How to productively build and be purposeful with Asad Hamir Co-Founder of Klyk & Co-Founder of Ocushield

It’s challenging enough to be productive while building one company. However, productively building multiple ventures at once requires incredible focus & purpose. So, I wanted to hear from someone who has achieved this alongside several investor, advisor & board positions all while keeping purpose at the heart of every endeavour. 

Asad Hamir is the Co-Founder of Klyk, the sustainable IT company helping businesses tackle e-waste & reduce their carbon footprint. Alongside Klyk, Asad is also a Co-Founder of Ocushield, a clinician-led eye healthcare company. In addition to both his Co-Founder roles, Asad serves as a Non-Executive Director & investor in several tech & healthcare companies. 

Keep listening to hear Asad’s advice on how to scale without losing productivity or purpose plus how to make your calendar work for you and not the other way round.

Asad’s advice:

• Any previous enterprises will have been valuable experience & will teach you what not to do
• At the start of the week, agree weekly objectives / at the start of the day, define what needs doing
• Allow time each day for checking emails, don’t leave them till the end of the day
• Leave space for you to react to clients’ needs if necessary
• Initially you will be fire-fighting on every front; aim to get to a place where you can look at the big picture as well as the immediate problems
• Celebrate both the big and the small wins - and keep your eye on both
• Try using Calendly - but protect your time
• Set boundaries for yourself and make sure your team understands those boundaries
• Parcel the week up, eg. meetings on Mondays, and maybe a certain day each week to concentrate on something different
• Focus is key; concentrate on one business at a time
• Draw a line at a certain time and finish your day
• Pay attention to your health / fitness / diet and you will be more energised
• Be open with your team and allow them to share your vision and plans
• B.Corp is a big help both guiding people inside the business and attracting people from outside who will want to work with you
• Write your own job description

FF&M recommends: 

• LastPass the password-keeping site that syncs between devices.
• Google Workspace is brilliant for small businesses
• Buzzsprout podcast 'how to' & hosting directory
• Canva has proved invaluable for creating all the social media assets and audio bites.

FF&M enables you to own your own PR. Recorded, edited & published by Juliet Fallowfield, 2023 MD & Founder of PR & Communications consultancy for startups Fallow, Field & Mason.  Email us at hello@fallowfieldmason.com or DM us on instagram @fallowfieldmason. 

MUSIC CREDIT Funk Game Loop by Kevin MacLeod.  Link &  Licence

Transcript

Juliet Fallowfield: [00:00:00] Welcome to season 11 of How To Start Up, the podcast helping you start and scale your business with advice from entrepreneurs on what to do now, next, or never. This season, we'll be hearing about all things productivity from amazing entrepreneurs sharing how they've hacked theirs. Hosted by me, Juliet Fallowfield, founder of the B Corp certified PR communications and podcasting consultancy, Fallow, Field & Mason. Our mission is to enable you to master your own storytelling, whether that be via PR or podcasting, all with a long term view.

Juliet Fallowfield: It's challenging enough to be productive while building just one company. However, productively building multiple ventures at once requires incredible focus and purpose. With this in mind, I wanted to speak with someone who's achieved this alongside several investor, advisor, and board positions, all while keeping purpose at the heart of every endeavor.

Juliet Fallowfield: Asad Hamir is the co founder of Klyk, the B Corp certified sustainable IT company, helping businesses tackle e-waste and reduce their carbon footprint. Alongside Klyk, he's also the co founder of [00:01:00] Ocushield, a clinician led eye healthcare company. And in addition to this, he also serves as an NED and investor in several tech and healthcare companies.

Juliet Fallowfield: Keep listening to hear Asad's advice on how to scale without losing productivity or purpose, but how to make your calendar work for you and not the other way around.

Juliet Fallowfield: Thank you Asad for joining How to Start Up today. It's wonderful to have you on. Before we get into all things productivity, it would be great if you could give a bit of an introduction as to who you are and a bit of background around the businesses that you started.

Asad Hamir: Yeah, great. So, yeah, real pleasure to be on, on the podcast first of all. I started my career as an optometrist. So that's why you'll always see me in 

Juliet Fallowfield: Really cool 

Asad Hamir: glasses. Yeah, I actually probably have about 40 or 50 pairs. So yeah, it's become a passion. My family's from East Africa, so from Tanzania and Uganda.

