Tim: 0:14

Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Cables to Clouds podcast. I'm your host this week, Tim, and with me always is my younger, more attractive version, Chris Miles at BGP Main on Blue Sky, and of course, I am carpe-dmbpn on Blue Sky, and with us we have a very special guest who we haven't had on the podcast before, but we're fixing that now Scott Robon Robon. I said that right, right, Robon.

Scott: 0:42

It's like putting a robe on yeah Robon, okay cool, do you? I said that right right Rabon. It's like putting a robe on yeah Rabon, okay cool.

Tim: 0:47

Do you have a blue sky, scott, I didn't actually forget.

Scott: 0:49

I'm Scott Rabon.

Tim: 0:50

One word I'm blue sky. Okay, I thought so, but I didn't want to get my wires crossed and think about somebody else. Okay, cool. So let me go ahead and introduce the topic real quick and then we'll let Scott introduce himself. So tonight we're going to be talking about kind of, you know, with the economy being what it is, we're going to be talking about freelancing and freelancing or also and also owning your own business and like kind of going into professional consulting, kind of as a business, and we'll kind of ask all sorts of questions and see, you know, I'm sure a lot of people have a lot of questions about what that looks like. So, Scott, go ahead and introduce yourself.

Scott: 1:25

Hey, really appreciate you, gentlemen, having me on. I'm Scott Robon. I'm the founder of Tech Salescraft. That's my consulting company, but it lets me do lots of other things besides consulting. I'm a co-founder of Network Automation Forum. I have a podcast on packet pushers called Total network operations. That's actually turning into a line of consulting business that I do. Um, I've been an internet plumber for 35 ish years. Um just had a career that's grown up with the commercial internet. Um, and just feel super fortunate. I've uh been fascinated with it from, uh, from day one, right out of school.

Tim: 2:01

So that's really. That's. That's cool. So I'm I actually had a really what I would consider probably a really late start into network engineering. Actually, I bounced around my career. I started when I was 20 and I bounced around in various things in it and then I actually fell into network engineering when I was 28, almost 29. So I definitely it was definitely a late entry for me. I was a late bloomer.

Scott: 2:29

I forget. Let me throw this at you. So I learned ATM before I learned IP. I learned secure telephony before I learned ATM, and one of my first projects at a carrier was looking at single point of failure issues in different facilities. Over 12 T1 MLPPP bundles on Bay Network's routers Wow, nice. So you know that's. I don't know one who's listening understands what any of that means anymore, so happy to explain.

Tim: 3:00

We actually have a pretty diverse listening group and actually we haven't put out I was going to remember we didn't last year. We put out the what is it? The survey, yeah, the survey. And we asked people like hey, where are you in your career and everything. We had a surprising number of people who have been in the industry for about as long or almost as long.

Chris: 3:21

We should add a question. It says what's your trigger word?

Scott: 3:28

And depending on how far back that word goes, what technology?

Tim: 3:30

will you never want to work again? Yeah, x dot 25. Yeah, okay, so, yeah. So so obviously we brought Scott on because he has a. Well, he's been doing this a long time and so you know I wanted to ask when you first started, like started getting out of corporate life, if you will or actually I didn't ask how long you were kind of doing the corporate life before you decided to to get into freelancing and consulting.

Scott: 3:54

So I've been out on my own just over two years. Now is January 2023. Took a long ramp leading up to that long ramp. Leading up to that, I probably spent the year before pulling the trigger really thinking it through very much, over communicating things with my wife and my one last adult daughter, who's still at home with us. And you know, I've wanted to do this forever.

Scott: 4:18

I like, really early on in my career, it's like I'd like to build something not necessarily a product, but you know, something that I'm responsible for and I came close a couple of times and just got cold feet and I have size 15 feet, so that's a lot of cold.

Scott: 4:35

But you know, look, I can't say it was anything that pushed me out. I had a great career, you know, on the operations side, with Bell Atlantic, as a Cisco trainer and then a Juniper trainer, long time at Juniper. That got me into being an SE and an SE leader had some time at Cisco and Nokia and even a disaggregated provider, drivenets if you've ever heard of them. But that really just finally all came to fruition and the last step for me was sitting down with my financial advisor and saying, look, I think I'm ready to pull the trigger here and just really kind of go with very little safety net and that, talking through the financial know, the financial situation, was the thing that made me, you know, gave me the confidence to, you know, just start doing it with a plan. But you need a plan from which to deviate, so we can talk about that at some point.

Tim: 5:36

So it sounds like you did a. Well, you did what probably everybody should do, which is try to figure out basically can I afford to not have a nine to five so that I can and do this on my own? And I swear like that's for me. For me, there's like a few things that I big red flags that keep me from trying to think about like, hey, could I do this? And that's that's one of them. You know, just trying to figure out, like, do I have enough in the bank? What is in the bank? Like, how much do I have to have? If this thing doesn't immediately take off, you know, how many months do I need? Like, is that? I mean, I assume that's the kind of math you were trying to figure out with the advisor, right?

