Kaseya Exec On Defining Success, Vision To Grow MSP

‘Identifying your personal goals allows you to really understand the why,’ says Mike DePalma, VP of business development at Kaseya. ‘Why is it important for any of the decisions you make on the business level? When you think about that, start asking your employees what their personal goals are, don't make assumptions. Understanding that personal goal will allow you to start looking at those business goals and really understanding where you want to be in 10 years.’

To successfully grow their companies, MSP executives should have a 10-year vision, three-year targets and a one-year plan, according to Mike DePalma.

But the first thing to do is define success.

DePalma, VP of business development at Miami-based vendor Kaseya, spoke about IT executive effectiveness at CRN parent company The Channel Company’s XChange August show in San Antonio this week.

“Identifying your personal goals allows you to really understand the why,” he said. “Why is it important for any of the decisions you make on the business level? When you think about that, start asking your employees what their personal goals are, don't make assumptions. Understanding that personal goal will allow you to start looking at those business goals and really understanding where you want to be in 10 years.”

[Related: Kaseya CMO On Kaseya 365, Pricing And Owning Their Mistakes]

The next step is to look for the hurdles in the road that need to be moved in order to achieve that goal. And those hurdles can be broken down quarter by quarter.

Another key factor is accountability: “You can't hold somebody accountable if they don't understand what their role is,” he said.

DePalma said when MSP executives define their entire organization and what they’re trying to do as a company, they need to then hold every employee accountable. That’s when the business will move forward.

The most important aspect, he said, is defining the roles and responsibilities of every person within the company.

“It's difficult because every org has got all these functions that you have to do. Unfortunately most folks aren't big enough to have dedicated departments to every single one of these functions,” he said. “What happens is a lot of people are wearing a lot of different hats. The problem [with that] is how do you measure when something goes wrong when you can't identify who ultimately owns that responsibility?”

It's about putting together the vision, identifying the goal and driving towards that to be effective and grow.

Brad Otto, owner of Jackson, Wisconsin-based P3C Technologies LLC, said defining success and the goals of the business is critical but sometimes hard to implement at a smaller MSP.

“You can define those goals and you can try to stick to that plan,” he told CRN. “But when you're smaller, you're looking at how do I pivot to handle this new client or this new thing, and then it can change those goals.”