Asad Hamir: My mom was an optometrist basically. So like hence why it became kind of the family trade. And I think our family's got the world record [00:02:00] for the number of optometrists. So we've got like 45 optometrists. Big Indian family, loads of cousins, everyone did it. But yeah, Mum wore the trousers and kind of forced me to do it.

Asad Hamir: But Dad was an IT engineer basically. So grew up with tech around the house. And yeah, always used to go with him to like repair stuff and like, you know, go to people's houses and I'd be the guy holding the screwdriver and always used to love it when he'd get me to like, you know, tighten things up on the motherboards and things like that got a real passion out of it from a young age and then did optometry and third year university Steve Jobs got up on stage and said here's the iphone and I finished my degree in optometry and then I launched a mobile phone reseller business with the mobile network O2 and I was one of three partners that helped bring the iPhone to the UK market in London Yeah, so we sold about three or four million smartphones over 10 plus [00:03:00] year period.

Asad Hamir: So it started that business at 22 years old, which was like a great, great experience. Right place, right time in many ways. I mean, the smartphone boom just, just took off at that point, right? iPhones yeah, did, did really well. And yeah, grew that business up to a couple hundred people.

Asad Hamir: 40 million in revenue the kind of peak and actually you know, it then was a trip back to East Africa in 2017, 2018. And I was wandering the streets there in carrier co, which is like a market area. And started to see like people selling like computers and laptops on sides of the streets.

Asad Hamir: And I was obviously just techies. I was like, let me go over and just see what they are. And on the computers, it's like these little asset tags, which has like the names of the company that they belong to before. And they were like companies from the UK. And I was like, hold on, what's going on here?

Asad Hamir: Started asking questions and realised that a lot of this stuff has just been shipped from the UK because, you know, it's just waste that they are just getting rid of, and then these guys obviously in Tanzania were [00:04:00] reselling it and that's where I came across electronic waste and realised how big this problem was going to get.

Asad Hamir: And yeah, and I guess I I was part of it, right? I was part of that problem with with the first business and so started looking into the area more and more and realised that there was no one really enabling the business world side of things. So helping businesses reduce their electronic waste kind of all the way through the employee life cycle.

Asad Hamir: And then Covid happened and that was a real moment for the tech industry where consumption just went through the roof and that was the point where I kind of, I connected the dots between e-waste, consumption and yeah, launched the business basically to try and helpespecially startups and scale ups reduce their carbon emissions through their device life cycles.

Asad Hamir: You are four years in now or five years?

Asad Hamir: So about four years in from the idea inception, like two years from proper launch. [00:05:00] So the business is now run rates, about 4 million ish. And yeah, we're profitable being bootstrapped till now, but now we're at a point where we're in a position where we can really scale the business.

Asad Hamir: Having done it before, I think is an advantage like having been through that journey a couple of times. So and then I've also had, business failures. I've seen what not to do as well. so it's an exciting time at Klyk for sure.

Juliet Fallowfield: And I was going to say, that's the first time you've actually mentioned the business name, which means I think you're probably one of the most humble founders there are. So Klyk is a sustainable IT company. So it's, it's a circular economy for IT waste. Is that correct? So you were taking what could become landfill and dangerous to the planet and getting it back into the system. And I noticed you were B Corp certified as well. When did you get your certification?

Asad Hamir: So we got our certification very early on it was about two years ago. And we actually do B Corps it as well. So the actual B Corp so we do all of their procurement or their [00:06:00] recycling. 

Juliet Fallowfield: I mean, naturally the types of businesses that want this kind of service are ones that are sustainably minded, but we're not seeing it just exclusively in that world because it makes

Asad Hamir: business sense to be more sustainable. It's one of these kind of rare areas where actually by adopting sustainability actually it saves you money because you're buying refurbished tech instead of buying new tech, you're repairing instead of throwing it away, you're recycling at the end, you're recovering value at the end.

Asad Hamir: So typically we can save a business like 60% on their overall IT spend. Whenever we tell a CFO that they're like, that definitely perks, perks, their ears.

Juliet Fallowfield: well that's the thing, I think a lot of the time with sustainability or businesses trying to be better,

Juliet Fallowfield: they think it's going to come at a bigger cost, it'll take more time,

Juliet Fallowfield: it's an investment, but it's worth it. And there's always a bit of an eye roll of like, we're doing it because it's the right thing to do.

