This is the single most important thing in your entire business as a founder - Ep 111

Back with one of my incredibly long and increasingly late evening walks around the old community. Never used to be an evening walk guy, but it fits the time zones in general day to day lifestyle here a bit more than anywhere I used to live previously. Also trying to get 12,000 steps in per day because I have the genetics of someone that could become a fat fuck if I don't do that. Even though I train religiously six days a week, I always eat a lot and sit down quite a lot, so might get sore I'm doing this. But I decided the DJI is better than iPhone because that's even worse. I want to talk about something fucking obvious, but something that I don't think enough people spend enough time on in terms of trying to get better as operators. And really I'm talking about myself. So maybe not everyone or even a lot of people, but certainly me. And that is leverage. It's like the single most important thing in business for sure. And really people say it comes from a few key areas and they are, you know, people say, I think naval says code people, capital and something else I've forgotten. But basically how can you be the most effective with your time and your efforts, right? And when you start a business, or a brand in my case, but a business in general, you probably by default have fuck all, if, if not quite literally zero leverage at all. I mean, especially if it's your first venture, right? You've got no experience, no network, probably no capital. Let's assume you don't, like most people, no products, no platform, etc. And as a result you basically have to hustle your fucking bass off and be bent over your laptop all day. And that was me, still is me sometimes, which is kind of my point. And you basically have to create leverage by. Well, you create value first with zero leverage, which then gives you some leverage because you have some money and you build a business, you build a team. There's a lot of fucking scooters around here. And then the more and more you go, you obviously have a bigger business and your revenue is a bit more stable and you've got money in the bank and you've then hired a few people because people are probably one of the biggest forms of leverage, actually probably even more than capital in many ways. Capital tends to have to come first so you can invest in the people and so on. But I think past a certain point, like if you have 10 million quid but no team, it's probably hard to build a consumer brand if not fucking impossible. But if you've got half million quid, but a good team, you can grow that to 10 million quid. Not easily, but definitely feasibly. Obviously, if you have both, even better. This might just be a fucking waffle, by the way. Excuse me, but it's something I've been thinking about a lot. Then I get to like how it's relevant to me right now, if that's remotely interesting. So that's kind of operational leverage. Right? But I think you also have just vehicle leverage. And this is one that you probably don't realize as much until you're often too deep into it, at which point there's no going back to some degree. And what I mean by that is the game you choose to play probably defines your ceiling more. In fact, it definitely does define your ceiling far more than how hard you work or even actually the other things to a certain degree. What I mean by that is like, I think any fucking product or category can get to a million a year. Like literally any. I think most can get to 10 billion a year. I think quite a lot can get to 20 million a year. I'm talking UK Europe. I mean, it's probably actually less than UK Europe, but you get my point. Some can get to 50 million a year. Even less can get to 100. Like some can get to a billion. Right. It's the nature of certain categories, certain time periods, decades, trends, whatever. For example, if you start a day, you know, super niche, I don't know, super niche, like cookery object brand in Scandinavia that's probably got a lot lower ceiling than, I don't know, an eco friendly home cleaning brand in America in 2025, for example. Right. So that's kind of one thing. And you sort of seal your fate to some degree. Some degree, I say. Not all, when you choose that. And a lot of people at the start just choose shit they're interested in. And actually that's the best way to start any business or any brand. That's certainly what I did for the first few brands I had. And I did chop and change a lot. And it's also what I did to some degree with Space Goods. I say Space Goods was a bit more. It was definitely a passion of mine. I think that's a great way to start business. But it was also a category that's interesting and growing and big enough. But it wasn't the extreme to which I have, you know, found a friend where they've openly said to me, you know, I chose this category because I literally just fucking looked at the numbers for like six months. I'm not remotely interested in it, but I thought I could build an economic machine in that space. And some of those guys I know have done incredibly well probably as a result of that. And they'd probably say themselves like the category tailwinds, which they reverse engineered in fairness, the category tailwinds and the size of the market and all this and the economics of they're offering are far more a reason why they've got to where they've got to. I like multi eight figures in less than two years, say, or even a year than, you know, their fucking ad strategy specifically. So anyway, put that aside one sec. Come back to the operational stuff. But that's just like an observation. I think I'm in a good category. I think there's better ones. There will always be better ones, by the way. I think there's better ones, there's better timing, there's better whatever. But I mean, definitely