108. Here is the New Me

Hi Erik,

I reached the same conclusion as you did, and I have already taken the necessary steps to delegate those matters that I should have stepped away from a long time ago. What’s more, I’ve begun training and coaching, instead of deciding and doing. I know I will get used to this, it feels as if a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders, and I am optimistic about the outcome. Mostly because I feel that my co-workers, who are directly involved, will benefit greatly from this decision.  

I also realised that our management team in Slovakia would benefit greatly from partners who decide to take a step back, because our interventions, although made with good intentions, ended up creating chaos rather than helping. We decided that we will no longer sit in the Lugera office, but instead the three of us will move one floor down to a new office.

The next step will be to gradually reduce daily communication with our co-workers down to zero, and we will only assess current and past affairs once a month with our General Manager. Hopefully, this will allow her to focus on what she does best, managing Lugera in Slovakia. After all, there is no denying that Lugera has never been managed more successfully than under her leadership. The last thing she needs is three overzealous muppets bombarding her with emails.

In part, I was inspired to do this by one of James Caan’s books, ‘The Real Deal’. Another reason was that the company he founded (Alexander Mann) was one of our clients and I know some of the people mentioned in the book personally.

What inspired me tremendously and what I was able to identify very deeply with, were the regular changes he goes through in his position as entrepreneur and leader within his companies. He develops himself from a jack-of-all-trades in his sole proprietorship to the highest invoicing recruiter and salesman, until he gave up the ‘real’ work and focused strictly on steering and managing. When doing so, he noticed that he was still blocking his co-workers and himself, so he switched to founding companies and then to primarily investing in companies and boosting their profitability.

I now realise two things: you should never stop developing yourself as an entrepreneur and you must be aware of when you are beginning to frustrate not only your co-workers, but also yourself. Looking back, I should have hit the brakes about a year ago and moved on to new ventures. That is not to say that I haven’t been doing anything new, I did venture down a new path: after signing final documents yesterday we are now the proud owners of a recruitment agency in the Czech Republic – GIT Consult Czech s.r.o, which specialises in IT personnel. This is very exciting and inspiring and many new challenges await us.

So, now it is time for the new Me. Delegate everything to my co-workers, support them with wise words (instead of deeds), coaching and advice, this will allow them to spread their wings and shape their own careers while continuing the growth of our company.

Regards,

Gerard