Think Like A Speedboat, Leave Competition In Your Wake

She soared up the Thames like white lightning.

A white foamy wake roared behind.

Metallic stars darted and danced and dizzied on the water glistening like a thousand shivering Rolex’s in the smouldering sun.

Everyone in Hammersmith stopped.

Couples stopped talking.

Kids stopped playing.

Grandmas and Grandad’s dropped their 99 p Flake Strawberry sauce-drenched ice creams.

Even fitness influences-with-a-dog-called-Tofu and BARRY’s Bootcamp addiction got off Instagram.

Nope.

Not Prince William on a jet ski.

Or Jesus on Dingy.

Or even Dean Gaffney and Wellard on a pedalo.

A prowpaaa Gaff bruv. Me n’ Wellard are well ’ard

T’was A speedboat.

Yes a gorgeous speedboat.

Speedboats are a vital lesson for us challenger brands. This Newsletter is inspired from my conversation with David Hieatt.

ALWAYS think, feel, act, be, live, breath like a speedboat not a ship liner.

**one caveat - you may find me caught #offside on the #StrawbDaiquiris in #Benidorm on a #shipliner.

#Bonhomie n Booze cruise. #Curmudgeon n Cankles. #Valerie n Viagra. #Phil and 10er-Phil English.

Starter: The Difference: speedboat vs. ship liner?

Challenger brand = speedboat.

Corporate = ship liner.

Speed boats move fast.

Speed boats find new waters and course correct quickly.

Speed boats are nimble and agile and anti-fragile.

Speedboats are teamwork.

Speed boats are creative clout.

Speedboats are no ego or silos.

Speedboats get to the future faster than anyone else - David Hieatt.

Conversely.

Ship liners are slow, lethargic, lugubrious.

Ship liners take hours to turn and get out of trouble.

Ship liners take ages to find new opportunities as they have meetings about meeting about fucking meetings.

Ship liners are filled with passengers and ego and please-Sir-give-me-a-promotion.

Ship liners obsess with perfection paralysis.

Ship liners obsess with process, pissing all over their creative clout.

The biggest mistake challenger brands make as they scale.

They get insecure and start thinking like a ship liner.

Hiring corporate people. Losing the magic. Meetings about meetings. Data research. Lose their gut instinct.

Man Like Sir James Dyson agrees.

“I thought experience was important, a necessity in fact, I now know the opposite to be true. Surprisingly naivety is an advantage. Experience can be cage, inhibiting, and hard to escape from. Today the world changes so quickly that freedom from experience can be an asset!”

aka be a speedboat.

**of course. You need some processes… I’d like to know what time fucking lunch is and what time going home time is… ya get me?

The real issue.

Challenger brands go wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy too far the other way.

They become process obsessed and ship liner cursed.

How to be and stay a Speed Boat?

Speed Boat: Building High Performance teams.

Teams of meaningful specialists > wandering generalists.

Speedboats = teams of meaningful specifics.

Ship liners = teams of wandering generalists.

Ship liner thinking: Founders mistakenly focus on bringing up employees weaknesses. This just softens the sharp edge of their arrows.

NEW’S FLASH: the world doesn’t need another average NAM. Or another average finance manager. Or an average NPD manager.

The market doesn’t reward better she rewards different.

Good News.

Whilst your competition are bringing up their employees weaknesses. Building blunt arrow teams.

Instead, you. Yes. YOU. You will apply The Reverse Pareto 80.20 Rule

Spend 80% FINDING and INVESTING in employees UNIQUE and WEIRD and WONDERFUL STRENGTHS and 20% bringing up weaknesses.

Celebrate strengths and idiosyncrasies. Meaningful specifics = Sharp arrows. = speed boat teams.

2.Speed Boat Business Strategy - Ready, Fire, Aim

Perfection is the enemy of Great - not a scoobies who said it.

Ship liners love perfection. Because employees are scared of being wrong. Maybe even fired.

Perfect decisions don’t exist.

Perfect time to launch doesn’t exist.

Perfect amount of market research doesn’t exit.

Perfection is literally an anchor slowing you down.

Am I saying don’t do your best work? Be lazy? Of course not.

But, there comes a point where perfection is pathological.

Speedboat strategy: Ready. Fire. Aim.

Take action, launch before you’re ready, perfect later.

• Minor Figures started as a nitro cold brew before oat milk.

• Curators started as beef jerky before moving into pork puffs.

• OLLY’s started as olives before finding success with pretzels.

• Rude Health started as granola, ended up being famous for Alt-Milk

The constant pursuit of better LATER > the need for absolute perfection NOW.

Embrace Ready. Fire. Aim.

Speedboat Life: Let go of anchors

As I soar towards 30. I’ve learnt negative people are anchors. Blinding my compass. Slowing me down like an odious octopus.

“Don’t bother with the podcast, Dan”

“Do you really think you’ll get anywhere?”

Anchors filled with dark doubt. I’ve learnt to let them go. They simply slow this speed boat down who’s Hungry to let’s be fucking havin ya

Speedboat: hiring amazing talent

Ben Branson, founder of Seedlip made the mistake of thinking like a ship liner.

Ben hired 3 different CEO’s. They all polluted the culture and slowed the Seedlip speedboat down.

Hiring is the BIGGEST threat to your speed boat. Wrong hires = heavy anchors.

Ben came on the podcast and discussed his 7 Step Hiring process to build Speedboat team to find the BEST talent who are ON brand (god, I just said OB word…soz)

Here’s Seedlips 7 Step Hiring Strategy.

Oh and soz, this email is probably littered with shit gramma and spwellig misteaks - sorree Manz a little dyse-wexicx.

Popey x

- Ed Perry, COOK. James Averdieck, GU & Coconut Collaborative, Camilla Barnard, Rude Health, Spencer Matthews, Clean Co., Jamie Laing and Ed Williams, Candy Kittens, Stuart Forsyth, Minor Figures, Richard Goldsmith, MOJU, Viv & Howard Wong, Little Moons, Mark Palmer, Green & Blacks, Charlie Bigham, Charlie Bigham’s.