Patrick Kelly, the CEO of Gratitech shares his journey from computer science major to CEO, offering invaluable advice on entrepreneurship, cybersecurity, and balancing professional and personal life. With a background in government, finance, and technology, Patrick provides a unique perspective on the challenges and rewards of being an entrepreneur in the cybersecurity field.
About Patrick Kelly:
With extensive experience in the financial and government sectors, Patrick Kelly has developed a reputation for his expertise in cryptography and secure coding. His entrepreneurial journey includes founding Gratitech and Cyber Armor AI, and he is dedicated to helping organizations secure their digital future.
In this episode, Thomas and Patrick discuss:
The Journey to Gratitech: Patrick shares his path from interning at the US District Court for Y2K preparation to holding senior technology roles at JPMorgan and Merrill Lynch. He discusses his transition to entrepreneurship and founding Gratitech, focusing on cybersecurity consulting and cryptography.
Balancing Side Hustles and Full-Time Work: Insights into how Patrick managed to balance his government job with side projects, eventually leading to the creation of his own company.
The Role of AI in Cybersecurity: Patrick talks about the integration of AI in cybersecurity, highlighting the development of AI-powered tools for secure coding and real-time risk assessment.
Key Takeaways:
Time Management and Focus
Patrick emphasizes the need for effective time management and focus, especially when balancing multiple responsibilities. He shares his strategies for prioritizing tasks and making the most of limited time.
Leveraging AI for Security
The potential of AI to transform cybersecurity practices, from automating code generation to enhancing real-time risk assessment. Patrick highlights the importance of staying updated with technological advancements and integrating them into security protocols.
Building Meaningful Relationships
While focusing on business, Patrick acknowledges the importance of maintaining personal relationships. He shares his journey of finding a balance between work and personal life, and the value of building a supportive network.
"Effective time management and continuous learning are key to success in both cybersecurity and entrepreneurship." — Patrick Kelly
Patrick Kelly, the CEO of Gratitech shares his journey from computer science major to CEO, offering invaluable advice on entrepreneurship, cybersecurity, and balancing professional and personal life. With a background in government, finance, and technology, Patrick provides a unique perspective on the challenges and rewards of being an entrepreneur in the cybersecurity field.
About Patrick Kelly:
With extensive experience in the financial and government sectors, Patrick Kelly has developed a reputation for his expertise in cryptography and secure coding. His entrepreneurial journey includes founding Gratitech and Cyber Armor AI, and he is dedicated to helping organizations secure their digital future.
In this episode, Thomas and Patrick discuss:
The Journey to Gratitech: Patrick shares his path from interning at the US District Court for Y2K preparation to holding senior technology roles at JPMorgan and Merrill Lynch. He discusses his transition to entrepreneurship and founding Gratitech, focusing on cybersecurity consulting and cryptography.
Balancing Side Hustles and Full-Time Work: Insights into how Patrick managed to balance his government job with side projects, eventually leading to the creation of his own company.
The Role of AI in Cybersecurity: Patrick talks about the integration of AI in cybersecurity, highlighting the development of AI-powered tools for secure coding and real-time risk assessment.
Key Takeaways:
Time Management and Focus
Patrick emphasizes the need for effective time management and focus, especially when balancing multiple responsibilities. He shares his strategies for prioritizing tasks and making the most of limited time.
Leveraging AI for Security
The potential of AI to transform cybersecurity practices, from automating code generation to enhancing real-time risk assessment. Patrick highlights the importance of staying updated with technological advancements and integrating them into security protocols.
Building Meaningful Relationships
While focusing on business, Patrick acknowledges the importance of maintaining personal relationships. He shares his journey of finding a balance between work and personal life, and the value of building a supportive network.
"Effective time management and continuous learning are key to success in both cybersecurity and entrepreneurship." — Patrick Kelly
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Speaker 1:
Welcome to the Never Been Promoted podcast with Thomas Helfrich. Get ready for a thrilling adventure as we uncover entrepreneurial journeys and life-changing business insights every week. And now your host, Thomas.