Juliet Fallowfield: Whereas, I like B Corp and we became B Corp certified a year last September

Juliet Fallowfield: and it was the fact that you're putting people and planet above profit, but you [00:07:00] still need to be a profitable company to be able to do do 

Asad Hamir: Absolutely. 

Juliet Fallowfield: And There's no shame in profit. And I think when you're saying it's actually going to save you money, it's also going to be better for the planet.

Juliet Fallowfield: It ticks all the boxes

Asad Hamir: yeah.

Juliet Fallowfield: For you to pivot from your previous business to this, that light bulb moment, when you saw what was happening, did you think, right, there is no choice. I have to fix this problem.

Asad Hamir: Yeah, it was quite different, right? Because I was like taking stuff from Apple, which was like new and boxed and you just go and sell it, right? And here you have to actually recover stuff. You have to triage it, test it, see whether it's needs repairs and stuff like that. So there's a whole kind of, from a supply chain perspective, there's a whole different layer before it's actually ready to sell.

Asad Hamir: And so, But yeah, I really felt that this was my calling , in many ways because, having seen that side of things, having been from East Africa myself in a scene where all this stuff unfortunately was ending up that it felt like, you know, this, this is where I need to be really.

Asad Hamir: And I, I couldn't see anyone else in the UK that was, [00:08:00] thinking this way. And I guess I really felt that, you know, I was the right person to go on that journey. 

Juliet Fallowfield: Well, I'm so glad you have,

Asad Hamir: Yeah.

Juliet Fallowfield: You're obviously killing it and it's doing really well as it should be.

Juliet Fallowfield: But You're a tried and tested serial entrepreneur. Productivity. This season is all around all things productivity. And I was saying how when you start a business you're busy and everyone says don't be a busy fool.

Juliet Fallowfield: And you want to be productive and time is money and time is the most precious resource that you have. Money will come and go

Asad Hamir: Yeah, yeah, 

Juliet Fallowfield: Productivity to me, I've always prided myself on a system and a process and a hack and actually realised I was burning myself out because the more systems I found, the more things I streamlined, the more I was trying to do. And actually sometimes you just need to stop and not do anymore.

Asad Hamir: yeah so,

Juliet Fallowfield: How do you define being productive?

Asad Hamir: The biggest thing that I find now it's like defining what I need to do every single day so I normally start my day off with like let's sit down and let's write down what i'm going to do rather than getting into the email death [00:09:00] trap, but challenges with with the business where we are at this stage is we're also client focused and so we are still very much on the front line with clients and I am as well.

Asad Hamir: So I have to strike that balance between, okay, I've got things to get done, which are more short, medium, longer term, but then at the same time, I also need to react to, clients. So for me, it's about, okay, the start of every week let me agree some objectives or some things I'm going to try and achieve by the end of the week.

Asad Hamir: And then at the same time, leaving myself enough time during the day to be able to check my emails, check my Slack, respond to things. So I kind of look at the kind of wins in terms of my longer term objectives and I, the way we work as a business, we try and match those to OKRs. And so I look at that and then I look at short term wins and short term things that happen.

Asad Hamir: So it could be like an issue that we've been able to resolve. And, you know a client is happy that we've been able to [00:10:00] resolve it. And that's like a, a win or it could be a, a client win, or it could be a sale. So I think you've got to celebrate not only the big stuff and, develop objectives that you need to work on more longer term, but I think you also need to 

Asad Hamir: count the things that come in on a day to day basis where unfortunately, you know in the early stages of a business you are always going to be firefighting to an extent right? You can't get away from that you can't outsource that so I look at it in that kind of bigger picture to go, right?

Asad Hamir: Okay have I been able to keep my head clear and achieve the things that have come in on a day to day basis at the same time have I been able to move forward the weekly objectives as well

Juliet Fallowfield: How do you protect your calendar? Do you time block or

Asad Hamir: Yeah,

Juliet Fallowfield: that some days are going to be better than others?

Asad Hamir: So I use Calendly 

Juliet Fallowfield: love 

Asad Hamir: possible. Yeah, exactly. And, and try and protect the Calendly as well. So I don't give it out sparingly, like try not to just give it out to everyone, just like that because you just find people just [00:11:00] like book in time. Right. And, and that could be both internally and externally.

Asad Hamir: Most days I'm in the office. So with that comes challenges because, the way our office is kind of designed is me and my co founder sit in the middle of the office and it's all open plan. So what tends to happen is people tend to come over when they've got a problem.

