buzz-on-business

[buzz-on-business]

Money #1.4

I have come to believe that our relationship with money boils down to this…..a continuum - at opposite ends there is “rely” and “don’t rely” and in between a myriad of variations of the two blend into one. If money reflects life, if our relationship with it mirrors that with ourselves and others, it’s possible that the continuum can reveal much more.

We all feel most comfortable somewhere between the opposite ends. We may move out of our comfort zone from time to time, but we all come back home to a place of comfort and security, where we rely more or rely less, depend more or depend less.

I figured out, over time, that my home was at the extreme end of rely. How do we find out where our home is and why? What does it tell us? How do we expand our comfort zone? Are the extremes healthy? What do we miss by living there? So many questions.

I've always looked to my formative years to give me insights into my later years. 0-20 is where the action is. In my world then, maybe now, reliance on money to buy freedom, choices, status, power and respect was the only game in town. Some 20-30 years later, my foundations are still rooted there.

Thankfully there were a couple of amazing human beings forever present in those early years and way beyond, that I could truly rely on. One in particular made the difference. But for her, and the constant and gentle teaching of my latent heart that money has its limitations, I wouldn’t be writing these reflections or contemplating a move away from the extreme.

So the other extreme, what about that? Don’t rely, don’t depend. I have no experience with it, but I’ve seen it. Creativity and freedom of the heart lives there. But the desire to rely on something, someone does not. Money is seldom contemplated, engaged with or embraced as a means to any end. Relying or depending evokes a feeling of unease, uncertainty and risk.

Enough about that warm and fuzzy life stuff….how does the continuum relate to business? Well….one of the non negotiable entry requirements to this world is being comfortable with relying on money, on people. Creativity can only morph into a successful business, a big business, with those two in support.

#money #business success #entrepreneur #creativity #business failure #startup #business leaders

[buzz-on-business]

Money #1.3

When I was 13 a school friend asked me what I wanted to do with myself when I got older. I said I wanted to be an accountant, with conviction. It sounds bland, boring, mind numbing number crunching, why would anyone want that? For me it was more than that, money was a passion, it made me feel things nothing else could. It represented life, choices, safety and survival. Any opportunity to trade, buy, sell, accumulate when I was young, I was all in. The currency didn’t matter, in primary school it was marbles and trading cards, in high school I bought and sold cars. I wanted and needed these things of value, not because I wanted to win or have more than anyone else, it made me feel safe, secure, independent.

My formative years provided a unique opportunity to learn about money. How people interact with it, feel about it, what they do with it. Being the introvert and perfectionist that I was and still am, I watched and listened as much as could, always sneaking a seat at the table if my favourite topic was on the agenda. My interest became obsession by the time I was in my early twenties. Making money was a part of that obsession, but knowing about it, truly knowing about it, was at the core. The allure and the potential mastery of this powerful, yet mystical human construct, consumed me in a way that has shaped my whole life. For better or for worse. If I could learn and know about money, I could learn and know about life.

#money #life #business #entrepreneur #business leaders #business success #business failure

[buzz-on-business]

Money #1.2

If we are to think of human relationships, a lot comes to the table. Money comes with nothing. No emotion, no judgement, no baggage, no history. It comes with a clean slate. Your relationship with it, for this reason, becomes the perfect mirror.

Money engages and reveals the full spectrum of human emotion. Joy, excitement, desire, optimism, fear, envy, frustration, helplessness. The emotions trigger behaviours that can repeat over and over.

Do you seek to control or wield power with it money? Are you engaged, ambivalent, dismissive, obsessed or frustrated by it? Do you love it or loathe it? Are you comfortable with money? Do you obsessively think about it, accumulate it, count it, or spend it? Do you meticulously plan for it, or is it easy come easy go? Would you rather stockpile it or let it flow?

In the answers to these questions lies awareness, insights, reflections and potential new pathways for us to consider. The mirror, if we dare to face it, can reveal more broadly the recurring patterns, themes and outcomes in our human relationships. Our friend money, who comes to us without judgement, shows us what we bring to the table.

