Rob Owen's Journey with Puzzle

Rob Owen's Journey with Puzzle

Rob Owen, a serial entrepreneur, operator, and ‘day-1’ hire at five startups, is currently leading a bootstrapped venture aimed at building an entry-level Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) platform. His company’s platform, MyRunwayHealth, allows early-stage startups to manage burn, budgeting, and forecasting without the complexity of FP&A platforms or hiring full-time finance resources. Rob’s platform is designed to be plug-and-play, enabling founders to handle strategic finance objectives without needing deep financial expertise or expensive setup.

The Challenge

Rob has worked with finance teams before, and knew from previous experience that it’s best to start accounting practices early, but was hesitant to get started with QuickBooks knowing that it would take time away from talking to customers and building products. Despite tagging recurring expenses and vendors monthly, QuickBooks constantly required him to re-enter the same information. “QuickBooks never actually remembers anything. You tag something as a recurring expense, and a month later, you’re doing the same damn thing again.” Rob said.

"QuickBooks never actually remembers anything. You tag something as a recurring expense, and a month later, you’re doing the same damn thing again."

Beyond the inefficiency of QuickBooks, Rob also found that the majority of FP&A tools on the market were far too complex for his needs. These tools were designed for mid-market or enterprise companies with full finance teams, leaving early-stage startups like his without a practical solution. The high cost and complexity of these platforms made them inaccessible for companies like Rob’s that were bootstrapped and in the early stages of growth.

The Solution

Rob was introduced to Puzzle when he heard Sasha present at the Operators Guild and quickly signed up. With Puzzle.io’s automated platform, Rob quickly realized that he could now handle his company’s bookkeeping in a fraction of the time it used to take with QuickBooks. The automatic categorization of 90%+ of his transactions meant he could go from setup to fully operational in under an hour. Now Rob was able to get his accounting efforts started early without the significant time investment required with Quickbooks. “What used to take me and every finance person who’s ever worked for me 7-10 business days to reconcile, now takes me 5-10 minutes a month,” said Rob. Puzzle.io allowed Rob to finally stop repeating tedious tasks that QuickBooks couldn’t handle efficiently.

 "What used to take me and every finance person who’s ever worked for me 7-10 business days to reconcile, now takes me 5-10 minutes a month. Puzzle.io is literally a paradigm shift in how I think about bookkeeping."

Results

• Efficiency: Rob can now reconcile his financials in just 5-10 minutes a month, freeing up valuable time to focus on other aspects of growing his startup.
• Cost Savings: Rob estimates that instead of hiring a finance resource, Puzzle.io will allow him to efficiently manage his company’s financials for several more years without additional headcount or outsourcing.
• Simplicity: With intuitive features like auto-categorization, Puzzle.io made it possible for Rob to manage his books without being an accountant or needing extensive training.

Conclusion

Puzzle.io offers early-stage founders a simple, automated solution for managing their bookkeeping and financial planning. By solving the challenges Rob faced with QuickBooks, Puzzle.io helped him streamline his financial processes and avoid the complexity of traditional FP&A tools. If you’re a founder looking to save time and avoid financial headaches, Puzzle.io is the tool you need to get started.

MyRunwayHealth:

If you're an early-stage founder that wants a simple and effective way to manage your burn rate and runway, or forecast budgets and scenarios without spending endless hours in excel, sign up today and receive 50% off your first 6 months.