FROM STARTUP TO SUCCESSION

OUR LESSONS IN LEADERSHIP

Startups require STAMINA

S stands for SIGNIFICANCE

Significance means a higher calling. A bigger mission. Many entrepreneurs focus on success. Significance is far deeper.

When we started out our main manufacturing company 27 years ago , everyone laughed at us. But we were not a start-up. We were an upstart. We did things differently, right from the start. We were there, not to sell, but to serve. We were the only company in our industry to offer free AutoCAD design drawings, at our own risk. That built trust. Trust was part of our Brand Idendity.

We were there to design, to serve, not to sell. Our mission was not to sell products. It was " Creating Beautiful Spaces". That is still our ethos today.

TEAMS

When you have a small team, you can have flexibility and agility. When we transitioned from 2 to 8 or 15 or 22 office staff, it required greater transparency. As we transitioned to larger teams, from 80 to 150 staff, it required extensive systems. Building took not just STAMINA. It took TIME.

Being an entrepreneur teaches you brutal lessons. Balancing patience with a relentless drive to build. Building 3 different factories and building divisions, an Orders Dept, Design Dept, Transport division, R&D dept, Finance Dept. Understanding the importance of an HR department, a Code of Conduct reflecting our values and our standards, as well as negotiating with and understanding different union representation over the years.

Small teams can operate on trust. Bigger teams require structure and systems. Every era has both challenges and trade offs. Know when to transition. That's where Business Coaching steps in. Because entrepreneurship can be a lonely road.

ACTION

Decisiveness is more important than perfection. The greatest asset of SME's versus a corporate environment is that you have the ability to make decisions quickly. Manifestation in start-ups is a verb, not a noun. We made many mistakes over the years, but we learnt from them. Every time. Research and global benchmarking helps build the muscle of decisiveness. We did a year's market research before starting our main manufacturing company, so that we knew the landscape, the environment, the players, the challenges, the texture, the tone, the possibilities, and above all, the gaps in the market, and what it would take to become a revolutionary upstart. Now our actions are more confident because they are based on a lived journey and the hard-earned wisdom we have walked.

MONETARY DISCIPLINE.

This is the piece so few people talk about.

The reason why I tell my story about building a company from 2 to 150 people, discovering a massive internal fraud a third of the way through, rebuilding an entirely new company with elaborate systems, and winning more awards, and becoming a serial entrepreneur, is not because it is a GRAND story, but because it's a RELATABLE story.

We developed the tools of financial stamina and systems that represented significance. Turnover is a signpost but Nett Profit is your real indicator of your strategic advantage. That is the fuel of your fire. Monthly financial analysis unpacked with your key leadership is the GPS of your strategic direction.

That is why I am so passionate about entrepreneurial education and financial literacy.

INTENTION

"The Science of Scaling", the work of a remarkable thought leader, Dr. Benjamin Hardy, is based on saying "NO" to most things in order to say "YES" to pivotal strategic direction. "The Science of Prospection" is living as your future self. That means how you dress, how you show up online, how you represent your brand. On every level. Because how you do one thing is how you do everything.

What set us apart in the early stages was our professionalism. Nobody knew that we were producing beautiful products on a shed, on a field, in Amalgam, in the early days, before we transitioned to the magnificent showroom we have today.

But we were always clear about our intention. We did not believe in "an opposition". We believed in global benchmarking. That is where significance guided our journey.

NAVIGATION

Navigation means riding around the potholes, sometimes even through them, the hard moments, the devastation, the starting again. Sometimes it means course correction, a willingness to adapt and look at different strategies. That takes enormous humility and discernment. But that is where our muscle of STAMINA builds. That is business fitness. That's not a fitness competition or a glamorous moment at awards. That's the muscle we develop when we are on our knees. Standing up, time and time again, that is where MUSCLES become part of our IDENDITY.

ALIGNMENT

Alignment is when for a brief time the road is clear and the progress is smooth. This is often short-lived until another challenge emerges. That is the rollercoaster ride of this thing called ENTREPENEURSHIP.

That is where faith steps in.

As Graham Mitchell writes in his compelling book, "The Compounding Advantage", companies are built "not in leaps but in layers".

That has been our journey of 27 years. It takes STAMINA.

Stamina is the fitness muscle we develop over time. The last 27 years have been turbulent, tough and triumphant.

Whenever I pay tribute to the awards we won over the years, I always tribute the teams that got us there. That are still getting us here.

They gift us S.T.A.M.I.N.A.

What we have loved the most about this brave journey from starting out to succession is GROWING PEOPLE.

That is significant.

Because that is not the legacy

We leave

It is the legacy

We live.