As tech journalist Sarah Lacey famously said, “Once you’re lucky, twice you’re good.”
Sarah was talking about founders who have started more than one successful company, but broadly what she meant was that sustained, repeatable success is really hard. Knock it out of the park once, and maybe you just got lucky. Maybe it was just a right place, right time situation, and you got an easy pitch to hit and didn’t miss. But step up to the plate day in and day out and sock home runs? That’s something special.
Making the Inc 5000 list for a second straight year is external validation that our strategy to lead with culture isn’t just a flash in the pan. Ours is a sustainable approach that leads to long-term growth.
Last year we talked about how PartnerHero is leading a change in the outsourcing industry, from extractive and exploitive to regenerative and equitable. By starting with our culture, putting a focus on the well-being and growth of our people, and proving that when you do that, the business metrics like revenue and profit follow, we’ve been able to demonstrate to our peers a better way to operate.
We’ll continue to employ this approach, but that's really just the beginning. PartnerHero is rapidly changing not just how we do business, but the business we’re in. We’re not only evolving how outsourcing is delivered, we’re evolving what outsourcing is.
PartnerHero is innovating on our business model and the services we sell. Last year we hired our first Chief Digital Officer, and this year we’ve rapidly scaled up our software division with investments in AI and building tools that help brands deliver incredible customer experiences. Our vision is to become a foundational operations platform for companies to grow through CX.
Part of executing on that vision is also elevating CX. Too often customer experience is seen as a necessary inconvenience. It’s viewed as something that costs money but doesn’t contribute to the bottom line, and it’s ignored for as long as possible.
We think that’s misguided. Customer experience is a growth channel that deserves attention and investment from the start. It’s also a career that attracts brilliant, empathetic people who should have a seat at that table when it comes to making business critical decisions.
We’re thrilled to be on the Inc 5000 list for a second time, and our entire team deserves all the credit in the world for making it happen. But we’re not resting on our laurels. We’ll keep pushing to evolve our industry to be more inclusive and just, we’ll continue to grow our incredible team of talented people around the world, and we’ll strive to make CX something that every company cares about deeply and provide them with the tools to do it well.
Once you’re lucky, twice you’re good… three times? Well, we aim to find out what that means.
- Shervin Talieh & Heather Casey, founders