Asad Hamir: So I think it's also about making sure that you set some boundaries for yourself in those kinds of environments. So that, you know, even though there might not be something in your calendar, there could be something that just can come up from time to time. And your internal team also needs to know that they have to kind of find the time to come and have that chat rather than, needing to come over.

Asad Hamir: Of course, if it's urgent, then you do so. But

Asad Hamir: It's so 

Juliet Fallowfield: isn't it because you want the open door policy and

Juliet Fallowfield: you want that open culture

Juliet Fallowfield: But I remember in one of my old jobs I'd come back from a press appointment and my team would just pounce on me straight away it's like guys I need a cup of tea I need to go to the loo and I need to write the notes from the meeting and then pounce on me because it's that [00:12:00] dynamic. I think the more time you spend together in the office, the more you know how people work, but you don't want to have that closed door, but you need time to yourself to actually do the bits you need to do yourself. And you can't be open all the time. So sitting in the middle is a big risk, but have your team learned how to respect that boundary?

Asad Hamir: it's taken some time. It's definitely taken some time and but yeah, I think now we've got a good balance. I think if I was designing the office again, I probably wouldn't have done it like this again. In some ways it's really good because you encourage this very open culture.

Asad Hamir: What I do separate to that then as well as I have like non office days, so I've got like also like a coworking membership at the office group and I'll go there once a week or yeah, just work from home. So that way I get my balance where I need my quiet time. I could just bang through stuff or 

Asad Hamir: we've got this really nice kind of outside seating area, which, you know, during the summer months is great or go to a local coffee shop. Coming back to the calendar, calendly, definitely time blocking and also just structuring my week. Monday is firstly meetings day.

Asad Hamir: So try and get through as [00:13:00] many meetings, internal team set everyone up, you know, especially by like two, three o'clock so that, you know, you can then go on with the rest of the day. Tuesday, you get some bleed of meetings from Monday but then the rest of the week is just getting stuff done. So I think I like to structure it in that way but then always like even if you have a day where you've got loads of meetings like sales calls and whatever just make sure you give yourself a couple of hours just to like catch up with things because otherwise you'll get to like six o'clock.

Asad Hamir: You haven't checked your emails and then you're at work till like eight, nine or you're taking it home with you and obviously that's not very healthy. 

Juliet Fallowfield: Yeah, there has to be an off switch. I think it was Uwern Jong in his episode in season three, which would have been two years ago. He's like, just know the end of your day. If it's

Juliet Fallowfield: ten o'clock, fine. If it's seven o'clock, fine. There is an end and you have to stick to it because you need to wind down. And I'm so bad at this because I think I'll just, I'll just clear a bit more. And then you need that extra kind of hour or two in the evening to then, you know, decompress to then be able to go to sleep and do it all over again. I'm my own worst [00:14:00] enemy with that. I'm fascinated how people manage their time, especially because you're also a co founder of Ocushield, which I think is a clinician led eye healthcare company,

Juliet Fallowfield: and you are non executive director and investor in several tech and health tech care companies as well. How do you find time for all of that, as well as your social life and family and maybe a here or there?

Asad Hamir: I think I've created systems for myself though so like what i've done is one day a week, which is Thursday. I'll normally dedicate to the portfolio companies and that would be the day where if I want to like have external meetings and get out of the office you know investor meetings whatever it is I'll dedicate it to that day so just being able to compartmentalise it because otherwise if you tend to get bleed over on different days then your mind just can't get focused on on the job.

Asad Hamir: I think focus is key. I've learned the hard way that in my view you can only do one business at a time like properly full on, like be invested and be all in so like [00:15:00] that for me is Klyk I'm all in that is 95 percent of my working week but it doesn't mean that you can't have investments and you can't have you know, things you're involved in from an advisory perspective or, investing in businesses and stuff.

Asad Hamir: That's my portfolio side of things. So that stuff, which I'm building for the longterm, I'm less involved in it. Also like Klyk may go down to 80 percent I need to spend a bit more time on the portfolio and that's okay so just having that balance and I think the key thing is being able to plan all of that as well 

Juliet Fallowfield: I spoke to Nnenna Onubu who's in the beauty sector and she definitely is a big advocate of lots of different things because she said that they all feed and support each other and that dot connecting, and I'm sorry if anyone's listening, not watching this, I'm talking with my hands a lot, but that dot connecting between all of those different sectors, peoples, connections, it all bolsters the bigger pictures for all of the businesses. But it is that off switch isn't it, it's knowing when you've done enough. And do you proactively carve out time to switch off from all of this as [00:16:00] well?

