3. 54 connect
Sometimes a story of triumph
over great adversity crosses our path.
Michael Proper’s story is too great to
pass up. When he was only 10 years old,
his mother dropped him off at a state-
run daycare facility and didn’t come
back. From there, Proper moved from
foster home to foster home, struggling
to understand his new reality as a young
child. He was separated from his siblings
and left to fend for himself on numerous
occasions. Despite overwhelming
circumstances, Proper found a love for
life and learned to emulate the positive
attributes and qualities found within
different role models in his youth. When
the state of California emancipated him
at age 16, he found himself hitching a
ride from Southern California to Payson,
Utah. He survived on manual labor jobs
ranging from digging trenches to
carrying hod.
Now, more than 10 years later,
Proper has launched DirectPointe
(www.directpointe.com), a successful
Information Technology Management
company. As Founder, President and CEO
of a company that has experienced over
200 percent growth each year since its
inception in 2000, Proper has proven the
possibility of overcoming the greatest
of challenges.
These days, Proper visits local high
schools to tell his amazing story and
to give his lecture, coined the “Proper
Perspective,” to ambitious young
students. Five years ago, Proper was
reunited with his mother and is now
in contact with all his siblings. His
forgiveness and grace are just a few
of the qualities that have shaped his
outstanding character.
connect was privileged to meet with
Proper to recount his journey on the road
to success. What we discovered was a
family man filled with humility who is
eager to give back to the community and
to offer opportunity whenever possible.
connect: How has your background
shaped your perspective?
Michael Proper: If there’s anything I want
to get across, it would be that we’re all
equal. The only thing that separates us is
the knowledge that we gain throughout
our time on Earth, the decisions we make
with that knowledge and our underlying
attitude towards life. When I was growing
up, I went through a lot of different things
related to turmoil. Some people look at
it as a negative experience, but I was
able to gain a lot of positive things from
it. Early on, I realized that life is hard for
everybody. I think that’s one of the things
that prepared me to make the decisions
I’ve made.
connect: Where did you get your
background and experience
with technology?
MP: In 1991 I found myself in Payson,
Utah living off manual labor jobs in pretty
much every different industry. One day,
it was just like a light came on. I found
myself carrying cinderblocks to some
masons. I stopped, looked at them and
thought, “I do not want to live my life
like this.”
Two weeks later I found myself in
Colorado working with a guy who left
Xerox and started his own business
called Veritas Solutions. I was the first
guy on board and I didn’t even know how
to turn a computer on. Veritas Solutions
was a consulting firm servicing small to
medium sized businesses, implementing
technology and applications. I worked
with him for about two years, making
peanuts, yet gaining an invaluable
education about why and how companies
use technology. From there, I wanted
to come back to Utah. I went to work for
a guy who owned a small technology
business. I worked on a 100 percent
commission basis. For every dollar of
gross profit I made the company, I would
make 20 cents. I was a young punk
kid, but I found my self being able to
understand what our customers’ needs
were and found ways to solve them that
created real value for our customers. The
customer base continued to grow. Over
the next five years we grew the company
from $100,000 in revenue to over $10
million with less than 12 employees.
connect: What made you decide to
start DirectPointe?
MP: I learned a lot from helping to grow
the two previous companies. I had made
a lot of money — for a young punk kid
that is. For me, life is about doing the
things I know I should be doing at the
right time. I saw the market and I saw the
model. Walking away from the previous
company was hard for me because I
spent five years helping to grow the
business and could honestly say I grew
to love my teammates and really enjoyed
working with them. But I left because
the DirectPointe business model had
too much potential and needed to start
from scratch — a fresh base. Standards,
centralization and economies of scale
were a must if it was to be successful.
My wife and I made a conscious
decision to invest a certain amount of
time and money to build something
and see it grow. From my perspective,
this business was based on adding real
long-term value. DirectPointe is a billion-
dollar business.
connect: How was DirectPointe
initially funded?
MP: I started with my own savings. After
that, every other month I would hire a
management team member. Each one
invested their own money — which is a
big deal. It meant they were 100 percent
committed. We ended up with a team
that is personally invested and really
cares about the company. After that, we
found 10 angel investors and completed a
$250,000 angel round in 2000.
Currently, I am still heavily involved
Having a caring team with members
in the right positions is what makes
the most sustainable difference when
starting and growing a company.
4. 56 connect
in each hiring process and decision.
We are up to 56 employees so far, and
I am convinced it’s important that our
employees are not only skilled and
educated, but also that they truly care
about the company and its customers.
