Róbert Dusík and Marek Greško (CEOs, TITANS Group): From Programming to Market Leader

How Titans began

Martin Brath: Alright, welcome to our podcast, everyone. Our guests today are Marek Greško and Róbert Dusík from Titans Freelancers. Welcome, guys. Hi.

Marek Greško and Róbert Dusík: Hi, thanks for inviting us. Hi, hello.

Martin Brath: I'm really glad you came. Titans Freelancers is the market leader in providing IT professionals for specific projects. What interests me is that you've been in business for almost twelve years, as of March. You both started as developers. Marek, and Robo, you were a Java developer in Vienna. Were you already freelancing at that point?

Marek Greško: I went through several positions. I was a developer, analyst, project manager, and team leader, so I experienced a number of roles within IT.

Martin Brath: Good. You started twelve years ago. Marek, you approached Robo to help you, or perhaps to place him on a particular project. Tell us how it all began.

Marek Greško: It began with Robo and me knowing each other through our wives. The saying that there's a woman behind everything applies twice over to us, because our wives brought us together. We were good friends. I went to Robo's bachelor party, and he went to mine. Alongside freelancing, I had a small company building websites. I was already trying to bring Robo into that, because we got along well and I knew he was a talented Java developer with a good head on his shoulders. But he wasn't particularly interested in that first business because he had a very good job as a Java developer in Vienna. It was good there. It was good. It all started when I wrote to him about an open Java developer position. I couldn't remember whether it was in Vienna. It was in Vienna. And I asked whether we could meet and talk about it. At that point, the company was basically just me. There were no recruiters or anyone else. I tried to start with people I knew well and clients where I'd worked as a developer or had some history. Robo and I met upstairs in the food court at Centrál. It was over lunch, and I began explaining the position. Robo said: great, thanks, but what would you say if I joined the business and we ran it together? That's how it started. We agreed on the basic terms and put together our first business plan in Excel: what we wanted to achieve and what would make us satisfied. Then we followed it. Very simple.

Martin Brath: Do you still have that spreadsheet? Do you remember the numbers?

Marek Greško: We might be able to find it somewhere. I remember the target: if we had ten freelancers on projects, five each, we'd be perfectly happy. That was the trigger in the business plan for leaving our jobs. While we were starting and running Titans, Robo was still working in Vienna and I was working for another company in Slovakia.

Martin Brath: But you didn't have any management experience at that point?

Róbert Dusík and Marek Greško: Nothing significant. I only had experience from working as a project manager and team leader.

Leaving secure jobs and starting lean

Martin Brath: So, two capable, ambitious developers with goals, but also families: wives waiting at home, and children already there or on the way. That was quite a business risk. How did you handle it at home? Were they okay with it?

Róbert Dusík: Our families weren't large yet, so it affected our partners more than the families as a whole. I don't want to call it a problem, but if anyone felt the impact most, it was our partners. When we started, I didn't have children, but my wife became pregnant. A pregnant wife with a growing belly and us with a growing business can be quite a challenge. We were clear about it, though, and we had their support. They knew it would take time and effort and wouldn't come for free. In the morning, we went to our regular jobs, I went to Vienna, and when we got home, we worked on Titans. We opened the second laptop and started. But Marek and I weren't just heading out aimlessly. We didn't start contacting clients and candidates with nothing in place. We began by building the company's structure. What does structure mean when there are only two of you? Do we have a website or not?

Róbert Dusík: Without a website, you don't exist. So Marek programmed the website in the evenings, and I programmed our database for the candidates we would eventually have. Meanwhile, we prepared CV templates and all the foundations so that, when we offered something, we looked like an existing company. You don't want to contact a client who searches for you on Google and finds nothing. It was an intense period. At first, starting the business wasn't about selling, because we still had jobs. We kept them so we could pay the mortgage and support our families without being under pressure to generate business immediately. We didn't want to leave our jobs and depend entirely on business we didn't yet have. After a year, or a little less, we began making our first approaches to people: my friends in IT, Marek's friends in IT, and clients, trying to connect them. That happened in the evenings too, mostly by email.

Róbert Dusík: Once those first matches started happening, we said we'd probably need an office. We started looking for premises in Bratislava. How long did it take? I think it took a year before we handed in our notice.

Marek Greško: Definitely about a year, as I remember it. I know aspiring entrepreneurs who feel they have to start big, with impressive premises and an investor. But Robo and I had families, mortgages, loans, all the responsibilities of an ordinary Slovak household. We needed some security because the business wasn't bringing anything in yet. Still, it can all be done with determination and the right setup. For a year we had no office, but client meetings and freelancer interviews still had to happen, so we were very creative. For clients, we'd say: no problem, we'll come to you so you don't have to travel. That solved one side of it. On the other side, when we needed to meet a freelancer in Bratislava, sometimes the client had no office there because they were based elsewhere so we'd say: let's meet at a restaurant. We sat in Panta Rhei, cafés, McDonald's, all kinds of places, until we were absolutely convinced that the business was earning enough, even though it still wasn't matching our IT salaries, and had enough potential for us to leave our jobs safely. Of course, even then there was fear. We were fathers: Robo had a child on the way, and I already had one. You worry about what will happen if things go wrong.

