The Rich Niche Group blog interviews and enables you to hear directly from successful entrepreneurs and product managers about the steps they took to grow their businesses/products and how they were able to create, penetrate, and/or dominate their niche.  This week we interview Leo Pound, the founder of Pound Consulting, a turnaround consulting firm often brought in by outside investors or the Board of Directors to fix ailing companies and get them back on the right path.

Interviewee:  Leo Pound, Turnaround Specialist and Financial Expert. 

Why Selected:  Mr. Pound is the President of Pound Consulting Inc., with over 30 years experience in many industries. For over 18 years Mr. Pound has specialized in high growth and troubled situations, with a focus on increasing customer and shareholder value. Mr. Pound’s in-depth knowledge of operational and strategic planning, M&A, forecasting and budgeting, cash flow, cost containment and re-engineering is balanced with his understanding of the customer and market needs. He is a team leader who builds consensus while moving a company forward. Mr. Pound is a hands-on professional who is sensitive to the pressures and challenges facing a troubled company and their management team. He has been active in the CEO, CFO and COO roles in manufacturing and further processing, distribution and service industries. In addition, he has been responsible for managing banking relations, Big Four auditors, outside legal counsel, the financial community and investor relations. Mr. Pound has had direct accountability for Sales and Marketing, Manufacturing, the Controller function, Treasury, Human Resources, MIS, Risk Management, Contract Administration, Customer Service, Real Estate, Purchasing and Administration.  Mr. Pound serves on many public and private company boards and consults with companies of all sizes.

Several years ago, Leo was brought into a firm I was working with and his insight and advice helped us get that company on the right track and eventually sold.

In the following interview, Leo discusses the issues he most often finds when brought in to help turn-around a company in trouble.  The key points you’ll take away include:

1.  The key to success is having a well rounded team that compliments each other and a focus on executing a well conceived plan.

2.  An early warning sign your company may be in trouble is if your revenue cycle is out of synch with your payable cycle. 

3.  Keep your lenders fully informed when bad things happen and what you plan to do about them.

4.  Don’t be afraid of change, it’s what growth is all about.

Over the past 15+ years you’ve worked with many companies who have gotten themselves into trouble, what are the top 3 – 5 characteristics of companies in that position?  Can you give an example or two? 

Here are some:

• Confused leadership in, and around, the management team 
• No depth and dearth of complimentary skill sets within the management team  
• Failed strategy, or ignoring the strategic plan 
• Failure to react to changes in the business environment, economic climate and/or changes in social behavior

Example 1: Failure to position team with strong leaders:  In this example a medical device manufacturer who was heavily dependent on Medicare reimbursement failed to see a shift in Washington surrounding Medicare funding of their products.  They ignored the environment outside the company only focusing on the growth of organization rather than looking at and understanding the underlying funding formula that drives revenue.  (i.e. checks that you can cash). 

Example 2: Confused leadership:  An international company with a dominant market position ignored competition, the management team actively fought any changes to the status quo that would require them to change how they develop and market their products.  Company was forced to sell to liquidate debt after covenant defaults. 

What are the top 3 – 5 characteristics of well-run companies you’ve worked with?  Can you give an example or two? 

When you have a well-run company, you almost always find:

• A good balanced team
• Thoughtful plan
• Intense focus
• Diligent execution
• And the result, excellent profit. 

A CEO over a 10 year period recruited and hired a world class management team to run a NYSE company.  This company was near bankrupt when he arrived.  His singular focus of hiring the brightest minds that created and executed a well thought out plan allowed this company to be Barron’s top retail investment one year not to long ago.

Are there any “early warning” signs business leaders should pay attention to that might help prevent them and their companies from getting into trouble? 

Simple, the revenue cycle is out of sync with the payable cycle.  If it takes 180 days from receipt of order to payment by customer and your vendor cycle is 120 days from PO to shipment of completed product and your capital base and bank facility cannot bridge the gap, you’re dead.  In this economy customers are asking for extended terms and vendors want to be paid next day.  A disaster in the making, the sales department wants to keep customers regardless of terms, and finance is the last to know.

Small businesses can be doing just fine one minute but can get themselves in a bad situation rather quickly, are there any set of processes and/or procedures you recommend to small businesses that can help them mitigate the downside of a troubling situation?   