Speaker 2:
Welcome back to the Never Been Promoted podcast. We are here at least I am to unleash your entrepreneur. If this is your first time visiting, I hope it's the first of many and if you've been here before, thank you for returning. Our mission is to create a whole bunch of entrepreneurs in this world, and we want to make them better at entrepreneurship, better at life, and we're doing that through the stories of other entrepreneurs. Now I say that every time we have another very interesting young man here who is like a top 100 innovator in the world, or at least in Chicago. We know for sure Patrick Kelly. Patrick Kelly is the CEO of Gravitech and he's a cybersecurity expert and also an author. He is joining us and so, if you're listening, he's in a suit and tie, which I'm encouraging him to chop off, that tie, but he's not there yet. We'll get him, patrick. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you too. Thomas, thanks for having me. I really appreciate you coming on here. You dressed up. You're like by far the best dressed guest we've had so far.
Speaker 3:
I didn't know. I read the notes that said dress for success. I read that book a long time ago. It called out a maroon tie. It's more red.
Speaker 2:
I would call it a cranberry with little sprinkles in it. I'm being funny because I cut my tie off, which is you know? Yeah, so we're going to, we're going to. I'll do that in the future. You're going to like listen, you're, you're, you're on this podcast, You're in, you're in, you're in the group, You're in the inner circle now. So let's maybe just to set up the kind of the conversation.
Speaker 3:
Oh, okay, yeah. So I started as a computer science major here in Chicago at Loyola University. I got an internship at the US District Courts, so the federal courts here in Chicago, and that was Y2K preparation. That's a long time ago. I know it dates me, but it's okay, I'm not worried. So yeah, I developed their jury intake form. It was all paper so I made it digital for that and then after that I went around handing my resume around. I ended up going to JP Morgan. I was interning as a banking operations intern and then after that Merrill Lynch brought me in as a senior technology specialist. It took me a while to get that senior. It was like five years and I got that promotion to senior.
Speaker 2:
Well, you've been promoted. This interview is over. That's it. No, I'm kidding. You're allowed to be promoted to be on the show. It's an allowable offense.
Speaker 3:
It took a long time, though, so it was kind of like never being promoted.
Speaker 2:
Never been promoted means you never actually got promoted. So I'll tell you that is a long time. That's okay. It just means you're smart and you know how to do things. I couldn't do that, but please continue. I don't want to keep interrupting you.
Speaker 3:
Oh, but please continue, I don't want to keep interrupting you. Oh yeah, and then after that I got a job at a trading technology. They did derivatives options and futures trading software that most global futures financial firms use for trading. It was kind of like a small Silicon Valley in Chicago. They were rated like one of the best companies to work for for a while. And then I went to another place, societe Generale. It's a big bank in France and they had a subsidiary here in Chicago, like the Walmart of trade settlement for organizations. They do settlement. Basically they're a third party that guarantees what the traders say and what the exchanges say. They kind of settle that. They audit and affirm the truth between the two parties there.
Speaker 3:
After that I went to the Rail Retirement Board, a government agency in Chicago that manages like a $30 billion trust fund for the railroad workers in the US and Canada, and I started as a web developer there and it was you know I read a book called Living your Life with Passion and Purpose by Matthew Kelly back in 2006. And that's when I started to kind of like put all my efforts into programming, into developing. I started to really like encryption, decryption, cryptography. One of my first programs were were like encryption programs that would use hybrid encryption asymmetric, symmetric and could send emails using public, and could send emails using public cryptography like certificates as the method of encryption. So it makes it easier, you don't have to remember passwords, you just have a certificate. And I did that for a law firm on the side when I was working at the Real Retirement Board. And then I got a job in data management and started studying for predictive analytics at Northwestern University and at the same time I was asked to help with audit, a course on secure coding that SAMS System and Network Security Org was brought in for because they recognized the policy and compliance and CISO recognized that I was pretty good at what I was doing because most things aren't encrypted internally but my stuff was they saw the talent there or the skill, but it was a lot of practice.
