Lobster Tales #18 - Getting the team together

From October 2013 until October 2017 I was Executive Chairman, then CEO of Fairsail, a scale up providing cloud HR software based on the Salesforce platform.  Fairsail grew from 14 people to over 200 in that time going through acquisition by Sage plc in March 2017 for ￡115m to become Sage People, 23x the ￡5m value in October 2013. In the time since leaving I have met many scale ups, investors and advisers and talked about how Fairsail scaled up. 

Fairsail won multiple awards for growth and success during the scale up for innovation, customer success, speed of growth and quality of the team. The business also became a thought leader and innovator, creating and pioneering areas like People Science and the transformation from HR to People. 

This is the inside story told from my perspective of the scale up, acquisition by Sage and integration. It's not my story, it's the story of the company, customers, partners and most importantly the team who made it happen. Elements of the Lobster’s Tale are being published individually as LinkedIn articles. Previous Tales are listed with links, you should really read the introduction before diving in:

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobsters-tale-introduction-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tale-1-end-beginning-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobsters-tale-2-lets-get-started-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tale-3-buttering-parsnips-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tale-4-battling-workdaysap-david-vs-goliaths-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tale-5-birth-sdr-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tale-6-growing-us-from-european-base-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tale-7-purpose-what-fairsail-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tale-8-las-vegas-san-francisco-chicago-london-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tale-9-customers-life-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tales-10-professional-services-implementation-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tales-11-customer-success-leading-99-license-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tales-12-global-flexible-solution-born-cloud-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tales-13-fairsail-wx-workforce-experience-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tales-14-scaling-product-function-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tales-15-transition-agile-scrum-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tales-16-scaling-up-team-adam-hale/

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tales-17-i-am-number-adam-hale/

Fairsail First Mondays

One of the challenges of a business growing quickly is for people to know each other, and not just the people they work with in their team but others in different functions/geographies. There is the risk that people become silo’d and isolated, which can mean that they take decisions without thinking about the wider consequences. This is particularly true when people are a long way away. In early 2014 we started to have a company meeting every month, this became Fairsail First Monday taking place 4pm first Monday of the month. The first one felt a little odd as it was in a small meeting room with about 12 people and seemed a bit pointless as we all talked to each other a lot anyway. However it was important to start the discipline as quickly the numbers started to grow. They moved around the office as more space was needed – building in video conferencing and audio visual. I hosted them with exec team replacing me where needed and hardly any months were missed. 

A FFM with Simon, Katie, Alex & Chris being front row keenies

The format was similar each time: new team members standing up & introducing themselves to everyone, key information on Marketing/events/campaigns, new customer wins, customer go lives, Product releases, Operational updates & recognition of the team. One of the key elements was for different members of the team to talk. My favourite part was the recognition of team members. This started off as a monthly ‘Values’ award to an individual. As the business grew we needed to recognise more people than that on an ongoing basis. Fairsail was used internally so that everyone could record recognition of anyone else in the business for something they had done. Monthly I picked out a handful to read out to highlight both the giver and the receiver. It was an effective way of having many people’s views and opinions shared and to highlight top quality work across the business. It was really interesting to see how some people got recognised not only by others in their teams but across different teams and functions. Especially powerful to use our own solution to do that. The meeting started at 4pm, as they got bigger and bigger there were more logistics to clear more of the office, set out the chair and the video for people remotely, particularly the growing team in the US. Early 2014 to October 2017 is over 40 FFMs. One big decision post acquisition was what to call them, luckily Maips had the genius idea of Sage People Awesome Monday – SPAM was born. That’s why she’s in Marketing. 

Global Team meetings – Fairsail kick-offs

Fairsail had started to hire the US team in 2014, who were all home based and scattered across the US. Before Fairsail I had always worked for global companies based in the US and had been to many extremely effective global meetings over the years across Europe and the Americas. I remembered more content from some than others, but always came away knowing my colleagues better.  Taking that idea, I proposed to the board the idea of the first Fairsail kick-off in Jan 2015, at the start of the year. They were supportive, even when I said that everyone needed to be there not just the sales team. It made sense to have it in the UK as the majority of people were there, and Kat found a nice hotel in Hampshire, the Elvetham in Hartley Wintney that we took 40 rooms in . Fairsail held the first kick-off at the Jan 2015 with 40 people, including all of the US team flying over. I remember looking at the room of empty chairs before the first session and hoping that we had enough to keep people engaged. Some things worked well: a customer panel; an awards dinner; scratch teams (see later). Chris amazed me again by putting together some opening/closing videos with key stats. Some sessions didn’t like breakouts by function. Overall it was a fantastic event with everyone going away feeling like the company had really made a big step forward and already looking forward to kick-off #2. We took a lot of feedback and resolved to improve, one comment from the first one was asking for mechanisms where people from different teams could meet and work together. See Scratch that Itch for how that worked out.

The second was held in Jan 2016 with 70 people in the same hotel, only this time we had the whole thing. The third and final one was in Jan 2017 with 130 people taking all of a much bigger hotel, the Old Thorns in Liphook. 