Depends if situation is of their making or environmental.  For example, if your lender experiences a large loss in your sector, they likely will overreact and try to limit future credit risk by reducing your credit facility.  Keep your financing options open by continually maintaining relationships with multiple banks.  Second, if bad things happen don’t waste time by blaming someone, or some earlier decision.  Take control, focus, communicate and redeploy a new plan to solve the problem.  And keep your lender fully informed when bad things happen and what you are going to do about it.  They will find out anyway, may as well face the music early, they may be able to suggest something new to help.   

In today’s market many companies, large and small, are in precarious positions, in your opinion, what can they do to help them survive these turbulent times?  

Stop the car, take time to sit and assess the situation.  Plan for the next step(s), and execute.  And have more than one plan.  Likely it will take several iterations before you find the right vein.  Don’t be afraid of change, after all that’s what growing is all about.  

There are reports that some companies have cut back their employee base at such high levels, that those left are having a tough time servicing existing accounts.  Have you seen any instances where companies have scaled back too far and were not able to recover? 

No, a few close calls but I have not seen one myself.  Although it is more likely because I do not work with companies that I feel are beyond redemption.  Let someone else put them into bankruptcy.

Once company leaders realize they have issues, what can and should they do to turn it around? 

Seek outside help and then listen.  Most teams do not want to, or are incapable of owning the process.  As an outsider, that’s all we do, all the time.  I can create a plan, help management execute, hand back the restructured company to management in a fashion they can manage and I take the baggage with me.  

What has been the biggest challenge you were brought into and were you able to help turn things around?  Why or why not? 

Biggest, $2BB, wholesale distributor, broke into two companies, sold both, including refinancing $100MM in senior debt.  One became a Midlantic based company, one southeast.  Southeast company failed within two years.  Midlantic survived for 5 years as an independent and then sold upstream to $1BB competitor.  Inherent problem was both companies failed to look at national landscape and missed an opportunity to combine 5 private companies to create a $7BB firm with scale and efficiency in a business with thin margins. 

When the CEO of a start-up and/or small business is putting together their Board, what advice would you give them and how often they and the company’s executive staff should be interacting with Board members? 

Seek experience that compliments and adds depth to the CEO.  I suggest at the start up stage to meet monthly, with calls more frequently as needed.  Board members should not interact with management team without CEO permission, such contact serves to confuse team and dilutes CEO impact on team.  The CEO reports to the BOD.  The management team does not. 

In general, what piece of advice would you give to someone who is either starting a new company or getting ready to launch a new product which they are hoping to either create and/or penetrate a niche? 

Make sure there is room for you in that niche, and that your product will make a difference to the end consumer.  And that consumer is willing to pay for that difference. 

What are the key characteristics of companies that have been able to penetrate a niche, even niches dominated by another company?

Their product has perceived value add for consumer and higher satisfaction for end consumer.

When you think of companies that dominate a niche, who do you think of and what do you see them doing to keep that dominating spot?

Research in Motion (RIM), as a company they have continued to focus on niche in business mobile communications.  This focus on higher margin business clients differentiates them from other mobile companies.  They are not a “me to” product company.

What are the biggest threats to losing that dominating position?

Complacency and ignoring any changes in customer behavior

Finally, which companies come to mind who once held a niche dominating position and then lost them and why do you think they lost that position?

Motorola, the innovator of the mobile phone in the USA lost that position years ago, they did not move fast enough with product development and did not see rapid change in the consumer behavior pattern in the mobile arena.  Motorola acted a lot like US car companies, the same old products with new names, rather than new products.  They lost their innovative edge.

This week we are going to review a new U.S. Government initiative you may not be aware of: The Department of Commerce’s new Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship and The National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship.  These new programs are designed to help entrepreneurs launch and/or grow their businesses and help lead the economic and jobs recovery. 

Why is this important?  According to a study by the Kauffman Foundation, the world’s largest foundation devoted to entrepreneurism, “More than half of Fortune 500 companies were founded in recession or bear market.”  The current economic challenges have lead many Americans to look at starting their own business and for many these budding entrepreneurs, they need to understand where and from whom they can get reliable advice.  According to a Department of Commerce spokesperson, this is exactly what the new Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurism is designed to accomplish.

