From the barber's chair to GTM Ops, and why the distance isn't as far as you'd think - Juan's story
by Juan Gonzalez10 minute read
Juan Gonzalez - GTM Operations
It started in a backyard in Buenos Aires with a pair of clippers and a group of friends who needed a haircut.
I was 15. I wasn't planning a career. I was just messing around. But word spread — the way it does — and soon I was cutting hair for friends of friends, learning advanced techniques from YouTube tutorials at night, earning money while I was still in school.
It was accidental. But it turned out I was pretty good at it. And they kept coming back.
By 16, I had my first official role in a barbershop in Buenos Aires. Within a few years I was managing one of its branches — scheduling barbers, ordering supplies, running the appointment book. A physical notebook and a pen. No software. No platform.
Just me, the chair, and the organised chaos that anyone running a small service business will recognise immediately.
I didn't know it then, but I was living the exact problem Booksy exists to solve.
Two worlds, one role
Fast forward to 2024. I've moved to Madrid, finished a degree in Industrial Engineering, and built experience in corporate roles. I'm looking for something that bridges my two lives — the hands-on world of the barbershop and the structure of a tech company.
Then I find Booksy.
It felt like the perfect bridge. It combined my experience and passion for the barbering industry with my goal of working in tech. It was a chance to stay connected to the provider community — but to help them from a completely different perspective.
That perspective is now my day job. I work in GTM Operations, supporting Booksy's global markets. My team builds and optimises the internal processes that Booksy's sales, success, and support teams use when they work with providers. Frameworks. Workflows. The behind-the-scenes infrastructure that most people never see — but that every provider eventually benefits from.
We operate in the background. But what we build directly affects the experience that barbers and other providers have with Booksy. When we get it right, they get better support. Better tools. A better experience.
The moment it clicked
For a lot of people who work in operations, the impact of their work stays abstract. It lives in spreadsheets and process diagrams, not in the faces of the people it reaches.
My role is different — because I know what that face looks like.
My clearest moment came at a Booksy industry event in Madrid. My team is responsible for developing the engagement processes the event teams use on the ground. I was there watching it all happen — providers at the booth, conversations with our team, people talking about how the platform had changed the way they ran their businesses.
Seeing it in action — watching providers interact with our people, hearing them talk about how much Booksy helps them — makes the behind-the-scenes work feel very real. You stop thinking about the process and start thinking about the person on the other end of it.
That shift matters. And it's one I get to make because I've been on both sides of it.
A small world
Then came the moment that brought everything full circle.
At a recent Booksy event in Madrid, I got talking to a provider who'd come to visit the booth. He was from Argentina. As the conversation went on, we started piecing together a connection — a barbering workshop, years ago, back in Buenos Aires.
We'd met before. In a completely different life.
It was a great reminder of how small and connected the barbering community is — even across continents. But it was also a reminder of something I think about a lot in my role.
The people building this platform aren't removed from the world it serves. A lot of us come from it. We've sat in the chair. We've run the appointment book with a pen and a notebook. We know what it costs — in time, in stress, in missed evenings — when the tools don't work.
That's not something you learn from a job description. It's something you carry with you.
And at Booksy, it's something that actually matters.
