Can you introduce yourselves and your roles?
Rodney Kabuye, Founder & CEO, PLUGG:
I’m Rodney. I’m Founder of PLUGG, and PLUGG exists to make ethical labour the standard in the built environment. We built a technology that brings transparency, compliance and real social impact into how labour is managed so companies can build responsibly and not just efficiently.
Pete Smith, Board Advisor, PLUGG:
I was a management consultant for almost two decades, and then made a jump in-house into Cardo Group for a number of years just after COVID, which was an interesting move. I was experiencing the fruits of what a startup organisation could be. That’s been a common thread throughout all of my career, helping organisations look at their operating models and understand how they can be more efficient.
Eric Wansong, Non-Executive Director, PLUGG:
The first half of my career was all focused on business development and sales. The second half of my career has spanned every aspect of operations. I have fortunately had experiences with different companies across the entire company maturity lifecycle.
What was happening professionally that led you to look for a new direction?
Rodney Kabuye, Founder & CEO, PLUGG:
It gets lonely, and we got to the point where strategically we needed that extra advice and input and insight into the direction we were going in. That was six months ago. Pete and Eric actually helped strategically so much in that journey, especially on the operational side of how PLUGG was going to grow, the challenges that we might be facing that I might not have seen myself as a founder.
Eric gave that sounding board and that holistic view of how everything should operate, and just bouncing ideas as well helped us on the technological side of things as we’re growing and speaking to enterprises on the compliance side of things that maybe I probably would not have seen. But we attacked them a lot earlier and now we’re in a better position going into the new year. It’s been great and exciting, so yeah, it’s been really helpful.
Pete Smith, Board Advisor, PLUGG:
The reason for going through Connectd and starting in the board advisory space is that I was a management consultant for almost two decades and then made a jump in-house into Cardo Group for a number of years just after COVID. I was experiencing the fruits of what a startup organisation could be. When Rodney and I first spoke, it was just a really natural conversation around how his business was, what he wanted to achieve with it.
Eric Wansong, Non-Executive Director, PLUGG:
I also have an eye towards where Rodney wants to grow PLUGG. I’ve been involved with 11 mergers and acquisitions over the years, so I have a sense of what investors look for when they want to invest in a company. So just helping guide Rodney as to how best to position PLUGG not only for growth, but to attract investment dollars. Selfishly, I’ve always enjoyed learning about different businesses. But having been the founder of a startup, I’m also hypersensitive to how difficult Rodney’s job is.
What surprised you most about early-stage work after corporate consulting?
Pete Smith, Board Advisor, PLUGG:
It was really embryonic and organic in the way that relationship developed. I just had to think about what I could bring in from other industries, other ways of thinking, to help Rodney with his challenges and how he was moving forwards. I’ve never worked in construction before, so it was a big learning experience for me as well in terms of how that business operates, the needs of the candidates, the clients, et cetera.
Eric Wansong, Non-Executive Director, PLUGG:
Having been the founder of a startup, I’m hypersensitive to how difficult Rodney’s job is. It’s a 24 by 7 job, and every once in a while, hopefully we can help Rodney poke his head up and get a line of sight into what’s coming.
How do you see your advisory roles growing in this partnership with PLUGG?
Pete Smith, Board Advisor, PLUGG:
It is actually something that Rodney and I spoke about when the initial six months was coming to the end, like what does it look like? Operationally, Rodney’s getting to the stage now where things could accelerate and get quite interesting pretty quickly.
I guess where we ended up was being on hand to provide that guidance when he needs it, but still providing structured insight on the key challenges that he faces. The way that we work sometimes is that we’ll chat through a challenge, we’ll spitball it for a bit, but I’ll then take it away and have a think about it offline and take that cerebral activity away from him for a bit, and then come back and we can noodle a bit more. It’s that flexibility. It also suits me from a personal level in terms of other stuff that I’ve got on in the rest of my career, and I can take learnings either way. I think it’s one of those situations that continually feeds itself.
Eric Wansong, Non-Executive Director, PLUGG:
Personally and professionally, I would like to be doing more of this in the future for early-stage companies. I find it energising. As I get older in my career, I am less tolerant of large company politics and the pace and rate of activity at large companies. Fortunately, I’ve seen pretty much all of them. So I would love to continue to help as long as I’m providing value.
I believe this is a business that can make money. I’m also at a point in my career where I’d like to cherry-pick the people that I align with and the companies that I align with, that are not only financially strong, but have a good social conscience.
Pete Smith, Board Advisor, PLUGG:
That’s the exciting thing about the partnership as well. It’s not just about what it is now today, but it’s being part of that journey of innovation for PLUGG in terms of where else it could go, what else it could do. That’s also really exciting, that it’s got that scope.
