7MS #430: Interview with Dan DeCloss

Today we're thrilled to have our friend and PlexTrac CEO Dan DeCloss back to the program! (P.S. PlexTrac is launching runbooks as a feature - and you should definitely check out PlexTrac's upcoming Webinar about runbooks on September 9!). We also did a PlexTrac 101 Webinar with them recently!

You may remember Dan from such podcasts as this one when we first talked to him in 2019. Dan and I have a lot in common in that we both started security companies about the same time, so I had a lot of questions for Dan around how business has been going since we last talked on the podcast. Today our topics/questions include:

• What are the (good) warning signs that a passion project you have could be a viable business?

• Why "having all the jobs there has ever been" is a great way to figure out it's time to start your own business :-)

• At what point does a side project have to become what you do for your day job?

• How do you safely prepare to quit a comfortable corporate life to life as a small biz owner? Do you go 100% on faith? Do you save your $ for a year so you can "float" your business for a while? Some combination of the two?

• How important is it to have the support of your friends/family when starting a new biz?

• Once you start a biz what are the best/worst things about wearing all the hats (engineering, sales, marketing, accounting, HR, etc.)?

• When is it time to hire additional resources or raise additional money to support your growing business?

• What marketing efforts are fruitful for a new security biz to spend time/money on?

• How do you decide what bells/whistles to add to PlexTrac? Follow your own roadmap? Let the customers drive your direction? Some combo of both?

• What new bells and whistles are coming to PlexTrac in the Webinar on September 9?! (Spoiler alert: RUNBOOKS!)