Asad Hamir: yeah, so I think as I've got older i've realised the importance. When you start a business in your early 20s, you're like an energizer bunny You just can keep going and 

Juliet Fallowfield: You're deluded as well. You're

Juliet Fallowfield: like, I can do anything. 

Asad Hamir: Yeah, I remember I used to have like KFC for lunch and two Red Bulls a day and like that kind of that kind of diet like I think I still thought I was in university or something But yeah, so I've got older I've realised that hey you gotta like look after your mental well being look after your your body because then if you look after your body that looks after your mental well being you can think clearer exercising so like, you know three times a week.

Asad Hamir: I'll make sure that I get to the gym, pt once a week you know healthy eating so I've gone to like meal prep in the last year. So having those meal preps, in trying to cut out as much dairy as I can. As well so I, I still give myself the treats, you know, every few days I've got massive sweet tooth.

Asad Hamir: So I think, I think it's just getting that balance, you [00:17:00] know, on the diet side. But it's amazing how if you get, if you have like with me and everyone, everyone knows themselves, right? Like with me, if I have too much caffeine, my head gets scrambled, you know? So like no more than two or three coffees a day.

Asad Hamir: And I think. The point you said around just listen to your body listen to your mind and when you feel scrambled and you're not getting anything done I had it yesterday. I was like, what am I doing? It's like seven o'clock I'm just just literally sitting here for the sake of it. I'm not actually doing anything just walk away, just turn that laptop off, get out of the office, go home and just switch off.

Asad Hamir: But I think getting that balance is super, super important.

Juliet Fallowfield: Yeah, and it's probably the hardest thing I've found in the last four years to get right.

Asad Hamir: Yeah.

Juliet Fallowfield: I want to lead by example for my team, and I'm really not. And I'm like, guys, got a Toggl for, like, time tracking. Toggl for walking, for listening to podcasts, for reading. Do I do any of it? No. But I'm so pleased they do, and I'm following their example. But I was going to say it sounds like you're, fueling a really well oiled machine and it's not [00:18:00] just work productivity to be the best at work you're being the best outside of work with health, exercise, sleep, nutrition and not too much caffeine it's really interesting actually founders I sort of joke.

Juliet Fallowfield: I go to the co working office Soho works and we use the

Juliet Fallowfield: Soho house gym. And I see a lot of the guys in the office in the weights room and all the founder chat of this is like meal prep and you like more Jules. need more protein. You've got to lift more weights. And I actually sort of started drinking their Kool Aid and thinking. They're onto it. It works. If you're healthy in mind and body, you come to work fresher,

Juliet Fallowfield: more ideas. Yeah.

Juliet Fallowfield: You enjoy it more as well. You don't start to resent it.

Juliet Fallowfield: Um, but with productivity, particularly given that you've scaled teams at pace, is there anything that you've put in at the beginning of these businesses and trickle down through all the recruits that you bring in?

Juliet Fallowfield: So it scales,

Asad Hamir: Yeah. So in terms of how we set up the business operations that I've found works really well is firstly, OKRs. [00:19:00] So objectives for the teams. So everyone's very clear on, be it monthly quarterly objectives, where we're going what we're trying to achieve and some of that could be like building the business some of and some of it could be like financial driven so like, you know revenue could be you know gross margin, whatever it is. And making clear to the teams what's good looks like so, not hiding away or sharing with them the financial side of things.

Asad Hamir: I like to operate a really open business that everyone understands and takes ownership of the business not just from a growth perspective or business operations perspective, but actually from a revenue perspective as well. So those objectives from a kind of macro perspective, then into the rhythm side of things, so making sure you have the weekly standups at the start of the week where everyone kind of refocuses or thinks about, okay, what am I going to achieve this week to achieve or hit the monthly objectives that we're all trying to hit.

Asad Hamir: So what are the blockers. Making sure everyone gets together and [00:20:00] talks about all of those types of things. And make that fun. Make that, you know not something which, can quite easily turn into a monotonous thing. Every single week you're catching up. So, it's just how you bring energy and freshness to that.

Asad Hamir: I think changing perspectives in your team is really, really key. Like even just small things like, just using a different room in your office just makes things feel, feel different.

