Awareness

At one stage in my life, there was this individual, whom I'll call Fred, who was about the same age as me, whose company I really enjoyed, but he was streets ahead of me in his career, and super busy. It was really difficult to get him to make time for personal conversations although we both enjoyed one another's company. I can actually not only blame him. I also, at the time, did not put a very high value on relationships, and I was also busier than what was good for me.

I had this subtle thought somewhere in the back of my mind, that one of the reasons I was building a company, was for it to get big enough, that Fred would want to take a stake in the business – and then we would have a good reason to see each other regularly, because we'd be working together on that business.

An Inversion of Ends and Means

What I found interesting, as I became aware of this, was the inversion of ends and means of most people I knew who were trying to build a relationship with Fred. Most people were trying to get into Fred's calendar, and build a relationship with him, so that they could get Fred to take a stake in their business – because there was a good chance that if he were involved in your business, it would succeed. He had a frightening track record of success. Others were hoping that some of his companies would become their clients. Others were hoping they could get him to fund their business.

In my case, I recognised that the means and ends were reversed to that. I wanted to build a business, because I saw that as a way to get to build a better relationship with Fred. If you are reading this with judgement about how this is shallow and one should not need to have a business reason to spend time with friends … go ahead. Judge. We were both building at the time. We were both very busy. And I've been unhealthily antisocial most of my life. I'm trying to fix that. Once you've finished judging, bear with me here, because I'm trying to make a point that I think is really important:

Business as a Forge of Relationship

The awareness of this, which dawned on me over a few years, caused me to begin to think about business differently in terms of relationships and business. I began to realise that some of my best friendships had been forged in the trenches of business. I realised that the countless hours fighting the battles that led to success or failure that we had spent together, built relationships of trust and camaraderie that are not easily built in other environments.

We live in a culture where networking is a big thing. And I'm not dismissing the value of building a strong, trusted network. However, I've come to see that in many cases we just build relationships in order to benefit our business – and that this is having the ends and means the wrong way around. I've come to see that one of the most important purposes of business is to create an environment in which we can struggle together, grow together, fail together, and succeed together. And in that process, build deep, meaningful relationships that become much stronger than the businesses, the accomplishments and the failures that we share.

Instead of seeing relationships as the means, and business as the end, I've come to see business as the means to build relationships.

This is significant.

This has become so significant to me that I've begun to see the building of relationships as one of the most important and core purposes of business.

Strong Relationships Build Stronger Businesses

When you build relationships as a means to achieve business results, then the moment a relationship is no longer useful, it also is no longer valuable. However, if you use business as a means to build relationships, then there will be times when specific relationships have no further use in a specific business context – but that will in no way diminish the value of those relationships. Over the course of a lifetime, this second way of living is much more meaningful.

The interesting thing that I've observed as I've become aware of this, is that those who live this way tend to build much stronger businesses. They have networks that can withstand economic shocks. They build businesses with cultures that set them apart in the market for good talent and high performance.

The need for Peer Relationships

As I became more relationally aware, I also began to notice my need to have some relationships with peers, outside of my business. With people who were also leading small and growing businesses. It is not always easy to find these peers. I have discovered that most founders and CEOs are actually not natural “networkers,” and not naturally good at building good relationships.

5-2-50 Growth Groups – A Place to Build Relationship

This is one of the reasons why we are starting up the 5-2-50 Growth Groups.

• If you are a founder of a small business of at least 5 people that has been running for at least 5 years, and you are feeling somewhat lonely on your journey…
• If you have ambition to grow your business, and want to surround yourself with a small group of people who are fighting the same battles as you, as they go on this growth path…
• If you are a Christian who is struggling to figure out how to integrate your faith with your business…

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… then the 5-2-50 Growth Groups have been designed specifically for you.

Groups meet once a month in person or online, for three hours. We encourage in-person meetings as much as possible.

Every meeting will contain:

• Some content to help you integrate your faith and your calling as entrepreneur with your business and your daily life;
• Some content to help you understand where you are at in terms of business growth, and give you some practical tools to help you grow your business further
• Discussions around challenges you are facing, with a group of your peers that you will learn to know and trust, to get the power and the value of shared insight.

If this seems valuable to you, please let us know, and we can get you connected with a group. If there is one close to you, we can connect you physically.

Simply reply to this email, and tell me that you are interested.

Be Blessed

Ashton

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5-2-50 is a community of Christian entrepreneurs on a mission to create 1 000 000 new good jobs, set 50 000 founders free from the day to day grind of their businesses, and grow 25 000 businesses to 50 people or more.

We focus on businesses of at least 5 people that have been running for at least five years.

If someone forwarded this email to you, and if this sounds interesting, feel free to sign up here. No cost and no catch and you can unsubscribe anytime.

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