Mentoring interview series: Sam Glover

Transcription

1 Mentoring interview series: Sam Glover Sam Glover talks to Tevin Shepherd and Frances Brown about starting a business managing risk, pitching to prospective investors, team building and emotional intelligence. So my name is Sam Glover. I'm a serial entrepreneur, I suppose you could say. So good afternoon Sam Glover. Thank you so very much for making the time to be with us. I am Tevin Shepherd, and I work as a programme co-ordinator with the Queen's Young Leaders programme, with the Leading Change team here at the University of Cambridge. We're so happy to have you on board our second interview and really to pick your brain and to see what you've been up to, and to really inspire the wild Queen's Young Leaders network on your work. So we will dive right into the call Sam. But I want to give you the opportunity to introduce yourself briefly and just tell our listeners what you've been up to, and more about yourself. Sure, sure. So my name is Sam Glover. I'm a serial entrepreneur, I suppose you would say. I started my first business when I was 18, having just left school, that was in I've been involved with really dozens of startup businesses since then. And I'm very passionate about it. I absolutely love the startup process. I've been fortunate to have some successes and I've also been fortunate to have a few challenges as well along the way. I now find myself involved with various different businesses, mainly with a technology focus. I'm always looking for great teams to work with, new technologies, new ideas to help develop. That's really what I do now. Nice. That's very interesting Sam. Reading your biography, one thing which stood out is just before we go into the questions you began a business at 18 in your bedroom. This is outstanding. I mean tell us more! What inspired that? Well, what was extraordinary is that, at the time there was no such thing as the internet. So in 1992, you didn't really have to the ability to connect machines together in the same way you do now. I had a games console. That games console which you may or may not be familiar with the name it was an Atari. And Ataris had the ability to you slotted in a cartridge, and you then played that game. But you had to go and buy another game. You had to go the store and buy another game. Then you could play that game. Seba were the next round of video games consoles and similarly you had to buy cartridges and you'd put those in the machine.

2 And about this time, was the invention of the modem. And the modem at the time was a device that you connected to a telephone line and it was able to communicate in data, rather than voice, over the public switch telephone network. And this was a bit of a revolution. And, it's very simple what we thought was that you could connect these games cartridges together and in so doing, you would be able to download a new game to the console every time you wanted to play it. It was really as simple as that. Of course the extension of that then was to be able to download movies, or indeed to use this device to connect other things, like even your electricity metre or whatever anything else in the home that you might want to connect to a central place. Like these days, that sounds like a very easy thing to do. But back in 1992, before the internet, that really was quite a revolution. So the challenge is, to answer your question, the challenges really were technical. And they were really, really challenging because the amount of data that you could transmit over the telephone network was extremely limited. Also, at 18-years-old you really don't know how business works. Or at least I didn't. Increasingly, I have to say those young people that I meet now at 18 are much more savvy than I think I was at the time. They really do have a good handle on actually how to put a deal together, for example. And I thought I knew, but it probably took me a bit longer than I anticipated just to understand how a deal works, what's fair, what's reasonable, what the value of my proposition was. That's a very difficult thing for people to understand really what's the true value of this thing that I've created. And then of course the really difficult thing is how to fund it. Most people have a challenge with that. That's where do I go. I know I've got to invest in this thing. I know I've got to spend some money on this thing. Where am I going to find the money for it? So, that's probably the biggest challenge of all. I want you to hold that thought on investment, because I have question for you from one of the Queen's Young Leader's on investment. But just before we move forward Sam, I want to know on your journey you've been so successful how do you convince people to come on board with you? And what have been some of your challenges? What have been some of the wins and some of your challenges? Okay. So the biggest challenges really in any early stage business, or in any project really, it's not just because a startup business or any business is just a collection of projects. And the biggest problem with any project is that you get slippage. Or you get delays in the project. And the main reason for that is that you have other people or other parties involved. And where you have humans involved, there is always a human factor whether that's delay, whether it's competence, whether it's just other factors that are going to affect your ability to deliver that project on time. And of course the problem is that time is money. And so, whilst you may have said, "This is going to cost me X to deliver this over this period of time." If you then extend that, then it's going to cost you X plus. And whilst you can build in contingency, it's often that unknown, which is the real challenge. And being able to manage the unknown and understand the true risks of any project that's really, I think, one of the fundamental arts of delivering businesses. Because if

