Founder's Story
2 Rejections. No Office. Global Success – The Kuty Shalev Playbook | Ep 209 with Kuty Shalev Founder of Lumenalta
Fri, 2 May 2025
Kuty Shalev shares how a college accounting grad became a pioneer of fully remote software consulting—25 years before “work from home” was a thing. He explains why speed, adaptability, and “soft skills” (EQ as deliberate practice) trump raw IQ in today’s agile, AI-driven world.Key Discussion Points:A Serendipitous StartFrom PwC-sponsored coding at Columbia to founding a lean software firm with Pricewaterhouse as Year-One client.Early adoption of Skype‐powered remote teams to solve developer shortages.Building a True Remote CultureLessons learned: codifying checklists, connectivity standards, and clear response SLAs.Hiring only those who thrive in remote settings—surfing from the beach, caring for family, or rural living.Soft Skills as a “Must-Have”Reframing EQ as a learnable “soft skill” through deliberate practice and gamified coaching.Engineers with high EQ excel at adapting to rapid change, cross-team collaboration, and maintaining motivation.Digital Transformation ReimaginedRejecting one-size-fits-all platforms in favor of modular, vendor-agnostic architectures. Rapid, low-risk proofs of concept that scale, saving time and budget.Remote model enables access to global talent, faster staffing (2–3 weeks), and reinvesting office savings in senior engineers.Speed & ResilienceSpeed as competitive advantage in a landscape where AI and new tools emerge daily.Overcoming early stumbles by showing up, iterating fast, and leveraging trust and feedback loops.Key Takeaways:Speed Wins: Rapid iteration and fast staffing trump slow, monolithic “big-bang” IT projects.EQ Matters: Soft skills can be learned; they unlock collaboration, resilience, and better outcomes.Remote Is a Strength: A 25-year remote track record proves that location-agnostic teams deliver quality, flexibility, and cost efficiency.Modularity Over Monoliths: Architect for choice—cloud providers, SaaS, and stacks—so you can pivot as technology evolves.Show Up Relentlessly: Consistent effort, forgiveness of failure, and learning from mistakes fuel long-term success.Closing Thoughts: Lueinalta’s journey shows that innovation isn’t just about tech—it’s about people, practices, and the courage to redefine work itself. By mastering speed, empathy, and modular design, founders can build resilient organizations ready for whatever comes next.Our Sponsors:* Check out Indeed: https://indeed.com/FOUNDERSSTORY* Check out Northwest Registered Agent and use my code FOUNDERS for a great deal: https://northwestregisteredagent.com* Check out Plus500: https://plus500.com* Check out Rosetta Stone and use my code TODAY for a great deal: https://www.rosettastone.com
Chapter 1: Who is Kuty Shalev and what is his background?
which is maybe the most important thing we'll need for the future. But Kuti, can you tell me what was the spark for you that made you say, this is the company and industry that I want to be in?
Yeah, it's a funny story. My beginnings are in accounting. When I first graduated from college, I ended up at Price Waterhouse, the accounting company. And they sent me off to Columbia Business School. And at that time, it was the very first time that they had Ethernet jacks in the classroom. So I'm dating myself here, right? We're talking about ancient history.
But at the time there, we started to create systems that interacted with the teachers and the students. And the code that I wrote at the time got very popular. I got written up in the school newspapers. And the dean called me into his office and asked me for the code I had written for the school. I said, that sounds amazing. Go ahead and take it.
Chapter 2: How did Kuty Shalev start his fully remote software consulting company?
He made a counting entry and my tuition disappeared. So at that time, I knew I wasn't going back to accounting and instead created a company that develops software in order to meet the business needs of the clients. And, you know, my my ex-employer, Pricewaterhouse, became my first client. And that was fabulous. You know, we did a million dollars that first year.
They needed software developers at the time. And, you know, just to talk about remote, you know, it wasn't intentional. You know, I needed software developers. It was really hard to find them in New York City, where I was, for my new, you know, bright, shiny, new client, Pricewaterhouse.
And what I was able to find, and this is back in the day when Skype, you know, no Slack, no Zoom, but we're using Skype. And I'm finding people in North Carolina, in Florida, right, in other places that were willing and capable of doing the work. They just weren't going to be able to walk into the office. Being an accountant, I'm like, oh, no overhead, no office. This works.