Scott: 6:16

Absolutely. And you know the calculus came down to okay, what if you're horrible? How long can you last if you're horrible? And you know, number one, that was not the plan. Number two okay, worst case, I probably had three years of runway, and you know who wants to deplete their resources, right?

Scott: 6:35

So I want to get out there and do it anyway. But I also want to emphasize, you know, relationships for important people in your life, like with my wife. I think it was just as important to have those conversations about. This is what I'm thinking let's look at the budget and let's get you know, let's get lean and let's do this together. So it wasn't, you know, one person me saying this is this is how it's going to work. Let's work on it together. And I mean that wasn't just a tactic, that was really important anyway. But making sure we were having that open communication about this and having buy-in together, that's all sorts of goodness. Right? You don't want to fight uphill on that with your significant other in any way that with your significant other in any way.

Tim: 7:26

So, especially if things don't, you know, don't take off and then you're you know they're being very nervous about things no, you're a hundred percent and you can't. If there is a significant other, if there's some other stakeholder in it, like they have to be involved, if for no other reason than, like you said, you need to get lean.

Chris: 7:41

You have to have a plan for if you fail. Right, yep, exactly.

Scott: 7:47

And going back to corporate employment, was you know that's obviously you know part of the backup plan at that initial point right Now. It's not a guarantee and everybody you know who's been in our business knows that if you get impacted by a layoff or you choose to leave someplace without a next place to land, it doesn't mean you're going to find your next employer in just a couple months Sometimes it takes a lot longer.

Tim: 8:10

Well, and lately it's holy crap man.

Chris: 8:13

It could be longer.

Tim: 8:14

Industry is on fire, man, I don't know it's been so I think this might be the worst I've ever seen it since I've been in the. Maybe I wasn't in tech in 2000, but I know the I know right around then was like really bad too because of thecom bubble bursting.

Scott: 8:30

It was it was a tough time, you know, and like I. So I was a juniper at that time and I remember, you know, the day in the office when the first first layoffs they ever had were announced After that, like first five years of incredible growth, to just kind of have to scale back that enthusiasm. You know that was, that was tough for folks. But you know, I think that leads into, you know, not just confidence in your bank account right, what you have to fall back on but confidence in your skills, right. Do you? Are you really going to be able, do you really think you can go out and peddle yourself and whatever ideas you have and get somebody to pay you for it? And you know, when you reach the level of insanity where the answer to that question becomes yes, you're ready at that point.

Scott: 9:21

And I'd say that's something I really wrestled with over time too. That's probably why I came close and backed out. And just to give a tip of the hat to a really good friend of mine, his name's James Dirksen, I will tell him about this episode. He may or may not listen to it, but he started his own independent work probably a decade before I ever did, and he always was a gentle encourager, basically said you can do this, not pushing me, you know, not trying to get me to do anything I didn't want to do. But I give him a lot of credit because, leading by example, kind of said yes, if James can do it, I can do it. Sorry, just kidding, for any audio only listeners.

Tim: 10:00

So yeah, the for me, like I have such terrible imposter syndrome like I, it would. It's hard for me to think like that people would actually that that I could go do work for someone and they would pay me some. You know the amount of money that you would need to make this thing work right and right. So I definitely struggle, have struggled, uh, with that idea. So that's definitely been something I been something that's kept me from taking that leap. And I don't think, I don't know is there. I don't know if there's any specific advice that anyone can give another person about how to get over that. But yeah, I think it's a big roadblock for a lot of people.

Scott: 10:39

I think there are a couple, you know, part of it's becoming comfortable in your own skin and you know, look, I do the math right. If I've got 35 years of experience, you can probably figure out how old I am-ish and I would consider myself a late bloomer. You know, to really get to the point of self-confidence that I could try this, I think one of the other confidence things that was an aha moment for me was everything what you bring to the table. What combination of technical skills, people skills. It's not for everybody, it's probably not even for most people, but it's for somebody right and like podcasts, I think, are really interesting in microcosm of that right. You know, I'm not sure if 1.2 million people are listening to Cables, to Clouds. They probably are, and that's awesome, but the medium lets you find your audience right. Yeah, it's not exactly the same with doing consulting work, but there's an analogy there, if that makes sense.

Chris: 11:36

Yeah, what's branding? I'm curious. Yeah, like you said, Tim, it's branding, right, Personal branding, and you have to. You know I think we've we've sung the praises of having a personal brand on this pod before and probably will continue to do so because we think it's, you know, very valuable. But I'm curious, Scott, from your perspective. So, like, obviously you have a ton of industry experience, so you've been, you know, you've been in the trenches, you understand, you know exactly what goes into, you know being a network engineer and how that's evolved over the last 20 years. But I'm curious, like, if you, when you moved into wanting to run your own company and do your own consulting, like how did you identify what your niche was Like, how, what would potentially like set you apart from other consultants? Or you know, or did you go through that process?