#money #relationships

[buzz-on-business]

Money #1.1

Money….it can buy everything….power, influence, image, choices, security, safety and all material things. The three things that escape its grasp are freedom, creativity and love. You can buy the illusion of those three and bask in that illusion until your heart is almost content. The truth is found and the secrets revealed, when we shine a light on our shadow, and explore our relationship with money….

#money

[buzz-on-business]

The Start Up #1.3

The world of business and the deep blue have much in common. Survival is the main game and it’s unrelenting. It’s predatory and unemotional, a fascinating world of beauty and colour, endless variety, life and death. 

The strategies for survival in the marine world are highly evolved, and they need to be precisely executed. 

Schooling, camouflage, mimicry, deception, poisons and potions, speed, manoeuvrability, counter illumination, smoke screens, mobile homes, reclusiveness, costumes, armoury, weaponry just to name a few.

Nothing is personal, there are no prizes or penalties, there is no winning or losing, there is no moral high ground, there are no perpetrators or victims, only consequences. It is the purest game of life and death. 

Business startups have all of this ahead. The cycle of life has just begun, and it can come to an end just as quick. An understanding of, and respect for the players, and the strategies for survival, are essential.

For the startup, the journey of the sea turtle comes to mind. If your eggs don’t get eaten by snakes, lizards or other land animals, you hatch, and run for your life. It’s only 25-50m to the water, but the crabs and sea birds are preying for a slip up. If you make it to the water, you may wish you didn’t. Swim, and swim hard.

To sum up this brutal numbers game, if 10% of the eggs hatch and 10% of the hatchlings make it to the water, and 10% of those see the day out, only 1 in 1000 will have survived. 

Who would back themselves against those odds? Only those who are sure, or stupid, or both? I would say the only people who take those odds are compelled.

#startup #entrepreneur #business #money #business success #business strategy

[buzz-on-business]

The business of giving and charity #1.3

Kings and Queens....

When we think of kings and queens, as symbols, and archetypes, our conditioning prevents us from seeing through the veil of benevolence. Ambassadors of all worthy causes, advocates for the poor, the disadvantaged, the hopeful. They portray themselves as givers, but the reality is far from that. In their castles, the real business is revealed. The insatiable accumulation of things for the sake of accumulation. Everyone and everything is an object to be used, adorned or paraded.

Kings and queens of business are no different. They have made it, they have their castle, they can get on with the business of collecting and accumulating wealth and people.

As a co-founder of a tech start up, particularly in the early days, I became well acquainted with the givers, the kings and queens of business knocking on our door. If you think you are hiding the fact that you need money, think again. They can smell it. That’s why they call it the shark tank, one drop of blood in the ocean is all it takes.

They always come offering the keys to their kingdom, the keys to their network, to their high net worth friends who live in other castles. We can take your company to the next level, make you rich, make you a star. Sound familiar? If I had a dollar for how many times this exact scenario played out for me, we wouldn’t have needed investors.

So what do they want in return for their giving, their benevolence, access to their kingdom? It’s simple, ownership, of you. You are a budding, yet vulnerable young entrepreneur with an interesting business, you are an object, a plaything, something to be shared amongst friends, to be boasted about at dinner parties. “I gave them their start, without me they are nothing”.

Word of wisdom, and warning…..if you can be disarmed with flattery, any form of it, SHUT, THAT, DOWN. It’s the modus operandi of the giver. Be aware, watch and listen, accept thanks, but don't fall victim their rescue attempts. If a giver puts their arms around you and says "come with me, I will show you the way...." run, and run fast.

In my experience as a tech start up founder, it’s been a hard road as a result of not accepting a comfy bed in someone else’s castle. But it’s my road, and I’m still free.

#startup #business #business leaders #entrepreneur #business success #business failure

[buzz-on-business]

The business of giving and charity #1.2

Beware of the takers they say. Beware of the givers too!

In business if you allow people to help or give “for free”, yes it seems generous on the surface, but you can bet your bottom dollar, the generosity is the tip of the iceberg. Not any iceberg either, I am talking about the one that sunk the Titanic. Underneath the giving lies a need, the size of which at first is not visible. But it will be there. Always.

Look at the givers through the same lens. The need is much bigger than the generosity, by definition. If they don’t need the money, they need something else. They don’t and will not want a monetary exchange and will insist on this to not muddy the waters. The exchange of money doesn’t muddy the waters, it purifies it.

