Life is way too short to start with anything other than the WHO…

Exec Summary

Don’t start with the Why, the Where or the What. Start with the WHO…

Background

After shaving my head and spending 3 months with my amazing family, I am back in town and ready to cause more mischief. After the most fun 10 year journey at 4Ps I am fully recharged and absolutely pumped for the next 10 years.

Here is what I discovered…

Month 1.

For anyone that knows me, I have never ending energy. I don’t have many skills but one asset I do have is stamina, I never seem to tire. BUT for the first month of my sabbatical I was SOOO TIRED. I didn’t realise how much 10 years of fighting to survive alongside my business partner Chris Hyland and our amazing team had taken out of me. My daughter and I got into a really bad habit of daily 2 hour siestas.

Month 2. 

The tiredness left me and my energy was back. My brain went into super creative mode. Every problem I encountered in life had a simple solution to it. I have written them all down. If you want to start a business but don’t have an idea just WhatsApp me, I have hundreds and you can have them for free :-)

Month 3.

I started to think about what I wanted in life. I listened to the advice of @MattDelaforce and watched some videos on YouTube of Simon Sinek and focused myself on the golden circle, that recommends you start with the Why.

I came up with loads of good ideas, plenty of places to do them and hundreds of unique ways to market them BUT I couldn’t raise the energy to do anything about them. I was awash with ideas but not an ounce of motivation to do anything about them. Mehh.

I couldn’t find my why…

Then I went home..

On the 1st September 2018 I travelled to my home town for my school reunion. For the record I HATED school, although I did ok academically and met many amazing friends for life. Some of my best mates today are still friends from school but I always felt restricted in that environment. I love learning; I just didn’t enjoy learning in a classroom.

I had a brilliant time catching up with my old gang and it left me in a really reflective mood about my future. Coincidentally the next morning Matt Stannard the CTO at The Happiness Index (more importantly one of my favourite human beings in the world) had invited me to watch Ipswich Town vs Norwich City. I had no desire to drag my butt out of bed on a sunny Sunday morning and watch Ipswich, but I wanted to see Matt, so I accepted his invite and with a serious hangover I made my way to the mighty Portman Road (Ipswich’s stadium). The quality of the football was terrible and on the way home I heard someone on a radio phone-in describe the game as “So bad that both teams deserved to lose”.

It was during that 90 minutes of watching paint dry that I had my epiphany moment - I realised I had been looking for the wrong thing. 

 Watching Matt celebrate an Ipswich goal was a wake up call for me. The “WHY” I went to watch this football match was irrelevant, I was there because of “WHO” I was with. Matt could have invited me to a snail racing competition and I would have gone.

When we were in school, we never once asked ourselves:

The Why?

or

The How?

or

The Where?

We just wanted to hangout and have fun. Why does that need to change when we get older? Does life need to be taken seriously for you to be successful? The most successful entrepreneurs I know, easily rank in my list of most immature people I know.

Starting with the WHO.

I was reminded that what motivates me is the people around me and and this applies to all areas of my life. The why, the how and the where are still very important to me but they are not my starting point. I need to be surrounded by an elite group of superstars but they need to be good human beings. They could be the best engineers or marketers in the world but if they are nob heads, I don’t have the motivation to work with them.

I have never missed any of my previous companies since leaving (sorry) but I have missed the people. I have missed all the the highs, the lows, the drama, the laughs, the tears and most importantly the sense of being on an adventure with people that care about each other.

Life is way too short to spend 1 minute around people you don’t care about just because they are your colleagues. For me it has always needed to be more than that. We spend more time with our colleagues than we do our families and for me, WHO you work with or WHO you start a business with must be the first consideration before you start looking at the WHY.

The TRAP

The WHO is not about creating a clique or always working with the same people. Every single year I meet new people that I include in my WHO and overtime they become people I 100% trust. The WHO is about living an amazing life and adding new amazing people to that group as you go.

Your next career move or business opportunity could be with the stranger sitting opposite you on the train, it could be with the cleaner who is hoovering around your desk right now, it could even be with an old friend you have lost touch with.

The WHO is not about creating a clique, it is about gathering up a band of kindred spirits who share similar values, desires and ambitions as you. You will probably all look very different and think very differently but you will have a bond that binds you together forever. You won’t be able to see it, touch it our explain it but you will be able to feel it. These people are your WHO. The bond is invisible but the feeling is very much real and will make you feel alive.

Identifying the WHO:

Trust me you will know them when you meet them. If you don’t know who they are, keep looking as you just haven’t met them yet. Trust your heart and ignore your brain. Your brain will be needed for all those fun tasks like reading the P&L, investor forecasts and 2 am pitch prep, only your heart can find your WHO.

The Risk:

But I need my job to pay the rent / mortgage. Trust me, if you are working in an environment you don’t enjoy, you will not be performing to your max. I guarantee you that over the long term of your career, you will earn a lot more money by working on things you care about, than if you don’t.

AND I know you know this BUT

Isn’t the biggest risk of all getting to end of your life and realising you spent it with a bunch of people you don’t respect, working on a project you don’t care about?

Summary:

The WHO is about finding the people you want to adventure with. If work doesn’t feel like an adventure, I would reconsider WHO you are turning up every day to work with. Life is way too short for anything else other than an adventure.

Final thought:

The numbers show that when you start a business you have a 5-10% chance of success. Business plans and vision statements will come but don’t wait to quit your job because you don’t have an idea or a plan yet. Identify your WHO and agree to start a business, the rest will come. Who you start a business with will be a huge factor in your success. When you are standing in the trenches fighting for survival the only thing that will matter is the person you are standing shoulder to shoulder with. That belief will transmit from co-founders, to founding employees, from person to person and as your business grows that togetherness will unite your rapidly growing business.

As I said

"You won’t be able to see it, touch it or explain this bond but you will be able to feel it. These people are your WHO"

What’s next for me?

I personally think the entire workplace is outdated, boring and worst of all making us sick (physically and mentally). Work doesn’t work anymore for employers and / or employees; I am currently involved with a few projects to solve this major issue. Life shouldn’t be a compromise and I want to work on projects that improve people’s lives.

I have identified WHO I want to be with on my next adventures and we are busily laying down our WHY, WHERE and WHAT. Luckily all these people want to change the world for the better and we are all turbo charged to do it.

I will broadly be working on happiness, mental fitness, what makes people tick and will be launching my monthly podcast called "Working with Humans". I need another month to knit all this together but I am excited that I know WHO I am going to be working with.

"We have a bond that we can’t see, touch, or explain but we are cool with that and I am excited to rock and roll again"

(Image: Attending my first meeting back in town)

TTFN / my first full day back will be 29th October

PS

The final score was Ipswich 1 Norwich 1.