Growing a business has very real human challenges…

Steph Graham, GoodCRM CEO

Some heartfelt musings, recently shared on LinkedIn from Steph, our CEO about how growing a business has very real human challenges. We felt it was important to log it here to:

“Wanted to bring a bit of realness on here for a moment and cut through some of the self-congratulatory content that is more often found on LinkedIn and indeed, other social media platforms.

I’m going to share some human things that have been happening over the last couple of weeks at GoodCRM, and some things that aren’t so perfect.

These weeks have not been exceptional in the challenges they have brought, nor have they been wildly successful, but I think they sum up some things I have been thinking about, about humanity and business.

We have been having some significant growing pains with the business this year. Our small team are overstretched, and this has started to have a negative impact on one or two clients.

Last week we had a conversation with a client where the main item on the agenda was that we had let them down on meeting an agreed timeline. It never feels good to know you have not delivered on something, especially when the blame sits firmly on your side (and it really was our fault). Taking responsibility for the issue, we ended up having a fruitful and honest conversation – I now feel we are working closer with that organisation, more than before. Bringing some authenticity to proceedings never turns out badly – that’s pretty much a mantra I live by.

Having recognised our ‘resource issue’, we have started taking on more staff and contractors this year. A handful of people that responded to our recruitment calls, are based outside the UK – naturally being a tech company this works perfectly for us and those seeking opportunities for work in the UK, whilst staying at home. We were delighted to offer a talented developer, based in Ukraine, the role of Junior Developer.

Tom Cowle and I were out of the office at the start of this week, meeting with a potential new client in Scotland. It felt great to know that our fairly new Junior Developer would be cracking on with some client projects whilst we were away.

But some chaotic voice memos come in – our new team member is safe, but the devastating floods are only an hour or so away. Along with hundreds of other volunteers, he’s gone to the site of the floods and has been helping people and animals escape unsafe and treacherous conditions.

Our developer won’t be able to do the work that we’d hoped this week, and we need to tell another client that there is a slight delay on some work they were expecting. This is what it looks like to grow a business, with humanity at its heart. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

GoodCRM have donated to the Disasters Emergency Committee Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal. Maybe you could throw a couple of quid their way too? https://lnkd.in/e9Wfkfuz

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