The problem for the giver is that they don’t want to be in an employer-employee relationship, where they are subordinate and accountable. The giver wants to be admired, adored, listened to and put on a higher pedestal, without the same expectations. The iceberg metaphor is perfect for the giver and their veil of benevolence.

So where do you find these givers? Well, they find you. They are in plentiful supply in two business arenas....start ups and charities.

#startup #business #entrepreneur #charity #giving #money

[buzz-on-business]

The business of giving and charity #1.1

Charity and Poverty are inextricably linked. The two are in the most toxic of co-dependent relationships one can imagine. Charity and poverty are meant in the broadest sense of the words. Charity usually means generosity and helpfulness. Poverty usually means the state of being poor but most people link that to financial terms only. Poverty to me, means poor in life. In post Money and Death #1.1, K was generous with his wealth but he robbed his children of life, the ability to create, to be fulfilled, to be driven, to be motivated, to be passionate and probably to love. Poverty is the dark shadow of charity.

#money #giving #business success #business failure #startup #entrepreneur #charity

[buzz-on-business]

Money and Death #1.1

The founder of an inspiring, disruptive, holistic deathcare business I follow on Instagram recently posted about an experience with a family where the father (K) who had passed left a letter for his family along with the Will advising them he had left his entire estate to charity. Well…this triggered me beyond belief. We have all heard a story like this. Most of us empathise with the person who has passed. They can do what they like with the money they have earned right? Yes, of course. But this is a statement to, a judgement of, the people he left behind.

Rich parents enable their kids all their lives, they buy them into opportunity, they buy them out of trouble, they stifle their creativity and rob them of proper learning (the hard way). To then punch their kids in the face for disappointing them, by giving their entire estate to charity when they check out, is just beyond words. You can’t create an environment that limits or prevents their ability to succeed, and then blame them for doing the only thing possible in that environment, not much.

Still not convinced? Still empathising with the dearly departed?

How about a physical analogy to ram the point home. Imagine K causes a car accident when his kids are teenagers, and all of them are left in a wheelchair. Out of guilt, K gives them a big pot of money to support them but tells them the end goal should be to get themselves out of their wheelchairs. On his deathbed, the now grown kids have not been able to walk again. In the Will, K takes back the wheelchairs. Thoughts? Feelings?

#money #last will and testament #money talks

[buzz-on-business]

The Start Up #1.2

More about the delivery of the detail, and how the founder must relinquish it to survive. It is such a delicate dance, like doing ballet on a tightrope that is stretched across the Grand Canyon. The founder must survive the crossing, and then, only then, is there a chance of success.

The analogy that comes to mind, to get the point across, could be one of an inspiring young chef who has just opened their first restaurant. This young chef has been through the wringer, travelled the world and worked at some great restaurants under some great chefs. They have been praised, abused, been given no credit, they work long hours and get paid for half of it, if that. They live in tiny, unkept apartments with two or three others, just to live in the city. In most of these restaurants they start work at 8am for preparation after getting home at 2am, 5 or 6 days per week. It is gruelling, find any Michelin star chef in the world that says it isn’t so.

So they have opened the restaurant, the 15 year lead up to this moment has arrived. Anyone who knows about them eagerly awaits getting a reservation and the critics and keyboard warriors on trip advisor are waiting to eat them alive. It is small, it has to be, the vision and the detail is them. They are alone, creatively they are finally free, it feels good.

Things start moving, they are fully booked but the cracks are starting to show. The small team who has been there from the start is exhausted, if they are still there at all. The delivery of the detail must be relinquished. What does that mean? In a restaurant context it means that the founder, the chef, now must find and train a team to deliver on the detail in the exact way that the founder envisaged. They need to understand the vision, embrace, manage, and deliver on the detail. Finding that team, training them, on top of running the fledgling operation is no easy feat. Survival in the truest sense of the word is at stake. That sick feeling that everything could be lost at any moment, is your new best friend.

