The Quiet Work

EP. 94 | The FBI Said He Was on an ISIS Kill List

https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomkirkham/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomkirkham/] https://www.kirkhamirontech.com/ [https://www.kirkhamirontech.com/] Tom Kirkham has been in cybersecurity for 26 years. He's seen everything from bragging rights hackers in the late 90s to an industrial-scale trillion-dollar criminal industry. But nothing changed his perspective quite like the day an FBI agent showed up at his office and told him he was on an ISIS kill list — because a company he signed an NDA with got hacked. Today Tom runs Kirkham IronTech, a managed security services provider ranked in the top 250 MSPs globally for four consecutive years. We talk about how hacking became a $10 trillion industry, why 95% of breaches are caused by human error, how AI is now scaling personalized attacks to target anyone, what ransomware actually looks like from the inside, and why your coffee machine might be your biggest security risk. Timestamps: * 0:00 – Intro: What Kirkham IronTech does * 1:01 – 26 years in IT and security — top 250 MSP globally * 2:06 – Starting the company from a dining room table on January 1, 2000 * 3:02 – When hackers did it for bragging rights — and when that changed * 4:11 – 95% of breaches are caused by human error, not technical exploits * 5:00 – How a ransomware campaign works — the math behind $10M paydays * 5:26 – The FBI showed up and said: you're on an ISIS kill list * 6:19 – How he ended up on the list (a Sun Microsystems NDA got hacked) * 9:14 – Stoicism helped him make peace with it in weeks * 13:31 – The number one threat to every business: ransomware * 14:33 – Hacking is now a $10 trillion industry — third largest GDP on the planet * 16:39 – AI now scales personalized attacks to everyone, not just high-value targets * 17:05 – Matt's real experience: CEO identity stolen, employees sent to buy gift cards * 18:14 – Proactive vs. reactive: how Kirkham operates * 19:07 – Gas pump skimmers, phishing, and cybersecurity beyond the office * 20:17 – Why traditional antivirus (Norton, McAfee) is no longer enough * 22:59 – Chinese cyber warfare and the greatest IP theft in human history * 26:10 – The three pillars: technology, training, governance * 27:28 – Why old laptops are costing you more than new ones * 28:48 – Why Tom replaced every Mac in the company within 6 months of Apple Silicon * 30:22 – They qualify clients as much as clients qualify them * 32:36 – Clients who've been with them 20+ years — and why churn is minimal * 35:29 – From a dining room to a radio show — how he built regional brand awareness * 37:50 – AI in the company: privacy governance comes first * 42:49 – Executive intelligence briefings — what's coming next * 46:55 – What Tom would tell his younger self: trust your gut, embrace failure * 50:17 – MSP 4.0: managed intelligence providers and the AI governance opportunity * 53:09 – Closing thoughts

