Inside Guideline's mission to modernize 401(k)s | Kevin Busque (Co-founder and CEO)

Kevin Busque is the co-founder and CEO of Guideline, a 401(k) management company revolutionizing the retirement space for small and medium-sized businesses. Prior to Guideline, Kevin co-founded Taskrabbit, where he encountered firsthand the complexity and low participation rates of traditional 401(k) plans—largely due to confusing fee structures. After launching Guideline to address those problems head-on, the company has seen remarkable growth, hitting $120 million in ARR by June 2024. In this conversation, Kevin shares pivotal moments that shaped Guideline’s trajectory, including a strategic partnership with Gusto. He also explains how his “Do the hard thing first” mindset helped the team build an industry-leading platform and disrupt an entrenched market. – Referenced: • ADP: https://www.adp.com/ • Aydin Senkut: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aydins/ • CalSavers: https://www.calsavers.com/ • DoorDash: https://www.doordash.com/ • Fidelity: https://www.fidelity.com/ • Guideline: https://www.guideline.com/ • Gusto: https://gusto.com/ • Intuit: https://www.intuit.com/ • Jeremy Caballero: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremycaballero/ • John Zimmer: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnzimmer11/ • Josh Reeves: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuareeves/ • Mike Nelson: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mnelsonio/ • Leah Solivan: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leahsolivan/ • Paychex: https://www.paychex.com/ • Plaid: https://plaid.com/ • Taskrabbit: https://www.taskrabbit.com/ • Tomer London: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomerlondon/ – Where to find Kevin: • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbusque/ – Where to find Brett: • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brett-berson-9986094/ • Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/brettberson – Where to find First Round Capital: • Website: https://firstround.com/ • First Round Review: https://review.firstround.com/ • Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/firstround • YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@FirstRoundCapital • This podcast on all platforms: https://review.firstround.com/podcast – Timestamps: [00:00:00] Teaser: “I don’t believe in stealth mode” [00:02:51] Inspiration behind Guideline [00:07:56] Lessons from a year’s research before Guideline [00:10:44] Identifying market pull for Guideline [00:14:28] What Kevin learnt before shipping their first product [00:19:10] How Guideline set their fees up [00:27:51] The surprising range of Guideline’s early customers [00:31:48] Kevin’s insights from the Gusto integration [00:39:48] Guideline’s first year [00:44:44] Working with Plaid as Guideline’s first customer [00:53:28] Guideline’s auto-enrollment feature [00:57:53] Lucky 8: Kevin’s unexpected pricing strategy [01:02:04] Franchise opportunities [01:04:49] Kevin’s reflections on Taskrabbit [01:11:36] Will Guideline ever go multi-product? [01:12:37] Kevin’s take on product-market fit [01:13:30] Guideline’s compounding advantage [01:18:51] The challenges faced by introverted leaders