Keeping an open mind - 25 years on

It has been 25 years since I started the Invicta Components business and almost 16 years since we acquired the Autogem brand. I was recently asked to reflect on it by a few of you on LinkedIn who have dropped me a kind note. So here goes….

…Keeping an open mind is a quality that many of us possess, but not something that was particularly preinstalled in my genetic code. Over the years I’ve learnt that it’s a skill that requires constant work.

The mind can default back to a closed setting at the most unexpected times, owing to preconceptions, presumptions and sometimes, other people’s opinions.

Keeping an open mind has extended to many areas of my working life...

The company takeover

As Autogem’s largest supplier, my brother Adit and I bought the business in 2005 after the company had entered administration twice in short succession.

We had heard that the company was in peril before taking the helm and the easiest thing to do would have been to write everyone off and everything associated with the business at that time with the exception of its prestigious customer base and product range.

After all, if the business was failing, then it had to be the fault of those that were there?

A new broom and a raft of sweeping changes, right? Wrong!

We kept reminding each other that we must keep an open mind about the staff we would come to inherit, the suppliers we were using and the processes that were in place. To do anything else would have been foolhardy! Our existing team of 10 suddenly found itself inheriting 50 members of staff overnight, Where would we have been without them? Not where we are today, I’m sure.

It works both ways too. Those staff members we first met in 2005 kept an open mind about our plans for Autogem, which couldn’t have been an easy thing to do after the successive failures of the previous two management teams. There was no reason for them to think that we’d have made a better go of things, so to stick with a couple of enthusiastic but young and inexperienced ‘pups’ in their early 30s meant a lot.

When it comes to mergers and acquisitions, some people think that you have got to make huge changes and that they’re an inevitable consequence. Don’t get me wrong, we made them ourselves, moving the sales team to a converted chapel in Leeds and the warehouse operation to London within a pretty intense six-week period!

My father’s wisdom

But we could see that there were plenty of hidden gems in amongst the debris of previous ownerships and it took time to find them. I remember clearly as if it was yesterday the immense energy, pressure and resulting stress level of having to quickly turn around a relative ‘super-tanker’ compared to the much smaller business we were running. As always, we had great guidance, psychological support and an irreplaceable sense of calm from our father who has always been the spiritual backbone to our endeavors. He could see the pressure we were under and on more than one occasion extended his great watching wisdom to see us through some particularly challenging moments. I have never valued that immense psychological comfort blanket more than in those early days. I have needed some years of maturity to truly realise and be humbled by it.

Inheriting existing team members and customers

So what about our existing team members who suddenly hand a bunch of colleagues to get to know - and dare I say assess? They were already within the Chopra inner circle, arguably in a position of both confidence and power. In fairness, we were all probably a little too green to realise the full extent of potential politics at play, but our existing team handled themselves well and did not abuse the positions they held.

The reflections do not stop there though, as I think back to those existing customers who had to suffer a loss of connection with members of staff or poor availability. So many showed great faith in allowing us the time and access to fundamentally improve service levels to where we are today, as a business recognised for innovation and leading from the front foot. We could not have done it without their open minds too.

Incumbent suppliers

Lastly, what about the incumbent suppliers having new management to deal with? We have certainly been on both sides of this somewhat nerve-racking equation. We needed to keep an open mind for the existing supplier base and allow them the opportunity to demonstrate their value add beyond purely just the numbers. Looking back, I am proud of the professionalism and courtesy we extended to what surely must have been many stressed suppliers some of whom remain our key partners today. 

The accuracy of any takeover plan – new broom and all – cannot be set in stone at the beginning. It will have to be fine-tuned or even rewritten entirely once you have got your feet under the table because you just don’t know what you are inheriting. The quantative will always tell you one thing but one cannot ignore the qualitative. Or to put it another way, the creepy crawlies come out of the woodwork for sure, but so do those hidden diamonds!

Shine on!!!!