like an 8 out of 10 category, I would say. And I've also managed to build a lot of leverage, right? Like more than most businesses, I would say. We've got a solid brand. We've been, you know, that's the right word. But I've been fortunate enough to be able to raise money from top investors and that's the whole thing, right? I made videos on that. But like that's the reality that's given us leverage. I've been able to invest more in brand and team and acquisition than a lot of my competitors. Again, there's pros and cons to that. But that's a video for another time. And I've definitely built noticeable leverage more than anything I've done before through people because I'd never really built a team before. And I've learned I'd built a team. But it was like, you know, VAs in Philippines, only there's nothing wrong with that. But there wasn't much intellectual leverage there, I suppose. Whereas now we've hired some great people and I've genuinely been able to not look at an entire area of the business, for example supply chain, like I don't look at that. Obviously I get reports on it and I broadly know what's happening and I certainly know there's a mega problem, but someone that's far better than me is running that. And I guess I had to learn my arms fucking own. I had to learn how to be comfortable, fully delegating and in areas that I've got less experience in and enjoy less, that was far easier, right? And that allowed me to step Back and then I guess in areas that I've got more experience in and I generally enjoy more, say marketing or growth or, you know, I like the growth, probably the most important word in any business, certainly startups, I've been a lot closer to and probably in some ways as a result has made it harder to build like more operational leverage in those areas because, I mean, I'm like decent at it, but there's, you know, there's plenty of people far better than me at that because I'm more of a generalist. A generalist with a growth like Lean. But I'm not like a mega technical spreadsheets wizard growth guy. I mean, maybe I'm downplaying myself because I've done a. Been battered by years of grinding and lost my confidence or whatever, but I'm more of a generalist. And now it's like, it's so obvious, right? I read the book who, not how, which is kind of where I'm going with this. I think a lot of founders, and also it's stage relevant. I'm also, fuck me, this is evidence that my brain's fried after a long day losing my train of thought. But like, where I'm trying to go with this, a lot of people create leverage through hustling at first. You get some momentum, you hire some people, et cetera, et cetera. And then I think you cap out because you haven't learned the skills of how to hire and retain really good people, say, or you haven't, or you're not in a market that's got a big enough ceiling to go to the next level. But actually, even that in itself could be solved by getting the right person to come in and do that thinking and execution for you, which in itself, yeah, requires you to have a story to sell, you know, some skill in hiring, maybe a great headhunter, certainly some capital and probably willingness to give some equity away to the right people, which is definitely worth it, by the way, in my opinion. So, yeah, I feel like basically, basically where I'm going with this is the right fucking people is literally the answer to everything in your business. Yes, set the vision. Yes, be involved in the things that you're good at and absolutely get involved more than you maybe have done historically or should do when stuff's not working as well, which will always happen in certain areas, by the way, at certain times. I do think that's inevitable. I think it's a fallacy that like any business ever has not got fucking mega fires in certain areas, but like ultimately set the vision, get great people, get the fuck out of the way. Obviously it's never as simple as that, but in basic terms, that's how to build a good business, you know, be in a good category, set the vision. That's right, get good people. This assumes that's easy. It's not. And let them cook. I actually love that philosophy far more than full founder mode. Grind, grind, grind, which by the way, has been my default and probably a lot of founders defaults just due to lack of experience with anything else over the past few years. But now as I've got older, and if I'm completely honest, like I'm still fucking grinding my face off, don't get me wrong, but I don't think that's productive anymore to the same degree. At least not in the areas I've been grinding on. And recently, for many reasons, I've touched on the previous videos. Like there's a lot of things that just need more involvement and there's a few challenges and whatever. I'm going through a very fucking, hopefully temporary extreme squeeze rough patch. But that aside, when that's through, and even that in itself can be sold by the right people. And other. Some areas we haven't hired in, for example, like brand. We've never hired anyone in brand. We've still never nailed like social media, organic stuff. And I know there's debate around whether that's valuable or not, but I think it ultimately is and is needed for our brand. And yeah, my point is I've realized very much that the single most valuable thing I can do beyond being in the right category, and that's already set and setting the vision, and I've already got that, and maybe having some capital I also already have, that is to just hire fucking good people. It's so simple, but it's so brutally difficult because even just practically, you have to find the person and then they have to be remotely interested in moving somewhere else. And then you have to align with how much they want to get paid and what they want to do and make sure it like works for both sides. And then does