Here are some of the key takeaways regarding these new programs:

1. The home page for the new Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurism can be found at http://www.entrepreneurship.gov/
2. The National Advisory Council will advise the Secretary of Commerce and the Administration on issues relating to innovation and entrepreneurism and they are taking statements of interest from anyone who is interested in serving on the council.  More information is below:
3. Entrepreneurship.gov is designed to streamline the process entrepreneurs need to go through in order to find and get access to U.S. government assistance.

Recently U.S. Commerce Secretary Locke announced a new Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship within the Department of Commerce and the launch of a National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship; can you tell us what these initiatives mean to someone who is either starting a business or running a small business? 

The mission of the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship is to unleash and maximize the economic potential of new ideas by removing barriers to entrepreneurship and the development of high-growth and innovation-based businesses.  One of its goals is to drive policies to help entrepreneurs translate new ideas, products, and services into economic growth.

The National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship will advise the Secretary and the Administration on key issues relating to innovation and entrepreneurship.  The Council will identify and recommend solutions to issues critical to the creation and development of entrepreneurship ecosystems that will spawn new businesses and jobs. 

For someone who would like to take advantage of these programs, how do they go about signing up/getting involved?

We plan to make entrepreneurship.gov a virtual one-stop destination for government resources, programs, information, and data for entrepreneurs.  We will post information there on new initiatives and programs for entrepreneurs.

The National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship will include successful entrepreneurs, innovators, angel investors, venture capitalists, non-profit leaders, and other experts on these issues.  All meetings of this council will be open to the public.

Can you give some examples of how you see entrepreneurs and small businesses utilizing these programs? 

The Office and Council will focus on identifying issues, recommending policies, and developing programs most important to entrepreneurs, such as

• Encouraging Entrepreneurs through Education, Training, and Mentoring
• Improving Access to Capital
• Accelerating Technology Commercialization of Federal R&D
• Providing Data, Research, and Technical Resources for Entrepreneurs
• Exploring Policy Incentives to Support Innovators, Entrepreneurs, and Investors.

How do these new initiatives differ from similar programs at the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA)?   How will the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship and SBA work together to foster the development of U.S. start-ups and small businesses?

The Office and Council will focus on promoting and supporting high-growth and innovation-driven entrepreneurship.  The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) aids, counsels, assists, and protects the interests of all small businesses.  SBA has many programs (including its 14,000 counselors) that are useful for entrepreneurs.  We see SBA as a key partner in our efforts to serve high-growth entrepreneurs. 

The Advisory Council sounds like a great opportunity for an entrepreneur to learn from and interact with seasoned entrepreneurs and others that have been and are involved in launching a company; will there be multiple regional advisory councils or just a national one?  Again, how can an entrepreneur take advantage of this initiative?

The National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship will advise the Secretary and the Administration on key issues relating to innovation and entrepreneurship.  The Council will identify and recommend solutions to issues critical to the creation and development of entrepreneurship ecosystems that will spawn new businesses and jobs. 

We will have one national council, whose meetings will be open to the public.  Anyone interested in serving on the Council should send their resume and statement of interest to entrepreneurship@doc.gov.

In general, what piece of advice would you give to someone who is either starting a new company or getting ready to launch a new product which they are hoping to either create and/or penetrate a niche about how they can take advantage of the multiple programs being offered by the U.S. Government?

We encourage them to take advantage of the wide range of resources available through programs at the Department of Commerce, Small Business Administration, and other U.S. government agencies, which are currently accessible at entrepreneurship.gov, export.gov, trade.gov, business.gov, data.gov, and others.

Many entrepreneurs and small business people have either a real or perceived notion that getting involved in any government program will be bureaucratic and involve them having to complete massive amounts of paperwork and/or call several different people in order to take advantage of the program(s), what has been or is being set up to streamline the processes and get entrepreneurs and small business people involved quickly and easily in the new Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship and/or National Advisory Council on Innovation and Entrepreneurship? 

Both initiatives are designed to do exactly that.   Our first step is to make entrepreneurship.gov a virtual one-stop destination for government resources, programs, information, and data for entrepreneurs.  We will post information there on new initiatives and programs for entrepreneurs as well.

This week is Thanksgiving week in the U.S. and the kickoff to the holiday shopping season.  During this week many Americans will gather with their family and friends to give thanks and I encourage all of you to reach out and thank those that have helped you get to where you are today.  It would take me hours to thank all of those that have supported me through the years but I would like to thank my wife and kids, parents and in-laws, all my family and friends and all of those that have helped my career and this blog.  I wish you all a safe and Happy Thanksgiving and holiday season!