3 you can mange expectation around risk and say to your investors, "You know what, we haven't delivered on time, but and here are the reasons why," then you will continue to get support going forward. If you're not able to do that, then of course you'll lose support. And if you lose support, if you lose your ability to fund your projects, then you no longer have a project. Okay. Nice. Interesting. As you speak of investors Sam, we have a question from one of our Queen's Young Leaders, which asks, what does a great investment summary look like? And possibly you can talk us through an example of a great investor summary. Sure. So I actually run a workshop on exactly this, which I'm very happy to come and do for you guys. An investor presentation is a very, very specific instrument. And I use that word specific because it absolutely must be fine-tuned to suit the audience that you're presenting it to. Okay. Now every investment would attract a slightly different type of investor. So you might have investors who are particularly interested in technology, or they say that they might be particularly interested in high growth or consumer or whatever that might be. And so in presenting your proposition to them you absolutely must know what it is that they're looking for. So some people are very focused on the numbers, other people are very focused on the risks. So you've got to be able to set out in the most succinct way possible and I mean people have different ideas about this but in terms of an opening presentation, I certainly... So the first material that you send to a prospective investor, I would say you don't want it to be more that probably four slides. Okay. And your full presentation I have a framework that I use and indeed I recommend to other people, and I would say there's probably no more than, realistically really 13, 14 slides at the very most. And that includes: executive summary description of the product or service description of technology if it's technology involved, or how it works and a sum analysis of your competition you must include that some detail on the team obviously your financial information so the forecasts some summary of costs how you're going to spend this money what the funding offer is, et cetera, et cetera. So, the key thing is that you want to convey the message as succinctly as possible whilst finding the specific things that that particular investor is going to be be interested in hearing more about and are going to stimulate them to want to hear or to meet you. Because really this document is only really to get them to meet you. Because once you've met them, it's down to you really to sell you and your team's ability to deliver his project. And first and foremost investor's really buy you. They buy you and your team. And so the important thing is to get in front of them.

4 Nice that's very interesting. And of course, thank you for the offer of delivering it this workshop. I'm sure we will definitely consider that, and we will be in touch if we are we'll be holding you to this Sam. But a lot of our Queen's Young Leaders, they come from different backgrounds. Some do work in climate change. Some do work in poverty alleviation. And we've realised that there's an increase in social businesses. I'm looking at developing an investor summary or an investor pitch. How is it different for social businesses? Or does it follow the same procedure? Well, it's a very good point, isn't it. Because again you need to understand what is the motivation of the investor to provide this funding? So, if it's a not-for-profit organisation then there needs to be some other motivation other than profit. So identifying investors who are first of all they must have this investment available. So you got to qualify them, the same way as you would do any other sale. So you got to qualify them as being interested and capable of making an investment in a not-for-profit business like this. Lots of businesses have social funds available, or funds available for social responsibility, or projects related to social responsibility. And lots of other organisations do. And it's a question of identifying those and aligning really what your organisation is going to deliver with whatever objectives it is that they are seeking to achieve through that funding or through the application of that funding. True, true. Okay. That's very useful. Let me just pick your brain a bit further on that point, especially on that social business perspective. For example say a Queen's Young Leader's is doing some work in climate change and may for example find an investor who is a private sector investor who invests in that social enterprise. But on the other hand that individual receives a grant from the United Nations to implement a project. How do you mitigate through or how of you manage these expectation of these two investors? One from a grant perspective, and one from the private sector which ideally is for a profit cause? That's a very good question. You usually find that there are certain success criteria that the grant funder are seeking for you to deliver in order for you to be able to draw down their funding. So whether that's number of employees that you're able to attract in a particular region or whatever that impact is that they're seeking to, whatever their objective is. One of the dangers of course is, particularly with an early stage projects or something that isn't an established business, is that actually your business plan change on the way through. So you may start something. You will obtain your grant funding according to certain criteria. You will also potentially attract your private sector funding. Private sector funding tends to be much more flexible. Just as I was saying earlier on projects change. There are delays. Things happen. If you go back to your private sector funder, and say, "Look things have changed. We need your continued support. This is the reason why it's changed. You generally find that private sector funders are very happy as long as your communication with them is good. If you go back to a grant funder, you will often find that if you changed any of the criteria, they may actually mean you can't draw down the remainder of your funding. In fact may even be on penalty.