Scott: 12:24

Not as thoroughly as one might think, and this is where I'll throw the. You know you need a plan from which to deviate out. So my path was, you know, having been on the pre-sales technical side for the 15 years previous to making this leap, I thought, okay, a really interesting gig would be helping folks with technical go-to-market, like helping create marketing materials that are actually true and accurate. And I got to find some of that work early on with through my friend James, through a DARPA program actually called the Embedded Entrepreneur Initiative.

Scott: 13:11

And you know, darpa works with all sorts of tech companies that create piles of tech that are not ready for prime time. They're not productized. They might be able to become products, they might be better off ending up as a feature on somebody's cloud platform, but the people who are good at the basic tech creation aren't the same people who understand. Well, this is what a use case would look like for this as a product. Here's how I would demo it, et cetera, et cetera.

Scott: 13:35

So it was really actually a cool confluence of, you know, people who understand go-to-market and product management and people doing really interesting basic tech. So that's kind of what I had right out of the gate for me and to make it relevant to your particular topic or your podcast. In general, my heritage is not as a cloud person I've chipped away, I did the AWS babysert person Like I've I've chipped away, I did the AWS babysert, you know I've. I've tried to piece things together as I've gone and I got thrown right into this project that was basically an IAM modeling tool, and one of these companies creating basic tech had a graph-based technology for looking at problems and gaps in IAM permissions.

Scott: 14:24

And this is totally an old dog, new tricks. You know I had no idea I could do this Again with a little baby AWS knowledge. And there was a day, like the people I was working with wanted an initial demo of the product, like you know, a scripted here's the use case we're trying to go after and so forth. And I was, I was being a perfectionist and I said just do it a couple more times before I bring it, you know, out in the open. And I kind of got tricked into doing it live with the customer on a call that afternoon and it was the right thing to do, like just ripping off the Band-Aid, but it's a confidence builder, right. You go, you find one of those initial projects, maybe even a technology area you're not completely comfortable with, and you get somebody pushing you out the door and that was a huge boost for me.

Chris: 15:18

I was going to say good thing, you were in SE at one point. You get asked to do a lot of demos that you weren't expecting to do, so I'm sure that was a common feeling for you, you got that right.

Tim: 15:31

What's interesting? A couple things. For one, it's interesting that that was your introduction to consulting, because what you basically described is technical marketing. I'm a TME, so technical marketing engineering. You're right, tme like I'm a TME, right, so technical marketing engineering, that's, that's, that's it, so that's really that's. That makes a lot of sense, and of what I've also found about technology. I know there's new technology and we're on a treadmill that we'll probably never ever be able to get off of. But when you get a certain amount of experience and this is this is something that I hope the people who are earlier in career will listen to and find hope in is that when you get a certain amount of experience or a certain amount of exposure to the tech that's out there, what you'll find is that 90% of every new technology is just three old technologies in a trench coat you know, at the end of the day, the raccoons with the baby hat on the uppermost raccoon.

Tim: 16:23

Yeah, it's the case, and especially in networking, where that's always been the case. Every new technology, like DMVPN, is just a frame relay with a new face. Right, take any old technology and dress it up with lipstick, and now it's a new technology.

Scott: 16:39

There's hub and spoke behind there somewhere.

Tim: 16:41

That's right. So it's not turtles all the way down, but uh, you know what a turtle looks like. You should be able to muddle through eventually. Um, so the other thing that keeps me from thinking about like starting my own consulting business is so, so okay. So before my grandfather passed he was very staunch like business guyunch business guy. He didn't believe that anyone should work for anyone else. He's a completely different skill set to run a business, to do the P&L, to do all of the SOW, to like just all the administrative bullshit associated with running a business. So you know, talk a little bit about that. How did you, did you just like both feet into the pool at the same time to make that work? Or how did how did you get navigate that?

Scott: 17:39

It did. I kind of just bit the bullet and I mean full disclosure. The back-end business stuff is not my favorite part of it, and I think that's true for just about every technologist that you know does this sort of thing, but I knew it was a must-have. One thing that's pretty awesome about you know the current environment and probably the last five plus years, is you know there's fractional everything out there, right, and you can get somebody to help keep your books and you can get somebody to make sure that your invoices are getting paid. Yeah.

Tim: 18:12

As a service.

Scott: 18:13

That's right. That's right. And I, a year and a half ago, started working with a virtual assistant who lives 40 minutes from me and I've never met her in person, but her name is Emily and Emily, if you listen to this, you rock. You know she helps reduce entropy in my business life and, like you know, having those support functions to minimize the amount of backend stuff that you don't want to do, that aren't the best use of your time Like that's much more easily obtainable today, I think, than probably even you know five plus years ago it's a really good answer.

Tim: 18:49

Actually, I hadn't even considered that part of it because I hate well, I'm just no good at it either like I like, for example. Uh, if it were coming to like I have to write a statement of work for a customer, I think I could write the statement of actual work, just fine, but God knows, I wouldn't have any fucking clue. I wouldn't have any clue. I'm like what do I charge for this service? You know? Like, how do I figure out a profit and loss? How do I figure out what? You know that I made?