Róbert Dusík: On the other hand, we knew we were IT people and hadn't lost touch with the field. If it didn't work out, finding work wouldn't be a problem, especially then. We started in 2013, around five years after the major economic crisis of 2008. Those five years had been difficult. There's a parallel with the current situation: something has been happening for two years, and we don't know what it is. In four years, time will tell whether it was a crisis or not. Back then, we were starting during a recovery. Investment was returning. We weren't worried about finding IT jobs because demand was enormous. Projects were starting, there were EU funds and lots of public-sector projects, the operational program for informatizing Slovakia. People were talking about building a land registry portal. Incidentally, twelve years have passed, and now we have no land registry at all [reference retained from the recording]. Some records are still on floppy disks in storage, or on paper. We knew that whatever happened, we could still program. But something I particularly value is that we decided there would be no business mortgage, bank loan, or borrowing. Still, let's not pretend we didn't invest a huge amount. We invested our time. Our big advantage was being developers. Other companies starting out would have to pay someone to build a website, and that isn't cheap. Someone would also have to build the entire database system. That doesn't happen for nothing either. It cost us time rather than cash, but nobody can give you back those evenings and nights until one or two in the morning. That was our investment. It was great that, as IT people building a business for IT people, we could create Titans' entire IT infrastructure ourselves.

Martin Brath: In the end, the return was worth it. You mention your time, but there was also an opportunity cost: you could have been programming for someone else for money.

Marek Greško: Yes, of course. Money came into it too. As I said, when we left our jobs, we weren't yet earning what we'd earned as developers. So we invested time and the income we could have had by staying. Another fun fact: for the first three or four years after founding Titans, we didn't take out a single cent in dividends or anything like that. We lived on savings and very little money. Our business isn't difficult to establish, but the first major obstacle is cash flow. With 270 people on projects in Slovakia and another 130 or so in the Czech Republic, you need enormous cash resources. Every month freelancers typically have payment terms of fifteen or thirty days, while the clients we work with have sixty or ninety days. Sometimes a person joins a three-month project, we pay them three times, and they finish before we've received anything from the client. That's why we needed to accumulate and retain money in the company. Even if we could have paid ourselves and bought something, we said no, we'll wait. It was a very good decision. Cash flow often limited the business, because we needed money to pay people before receiving payment from clients.

Róbert Dusík: Not to mention hiring your first employees, who don't immediately translate into profit. Hiring someone doesn't mean they generate profit in the first month. We're talking about back-office roles, but you need help if you want to reduce your own workload. Again, it hits cash flow. What Marek said is important: we took nothing out because every cent went straight back into developing the business.

Martin Brath: You mentioned wanting to leave your jobs. How long had you been thinking about it? Most entrepreneurs want to work for themselves. Having to return to employment would probably have disappointed you. Had you wanted to be entrepreneurs, to be your own bosses, for a long time?

Marek Greško: Everyone will have their own story. I'd been thinking about it for a while. After university, I went to Prague for about two years, working as a developer, analyst, and project manager. Then I returned to Slovakia because of my girlfriend. Paradoxically, I'd moved to the Czech Republic and found a Slovak girlfriend, so I came home. That's when I first began thinking about having my own company. I felt the company I worked for was holding me back, and I think Robo had a similar experience. You do tasks you don't fully agree with, sometimes working harder than you should. In that role, I worked twelve- and fourteen-hour days, woke up at night thinking about work, and put a huge amount into it without being paid enough for what I was doing. I was losing my time too, working weekends and very long hours. I thought: I'd like to start a business. I wanted more money, more time, and more freedom to realize my ideas. Those were the three drivers. Before that, I had the tiny website company, my first attempt at entrepreneurship. Looking back, I thought about it for perhaps four years, but always with the fear: what if it fails? What if I don't earn enough? What about the family, the mortgage, the loan? I remember my mother-in-law buying us a lawnmower. We were finishing the fence, living the ordinary life of a Slovak family.

Róbert Dusík: When we first sat down to discuss Titans, I was in my fourth year in Vienna. I'd never had another job. I'd gone through an eight-year grammar school, without a ninth year because it didn't exist then, then five years at university, and straight to Vienna. Four years is long enough to know whether what you're doing is something you want to do long term. I enjoyed programming and database optimization. But I could look at my older colleagues and picture myself. Titans is twelve years old, and I turn forty this year, so I was about twenty-six when we started. Another four or five years earlier, I was roughly twenty-one when I joined the company, a young rookie with no real experience. I worked for Generali, at its European development center in Vienna. Around me were experienced colleagues in their thirties and mid-thirties. At twenty-one, I thought: this isn't a bad job. It pays very well, salaries were adjusted for inflation, and the working hours were comfortable. I'd come in, finish my work, leave, and nobody hassled me. But would I still be sitting at a computer writing code in ten years? I couldn't quite accept that idea. I wanted to stay in IT and work more with people, but not write code forever. It can be exhausting. Programming, and IT work more generally, is creative work. I didn't have another plan; I was just wondering what would come next. Then Marek got in touch.

Marek Greško: You may remember that at Generali you suggested a way to boost the business, and they turned you down. That was another driver. Your idea was to do something with those people, wasn't it?