You know, let's try it this way. Can I be the person who is going to manage and be the go between between the client and the software developers? Let's see if we can make it happen. I really don't have any other choice. And and it worked right. I think at the core is the belief that people, no matter where they are, can have the skills and can collaborate in order to deliver the outcome.
Chapter 3: What challenges did Kuty face in building a remote team 25 years ago?
I've heard this story a few times where somebody leaves an organization and then maybe they were a consultant advisor and that company becomes their first client. Which, I mean, that's amazing, right? Because as we know, sales and getting clients, that's like the lifeblood of most organizations. So looking back when you were remote, and I love that you're using Skype, which no longer even exists.
You know, 25 years ago, from both your client's perspective, if they knew that you had remote staff, and then also your staff's perspective of being remote, were there any challenges that you faced?
oh we we face tons of challenges i think we did all the things wrong right and you find out it doesn't work and you say well hey i better create a standard to ensure this type of thing doesn't happen right so um the ability to quickly react to the mistakes and figure out what are the right rules and the right checklists to ensure, because you're not in the place, right?
They're not sitting right next to you. You can't do something. But if you have, hey, here's the checklist. Make sure you have these types of internet connections. Make sure you're able to have these types of software connections. These are the times we're expecting you. It sounds basic, but if you don't have an agreement, right, to commit to these basic principles, then you will fall.
And I think when you're remote, it highlights those more than if you were in person and can kind of paper them over.
That's what everyone keeps talking about is, you know, how is it to lead people when you're remote? Or how are those people performing when you're remote versus when you're in person? And the things that you're seeing, you are all about EQ, right? So we had a futurist on recently and he was telling us that IQ will make no difference in the future because of AI, but EQ is incredibly important.
Why do you think EQ is incredibly important for the future?
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Chapter 4: Why are emotional intelligence (EQ) and soft skills important for engineers today?
So, I mean, I'll give you the perspective of EQ for engineers. And I'll tell you the, you know, right before the show, I went on to one of my favorite AIs and I'm like, what is the hardest part of being a successful software engineer? Right. And I got back. And I'll read this to you.
Adapting to rapid technical and AI-driven changes, navigating a selective job market, maintaining motivation in incremental roles, collaborating in cross-functional teams, and managing work-life balance. And you know what? I think that's pretty accurate, right? These are the tough challenges for an engineer today in 2025. And notice what's missing from that list.
It's not about learning a particular piece of software or mastering a software paradigm, right? All of these challenges are really challenges of human emotions, right? And I found that engineers that have a better EQ, they perform better across all of these factors. Right. And I don't like the word EQ. I use the word soft skills. Right. Why? Because emotional intelligence, emotional EQ is a skill.
It's not something you're either born with or you don't have. It's something you can learn. So that's why I prefer calling it a soft skill. Right. So we know that if you think of it as a skill, then then it's obvious that if you want to gain mastery over that, there's a way to do it.
And I like to look at deliberate practice, deliberate practice, which was popularized by a Swedish psychologist back in 1993. And he talks about what does it take in order to create deliberate practice. So we can talk a little bit about that.
And if a software developer has the soft skills on these projects, then all of these types of things, the fact that things are rapid and changing all the time, you need to have the right kind of resilience to deal with that. You need to collaborate with others. Well, do you know how to build trust? Do you know how to ask the questions that are truly concerning?
Oftentimes we hide the things that are most concerning to us. We are not open with it. We need to build that trust. We need to answer the right kind of questions. We need to discover the right kind of questions to ask in order to uncover those questions. So all of these things, right, even maintaining your own internal motivation when the work isn't as exciting, right?
When you're a software developer, not everything you're going to do is going to be earth shattering. Sometimes it's just about enterprise systems and, you know, getting to that 99.999% uptime and, and you need to have a certain amount of, you know, uh, um, Self-motivation, create new games, find new ways to get excited and show up to work with your whole self when you are in those types of roles.
And managing work-life balance. I really hate the word balance. I prefer harmony, right? I think there's a way to create harmony in these situations. And by the way, being remote gives you a tremendous advantage simply because of the time savings, right? That you don't need to do that commute.