Scott: 19:12

that I'm not eating my hat by doing this work, right, right, yes, I think projects projects is probably more art than science, and I'm still not really good at it, um, but again I've got good resources to go to. Um. Part of the feedback loop is, uh, doing a project that you do, you know, eat your hat on right because you didn't bid enough hours and it took you twice as what you budgeted. Um, or pricing something too high and not winning the job because of that. But hopefully, as a sentient human being, you're able to take feedback and incorporate it into your future and you just you have to take that attitude. You're not going to get it right all the time, even though you're going to try to.

Chris: 19:57

I'm curious how much of the business side of the aspect did you did you know before going into this? Like, is this stuff that you just kind of learned being in the industry? Or did you actually do any kind of formal training or education on this stuff? Or did it? Or did you kind of like take what you know and then kind of added in the pieces you didn't have, using fractional people as those services? How did that come to be?

Scott: 20:26

So no formal training at all, but two really good sources of here's people you can go to if you have questions. One of them is the guy, james, that I keep over quoting here, always good for a question on how do I do this. Also, my financial advisor plugged me in with other local business people that were really supportive and other good places for me to hey, do you know somebody who knows about this or can help with this from a business perspective? We've got a couple of those remote workplaces in my town as well and they actually use that as a feature to sell you to come in and use space.

Tim: 21:06

Oh, like the WeWork facility. That's right, yeah, but my town is too small.

Scott: 21:11

Yeah, we don't qualify for WeWork, but I visited the newest one a couple of weeks ago and almost almost you know said let me try it for a couple months, just for that aspect of rubbing elbows with other entrepreneurs, other folks in the local networking. Right, that's right, yep. But here's another big thing that kind of hit me early on in the gig. I, I'm, I'm a team player, right, I've been always been part of teams and I'm, I'm, wired that way. I like it.

Scott: 21:42

On day two literally it was the Tuesday after the Monday that I officially started on my own. Um, I had this realization that I'm not part of a team anymore and my, there was a temporary my stomach dropped out from beneath me. Um and but, um, I but I came back to my senses pretty quickly and just had the thought that I'm just gonna have to find other ways to be part of a team. And that's led me to do other things, like co-found Network Automation Forum and, even though that's not an employer or a you know the same kind of organization, it's certainly scratched an itch there, where I do have a community that I'm part of. That's pretty awesome to see how they come together and help each other on automation issues and other issues too and like so. There are other ways to build a team and feel part of a team, even if you're not in a corporate context anymore. That's really good.

Chris: 22:40

Yeah, just a bit of feedback there. I will say that it must be working because the reviews I've gotten about Network Automation Forum have been astounding. To be honest with you, Some people have said it's the best kind of networking based conference they've been to, et cetera. So I think you're doing a great job there. And I also wanna kind of touch on that point you made about getting involved in these kind of like entrepreneurial hubs and things like that.

Chris: 23:07

When I when I briefly lived in Tulsa same thing they had this thing called 36 degrees North. I think it's changed names now, I can't remember, but like I was part of this program where all these remote workers were moved to Tulsa and they would all go to this entrepreneurial hub like co-working space and I have seen people just like thrive there, like starting businesses, doing those things. So like, yeah, if you can find one of those communities, I can definitely see how you can just like build the groundswell and then just like launch, like it really works.

Scott: 23:37

I've seen the benefit in those I haven't tapped into that per se. I see the benefit in those I haven't tapped into that per se. But another group I want to tip hat to is USNUA and the local networking user group Sure absolutely.

Scott: 23:59

We'll pay homage to Jason Ginter, who was supposed to be with us tonight, wasn't available. Jason, right, I'm here in Northern Virginia much of the time and that's been another way to like connect with folks with same technical interests in, you know, a different way than NAS, but a very complimentary way, you know that very hyperlocal, and I probably spent 2024 going to maybe 10 or 11 different NUG meetings all over the place. So, yeah, but those community connections are really important.

Tim: 24:28

You may not think they are, but they are so oh no, I mean especially when, like you know, especially in a time like now where, like, people are getting laid off left and right and center and the industry is on fire, like you know, I've heard so many horror stories and people are like.

Tim: 24:43

You know, I've been out of job for over a year and I've sent 5,000 applications, you know, I've sent 5,000 applications in and I've applied on these websites and, at the end of the day, it's it's really your network that's going to be there for you, like probably when in that, in that moment, and then that you need to be, you know, in the same method, you need to be there for other people as much as possible to help connect, because I think getting a job or whatever, like in that situation it's it's it's hard, like it's a black hole and you're competing with so many other people and leveraging your network is such a huge boon. So, yeah, making those connections and just and be, and not not insincerely right, not making connections and just seeing what you can get out of them, but like truly making connections and actually being part of community and networking with people.

Scott: 25:31

Yeah, man, it's, there's not a I don't think there's a substitute for it. Really, I think before doing this my ideas and thoughts around community were restricted to religious groups and the neighborhood that you lived in, and I've kind of seen the power of community in other contexts and so that really kind of expanded my view there pretty clearly. It's been great to figure that out.