5 So it is very important to constantly communicate with both of these different types of funders. And ensure that all the time really you're doing what they need you to do to ensure that they can meet their obligations under whatever those criteria are. So you really need to listen to what sort of objections they may raise throughout your process, and then you need to adjust your plan accordingly. Nice. That's very interesting. But just before we move on Sam, for the purpose of this call, because some Queen's Young Leaders are keen on entrepreneurship, but I think just to establish, probably you want to walk us through, explain to us what is a funding offer? Okay. So, if an investor you've been successful in pitching to an investor. And generally speaking I personally like to work the other way around. I like to structure if I'm raising money from investors I like to structure my offer to the investor and say, "This is the criteria. This is the framework by which I'm seeking to attract funding." So that would normally have an evaluation associated with the business or the proposition. It would also have the number of shares of the amount of equity that I'm willing to offer in that business. And so effectively that's going to be a share price if it's a company limited by shares and I'm going to put a time constraint on that, or a time limit. So I'm going to offer this amount of shares, at this price, within this time. Often you will find that companies that are seeking to raise money, they won't necessarily have a clear view of what their valuation is, or they will have an inflated view. They rarely view their business as being undervalued. However it does happen. Really the situation you don't want to find yourself in is that the funder is saying, "Actually you know what, I just think you're overpriced. And thanks very much, but no thanks." Again the key thing to do is to listen to your prospective investors through your investment process. Hear what they are saying. Ask them about deals and investments that they've made and what their evaluation metrics were. How did they value those businesses that they were investing in? And then apply that to your own project. You do not need to give evaluation in the first meeting. You absolutely can hold that back until such time as you've met a couple of different investors or a handful of investors, prospective investors. And then go back to your prospective shareholders and put forward your price, once you have got an understanding of what the market is, where you sit in the market, what the appetite is for your particular proposition. That's very interesting. And you mentioned something, which I find very interesting. Because you're suggesting that you first off make your proposition, based on your experience. You make that offer to the investor based on your own criteria. Now you also mentioned that sometimes investors may say no because you've over-priced, or you do not bring that kind of value that they're looking for. How do you deal with such a situation? Or maybe prevent it from happening? Well that's my point really, is you don't go out with an evaluation in the first instance. You may have your ideas about what evaluation is. But really the key thing is to first of all to get prospective investors interested in what you're doing. Listen to what criteria they apply to valuing the investments they invest in. Understand what return they're looking for. So you will regularly hear investors say, "Well I'm looking for a ten-times return, or a 15 times return. That's what they say they're looking for and in terms of a portfolio view, they need to achieve that with certain investments. So you need to understand how your business is going to deliver that.

6 So how is your business going to deliver ten times invested costs. It they are going to invest 100 in you, how are you going to deliver back 1,000 pounds? So you need to hear what those metrics are, turn to base, work out your own numbers. And then, when you're ready, go back your prospective investors and put forward your evaluation. Let's just take two steps back from the technicality of investment. I want to find out from you, ideally when you're building a business, you build it with a team. And there needs to be that level of emotional intelligence as a leader. I want to understand, do you value building emotional intelligence in your team and how do you go about doing that? I would say that in the modern working environment, it's absolutely essential. The way that we do business, the way that we conduct ourselves in business, and in the business environment it is increasingly sensitive to people's needs and far less aggressive actually in terms of managing style. And I think the key reason for doing that of course is ultimately you get a lot more out of your team. And you get a lot more creative, higher-value ideas and delivery. Ultimately, then people are happier. And of course it's a virtuous circle. I think the key thing is you really need to identify, first of all, natural leaders within the business. So I find people who have natural leadership ability by not just focusing on the work environment, but also doing things outside work, working together on whatever it might be. Sport s obviously a very good thing to bring people together, see where leaders come ahead, et cetera, et cetera. But, in all sorts of other work, socialising, you often find that you can actually see how people work together in the bar. Or, if you've gone out for the evening, you can really see how the dynamics of the group work. Then coming back to the work environment, you really need to understand what people's strengths and weaknesses are. So there's no point giving somebody or tasking an individual with something that they just don't have the strength for they don't have the qualities or the skills or the experience to deliver that particular project or that particular thing. So you need to make sure that you're tasking people with the right thing to suit their skills, experience, et cetera. Once you know that, then really what you need to do is inspire people to actually deliver this thing that you've asked them to do. And I think you do that In two ways. Very important, you must give people the big picture, but not too much of the big picture. Because there's the big sort of vision, which is great but ultimately people like kind of small snacky tasks. And if you can inspire people to deliver well In the small snacky tasks, then you'll find that you get a good rhythm going where people get a real good sense of achievement in the short term and you can then build up momentum. People start to listen to each other when they start to succeed in their roles. People will have respect for each other's opinions, et cetera, et cetera. And that's really what you're trying to develop, isn't it. You trying to develop a working environment where there's no blame developing. Okay, people get stuff wrong. I get stuff wrong all the time. But it's easy for one of my colleagues, a member of my team to turn to me and say, "Sam you know what, I don't think you did that right." And I go, "I think you're right." Yeah. True. True. That's very interesting. And I think while we're on that question of teams, I would want you to weigh in on that discussion. Because a lot of the time, you have for