Róbert Dusík: Yes. We worked for Generali in Austria, but we were a separate Slovak subsidiary owned directly by the parent. Imagine twenty-five Slovak developers outsourced exclusively to Generali in Vienna. We were together in Bratislava only on Fridays. Monday through Thursday, we'd take the train to Vienna and join different teams. That was the idea, my little version of Titans. I told them we could make the Slovak Generali operation available to other clients too: we had talented developers we could outsource. They weren't interested. Then Marek came along with this idea, and it was clear. I'd already been willing to devote time to it for the salary they paid me, on Fridays, so I decided to devote that time under a different company name. It clicked quite nicely. But without that, I didn't have a plan to start a company. I was simply thinking about what I'd do in a year or two if it wasn't programming, because I knew I wouldn't code my whole life.

Martin Brath: So if they hadn't brushed you off, Titans might never have happened.

Róbert Dusík: Marek had already founded Titans.

Martin Brath: Without you, then.

Marek Greško: It certainly wouldn't be as far along as it is today. Two people can always achieve more. You have more capacity than one person alone.

First clients, channels and contracts

Martin Brath: How did you win your first clients? You were two young guys nobody knew.

Marek Greško: You start with the contacts you've built during your career as a developer or analyst. Those were the clients we approached first. Paradoxically, they weren't the first clients we won. The website helped. I remember our first placement was in Žilina, with a tiny company developing software for a postal weighing system. A vehicle would drive onto scales to weigh the letters and parcels. That was the first assignment where we placed people: Delphi developers. The bigger clients Robo and I knew mostly turned us away: you're too small, you can't give us guarantees, what can you offer? Show us your website. We'd show them, and they'd say it wasn't enough. So our first clients were actually the little ones. At the beginning, we also did what's called re-outsourcing where an IT company, or an individual, has a client but can't provide the people, so we supply through them. They buy capacity from us and resell it to the end client. Those were our beginnings. But remember, Robo and I were IT people. We needed to improve sales and gain experience, so we hired a trainer who was a real expert. He helped us build sales, learn to sell, write client emails, make cold calls, and so on. We learned very quickly and kept raising the bar. That's how we started with clients.

Martin Brath: Which channels worked best? Cold emails, cold calls?

Róbert Dusík: Emails worked. Again, take yourself back twelve years. Things many listeners take for granted didn't exist then. LinkedIn existed but it wasn't where managers met and built Slovak business contacts. LinkedIn has really gained strength in Slovakia over the past three years, and people still say it has enormous potential. It isn't too late to build a network; now is a good time to invest in it. Back then, Instagram wasn't relevant, and we still don't use it for contacting clients [wording slightly unclear in the source]. For the first two years of Titans, I didn't even have a LinkedIn account, and it wasn't a problem. That's one interesting thing: LinkedIn wasn't a networking tool for us. Second, Finstat didn't exist. It's an excellent service, but its absence helped us. Today, if someone contacts you, you look them up there: one year in business, six thousand euros in revenue, an accounting loss of seven thousand. You may have a nice website, and every startup begins at a loss but that doesn't help you win trust. We didn't have that, so nobody could check us that way. What sold you was your conduct, professionalism, website, and your word that you'd deliver. Identifying potential clients wasn't difficult. There were things like the IT yearbook. You'd go through the list, find company websites and contacts, try calling, then email if necessary, and repeat. Eventually you'd reach someone and explain why the service made sense. You had to be professional and sound as though you knew what you were talking about, so they'd want to meet. You'd go to your first meeting with a bigger client, shaking inside but needing to appear confident and relaxed. Eventually someone would say: okay, let's try. You'd come home shaking because somebody had asked you to deliver something and you'd promised you would. Then you started looking for people. You'd find someone and celebrate then the person would pull out, and you'd already given a guarantee. Over time, you learn that not everything is as critical or dangerous as you make it in your head. Not every promise is interpreted as strictly as you interpret it yourself. You work with expectations, but you still have to deliver. Delivery was what Marek described: finding that first match after someone trusted you and said they needed people. Looking back, they hadn't signed anything. They'd just said: find those people, then. They went on with their lives, while we put enormous pressure on ourselves: they need people now, we have to deliver. They'd only said let's try. But once we brought candidates and they saw the interviews, profiles, or CVs, it became interesting. That was the basis for discussing a contract, which meant more meetings and negotiating from a position where you didn't have many signed contracts. A larger company would say: remove this clause, that can't be in there, and neither can that. You'd think: okay, some things will have to go, even though we'd like to keep them.

Martin Brath: Did you have legal support?

Marek Greško: We did, but at the beginning Robo and I mostly provided it ourselves. We tried to keep costs as low as possible, so we didn't have an in-house lawyer. Having worked in IT, we understood the business, guarantees, and legal obligations, so we could assess a contract. We had draft contracts for both clients and freelancers and knew what the clauses meant, where we could compromise and where we couldn't. It became harder when a large client sent its own fifty-page template in English. For some parts of those contracts, we needed an external lawyer.

Róbert Dusík: Again, those were usually people working in corporations who did this on the side. We'd call them, and they'd review the contract. Because they worked as lawyers in companies that bought this type of service, they understood the contracts and could tell us, for example: we wouldn't sign this with you. They weren't speaking as representatives of their particular bank, but advising us independently. Choosing the right lawyer was crucial. Thinking carefully about whom to ask saves a lot of time.

Stress, family and finding balance

Martin Brath: It sounds as though the first years involved a lot of stress.

Róbert Dusík: A lot of stress, yes.

Martin Brath: Especially stress you put on yourselves.

