State of the Union: Q2 2016

Hello, Phriends!

While it might not feel like it right now with projects being stalled or put on hold, there’s a lot going on. This week we welcomed Karmon to our team, and we’re still on the hunt for a business developer (irony, much?). We also have an incredible amount of potential ahead of us, and I’ve never been as excited about the vision we have for Phuse.

All of this has gotten me thinking about where we’re headed, and what our path to get there will be. Historically, this State of the Union has served as a platform for us to not only rally, but to reflect and make sure we’re staying true to our core values as we move forward. Today, I’d like to take the opportunity to talk about what I have in mind for the next 5 years.

In the next 5 years I’d like to focus on growth. That can mean a lot of things, so let me lay down the high-level goal: I’d like to get us to $3m in yearly revenue, and to have 20–30 people (for reference, we’re at $950k yearly right now, and have 10 people). The reason for these numbers is twofold:

1. When we get to these numbers, we’ll be able to make more experimental hires into areas we don’t specialize in right now (i.e. IoT, mobile development, QC), and work on a different caliber of projects.
2. My vision for Phuse has always been as a lifestyle company where people come before profits. At 20–30 people, we’ll be able to still effectively manage our culture and ensure people feel connected regardless of their location.

We need a lot to get to this point, and 5 years is certainly an ambitious target. Admittedly, we’ve seen a slowdown since last September and had our first two down quarters as a business in 7 years. Additionally, we’re on track to have a down year (we’ve been aiming for a $1m revenue for this year, but are trending towards hitting roughly $900k). It’s easy to look at these facts and say we’re in a bad place, but we’ve actually seen a higher profit margin as a company as we’ve been able to structure a stronger foundation. While we didn’t want a down year, I think we need one as we ramp up towards our plan for the next 5 years.

What this means for everyone across our team is a focus on what we can do to move the needle forward. While we hire in sales (and improve process / ideate on how to improve our pipeline) and focus on our marketing (such as our website, social media, etc), we’re still relying on the entire team to make the most of every billable hour and to do our best work to help attract new business. Thinking about long-term relationships and ideating on how to provide more value as clients grow is something we should all be doing as we grow together.

As we think about what’s ahead and how we can get there, here’re some of our stats from the last quarter (Q2 2016):

• 🍏 Total hours worked: 2912 (114% of Q1 2016)
• 🍏 Billable hours worked: 1423 (roughly level with Q1 2016)
• 🍏 Average hours / person / week worked: 26 (same as Q1 2016!)
• 🍎 Billable percentage (with Ops): 49% (down 6% from Q1 2016)
• 🍎 Billable percentage (without Ops): 66% (down 10% from Q1 2016)
• 🍎 Invoiced: $194,386.00 CAD (63% of Q1 2016)
• 🍎 Percentage of $1m goal attained during quarter: 19% (45.93% year to date, so roughly 6% shy of where we should be at this point)
• 🍎 Average hourly rate during quarter: $137 CAD ($162.37 year to date)

Some of the things we’ve accomplished:

• Launched InfoSec!
• Got PAM React launched: pam.phuse.ca
• Got Alex and Ben involved in the Operations team discussions
• Hired Karmon!
• Derek created a Bot that can handle Reminders and Recognition / Karma

In this next quarter, I’d like us to:

• Hire a business development person
• Come up with sub values for our team, and a set of values for our clients
• Complete our lead guide
• Unveil our salary calculations
• Come up with approach to profit sharing or similar (complicated discussion)
• Have more green apples (see above) than red apples

In the next few hours I’ll be sending out a Doodle Poll to everyone to set up a time for our quarterly stand-up. I’ll be looking for your thoughts in my idea around our 5 year goal, and any ideas you have on milestones you’d also like to hit along the way.

Thank you all for what you do. You truly are the best team I’ve ever worked with.

✌️