Hello, and thanks for taking the time to come and check out my blog - not a sentence I ever expected to write!
This whole blogging, vlogging, constant content marketing, social media posting stuff is all new to me, but I truly get the value of it, so I am looking forward to sharing more of my business insights, my ideas and my thoughts here on the blog regularly. As someone who has founded and exited 6 businesses - which I'll no doubt talk about in upcoming blogs – I sometimes think that I’ve seen it all, but this world of omnipresent content creation is something I am still getting used to, but am very excited by.
To be honest, I didn’t realise just how valuable my experience might be to others until recently when I was working with a branding expert who suggested I shared them across my platforms. Of course I understood that being the CEO of two multi-billion dollar businesses and founder of lots of other organisations meant I had something to share, but it wasn't until I started to go back through my business journey that I started to spot how many micro-lessons I could take from the various highs, lows, wins and losses I have been involved in over the years.
I suppose that summarises us entrepreneurs perfectly doesn’t it? Always moving forwards and rarely stopping to reflect, but there is genuine value in reflection.
From being at the top of the travel industry to buying a football club, to selling up and relocating to 'find myself', every step along the way probably holds a thousand different lessons and I look forward to being able to tell you some of those stories and highlight some of my learnings.
So, what can you expect from the blog? Well, the first and most essential thing is THE TRUTH! My intention through these weekly writings is to tell you useful business insights based on my real-world experience in numerous sectors. If something worked I'll tell you, if it was a failure I will tell you, if something created huge profits I'll tell you and if something left me with egg on my face I'll tell you that too!
I like to think of myself as a disruptive, people person who is an out of the box thinker in business, so I really hope that some of the concepts of entrepreneurship that I have picked up across thirty something years will serve you - my goal with this blog is to give you information - and maybe some inspiration - that you can use in your own enterprise.
Being the CEO can be a very lonely place; there is often no-one that you can turn to who understands the challenges and pressure - your staff/team/board/stakeholders expect you to be the genius with the answers, your partner doesn't 'get it' and your mates down the pub can't relate. This is the blog that will hopefully answer a few of your burning business questions.
I'll also be aiming to share some of my 'business principles' in further blogs, getting you to think in a different way and using the guidelines I lay out to offer an alternative way of assessing your own endeavours. For example, 'Know Your Exit'. I always say this to business owners, but so few have ever considered it. Whether its CEO's that I am consulting for or businesses that I am creating an 'exit strategy' with, this principle of knowing your exit (often from Day 1) is, I believe, imperative to long term success.
If all the above sounds a bit too serious, fear not, for the journey has been filled with fun and laughter as well as lessons and I'll make sure those stories make their way to you as well. As an example, the (hard) lessons that I learned from owning a football club will definitely have you smirking - even if they definitely didn't make me smile at the time! The reaction to the day I gave Neil Warnock a wage cap for players will definitely give you a laugh for starters!
Anyway, thanks again for being here, until next time, bye for now.