Asad Hamir: So then into the daily huddles. So like daily making sure that, you know, the people that you are reporting to you're clear with them, what you're doing and what they're doing that day. So then every day you're getting a quick update of what's going on. And if there are any blockers and if you're able to create that structure

Asad Hamir: yes, it does take time away from your diary, but then everyone can get and get on with the job and they know exactly what they're doing. And also you are then able to document everything there's a clear trail for how, you know, if someone doesn't do whatthey said they were going to do, you've got that, that audit trail.

Asad Hamir: and it's clarity for your team members. They [00:21:00] have that accountability when it comes to what they're trying to achieve and also what their role is in the success of the business. So for me, that rhythm is super, super important. And you get to certain

Asad Hamir: size and I think i'm at that point now where you need to start thinking about outsourcing that to someone else so we've just brought in an operations director into the business and he's now picked that up and it's great because it's like meant I can get more on the business instead of in the business and I think in early stage you have to as a founder you have to be in right, you've got to be controlling everything and driving it forward.

Juliet Fallowfield: Test, break, and learn everything. And then when it built and ready, can hand it off to someone to have a really nice time with it.

Asad Hamir: 

Juliet Fallowfield: The excitement and the drive is there and if everybody's checking in with each other and there's that accountability. I love this and I've always worked like that, but I've worked for businesses that weren't like that and were very private and teams didn't talk to each other and I found it quite boring. But with our team, every Monday we do a success and [00:22:00] failure from the week before and three things we'd like to tick off our list for the week ahead.

Juliet Fallowfield: And what support

Juliet Fallowfield: we might need from each other.

Juliet Fallowfield: And it is two years of that in, and we're like, how do we make this more exciting? And then I kind of chuck in a rogue and where are you going on holiday next? Or something just so we all get to know each other, especially if we're hybrid, because we're not all. eavesdropping on each other's lives, you don't know each other as well as you would if you're five days a week together,

Juliet Fallowfield: but that that relationship is built and that drives and you know that you're all united in the same mission, which is exciting. And how have you found sort of letting it go a bit to somebody else? You're like ready, take

Juliet Fallowfield: it, 

Juliet Fallowfield: run. 

Asad Hamir: easy. So I it's a classic interview question when you hire someone like in that role like they'll always ask you how do you feel about letting go right? 

Asad Hamir: It's a big problem I think sometimes for founders. They don't want to let go but I think because I've gone on the journey a couple of times like I know where i'm best at.

Asad Hamir: I don't think i'm the best at that early stage and driving the rhythm and I do it because I have to I think i'm best when i'm being [00:23:00] creative and i'm thinking of the ideas are really gonna drive the business forward actually like for me it's like being able to do the things that I'm best at and I'm going to enjoy and selling the business and getting out there meeting new clients and all the things that I should be doing rather than getting involved in the pnl for this month and you know, or operations, stock ordering or you know, whatever it is, right?

Asad Hamir: And every founder is slightly different, every founder has their own strengths and weaknesses and I think it's recognising your own strengths. I think you've got to be a good generalist if you're not good on finance. You've got to learn the finance you gotta you know, bring your levels up in all areas, but there'll be certain things which you are amazing at and that's what you got to then eventually, once you get to the scale, then focus on, I believe,

Juliet Fallowfield: And with purpose, given that you went off to B Corp quite quickly and it was a no brainer, I was going to say that actually the feedback loop is such a big thing that B Corp pushed through when you go through the certification, with purpose at the core of your business, do you think it has slowed down [00:24:00] productivity?

Juliet Fallowfield: Do you think it's sped it up? Has it helped or hindered the business growth?

Asad Hamir: Massively helped it because I think on a number of accounts and I'll talk about the internal and the external. So the internal, it really helps align everyone in terms of where we're going and when we make decisions and it's clear about what our vision is and what our purpose is and what our values are.

Asad Hamir: It's really easy internally for people to know if they're making the right decision and challenge others. That actually, no, that isn't the right decision. It really helps with those internal discussions where you don't always need to be the person going like, oh, why are we doing that kind of thing?

Asad Hamir: So you create that accountability and internal discourse in that way. Externally, I think, from a purpose perspective, the amount of clients that we get, like just coming through to us because they love what we're doing and what we believe in and what we stand for. So we've spent nothing on marketing in the last two years, like literally probably about 20 grand.

