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Peer Effect
As founders we’re sold a lie. The journey has to be tough. Isolation is normal. We have to choose between work and life. On this podcast, James Johnson, renowned coach to Series A+ founders, explores a better way. One where you build a great business and a great life.
It’s time to take back control. The answers are out there. Your peers have already uncovered hard-won insights, practical tips and people to look out for.
That’s the Peer Effect.
Tune in every Wednesday for 30 minutes that will inspire new thoughts, avoid expensive mistakes and keep you energised.
Peer Effect
Founders Share 4 Key Lessons in Scaling and Decision-Making
In this curated episode of Peer Effect, we've gathered insights from four industry leaders on the strategies behind successful scaling and decision-making.
Sam Rosen (founder and CEO, DeskPass), Bartosz Skwarczek (founder and president, G2A.com), David King (co-founder and co-CEO, Artificial Labs), and Anouk Agussol (founder, Unleashed) share their experiences, highlighting the critical decisions that propelled their companies forward, the challenges they faced, and the leadership practices that drove their growth.
Links:
Follow Sam Rosen on LinkedIn!
Follow Bartosz Skwarczek on LinkedIn!
Follow David King on LinkedIn
Follow Anouk Agussol on LinkedIn!
More from James:
Connect with James on LinkedIn or at peer-effect.com
I increasingly feel that efficiency is actually a dangerous word because it's really saying how can we do something quicker? It doesn't really give you the idea of are we even doing the right thing in the first place, and I think, particularly for founders, it does start with us. Our culture does start with us. Our control of our business, of our lives, starts with us. But I really think, looking at effectiveness rather than efficiency, because actually take a step back. Do we need to do everything we're doing? Probably not. We can do a lot less. It's all about achieving more rather than doing more.
Speaker 3:Totally.
Speaker 1:At Butcheros, we're so brainwashed by the early stage of our career where it's like here's a task list, get it done. Okay, well done. Get promoted. Okay, you've got a bigger task list. It done. Okay, well done. Get promoted. Yeah, okay, you've got bigger task list. Now make your team do that task list quicker. Well done. And so by the time you were found the number of times found something. Oh, how do I make my time management more better? How do I get more efficient? How do I make more? It's like you're trying to solve the wrong problem, like efficiency is like almost like fourth down the list. I increasingly feel that efficiency is actually a dangerous word because it's really saying how can we do something quicker? And it doesn't really give the idea like are we even doing the right thing in the first place?
Speaker 1:and I and I think particularly for founders we it does start with us, like how we like our culture does start with us. Our control of our business, of our lives, starts with us. But I really think, looking at effectiveness rather than efficiency, because actually you take a step back do do we need to do everything we're doing? Probably not. We can do a lot less. It's all about achieving more rather than doing more.
Speaker 3:Totally.
Speaker 1:At Butcher. We're so brainwashed by the early stage of our career where it's like here's a task list, get it done, okay, well done. Get promoted Okay, you've got a bigger task list. Now make your team do that task list quicker, well done. And so, by the time you were found, the number of times found oh, how do I make my time management more better? How do I get more efficient? How do I make more?
Speaker 3:it's like you're trying to solve the wrong problem, like efficiency is like almost like fourth down the list yeah, I think that's so wise, I'm so guilty of this and I think it's so wise, I'm so guilty of this and I think it's a really hard, hard thing to do. You have to be really disciplined and really smart. But it's like if you've got 30 things on your to do list and I do, uh, you're doing it wrong. You know what I mean. Like there's no way there are 30 things that are going to.
Speaker 3:You know, there are, at best, five things you could be working on right now that deserve your time will move the needle, and whenever I hear that, it hits really hard because I think, especially at the founder level, you get a lot on your plate and there's a lot you can be doing, and it's not how much you get done, it's getting the right things done in the right order and, um, that takes a lot of discipline, um, and a lot of effort and a lot of practice. But it's true, I mean I so many times I'm like you, you cross off these small things because they're easy wins and it gets your list down. But it's like man, if I just did this one thing today, it would have been a much better use of my time than the 10 things that I did.
