clarity that can only come from somebody who doesn't just report, but understands.
I'm honoured to write the foreword for this unusual and fine book. As they say in the classics, it's a corker.
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It's a game of inches
Over the past couple of years I have interviewed many successful people, from high-profile entrepreneurs to unrecognised individuals throughout Australia who are doing amazing things that you and I may never have heard about.
My odyssey began in April 2013, when I set off one morning from my home in Sydney heading for remote Australia – just me, my motorcycle and a video camera. It was the start of the Ingenious Oz Project, an initiative that set me on a quest to uncover and tell the stories of ordinary Australians like you and me who have done extraordinary things.
I had launched my own first business at the age of 20 and had forged a career in the business events industry, over nine years building up Absurd Entertainment, one of Australia's largest creative entertainment design companies. So I knew firsthand that most people don't think they are very creative or that their ideas are of any value or that they have what it takes to succeed. I wanted to prove them wrong.
My mission was to demonstrate that Australians are far more creative, clever and capable than we often give ourselves credit for. I wanted to show that innovation isn't the sole domain of the leviathans of business or the elite few, but that it belongs to everyone, and that with determination and hard work anyone can build a successful business. There were, after all, clever and successful people and businesses to be found all over Australia. So I headed off on my quest to inspire the ideas of a nation – and ended up getting the biggest education of my business career.
In 2014 I was invited to become an ambassador for Start Up Australia, a not-for-profit organisation created by entrepreneurs to help young businesses and entrepreneurs get started by offering free practical advice and hard-earned lessons from people who had been there and done it. I was asked to interview 50 of Australia's top entrepreneurs. After the success of Ingenious Oz, and because I had already talked with so many businesspeople and leaders over the years at conferences and other events, I leapt at the chance. Why wouldn't I? The opportunity to spend an hour with each of these dynamic individuals and draw on their ideas and practical advice on how to grow a profitable business was one I simply couldn't turn down.
What hit me during my involvement with both projects was the sheer number of smart, successful businesspeople there are throughout Australia. Both these initiatives offered me a rare opportunity to tap into the collective wisdom of highly creative and resourceful people from a wide variety of industries and backgrounds. In both projects I found people who were open and willing to share real strategies and ideas for business success.
That's important, because now more than ever entrepreneurism is vital to that success. The world today is a very different place from the one we knew even a couple of decades ago. The economy behaves differently, the social landscape and the way we do things have changed radically, and the evolving world of new technology has opened many new doors of opportunity in the way we do business.
Like you, I've listened to, watched and read a myriad of gurus and experts talk about entrepreneurship and business growth. Yes, some of them have interesting insights to offer, but let's face it: there's no substitute for the real thing. If you want to learn how to improve your business, learn from those who've done it and done it well.
The one thing that binds them all
In every interview I've conducted, without exception, one thing has stood out again and again. If there's such a thing as a silver bullet for business success, this is as close as you're ever going to get.
I started noticing it a while back while travelling through Australia's regions and remote areas on the Ingenious Oz Project. The realisation was a slow burn at first, an isn't that interesting? moment that became steadily more obvious, and more important. Then, when I began interviewing Start Up Australia's 50 top performers, it popped up again, right from the first conversation.
When I looked back over my own career, from my first business 30 years ago, I realised I'd done it myself without being explicitly aware of it or recognising just how vital it had been. In fact, the one time I didn't follow my instinct it bit me on the bum. In the early days of my consulting business I once tried stepping over the necessary intervening stages to jump directly to ‘overnight success'. It didn't work. Once I recognised I had missed something vital and stepped back, things began to take off again.
What is the one thing? Simply this: business is a game of inches.
It's not about a one-off disruptive event or inventing the next iPhone. It's about consistently finding ways to improve everything you do. It's a philosophy to constantly drive towards doing it better than everyone else. It's an obsession with finding the best ways to advance every part of your business, incrementally.
It's more than an obsession – it's a quest. The constant passion that every one of these entrepreneurs demonstrated for playing this game of inches floored me. When I asked John McGrath (who set out to build one of the world's best real estate companies) if this was how he built McGrath, he confirmed that it was.
He started his business with a vision: to be the best real estate company in the world. To make that happen, he focused on doing everything better in every way. He still does. As he said, ‘I recognise incremental improvement on a daily basis'. Business success and profitable growth are not about quantum leaps. They're about moving forward step by step, inch by inch.
At first glance, this idea might seem to contradict thinking big and aiming high. It might appear that playing the game of inches means you're playing small and thinking small. Not so. Siimon Reynolds, who built one the largest marketing companies on the planet, explained to me, ‘We must completely commit to constant improvement', adding, ‘That philosophy, over time, combined with the philosophy of aiming high, is pretty much all you need to succeed in business and in life. The rest is just detail'.
The game of inches is what makes big happen.
In the foothills of the Flinders Ranges is a remarkable business that does this exceptionally well. Kelly Engineering manufactures farm machinery, mainly diamond harrows and prickle chains used for paddock preparation, weeding, tillage, soil management and so on.
It started 40 years ago when farmer Peter Kelly wasn't totally happy with the machinery he had – and decided to make his own. Then he thought it would be a good idea to make a few extra and sell them to his neighbours so his machine would effectively cost him nothing. The word soon got around, and by the time he'd sold 30 units or so he realised he had a viable engineering business on his hands.
The game of inches is what makes big happen.
It wasn't an overnight thing. He didn't wake up one morning and decide to quit farming and take up engineering. Thirty farmers didn't all knock on his door one Sunday morning each with an order. The game of inches takes time, for good reason. But as the momentum slowly built, so did Peter Kelly's ability to meet it.
When I visited Shane Kelly, Peter's son, in 2013 he had a unique process in place that empowers their employees to constantly seek ways of improving every part of the business, so the business advances in every area. It's extremely simple. He asks his workers to come up with ideas that will improve their particular part of the business, and then to apply those ideas. Each week a team leaders' meeting focuses on the most innovative ideas. As Shane said, ‘The team leaders are expected to bring their diary with as many innovations
