About Dave Baldwin

My Story

In 1996, I started my career assembling circuit boards with a soldering iron, working my way into automated control systems. In 2002, in between jobs and completing my bachelor's degree, I took a summer job selling kitchen knives. The job took me way out of my comfort zone and planted a seed that would later play a pivotal role in the development of my business. It was my first attempt at trying and failing to make myself act like an extravert. I then began to realize how valuable it could be if someone would create a selling system for an introvert like me.

In 2007, I left the technology field, packed my bags, and moved to Raleigh, North Carolina, where I would launch my first attempt at self-employment. I went to every networking group I could find and promoted myself as a writer. I'd recently taken a creative writing course and felt spurred on by the encouragement of several classmates who said I would do well as a professional writer.

I spent a lot of time and money taking business courses and workshops, not to mention hotel rooms and plane tickets. But every time, I came home disappointed, finding that I still did not feel equipped to build my business. Most of the advice I heard was the same. I heard lots of tips and tricks for how to act more like an extravert, but nothing that honored the truth of who I really was. I found that most sales systems were cookie-cutter and were designed for someone else. I struggled to apply them because they didn't fit me.

My initial business efforts failed because I lacked the toolbox and the skill set to build a business. Formal schooling had trained me to follow directions and stay in my lane. I hadn't learned to navigate the ambiguity of running a business. For the next 13 years, I conducted a lot of different experiments to find the elusive formula for launching a business, while taking a variety of different jobs to support myself, including but not limited to delivering pizzas, driving for Uber, freelance writing, fixing copying machines, and working part-time as a copywriter for several marketing agencies.

In 2020, after several years of working full-time as a bookkeeper, I realized that I enjoyed helping business owners develop a clearer picture of their finances. I realized that most business owners didn't have a great way to gauge the financial health of their companies, and that standard accounting reports were inadequate for day-to-day business management. I saw an opportunity to build a better kind of business operating system.

Values and Philosophy

Respect the people you work with or don't work with them.

Invest in people or send them on their way.

If someone needs a babysitter, hire someone else.

If the right people aren't following the system, you have the wrong system.

Performance is measured by math, not feelings.

No moving the goalposts.

No secrets about how much anyone gets paid or how much the company is making.

Every job has one owner.

Every team member has a path to career advancement.

Actively seek out disagreement and don't move forward until challenged.