Speaker 2:The one thing is to believe the one thing is to believe I know it's not very technological, even though we are very tech-oriented business I think at the end of the day, it all comes from how much you believe, because, statistically, entrepreneur starting the journey, 99% statistic is saying you will fail. So you have to have this crazy belief in yourself, in your idea, in your people to do that. And from this believing mind is coming all the rest. I mean, if you believe you will find the motivation, if you believe you are always happy to to do this extra mile. If you believe, then you want to invest and reinvest. If you believe you want to continue your business even without any external investors, external funding, even though several times you have to deal with thousands of problems and even though every morning you know that something is gonna happen this day, you just don't know what.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and this crazy belief, this crazy belief that you want to deliver something exceptional to the world, to the, the people, in my opinion is super necessary to be successful. And even when I failed many times, a thousand times, I still was a believer that it is worth to do it and I knew what I want. And this high standard is giving you something more. It's giving you people who want to join your journey because of the high standard. You know, there is this rule, which everybody knows, that A player is looking for A players, b player is looking for C players. So what I was always looking for was A players. And, tricky thing, when you are looking for people who are better than you, you have to be really good at something, because top players want to work only with, not even for, but with, top player. So you need to know what are you good at and you have to develop constantly, all the time, all the time, all the time storytelling is a an amazing tool to leverage in business.
Speaker 4:I wouldn't say that we or I am the best storytellers, but I think what we have absolutely learned is that there are probably three things that you want to get across in a presentation meeting pitch. There's probably one things that you want to get across in a presentation meeting pitch. There's probably one key message. That's the takeaway message that you want the stakeholder that you're communicating to to take to their colleagues, and I think this simplicity making it easy for them to understand how your product or platform differentiates their business, their team and their results and I think that works for when you're talking to VCs and when you're talking to potential customers.
Speaker 4:So if you talk to a VC whether that be an associate or a partner they have to then go and sell you or explain and describe your business and why you are phenomenally scalable and exciting to an investment committee.
Speaker 4:Now, they've probably got one minute to do that. So if you can't really stress to them what the message is and how they can deliver it in a minute, I think they're going to definitely struggle when they go to their investment committee and I'm not saying it's their responsibility to sell your business in, but you're not going to be in that room for that kind of first pass a lot of the time. So make sure that they are well equipped to do your job for you, or to help them make them look good when they're trying to tell everyone about this fantastic company that they found. And in the same context of a commercial partner or a customer whether it's a chief strategy officer, chief operating officer, a chief operating officer, a manager, an end user, whomever it may be when they're discussing, in whichever context, that they're usually in to get the budget signed off.
Speaker 4:There are always competing factors, right? No customers that you're going to be selling to have unlimited budgets. So there's always the case of what does your tool platform product do that delivers for that? Business changes how they operate and how can they describe it in 30 seconds to a minute, which means that you can continue down the process. Interested in and boxes they're going to tick. But the one-minute summary or the one-page summary, I think is absolutely vital to get through those early stages and continue going.
Speaker 1:It sounds really what you're doing is removing the or shrinking the uncontrollables. It's kind of like option one is you just throw as much spaghetti at the wall and hope something sticks, but you're kind of leaving it up to the wall if we can call a VC a wall but it's kind of you're really sort of throwing a lot out and going, okay, take what you want from this, but actually by simplifying it you increase their chances of understanding it. You make their life a lot easier. But also you get to control what you think are the key messages and what you think will cut through and you you reduce risk of either being forgotten, miscommunicated or focused on the wrong things.
Speaker 4:Yeah, absolutely. And if you are a phenomenal spaghetti maker and you want to make 10 different types of spaghetti, right, and you're going to throw them all at the wall to mix a number of different metaphors and analogies and all sorts of different things is that you have to pick your best one, and I think that's another part of selling. That's very close to this is we always discuss this here is don't sell the pizza oven, sell the pizza. If you're trying to persuade a restaurant or consumers on the street that you've got the best pizza, you don't tell them that it it goes up to 800 degrees c. It was made in this certain part of Italy. That's a phenomenon.