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Chapter 5: How does Lumenalta recruit and support remote engineers effectively?
And we are consistent with our core values, which has been remote from day one. And we don't change that. And that has certain strengths for us. One of which is when we are recruiting, when we're looking for who it is that will join us, we're looking for people who want the remote and who can take full advantage of remote.
So if you're the type of engineer that just graduated, right, first job, looking for the mentorship and how to and to kind of grow your career, We're not looking for you and you shouldn't be looking for us. We don't have an office. We don't take those types of people. We're looking for the senior developers, guys who have already proved themselves. And we're looking for more than that.
We're looking for those that have a reason to be remote. Right. So does that mean you're just starting a family? Does that mean you're close to aging parents? Does that mean that you like to travel and want to surf every day?
And so you've got a place that's right by the beach, but you're going to work the eight hours first and then you're right there in order to either before work or after work, go out and do and do catch the wave. So the people that we're looking for are those that have that are interested in and have a way to take advantage of being remote. Then we find that we're we're real tight. Right.
We both want the exact same thing for real reasons that last. So we've got people who are with us for, you know, five, six years as opposed to the industry trend of less than two.
Hey, I like the surfing. I don't surf, but I feel like being remote, if I could be on an island and surf and still work and still do a good job, I'm there for that. I like that.
So we have people that are doing exactly that. It's kind of funny to think about that. And I think it's rare. There are some people who do that. I'd say more common are the family obligations, right? People who are developing in their career and developing in their personal lives are Or those that have other reasons. We've got a couple of people who are into rural farming.
We have interesting people who want to take advantage of being remote.
Hey, that makes sense. Obviously, you know, artificial intelligence, this emerging technologies, a lot of things are happening right now. It seems like it's a very interesting time to be in the tech space. or the tech sphere. So how are you approaching digital transformation, technology development, obviously, since you know, a lot of this is what you do?
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Chapter 6: What is Lumenalta's approach to digital transformation and technology adoption?
Yeah, and I think when it comes to what's happening, and it's going so fast, and we're noticing how it is that the whole world is changing, what they're paying attention to. And at Luminalta, one of the biggest ways we stand out is our focus on interoperability and flexibility. Too many firms push clients into rigid, one-size-fits-all platforms, right?
that lock them in to a single vendor for a decade. We take the opposite approach. We design modular, adaptable architectures that give clients options. So they're not tied to a single cloud provider, SaaS solution, or proprietary tech stack. We also take a pragmatic approach to innovation.
Instead of forcing clients into massive, high-risk IT projects that take years and millions of dollars, we build lightweight, cost-effective proofs of concept that can be tested quickly and then scaled into enterprise-grade solutions. Organizations are moving away from the old, you know, 10 million multi-year transformation mindset.
They want solutions that are efficient, cost conscious, and built with flexibility in mind. And the cost piece is critical, right? Especially in this economy. IT leaders aren't just thinking about what's technically possible. They have to justify every dollar of IT spend to their CFOs.
So we help them make smarter investments by ensuring their infrastructure is scalable, cost efficient, and future-proof. I want to make another point about speed, right? We're remote first and our remote first model, which has been in place, like you say, for 25 years, long before it was common. And for our clients, that really means three key advantages.
I mean, first, it gives them access to top engineering talent worldwide rather than being limited by location. Second, we can staff projects quickly, often in two to three weeks instead of the industry standard four to 12 or more weeks. And finally, because we don't have expensive office overhead, we reinvest in senior engineers rather than passing unnecessary costs onto clients.
So it's about flexibility, speed, and efficiency, which are the perfect things that you need when technology is changing so dramatically with AI and the new thing is coming out every week. And how do you kind of respond to that? So being the type of company that is speedy, that is able to be flexible, is the type of company that can take advantage of that.
I like that. Speed, nimble, agility. If you can't adapt in the next five minutes, it can be crushing to many companies. Like you said, every week there's something new. Almost every day I'm hearing some change, some new software, some addition. Some this, some that, and many people I don't think can keep up for this.
And it sounds like your organization, you've really set it up to be able to find success no matter what. Obviously, 25 years, there's ups and downs of everything in life. Was there any time that you were close to wanting to give up or any specific challenge that you faced that you were able to overcome and how were you able to do that?
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