it make practical sense? Like, I don't know if there's supply chain role, are they near where you make shit, etc. And then when they join, do they align with you enough that it works? Because even if you're letting them cook, you still want to be on the same page and let them cook on the right things, right? Do they get on with the existing team? Are they aligned with the culture that you've either intentionally or unintentionally set, which ultimately does come from the founder and should at least in the first few years for sure. But yeah, I've seen like the right people absolutely transform a business and like change fucking lives. And I've seen that myself in positive ways. But I've also in the past seen, you know, the wrong person or people like completely crucify a certain area of the business because not necessarily because they're bad at the job and although that can obviously sometimes be the case, but because they're just approaching it's differently and before you know it, like even if they're quite good at the job and they're not online, this is the other thing that can like build a good business in the wrong way. So you need people that are fucking good and on the same page and are happy, you know, happy enough financially and whatever to like build the vision that you have. And then obviously people have their own ambitions and you know, they get great. People are always getting approached by other roles and you have to keep them. And basically this is a long winded way of saying I've realized that having and keeping the right people is the single biggest form of leverage you can create in a start up or scale up or a more critical scale up when it's like past the phase where you literally can do it just yourself and a couple of people. So definitely can't do that in my business now. But the dichotomy is, and I've experienced this over the past year, the wrong people create a shitload more work than not even having them. But the right people can literally transform your life and give you a fucking life back. Because I've felt like I've not had a life at all, not at all. But like in certain seasons that I just wake up, work and go to bed, I mean that's probably normal, but like I don't think it's healthy to the extent I've been operating like that in the past. Probably three to four months in particular ever since like September after summer. And it's partially because we hadn't even hired in certain areas when we should have done. You know, I was getting more involved in certain areas for another reason, etc, etc, I was spending more time hiring itself, which can be like a full time job by the way. Anyone that's, you know, hired a lot knows this and it's worth it to get it right. See, I guess that's kind of the point of the video. Like you can't keep operating like you have in the past. To get to the next level. There was a bench down here since you disappeared. You need to realize that what got you here won't get you there. And basically my reflection, probably a learning that I can pass on to whoever's watching this, maybe at similar scale, is the next phase is probably just focusing on getting the right people beyond the basic stuff of setting the right vision and so on. But also what is so simple and critical is also like, no surprise, the fucking hardest part. But yeah, something I'm trying to get better at, spending a lot of time on it. Not, not just finding people, I mean, like learning how to work better with good people because good people also need good leadership. I'd be lying if I said I had that one figured out, but I'm consciously trying to get better at it because I want to get better as a operator. And I probably have defaulted to founder mode in the past to some degree. And I think that's relevant sometimes, but I don't think it's sustainable and I don't think it's ideal long term. So, yeah, I am trying to get better at that. I realize it's the absolute biggest point of leverage in the business and it's so obvious. There's loads of business books on this. Right. And how do you get the right people, inspire the right people, keep the right people? We have some great people we have had in the past, some people who haven't been so great and they're no longer here and so on, and that's normal. But yeah, like sometimes, even now, I find myself in the trenches on certain areas, either temporarily or just because I want to figure out what's going on. But then I kind of stop myself and think, well, geez, if you had the. We just had the right person for this, that this would solve the problem. So, yeah, maybe that's fucking obvious stuff, but it's just a reflection of mine. Basically. A job as founder is to have enough resources, set the right vision, and then get the right people to deliver the vision, basically. And then remain. Like, it's never that simple. Right. But then remain Chief Urgency Officer and Chief Inspiration Officer when stuff gets hard, I guess, which it inevitably will sometimes, and try not to fucking burn out or crash the boat along the way, which is sometimes also difficult, especially I think, when you're a solo founder. So, yeah, anyway, I've waffled a lot. I'm gonna fucking sign out. I'm not trying to drop knowledge here. I'm literally just documenting my thoughts, as I've always done on the YouTube. Hopefully there's something there. You could probably AI summarize this and get like one minute of value out of it. But yeah, just find the right people. It will solve a lot of problems when you're at the right scale to do so. And obviously that changes as you go in certain areas. Yeah, that's me for now. Subscribe to the Pod. More coming soon. Just trying to keep it real and documenting the shit that's relevant to me right now, which may be relevant to you. And yeah, I appreciate you watching as always. Catch you soon. Peace. Sa.