Speaker 3:
I coded on the weekends, at night, I was doing side projects for, like, family and friends and other businesses, uh, earning a little extra there, uh, outside of work. And then, um, we had a audit of all our applications, all the vulnerabilities and the risk and the external web apps at the Railroad Retirement Board, the annuity estimators, everything that was, you know, outward facing and had public exposure and I participated in the secure coding standards there. And then they posted a position for an application security engineer and I was the one who got it. So I had like 200 developers I was helping do secure coding and auditing all their programs and writing code. If they couldn't write secure, developed a secret protection application inside the real retirement board that would encrypt credentials in their connection strings like to the IBM mainframe or to the SQL Server databases or anything that you'd have to store in your code but wanted it to be encrypted so someone couldn't see it and a hacker couldn't or an internal threat couldn't have that access that they shouldn't have.
Speaker 2:
I should probably have you on the AI Nerd channel. This is going to be good too, because you are full nerd on. Listen, I wear the nerd badge with the no, I wear the nerd badge with with pride, full on, and you get one as well. Sorry, you like it or not, you're in the nerd zone, which is good because they rule the world and they know how to hack things. But in your, in your journey here, you've done all these side hustles. When, when, when did you? So? Let me just kind of summarize that a bit. You know you have a lot of career in government, quasi-government and doing a ton of stuff around security, and just you've learned, you've. You know. The takeaway is you've found passions. You take, you know, and you didn't just sit around and you know, collect the check. You went out and did things on the side and you learned Because clearly it looked like you had an ambition to do more. When did you? What was your first company and when did you make the like? How did you make the shift?
Speaker 3:
My first company was 20, was actually when I was back at Merrill Lynch. I opened a company I called it a trauma. I was doing like cyber security consulting. I didn't really have any customers back then, but I closed it down. And then, 2017, when I started being an application security engineer for the government, I um, I found people that were coming to me, uh, outside, uh, that wanted help with their businesses. So I started a company called gratitech uh, based on you know the, acting grateful with the, with the experience and skills skills I have to help secure the digital future.
Speaker 3:
There was a company, precharge Risk Management Solutions, that had a plan to do an ICO on a cryptocurrency. So they needed help. They needed help and brought me in because I was good at cryptography. So Ralph Dahm was the CEO and they ended up selling the coin to NativeCoin N8. I think that's the symbol. So they ended up selling that like two years ago, but I was the CIO and CTO there for two years and migrated them off different exchanges, made sure that the token balance is all transferred over.
Speaker 3:
So that was my first customer was Ralph Dahm at Pre-Charged Risk Management and IT Audit. He had an IT Audit practice too, so I did some work for him and then that was while I was working full time at the rail retirement board. So I, you know when you can't double dip when you're in the government, so you have to take opportunities that are outside of the time that you have to work and they respect your personal life so they don't want you to work past six. So here you know, know I'd work in from, you know, maybe 6 am to 4 30, and then after that I come home and I do the do the side business, do the the entrepreneurial thing. I I gained another customer drone industry systems and participated with them for about two years in helping them with their technology patents for drone and drone mailboxes, smart drones, smart drone airports.
Speaker 2:
What did you learn in those first two? What was kind of your biggest takeaways? Because I think and the reason I ask is there's a lot of people in the world who want to become entrepreneurs. There's a lot of people who want to have a side hustle or start a business. Doing that is sometimes, you know, you got to give up some stuff right, so you got to, you know, to work two things. So maybe talk about what you gave up and some of the biggest learnings you had from just launching the side hustle.
Speaker 3:
So things I gave up were time personal time, time with friends and family.
Speaker 2:
Or uh time with friends and family. Uh that, uh, or you know, I I stopped watching tv completely that's a big one.
Speaker 3:
Read more, read more, practice, uh less and not hang out with friends. As much that was about I. I kind of cut a lot of things out just to make that extra time and then it paid off later on, you know, in terms of getting some really good customers like chub insurance, volvo, mac trucks were my first. Uh. Volvo and mac truck were my first customer, and then chub insurance. I worked with blackbaud, vericode uh, berkshire hathaway fannie mae for a year.
Speaker 2:
So you've a year, so you've had some big customers with that. Do you regret the time that you gave up with friends or family or just developing those relationships?
Speaker 3:
I think it's a sacrifice. I do feel a little. I think you could have managed it a little bit better, but I didn't know how else to do it, because I have ADD too, so I have to really focus. I had to cut out a lot of things, I had to stop. I think I should have kept in touch better with some friends no-transcript.
