a really nice feeling to have someone that started with you fairly junior, and then you gradually feed them more responsibility.

[00:38:58] Ryan Wardell: And you can see, Oh, actually they did a really good job of this. I'll give them a bit more, a bit more responsibility. And they're, they're nailing that too. I'll give them a bit more responsibility. Like, I don't know if you find this, I, I've found, I've had a few employees that have, that have done that. And as, as a boss, as an employer, it makes me really happy to see people really step up, um, as they kind of grow.

[00:39:16] Ryan Wardell: Uh, I, I don't know if you find the same thing, but that's, that's something that I get a real kick out of. Um, but, uh, but it sounds like you've got a, you've got a really good plan for, yeah, getting, you Hand off the stuff that you don't want to do. Get someone else to start off with that and then feed them more responsibility over time.

[00:39:32] Ryan Wardell: I like that approach. 

[00:39:33] Shanna Huber: She's amazing. Say hire, like, don't be afraid to let people go either. Like she's a special person for being able to take over all of that. And I can leave, leave her with responsibility, but we've also had people that aren't like that and they don't want to put in the work. They just want an easy job.

[00:39:52] Shanna Huber: And I'm like, if you want an easy job and just to kind of. Melt into the background like this isn't the right fit because you can work for large organizations and kind of be lazy and sit back and that's not this job. So don't be afraid to let the wrong people go. Also, 

[00:40:10] Ryan Wardell: do you have any kind of guidelines on how, how much time, how do you make a decision about?

[00:40:16] Ryan Wardell: This person isn't working out. Do you, do you give them, do you give them a month? Do you give them three months? Uh, is it like if they, they sort of miss their targets three times in a row? Like, do you have any, any kind of, what would indicate that this person is not the right fit for the role? 

[00:40:30] Shanna Huber: I think if you see that they're being lazy, giving pushback about what, um, Like you give them tasks and they give you pushback or they don't want to do this.

[00:40:41] Shanna Huber: Or they're like, Oh, well I was hired for this. Like that's not the right fit. And I've been really bad in the past about letting people go. I try to hang on to them and coach them. And maybe it's me, maybe I'm not explaining things well. So I hold onto people way too long and then I'll finally like start micromanaging.

[00:41:02] Shanna Huber: And that's kind of how I've let people go, is start, um, writing down exactly what you do with every hour, and I had one person that, um, for eight hours they posted one post, social media post to Facebook, and they were like, well, it took a lot of time, and it was really thoughtful, and I'm like, yeah. It was one, it wasn't even a blog.

[00:41:23] Shanna Huber: It was just like a reshare, like inspirational saying. So that was the final straw. Like, 

[00:41:29] Ryan Wardell: yeah, 

[00:41:30] Shanna Huber: that was an awful funny story. So this employee, I was texting, um, Alexis, who's been with me forever and she's like management now. So I'm like, We're hiring, you know, people and I'm texting her about, um, oh, we have an interview next week, blah, blah, blah.

[00:41:50] Shanna Huber: Well, it turns out my, she's at her computer and my phone is connected to her computer. I'm not in the office and she's reading the whole thing. And she turns to Alexis, I guess. And she's like, Are you guys interviewing for my position? And Alexis had to play stupid. She's like, what? 

[00:42:10] Ryan Wardell: What 

[00:42:11] Shanna Huber: is Shauna doing? Oh my gosh.

[00:42:15] Shanna Huber: So we laugh about that now, which we shouldn't. It was hurtful, but she, but she was the person who wrote the eight hour Facebook post. You 

[00:42:27] Ryan Wardell: can't, she must've known though. Come on. Like she would have had an inkling that she's not doing enough to, you know, Yeah, the mustard. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, wow. A couple more questions, Shana.

[00:42:40] Ryan Wardell: Um, what other skills have you developed or learned, uh, since you started MyJuna? 

[00:42:49] Shanna Huber: Skills, I think, like we just talked about being, managing people better. Um, before I felt like I was too nice and too like friendly. And, um, there is a point that you also have to look at the business and what the business needs to grow and not like cling on to being the nice person.

[00:43:10] Shanna Huber: Of course you want to be the nice person and, you know, have employment. You don't want it to be a grudge. You want it to be a, I want a happy, fun place to go to work. Who doesn't? We all want that. Um, but you have to create that. It doesn't just. Um, what are the things have I learned, I guess that's the biggest thing.

[00:43:32] Shanna Huber: And I guess, um, not about me, but just anyone watching the podcast, like, don't be afraid, take risks. It was risky to start my consulting business and take that leap. And I was working both jobs at first doing that, like as a nurse and as a consultant, and at one point, you know, my income wasn't what it was as a nurse.

