In 2018, five years after exiting KashFlow, I found myself advising several SaaS companies. Among their needs was a requirement for a web-based payroll solution with a truly comprehensive API—something that I was surprised to discover didn’t seem to exist.

Driven by a mix of curiosity and boredom one afternoon, I decided to have a go myself. How hard could it be? It didn’t matter if it went nowhere – I was just curious as to what the challenges were.

Eighteen months later, I looked up from my laptop having created and launched Staffology Saas Payroll and grown a customer base spanning from small accounting firms to large tech platforms.

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Originally posted on LinkedIn.
Larger firms in the industry were seeing the traction and were ‘reaching out’. There was clearly a big opportunity here, but I knew the level of effort and sacrifice it would take to deliver on that potential independently. So I decided to explore some of the options to take it to a ready-made home.

Just before Christmas 2020, IRIS Software Group acquired Staffology, providing it with resources for commercial growth and the depth of knowledge (and pocket!) for feature expansion.

I was a free man after a year with the earn-out having been completed. But I decided to stay longer as I was intrigued by how larger software companies work in contrast with the world of start-ups that I’m more familiar with. My time at IRIS also gave me the opportunity to see some of the M&A process from the buy-side, after four sell-side experiences.

The ongoing development of the software has been managed by others for quite a while now, with my focus having been on scaling up the volume it can handle. And with IRIS now transitioning all its payroll users to Staffology, establishing it as their primary platform, there is a feeling of “Mission Accomplished”. So it seems the right time to be moving on.

Remarkably, one in five employees in the UK will soon have their payroll processed through Staffology.

The platform’s journey from concept to perhaps the largest and most capable in the UK has been extraordinary, involving countless contributors. Far too many to mention them all individually, but special recognition and gratitude is due to Fran Williams and Chaitanya Deshpande, whose exceptional efforts have been pivotal in that journey.

So, what next?

I’m more interested in contributing to the growth of an existing B2B SaaS business rather than starting from scratch. So I’m currently exploring a few opportunities and am open to discovering more.

But failing that, I think there are still lots of opportunities out there to continue to innovate in this space so perhaps I will get bored and curious again. A dangerous combination.