It was a reunion with my classmates from the 2019-20 Icehouse Owner Manager Programme (OMP). We got back together to reflect on our progress and reset our visions for the coming years.
We graduated in March 2020, two weeks before Covid lockdown — having spent six months doing three-day stints on-site in Auckland to work through our growth strategies, none of which factored in a global pandemic.
Despite this, we had all survived. While the OMP plans weren’t executed in the linear fashion they’d been designed, along the way most of our key goals had been achieved.
One had very nearly gone insolvent but came back from the brink, now with a much more resilient business and new-found respect for the runaway train that can be growth.
Several of us had to make tough calls and let people go, scale back and wait it out. While in hibernation we pivoted and launched new products or entered new markets. Now coming back stronger with greater market share and more resilient teams.
Two had sold their businesses, with one of those now diving headfirst into a new venture and the other attracting more than a little jealousy in early retirement.
What surprised me most, and shouldn’t have, was how much empathy there was in the room for each other and how engaged we all were in each other’s journeys.
While we hadn’t had a reunion for two years, we picked up where we left off: did you sort that issue?; how did you go with that situation you were dealing with?; did you manage to crack that new market?; what’s happening with your other shareholders now?; what happened with that acquisition?
Most importantly, how are you feeling, are you OK? Are you getting enough time to look after yourself?
I remember our very first session nearly five years ago now. One of the youngest owners had literally never talked to anyone about his stress. He didn’t even know any other business owners. He couldn’t talk to his friends and family, as they perceived business owners talking business and money as crude. "How big could his problems be anyway, he’s a business owner, he must be loaded".
He was elated and relieved when we started talking about issues like cashflow and wages. His story is not an isolated one.
On the IceHouse programme they map out the ven diagram of You, the Community, the Business — You in the Business and You and the Business in the Community. There’s a huge focus on personal wellness and impact beyond profit as key drivers of business success.
The critical piece is remembering who "You" are and coming back to your purpose. Having a cohort of fellow owners who understand this model has been an enormous support for me.
It’s a bit like a "Business Owners Anonymous" circle where we all share stories of how hard things can be, what we feel sorry for and how we’re going to get better and do better.
I promise this isn’t a pitch for IceHouse — I am not on commission. But rather it’s a plea to those owners going it alone to reach out and find a network of owners to act as your support network.
And there are a lot of you out there. Stats.nz 2022 data reports there are 163,286 enterprises with between 1-100 staff, employing over 1.2 million people, or 50% of the private sector workforce.
Right now is the toughest it’s been for a decade, in the case of manufacturing since the GFC in 2008. Every morning I listen to the RNZ Business News podcast. Last year every now and then they’d report on business liquidations and insolvencies, this year it feels like they’re reporting it every week.
Just this morning they reported that insolvencies and liquidations are at a 10-year high. What does this mean for the people running these companies?
Yesterday the podcast reported some MYOB statistics which revealed the highest ever recorded levels of mental distress across SME owners — with 77% of respondents reporting high levels of anxiety and 50% of those battling with depression.
I believe the increase in voluntary liquidations is not just due to financial pressure, but that many business owners are quite simply just giving it up for their own wellbeing. They’re worn down. The idea of continuing is worse than the idea of potentially losing the house but keeping their health and family.
How many of those owners were going it alone? Business ownership is isolating. You are literally the canary in the mine or the airhostess keeping a brave face through turbulence — your team look at you for undue signs of stress as their radar if everything is OK.
Early last year I got picked up by an ambulance from work due to heart issues entirely brought about by stress. I thought I was doing an OK job of shouldering the stress and pretending everything was fine — but in the words of one of our youngest "kids" in the shop, "it’s good you’re better now, you looked terrible most of last year".
When everything is not OK it can be very hard to fake it. The ambulance was a pretty big canary for me and my team. Don’t be me. Join or reconnect with a network before you take a literal ride in the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff.
As for me, we’ll be going back to Gibbston same time every year now.
• Sarah Ramsay is chief executive of United Machinists.