EP. 93 | One Lawyer Running Seven Ventures at Once

https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcsnyderman/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcsnyderman/] https://npoint.ventures/ [https://npoint.ventures/] At 17, Marc Snyderman and his brother rented a bay at his dad's dealership, made business cards that said "Exotic Care," and started picking up people's cars door-to-door to detail them. He says it would have been a nine-figure exit if he'd kept going. Instead he went to law school, interned at the Philadelphia Stock Exchange, ran operations at a defense contractor from $15M to $60M ARR, burned out, rebuilt, and now runs seven ventures at once — including a subscription-based law firm, a creator marketplace, a lithium-ion fire extinguisher company, and a coffee brand called Teddy Outdoors. We talk about how he flipped the law firm model on its head, what 26% annual growth for five years actually looks like from the inside, how to spot the wrong business partner before it's too late, mental health as a founder, and why vibe coding a full app in a weekend is now completely normal. Timestamps: * 0:34 – Age 17: Exotic Care, door-to-door car detailing, and the nine-figure exit he missed * 2:23 – "That would 100% be a nine-figure exit today" * 3:41 – How he ended up in law: a Hansel and Gretel mock trial in second grade * 4:09 – Paying his way through law school from day one * 4:48 – Interning at the Philadelphia Stock Exchange * 5:06 – From corporate lawyer to COO — and 10 years running a defense company * 5:58 – 26% annual growth for five straight years — what actually drove it * 7:19 – Would he need fewer people today with AI? His honest answer * 8:02 – Excel didn't kill accountants — and AI won't kill lawyers * 10:17 – Legal as a Service (LaaS): flipping the billable hour model upside down * 12:14 – Are other law firms copying the subscription model? * 13:32 – ChatGPT hallucinated a case citation — a lawyer got disbarred * 14:48 – The private AI tools built specifically for lawyers * 16:00 – Next Point Ventures: the airport analogy * 17:03 – The only thesis: "We don't work with assholes" * 17:22 – Ukreate: a creator marketplace for travel brands and hotels * 18:58 – VendOnBoard: vendor compliance automation * 19:55 – The lithium-ion fire extinguisher — why your regular one won't work * 22:13 – Teddy Outdoors coffee: step outside, put the phone down * 23:46 – Performance coffee with mushrooms — trying to make it taste like coffee * 24:34 – Matt's Milton Hershey story and the Switzerland recipe * 25:40 – Entrepreneurial ADHD: open, focus, move — one window at a time * 26:37 – Vibe coding a full app with audit capability in a weekend * 28:11 – How to spot the wrong business partner before it's too late * 29:26 – Business divorces: the ugly reality of startup partnerships * 30:05 – The Warren Buffett / Charlie Munger restaurant test for CEOs * 31:47 – Matt's never held a real pager * 32:05 – Health, burnout, depression, and the semicolon tattoo * 33:41 – What Marc would tell his 17-year-old self * 35:03 – Why failure has one root cause, but success has 100 * 36:53 – Neuroplasticity, individuation, and why talking to younger people is mission critical * 37:58 – When we all became uncomfortable with our own thoughts * 40:32 – What gives Marc the most fulfillment

EP. 92 | This AI Answers Your Phone at 3AM and Books the Job — CallTex Co-Founder

Connect with Casey: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/casey-purington-537103ab/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/casey-purington-537103ab/] Website: https://www.usecalltex.com/ [https://www.usecalltex.com/] Casey Purington has spent 15 years obsessing over one thing: what happens when a customer calls a home service company. Most of the time — especially after hours — nothing good happens. The phone rings. No one answers. The customer calls the next company on the list. And the HVAC company just wasted $300 in marketing to get that call. Casey built CallTex to fix that. An AI voice agent that answers in under a second, pulls the customer's history from Service Titan, quotes the right price, books the job, and logs everything — without a single human involved. We talk about how AI voice agents actually work behind the scenes, why transparency with callers matters, how Casey cold calls companies at midnight to prove his point, his plan to land private equity groups, and why he's betting everything on AI. Timestamps: 0:00 – Welcome + Casey introduces himself and CallTex 0:55 – From the car business to call centers at 18 2:30 – His first day in a contact center: a chair, a headset, and a notepad 3:40 – What great call handling actually looks like — and why most companies miss it 6:04 – How AI pulled him out of consulting and into building 7:00 – Three buckets: inbound, outbound, and proactive follow-up 8:00 – Happy check calls, tune-up campaigns, and the CRM integration 9:55 – Playbooks, tagging, and how the back end works 11:16 – Who's adopting AI fast — and who's still talking about it 13:39 – The Yellow Pages moment: early adopters win, resisters get left behind 14:36 – Should you disclose the caller is talking to AI? 17:00 – Transparency, hallucination, and the hybrid approach 20:09 – What happens to the call center agents he trained? His honest answer. 22:09 – The full customer journey with CallTex — demo to live 24:47 – Tagging, routing, knowledge base, and advertisement integration 27:12 – This is not an answering service — what makes CallTex different 29:23 – Onboarding takes days, not weeks — but you need one owner 30:18 – Why every home service company needs a call center manager 32:38 – Can the manager role be remote? Yes — and Casey plans to offer it 36:01 – How they find customers: calling companies at midnight 37:00 – The leakage report: Casey records missed calls and sends them to the owner 39:27 – The private equity play — scaling dozens of locations at once 41:00 – "We couldn't get the big players to do what you did" — a client this week 43:22 – Where is AI voice going over the next decade? 45:28 – Why off-the-shelf AI won't cut it — the builders vs. the plug-and-play crowd 48:19 – Matt's take: AI is the direction, human in the loop stays 49:46 – Closing thoughts