Asad Hamir: Like all in, yeah, like,

Juliet Fallowfield: for a business your size, that is amazing.

Asad Hamir: yeah. [00:25:00] So all of our business has come from referrals, you know, pretty much all of it. So 

Juliet Fallowfield: the 

Asad Hamir: we've done, 

Juliet Fallowfield: The best PR you can ask for.

Asad Hamir: yeah, so we've done one trade show. But we've made a good return on that, but just because the business has been growing, we've just not focused enough on getting that marketing funnel up and running now in the next, couple of months, we just hired a head of marketing and now we're trying to scale that side of things.

Asad Hamir: But yeah, like from a growth perspective, it's been huge. And I mean, B Corp themselves came to us for their IT you know, wanted to work with us. And once you get a marquee client like that, then like they've done a case study on us, that's on their website. We then get referrals off that.

Asad Hamir: So that purpose piece, I think from a marketing perspective from a sales perspective and then finally from a recruitment perspective like people want to work with you because they believe in what you stand for and it becomes less of a financial conversation, which you know is amazing because when I came from the telecoms industry, which is all very commercial like they're just working

Juliet Fallowfield: commission, money, [00:26:00] bonus.

Asad Hamir: and all that, right?

Asad Hamir: So it's, it's amazing. It's amazing. Like, I think having people that want to work with you for the right reasons, means that you get that real passion, they stay with you. They recommend other people, so many benefits.

Juliet Fallowfield: Well, it's so much bigger than the bottom line, isn't it? And when you work this hard, it has to be. One question I started asking guests, and all of our guests are founders, whether they've sold, exited, currently in, scaling, whatever stage they might be. Have you written your own job description? Ah,

Asad Hamir: I actually did , so about a year and a half ago. So because I thought I need to move into more of a growth role. So I actually wrote a chief growth officer job description, and, 

Juliet Fallowfield: all the other bits that you do without realising on as well?

Asad Hamir: Yeah, basically. So it was all like sales focus and like fill the pipeline and all that stuff.

Asad Hamir: And yeah, it lasted about two weeks.

Juliet Fallowfield: Well, I laugh kind of manically slightly because I have had it [00:27:00] on my to do list to write my job descriptions, like there's no point because it changed every week.

Juliet Fallowfield: But also I don't really want to know the magnitude of it because it's not realistic.

Juliet Fallowfield: But I remember I hit sort of a point in one of my previous roles, De Beers Jewellers, and I went into the CFO at the time and said, everything in green is in my contract that I'm being paid to do and everything in red in the job description is all the other bits.

Juliet Fallowfield: I'm not being paid to do, but I'm doing. He said, there's one page of green and four pages of red. And the moment for both of us, he's like, firstly, I'm really sorry. Secondly, we'll recruit a team for you, but it was a really good exercise to be really clinical about. All the tasks, but I keep shying away from it in this job because I, I kind of in denial.

Juliet Fallowfield: I just don't want to admit that it's a little bit too much,

Asad Hamir: yeah,

Juliet Fallowfield: but it will be a useful exercise and, you know, helpful for the team as well.

Asad Hamir: I think it's super important once you get to a certain scale. I think it's super important to define and I felt this when I my first business when I grew it you just start stepping on people's toes like it becomes frustrating you disempower people So it's [00:28:00] really important.

Asad Hamir: I think at some point to go right? Okay, I'm gonna do this area i'm going to own it put yourself create the org chart say that's where you sit you know now i've brought in this operations director it's important that you put people like that on the same level as you and the org chart so they feel like they've got that

Asad Hamir: autonomy other people in the business also recognise them as their boss because otherwise what tends to happen is people then end up still coming to you with their problems, and I think in those scenarios, it's really important that you go, no, like, that's not me.

Asad Hamir: Now you need to go to, to Kevin,

Juliet Fallowfield: Well, lucky Kevin, he's got an amazing piece of work ahead of him. What an exciting role.

Juliet Fallowfield: Something that we do is a question from the previous guest, has a question for our next guest. And this was a mother daughter duo who founded a skincare company. And their question was, do you feel good in what you're doing in all areas of your life? It's a very holistic skincare company, so this question didn't surprise me. What is standing out to you at the moment and what needs to be decluttered? 

Juliet Fallowfield: Would [00:29:00] say I, I feel like I still don't have the right balance with like entrepreneurship and business and my personal life and my kids are growing up. you know, having the time for them. Also like, you know, I've become a lot more spiritual in the last two, three years as well.