Speaker 2:
But you know that you have to focus. The problem with that is, as you know, is like sometimes you give up things in the moment. You're like it won't be that long, I'll go back out, and next thing you know, you stop getting invited and then you're seeing the FOMO on social media of, like man, why didn't I get to go on that trip with them? And then you got to. So I've had that moment, I know. You know, even with my, and part of what I love to kind of do in these interviews is, you know, is how did you deal with it and what have you done differently since?
Speaker 3:
So the way I've dealt with it since is that I realized that I've also grown and changed and I try to make friends with people who are kind of in similar lifestyle or reach out to people on LinkedIn that I've worked with in the past. A lot of my social network in, in and out of work is still work, uh, and that actually helps with business too a lot, and I feel like I have a lot more in common with people I'm I'm interacting with now than I had in the past. So it's kind of like a transition phase where at first I was like really regretful of the time I didn't spend with people, but then the ones that stick around, you know, are the ones that are still important enough to kind of have in your life and that weather the storms of life with you.
Speaker 2:
I find, though, having a network of acquaintances and people that are still tied around work is a very risky place to be because of the identity you put with your work and your success. And do you feel like and I ask this because I mean, I'm just being selfish, I don't know how you solved it, but I feel like that relationships they're not nearly as deep as some of the other ones, that when they sit outside of it and do you feel kind of that strain of hey, hey, this is really just a good acquaintance level, or are you, or do you buy into it more than you feel like you should, into those relations?
Speaker 3:
well, I've seen a lot of the acquaintance level too, and a lot of the ones before my life. I feel like work too, but now I feel like some, some of the the conversational I kind of call it conversational marketing. So, whereas I'll I'll reach out to people who might have partnership opportunities or or might be doing the same kind of thing that we can enhance each other's offerings Like one example is Stanley Feinstein from Project Remedies. He does a project management software. He's out of uh, los angeles, uh like palisades park, and he just had eye surgery the other day and you know I'm, I'm like I'm just texting, I'm, you know, sending a text.
Speaker 3:
I'm saying, hey, how's it going, are you healing? You know it's more like I, I I get a personal connection with some people, whereas you know it becomes comes acquaintances most of the time, like he said. But there are um, there are other opportunities. Like he was potentially going to use me in a dod contract that he had and we're still going through the security clearance portion of it. But I'm working on automated uh risk and control attestation. So, instead of pointing time where you get an auditor coming in, yeah, they're good this day.
Speaker 2:
It's ongoing.
Speaker 3:
So this is more like a continuous risk and control attestation.
Speaker 2:
With AI, in particular, you can do 100% sampling, so you can keep it real time. I'm going to come back to something, though, and as entrepreneurs, I was trying to find these reflection points right of what you can learn and not learn. I will tell you you, your passion for business is going to be well served if you do kind of and I love the idea of conversational marketing, which is you sincerely want to get to know people, to just build a personal relationship, acquaintances, people in the same space. It's it's not like philanthropy for profit, but it's almost like I'm getting to know you. We might do business, even not. I still enjoy it.
Speaker 2:
You're my, you're my friend network, but it is incredibly risky and uh, and people have this at work too, right. So I, you know, I've been there where I've really thought I had some friends at work, and then you lose your job and you never hear from anyone again, and this, this is um, as an entrepreneur, I don't want to call it a trap, but what I'd say is you have to develop some relationships, as you know, I think, that are for sure outside of your identity of work, and the reason is you're going to need them at some point, and they're going to need you.
Speaker 3:
Oh, yeah and yeah, I do, I have those. I'm working on that too no-transcript on nine. I think I'm gonna walk most of it.
Speaker 2:
It's harder to walk it you might as well jog it, because it's it's time out there. So you're right, you want to make sure you do, yeah, so you're doing so, health matters most of your.
Speaker 2:
So the idea of running and uh, which is, you know, obviously you get, I love running for the community piece of it, cause runners, you know, they like to have beers afterwards. They have a good time, they, they, they're all professionals cause they can find the time to do it. Um, I think that's great and brilliant. Um, but let me, let me pivot the conversation forward now. All right, so you have like four things going on, maybe not specifically the details what you're doing, but I, I, but, but as a just as an entrepreneur, what are like kind of your biggest challenges and how do you? And then how you're going about solving those right now, just just from the business, a lot of stuff going on. So talk to me about the time management.
