He was twelve when he sat on the floor of a server room among the cables. Nobody had asked him to be there; he wanted to see where the internet actually came from. That same week he took a phone exchange apart at home to see how it worked on the inside. It never wore off.
The first real job came from the sandwich shop around the corner. They had no website, he wanted to build something people would actually use. The deal was short: he built it, they stood him a sandwich. The most honest rate he has ever charged, and it has never tasted that good since.
What changed since are the jobs. Today there are platforms with hundreds of people in them daily, wired into an ERP, where an hour of downtime costs revenue directly. The meeting tables got a few sizes bigger. The deal stayed the same.
If I think you should not build it, I say so. Even when it costs me the job.
In roughly one in three calls that is the honest answer. An off-the-shelf package would do it too, or the problem sits somewhere other than in the software. Saying so costs a job and usually earns the next one, because people remember who kept them from building something they had no use for.
He picks up six, sometimes seven days a week. Not because that is healthy, but because software standing still costs money at the moment it happens rather than on Monday morning. Clients who have been through that once call him directly afterwards, which is exactly the idea.
He started in Rotterdam and never left. The coffee is on, even if you only want to think out loud about an idea with no budget attached yet.
What to call about
- A first call about what you want to build, and whether that is wise.
- Whether something is possible, what it roughly costs and when we could start.
- Custom platforms and integrations with an ERP, webshop or accounting package.
- Downtime outside office hours on software we manage.