EP. 91 | He Helped His Client Exit for €167M (Then Moved to the French Riviera)

https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshua-kennedy/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshua-kennedy/] https://businessclubcotedazur.com/ [https://businessclubcotedazur.com/] Joshua Kennedy started his first business at 18. By his thirties, he'd helped a client grow a data center from a €100M dream to a €167M exit in two years. Then he packed up, moved to the French Riviera, and started over. Today Josh runs Business Club Côte d'Azur — a highly vetted founder community in the south of France — and Next Locals, a social network for people living abroad. We talk about why European entrepreneurship culture is broken, how he grew and sold multiple companies, what it actually takes to scale a service business beyond yourself, and why moving to Nice with two kids and no network was the best decision he ever made. Oh, and a €150 hospital bill for delivering his son. Yes, really. Timestamps: 0:00 – Welcome + Joshua introduces himself 0:55 – How Business Club Côte d'Azur started — from a social project to a vetted founder network 2:30 – Why Europe's entrepreneurship culture kills ambition before it starts 3:29 – The Hampton model — what Josh is building for the French Riviera 5:35 – Why he just relaunched the club and what it looks like now 7:30 – Moving abroad changes you permanently — Matt and Josh compare notes 8:15 – The micro-entreprise trap: why most founders in France stay small 11:30 – Surrounding yourself with people who match your mindset 15:17 – How it started: walking out of the chamber of commerce and into his first sale 16:06 – Websites for €30,000–€50,000 and why clients paid it 18:29 – From web design to online marketing to growth agency 20:34 – The data center client: €100M exit goal, €167M actual result in two years 23:12 – Why Josh won't build in AI despite the opportunity 26:49 – How the data center model actually works (simple, brilliant, boring) 31:39 – Entrepreneur ADHD and why focus is the only thing that matters 33:59 – 90 days to change everything in your business 35:03 – Josh flips the mic and starts consulting Matt live on air 36:37 – Niche down or stay invisible — why "B2B founders" is too broad 40:02 – Don't create demand, capture it — the principle behind every good go-to-market 41:20 – If Alex Hormozi is right: go where the hungry crowd already is 42:13 – Life on the French Riviera — 300 days of sun, great food, and kids who forage 44:43 – French healthcare: €150 out-of-pocket for a full private clinic birth 47:00 – The $91,000 US hospital bill and a €150 cup of coffee 50:21 – Raising kids abroad and why Matt thinks the world needs more babies 51:22 – Closing — Matt promises to show up at one of Josh's events

EP. 90 | Tinder for Hiring? How Two Siblings Built an AI Platform for Restaurants (Swob Co-Founders)

https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephanie-florio-51397765/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephanie-florio-51397765/] https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexanderflorio/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexanderflorio/] https://www.swobapp.com/ [https://www.swobapp.com/] Stephanie and Alex Florio weren't engineers. They were marketers — both working at agencies, both quietly dreaming of building something of their own. The idea hit Alex while using Tinder. What if hiring worked like that? Swipe left or right on candidates. Simple, fast, human. That idea became Swob — an AI-powered hiring platform built specifically for restaurants, where turnover is brutal, managers are stretched thin, and the guest experience lives or dies by who shows up for their shift. We talk about how Emma (their AI hiring assistant) works, why restaurants are still struggling to hire despite dozens of job boards, what it's like to build a company with your sibling, and how two non-technical founders with a marketing background are taking on one of the oldest problems in hospitality.