Speaker 3:
Time management is the biggest, uh, biggest problem, but I think it's coming to a point with all like I study AI too. I study AI it's still in my master's program at Northwestern and using generative AI, that's more mainstream now and the scope and the ability, the awareness for some of the AIs out there now the generative AI like Gemini, google Gemini you can do a lot with that. That helps you save time, especially with programming too. It might not be able to write a whole program for you, but if you know the pieces you need and you know what you need in it, but you just might not have the time to type every letter or every symbol that it can help give you. Like, if you get to give it pseudocode, it can help write some of your code for you. It makes it makes time to production and also security a lot better.
Speaker 3:
And, um, yeah, it goes along with uh, one of the courses I'm teaching, uh, now it's a video course with um ec council called ai powered cloud defense. So we're basically taking, you know, all the logs and we're having AI analyze that based off of some model I built, flagging different events in that model attacks that are more, more complex but more prevalent now, especially with the news about, I think, mgm. I think that was one of the things with the mgm brand, uh well, tell me about that.
Speaker 2:
So I'm not up to maybe the speed or catch the audience up what you're talking about.
Speaker 3:
So, um, yeah, permiso, security had a great write-up about it a while back, maybe a couple months ago or maybe last fall, last winter and they ended up doing a session-based behavioral attack. So they steal credentials of an account that may have the rights they need but may not have used the instance or the cloud resources that they were using. So that would have been an indication that something's off. Say, if you've had access to create an EC2 instance but you haven't done one in two years in the cloud and then you finally start doing one, that'd be an indication that there's something going on there. They created serial port connections and we're doing a lot of command line Amazon command line scripts to distribute the malware around in the I forget the name of it. Now you know what Ransomware ransomware.
Speaker 2:
When you get to a certain age, your memory's going to be great, but short. Yeah, let me focus. So, listen, I think there's no doubt, if you have questions on like cybersecurity and how it like, I want to give you a moment Because I want you to tell the audience maybe who should get a hold of you and how. Just briefly, tell me that. And I want to pivot this conversation because I think you could really help a lot of entrepreneurs. Um, I've been there. You're in the, the entrepreneurial ADD of how you're making success when you know and I and we'll talk about this in detail me a little bit about how you're pulled away every second of the day in your mind and I and I get it, cause it's a wandering mind, um, but, but I want to give you the fair shot here because, like you've talked a ton about technology and and what you do. Well, I want, who do you want, to get a hold of you and how do they do that?
Speaker 3:
so I anyone who develops or uses ai tools. We're working on a application that will be a like intermediary, like a proxy or a web browser for generative ai, and I'm doing a development camp soon, this the spring, where developers or people that want to learn to code or know how to code they want to get their foot in the door. We're going to develop open source projects. It's a friend of mine who works at uh or studied at university, chicago is is doing this and I forgot the name of it's of the website.
Speaker 3:
But, um, if you need help with with securing credentials in your code in DevSecOps processes in AI, if you're storing your username and password outside of a password protection application, you can use it as either a SaaS service or you can download it locally and it will encrypt and decrypt your credentials for you and um. I'm going to be lowering prices soon because I've just been playing around prices. I haven't had many customers yet because I'm not really marketing well, but um, I think the add, if I go back to the add, uh, that application, it's a, it's an mvp called secrets and it's spelled with threes for the um, ease and that's almost like a beastie Boys reference 3ATM3.
Speaker 2:
Anyway, eat me. Do you guys remember that it was backwards on the album and it said eat me? I always wanted a license plate that said 3ATM3. Anyway, I'm going to give you another shot at this. We're going to help you with marketing. We're going to take that online. Since I own a marketing company, I'm going to help you focus this in. In 20 seconds, I want you to tell me how someone gets a hold of you and who should be it.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, they can go to gratitechcom, g-r-a-t-i-t-e-c-hcom or Cyber Armormor A-I, which is my software enterprise security software company Cyber S-C-Y-B-E-R-A-R-M-O-R dot A-I. We're looking at A-A powered cybersecurity solutions, right.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, so you want the people who need cybersecurity and what do you call it Credentials management of some sort, like where it's secure If you have troubles around you have issues or questions or just concerns around your credentialing either it be encrypted or where it's being used or how it's being used. You're a good consulting firm to start with, to kind of dive in the weeds with that.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, we can help you find unprotected credentials too, anyway.