Speaker 4:So you just give them a bit of pizza, and I think that's very similar to this kind of approach of a VC is looking for a business that's going to scale probably to a billion dollars in valuation within five years, and you need to say this is that. So the pizza in this instance is we have a SaaS business or a software business and this is the market that the TAM is absolutely ginormous. We've validated x, y and z. This is our time to to close a deal. This is our average deal size and say this is the key message, this is why the, the pizza, is fantastic. And then yeah, this is why we're gonna meet all of your requirements.
Speaker 5:I've got a lot of learning over the years, both from being a founder and kind of growing my own business, and I think actually my biggest learning and it goes against popular doctrine really is that you need to show up as a founder how your team need you, not how you need to be. I know that kind of goes against the grain of being vulnerable and sharing things and expressing your own vulnerability so that your team can share their vulnerability and feel safe to do so. And although I completely, completely agree that it's really important to create an environment where your team feel totally safe to be able to express themselves as a founder, I actually think you're a bit more limited in doing that. I think actually you're a lot more limited. I think it's fine to say you have, you know, today's a great day, feeling really productive, but actually your team need you to be, especially when times are tough.
Speaker 5:Team need you to be motivated, to be energized. Team need you to be motivated to be energized. They want to feel aligned to a vision and a mission. It's not about kind of being falsely positive, but it's it's very much about being there and and supporting your team when you get to a point of like your team are feeling like they're supporting you, then actually that's, that's a balance, that that doesn't work. Um, so I think my, my insight for founders would be to every day put on your big girl pants or your big boy pants and show up how your team need you to, and find your own personal support elsewhere so there's a sense of sort of you can be authentic with your team.
Speaker 1:It's just you're there to support them rather than them being there to support you. And you said like looking elsewhere for those sources of support.
Speaker 5:Yeah, absolutely, and it's hard because you are still a person and I think you know that that can sometimes be forgotten. You still go through things, but ultimately you've made the choice to found a business, to create something, to grow a team, to create a product, and then you have responsibility for that and you can't kind of shy away from that responsibility when it gets hard and you might need some support. So you should get some support and in fact, even if you don't feel you need support, you probably do so. I would definitely rely on and it depends what it is coaches like yourself, therapists, if necessary, other founders Joining founder groups can be really valuable as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it sounds like there's a degree of distance to keep maybe a healthy distance to keep between yourself as a founder and your team, whereas some of the today now it's like, oh, you're, you're, you're a family, you're, uh, you're all in it together, you're which feels like quite unhelpful language when you, when you really dive into it yeah, I think it is unhelpful language and I think it's potentially really lovely in theory, um, that that might be how people experience the world of work, but it's not in practice.
Speaker 5:You're not all in it together. I'll start with with that point, because, as a founder, you can't just choose to leave whilst others can choose to leave, and that's fine, right, that that's the, that's the difference. And and as a founder, you get the upside of that when the times are, when the times are good, um, but I think you have to recognize, as a founder, to expect people to be by your side and forever there with you and for them to feel as in it, as you are, is is kind of is misplaced, right. So it's nothing against the people, it's as a founder, it's misplaced judgment if that's what you think is going to happen.
Speaker 5:Um, the family piece, I think, is very dangerous in any case. I mean where, where you don't choose your family. You know, striving for profit especially, it is now kind of prior to the last two years, it was all about growth at all costs, and now it's very much about performance and striving for profit and having a really good plan to get to profit as quickly as possible, which it never was before. Like that, those same investor pressures don't exist in a family whilst at work. You have to perform and you have to be clear about what performance is, and if people aren't performing, you can't send them to the naughty step that doesn't. You know that that's not going to, it's not going to work. You need to get them to perform and if they don't perform, you need to be able to have open and honest conversations about whether it's the right company for them, whether it's the right role for them. So yeah, it is quite a dangerous dynamic, I think.
