What role does Lyra Technologies play in helping Evergreen MSPs post-exit?

That was one of the questions I wanted to explore with Greg Zolkos, Regional CEO at Lyra Technologies for Evergreen’s MSPs in the South.

Greg sold his own MSP, Atlas Professional Services, to Evergreen after 16+ years as a founder. Today, he coaches more than 20 MSPs across the region.

What I liked about our conversation was how practical his advice was. Here are 7 takeaways for MSP founders:

1. Protect your client relationships before chasing the next dollar of growth.

Growth is a lot easier when you don’t have a leaky bucket.

Strong relationships drive retention. Retention means you aren’t constantly replacing lost revenue. Your team is happier. And organic growth becomes much easier.

This is a trust-based business. Spend your time where relationships are built—not at every conference or chasing every prospect.

2. Watch three numbers: organic growth, profitability and client retention.

There are hundreds of MSP KPIs. But these three matter the most

The lesson: don't drown yourself in metrics. Start with the few that tell you whether the underlying business is actually getting better.

3. Question every expense—even your garbage bill.

Greg calls it “controlling the controllables.”

One MSP was spending almost $3,000/month on trash collection.

Why?

The dumpster was being emptied five days a week—even though it was only full once or twice.

They changed the schedule.

Annual savings: ~$20,000.

Profit improvement isn't always another automation or PSA optimization. Sometimes it's sitting in your garbage.

4. Standardize your stack and your service delivery.

Five backup tools. Three security tools. Different processes for different clients.

Greg sees significant room for improvement here.

Standardization creates operational discipline—and makes it easier to automate, train people and scale without simply adding more headcount.

5. Clean your data now if you expect AI to help you later.

Poor documentation + poor ticket resolution notes + poor data hygiene = poor inputs for AI.

AI can't magically compensate for years of bad operational data.

The MSPs that clean up their data today will be much better positioned to automate tomorrow.

6. Use AI to solve your clients’ business problems—not just their IT problems.

Greg gave a great example of an engineering firm.

A human might spend 4–6 hours reviewing CAD documents and counting the rebar required for an estimate.

AI can potentially do that work in minutes.

That changes the conversation from:

"How can I manage your IT?"

to:

"Where is your business wasting time, and how can technology fix it?"

That makes an MSP far more valuable—and far stickier.

7. Find peers who will show you their numbers—and be willing to show yours.

Evergreen now has 120+ MSPs, giving the organization what Greg calls the ability to fire a lot of “test bullets.”

Its peer groups share scorecards down to metrics such as endpoints per employee and gross margin.

If your neighbor is generating 60% gross margin and you're at 40%, the conversation becomes pretty straightforward:

“What are you doing that I'm not?”

But that only works if founders are willing to be vulnerable enough to share what isn't working.
And that may be the broader lesson from my conversation with Greg.

Lyra gives MSPs access to things that are difficult to build efficiently on their own—recruiting, sales and go-to-market playbooks, back-office infrastructure, coaching and a large peer network.

But the objective isn't to take the founder further away from the business.

It's to free them to spend more time on the things that matter most: their people, their clients and their relationships.

This podcast is hosted by Madhur Duggar. Madhur is a Senior M&A Advisor at Excendio Advisors and focuses on IT Services

Reach out to Madhur at Madhur@excendio.com or 212.731.4230

Book an Appointment with him on his LinkedIn at (34) Madhur Duggar | LinkedIn

Check out Excendio Advisors and our amazing content at www.excendio.com

Reach out to Greg Zolkos on his LinkedIn at Gregory Zolkos | LinkedIn

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