Tim: 25:59

So actually, this is an interesting question. So a thing I wanted to ask that you just reminded me of as a tangent to this what about, or do you I don't know if this has happened to you or not have you ever had to take on a job or a consulting gig or whatever, or get asked to do something that you yourself either don't have the skill set for, don't have the time for, like, have you done subcontracting as part of your business? Have you brought in other people to perform any kind of some people do and some people don't? Right, yeah, and it's a different. People run their businesses differently, so I was just curious has that been a thing that you had to concern yourself with?

Scott: 26:34

So I'm actually in the middle of a project where we're bringing somebody on as a contractor because he has the right skill set and because I don't have the time to do it, and you know it's using your network right and figuring out okay who's doing what and who needs what, and I'll, I mean, I'll say, on this point, another huge lesson learned was how important your LinkedIn network is. Oh yeah, Right, and LinkedIn is just a manifestation of the people that you actually know, but it's a very practical manifestation of it and I had no clue how useful that was going to be to me. Just, you know, seeing things to ask questions about and leading to opportunities in ways that I just had not ever expected.

Tim: 27:20

Yeah, I mean, linkedin itself is just an artifact. It's a social media site that's focused on business. But yeah, that that essentially that gathering space for people in your network where you can know that you will find them basically is what we're really. I think what we're talking about here, right, like exactly, yeah, so totally agree with that.

Chris: 27:39

And I think, I think you've partially answered this in some capacity. But I'm curious, now that you are kind of outside of, you know, having a big company behind you, so to say. I say that until it grows into this conglomerate right, which will happen one day- Rebel Corp yeah.

Chris: 27:58

But, like, how do you stay current with like technology and things like that? Like, obviously, if you have NAF and you have a USNUA, then there's, you're tapped into the community. But is there, is there a certain way that you're making sure that your skillset is is up to date, not only from a technical perspective, but also just a market perspective? Right, you got to know what's out there and what is what services people are going to pay for, right? So how are you staying current in that capacity?

Scott: 28:23

So my number one mechanism for that is podcasts. Um, and I, I like to walk and run for exercise. Maybe running, calling it running is a little generous for me at my stage in life, but but like that's. You know, we we had this offline conversation about video versus audio, only Right, and uh, I just load up on podcasts and I have ones that I intentionally stretch me. Um, what's the AI developer? One latent space, um, I've heard of it.

Chris: 28:54

I haven't listened to it.

Tim: 28:55

I've been listening, but that does sound. I've seen it, I know it's hard.

Scott: 28:58

And I don't understand half the things they're talking about. Um, I've seen it. I know it's hard and I don't understand half the things they're talking about, but it's exposure and it's like, okay, I need to go learn about that. I need to go learn about that. You know, and amongst our community of you know, you know spread networking and cloud networking and adjacent tech, I've always got something coming at me and it's probably because I'm also always trying to battle tinnitus. But let's just say this is a happy side effect of, you know, usually listening to something when I'm not supposed to be paying attention to somebody else, like my wife.

Chris: 29:35

So I also pay for YouTube.

Scott: 29:36

Premium specifically so it will keep playing, even when the screen locks Right, so same approach there.

Chris: 29:45

Youtube Premium Look, I hate them for doing it, but it's one of the best investments. They got us all locked in on YouTube for years and years, and then like I will never.

Tim: 29:55

That's the one thing that's worth the money, for sure I didn't even realize this was a thing that youtube premium did, because, yeah, so I've been learning, for I've been learning japanese for for years now, for for almost three years now, and I've watched a little bit of your, your, uh, your progress reports on that yeah, I'm working, I'm working on it, I'm working on it, um, but what I was going to say is today, for example, I really wanted to load up some they they do a lot of.

Tim: 30:19

there's a lot of japanese language podcasts on youtube and, uh, that are not necessarily like on podcast catchers because they're, you know, japanese. I just haven't done the work to, but I usually listen to them on youtube while I'm doing other things, and I wanted to go on a walk today and, um, and I and I did that. I hit the YouTube button and then, and then I put the phone in my pocket and I was like, ah, shit, cause it stopped playing. Of course, I was like, man, I wish I could get this thing to keep playing. I didn't even know that was like a thing. I didn't realize the YouTube premium on that sale. Yeah, I'll split it with you, chris.

Scott: 30:58

Yeah, that's fair. It'll be like $3. Exactly One time payment, yeah.

Tim: 31:04

See, you learn something. Everybody learns something on this podcast. Yeah.

Scott: 31:07

Let me. I don't want to cut off your questions, but let me just throw out one other big idea that's really you know, why do this right and how do you adjust your plans?