Please remember to recommend this blog to others.  Thank you for taking the time to read this posting.

Ken & The Rich Niche Group Team

This week we are taking a break from the normal interview of an entrepreneur to answer a question we frequently get at The Rich Niche Group.  While there are several ways to answer this question, we have boiled it down to 5 skills which we have seen lead to a more effective leader and company.  The 5 skills are:

1. A passion for providing an extraordinary customer experience and an understanding of your client’s and prospect’s problems.
2. An unwavering focus on your core strengths and using those to solve your client’s and prospect’s problems.
3. Being a source of innovation for your clients and partners and a leading innovator in your market.
4. An understanding of finance and financial statements. 
5. Company culture plays a very important role in the success of your business.

Let’s examine each of these and look at some examples how possessing these skills have aided in a company’s growth.

Passion for Extraordinary Customer Service

We all have personal examples of working with and buying from companies that treat us well even if they are higher priced than their competitors.  Smart leaders not only know this, they make it a central part of their company’s philosophy.  Simple things such as calling each new client and listening to their feedback or sending each new client a “welcome to the family” gift, as well as, setting up customer service so that the company can get quick and needed feedback on what it needs to improve and move customer service from just being a “complaint department” to being a strategic part of the organization.  John Goodman, Vice Chairman and co-founder of TARP World­wide, in his new book Strategic Customer Service: Managing the Customer Experience to Increase Positive Word of Mouth, Build Loyalty and Maximize Profits, shows how successful companies use customer service as a “catalyst,…making the organization more proactive, accelerating responsiveness, and boosting its effectiveness.”  John also points out the financial impact good and/or bad/no customer service can have on an organization.  In the coming weeks, we will have John as one of our interviewees.  

Here’s an example of an executive providing great customer service: Recently my wife and I stayed in a hotel and during our stay we had a small problem with our room.  Since we were there just one night, we did not report it but I did complete the comment card to make them aware of the issue.  A few days later, I received a call from the hotel’s General Manager asking for more details and comments on our entire stay.  Next time we’re Ft. Lauderdale, his customer service will earn his hotel a return visit.  As John Goodman points out, strategic customer service is applicable in every market and impacts every department within an organization.  Successful business leaders understand this and ensure customer service plays a central role in every decision made.

Unwavering Focus on Your Core Strengths

David Packard, co-founder of Hewlett-Packard, once said “A great company is more likely to die of indigestion from too much opportunity than starvation from too little.”  Companies of all sizes tend to lose focus at different points of their evolution (Successful companies regain it quickly).  Some will say they are “re-inventing” themselves or “innovating” but if they are doing these things without regard to the company’s core strengths, they will most likely fail.

Many start-ups and small businesses continually chase “one-offs” and justify them by saying they provide revenue and while this may be true, it takes away precious resources that are needed to move the company forward and normally is not a service that can be easily duplicated for other clients or prospects.  As your company grows, the need to focus becomes more challenging as current clients ask you and/or your sales reps to do a “little more” or “can you provide us…”  It is hard to say no when clients are willing to pay you to do something, but in most instances that is exactly what you must do.  How do you know when to say no?  Ask yourself these questions:

1. Is the service/product being requested an enhancement to our core service/product or something totally new?
2. If it is an enhancement, will other clients be able to understand the enhancement, are they interested in it and willing to buy from you?
3. If others clients are interested in it, can we add the enhancement to our service/product with our current resources or do we need to bring in additional resources?
4. Will the enhancement add value to our current offering and/or enable us to differentiate our product from that of our competitors?
5. Can I support the enhancement?
6. Will our ROI (return on investment) meet our margin requirements?

Recently I asked Peter Wakeham, the founder and former CEO of World Investor Link (WIL) which he sold in 2006 and is now known as PrecisionIR Group, his thoughts on how a company can be successful and penetrate and dominate its niche.  Peter said, “I do not think one can describe “Niche” better than “differentiation through focus” but the basics of strategy continue to apply regardless. WIL achieved differentiation through focus on i.) retail investor segment and ii.) annual reports.”  Peter also talked about focusing on the company’s core strengths by developing mutually beneficial partnerships with leading financial service organizations which “provided significant competitive advantages and blocked other entrants into the market”, as well as, “operational efficiencies…which no other competitor could match without significantly reducing service standards.”  Not just a focus on the company’s core strengths but also a passion for extraordinary customer service, no wonder Peter and his team were successful.

