I’m excited to announce the hiring of our second Customer Success Manager, Lovo Baysah – see the New Teammate section below!
Some big changes over the past few months have increased our ability to bring on high-quality talent and continue to scale our team. The biggest hurdles were offering health insurance, setting up direct deposit, and transitioning employees from 1099 to W-2.
I’ve always tried to be a do-it-yourself problem solver, but that’s not always efficient in a time crunch. For example, if I wanted to build an app it’s not like I would learn to code. As a leader, one of the most challenging things is knowing when to ask for help.
The accountant in me looked at these problems, stressed about the expense of an HR Manager, and then Googled how to do it myself. I watched hours of YouTube videos on how to set up QuickBooks direct deposit and shop for company health insurance plans. I didn’t make any significant progress and felt like I was neglecting other responsibilities. Also, it wasn’t a project I necessarily enjoyed.
Something to keep in mind in entrepreneurship: if there’s a part of your job you don’t enjoy, there’s probably an entire industry to solve that problem for you. So then I started talking to health insurance brokers and I finally started to see light at the end of the tunnel. After Zoom calls with several brokers, I found a salesperson I trusted and left it in their hands. They did ALL of the work for free because they’re paid by the insurance companies for walking us through the process and helping us purchase a policy.
After seeing how easy this process became, I stopped trying to figure out QuickBooks myself and searched through the solicitation emails in my LinkedIn inbox; anything pertaining to payroll or bookkeeping. After another round of conversations, I found a team I could trust and promptly outsourced all of our payroll and monthly bookkeeping. They also did all the paperwork on our behalf so we could offer W-2 employment. They are fulfilling our needs of an HR Manager at a fraction of the cost.
It was very cool seeing the consumer side of our LinkedIn service. It reminded me that even if someone isn’t ready for your service now, they will remember you when they are.
New Teammate
Lovo Baysah is originally from Liberia, West Africa, she currently resides in Cape Coral, FL. She has her bachelor’s degree from Florida A & M University in Computer Information Systems and master’s degree from Florida Gulf Coast University in Educational Technology. In addition, she previously worked in the field of logistics for over 10 years helping clients execute and fulfill their logistics needs.
As Customer Success Manager, Lovo will work closely with our existing clients to attain their targeted business goals by leveraging our services.