7 Frances: example in a social enterprise environment, you have some individuals who work within the organisation, are working on a voluntary basis. I mean how do you manage these individuals expectations? How do you ensure that they work optimal productivity? Well that's... there are many different issues associated with people volunteering, of course. Not least, that people who volunteer often can be the most enthusiastic, but not necessary the best focused, because they sometimes feel that they're outside the usual management structure or structure of the particular project. And of course that's key. You've got to bring them within your management processes to ensure that everybody's in line in terms of what the overall delivery is. And again it comes down to tasking them with specific things, whatever that task is, and ensuring there's some sort of measurement. So that they have a sense of their own success, and their own achievements in whatever is it that they're doing for you. It isn't difficult to ensure that volunteers are aligned with whatever the business plan is. You just need to be very specific really about what it is that your expectations of them are, to ensure that your expectations align with their expectations. I do think that even volunteers need to be compensated in some way, and that's not necessarily financial obviously. But they need to feel like their time and their effort is valued. And so finding a way of doing that, I think is really key. And it's beyond just a thank you. You need to find some way to make people feel like they are really genuinely valued in the organisation. Okay. Okay. Okay, So you're saying that, it's more an issue of ensuring that they're included and valued within the organisation to ensure that they produce that level of productivity that you want. Yeah exactly. Nice. Just before you move on, Sam. Looks like time is running so quickly and the discussion is becoming so interesting, but we want for a part of the discussion to look at entrepreneurship policy. But just before we move on, we have a question coming out from Frances. You just want to unmute your mic and you can go and ask your question. Hello. So I have a question Sam. For those of you don't know, they do know I used to work in a business incubator. Sam's business used to be based there. So we were based in the same building. And that building had a particular kind of work place culture, I would say. But I know that Sam has worked in a more corporate environment and different kind of income levels of environment. Without giving names, are there any examples of who in leadership or who emotional intelligence in leadership, that you've witnessed and that people might not notice that they're doing? Gosh. Yes is the answer, I mean you see it all the time, don't you. I think it's very difficult because of course we've been through an enormous transition over the last really ten years, at the very most, moving towards a more emotionally intelligent environment. But, there is certainly a legacy, I would say pretty much every organisation, and not just in business, but in all walks of life where people can be dictatorial. They can be autocratic. They tend to, certainly if they feel under threat, they can tend to become extremely isolated in their own activities and their own objectives. They can become even resentful of help and assistance, support from others.

8 Frances: And it's quite difficult. Once those things have started to work their way into a working environment, they really can contaminate that environment, and they're quite difficult to then to get rid of, to work through. Unfortunately sometimes that means those individuals can't stay within the organisation because you can't turn them. But if you can do that then obviously that's the best. That's a great outcome. If you can get people to understand that perhaps they're not under threat. Even if they're a leader within the organisation! Often find that if you get talented people coming in below the leadership level then a leader can feel quite threatened, and they become not so efficient, perhaps, or not so good in their role any longer. I hope I answered your question Frances. Yes. Great! I think you're right. I think that the transition from being the superstar solo entrepreneur to somebody that starts building a team, and then, not all the credit goes to you, because you have this team and you have a role that's dual. You have to lead that team also. There's something in you in that solo person that stills needs to prove, to keep proving, yourself. I think that's a really valid thing that we don't often talk about. So thank you. Thank you very much Frances. Just before we move on, Sam, to the last five minutes of our conversation, we have a question from Emma Dicks. And she's asking, I have a question on the previous topic. I'm looking at investment. She wants to go back to the topic of investment. What advice would you give for finding angel investors, and how to approach them? What offer to make? Finding individual angel investors is quite difficult. However, approaching angel groups can be extremely tough. And you really got to be well practised, and well rehearsed, and you've got to be pretty tough to stand up in front of large groups of angels, who sometimes can find that it is sport to undermine somebody's proposition, or to, frankly not necessarily be that supportive, or potentially not have the real intention of even investing. I've stood in front of groups where actually probably only about 50% of people there actually are really interested in making investment, and the others are having a nice day out. However, if you find the right angel groups, and there some really excellent angel groups out there, then they are extremely supportive. Often members of the group will have been standing in the same position themselves and probably still do. It's those groups that you want to find. Now there is a register of angel investors in the UK, angel investor organisations that you can access. It's readily available on the internet. There is an association. I strongly recommend you do that. I would then look at the types of investments they've made. I would contact whoever the co-ordinator is at those groups and discuss your proposition with them, and how it would fit with their existing portfolio. I would very much source them, and try and understand what their process is. Often the investment process that these groups employ is not necessarily conducive with frankly attracting investment. It can be extremely rapid fire, and quite tough actually. But again if you find the right fit for you, then you're going to find access to good investors.