The exec team led the kick-offs and put a great deal of thought and organisation into them. They became a big part of the culture. The theme of the #3 was all around ‘Becoming a People company’ and the revised company purpose see https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tale-7-purpose-what-fairsail-adam-hale/ in order to ensure that everyone understood what we were doing as a company. 

A Salesforce quality demo

At kickoff #3 we were doing several things for the first time: a partner forum ; customer panel; values session; as well kicking off with a Salesforce style live rollout of the new positioning and new demo. Seemingly small details can make a big difference, Kat excelled herself as usual in coming up with ideas like Fairsail kickoff Dairy Milk bars for everyone. Much of my focus was on the first session of the event, a showpiece of the new ‘Becoming a People Company” for the whole company, showcasing the new demo. Alex and the pre sales team had worked unbelievably hard to put together a new series of stories, scripts and data to form the framework of how we would describe and talk through the range of the solution with customers. In a meeting just before Christmas, I had set them the challenge of building in all of the business positioning, customer videos and running order into the demo itself. This meant that all anyone had to do was to register for a new trial online which would have literally everything in it. This was a huge change from how the company operated before where people had to cobble together pieces from Box, emails and previous work.  This was not a mechanism that would scale across larger global teams within Fairsail, Sage and other partners. 

 Alex had built a relatively new team with consultants like Khush, Kate, Ti, Danny who were relatively new. I was sceptical that this could be done in time. Alex grabbed me in the first week of 2017 with a big grin on his face to say they had something to show me. Looking at it with the team I told them that they had achieved another transformational step for the business that took us to a new place. Another example for me of how individuals, including relatively new ones to the business, can make a difference that can change the company for the better. I was really excited to go through it at kickoff, we had booked all of the impressive Old Thorns hotel in Hampshire, 140 rooms and a seriously big main room with 15 round tables and a stage. We started with a high energy 2016 review video which Chris had again somehow magicked up over the break and evenings. The next 2 hours will stay with me for a long time, all the Fairsail team in the room (on time of course) proudly wearing their numbered t shirts, me getting to roam the floor with a mike talking through the positioning and Alex working the demo on the big screen. It really felt like we were onto something big.  Knowing what was going on at Sage at the time also meant that I knew the scale up job might be almost done. The Fairsail board heard during day 2 of kickoff that the acquisition of Fairsail had been approved by the Sage board. That evening I hosted the awards gala dinner, an event which had got bigger and bigger in three occasions. On the first I presented an award to all 40 people in the business with some words about what they had done (plane flights to the US are good for that). On the second we did the movie posters with everyone featured on one and on the big screen largely thanks to Chris. For this one awards to everyone would take far too long so we there were several categories for individuals and teams. Each table had a theme too with costumes, the table with Marge Simpson hair will never leave me. I had invited Professor Thomas Hellman from Oxford Said Business School to speak before dinner about scale ups, to put into context what we were doing. I hosted the awards, putting the acquisition out of my mind to focus on the team and what we had achieved. Knowing that this was likely the last time this would happen made it more important. It didn’t all go according the plan at the dinner though, I forgot a member of the exec team and ended up wearing the Lobster suit as my punishment. Oops, very embarrassing. I can say that dancing in a lobster suit is non-trivial, and very hot. 

We’re getting the band back together

I’m the only person in my family not full time in the music industry. Married to a composer, brother an orchestrator, his wife a singer/actress, my Dad retired from radio production. I had grown up with music all around me and though my career took me in a different direction it was always a big part of my life. So when Craig volunteered to lead the formation of a Fairsail band at the end of 2016 I gave him my full support and also the services of a rusty trumpeter. It was agreed the band would debut at kickoff in Jan 17. He and I were talking at the tiki Hawaii Christmas jumper event and I asked him when rehearsals were and he said they weren’t in the diary. Hmm, a bad band is not fun it’s embarrassing, I summoned Kirsty to help and they soon were. Craig is an accomplished guitarist, keyboard player and arranger and quickly became the Guv’nor or a band with Vocals, keyboards, guitar, drums, bass and 3 trumpets (me on 3rd Trumpet behind Tom & Alan C). There was a brief moment of panic when it was realised that Tom couldn’t read music but he amazingly he could play far better than us without it. 

Band rehearsal - Guv'nor Craig waving

We decided to play simple, loud, high tempo numbers like Walking on Sunshine, Sweet Caroline, Proud Mary and Living on a Prayer. Which we did, often. I hadn’t played in a band since orchestras at school. We went on at the end of day 2 at kick-off #3 surrounded by our colleagues who were soon singing and dancing along  We were loud, enthusiastic and luckily not captured on video. Allegedly we surprised some people who weren’t expecting it be any good at all.  It was all part of the spirit and culture that had been built. 

Da Da Daaaaaaaaa

Driving home from the kick-off on a gorgeous cold January day was a strange feeling. A great company had been built, the scale up had been done and a FTSE100 was about to try to acquire Fairsail. Mixed emotions, the highs of the company reaching many of its goals but also the realisation that the company might exist independently soon and that this phase would be over. It was particularly strange as so few people knew about both elements.     

