Meet David Feinberg: NAPEO’s 2024-2025 Board of Directors Chair

A few weeks ago, nearly 1,000 industry members gathered in Orlando for our 2024 Annual Conference and Marketplace. We celebrated NAPEO’s 40th anniversary and welcomed new association leadership. David Feinberg, Justworks’ senior vice president of risk and insurance programs, officially took the reins as NAPEO’s new Board of Directors Chair. He’s been active within NAPEO for several years, participating on numerous committees. ​​​​He most recently served as vice chair. Feinberg joined the PEO industry after a career on Wall Street as an equity research analyst. He also worked to build national, small group health plans as the Executive Vice President of Health Plan at WellNet before joining Justworks in 2015.

He spoke with PEO Insider ® about his background, plans for the year and why his first impression of PEOs turned out to be wrong.

PEO Insider ®: How did you first learn about PEOs?

David Feinberg: In 2005 I worked as an equity research analyst for Goldman Sachs, and I was assigned to cover HR stocks. I keyed in on temporary staffing companies, and when I prepared to put out a report, my supervisor thought we needed more companies in the analysis. I mentioned that I had found two other companies that were sort of like staffing companies but called PEOs. He told me throw them in, so we added them to the report. I thought they were confusing and bad businesses, basically insurance arbitrage businesses. That was my first exposure to PEOs.

PI: How did you end up working for a PEO?

DF: After 10 years behind an Excel spreadsheet telling people how to run a business, I realized I wanted to be a part of the operational side of a business. I got my MBA and then had an opportunity to build a small group self-funded health plan which I did for a few years.

While looking for my next opportunity, I met a network connection who set up a meeting with a venture capital firm. The person I met with told me the firm had invested in PEOs. My reaction was to say, ​​“it’s just an arbitrage play.” He told me that I had to meet Isaac [Isaac Oates, Justworks’ founder]. By June of 2015 I had a job offer to join Justworks.

PI: What had changed? Why were you interested in working for Justworks?

DF: I found Isaac to be an incredibly thoughtful person. Three things about Justworks stood out to me that made the company unique compared to other PEOs. First, I thought the company had a modern go-to-market strategy. Second, Justworks owned its own technology. Third, it was a mission and values-driven company.

​​​PI: What are Justworks’ core principles?

DF: Justworks’ mission is to help entrepreneurs and businesses grow with confidence. If you talked with 100 of my teammates, you would sense an incredible alignment to this mission. Many people at Justworks have had a small business owner in their family or previously had their own small business, and they see how challenging and honorable small business ownership is. It gives us a visceral drive to help our customers, and we aspire to be the partner that they have always needed and deserved but never before had access to. Justworks is committed to being this true partner where we believe the market needs are greatest, which is among companies with under 100 employees.

PI: How did you get involved with NAPEO?

DF: In September of 2015, I attended my first NAPEO conference, and it changed my point of view on the entire industry. I learned we paid a large sum in member dues, but we were not engaged with NAPEO. That seemed silly to me, and I thought someone should go to evaluate the ROI. I realized we were not taking advantage of our membership and underutilizing the education resources. I met people like Dale Hageman, Bob Cerone, Barron Guss and Andy Lubash. They were all incredibly generous in helping me learn about the industry and sharing their knowledge. I realized that the PEO industry is unique in that, yes we are competitors, but we also rely on each other to do the right thing in terms of compliance for ourselves and our customers.

In a startup there’s your job description and then there’s your job. I saw white space where we had an opportunity to have someone engage at the leadership level with NAPEO. I took on that role and eventually joined the board and executive committee.

PI: How do you see your role as chair of the board?

DF: My role is role to support the NAPEO staff. Our biggest deliverable next year is our new strategic plan, but I’m focused on supporting the staff to make your jobs easier.

PI: What are your goals for the year?

DF: There are three things I’d like to achieve this year. First, let’s end the ERTC saga and get money in the hands of our customers. Second, I want to see increased participation with NAPEO’s PAC. The PAC is one of our top tools to engage with policymakers and achieve our advocacy goals. We need to increase participation throughout all levels of our members. Third, I’d like to see more participation with programs like Next Gen and WIN (Women in NAPEO). We need a more diverse talent pool to lead the industry going forward.

PI: Do you have ideas for any new initiatives or programs?

DF: No new initiatives. We have a lot of good things in flight with different levels of maturity. We don’t need more, we need to continue investing in what’s already there. I want to focus on improving our existing resources to make them even better.

​​​PI: How do you think the industry will evolve?

DF: The only constant is increased regulation and complexity. Even though there are more tools and resources available, it’s becoming harder to start a PEO. Many of the new entrants now are well-funded players leveraging the model as opposed to traditional start-ups. Consolidation will also continue playing a role, but I’m not concerned about PEOs going away. The industry has seen different eras from its infancy to the workers’ comp. focus of the 1990s to the health insurance focus of the 2010s. I think we’re entering a new era now that’s focused more on HR and remote work. The business of how and where people work is where a lot of PEOs are focused, and we provide incredible value to our customers in this area.

​​​PI: What’s life like outside of work and PEO?

DF: There’s a lot of demands at the office, so my main focus outside of work is the Feinberg family. I’m also a diehard Duke and New York sports fan (Yankees, Giants and Rangers).