Speaker 2:
So that's a short line I like that We'll help you find unprotected credentials too anyway. So that's a short line I like that. We'll help you find your unprotected credentials anywhere From a marketing hat. I'm going to throw that hat on. Actually, that hat never comes off. That is a really good one. That's a good line. We'll take that.
Speaker 2:
Now I'm going to pivot with you for two reasons. One, for an ADD brain that we both have. It's important to pivot. It is how are you like? You know time management. You said it's tough. You know you got to build relationships. I don't know. I feel this. So you can say no, I don't really have that, or not. But I'll autobiograph it here a minute. I find sometimes I'm okay with just chasing the things I want to do with work, because it brings an incredible amount of happiness and I've accepted my ideas kind of like somewhat wrapped up into it. But I find at times then the need for relationships it's not that it's surface level, but it's sometimes enough just because I'm supposed to do it, and I know that's a mistake, but I don't care in the moment. And so do you feel the same out there as well?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I feel the same way. It doesn't help that part of my ADD coping mechanism is to turn my phone on focus mode for like every minute of the day except between 11.59 and midnight, and then I turn off most notifications during the day when I'm working.
Speaker 2:
So I put 100% in work by hundred percent in my phone is always on. Do not disturb, my wife gets so mad at me Cause she's like will you pick up your phone? I'm like she's the only one can punch through, but then the volume's down. I'm like I just don't want to. You know I'm with you on this. Like I massive distraction that I feel like it's an advantage. When I have it, I use it when I want it, like it's at my be a beck and call.
Speaker 3:
I am not at it, for sure yeah, and I try to take breaks when I can to check, instead of having it be like pavlov's dog, where you're just every time it dings, you're like but yeah, I do set. I set alarms for when I should eat, when I should you know work out sometimes, and then when I should check on my daughters. I have three daughters I lock them up.
Speaker 2:
Sometimes it's two, three days ago.
Speaker 3:
Shit, I haven't fed them the, the dogs will let you know, though that's true, you know they, they bark, but now they bark. Are you married? I'm divorced.
Speaker 2:
Divorced. Okay, I'm single now.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, seven years now.
Speaker 2:
So seven years divorced, you got your three little precious daughters. Those are the ones that you just can't shortchange. Focus mode goes out the window when they're around, I'm sure.
Speaker 3:
Oh yeah, it does, and they're so busy now it's hard to get time with them. It's like, guys, I haven't seen you for like three weeks now, are you still gonna? They're traveling with all the extracurriculars and stuff like that. I I try to go as much as I can because I'm remote too, uh, but it's hard to get a text back sometimes because they're so busy and heaven forbid, they have the same.
Speaker 2:
Uh, you know, draw to what they're into and then you're like, oh, I'm left out now, that's so. So I and I'm not trying to pick into a piece, cause I know you probably didn't see this going, but I will tell you. If you think about how podcasts are used in marketing people getting to know you, the marketing conversation but they truly understand and identify with you the struggles that you're having with family You've been through a divorce now, which is so many entrepreneurs. You're trying to make it work and make it happen and at the same time, there's always a sawtooth of revenue. What's next? Everyone gets all that.
Speaker 2:
I think if you talk about how you're dealing with some of the challenges, that kind of work internally against you. If you only had more time, if you only had like, like, if this one thing would happen. I struggle with the exact same thing and I got to tell you I don't have an answer. I just know that it's a huge struggle to keep focused on the thing that makes money sometimes, but also to know is that enough and can I make it more efficient and why do I keep getting drawn off to this or that? An example, by the way, is this podcast?