Róbert Dusík: Of course. The first twelve years were the hardest.

Martin Brath: It's getting better. Apparently tomorrow will be better. How do you handle it at home or personally? How do you cope?

Marek Greško: You're right: there was a lot of stress at the beginning. Robo and I put absolutely all our time and energy into it. Any hobbies went completely aside so there'd still be some time for our wives and children. Everything else had to go. I played football, Robo went to the gym, but for the first ten years that world stopped existing for us.

Marek Greško: We were young and strong and could still absorb the stress. We bought a Horálka wafer and a Coke every day. We didn't look like we do now; we were a little bigger, in terms of body fat. We reduced stress with sugar and things like that, but we absolutely loved what we were doing. You had this powerful engine inside you. It wasn't: oh God, what do we have to do now? We worked with enthusiasm and joy because it was our own business. What you earned was yours to invest, and you made the decisions. So stress was high. We gave it everything. For the first ten years, Robo and I didn't have a holiday.

Róbert Dusík: Wait, not ten. The company is turning twelve. Let's say six, six or seven years. About half that time, realistically.

Marek Greško: Six or seven, yes. What that meant was going away with your family for a week at most and taking your laptop. When the children were asleep or you had a moment, you dealt with client orders and everything else, because the company couldn't afford someone to cover for you. It was demanding. As we got older and our bodies couldn't cope as well, we had to add ways of releasing stress. I wouldn't say there's less stress now; there's more, or it's more demanding, because you have greater responsibility for a larger company and much bigger problems. It's like children: the older they get, the bigger the problems. The same applies to a company.

Róbert Dusík: Small children, small problems; big children, big problems, as they say.

Marek Greško: Exactly. We gradually started putting things into our lives to compensate for stress. I started running again, then exercising, cold-water exposure, reading, and meditating. The harder things got, the more I added. Now I can't add anything else. If stress increases, I'll probably fall apart, and burnout becomes a risk. Robo's approach was a little different; he can explain. But that's how you can relieve stress. And of course, you have children. That makes a huge difference. You come home, they grab your leg and want to play. Whether you have energy or not, whether you're stressed or not, you have to give them attention, and you want to. That's another stress reliever.

Róbert Dusík: What Marek said is true, but we couldn't simply decide after six years to add exercise and movement. Something had to happen first. What was it? I've said for a long time that we're extremely analytical. We don't make work decisions based on feelings. At home, in a relationship with your wife, that's different...

Marek Greško: You don't have data there. No data from your wife.

Róbert Dusík: Exactly, and even if you ask for data, you don't get any. Without data, it's emotion, and emotion can be unpredictable and take you somewhere else entirely. At work, we both liked data. I'm a passionate person; that's an excellent trigger for getting involved in things. But passion and emotion can't be the basis for decisions. You have to think: okay, how do we do this? Something excites me, but that doesn't mean I immediately do it. We thought about it together. With holidays, for example, I'd call them planned absences from the office rather than holidays, because mentally we were absent from our families. To change that, we couldn't just add sport. If I add an hour of exercise, who does the work? That was the question: who does it? We'd need colleagues to take over at least some of it so we gradually kept scaling the company. First the two of us, then a recruiter, then someone in back office, another recruiter, and us doing sales, acting as CEOs, and everything else. Then we found someone to help with marketing, initially outsourced roles, such as article writing. We did a lot ourselves. Later came a permanent person, another salesperson, and someone to help with IT. But when you hire someone, for six months you're even more screwed than before. We knew we wanted to add sport, but the analysis told us that first we had to free up time. To do that, we had to hire people, which meant an even longer wait before sport, but it would come. And it did. Sport, cold-water exposure, meditation playing guitar, journaling, whatever. Our approach is always to analyze the situation and draw a roadmap of the steps needed. Then it's much easier because we're aligned. That's how we still approach everything. Often, to achieve something good, you can't simply say: I'll do it now, because it may negatively affect something else. You need to ask what foundations have to be built so that the situation is sustainable. We know entrepreneurs who decide to go on holiday and disappear, telling people on Wednesday they won't be there Monday because they're going away with the family. We couldn't imagine saying: I won't answer the phone for a week; people can wait.

Róbert Dusík: People can wait? We don't like the idea of leaving things hanging. We're detail-oriented, perfectionists, and very thorough. We don't like loose ends that might fall apart. We like almost everything covered, and even then something always surprises you.

How they became number one in Slovakia

Martin Brath: How did you reach number one in Slovakia? You weren't first to market. You were relatively new, young, and inexperienced. Were you better at sales, or what do you think explains your success?

Marek Greško: I think we were better at everything, but above all, it came from the heart. When we started in Slovakia, a major competitor, the market leader in the Czech Republic, started here too. They already had databases of clients and freelancers. You'd think they just had to come and do deals. We started from zero: no candidates, no clients. What helped us beat them was that their business was being launched by an employee, a country manager sent here. Robo and I did it because we loved it. That drove everything, including how we communicated with clients and freelancers. If something happened on a project, we didn't wait a week and pretend you didn't exist or run away from the problem. You dealt with it immediately, cared about it, and looked for ways to make it right for the client or freelancer. I think that's why we became number one in Slovakia: we put our hearts into it. We also did things differently. As IT people, we thought about automation and doing things better. We had a system for sending project offers, which almost nobody else had. Nobody did. It handled matching so offers reached the right candidates. We put everything into everything we did. Whatever the sales trainer taught us, we tried to improve, Googling alternative approaches, asking clients, looking for ways. We'd look on Profesia to see which companies were hiring and what people they needed. You couldn't necessarily approach the company directly through Profesia, but we'd find a way: send in a CV and at least get an HR contact. Once we had them on the phone, we'd explain that we weren't looking for work ourselves but had a company that could help them find specialists. All of that, plus a third factor: hard work. We really put the hours in.