Scott: 31:19

And I think when you stumble on something or something brews for long enough that it's something you get really interested in and you feel like you have things to say about it. That's a driver right, and for some people that's a product idea. You know, for some people it's basically a consulting engagement model, and that's what led me to start the Total Network Operations podcast on Packet Pushers and talk to organizations about you have a modern network. Do you really think you should stay organizationally aligned to the old way? And are you thinking about the new tools in tech from an ops perspective? You know ops teams. You really need to participate in your own rescue. How do you elevate and I won't go into a pitch on that here, but kind of developing those ideas and turning it into something where I'm having multiple constructive consulting engagements with enterprises. That's pretty awesome to like to say this is something that I. It's my idea and I'm not bragging like cause, you know, but no idea is purely yours, right, you? You have all sorts of influences.

Tim: 32:26

Yeah, I mean, everybody forms their opinions based on the things they learn, the things they do. Yeah, no, that's great though, because you know you've got this point that you basically to make and on the podcast, which is true, by the way, I've I've talked to many, you know, ops teams, who are some varying flavor of essentially consumers of whatever tooling management buys for them.

Chris: 32:50

That's right.

Tim: 32:51

Which is terrible, instead of it should be the opposite of way. The ops people should be saying here's maybe not tool, maybe not saying here's the tool we need, but certainly here's the data we need. Now, how do we find these tools? But anyway, but that leads to opportunities for you to then you know cause people are hearing that and being like, yeah, we agree with you, and then it becoming a business opportunity. I think that's really powerful, cause I was going to ask basically my next question and I don't mean it to be like a Q and a, but I just have so many questions about this.

Scott: 33:17

This is awesome. This is going fine yeah.

Tim: 33:19

Yeah, you know how do you find customers.

Scott: 33:23

Like you know what I mean, Like you, you launch your, your business on Tuesday, wednesday, where?

Tim: 33:28

where's the pipeline, like you know? That's the part I, that's another thing. I'm like man, how do I find customers?

Scott: 33:33

so on on the one hand, you'll find your initial customers through your network and your contacts right I mean that's fairly organic and natural.

Scott: 33:44

Unless you're super charismatic and you have the, the pill to ale all else or to cure all else, you're gonna need to do marketing at some point, and that's another huge lesson learned here. You know LinkedIn plays a role there. Other tools play a role, One of the. I interact with lots of marketers and marketing leaders now in my you know, multiple roles and I never set out to learn more about marketing, but I have. It's actually a lot more interesting and I never set out to learn more about marketing, but I have. It's actually a lot more interesting than I ever expected. And it's also changing right Because of what AI is doing for search and kind of breaking everything with SEO. Like everybody else has to have me to figure it out all again. Yeah, that's a great point, and like I get to figure it out too right along with them.

Tim: 34:34

Yeah, the SEO thing is so interesting and and the what is it? The open AI as a as search engine bit like, yeah, that's going to change. Basically, seo won't be a thing Like, if that's breaks it, totally breaks it, yep. So yeah, yeah, I was listening to an audio book because I couldn't listen to the YouTube thing I wanted to listen to. I was listening to an audio book on my walk instead. It was one of those business books or whatever. The guy was saying that email is still king from a marketing perspective, not social media. Email can drive you Websites and email, but that email is still apparently the number one way to reach people. I don't know if that's true or not, that's, I don't know how old this book is, but there's probably something to it.

Scott: 35:23

I do know that the noise threshold has risen horribly and I have I have some increased sympathy for marketers who will say things just to get attention. I don't like it. I'm never going to recommend that approach, especially for a technical audience.

Scott: 35:41

That's a. You know, our BS detectors go off pretty quickly, but the good ones are the ones who don't do that and still find a way through the noise, and that's you know. Again, it's a changing environment. I sound like I'm an expert on this. I'm going to I'm way over my skis right now, but it is fascinating and like I'm learning a ton in this area that I didn't expect to.

Tim: 36:05

Well, I mean, I mean, I mean, what is an expert except someone who's being successful at the thing they're doing Right? So I mean, as long as you're being successful, I think that's still. I think that fits. I'm writing that down. I'm going to remember that. Tim said yes, yes, yes, Put the quote on your next newsletter or whatever. That's right. People will read it and be like who, but anyway, Tim, you know, tim?

Scott: 36:29

Oh no, it was Chris. It was Chris.

Tim: 36:31

Yeah, there you go Well if you said Chris, they'd probably know what you're talking about. I don't know. Okay, I have to ask, I'll ask one more question and then we have to make this like more see where it goes. Because this one and you don't have to answer it, because I feel like it's almost personal, but like I don't know how you'd possibly like. The number one red flag for me starting my own business with a family red flag for me starting my own business with a family I have I have a wife and two daughters is how do you strike out on your own, like in America, with, like, health insurance, the way it is like how does, how do you do it? You don't have to answer, but you don't have to answer.

Scott: 37:09

I will. So that was a huge. That was probably a big blocker for me for a long time, and I mean the short version is there is a certain amount of suck it up. You're going to have to figure out how to pay for it. The Affordable Care Act really helps, right, when you're only at an income level of you know a place where you can qualify for. You know if you like your doctor, you can keep it in plans, but if you're successful, you're not going to qualify for that for long, right, and I'm like 2025 is the year that I'm going to have to make a switch. Right, the reality is that it is expensive. I don't have. I only have my wife and I. Now we have four adult children, so I mean, that was part of my calculus too.