Speaker 2:
This podcast is something, because I wrote a book, because I wanted to be able to explain to my kids what it was to build a thing, and here it is. It's exploded, with 400,000 people already in YouTube, and I'm like, oh shit, I don't need another distraction. A real one, that's a real distraction. That's something I have to. I'm asking you this because I I'm in the same boat. So, I think, just a conversation around how we're dealing with it. I think a lot of people, a lot of people deal with it, and some are more open about it than others, and so I mean, I look forward to you on that but like you say, yeah, as you get more seasoned in business, things become easier in the business world.
Speaker 3:
But then I think you can kind of focus a little bit more on your relationships and parts that are suffering, you know, and schedule those out. I never used to schedule my time with my friends.
Speaker 2:
You have to. If it's not on the calendar, it doesn't exist right, yeah, not calendly.
Speaker 3:
I'll send calendly to someone I might want to go on a date with.
Speaker 2:
I'm going to tell you right now you are setting a tone that's not so romantic. Hey, why don't you just go and pick a time for us for you Schedule? Okay, we're going to have to have a guru on for you.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I need some help with that. I do seek coaching, so I seek advice. And I do seek coaching, so I seek advice and I do like leverage, like lead, um marketing. Uh, I kind of outsource some of the marketing. Yeah, Then, um, some of the I get coaching from, uh, Mike Moss dollar and uh, JT Fox, uh who, JT is great at sales and Mike's like an operations guru and kind of like helps me bring things down to from the like high tech speak to down to like normal. Yeah, he's, he brought the pink pep in from like 100 million to billion and secret Victoria's Secrets and now he's a consultant at BB.
Speaker 2:
Growth and that's why your thing's named Secret with a three. Yeah, maybe it was no connection there. Yeah, no, no. But listen, I think that's actually a good point. So I know when I built my companies, if I was on the hook for delivery, it fails 100%. It's not my sweet spot and so from day one before I offered a thing out there, I made sure the parts I know I was going to fail out I I just didn't. I had it in place to do 100 and it sounds like you're getting the right coaching to get you focused. Where you know you start losing the rails or lose, and probably it's not even really using the rails because you know you can do it, we have zero interest and no matter what fuel you put into that, it's not going to be high enough to actually go do it.
Speaker 3:
yeah, and right now I'm interviewing some sales guys and sales engineers, some guys I've worked with in the past who want to do it only so it helps when, when you're not funded yet or you're working off whatever you make. If you can get people to help you, uh, and do things like take over demos for customers or, uh, take over the sales prospecting, that helps a lot. And some people do it fractionally, so it's not a big dent. They're bringing in business so they can take a cut of that.
Speaker 2:
Well, no, it's your cost of sales go to zero and it's just your job, which you probably do very well, which I find a lot of individuals like ourselves who so you probably do very well to develop an account because you should get, you get so into it. The people see the you know, the intensity, the passion, the love for what you're doing. They're like we got to get this guy more work because this guy kicks ass. It doesn't become scalable because you're sometimes the linchpin in.
Speaker 2:
You just got to go replicate your underling, to go execute something you see and then you know but, this is the comfort thing that I struggle with, and I think you probably have this too, I'd have to guess. You get it so big and you get kind of stuck because you get unscaled, because you're such a linchpin in so many things. The question is, can you just get comfortable being like that?
Speaker 3:
But you do know, in the back, of your head like I don't want to do this when I'm 50s, 60s, so I got to scale it and like how the hell am I getting out of this? Yeah, and that's what I asked for, my advice from my coaches Listen to podcasts that help, like this.
Speaker 2:
Well, you're on one right now that's talking about that. I'll tell you what this is. What we talk about, because I think identifying the problem and we've had some people on here that are experts in this, and I will tell you that making sure that your processes are documented and you get to the point where your brand and your delivery is so systemized you might be in a closing role, or your digital version of you might be, and that's a step I know we've taken. It's really helped me. It's uncomfortable a little bit because you're kind of like. You don't feel like you lose touch with the customer. You're worried about them leaving more often, but if they're there and they're getting their value, you're probably in the right spot.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, and you feel like communication channels open for feedback growth opportunities. That's right. That helps a lot.
