Lean Way

Milan Motavar
By Milan MotavarSeptember 20255 min read

For us, how we build the company is as important as what we build. We are not a typical SaaS startup chasing headcount or vanity metrics. Our philosophy is rooted in being lean, staying radically transparent, and cultivating a culture that values ownership and speed.

This is how we align with our mission of making WhatsApp infrastructure simple and reliable for developers.

Building the Lean Way

We are intentional about staying small and focused.

A lean team forces clarity in priorities, fast decision-making, and true ownership of outcomes. Instead of adding layers of management, we optimize for impact per engineer. Every person writes code, shapes product decisions, and contributes to strategy.

This model keeps us fast and disciplined. It also prevents us from hiding behind process or bureaucracy. With fewer people, the quality of each decision matters more. We are not trying to scale headcount; we are scaling efficiency.

Being Transparent

Trust is the foundation of infrastructure. Developers attach their WhatsApp numbers and message traffic to our platform. That level of trust requires openness.

We share our sub-processors, publish how we handle GDPR and security practices, and make our roadmap available to customers. We document incidents when they occur and treat them as learning opportunities, not PR risks.

Transparency is not a marketing tactic for us. It is how we survive and earn the confidence of CTOs, compliance teams, and developers. If the product is critical infrastructure, customers deserve to know exactly how it works and how we run it.

Culture

Culture is not perks, slogans, or motivational posters. Culture is the set of decisions we make when nobody is watching.

We value:

  • Ownership: every person owns their work end-to-end.
  • Speed: we bias for fast execution because speed compounds trust and reduces friction.
  • Clarity: we say things plainly, design simply, and avoid complexity unless it is necessary.

Our culture expects everyone to think deeply, challenge assumptions, and build with care. We want a team that is comfortable asking hard questions and shipping high-quality answers.

We believe culture is an amplifier: with a lean team and transparency, the right culture keeps us aligned with our mission.

Bootstrapped by Choice

We are bootstrapped. We are building with our own resources and intend to remain this way until we achieve true product-market fit.

Bootstrapping forces us to stay close to customers, ship only what matters, and avoid distractions that come with chasing funding rounds. It keeps us disciplined, frugal, and focused on solving the real pain points developers face.

We are not opposed to raising capital in the future, but only when it accelerates a working model, not before. Until then, we choose independence. It keeps us honest.

The Way We Build

We are deliberate about how we grow. Staying lean forces discipline. Remaining bootstrapped keeps us focused on solving customer problems instead of investor milestones. Radical transparency earns trust with developers and compliance teams. A culture of ownership and speed ensures we deliver with clarity and care.

Together, these principles form the foundation for the kind of company we want to be - resilient, product-first, and essential to the developers who rely on us. This is the way we build, and it is how we believe we will endure.

Lean Way - SendZen Blog | SendZen