CRN’s Cass Cooper engages with Nahjee Maybin and Jonathan Mack to explore their journeys in the managed services industry, focusing on scaling businesses, pricing strategies, leadership, client relationships, and the integration of AI.
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In this episode of The Channel Angle, recorded live at Pax8 Beyond 2025 in Denver, Cass Cooper sits down with Jonathan Mack of Pax8 Academy and Nahjee Maybin, CEO of Kenyatta Computer Services, to explore how leadership evolves when profit margins tighten. The interviews touch on the future of agentic AI, the Pax8 marketplace, and how to grow without losing sight of who you are.
Mack shares lessons from the 2008 crash and offers a practical framework for aligning service delivery with profitability. Whereas Maybin talks about transforming a family-run business from break-fix to managed services, leading with empowerment, and the importance of values-based client relationships.
From Revenue Growth To Profit Clarity
Jonathan Mack didn’t come to Pax8 by way of theory. He spent nearly two decades building and scaling an MSP himself. His journey started at the bench, fixing computers while working his way through a commerce degree. When the 2008 economic downturn hit, his business, like many, he was forced to face an uncomfortable truth: Revenue was up, but profit was… not.
“We were over-servicing clients,” Mack shared. “It wasn’t wasteful spending or bad tech. It was just that our pricing didn’t reflect the level of service we were delivering.”
That moment changed everything. And now, he spends his days helping MSPs confront the same reality: Doing great work doesn’t mean doing it at a loss.
Three Ways To Reimagine Pricing Strategy
- Top-Down – Understand what the market will bear. If you’re charging double the going rate, have a clear story for why you’re worth it.
- Bottom-Up – Know your costs, calculate your margins, and let the math speak. “The number won’t lie,” said Mack.
- Integrated View – Merge both methods. Understand what’s making your margins thin: Is it your tech stack? Your labor? Your value narrative?
The key, he says, is not just knowing your worth but being able to articulate it.
Leadership By Design, Not Default
That principle of clarity carries over to our second guest, Nahjee Maybin, who took the helm of his family-owned business in 2018. By 2021, Kenyatta Computer Services pivoted from break-fix to MSP, and has been scaling ever since.
Rather than jumping straight to rate hikes, Maybin led with a bottom-up mindset.
“We added value first with more consistent support, cybersecurity upgrades, better communication. And then adjusted pricing,” he said. The company also invested heavily in Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs) to prove ROI and ensure that clients remained aligned with their evolving service offerings.
Leadership, for Maybin, is about empowerment.
“Leadership is pulling people up, not just telling them what to do,” he told me. That applies to clients, staff, and even partners. “We want our employees to feel ownership over their work and their ideas. That’s how we grow.”
When Values And Margins Collide
Both leaders echoed a similar tension: the relational heart of this business. In a people-centered ecosystem like the IT channel, it’s easy to want to go above and beyond for clients, even when it cuts into profit.
But Maybin put it plainly: “You start losing money when you work with clients who don’t share your values.”
That’s why Kenyatta Computer Services now leads with values-first alignment. It’s not just about what services they offer; it’s about who they offer them to. Whether working with nonprofits, engineers, or HVAC pros, Maybin’s team focuses on partnerships that feel mutual and purposeful.
Future-Facing: Agentic AI And Market Flexibility
As we looked toward the future, both leaders acknowledged the pressure to adapt to evolving technologies like agentic AI. Maybin emphasized the importance of internal adoption before external implementation. “If we don’t understand it internally, we can’t offer it externally.”
He’s especially excited for the coming Pax8 marketplace for agents, expected in 2026. “We’re not developers. We’re Lego builders. Just give us the blocks; we’ll build the solutions.”
Raise More Than Rates
Profitability and purpose aren’t mutually exclusive. In fact, when done right, they’re deeply connected.
What both Jonathan and Nahjee make clear is this: Leadership in the channel today means being honest about your numbers, clear about your story, and intentional about your relationships. Raise your prices, sure, but raise your standards, your alignment, and your community impact while you’re at it.
Because in this economy, the real flex isn’t just staying afloat.
It’s staying aligned.