Asad Hamir: And, being able to dedicate some more time to that side of things. I like, as I've become more spiritual, it's actually given me a lot more equilibrium as well from a work perspective. It fits in nicely with the type of businesses that I'm trying to create from a, you know, people, planet, purpose perspective as well, you know the ethical, you know side of things and so I think for me it's about rounding myself You know, I you know in my 20s I was like I want to retire by the age of 30 or 35 right and you're in a rush and make money and, and then go off into the sunset.

Asad Hamir: I've now realised, like, I mean, I've just hit 40 like last week and I [00:30:00] realised this is just me, right? I want to enjoy doing this for the next 20 years. You know, I want to build amazing things. I want to keep on, you know, maybe over the next few years I want to move into slightly different roles and less heavy lifting.

Asad Hamir: But But yeah I think it's now being able to find that balance because you have to recognise as you get older you just can't do the same hours the same you know work rate 

Juliet Fallowfield: I've shifted in the sense that, yes, I've been in PR and communications all of my career, but I love the business side of things, and the business development, and the people management, and that side, and the PR, yes, I could do, and friends are like, why aren't you doing more of that side, because I really actually like doing this bit now, and you

Juliet Fallowfield: have that choice. I think that's why I will write my job description this weekend because you can carve out the bits you want to do, and the bits you don't want to do, and you have that freedom to make that decision. But no, congratulations for being aware is huge, for one, and then doing something about it. But I get the feeling if you did retire at 40, you would get [00:31:00] bored if you're sitting on a desert island twiddling your thumbs, you're like, but I'm not saving the world.

Asad Hamir: Yeah, yeah, that's the thing, like, I feel like now all the experiences have brought me to this kind of moment that now I can, you know, the successes, the failures, the blood, the sweat, the tears, like, can all help me build Klyk into being as, as amazing as hopefully it can be. So 

Juliet Fallowfield: And already is. I mean, it'd be so exciting to see where it goes going forward. And what would be your question for the next guest? It could be anything around starting a business, scaling, anything.

Asad Hamir: So I would say my question would be around when is When is it enough? You know, when is enough, like, you know, be it money be it scale you know, be it the glitz and the glamour, the news articles, when is enough enough, you know? 

Juliet Fallowfield: I think it's really important to ask that question. And we ask our clients when we're teaching them how to do [00:32:00] their own PR. What does success look like to you in communications, in PR? Like if we got 10 articles. Would that be good for you? Or are you thinking 50? Why? And then going to the why for that?

Juliet Fallowfield: Because a lot of people, and then we do podcast production as well, and a lot of clients, I want to start a podcast. I'm like, but why? Why? Why? And I try and get to the bottom is, is this ego led? Because if it is, it's not going to work. And if it isn't, and you're doing it for some other reason, then it gets exciting.

Juliet Fallowfield: But that why tapped into enough is so important.

Juliet Fallowfield: I love that. 

Asad Hamir: yeah. Cause my mum, my mum always asked me like, why are you working so hard? And she goes, you don't need so much money. Like, why do you want so much money for? Right. Like, you're not, as she always says, she's quite a spiritual woman. She goes, you know, you're not going to take this to your grave. Right.

Asad Hamir: Like, you know it's quite hard hitting. Mum knows how to  press the 

Asad Hamir: buttons. 

Juliet Fallowfield: If they do, 

Asad Hamir: So I'm like mum, that's not what it's about. It's not about the money. You know, like I think you realise some point, like,how much money do you want? Right. How many, how much of those nice things [00:33:00] do you want yet?

Asad Hamir: You've got, you know, all those nice things. Maybe you could have even nicer things. For me personally, like I, I love the challenge of it. Like I love the challenge of creating something. 

Asad Hamir: Thank you so much for your time today. It's been wonderful chatting

Juliet Fallowfield: and pleasure. on everything you've achieved.

Juliet Fallowfield: Thank you. No, thank you. I really hope you've enjoyed this conversation, you can find a recap of all the advice so kindly shared by guests in the show notes, along with our contact details, we'd love it.

Juliet Fallowfield: If you could rate and review or share this podcast, because it really does help other people discover it. To incentivise this a little, I would very happily offer you one of our PR guides on how to share editorial coverage legally. Just DM us or send us an email, hello@fallowfieldmason.com with review in the title and we'll share it on.