Kick-off #3 remains one of the highlights of my career, we had it video’d, for a flavour of it look at https://vimeo.com/200350785 – it’s 4 minutes I will always enjoy. 

Being late has consequences – enter the Lobster

So why the lobster, and particularly a lobster suit. It started during one of the European Sales meetings. There were discussions with a prospective customer that were taking longer than expected. .At one point I made the promise that if the contract with the first company signed in that quarter I would come to the next sales meeting wearing something ridiculous. When asked what I looked for inspiration and saw also on the prospect list was a company called Lobster so replied “A Lobster Suit”. As these things happen it did happen, even more bizarrely the deal was led by Hugh who it turns out who previously had worked on a lobster boat in the US. 

I fulfilled the promise, Kat procured a lobster suit (Velcro one size fits most) and I wore it to the next sales meeting. As Fairsail had invested in it, it needed another purpose to keep everyone honest. I got inspiration from my time at Accenture, particularly the global education centre in St Charles Illinois. In St Charles timekeeping was strict, if anyone walked into the classroom when the door had closed they would find themselves at the front of the class telling a joke, anecdote or story from their country. Classes were always global and it was a challenge telling something that would keep for example Spaniards, Japanese and Canadians interested. As a result everyone respected timekeeping and was in there on time. 

We decided to repurpose the Lobster suit for the same reasons. At annual kick-offs anyone into the room late wore the Lobster suit the next time they came in, accompanied by the Scooby Doo suit if there were 2 people. This wasn’t an empty threat, at the first kick-off 2 US team members entered the room a minute after the door had been closed, they had been enjoying a cigarette outside. I talked to them at the next break, we’ll call them the Late 2

Late 2: Sorry for being late

Me: OK. There’s good news and bad news

Late 2: What’s the good news?

Me: You’re going down in company history

Late 2: Good. What’s the bad news

Me: You’re doing it by wearing the lobster and scooby do suits.

To be fair to them they put them on and walked in to great applause at the end of the break. They went to change straight after. After that, timekeeping was superb! If anyone did walk in even slightly late at any of the kick-offs a cry of “Lobster, Lobster” would come from the team. Some people enjoyed it so much that they made presentations in the lobster suit, memorably Kate a solutions consultant at kickoff #3. I wore it once after making the unforgiveable error of getting the exec team on stage and forgetting someone. When people realised the familiar cry went up. Mortifying. Next time I came into the room it was with claws.  

Kate - best lobster ever

Bringing the team together – Scratch teams

Feedback from kickoff #1 asked for a mechanism that people from different teams have the chance to work together where they normally wouldn’t in the course of business. I had also wanted a mechanism to mix the US team in with the majority of people in the UK. Inspiration came from a local regatta in Wargrave, Berkshire which holds a ‘Scratch Dongola’ they put 6 random people together into boats. Taking inspiration from this we formed ‘Scratch Teams’ at kickoff #2, 9 teams of 7/8 people who were put together to mix function, location and tenure. A member of the exec team was assigned to give guidance/be a sounding board if required. The brief was deliberately broad: to recommend things that would make Fairsail better. Each team had to self-organise before kick-off #2, then had sessions at the kick-off to prepare. One morning at kick-off each team presented to everyone else. 

Kathryn and Alan P explaining Scratch teams event

There have been only a few occasions in my career where expectations for something have been so radically exceeded, this was one of them. Seeing the team take such responsibility, use such creativity, think so deeply and do it with humour and impact (one team all wore Viking helmets – I’m scratching my head trying to remember why) was a really humbling and proud moment. Some of the recommendations were easy to do and were adopted straight away: provide lunch for everyone one day/week in the office; put Fairsail on Glassdoor; move CEO weekly note to Fairsail and off email; use video on calls rather than just voice). Others were harder, such as redoing the values and would come later. In the feedback on kick-off #2 it was many people’s highlight.  Where we (and me primarily) disappointed people was not putting ongoing focus into Scratch teams during the year after kickoff. I came to the conclusion that there just wasn’t the bandwidth to do it and to make Scratch teams a kick-off event only. With this reset they ran again (for the last time) at Kickoff #3. With 130 people in the room it needed to be done in a different way and so Kathryn a long standing consultant and Alan P who had been there almost from the start took charge. Teams now produced 2 minute videos played to everyone, from which finalists were chosen who presented. Again some fantastic ideas came out which were in process when the acquisition came along like private phone booths in the office and a buddy system for mentoring. We also had a whole half day to develop the new company Values. 

Doing the values Kate's in charge

When people ask me about the scale up it can be made to sound like it was a smooth orderly progression. It wasn’t like that, I remember the things that go wrong and the things that had to be done differently to grow. The next Tale covers a reality check of robust feedback from the team, along with how we re-invented company values from scratch.   

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lobster-tales-19-wheres-values-adam-hale/