End of 2020 mega-episode

Looking back at 2020

Note, many of the goals mentioned here were set in our 2019 recap episode.

• Personal accomplishments 
  • Rick 
    • 2019 Goal: Get to a point where he and his wife feel comfortable having kids - ✅ Not only are they ready, Rick's wife is pregnant 🎉
    • 2019 Goal: Increase level of play - ✅ He's been playing basketball, skiing, playing water sports, etc.
    • Had success writing his newsletter almost every week.
  • Tyler 
    • 2019 Goal: Get a dog - ✅ His name is jolo and he's an idiot.
    • 2019 Goal: Exercise three times per week - ❌ Things were looking good until covid hit.
    • Got married and bought a house.
• Business accomplishments 
  • Rick 
    • 2019 Goal: Grow to $10k MRR - ❌ But did even better by focusing on one business and investing in the long term.
    • LegUp Health makes more money than it spends.
    • Built the LegUp Health product with no-code and low-code.
    • Shut down his old business, Group Current, while maintaining a strong relationship with his co-founder.
  • Tyler 
    • 2019 Goal: Continue product team's momentum - ✅ LACRM put out meaningful product improvements regularly throughout the year.
    • 2019 Goal: Write code once per week - ❌ Didn't even come close.
    • 2019 Goal: Average 50 paying users/month from the referral channel - ❌ Had the right input, but didn't get the results.
    • Launched a major redesign.
    • Made it through the pandemic despite a couple terrible months.
    • Raised prices.
    • Hired two new people.
• Biggest disappointment 
  • Rick - Not spending enough time with customers, friends, and family.
  • Tyler - Had to fire an employee.
• Biggest learning 
  • Rick - The difference between earning 10% of a business vs 100%.
  • Tyler - The role of an entrepreneur vs. the role of a CEO.

Discussing big picture goals

• Why are we entrepreneurs? What drives us? 
  • Rick - He's good at it, he likes it. It's the best pathway to freedom.
  • Tyler - Trust, building things, creating a great place to work.
• What do we want to accomplish over 10+ years 
  • Rick - $10mm ARR, 20% profit. Become the one-stop shop for consumers finding healthcare. Build a full benefits platform for employers.
  • Tyler - Turn the one successful product into a suite of products for small businesses. Be more than a CRM.
• What do we our roles to be long-term? 
  • Rick - Build a management team. Stay involved in product marketing.
  • Tyler - Manage the product team and innovate on the product as an individual contributor. Be CEO, but mostly have non-product things delegated to a management team.

Expectations for 2021

• Personal themes/goals 
  • Rick - Get sleep under control. Adjust to being a dad.
  • Tyler - Spend more time with friends and family once the pandemic is under control (knock on wood)
• Professional themes/goals 
  • Rick 
    • Get to $10k MRR.
    • Automate/delegate so service can be scalable.
  • Tyler 
    • Get marketing to the point that it can be delegated.
    • Design the new appointment scheduler product.
• Biggest worry 
  • Rick - Being able to scale service.
  • Tyler - Growth leveling off after the benefit of the price increase wears off.
• What do we want to learn? 
  • Rick - Learn more coding, especially working with API data and generating dynamic emails.
  • Tyler - Re-learn how to iterate and move fast.

Predictions

• Our predictions from last year 
  • Rick - An all-in-one solution will emerge in the no-code space ❌
  • Tyler - Startups raising money from non-VCs will become more mainstream (sort of happened, but still in progress)
• Next year 
  • Rick - Asynchronous video will become big in professional settings.
  • Tyler - San Francisco will start a new era of opportunity for early-stage startups.