Source of Innovation

Being a source of innovation for your clients and partners and a leading innovator in your market is a key trait of companies that have penetrated and/or dominate their niche.  Back in 1986 while in college at The Ohio State University (Go Bucks!), I had an international business professor who had us use a draft of his upcoming book as our text book and on the opening page he wrote “Companies that fail to innovate and adapt to changing markets will be out of business by the year 2000!”  In today’s global market, innovation is a key to survival!  But innovation has to be tied to the company’s strengths and to either the company’s short or long term goals.  Innovation for innovation sake is nice but frankly of no value to your clients, partners, employees or investors and the current CEO of HP, Mark Hurd, has mandated that all projects coming out of HP’s research labs must provide economic value to the company.  In 2008 he reorganized HP Labs to “…ensure that HP is focused on groundbreaking research that addresses customer needs and creates new growth opportunities for the company.”  An example of this on the small business side comes from our first blog, where we interviewed Bob Cowan and talked about his former company American Teleconferencing Services, Ltd. (ATS) and how ATS was known for “not stealing market share but for creating new markets.”  As the head of Business Development at ATS, I can tell you this was not easy.  Every partnership, alliance and/or new product we wanted to offer HAD to be part of one of the company’s annual goals and fit within our service delivery capabilities or we had to justify the exception to the executive staff and the board of directors and get their approval before moving forward.  This made us focus on innovation initiatives that would positively impact ATS. 

Do you have an innovative new product or service being developed?  Does it tie to your company’s goals and strengths and is it something clients and prospects have given you feedback on?  If not, take a hard look at it and get moving to answer why.

Understanding of Finance and Financial Statements

In all businesses “cash flow is king” but in a start-up and/or small business it means life or death.  Every decision you and your management team makes will have a financial impact on the organization and you need to be able to see that in your reports.  Understanding the basics of finance and financial statements will enable you to quickly recognize problems, negligence, maintain the confidence of your employees, bankers, investors and board, and better enable you to evaluate the use of your limited resources.

When discussing this topic with Jerry Clarke, Chairman of the Board and retired CEO of Energy Services Group, International (ESG) – a Specialized Staffing and Business Solutions company he co-founded 26 years ago, here is what he had to say:

“The Chief Executive should be his/her company’s number one salesperson.  The CEO must not only be able to sell the company’s product or service to the customer at the Executive level, they must sell the company’s integrity, ability to succeed, including profitability and financial accountability to the financial institutions that provide banking relationships, insurance, accounting and auditing.  Additionally, the CEO must sell the company and particularly the executive element to the employees. It is improbable if not impossible at this level to be a convincing salesperson without an in-depth knowledge of finance and accounting principles.

One does not truly learn finance and accounting from a classroom or a book.  Books give you the basics and can teach the language but to understand financial statements the executive must live with the numbers.  You need to know how and where they are generated and what they mean.  Most accountants only collect data and put the numbers in the accounts that apply without any understanding of the big picture.  They press a key and a financial statement comes out, usually without any idea if the results are reasonable for that business.  The executive must have the accounting and business knowledge to examine a level one statement for reasonable results and if they see anything that is unreasonable, they must be able to examine sections of level five statements for application accuracy.

In the lifespan of every business there will arise a need for funding from external sources.  Lenders do not like uncertainty and particularly want assurance that loans or investments can be repaid.  Even though a company has a chief financial officer or controller that are CPA licensed, lenders usually require assurance directly from the CEO.  The financial world communicates with a language all their own that is typically foreign to many executives.  The CEO that does not understand and communicate in this language may as well have a sign across their forward that reads ‘I am uninformed and do not have a clue how I am going to account for your money.’  Of course this impression is not accurate but it is perceived.  This perception raises doubt and uncertainty in financiers and greatly reduces the probability of obtaining funding.  Most lenders require audited financial statements prepared by a mutually acceptable accounting firm.  Lenders used to require a “big eight” but since the consolidation of the big eight most any reputable firm is acceptable.  Accounting firms are accounting firms and not traditional businesses.  They do not understand what generates revenue or the expenses necessary to generate that revenue.  They do however know how to account for these items and the rules by which the accounting world is governed.  It is incumbent for a CEO to challenge any statement items that adversely affect the reported company’s performance.  The governing standards for accounting are “General Accepted Practices” (GAP) and “Federal Accounting Standards Board” (FASB).  The CEO does not have to quote the standards but should be aware of the existence. Let me talk about a few examples in ESGI’s life when this was very important:

In the early years of ESG, our bank required an audited financial statement from a “big eight” accounting firm.  Our in house income statement indicated a profit of approximately $300,000 but the audited statement indicated a loss of $100,000.  The difference was an investment of $400,000 that in house amortized over five years and the big eight firm expensed.  The difference between profit and loss could adversely affect the company’s ability borrow.  In the exit meeting with the big eight partner I requested, to no avail, that the investment be amortized.  When I ask if they were citing GAP or FASB as the governing body the whole situation changed.  Instantly their perception of our management changed and they saw us as equals who clearly understood the world of accounting.  The audited statement was changed to match the in house statement, we were happy, our lender was happy and our line of credit was renewed.

In another situation when ESG was in the $25 – $30 million range, we were funding operations with $500,000 of paid in capital and retained earnings with a $3 million line of credit and an additional $2 million guidance line.  (Guidance lines are not automatic funding but require bank loan committee approval.) We were awarded a $6 million short execution time (10 weeks) contract in Fl. And in all likelihood we would spend $4.5 million before any of the receivables from this contract were collected which would push us beyond the funding availability of both lines.  We prepared three flow of cash (not cash flow) scenarios which depicted best case, worst case and most probable case.  I met with our loan officer and explained the scenarios who presented them to the loan committee who in turn not only granted the guidance line but extended the upper limit to $4 million.  After the contract was completed and all receivables collected our loan officer complemented us on the presentation especially the 3 different scenarios.  He said the presentation was evidence that we completely understood the financial aspects of the business relationships.  By securing the funding for this contract we were able to grow our revenue for the year by $6 million.”

Company Culture

The knowledge that company culture plays a very important role in the success of your business is one that successful business leaders have known and have gone to great lengths to ensure the culture remains intact as the company grows.  Every company has a culture and that culture is shown in everything the company does from how it designs and implements new products and services, to how it sells, supports and bills for those products and services.  A good company culture is empowering to its employees.  They feel as if they can and do positively impact the company on a daily basis and that their personal reputation is manifested within the company’s culture.  Employees within an organization with a good culture guard that culture tightly by hiring only those that fit the culture and can make a positive impact on the entire team.   Conversely, working at a company with a poor culture is draining to the employees and they feel as if their opinions and expertise are either taken for granted and/or not valued at all.  Typically these are companies where decisions are made by one person or a small select group of people (silo decision making) with little or no input from employees, clients, partners and prospects.

A positive corporate culture starts at the top with the CEO and every executive within the organization.  New hires are not only trained to do their job they get trained about the company history and its culture.  Dharmesh Shah, Chief Technology Officer & Founder of HubSpot, as well as, co-Author of Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs recently spoke with me about the importance of company culture within HubSpot and the specific steps they took to make sure it did not get lost as the company grew.  Dharmesh said, “First, we make ‘cultural fit’ one of the key hiring criteria.  You’d be surprised at how many companies don’t have this in their list of priorities when recruiting.  We try to maintain an environment of ‘passionate and fun’ in the office.  It’s a good work environment and it’s not possible to spend 15 minutes in the office without hearing someone laughing.  We have regular work-but-not-work activities that help people come together.  This includes a live weekly web TV show on Friday afternoons where we invite anyone from the outside to be part of the studio audience.  The idea is not to be overly serious, but not be frivolous either.  It’s not just about free beer on Fridays.  It’s about recognizing that HubSpot occupies a large part of our people’s lives and we’d be silly not to recognize that and make the environment as pleasant as possible so great people can work with other great people and do spectacular things.”  You’ll hear more from Dharmesh about being a successful two-time entrepreneur and his book, Inbound Marketing, in an upcoming interview.

Do you know what the culture of your company is?  If not, blind survey your employees and ask them what they think it is and where improvements might need to be made.

We hope you found this information helpful and if you have other traits you think a successful business leader needs to have, let us know and we’ll assemble them and add to the list.  If you like our blog, please be sure to pass it on to others.  Thanks & Make it a Great Day!