[00:43:57] Shanna Huber: And I just had to take that leap of faith. And then the same with consulting and the SaaS business. Yeah, I was rocking it. I was making a ton of money last year and I had to take the leap of faith and a pay cut. And just, um, so don't be afraid and don't think that you have to have everything at a certain level to go to that next step, you have to just have faith and do it and believe in yourself.

[00:44:23] Ryan Wardell: I think there's, there's always that period where, yeah, You have to go backwards to go forwards. Right. And I think a lot of people, as soon as things start to feel a bit tough, it's not the first month where that happens, but where you're grinding away and it, you know, it's, it's, it's month five or month six, and it's been a while now.

[00:44:38] Ryan Wardell: And you know, you've taken a big, a bit of a pay cut to be able to do the thing. I think that's the point where a lot of people give up and that's probably the point where if they just kept on going for a little bit longer, that's when things start going up into the right. And I think a lot of people give up far too early.

[00:44:52] Ryan Wardell: Interesting. Just on the, on the management stuff, I. I had a, I had a mentor once, um, and this is going back 10 years ago now. Uh, so the, the, the. The talk at the time was about hiring a players, B players and C players. So, so a players are awesome. You don't need to manage them. They just come in and you know, one, a player is worth 10 B players, one B players worth a hundred C players.

[00:45:19] Ryan Wardell: That was kind of the, the, the thought process. And so, so the, what, what the advice that they would give people is if you're a startup founder, you should only ever hire a players. And the reason is that they want to work with other people who are really motivated, really awesome, want to, um, you know, take on the world and win.

[00:45:36] Ryan Wardell: Um, and those are the only people you should hire, except that those people tend to be really expensive and they have a tendency to leave and start their own business. Um, which, which is, which, which, which is, you know, uh, bittersweet, right? When, when you see someone do that, I've had, I've had that happen a couple of times to me.

[00:45:54] Ryan Wardell: So on the one hand, it's awesome. On the other hand, I lost someone really good. Um, But then my mentor said something was really interesting. Everyone's trying to hire these A players, which means that it's really hard to find them and really difficult to hold onto them. The real superpower as an entrepreneur is being able to take a B player and turn them into an A player.

[00:46:14] Ryan Wardell: So can you find someone who's a bit younger, a bit more junior, they've got plenty of talent, plenty of hunger, plenty of ability, but can you train them and manage them and mold them and kind of mentor them so that they can reach their fullest potential and get them to Basically have the same impact as an A player because if you can do that Um, and you can do that over and over and over again.

[00:46:36] Ryan Wardell: You've got a superpower that nobody else has. So that's something that I've always kind of tried to do myself. Um, sometimes more successfully than others, because I think I've got a tendency to keep people too long as well. You've got someone that's like, no, no, no, but I'm good at this turning B players into a players thing.

[00:46:53] Ryan Wardell: But I had a guy, uh, last year and he just wasn't working out. Like he'd send emails to customers and he'd spell the name wrong and Basic things like that. And it's like, okay, like I can't, I can't, I can't keep you. It wasn't, it wasn't a productivity thing. It was just that everything that he did was just not, not very good.

[00:47:11] Ryan Wardell: And you can't, you can't have anyone like that. 

[00:47:15] Shanna Huber: you're going forwards. You, you have someone pulling you back. It's like, yeah, let them go. 

[00:47:21] Ryan Wardell: Yeah, absolutely. 

[00:47:22] Shanna Huber: I want to just comment to that because I know like people want to hire the best of the best, but. Like you, you just don't know. Like, I feel like until you have someone in that seat, like, that's why we have to let people go.

[00:47:37] Shanna Huber: And that's why we have to promote Pete, the good people. That's embarrassing to say that four years ago, Alexis started out at 13 an hour. She was 20. She was going to college. You know, I didn't know. I just needed someone to do imports and Excel and do some things and her actually her major changed too.

[00:47:55] Shanna Huber: She was in business and then it changed to marketing 

[00:47:58] Ryan Wardell: and, 

[00:47:59] Shanna Huber: um, kind of went in that direction. So I just, um, I don't know. I feel blessed and favored and. I don't know. I always laugh. I don't know how I got here. Besides God's grace. Cause I'm like, I was looking back at, um, so there's an R and D credit. I don't know if you're familiar with that.

[00:48:18] Ryan Wardell: I 

[00:48:18] Shanna Huber: had no idea about this, but, um, I just found out about it. So it's a tax credit that you get when you are innovative. So I had to look back. From beginning on, like what I spent on development, you know, staff, all this stuff, I'm like, how the heck did I make it here? I don't know. Cause I was piecing together like developers, like I can afford 10 hours a week right now and I would hire people from Upwork and then I got to a point where a full time developer, he's like, how many people did you have working on this thing?