Tim: 37:59

You did the math on it.

Scott: 37:59

yeah, that's right, but it is doable. You just you have to factor it in. You have to. The financial planning has to account for that.

Tim: 38:08

Yeah, yeah, for sure, I think.

Scott: 38:12

And that's for normal situations.

Tim: 38:14

Like I know, other people have very specific medical circumstances that make that a lot riskier At the end of the day, whatever your situation, you just simply have to be able to afford to not have your employer pay for half of your health insurance, whatever that looks like, I don't think there's an easy answer for that. Also, who knows how long the Affordable Care act will be around? But like, hopefully it, hopefully it stays.

Chris: 38:38

you know, stays um you could be a country with uh socialized health care or, or you can move to a country with a socialized health care.

Tim: 38:46

I guess that would be an option as well, perhaps. Uh, yeah, no, that for me that's every time I think about, like intentionally doing it. Like, for example, I have a friend in Canada, andrew Brown. He runs a exam pro, he runs a training platform and you know he's that's his job, that's his full day, that's his full time job. He's very successful at it. It's a really cool platform and I just like, dude, how nice, good for you. But like, I'm just thinking like I could not at this point in my life, with two, you know, still underage kids and my wife doesn't work, and so I'm, you know, sole proprietor, if you will, sole breadwinner. It's yeah, man, it's. It's tough like not to not to be political. But it's so funny that you know there's so much said, you know, by the party of that loves business about, you know, starting business and being successful business and the American dream. But I wonder how many people are actually blocked from from starting their own business because they literally just won't, would not be able to afford to do it.

Scott: 39:49

Whether, whether it's whether it's a real financial blocker or just the fear of it. I mean, that's a real, that's a real impact and I definitely. How am I going to pay for healthcare? How am I going to do this? How? You know, that was, that was me when I backed out a couple of times before. Right, I, you know. Again, I don't. We won't make it super political, but I think the one thing that is so messed up is that doctors and healthcare providers don't work for us. They work for the insurance companies, and having this intermediary, that is not. You know, you can, you can search for all terms.

Scott: 40:23

All you want, yeah, it, it. It's even not even profit motive. Right, it's like you should be concentrating on me, not what bill code you can put down to maximize the. You know what's insurance is going to pay out. And that's another podcast on a different network with other beverages.

Tim: 40:43

I think there's a few of them out there already, but yeah, no, and and again, not to. I didn't.

Tim: 40:49

I wasn't trying to make it a political at all but like but but yeah, I mean, I think a lot of people and I've talked to a lot of people and I think there are a lot of people who are like, look, I got to keep a day job and like this can just be my side gig until you know that that time in my life comes where I could potentially make this happen Right, and do a full time, do it on your own gig. So, yeah, that's. I wasn't looking, I didn't. I didn't think there was any kind of silver bullet there.

Scott: 41:18

I was just like man. The bottom line you know the way I would wrap that topic up is there are ways you can do it If you just plan, you know. I am not saying it's easy, I'm not saying it's cheap, but it can. It can be done and just get educated and know what your options are. You know in that regard, you know kind of build it as a side gig until you're ready to leave your full-time employer. I did this absolutely the wrong way. I was too ready to actually just jump over the cliff without having lots of steady, you know, or promised revenue. Yet that is not. You know what the textbooks tell you to do.

Tim: 41:56

Yeah I mean. But you know you built a network and that obviously helped a lot getting you started. You had coaches who were in your corner, right, that obviously helps a lot. You've called out multiple people multiple times about that. So, yeah, if there's any message we could give to the people listening, from my perspective, the biggest one would be, if you're going to try to strike it on your own, like, make sure that you have a network that can help you, help support you in that endeavor.

Scott: 42:25

Yeah, again, not a LinkedIn plug, but just discovering how important that really is right. That really is right Not just for you know jobs and revenue and gigs, but for ideas to bounce off of Somebody might know somebody you know there are so many other pieces to that puzzle. That makes your network so important.

Chris: 42:49

Yeah, I guess. Maybe one last question for me before we kind of wrap this up, so like, obviously you're, you're a few years into this, you've you've kind of done a lot of research into it before you went in. Um, I guess, at this point, like what would you say, like twofold question, like what, what is the easiest thing to do to get started? Um, if you're, if you're contemplating doing this? And second, like what are the things you did wrong that you would recommend someone not do or do differently, which is always, you know, take it with a grain of salt, I guess, but yeah, what would you say?

Scott: 43:21

Well, I think you have to start with the things that are really going to engage you, like, what are the things that you really like doing that you can actually get other people to pay you for? You know, it's that intersection of you, know, I think I think I have talent and skills here, or at least enough, and there's enough of a market demand for it. I kind of business one on one, but I think some people don't don't think that through. To answer your, what did I do wrong? Well, you know, again, probably jumping in, maybe being a little too frustrated and being ready to go.

