Happy Birthday to Us!
Global Pathways turned seven years old this Monday! The company was conceived and named in May 2015 but was formally incorporated on 1st August that same year. So has been a real entity for the last seven years!
We honoured the day by adopting Scotland’s public holiday and making it our own. A bonus day off in recognition of the fact we made it this far.
What a journey we have been on. And when I say ‘We’ I mainly mean the business and I – but also the team we have collected along the way.
I have effectively been learning as I go along – having never had any experience of captaining my own ship before. There have been some pretty big surprises along the way (for example, I didn’t realise at the start that I had to pay myself through the books – assuming for some reason that the company’s money was my money – and as a result, I hired two people before I realised, rendering myself as ‘Employee no. 3’ on my own payroll! Haha).
Each year has presented its own challenges – right from the get-go. Foreseen and unforeseen issues, it is only really now – seven years in – that I feel we are truly hitting our stride and maximising on the potential this little gem of a business has.
Year one – it was just me working from a desk in my bedroom in a shared house. I had to hold down two or three part time jobs to make ends meet so Global Pathways was often overlooked as I was working day and night around it. Without focus one can’t hope to get a business off the ground – so it was more of a hobby in the first year.
Year two – Once I realised that this was not a sustainable way of running things, I secured some funding, took an office and hired my first employee. Mainly to keep me focused and engaged. I am more motivated by having people around than I am by money – so this was a great move. If I do say so myself. The company started to make a little more revenue as my focus was pulled in sharply.
Year three – I took an opportunity that presented itself to open my second office - in the US. This took up a lot of time and turned out to be a terrible move. I essentially just set fire to all the company’s spare funds. The US office closed within that year having made huge losses.
Year four – with a growing UK team we moved from our small but glamourous offices overlooking the Tower of London and Tower Bridge to something more manageable (rent and space wise) a little further out of the city centre. I had some issues employing a friend (now ex-friend) who was a disruptive force and I had to fire. Our client base started to grow and relationships began to strengthen based on trust and delivery capabilities. Both with clients and candidates around the world. This felt like the start of things beginning to come good.
Year five – The pandemic hit. The cross-border nature of what we do led to a number of disasters for my candidates. People were heading to airports to start their new lives, when country after country began closing their borders. I had more than one candidate who had quit their job, pulled kids out of schools, whose spouses had left their jobs, and who had moved out of their homes, who suddenly found themselves trapped and homeless and jobless. A terrible state of affairs for them! Our revenue plummeted off a cliff. I had to beg, borrow, and paper over cracks in the cash flow as creatively and calmly as I could. We scaled down from a team of eight to just three (not by letting people go – people just drifted off as the market was dead). A tough year for all of us.
Year six – The pandemic raged on and lockdowns roamed across the world over and over again. However, some green shoots of optimism started appearing in both the M&A and recruitment markets which helped us knuckle down and consolidate our knowledge of the global market to flourish. Sadly – on the personal front - I lost my mother after a slow and horrible fight with cancer which took my eyes off the prize for a few months.
Year seven – Business properly boomed – the market was amazing. This led to a shift – it went from clients calling the shots to candidates being able to choose who they want to work for. This was a double-edged sword as on the one hand we have jobs coming out of our ears but also so does everyone - so candidates are given more choices at this point in time. This translates into us getting a lot of offers, but many are turned down. This is the latest twist of the current rollercoaster of a market. Additionally, with recruitment being hot, it has been difficult finding talent to bring into my team to help meet the needs of our clients in these unprecedented times. There is a bidding war on talent across the board so good recruiters are hard to find, and I would rather hire right than hire twice. (Another lesson I have learned along this journey!)
Here I sit at the beginning of year eight wondering what the next twist might be on this unpredictable ride we all find ourselves involved in. Hoping that this can be the year that both the business and myself can clear our debts debt and start turning an actual profit.
Have you started your own business? How has your journey been? Has yours been as bumpy a ride as this? Am I unusual in getting this far without having made my riches? Or is that normal?
All input and feedback gratefully received!