9 I strongly recommend that you use LinkedIn. I would find individuals who put themselves out there as angel investors and who have specific field experience or industry experience in whatever sector it is that you are operating in. And I would talk to people. If you put the message out to the universe that you're looking for investment, and you've got a really good elevator pitch, you know: this is what I'm doing; this is what it's about; this is what the challenges are that I'm overcoming; this is what the market is; this is what I'm seeking to achieve, da, da, da. And you can get that out very succinctly, then you'll find that if you speak to enough people, and speak to the right people, then you'll get introductions to investors. There's a lot of money around at the moment, which is looking for a home. Interest rates are very low. The Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) and Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEIS) is a fantastic scheme here in the UK, for those people raising money in the United Kingdom. And that is a massive advantage. It can not be underestimated what an advantage it is to offer your propositions as an EIS or SCIS investment. Thank you very much for that question Emma, and thank you for that response Sam. I once again want to shift the discussion to policy. We have like maybe three more minutes to see how we can get an answer in. Sam, a lot of the time we see that governments are responsible for creating the enabling environment to promote entrepreneurship. If there's not the right policies, if the interest rates, as you mentioned a while ago, are not low, then you have problems. Where do you see government in all of this, in this food chain or this entrepreneurship chain? Do you think that they are responsible for creating the enabling environment to promote entrepreneurship? For sure. Probably before you go, maybe you can also answer this question by also answering, what can an advocate, someone's who advocating for entrepreneurship policy, what should that person speak to? What should that person encourage? Gosh. Well I mean that's a very big question. Fundamentally, funding and skills is obviously at the core of this. And with skills, a subtext of skills is really in an environment where skills can be developed, shared, and those resources. I mean for example Frances mentioned that we have previously spent time in an incubator together. And those sorts of platforms are hugely valuable to smaller businesses whether it be an individual who's got an idea and they are looking to develop that into a proposition, right the way through to a team of guys who've got a proof of concept, and they're looking for a home. They're looking for someone to share ideas. They're looking for somewhere to base themselves and start to build their investable proposition. And those sorts of environments are incredibly valuable. But I really think there's a significant gap at the moment in real life education. The notion of becoming an entrepreneur is a relatively new vocation. In 1992 when I said, "I want to be an entrepreneur." People looked at me very befuddled because it just wasn't something that people did. Whereas now of course it is genuinely a potential vocation. I mean, it's something that you can really do as a career. However, it is a multi-disciplinary career and you need to have a good understanding of finances, or finance. You need to have a good understanding of, or a basic understanding of, legal matters, corporate law, employment law, et cetera, et cetera.

10 Frances: Frances: And I think, really, one of the key things that could accelerate entrepreneurialism and the development of smaller businesses, is really a basic grasp of these various different principles. And I think that probably there is a shortage of that currently in, if you like, in the ecosystem. Okay. Nice, nice. I mean that was very comprehensive answer for our big question. Nice. Thank you very much on that Sam. Probably before you end just before you end I think it'd be interesting for you to answer, at what point did you realise you were successful? And have you had anything else from then? Gosh, well... And don't be modest. I think through your career and, as I said, choosing to be an entrepreneur is one thing. And I guess to great or lesser extent you got to at some point say, I want to be an entrepreneur to do this sort of stuff right. But from time to time we all hopefully have successes. And those are small things that mean you that feel successful about that particular project. But I have to say, I sometimes and this may sound a bit narcissistic but, actually sometimes when it's hard, then it also feels like great success. Because to overcome some of the bigger challenges, you know, things are tough. If it was easy, everybody would be doing it. And it isn't easy. Not everybody is doing it. And so when you find that you developed a project and you got through the minefield that is being an entrepreneur. And you delivered a business. And you see it ticking away. And you look around and you ve got a great team. And you're able to share some good times together. That is a really truly great feeling! Great feeling. Nice. That was a very good way of closing our call Sam. Thank you so very much. Doesn't look like we have any more questions based on our chat. But thank you so very much Sam for being on this call to share your experience as an entrepreneur. Thank you very much. Great, great, pleasure. Yeah definitely. Have a good evening.