Róbert Dusík: One important addition: being IT people didn't just help us analyze things and build systems ourselves. We weren't setting up a restaurant. People sometimes think: I like something, so I'll open a business doing it, a gym, for instance. We were opening an outsourcing company providing IT specialists. Marek had freelanced, and so had I. Agencies had approached us. We'd seen what we disliked in Slovakia and how differently outsourcing worked in Vienna or Prague. Most importantly, we were matchmakers, connecting a client's project requirements with a freelancer's capabilities. To deliver that match, you should understand what you're matching. We spoke the clients' language, which was a big change in Slovakia. You'd reach someone who said: okay, I'll describe the position. It wouldn't be like the pronunciation mix-up over Java at the beginning of this podcast [the distinction is unclear in the transcript]. People immediately notice whether you understand the subject, although it's natural that you, running a different business, wouldn't know everything. But we'd ask questions. They'd mention ORM and expect you to be lost, while you knew it meant object-relational mapping. Okay, which implementation do you use? Hibernate? Suddenly it was a completely different conversation. People liked speaking with someone on their level. Then with freelancers, it was similar. They were used to people presenting C# or .NET positions without even knowing how to pronounce the technologies. Those are real stories.

Róbert Dusík: Suddenly, they were having a relevant conversation. I was a former Java developer, which helped because Java was mainstream, and Marek had extensive .NET experience. Those were the strongest programming technologies. Whether Java or .NET, the principles of object-oriented programming are the same. The freelancer realized it was a meaningful discussion. You sparked their interest, and they thought: wow, this isn't just a routine chat. You could assess the profile as though hiring for your own team, or as Marek had done for his teams. Then you sent it to a client who wanted to meet. But we didn't just say: Peter, go there and meet them. We went too. Twenty minutes before the meeting, the candidate had an email explaining where and how, with a Street View link facing the building. We were outside welcoming them, explaining a few things, and going into the interview together. We already knew they were good, or they wouldn't be there. Imagine you're the client, I'm Róbert Dusík representing Titans, and Marek is the candidate. Nerves or stress can affect someone. You ask a question, and they answer differently or incorrectly, but I know what they can do and have an hour to help clarify. I'd say: I think the question was about this, which we discussed before. That changed things. People liked the professionalism. After an interview, they knew they wanted to work with the person. It came from one well-matched CV, which came from one well-structured conversation.

Marek Greško: IT people started recruiting IT people. Before us, it was mostly HR people without our technical background.

Róbert Dusík: And that's still common in our business.

Marek Greško: Something we shouldn't forget, so it isn't all about us: we were fortunate with people. Our little team, Sylvia, Evka, Boba, Rado, Monika, Míšo, Máro, I could go on, all had the same enthusiasm for what we were building. They weren't just clocking in at eight and out at four. They gave a huge amount of their time and energy in those early days, and we owe our number-one position to them too. It isn't just about the two of us. I want them mentioned because we owe them a lot for where we are.

Róbert Dusík: I once asked some of them why they'd joined us. We had one office on Seberíniho Street, about this size, perhaps half a meter bigger. That was Titans. We still have it, although someone else sits there now and it looks better. Why join a business that has just one office? The answer I got last year, and get from colleagues, was that it wasn't about the building or premises. When they spoke to us, they believed us. We were credible. They felt what we said was genuine, that we understood it and had enthusiasm. They felt something was beginning that they wanted to be part of. Everyone told me that. Marek and I are also very fair people. That's important, with each other, our partners, our children. Fairness is fundamental. From the start, we treated everyone in the company fairly in every respect. What we said held true. People value that, even in a smaller company. In a corporation, you often don't get it. A corporation is just a brand; whatever the building says, you may or may not be lucky with your team. You can have a bad team leader at IBM or anywhere else. Our approach was a smaller team with professional standards: what we say should happen. People responded to that. You earn credibility by saying you'll do something and doing it, explaining plans and expected outcomes and then achieving them. That's when people believe you, not because you have a crystal ball.

Marek Greško: I said it was luck. Perhaps Sylvia and some of the first hires involved luck, but fortune favors the prepared. Robo and I still take enormous care over hiring. People ask why we do three or four rounds and ask particular questions. Because every person matters. I remember being undecided and saying: let's do another round, let a third person speak with them and assess whether they'll fit the team. We still pay close attention to cultural fit, values, and whether someone has the drive to enjoy the work and find it fulfilling and give Titans a little more than the standard eight hours.

Róbert Dusík: Or if it's eight hours, make them eight real hours of work.

Rapid-fire round

Martin Brath: Of course. Next is a series of quick questions. Since there are two of you, we'll see whether you agree. Try to answer as quickly as possible. Who's the worse driver?

Róbert Dusík: Wow.

Marek Greško: Neither of us.

Róbert Dusík: I don't know. I feel completely comfortable in a car with Marek.

