Third, don't get comfortable! The second you start relaxing and loose your drive, you're only going to make one person happy: your competition. In today's business environment, you have to stay a step ahead or you'll find yourself a step behind. Your competition is watching you, whether you know it or not. I know mine is. So far this year, they've changed their marketing approach after seeing ours and tried to hire my PR firm away from us. If you're good at what you do, the same will happen to you, and when it does realize it means you've arrived! No one pays attention to failures.
#17 Mark Spencer, Digium
Digium's business has been growing rapidly since 30 Under 30. We have literally doubled in size and have broken ground on a new Digium world headquarters in Huntsville, Ala. A new leadership team has been put in place, including naming Danny Windham, former president, chief operating officer and director of ADTRAN as the new CEO. In my new role as Digium chief technology officer and chairman of the board, I am 100% dedicated to my quest of developing open source telephony solutions for the enterprise market.
To that end, Digium's Asterisk open source technology is currently being used in business, government, and educations settings in 140 countries and we most recently signed a partnership with NTT to become the first company to bring open source telephony to Japan. Two million servers are running Digium's Asterisk open source telephony platform worldwide with more than 3,000 downloads taking place every day.
We released several new Asterisk-based business solutions in 2007, including AsteriskNOW, featuring an easy-to-install version of Asterisk with a Digium-designed graphical user interface that makes Asterisk more user friendly, as well as the Asterisk Appliance, a Digium-designed hardware appliance that incorporates Asterisk Business Edition into the hardware needed to run phone service for small to medium-sized businesses.
Being featured in 30 Under 30 was an honor! I appreciate the recognition of my hard work and the exposure has certainly opened doors for Digium. If I had to give some advice to young entrepreneurs, it would be "get featured in the 30 Under 30!" Seriously though, what I've learned from our rapidly growing business is the importance of working with the most talented people in your industry and putting a focus on delegating responsibility based on both passion and skill.
The easiest part is giving up the things that you neither enjoy, nor are good at. The next hardest thing is giving up the things you don't enjoy but are still pretty good at. The next hardest thing after that is giving up the things that you enjoy, but aren't especially good at. Finally, the hardest part of all is giving up the things that you both enjoy and are good at, because there's simply too many of them for you to do all by yourself. But, with all that done, I get to spend my time on truly the things which are the most enjoyable to me, and which I'd like to think are the most important for me to do for the company!
#19 Angela Batinovich, Portland LumberJax
Things have been great. We have doubled our season ticket-holder base and expanded our front office!
Our record was not very good as a team (4-12) but we still managed to have 12,000 at our final game of the season last year. We were awarded the All-Star Game last season and it was the first All-Star event in Portland's history.
We are looking into an outdoor team -- a prospective new venture from the National Lacrosse League.
My advice for other young entrepreneurs is that with hard work, anything is possible. ANYTHING. Plus, there are more wealthy people looking for "fun" investments than you think. Have a good and realistic five-year business plan and start networking!
#20 Mark Herthel, Platinum Performance
Business has been very good. We are continuing to grow at a good rate.
New Expansion Plans: We are beginning construction of a new 43,000 square-foot manufacturing facility and corporate headquarters. We are hiring new talent and are promoting from within to enable us to continue to grow, stay innovative, and provide exceptional service to our clients.
New Projects: We are starting clinical trials on some of our new products to look at how we can decrease inflammation and free radical damage and improve human health and performance. We have been studying the effects of diet on gene expression (Nutragenomics) over the past couple of years, and have found a dramatic correlation between what you eat and the messages that your genes send to your body.
I was honored to be included on the 30 Under 30 list. I have heard from a lot of people that saw the article.
Advice for other young entrepreneurs:
- Invest in developing your skills and those of your employees.
- Provide an environment of continuous learning, where team members can grow within the company.
- Set Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely (SMART) Goals for each quarter -- one year, three years, and five years.
- Break your goals into specific projects and tasks that you and your team work from.
- Identify your unique abilities and spend more time focusing on those activities and less time (delegate) on those that are not your unique ability.
- Schedule free time to spend with your family and friends to ensure that you keep a good work/life balance.
- Make sure that you and your team focus on the positive results that your company has achieved on a regular basis.
- Look into joining an executive coaching program such as the Strategic Coach or an organization like Young Presidents Organization.
- Listen closely to your customers -- and provide exceptional customer service.
- Pay attention to domestic and world events, as they will affect your business at some point.
#22 Geoff Wilson, 352 Media Group
