Think fresh to grow big

While governments lay the foundation to facilitate the growth of businesses, entrepreneurs should embrace new technologies to expand in the market

Having accomplished a business goal, broken through a psychological sales target or created sizeable staff strength, an entrepreneur would set his eyes on new markets, make the next ‘big bang’ and reach higher profit margins.

What can he do to scale his business? Should he spend his time and resources to reinvent the wheel, find more investors or obtain more government grants and support?

Governments should set the stage for businesses to start and bud by creating the infrastructure and platform for entrepreneurs to scale, said Gerry George, Professor of Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Dean, Lee Kong Chian School of Business at the Singapore Management University. He was speaking as part of a four-member panel on the topic Scaling Up Entrepreneurship: From Startup to Enterprise held last month. The panel session was a live television recording of Singapore’s national news and current affairs program Channel NewsAsia Perspectives.

The other three panellists were Michael Brown, Regional General Manager from Uber Technologies; Priscilla Shunmugam, Director and Founder of local fashion design house Ong Shunmugam; and Tyson Hackwood, Head (Asia) of Braintree Payments, which is a part of eBay/PayPal.

“Singapore has started investing heavily in entrepreneurship and start-ups,” said Professor George. “But if you think of China, India, Malaysia and the region, there is not enough being done. The government is to create infrastructure and provide platforms for companies to scale, such as having the right talent, the availability of financing and access to geographical markets.”

Managing talent

Depending on one’s appetite for risk, the entrepreneur can either invest more resources into his business or acquire companies for opportunities to grow, said Hackwood. He added that getting the right people is the greatest challenge to scaling a business.

“It is difficult to find people who are adventurous or have evangelical experience to help the company grow. It is also very difficult to find people who love the company and are willing to take on something new, the challenges and the change,” he said.

To build a sense of ownership among staff, Brown advised organisations to have a “clear articulation of what culture is, make sure everyone in the company knows that and have a clear mission that even the newest member based thousands of miles away knows.”

“How do you, as the founder the company based in San Francisco, ensure the newest person in the organisation, who is based in Vietnam, understand what the company is about, how you make decisions, and what you are trying to achieve in the future? It will be a challenge if the new person does not know these,” he says.

Start-up culture

To do so, Hackwood said the entrepreneur should have a healthy relationship with his work.

“You have to back yourself, above all else. You’ve got nothing else. Do your research. It’s always a gut feel for me: Can you believe in the product, the organisation and the people around you? It’s about taking those kinds of risks and believing in yourself,” he said.

“I find that my position is driven today more by my family than when I was by myself. I am still driven today to be the best person that I can be. You can ask yourself ‘Are you enjoying it? Does it make you smile?’ In others words, at the end of the day, can you go back to work? Then you know that you are in the right place.”

In addition, the entrepreneur needs to “enjoy what [he] does with a sense of purpose”, said Shunmugam.

“Be comfortable when you are not finding answers in your twenties or your thirties,” she advised. “It might take a little longer but it is really fine. When you decide to start your own thing or to have a very long, fruitful career in a large or small company… you should be able to see fulfilment in both options and not feel that just because ‘I couldn’t come up with the next big thing that I have failed in any way’. No you haven’t.”

Embracing the new

Entrepreneurs should leverage existing technologies such as mobile apps to scale and be open to learning new things. For example, the creation of mobile phones and technology has led to the availability of mobile apps for businesses  to engage with their customers  in interactive ways.

“There is a lot of talk and chatter about the next great app doing this or sharing that,” Brown said. “The app to me is not a fad. It is just the current best way to take advantage of this amazing piece of technology that we all hold in our hand or pocket, the mobile phone.

“When something better comes along in the mobile phone or the next version of the device, entrepreneurs will pivot to that thing. But for now, to reach billions of people around the world and build something truly scalable, with a relatively efficient use of capital, I think mobile technology is one of the ways to do that.”

He added that innovation should be a way of life and people should be encouraged to create.

“Innovation is very important to how we live our lives. Very often, innovation comes from the outside, not from the inside of large corporations. From my experience, it is because large corporations often have the momentum of their own,” said Brown.

“Doing something disruptive or contrary to the momentum of the large corporation can sometimes be difficult, unless the values of that large company really encourage the people to break glass and try something that is out of the ordinary and unusual.”

He added, “There are certain industries that have a greater societal benefit, for example medical industries, education or power generation distribution where scale or network effects may have broader societal benefits, in which the government can play a partnership role because the more successful a company gets, the benefit accrues to everyone in the society.

“There needs to be a combination of letting builders build and innovators create new ideas and constructs, as well as supporting organisations that have a broader social purpose that governments deem worthy to societies.”

To that point, regardless of the size of the company or its length of time in the business, the organisation needs to think like a start-up, particularly family businesses that often have two or three generations in the management. With the foundations and systems laid by the first generation of business owners, and the second generation continuing the business, the educated and tech-savvy third generation leaders may often have ideas and initiatives to energize the business.

“The biggest advantage the company has is a wealth of experience and some of the wisdom of the business, which is different from a start-up that it may not be experienced. My take is to embrace that more than anything else. Often, it’s good to find examples of growing family businesses that use the wisdom of the past to embrace the future and in many cases, it is the only way for businesses to continue to the next generation,” said Hackwood.

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