Speaker 2:
So what's so? So you, what I find are there's usually three things that work together. So tell me, high level, the three parts of your business. You said you're an author, you have the Cyber Armor and you have the Gravitech right. Do they all three work together from a business standpoint?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, they work together. So Gravitech is more professional services consulting for large organizations that need help with their application security architecture or application security program security coding, security architecture or application security program security coding. And then Greta Tech also does like coaching, so I do coaching through that. So there's a link on my website. You can, you can I leave it to whatever you need like if it's if it's like generative AI or if it's cyber or application security, or if you need help with ideas for innovation or basically anything coaching technology wise. And then CyberArmored also does the software. So Gratitech supports with a maintenance contract for CyberArmored for the secret software, secret protection software. And then the third one is Gratitech Research and Charitable Endeavor Corporation. It's a mouthful but it's basically like a nonprofit that produces open source software that we can bring into. It's almost like the open AI concept, but not as well funded either and not owned by Microsoft.
Speaker 2:
Not yet.
Speaker 3:
Not yet. So yeah, I open sourced the software I developed through Grad Tech Research and Charitable Endeavor Corporation and then I can customize it or bring it in based on the license the license that is distributed through um. I can customize and make it better and also support that as well, if people need help with that sounds like your dogs just ate your, uh, your children, because they were hungry my children are not home.
Speaker 2:
Well, not now they've been eaten, because the dogs ate them. Um, let's, uh, uh, give the. What's their words? The. You know. I want to just conscious of time. I want Now they've been eaten, because the dogs ate them. What's their words? I want to just conscious of time. I want to make sure people know how to get a hold of you. Do you want them to go to gravitechcom or LinkedIn? What's the main place for you to get?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, linkedin is a good place, or gravitechcom G-R-A-V-I-T-E-C-Hcom.
Speaker 2:
How do people get a hold what E, c, hcom, how do people? How do people get a whole like what do they do? Should they do you have like a 30 minute assessment or what's the kind of the way they start with you?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, so I have a. I have like a 15 minute intro or like an intro call and just to see you know what are their challenges, what can I help them with, you know? And and if I Can't, Can I recommend or refer someone?
Speaker 2:
else. Now, guys, if you're just watching this and me watching, he looks like Mike from Suits. So what calendar link should people who are interested in going on a date with you? What should they use?
Speaker 3:
They should use the 15-minute.
Speaker 2:
You can do a little screening on your dates as well, like, look, you can have business or dates, I'm open to both at this point.
Speaker 3:
So the consulting ones have like a credit card application.
Speaker 2:
What kind of business are you running here? We've determined that Patrick Kelly is potentially a pimp we don't know or a gigolo we don't know.
Speaker 3:
No, I can't use that for dates, only the free ones.
Speaker 2:
Only the free ones. Okay, that's very good. Patrick, thank you so much for coming on here. I really appreciate you for sharing, you know, some, some of the inner workings of how you think and do, and I and I, I really do mean like, uh, the more you share on that, the more you're going to help other entrepreneurs because you've battled through it, Right, I mean you're and you still will battle through it and you will forever, as I will, um, anybody else and and uh, it's really helpful. It really is just to have other people talk about it and knowing that I'm not the only one that experiences this, because God knows that that's exactly how you think when you're in the, when you're by yourself and you've realized I haven't talked or seen anyone in a week, it's a horrible feeling. In that moment, You're like it's Friday and I'm working and you take mistake of checking your phone at 7. Pm and you're like damn. And you're like damn it, what am I doing home?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I do recommend a stand-up desk. It doesn't help with your exercise.
Speaker 2:
I like to get fatter. If you listen carefully, you can hear me getting fatter. It's great, patrick, thank you so much for joining. We'll have all your stuff in the show notes and anybody who's made it to this part of the podcast I really appreciate. You Get a hold of Patrick, you know, have a conversation from from his expertise in just technology and cybersecurity, or you know credentials and and read some of this as content it's going to. I assure you it's going to be incredibly detailed and helpful, but you know, if you've made it this point, once again, thank you, and if this was your first time, I do hope you come back and learn some more from another entrepreneur. Until we all meet again. Thank you so much for listening to the Never Been Promoted podcast and get out there and go unleash your entrepreneur.
Speaker 1:
Thanks for listening to Never Been Promoted with Thomas Helfrich. Make sure to check the show notes for our guest contact information and any relevant links. Connect with Thomas personally at neverbeenpromotedcom.
