Are you the sort of person who wants to:
If that sounds like you and you want to work towards these objectives, but you haven’t got an idea how to - don’t worry!
Don’t worry about whether or not you ‘think’ you can run a business either!
If you’re working in an organisation on a sustainability issue or subject, or you work in the sustainability sector, the nature of your job means that you get a great insight into the problems that organisations are facing.
On a daily basis, you see the problems that are impeding businesses and their attempts to scale their efforts and impact. With that insight and knowledge, and our expertise and input, we are going to draw ideas out of you that you never even knew you had!
We’ve got a framework of questions that are going to validate your ideas and open your eyes and mind to what you can achieve.
As well as that, we have the tools, tips, and personal experience (We've already made lots of the mistakes so that you can avoid them) to support you in bringing your ideas to light while you’re still working. You can get funding, launch, and get your first 10, 20, 50, 100, and 1000 customers all while still working full time. That’s a huge risk reduction, wouldn’t you agree?
There are other long term benefits too; financial freedom, freedom from your boss and your commute, better quality of life, a lifestyle you’ve designed for yourself...
I actually started my own business so I could surf more. I needed work that I could pick up and put down at my own leisure, so that I could hit the waves when wind and tide and swell combined.
I thought ‘I’ll just go and start my own business!’. That was my driver.
I failed on the first few attempts of setting up businesses. But the drive did not go away because I loved surfing so much and each failure actually created more learning and a belief that I could do it.
In 2011 things took off. I started Warp It Reuse while I was working a a Waste Manager at Newcastle University. There was an expensive issue which I knew i could fix with a software solution. So I started the journey while i was still at work. It did not take long to prove the concept and I incrementally left work and went into Warp It full time after 18 months.
I still surf, but now I have a family so I get to walk my kids to school most mornings, bath them, tell them stories before they go to bed. I get to spend hours with them, hours that I wouldn’t have had if I worked for ‘the man’. If the surf is up I go surf . Or if not then cycle or run. I work very hard at the right time, but I have so much freedom of time and movement . I get to work with my wife too, and we all take long holidays together that we call ‘mini retirements’.
This is all down to setting up and creating a business which gives us freedom of time and geography.
The business is having a great impact. I get to enjoy time with my family, surf, follow my passion, and fix the planet all at the same time!
Working for yourself is such a life-affirming thing to do, what you put in you get back in a way bigger ration then when you work in an organisation. You get to generate your own positive impact lifestyle through your ingenuity, initiative, and hard work.
Have you joined up to our "6 Week Welcome Email Series" yet? This takes you incrementally through setting a vision and generating ideas. Click the button below.