As I wrap up DELCO, my product design consultancy that I have been growing over the last 4 years, I am going to reflect on what I’ve learned from the process of starting and running a business in another country. I’ve split these into two categories personal learnings and practical learnings.

Personal

1.  Tenacity – I could not give up or slow down ever. More than 2 days of low motivation and productivity had an effect on cashflow. I worried constantly about either revenue or project delivery for 4 years and often wanted to just pack it in. I couldn’t commit to holidays longer than a week. I would honestly fantasise about a regular desk job. Relentless determination was a key factor to survival.
2. Failing upwards – I honestly consider everything I’ve done in my career a failure. I have never hit the standard of perfection that I set for myself. But by trying hard and being aware I can build, learn and still get good results from every time I fall short of my own standards.
3. Fearlessness – Another key ingredient was not being afraid of worse case scenarios, and not being afraid of what I don’t know. I’ve spent all my working career pushing the line of what I don’t know and if I was scared of that I wouldn’t have got anywhere. Most projects I took on I didn’t know how to do, but I knew how to approach working them out.
4. Leadership – This is an area I’ve had no training in and see as something I really need to work on. I believe with better leadership qualities and strategies I could have built a more cohesive team and executed projects better. This is a noted area for improvement.
5. Selling yourself – I am not a natural salesman, but my existence depended on selling myself. I developed a very earnest and engaged approach to sales, sometimes working better when paired with a colleague who has more classic sales charm.
6. Client Relationships – The client is paying for your service and they have expectations. I treated all my clients as well as I could and have often gritted my teeth, taken a breathe, and made the extra effort even when I think they are being unreasonable. I have had to practice tact and communication with clients.

Practical

1. Cashflow and Risk – I grew the company entirely out of my own pocket – and I was straight broke when I started it. I am very proud of this. No loans, investments or favours. This obviously slowed growth and meant I had to be very cautious and calculated about my spending. I practised very careful cashflow management. I probably came across as cheap to my friends.
2. Creating quality – This is always hard. I have my own standards and abilities. As we grew I quickly realised others were better than me at visual output. And as we got busier I spent less time executing and more time organising. Deadlines, low pricing, and young talent limited the quality we could output. That and learning that many Malaysian suppliers will only provide the bare minimum paid for.
3. Project management – For the last 3 years I have had at least 6 projects on the go simultaneously at any given time, often around 10. I have learnt how to balance projects, workload and resources so that all projects are achieved within the allocated time. I am happy with my organisation skills and given greater resources could have performed much better.
4. Training talent – I had mixed results in this. I improved the practical skills of my interns dramatically. They often started as well-intentioned-but-useless and ended up as essential cogs in the company machine. However, with my longer term employees I could have done more to help them fulfil the bigger responsibilities that they had the potential to achieve.
5. Networking – Malaysia is very much a ‘who you know’ kind of place. I hate networking but it was essential, especially in the early years. I had to teach myself to schmooze and make useful small talk with strangers. I don’t enjoy it and could definitely be better at it, but it was a big effort to get out of my shell at events where I didn’t know anyone.
6. Pricing – A flaw in the business model, and maybe a reason why there was the gap in the market, was that Malaysians do not highly value design. I hardly raised my prices in 4 years, when I did raise my quotes a little the deal would often not be closed. This was a big frustration of mine; constantly providing a service that was under-valued.
7. Setting up a company overseas – On the legal and admin side this was very frustrating. As I was trying to do it on the cheap I learned, often the hard way, how to navigate the various legalities of setting up a company in Malaysia, getting staff on the payroll, and setting up their pension contributions.

I had the somewhat daunting experience of spending two months, on my own, in industrial China. These were probably the two most intense months of my life. I visited a number of factories in DongGuan province and set up a production line with our manufacturing partner in ChangPing. I learned so much about manufacturing in that region and the Chinese mentality to production. I also immersed myself in the political, social and economic issues that have dramatically changed the landscape there over the last 40 years. China is a fascinating place, far removed from the world I was familiar with. Beyond manufacturing I tried to find out as much as I could about the people, their lives, what motivated them and their views on the world.

I dealt mostly with the back end of the supply chain, and as ‘the customer’ I was often treated well by account managers trying to build good relationships. It was a steep learning curve and I quickly realised how important it was to keep on top of our suppliers in order to get faster and better results. I am very glad I visited as frequently as possible to save time and to address issues before assumptions were made. With the front end of the supply chain – the distributors and the retailers – we discovered the dangers of accepting what was said at face value. As a business mantra, it is always best to under-promise and over-deliver and we learned the hard way!

My experience taught me that a friendly level of management encourages teamwork and innovation, but respect is essential for delivery. I achieved productive results by finding out what motivates people and what tasks best suit their working style or strengths, and adapting the workload accordingly. People generally respond better to being led than being pushed.

I was trained as an engineer, but when running a business you have to put on many more hats. I received a crash course in marketing strategy, business plan writing, accounting, cash flow management, fundraising and grants, import/export bureaucracy, intellectual property and other legal and financial issues: all of this while doing my main role of product development and manufacturing. I was fortunate enough to have access to a range of advisers and workshops which accelerated and guided my learning. Multi-disciplined multi-tasking became an essential skill, as well as careful time management.

Whilst trying to develop solutions to either mechanical design problems or business strategy I found that innovation just cannot be forced. Unproductive days in the office are inevitable. Ideas come naturally when inspired and I found the best way to encourage this was by bouncing ideas around, seeking advice, discussing the topic – and then sleeping on it. The discussions the next day were always much more fruitful.

We were able to take advantage of the recession, and the resulting bleak grad job scene, and employ some of the best talent coming out the universities at a rediculously cheap price. Young graduates are much more driven by interesting work with exciting prospects than money – but everyone still has their motivating price.

Not all of our employees worked out. In a small start up company broad skills sets are as valuable as concentrated ones, and internal communication is key. It is essential that all personalities within a team like this click, and the wrong ones can be toxic. I was unfortunate enough to get a lot of tutoring in employment law as an outcome to this delicate subject.

Iterations! By creating a range of prototypes I was able to fine tune ideas and physically interact and test designs as they evolved. Unfortunately there is a relatively high cost associated with 3D printed prototypes, but this process saved me thousands of pounds by not having to make mould tool modifications. These prototypes were also extremely useful for demonstrating, explaining and selling the concepts.