Scott: 43:57

You know that I'm an emotional person, right, and I probably could have kept my emotions under check a little bit there. I'm glad it worked out as positively as it did and I don't want to imply that there's only one way to do that right. I think you can say by the numbers that having more of a plan well ahead of handing in the resignation letter reduces risk. You're never going to eliminate risk in this conversation, but yeah, that's definitely something I could have thought through more thoroughly, but it thankfully just has worked out well.

Tim: 44:34

No, I think it's really good advice. I mean, obviously it's not just like, oh well, you should plan better. Right, like it's specifically like you know, don't try not to be emotional in the moment. Try to really have the plan together. Try to really, you know, do the math. Like, do all the stuff that you said you did all the way at the beginning, right, like before you pull that trigger, make you did all the way at the beginning, right, like before you pull that trigger. Make sure that your financial advisor believes that you have the runway. You know, all things being equal, right, nobody knows what's going to happen tomorrow, right, and you know a house could burn down. Who knows? Nobody knows Exactly, but within reason, risk adverse you know, within the margin of risk, right?

Chris: 45:11

So, basically, failing to plan is planning to fail, right? Yes, so it's pretty easy. So, tim, if you want to do this, just sit your wife down, sit your kids down and say hey, for the next year we won't get sick, we won't break any bones.

Tim: 45:22

That's right. Nobody's leaving the house because I can't have anybody trip on the stairs and break their leg.

Scott: 45:29

Here's how the conversation really should go, chris. Hey, honey, here's what I'm thinking, and I think I really love to do this, and here are things that I think need to happen.

Tim: 45:40

What do you?

Scott: 45:40

think Right, I mean, it's a real, and I know you were just being silly, sorry.

Chris: 45:43

I don't want to sound?

Tim: 45:44

I think it's not fair. No, that's a good point yeah, no, I completely agree with that.

Scott: 45:49

So I mean let me, let me, let me give you like one, please, if I were to end, if I were to end, if I were to end with an anecdote on how's that worked out. So like I felt, like I I had really good partnership and buy-in from my wife, stephanie. Thank you, I love you. She's going to listen to this, I bet. And I at my year anniversary, like I, I'm really good at memorializing dates. I remember dates and I totally missed the one year anniversary of me starting my own business and I realized that a couple of weeks after the date and it's just a function of how busy I was, which is a really good problem.

Tim: 46:27

That's a good problem to have, yeah.

Scott: 46:29

And so I said you know, hey, honey, you know I'm a year into this, just passed. I know what I think about. How is it going? What do you think? She paused very thoughtfully and she said I think you're thriving. I've seen you work this hard before, but always accompanied with all the stress. And now I see you working this hard and I don't see the stress. That's super gratifying, you know, to hear it from outside, my own head, Right, and I didn't think of it that way and I I just didn't realize how much I was enjoying things.

Chris: 47:02

Yeah, If the person that knows you the best says that, um from a reserve review. Then that's yeah, that's really good yeah.

Scott: 47:09

So that gives me continued hope and I hope it gives others hope.

Tim: 47:12

That's great. No, no, the, the definitely. The goal here is to just let people know you know, hey, what, what to expect and good, bad and ugly, and and that's a. I think that's a really good place to uh to wrap it up. So, um, scott, thanks for thanks for joining us. This has been so enlightening. I hope that a lot of people that listen to this really uh find it enlightening as well, chris, any final thoughts?

Chris: 47:34

No, I was going to say again this has been great. I think it's a really fruitful conversation. Scott, is there anything you want to plug where people can find you online, or anything that you're involved in? Feel free.

Scott: 47:46

Yeah, look, come visit us at Network Automation Forum. We'll be in Prague at the end of May 2025. And I'm not just talking to everybody. I mean you, tim and Chris you need to come and join us.

Scott: 48:00

We'll be back in the US in November Location to be determined soon, I hope and announced. And do me a favor and check out Total Network Operations. I'm really trying to put emphasis on helping elevate the role of ops in network organizations and across IT. Love to hear what you have to say, any feedback and if you have interesting folks you want to recommend to come on that show. I'm all ears and if I can follow up with any questions on anything from this pod, reach out. You know, get Scott Robon on LinkedIn. That's the easiest way to find me. Tim and Chris, it's been awesome. I really appreciate you having me on.

Tim: 48:38

Oh, and, chris, it's been awesome. I really appreciate you having me on. Oh, dude, it's been great having you. We'll get all the links to the shows and everything in the show notes and the Network Automation Forum and everything as well. I would love to go to Prague. I'll see if the wife's up for it, roger, I'll let you know. All good, okay, so this is yeah. So this has been the Cables to Clouds podcast. If you like what you heard or saw or both, please subscribe to us. So, assuming you haven't already actually I'm assuming if you're listening to this, you're probably already subscribed. So nevermind, just hit the unsubscribe button and subscribe again.

Tim: 49:10

That'll help us a lot and with that we'll, we'll leave you and we'll see you next week.