[00:48:52] Shanna Huber: I'm like. A lot. Can you fix it?

[00:48:59] Shanna Huber: Yeah, you don't know. Don't think you have to, your first hire has to be 60, 000 a year. Like build people up to that. Awesome people are awesome. 

[00:49:09] Ryan Wardell: And I think one thing you were talking about before that I think is super interesting, not everyone's a good fit for a startup. I think some people really shine in that kind of an environment.

[00:49:18] Ryan Wardell: It sounds like Alexis has really stepped up. Um, but I've, I've, you know, I've hired people as well that, uh, would be better suited to a corporate job where, you know, they, they make a cup of coffee and they walk around and they talk to people and they don't actually have to get a whole lot of work done that day.

[00:49:33] Ryan Wardell: They just, They just need someone there that doesn't apply to startups. You need people that can roll with the punches and Hey, have you done this before? No, never. Can you figure it out? Probably, you know, those are the sorts of people you want to hire. Um, and, and, and I've always found that, you know, I, I, one of the best ties I have made is, um, Sonny.

[00:49:50] Ryan Wardell: So she's the community manager at startup source, but said, Hey, you know, we, can you help organize a guest speakers? Yeah, probably never done it before, but I can do that. And she's amazing at it. Um, Cool. We need to work out some partnerships. Would you mind talking to this person? Yeah, probably. Sure. And so every every time I give her something to do, she ends up being pretty good at it.

[00:50:08] Ryan Wardell: It's amazing. It's a really good feeling. Um, and I think you've probably had a similar similar situation as well. So I just wanted to change tack a little bit now. Um, one, one thing that has popped up a few times in a few, a few of the mastermind calls in the community is, um, uh, a lot of founders feel stressed, burnt outs.

[00:50:28] Ryan Wardell: Struggle with motivation a little bit. And I think, um, I think as that sort of. You know, the first year when you're launching a new business, you can kind of, you've got this momentum behind you. You're really excited about what you're doing when you're going through that, that grindy period that you were talking about before, when you've taken a pay cut, things are a bit harder, things are taking a lot longer.

[00:50:47] Ryan Wardell: You're, you're, you're looking at the numbers going, well, I can afford 10 hours of developer time, you know, when you're going through that period. Um, how do you have some tips? For other founders that are going through that period on how they can stay motivated, um, how they can deal with, with stress, how they can feel with, uh, deal with feelings of being, being burnt out or overworked, or just not kind of making the progress that they thought they would be making.

[00:51:09] Shanna Huber: Yeah. So I think just, um, taking care of yourself is so important. And I did let that go because you can only do so much. So these people that talk about like work life balance, like sometimes there's not balance. And you're just grinding it. So I did take like meditation classes and I was meditating. Um, you know, I let going to the gym every day go and I would say don't let yourself go so far.

[00:51:40] Shanna Huber: There's gonna be periods that maybe you don't have time to take care of yourself in the a hundred percent proper way that you should, but try to do something and, um, 'cause it's hard to get that. back once you lose that. And now that I'm exercising again, um, eating healthier, like when you go through those periods, you can rock it.

[00:52:03] Shanna Huber: Better and you can stay focused and feel better and, um, be there for your team versus, you know, working a gazillion hours a week. And sometimes that's needed, but I would say, just don't let yourself get so far down the road of. Focused on your business because your business is running because of you, you have to take care of you.

[00:52:25] Shanna Huber: I know everyone says that it's cliche, you know, to take care of you, but really honestly, like eat well, you know, get your sleep, meditate, do all those things because meditation has helped me the most because my mind like zings and a million directions as you do with businesses, you're like, Oh my gosh, did I send this email back?

[00:52:50] Shanna Huber: Did I do this? Oh my God, did I forget to do this? Well, here's an idea of how we can grow this. And my mind goes in a gazillion different directions. Um, so meditation, even though I don't meditate, I learned to quiet my mind of all of those things. So even without meditation now I can quiet that down and kind of redirect.

[00:53:12] Ryan Wardell: Were you doing it in the morning or at night or like when, when was the best time of day to do it? 

[00:53:17] Shanna Huber: So one of my friends did a meditation class. So I learned to meditate and she would always be like, um, so what is your practice? Are you doing it every day? I'm like, nope. So it was just whenever I had a moment, um, a lot of times just sitting outside.

