Advisory Solutions

We had a long week last week. The whole team came to NY for our second annual all-hands on/offsite, followed by our leadership retreat over the weekend. There is truly nothing better, and this post is a celebration of our team. We have grown a lot since our gathering last year in New York. This year, the team survived harrowing conditions at their hotel, happy hours, late dinners, and a total lack of the usual efficiency we experience when siloed in our quiet homes. As a business owner, I used to look at an event like this solely through the prism of expense. How could you not? It's not like NYC is cheap. But after doing it for the first time last year, I got a true taste of the intangibles that come out of having people all together: • Unlikely connections were formed • Impromptu discussions yielded some of the most exciting strategic initiatives that we can pursue into 2025 • We got to collaborate in ways that may have felt very different to our usual flow but formed the momentum that will last long after everyone has settled back in at their homes • Team members got to learn about the hard work that their colleagues are doing in really impactful ways • We got to spend time together outside of scheduled video calls. In short, it's become the big event that I look forward to every year. And while I wish we could do it more often, having it happen once a year is already pretty special. I would like to say thank you to my whole team publicly: Nicholas M. Orbis Lopez David Doney Rob Hardaway DIJON BATHERSFIELD Ryon Riley Daniel Thompson Jim Erdmann JohnRene Malaya John Harris Ellie Ransom Richard Abele Kris Ortiz Michael Fileti Kevin Saltos Jay Chaudhrey Christina Parker Ryan Wike Gospel Adebanjo Abe Santos And I would like to shout out the Leadership team (Michael Fileti, Ryon Riley, Jay Chaudhrey). This is the second time you've allowed me to hijack your weekend and we are getting so much better at this leadership planning thing. You guys are all great.

I went to Nashville for JNUC, and all we got was.. oh wait, we got an award! During the first ever global partner summit, the very kind souls at Jamf awarded Advisory with the collaboration excellence award for the AMER region. It is pretty humbling to be in the company of other award winners CDW, SHI International Corp. and Verizon. And then there was us. Pretty surreal. First and foremost, I want to thank my ENTIRE team at Advisory Solutions. This is something we collectively share and reflects the hard work we put into the amazing stuff we do day in and day out. I certainly thank our clients for entrusting us with their systems. And a very special shout out to the channel team at Jamf. All of you guys. With particular praise to our immediate team Patrick Watkins, Kristen Chambers, Katherine Garbis, Eric Ruckart and even though he looks really upset to be next to me on stage, Justin Smith. That was a wonderful, heartfelt intro to the award Justin. I appreciate it. While we don't ever seek out awards, it's very nice to be recognized.

I've been quiet for a few weeks, but that's for a good reason: For the third year running, we just passed our SOC2 Type 2 examination with a clean bill of health! Advisory Solutions continues to stand atop the MSP field, alongside some of our esteemed colleagues in the space, for our stated AND verified dedication to internal and client security. I want to thank the entire Advisory team for taking time out of their already busy schedules - particularly Ryon Riley - alongside our team at A-LIGN for the seamless experience. And lest we forget Ellie Ransom for her sage like guidance through this process.

To borrow a new HR term that I learned the other day, I am very excited to announce that Advisory just launched the "5-year club", and we have our very first member! Daniel Thompson - welcome, bud. You stand as a club of one, but you have others joining you soon. For those of you who don't know, Dan is our Senior IAM Engineer. In simple terms, that means he is the brains behind the identity solutions (particularly Okta), protecting employees across many of our clients. Dan joined us back in 2019 as a member of the service desk and has specialized his skills to be our voice for automation, security, organizational structure, and so much more in the world of identity management. He pushed me to expand my vision of what an MSP can be and even forced me to adopt words like "scrum," "sprint," "epic," and all the other dev jargon that I still feel uncomfortable using. So, happy five year anniversary Dan! We are so much better since you came through those doors. (Credit to Michael Volchok for the 5-year club term. Those lunches really pay off.)

Hey, LinkedIn Connections, Where does one find good interns? We are opening up a six-month internship in our business development/customer success department. We need someone interested in organizing data, account management, and helping our CSMs keep our clients happy. An interest in IT doesn't hurt either ;)

I started Advisory Solutions seven years ago because I was looking for a new challenge in the IT space, but no one would hire me. Today, we are 20 people with over 100 clients. This isn’t a post where you learn something or I provide some helpful anecdote. I didn’t know what I was doing then, and I’m pretty sure I’m still winging it now - maybe a bit less than before. Success is often hard work + luck + recognizing that you have been handed some luck + consolidating on that luck with more hard work and a strong team. Maybe hindsight will teach me more profound lessons, but for now, I just wanted to thank all who have come through Advisory’s doors to build our foundations and all those who are here building the next seven years as we speak.  Happy anniversary, Advisory! (albeit a couple of weeks late) #msp #startup #anniversarycelebration