Survival has now become a 24/7 mission. Some bright young stars have been found, they are training all day, executing all night. Remembering that the detail is customer centric, how does the founder know where to place themselves in order to ensure the delivery of the detail is exact. Think of all the best restaurants you have been to, how do you know which one is head chef, the owner, the founder? They are at the pass. Busily inspecting, feeling, wiping plates, checking the temperature of every single dish that goes out, and yanking them from production if there is the slightest problem. If they are not at the pass, they should be. In any business, the founder needs to place themselves in that part of the business where the battle for survival is fought and won, and where mistakes can hopefully be unmade.

#startup #business #business leaders #entrepreneur #business success #business failure #money #creativity #business creativity

[buzz-on-business]

The Start Up #1.1

Last night, one of the people I follow on Instagram posted “There are two types of people in this world. Macro managers and micro managers. If your business doesn’t have both, and if they aren’t on the same page, you will fail. You will lose it all. You will be left in the dust.” @donaldmiller.

Donald Miller is a business coach with a focus on relationships and emotional awareness. Relationships in business are just as important as the ones we form in our personal lives. He posts some of the most unique, insightful and useful messages to think about and if they resonate, apply in our lives, work and businesses.

This post woke me at 4am the next morning, compelling me to consider it, to unpack it, to explain it, to feel it. Our reactions to words, mantras, messages and memes are always a personal thing but this post hit me hard. It was like potentially finding the key I’d been searching for in my whole business career, if I chose to listen. For me, it is the key to business success and failure. Let me explain.

When someone starts a business from nothing they need to be resourceful. They have an idea, a vision, they are compelled and usually they are creative. They have to make time and find money. They will have to manage the macro (the vision) and manage the micro (the detail). If any first time around founder knew the path ahead, I wonder whether they would choose it again. Probably yes, but it is an interesting question to ponder.

So the founder, the creator, gets to work. The macro and the micro, the vision and the detail, is managed by them. There is no-one else, there is no other way. It is generally a harmonious relationship with yourself for a while because you are the macro and micro inside one person, naturally you are on the same page. It’s just you.

The vision or the macro is the big picture version of the problem and the solution. It is about seeing opportunities and forging a new path, sometimes even before your currently unknown customers knew they needed one. The detail or the micro, is a little different. The detail, and the founder’s ability to embrace it, manage it and deliver on it is the key to business success.

A customer of any business has “detail” that they need managed and delivered upon. The detail differs from business to business but knowing it, is essential. If you are contracting with a building company to build you a house, your “detail” will almost always be certainty – of both time and cost. If a building company can’t deliver on time and cost, they will fail soon enough. If you frequent fine dining restaurants your “detail” will be quality and the experience, not certainty of time and cost. If a fine dining restaurant can’t deliver on quality and experience, they will fail soon enough too. The examples are endless. The point is that to succeed, a founder needs to know what “detail” does their customer want managed, and at first, they need to deliver on that detail too.

So say the founder knows the detail and how to deliver it. Customers start coming, things start moving, all of the “not essential for survival” parts of the business get left behind. The founder is trading off their time every single day, every hour, every minute. Even more than when the thing was just an idea, a vision, a bubble. The problem for the founder is when they can no longer do both the macro and the micro, the vision and the detail.

The vision, always needs to sit with the founder and this cannot be compromised. There wouldn’t be many founders who farm out the vision at any stage of the business, to do so would be perilous. The detail however, the delivery of it at least, must be relinquished by the founder in order for them survive, and for their business to survive, and then scale. It is the most daunting, risky transition a business will ever face. The “detail”, the knowing of it and how to deliver it, will always be key to continued business success. Can anyone do this? The vision and the detail? Less than 1% I’d say. Less than 0.10% might be closer.

When the founder, or anyone else in the business is not paying attention to the detail, disruption and spectacular failures occur. These disruptions and failures can happen at ANY stage of business maturity, but they ALWAYS happen when you’re asleep. Case in point are taxi businesses worldwide. It might have been A to B safely and comfortably in the start, but I wouldn’t know a person who rode in a cab for the last 20 years that didn’t get peeved about not knowing when they were arriving and how much it would cost. Was anyone listening, or caring, from within these taxi businesses? No. Was anyone else? Yes – the founder of Uber.

#startup #business #business leaders #entrepreneur #business success #business failure #money #creativity #business creativity