Meet Juan Manuel Barrero | Cofounder & CEO at CFOstartup

We had the good fortune of connecting with Juan Manuel Barrero and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Juan Manuel, we’d love to hear about how you approach risk and risk-taking
Risk is the price of change. One cannot expect to change the world if they are not willing to risk failure. In my experience, the biggest challenge in taking them is not the risk itself, but it’s calculation. Entrepreneurs tend to overestimate their strengths and undermine their weaknesses. That is, in part, why there are so many startup failures. The most common character flaw in an entrepreneur is overconfidence. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but it has to be in balance with critical thinking and down to earth reasoning. And the best way to get that is having a great team that will challenge and at the same time support you all the way. With the right team, any risk is possible to overcome.

Can you give our readers an introduction to your business? Maybe you can share a bit about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
When I started this business the main reason was because I was working at an accounting firm and I didn’t like it. I wanted to change it. And trying to do so I failed numerous times. But if you don’t like how things are done you have three options: 1) complain and live a miserable life, 2) crawl back to bed and never come out again, or 3) try to change things. So I chose the latter. Was it easy? No. But it was necessary.

Last month we reached a new record of 100 paying clients with an average ticket of $800 after only 7 months of operations. When we started this project, this was the speed of growth we were aiming for. As I said before, I know every challenge is achievable with the right team, so we started scouting for the most passionate and hardworking people we could find. Reaching this goal confirms our most important differentiation: we try harder. Every day we deliver excellent results to startups all over the region and the US. And we are able to do that not because we are better, but because we try harder. I have a dachshund called “Balboa”, who we named after Rocky, of course. We´ll, in Rocky´s words: “it’s not about how hard you hit, but about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.”

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I had the chance to travel the world and what I learned from that experience is that it’s not about the place, it’s about the company. My favorite cities are probably not too glamorous. They simply are the places where I created the best memories in my life. So if one of my best friends comes to town I would probably concentrate on enjoying quality time with them, but let them choose wherever they want to go.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
There is a scene on Valentine’s Day where Topher Grace says to Anne Hathaway: “I’m from Muncie, Indiana. The wildest thing I ever did was… Leave Muncie, Indiana!”. I sometimes feel like him. I’m from a small town in Argentina called Trenque Lauquen. And the one person that made me see that there was a bigger world beyond Trenque Lauquen was my father, Carlos Barrero. He made me come to the United States when I was only 17. More than 20 years later I am the founder of 3 companies where we employ more than 60 collaborators in the US and LatAm, and now I’m pitching to get 3 million usd in seed funding for Lazo, the startup I co founded with my excellent team. I can’t begin to describe how traveling has changed the course of my life and it all traces back to my family, and especially my dad.

After that trip I began working with organizations and NGOs, and I would like to dedicate this interview especially to the ones in which I became most involved with their leadership: Rotary (Rotaract), UNAJE (Argentine Young Entrepreneurs Association) and FIJE (Iberoamerican Young Entrepreneurs Federation), all of wich I presided. I also founded Hatch, where we got together social leaders from Argentina to develop long term relationships between them in the hopes that someday they become the seeds of change in our country. And now I am a member of EO, the Entrepreneurs Organization. There I get to learn from pears, exchange experiences, and build lasting relationships. A book that had a big impact on my life was Never Eat Alone, by Kieth Ferrazzi. This shoutout is also dedicated to all those who have crossed my way these past 20years.

Finally, I would like to dedicate this Shoutout to our youth. Growing up in Argentina, I very soon got the desire for change. But overtime there are two things I learned about long lasting change: it takes time and it takes a team. My message to other young people is that if we want change we have to be patient but also we have to work together, spend time, do sports, go out, partner… in essence: build trust. I believe we can do it if we work hard and we work together.

Website: cfostartup.io

Instagram: cfostartup

Linkedin: cfostartup

Twitter: juanmbarrero