Startup leaders love to talk product, growth, and traction. This episode makes a quieter point: most companies do not run out of ideas, they run out of time and money. Labor is typically the biggest cost, and when execution slows down, runway disappears fast. In Episode 39 of DissedMedia: A Startup Story, Ben Olmos speaks with Brian Samson, Founder and Chairman of Plugg Technologies, about how nearshoring in Latin America has evolved from a “cost savings” tactic into an operating advantage. The conversation is practical, occasionally blunt, and aimed at founders who need more capacity without adding more friction.
Who Brian Samson Is
Brian is a nearshoring operator, not a theorist. He has built three nearshoring firms from $0 to $4 million in revenue and previously served as VP of Talent for several San Francisco startups. He also holds an MBA from UCLA. Outside of business, he is an advocate for children in foster care and adopted a child from the foster system with his wife.
That blend of startup talent experience and values-driven leadership shapes how he thinks about teams: the goal is not just filling roles, it is building a system that performs under pressure.
Time Zone Is the Feature Now
A key theme in the episode is that nearshoring has changed. Founders used to lead with labor arbitrage: “How can the company pay less?” Post-COVID, many companies still care about cost, but the bigger driver is collaboration speed.
Brian describes the reality founders want: people who can jump on a quick Zoom, go back and forth in Asana or Monday in real time, and deliver fast feedback without the built-in delay of a massive time-zone gap. He makes the point that the dollars saved can evaporate when a team spends the next day waiting for basic answers, approvals, or fixes.
This is not framed as an “anti-Asia” argument. It is framed as an operational argument: working against body clocks is possible, but it is not natural, and it often creates hidden costs in momentum and morale.
The Startup Urgency Problem
Ben reinforces something every founder recognizes: startup urgency is unlike anything else. When systems are down, customers are blocked, or a release is on the line, waiting even six hours can be painful. The discussion lands on a simple idea: nearshoring works well for startups because it pairs urgency with a staffing model that can keep up with it.
In other words, nearshoring is not only about rate. It is about tempo. And tempo is a competitive advantage.
Plugg Technologies: What They Do Differently
Plugg is positioned as a nearshore staffing agency supporting early-stage to mid-stage tech startups and middle-market companies. Brian describes Plugg as “talent brokers,” with recruiting and operational infrastructure in Latin America (recruiters, operations, HR, legal, payroll), combined with a U.S. entity that supports U.S. contracts and standard payment workflows.
Why founders should care: this model reduces the usual obstacles that derail international hiring. The episode calls out the kinds of headaches that make leaders hesitate, like complicated payment logistics or “crazy wire transfers.” Plugg’s approach is presented as a way to keep the relationship clean and businesslike while still tapping the LATAM talent market.
A Useful Lens for Founders
One of the most actionable distinctions in the episode is Brian’s framing of “cheapest” versus “best value.”
He is direct: if a company’s only goal is the cheapest talent in the world, Asia is often the answer. The argument for Latin America is different. It is best value: a company might pay a little more than some offshore options, but less than U.S. rates, and the operational gains (time zone alignment, communication, speed, strong English in many cases) can more than justify the difference.
He also notes that the kind of talent Plugg targets is not sitting in commodity marketplaces. The positioning is that these are recruited professionals, similar to how U.S. companies chase scarce roles like data engineers and AI engineers.
Grit, Gratitude, and Why Startups Need It
The most memorable story in the episode is a startup reality check.
Brian describes being on an executive team at a San Francisco startup running out of money. They had to cut a meaningful number of contractors quickly. The next workday, the team’s complaints centered on losing the hummus budget and the micro-kitchen, not on the people who had just lost their roles.
He contrasts that entitlement with what he experienced spending time in Latin America: people who are scrappy, gritty, and grateful for opportunities, including the growth that comes from difficult circumstances. The point is not to romanticize hardship. It is to highlight that startups require resilience, and teams who have operated inside real constraints can bring a different kind of strength to the work.
Ben connects this to the idea of grit and perseverance, referencing how resilience shows up in personal and professional cultures, and why that matters when building in uncertain conditions.
Mexico, Headlines, and the Mistake Founders Make
The episode also tackles a common founder bias: judging countries by headlines.
Brian speaks positively about Mexico’s advantages for nearshoring: accessibility, educated talent pools, and strong major-city ecosystems (including cities like Monterrey, Guadalajara, and Mexico City). Ben adds an important perspective: if outsiders judged the United States only by crime stories from major cities, they would assume the entire country is in chaos. The conversation suggests the same pattern happens with Latin America, where founders confuse government or media narratives with the reality of the people and the workforce.
The takeaway is straightforward: founders who can look beyond scary headlines tend to find opportunity where others hesitate.
What Founders Should Do Next
This episode effectively hands founders a decision framework:
1) Clarify what “winning” means
If the priority is pure cost minimization, be honest about that. If the priority is speed, iteration, and collaboration, time zone alignment becomes non-negotiable.
2) Choose roles that benefit from fast feedback loops
Nearshoring is especially compelling for teams that need ongoing interaction: engineering, product, data, operations, and support functions where response time affects customers.
3) Treat nearshore staff like real teammates, not a side vendor
The episode implies that nearshoring fails when it is treated like an external task rabbit. It works when expectations, cadence, and accountability mirror how the company runs internally.
4) De-risk infrastructure early
Contracts, payroll, HR, compliance, and payment workflows are not “later” problems. If founders solve the operating layer early, nearshoring feels like capacity. If they ignore it, nearshoring becomes another project to manage.
Where to Learn More
Brian Samson and Plugg Technologies
Brian Samson on LinkedIn
About the Show
DissedMedia: A Startup Story follows the build-in-public journey of DissedMedia and The Daily Pitch, with founder and operator conversations focused on what it really takes to build, scale, and survive.