[00:53:34] Shanna Huber: So I'll even do that now. I'll get my diet Pepsi. I'll go sit outside. Um, sit in the grass. So whenever you can, I would say if you have a certain time of the day that you can do that, that's best. But for me, I would just, I wing a lot of things. So, so I would wing it, do it in the evening, morning. I would say midday is probably ideal.

[00:53:59] Ryan Wardell: And Chana, do you have any other advice for SaaS founders, whether they're technical or not? 

[00:54:06] Shanna Huber: I think my biggest advice is just, um, don't be afraid to take the leap and, um, make quick decisions. I, in the beginning, I had someone tell me that, um, they didn't think I would be successful because I made, Such snap, like quick decisions.

[00:54:21] Shanna Huber: Um, but I think that's a benefit. And I know a lot of entrepreneurs that are also successful and they make fast decisions. Um, and I always say my motto is make a quick decision. If it's the wrong decision, quickly make another decision. Like you can change your mind. You don't have to like hold stone to like every decision.

[00:54:43] Shanna Huber: Um, Yeah, and just don't be afraid. Get out there, do it. Like, I feel like if it's in your heart, there's a reason it's. They're pulling you and don't have a plan B. I hear a lot of people say my plan is to grow my fast business, but my plan B as a backup, blah, blah, blah. And I always say your plan B is change.

[00:55:07] Shanna Huber: Whatever's not working with plan a and just.

[00:55:13] Ryan Wardell: I like that a lot. I really like that. Because if you've got this safe, cushy plan B, you're not going to throw yourself at plan A enough to make it work. 

[00:55:22] Shanna Huber: You have to change things if something's not working, but then you have to just believe in yourself. 

[00:55:28] Ryan Wardell: Are there any books or tools or resources that you would recommend to other founders?

[00:55:33] Shanna Huber: So we started traction this year. It's by Gina Wickman. Are you familiar with that book? 

[00:55:40] Ryan Wardell: No, no. It took me through it. 

[00:55:41] Shanna Huber: I love this book. I actually did it with my consulting business, but I didn't have a big enough team that like, um, to do it with, but it just breaks down, um, it's how to manage your teams. It also breaks down what is your three year plan or goal, and that breaks it down into what is your one year goal.

[00:55:59] Shanna Huber: And then you break that down into quarterly goals. And my teammates once a week now and we come up with what are the issues? Um, what is not working? What is our solutions? And it gets everyone involved with what are the solutions and then we create to do lists And it's very structured and my team loves it because, um, before we did this, we were all like, kind of like on fire with, you know, we're all sitting together in the same room and we're like, oh, this is a problem and we're trying to troubleshoot, but we felt like we were never moving forward with the solution.

[00:56:32] Shanna Huber: It was just brainstorming and then we would never do it. And now it, it feels like you're like moving forward, solving problems. You can. see the you accomplishing goals every quarter. Um, so we all just love it. I think it's hard to do. Um, on your own, you can certainly do it. Even if you're a solo person, there's a lot of value and creating goals and breaking that down.

[00:57:00] Shanna Huber: And what is your weekly to do list? But I think once you have a small team, um, yeah, it's a lot of fun. So that's my number one book. And then I did recently, um, read the SAS playbook on Amazon. It's just a really short book, but it has a lot of value. And, um, so that was a recent read. But I was like, Oh, I'm doing a lot of the things already in the book.

[00:57:23] Shanna Huber: So I was excited about that, but I also learned a lot. So I think anyone starting out, like definitely read that. 

[00:57:29] Ryan Wardell: What, what, what, what did you get out of that one specifically? Like, is there any, any, any key takeaways from that, that, that really stuck with you? 

[00:57:36] Shanna Huber: Um, it just confirmed a lot that we're doing correctly.

[00:57:39] Shanna Huber: Um, it talked moat around your business, meaning like customers, they're going to, um, leave. Like, how do you keep them? How do you market to people? Um, how do you know the industry? So it just, um, it breaks it down. It's not like a front to back read, but it breaks things down so you can, like, open it up, read a few pages, um, and just get little tidbits about your SAS business.

[00:58:07] Shanna Huber: And it's very specific to SAS, which I like. 

[00:58:10] Ryan Wardell: Absolutely. Shana, how can people get in touch with you if they want to find out more about MyJuna or about you or about any of the things that we spoke about today? 

[00:58:19] Shanna Huber: Um, they can link in with me. So it's Shana Huber, S H A N N A, Huber, H U B E R, or they can email me, Shana, S H A N N A at MyJuna, that's M Y J U N A.

[00:58:33] Shanna Huber: com. 

[00:58:33] Ryan Wardell: Fantastic. And I'll put a link in the description as well. Um, Shana, it's been a pleasure. That was fantastic.