In Episode #307 of Catching Up with CUB, Daniel sits down with CUB member Rob Pisano, co-founder of Appliers.AI and founder of Next Fulfillment, to explore what it takes to build a business that runs without you.
After a career in enterprise software with Oracle and Vlocity, where he opened the Australian office of the Silicon Valley startup later acquired by Salesforce, Rob traded corporate life for entrepreneurship. He scaled a global fashion e-commerce business to a quarter of a million orders, then founded Next Fulfillment in 2020, growing it from a 1,000 square metre site in Tullamarine to multiple warehouses, the largest spanning 30,000 square metres.
Daniel and Rob unpack why so many founders hit a ceiling when every decision runs through them, how EOS took Rob from being the bottleneck to spending 90 minutes a week with his leadership team, and why getting the right people in the right seats remains the hardest part of any system.
They also discuss what Silicon Valley gets right about scaling, why leaders sometimes need to let their team make the wrong call, and why Rob believes AI only amplifies what's already there, good or bad.
A practical conversation on building a business that doesn't depend on you, and getting the foundations right before AI.
Daniel HakimHost