Marek Greško: Same here, more or less.

Róbert Dusík: I don't feel I need to hold on or brace my foot against the door. Good. Which of you is the better cook? Not me, Marek will say. Not me either. [Several speakers are combined under this label in the source.]

Marek Greško: I can boil sausages, cook pasta, and make a few other simple things. Fried eggs too. Fried eggs are very good; I recommend them.

Róbert Dusík: That's quite the culinary expertise.

Róbert Dusík: We're two chefs...

Martin Brath: ...without hats. You really found each other. If you were on the reality show Vyvolení, which of you would last longer?

Marek Greško: Probably Robo.

Martin Brath: Possibly, yes. Which of you has the better sense of humor?

Róbert Dusík: Damn, that's difficult. We have different senses of humor, different styles. That's why I like Marek's, because it isn't the same as mine.

Marek Greško: Robo remembers all the jokes. He could tell ten right now. You could tell me a joke, and I'd repeat it ten minutes later, but an hour later I wouldn't remember it.

Róbert Dusík: We have different humor, and that suits me. A joke is one thing but being able to laugh at yourself matters too. We have that, and I like it. We're not boring people.

Martin Brath: Good. Who's the stricter boss?

Róbert Dusík: Robo.

Martin Brath: You're the stricter boss?

Róbert Dusík: Marek said it.

Martin Brath: Is that the end, then?

Róbert Dusík: No, Marek... [The exchange is unclear in the source.]

Martin Brath: Which of you would be more likely to survive a zombie apocalypse? Marek. What was your first impression of your colleague?

Róbert Dusík: What do you mean?

Martin Brath: What was your first impression of Robo?

Marek Greško: Great guy.

Róbert Dusík: I remember exactly when it happened. There's a cocktail bar in Šaľa called Waikiki. Our wives took us there for the first time, and we got properly drunk on three or four cocktails each, wild stuff, of course. The chemistry was excellent. From the moment we sat down, we were laughing with the women. I remember telling Noni: this is great. Noni is what I call my wife; people in Bratislava know her as Ella. Noni is a childhood nickname that's hard to pronounce. Our wives sat together at grammar school for eight years and were friends. They introduced us, as Marek said at the beginning. Ella and I were already together, but Míša had only just started seeing Marek. The first person she wanted to introduce her new boyfriend to was my wife. So we met at Waikiki, and that vibe is still there today.

Martin Brath: You're still best friends.

Róbert Dusík: It's excellent.

Martin Brath: That's an incredible story.

Róbert Dusík: Yes, that's how it is.

The comic-book brand

Martin Brath: You mentioned doing things differently. I'd like to ask about branding and the story behind your visual identity. You essentially look like comic-book characters. Most competitors in the Czech-Slovak market say the same thing: they'll provide better people faster, with photos of developers programming. In the last market analysis we did together, almost everyone looked alike except you. You stood out visually. You took a completely different approach: we're Titans, here's our battalion of Titans. Underneath, you communicated the same thing, but differently. The visuals are distinctive and consistent. It's surprising that hardly anyone else does it. How did you arrive at this?

Róbert Dusík: I like you saying that, because that's been Titans' reality for three years, and we've been around for thirteen. We weren't these Titans before, remember? We had 'Extra muscle for your IT projects,' with a polygon-style strongman. Something completely different. Look at what we've created in three years. Before that, we'd already been market leaders for about five of the previous ten years. Marketing is great. We never used photos of developers at computers, but we did present ourselves as reinforcements for your team. That was a step toward more interesting reinforcements. We began thinking: what do we all like? Star Wars, Avengers, and so on. Why do we like them, and how long have stories like these been with us? [The source gives an unclear time reference, mentioning 150 years and early wall paintings.] They'll continue forever. So we thought: that looks promising. Who do we work with? Geeks, nerds, IT people. We all like it. Let's try. But neither Marek nor I can draw, and you can't get this from a stock-photo library. Marek can explain how we got it onto paper.

Marek Greško: Rado first brought the idea. He's now head of recruitment. He found a Mexican comic artist, or someone we thought was Mexican, working in a kind of neo style. Rado likes memes and is very creative. In his presentations, everything flies, flashes, and moves, but tastefully. He suggested trying something different on LinkedIn, a comic. The artist drew it, and we thought: wow, that's great. But communication was harder because he was somewhere in Mexico and Rado was in Slovakia, speaking English, and so on.

Róbert Dusík: Rado found that Mexican artist on a platform for freelance comic artists.

Marek Greško: We also started working with Branko, I think that was his name, who made our first videos and drew a ninja-like character. I wouldn't call that a comic yet. We were just beginning to play with superheroes and characters. Once we liked the comic idea, we decided to find someone in Slovakia to make communication easier. What was the site? Behance. We found a Slovak comic artist who began drawing for us. When we saw it, we thought it was incredible. It wasn't a website at first; the first thing was a comic.

