Eat Your Customer's Pain

Justin Jackson (0:10)

Welcome to The Panel, where founders talk about building a better business and a better life. I'm Justin Jackson, co-founder of Transistor.fm.

Brian Casel (0:19)

And I'm Brian Casel, creator of Builder Methods.

Jordan Gal (0:21)

And I'm Jordan Gal, co-founder at heyrosie.com.

Justin Jackson (0:25)

And we have a special guest this week, Aaron D. Francis of Laravel Holding, Incorporated.

Aaron Francis (0:33)

That's right, honored to be here. Thanks for having me.

Jordan Gal (0:36)

Well, we've got two VC-backed and two bootstrapped at this point. That's right, that's right. The force is balanced.

Brian Casel (0:44)

Yeah, we had to balance it out.

Justin Jackson (0:46)

And this week, Brian's hosting, so yeah, take it away, man.

Brian Casel (0:50)

There are so many, you know, we have our chat group where we sort of just like bounce around ideas. I feel like this week, we've got a whole lot of them. I mean, Aaron's here, there's a lot of things I feel like, Aaron, I want to catch up with you on, we might as well do it on air.

You know, we got to talk about Jev, we're going to talk about, you know, what's happening in Laravel land. I just want to hear a lot more about Aaron's whole just career change and that. I mean, I know you've talked about it on mostly technical, but that I've always been fascinated with people making big career moves. That's really interesting to me.

Justin Jackson (1:25)

What's that been like so far, Aaron, being a W2?

Jordan Gal (1:28)

W2 and finding out that DHH is a fanboy. That's a lot all at once.

Aaron Francis (1:33)

I mean, I don't know which one's better, honestly. They're both fantastic. I love it.

Yeah. So I joined Laravel like maybe two months ago now, and it's just been great, guys. It's so awesome.

Jordan Gal (1:51)

You had a big coming out opportunity at the big conference.

Aaron Francis (1:56)

Yeah. Right?

Jordan Gal (1:58)

Where was it?

Aaron Francis (1:58)

England?

Jordan Gal (1:58)

No, it was something.

Aaron Francis (1:59)

It was in Boston.

Jordan Gal (2:00)

Oh, same thing.

Aaron Francis (2:01)

Same thing.

Brian Casel (2:02)

New England. New England.

Aaron Francis (2:04)

Yeah.

Brian Casel (2:05)

Nailed it. Yeah.

Aaron Francis (2:07)

That part was a lot of fun because normally, I've MC'd Laracon the past, I think, three or four years. I was on the website as MC, and so Taylor comes out. I'm supposed to come out, but Taylor comes out first. He's like, hey guys, we're going to change things up this year. Usually, we have a member of the community do this, but we're going to change it. This year, we're going to have an employee do it. Today's actually his first day as Vice President of Marketing. Please welcome Aaron Francis. People were like, what the hell is going on?

Brian Casel (2:38)

It was great.

Aaron Francis (2:40)

It was masterfully executed. Everyone, part of the, I think part of why it's so great is I've just been there for 10 years or more. And so people were genuinely excited for me.

I knew, you know, 90% of the attendees there just because I've been around for so long. And obviously, doing a job well is hard, but this has felt pretty easy because I'm not, I'm not like trying to figure out what is the identity of Laravel. How do I speak about it? It's like, no, I've been there the whole time. And in some regards, I've helped set that as like member of the community, MC, outspoken person. And so it just feels like slotting right in. It's been awesome. My wife is even more thrilled than I am because I'm way less stressed.

Brian Casel (3:33)

Yes. I mean, that's what-

Justin Jackson (3:36)

That's a big deal.

Brian Casel (3:37)

That's what I think is so interesting when you see someone in our community make one of these big moves, when I heard about it, it was like, oh, I didn't even know that a role like that was even something that you would even consider. But then at the same time, it's like, obviously, you're such an obvious perfect choice. From Taylor's perspective, it makes perfect sense why he would go to you and Laravel, and you're already in the community and it makes perfect sense. I mean, I want to ask you all about more of the decision process on everything else that you've had going on in your life and work and everything and then the transition. But where we sit today, you said that you're like two months in. Where are you at today with it? Is it like you're truly embedded, like part of the team running the show, like making a lot of decisions or is it still like the getting to know you phase, the honeymoon phase within Laravel?