Having a caring team with members
in the right positions is what makes
the most sustainable difference when
starting and growing a company.
connect: What services does DirectPointe
offer its customers?
MP: DirectPointe offers a full suite of
managed computing services that can
handle up to 100 percent of a company’s
computing needs for a consistent monthly
fee. Our primary offering is targeted at
small and mid-sized businesses and
includes all of the needed equipment,
software, management and support.
Our clients don’t have to spend large
sums of money upfront to properly
outfit their companies with the needed
computing infrastructure or hire any IT
staff members. We handle everything
for them. What really makes us unique
is that we provide one point of contact
to prevent “finger pointing” between
vendors, and everything is included in the
client’s monthly fee. Service providers
have traditionally sold their services
based on billable hours. While this may
have been the only feasible option in
the past, it creates a potential conflict
of interest with their clients. If a client
encounters more problems, the service
provider makes more money. What is
the motivation to do it right the first time
and minimize future problems? With
our model, we have a common goal with
our clients. We are very sensitive to our
clients’ productivity and spend 3-5 weeks
planning the deployment of our solutions.
By planning in advance and completing
much of the configuration work at
our facilities, we minimize the impact
of a change to a client’s computing
environment. After the planning phase
and configuring the environment, we
deploy our solution over a weekend.
Our clients can leave their offices on a
Friday and come back on a Monday with
all of their systems ready to go. We even
migrate all of their data files to the new
systems. We enable our clients to have
everything set up right the first time
without having to make a significant
investment upfront. We average all
the costs, including the hardware,
over a three-year period to make it as
affordable as possible. The average fee
is around $150 per user for our complete
solution that provides all of the computer
equipment, software, and services.
Large companies can afford to keep IT
personnel on staff. Smaller companies,
however, can’t justify the expense of
just one internal IT employee let alone
hire the multiple experts needed for the
various areas of technology focus. At
DirectPointe, you pay the same monthly
fee and receive unlimited support from
a full team of technology experts. If you
have a problem, you push a button, type
in your question and it routes to the most
proficient technician. You get a faster
response and resolution, 24 hours a day.
We have implemented very specific
standards for all of our customers
ranging from the installation, operating
systems, hardware, software, virus
protection, remote back-up, remote
monitoring, messaging and security
processes. This allows us to limit our
knowledge base for faster problem
resolution to ensure our clients are
more productive than our competitors’
clients. It’s about standardization and
centralization. We do it all from here. It’s
like what Ford did with automobiles; the
automobile had been invented and the
need for individual transportation was
there, but it wasn’t really affordable. Ford
basically streamlined the process, used
some structural processes and the best
technology. That’s essentially what we’re
doing to automate the way technology
services are delivered. We believe our
offering is a disruptive service in a new
market. Currently, we are delivering the
service in all 50 states and 7 countries.
connect: What kind of competition does
DirectPointe have, and what makes
DirectPointe better?
MP: There are four other companies
in the US that provide similar types
of services. The way that we deliver
the solution enables our customer
satisfaction levels to be higher than
most companies that deliver IT types of
services. Our average eSupport response
time in 2004 was 18 seconds and the
average time to resolution was about
27 minutes.
DirectPointe wants to be better than
any other business in the world at one
thing — managing the IT lifecycle. That’s
what we’re in the business to do: quantify
costs associated with managing the
IT lifecycle. Our tools and systems are
such that we can manage, protect, and
support our customers remotely; utilizing
centralization, standardization and
economies of scale, we can manage IT
better and cheaper than our clients can
internally — with or without an existing
IT staff.
connect: What are your future plans
for DirectPointe?
MP: Like I said before, this business
is a billion-dollar business. We’ve had
multiple offers to be acquired, which
we have declined. It’s a matter of proper
execution and delivery. Continuing to help
build this business is my goal for the near
future. In all reality, I see myself in this
type of business for a long time. There
will come a time when it will be right
and the timing will make sense, at which
point I’m sure DirectPointe will
find some type of liquidity event for
our shareholders.
connect: Do you have any words of
wisdom for aspiring entrepreneurs?
MP: You must learn to identify a problem
and then solve it. A good entrepreneur
should be a good leader and one who
understands he or she serves those
they lead. Surround yourself with smart,
caring and dedicated teammates. Make
sure that everyone is focused on the
same goal and that there are simple
ways to measure the progress toward
that goal. Create balance in your life.
Value your time. You never know when
your time will run out. Devote yourself to
continuing to gain knowledge and make
wise decisions based upon the knowledge
you gain. Use your mind — it is the secret
to success! Always believe in yourself.
Work hard and never give up! fin