Róbert Dusík: But first, we looked through Behance, a platform with lots of design work. Not every comic style suits you. A bit like Pinterest. Futurama or The Simpsons look good, but that wasn't our style. We liked something more noir, a spaceship, a slightly purple undertone. We saw work we loved and a name underneath, Vlado. Vlado Križan [surname spelling uncertain in the source]. It sounded Slovak, so we asked Rado to contact him. We discovered he lived 150 meters from our office. Incredible. He came in, and we explained that we wanted something in his style. There was a cup of pens or markers [object unclear in the source], and he asked whether he could use one. As we talked, he doodled. At the end, he turned it around, and we said: exactly! That kind of sketch. Let's do it. He was a good fit and could draw. We made our own comic around the idea we like to present: you're an IT professional who wants to advance your career, and with us you can change your DNA and transform into a superhero. What's your superpower? Java, .NET, Python. Titans helps you enter that superhero world of IT. From there, we developed more characters, locations, and visuals until we thought: if this is how we present ourselves, our existing website no longer fits. Vlado began drawing the website too. It's all art, everything created by a person's hand. That's what makes it special. You can't simply copy it, and I wouldn't advise anyone to try.

Róbert Dusík: You can't do the same thing twice and expect it to be the same.

Marek Greško: I've seen a few attempts to copy it. Competitors occasionally post something with a superhero, even if it isn't drawn as a comic. They see it working and try to borrow some of it.

Martin Brath: So it's about the consistency you've maintained throughout.

Róbert Dusík: We're proud that it's an artwork, genuinely drawn for us and original. Every character is original. It wasn't generated, even though generative AI can do a lot now. It's different.

Martin Brath: Why don't you have your own characters?

Róbert Dusík: We do. You mean avatars of ourselves? Yes. Because we don't make it about us. We don't need personal characters. Okay. [Speakers are combined in the source.]

Bringing in an investor and acquiring Bridgewater

Martin Brath: A question about Bridgewater, which was quite a big step for you and changed the company overall. It doesn't happen very often in services, at least as far as I know. Tell us the story. What did you expect to be easier that wasn't, or harder that wasn't?

Marek Greško: Do you mean Bridgewater specifically, or the step before that, bringing in an investor?

Martin Brath: If it's connected to the investor, tell us that story too.

Marek Greško: They were two different stories. Bringing in an investor was challenging because we spent a long time considering whether to do it. We wrote down lots of options and scenarios: open a branch from scratch, franchise the model, license it, and so on [part of the licensing example is unclear in the source]. Eventually we concluded an investor would be helpful for several reasons. Robo and I didn't have M&A experience, buying and selling companies, so otherwise we'd need to find someone to help. Ideally, an investor in our own sector, IT. An investor outside IT wouldn't offer the same benefits. If they have twenty IT companies in their portfolio some may already be clients and others not, but joining the group encourages cooperation with them. A third requirement was an honest investor, ideally speaking our language, Slovak, rather than a foreign investor. That's how we partnered with Sandberg [the name is transcribed phonetically in the source]. Was that three years ago? In 2021. So four years ago. Shortly after that, within six months, we partnered with Bridgewater, now Titans CZ. What was difficult?

Marek Greško: The Czech Republic and Slovakia are very close, with similar languages, but the companies were at different stages. We were further along: we'd had ten years, they'd had five. It's difficult to explain experiences you've already been through to people who haven't had them and see things differently. We had to communicate a lot to help them avoid our mistakes or approach things differently. That was probably the hardest part, communicating and aligning. Now we're largely on the same processes and systems. We've brought the companies much closer. Titans SK and Titans CZ are very similar. Robo can add to that.

Róbert Dusík: That's it, really. The biggest obstacle was clarity and aligning expectations at the beginning. The chemistry was good. Jakub, the co-founder we still work with, is a fair, decent guy. Without that, it wouldn't work. But our personalities are different, so we needed lots of discussion. We're strict and analytical. Jakub often lets enthusiasm carry him and can decide faster than we would. We had to find alignment: slow down a little. Sometimes quick decisions work, sometimes they don't. We don't like leaving it to chance when time, effort, and money are involved, especially our money. So we needed a balance: we'd be less obsessive about processes, and he'd slow down a bit. It was communication and showing that we hadn't come to cause harm. The point was synergy, working together and achieving things. It took three years to build shared expectations step by step, understand that we meant well, find a common language, and introduce shared systems. Changes hurt, but we've reached a very good, coordinated way of working. Our personalities were and still are different, but we've learned to understand and respect each other.

Martin Brath: It's difficult when the two of you understand each other so well and have to bring a third person into the pack.

Róbert Dusík: It's harder for him: he's dealing with two people so aligned that there's no point trying one and then the other. Everyone who's worked with us knows that, employees and business partners alike. It's like children trying one parent after the other [the source's parental comparison is garbled]. That doesn't work. It's part of why we've led something so steadily for so long: we're united. You won't get through one side if you haven't got through the other. It won't happen.

Expanding into new markets

Martin Brath: When you enter more markets, which I assume you're planning, are you considering mergers too, or would you start from scratch?

Marek Greško: Both options are on the table.

Marek Greško: Our plan was to buy one company in another country every year and grow that way. But current market conditions don't favor it: the war in Ukraine, interest rates, and so on. Economic sentiment is poor, so we haven't managed an acquisition every year. Slovakia's political situation also affects how we're seen abroad, as though we still ride horses or carriages. Our reputation isn't good. Even if you have money and can buy a company, sometimes they say they don't want to be bought by a Slovak company because it would be humiliating. That's happened a few times. But it wasn't only that. Owners wanted to sell at high prices, while investors wouldn't pay them. So we haven't bought anything else. We still want to acquire every year and have several deals and companies under discussion, in Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Germany, and elsewhere. We're constantly working on it. Since we didn't meet the goal of adding a country every year, about a year ago we started considering opening a branch from scratch: enter a market, find a local salesperson, perhaps in Germany, and serve the clients from Slovakia. That's possible.

