The Ultimate Underdog Story: How TaskUs Used an Outsider’s Perspective To Unearth Hidden Talent Around the World
The origin story of TaskUs, including taking lessons learned as the forgotten outsider to turn an undervalued company into the massive success it is today.
Every business wants to grow — it’s a sign you’re doing something right. That next big job, the next big step… every entrepreneur looks forward to it.
Businesses have been outsourcing tasks for decades. Somewhere, someone learned that you can pay people to answer phones and solve basic problems, freeing up others to do the bigger tasks on the ground.
This idea has shaped the business world as we know it. For TaskUs CEO Bryce Maddock, it was also something he hoped he’d never do. Maddock and his co-founder, Jasper Weir, traveled the world. When they saw the billboards for outsourced work, Maddock had one thought: that will never be us.
To him, it was a sign that a company had lost themselves: they’d grown too fast. They didn’t care about the interpersonal relationships that make up so much of the heart of a company.
“We thought that becoming an outsourcing company would be the biggest sign of defeat,” Maddock said. “Now, we had a thesis which was wrong. The thesis was: individuals are going to outsource at scale. Everyone is going to have their own personal assistant… but people have different preferences when it comes to managing a one-to-one connection.”
Maddock was forced to re-think his thesis, which he did with his business partner, Weir, when they were working for their start-up social media consulting company. They found that a lot of the problems they were fixing were related to manpower… companies needed more help, not better strategy.
“They couldn’t hire people fast enough to keep up with their scale, particularly in entry-level positions, customer support, data entry, and sales,” Maddock said.
He and Weir saw their opening — and they took it.
“We were open to pivoting,” Maddock said.
They now run TaskUs, the world’s leading digital customer experience outsourcing company, which employs over 25,000 people worldwide — and they do it all by maintaining a focus on the heart of their business: people.
“We don’t have a lot of employees working in places like Silicon Valley,” Maddock said. “Our employees are working in the Philippines, India, and in Eastern Europe. And these are incredibly talented individuals that the world has left behind in many ways. We’re able to go in and say, ‘Hey, you’ve got an opportunity to work for the most innovative, fast-growing technology companies in the world and really make a difference.’”
So how exactly did two childhood friends create one of the biggest companies in the world all while leaning into the difficult task of upscaling and upskilling? Find out on this episode of Business X factors.
—
Business X factors is produced by Mission.org and brought to you by Hyland.
For over a decade, Hyland has been named a Leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Content Services Platforms, leading the way to help people get the information they need when and where they need it. More than half of 2019 Fortune 100 companies rely on Hyland to help them create more meaningful connections with the people they serve. When your focus is on the people you serve, Hyland stands behind you. Hyland is your X factor for better performance. Go to Hyland.com/insights to learn more.