Marek Greško: But we haven't taken it further because of the economic situation. To put it bluntly, Germans are struggling too. A Slovak company won't simply arrive and make a huge splash. Serbian, Bulgarian, Romanian, and other providers have been there for a long time and compete strongly. You won't suddenly conquer Germany now. German companies don't even have enough project work for their own people.

Róbert Dusík: The same applies in Sweden, Finland, and Denmark, based on our research. The effort of entering a market, including the Nordics, has to match the opportunity and the money we're willing to spend. At the moment, we're allocating some time, but not going all in, setting up a company, fitting out an office, hiring people, and hoping it works. Not in this market. We're looking for clients there and building on contacts. As we discussed about your company earlier, a contact who introduces another contact can help get your foot in...

Marek Greško: ...the...

Róbert Dusík: ...door in that market. We're building that network. There are several approaches; I won't go into detail. For now, it mainly takes time: mine for one market, a colleague's for another. That's what we're prepared to invest. As Marek said, some things can't be bent to your will, including Europe's economic situation when everyone is experiencing the same thing. You have to look at it soberly. If you have a spare hundred million, of course that's different.

Motivation and building a management team

Martin Brath: You've been in the market twelve years and are still under stress. That isn't going away. Presumably, if you wanted to, you could stop working now. Yet you're still putting everything in, and it could continue for ten years, fifty, perhaps you'll never leave. How do you see your own futures and where this is heading?

Marek Greško: For thirteen years, Titans has been the one thing I focus on and put all my energy into. There's a book called The One Thing that I recommend. I know entrepreneurs with ten companies, each bringing something in, but I guarantee that if they put all their energy into one, it would look very different from ten scattered businesses. What I do still moves me forward. I still enjoy it and haven't reached the limit of my abilities or energy. I can't say how long I'll stay at Titans: as long as I'm healthy, capable, and enjoying it.

Róbert Dusík: That's the best answer. We're still enthusiastic and have energy because things keep moving. Every year, something changes: the structure, building and aligning the executive team, acquiring and integrating Bridgewater. There are always interesting new challenges. Now we're all fighting the same enemy, the economy, which brings us together again. We're finding ways to succeed, approaches and levels of effort we may not have needed in the past [the number of years is unclear in the source], when things moved more easily. We enjoy finding those new ways and advancing the business. We're not standing still. I'd struggle if I stopped moving, or if Marek did, because then it wouldn't be fifty-fifty anymore. As long as we're both fully engaged, it's good. For how long? As long as there's somewhere to take it.

Martin Brath: Do you think that if one leaves, the other will leave too? That's quite likely, yes. Alright, my last question is about executive management. You had to build it so the whole company no longer depended on you. You're taking the company to another level, managing managers. How did you approach it? What's the biggest challenge in building a C-level team? [The source combines a question and response under Martin's label.]

Marek Greško: We did it gradually, step by step, adding one executive, then a second, third, and fourth. We selected very carefully. Since we started building that management team, it has stayed unchanged. Those people are still in place, so we chose well. They've stayed through both good and difficult times. The first challenge, as already mentioned, is that when you hire someone, you as the owner train them and explain everything. A colleague can't simply do it for you. It suddenly takes much more of your time. Second, everyone in the company used to speak directly to an owner. It was quick and efficient, and they had all the information. If they needed something they came to you. Suddenly, you've inserted a manager between yourself and them, which creates a barrier. We're still dealing with that, because long-serving colleagues were used to having us close by. Another challenge is transmitting the heart we put into the company, our determination and enthusiasm, through that extra layer. Motivation or morale can dip because people no longer receive the same amount directly from us. That's something the company has to address.

Róbert Dusík: We're finding ways for managers to pass on what they now receive directly from us. They're at the source, have everything they need, and feel as everyone did before. Others no longer feel that way, which disappoints some people. We have to emphasize: this information mustn't stop with you. We're sharing it so you can convey it to your team in the best form, credibly and with the right feeling. The values and approach we built the company on must keep flowing through every level. A good manager can pass them on. Another challenge is that we have six managers: IT, recruitment, HR, back office is combined with that, marketing, finance, and sales. Six people who each came to help their own team, but they also have to be a team together. You can't go your own way or think other teams exist to work for you. They work for all of us, for the company. We created a C-level Academy, or C-level College, working with a coach or mentor to help them function as a team, align, and support one another in fulfilling our shared vision. It's a challenge because some joined executive management three years ago, others a year ago. Some departments feel stronger because they directly generate revenue. Others provide support, but that doesn't make them less valuable. You have to bring it all together. Selecting people well makes it easier. With the right values, at least you aren't fighting toxicity or people trying to harm each other but you still need a great deal of communication and alignment about what you actually meant. Across all these challenges, the common thread is that we keep communicating to make sure things are moving in the right direction.

Martin Brath: Alright, guys, thank you very much for joining us. I hope you'll come again next time.

Róbert Dusík: Thank you for inviting us. Speaking for myself, it was very enjoyable, and we look forward to it. Thank you from me too, and have a lovely day, everyone.