Going for growth

1.    All of our Fastest 50 companies have grown rapidly over the past 12 months – what’s your one piece of advice for scaling a business?

• Make sure you plan and communicate your business strategies for growth.
• Try never to over promise and under deliver, the reverse works best.
• Hodgson Fish is over 100 years old, and the last 5 years have provided the fastest level of growth. Take a moment and breath, and make sure the growth is sustainable.
• We had to scale our business, by enabling leaders within it to grow and enable others. Use the analogy of an upside-down pyramid.  If employees are guided and given autonomy, they will find their niche and flourish. This will lead to greater customer acquisition.
• Focus on customers and cashflow – without them, all bets are off!
• Reflect on the past to improve the future, whilst making well considered plans to sustain growth.
• Believe in what you are doing, imagine what success looks like once you have scaled, and hold that image in your mind when things get tough.
• Get a dog to walk – a good dog walk is very, very, very good for the mind and soul.
• Think big, act small. Everything we do at Lucion is with the bigger picture in mind. Even though a task may seem insignificant in the grand scheme of things, it may have a bigger impact in the long run, so we make every decision with our goals in mind.
• Assess your capabilities and don’t overstretch yourself. Expansion is great, but if you can’t deliver the end product to your client, then there is no point in expanding.
• Don’t lose sight of customer expectation, better to grow slowly and perform well, than to grow fast and perform badly.

2.    What does having a growth mindset mean to you?

• Empowering people by using their talents and challenge them to achieve company goals.
• A growth mindset is to never believe you have reached the top of your potential.
• Healthy, controlled growth, helps the sustainability of business. It also helps pay a lot of mortgages and provide school uniforms!
• Having the ability to believe you are in control of your own destiny.  Success has to be earned, not given.
• Doing your very best and maximising your potential – important in life and business.
• It means that we can be more assured and confident in helping to provide long term sustainable employment and opportunities for the people in the North East.
• Not being afraid of change. We grow because we do things differently all the time. We’re always curious enough to ask, “Why do we do it that way? Does it still work for us and our clients?”
• It’s about looking for opportunities and being inquisitive, with an entrepreneurial spirit. It’s about being agile and responsive to change, as well as anticipating it.

3.    Who is your inspiration and why?

• A former Japanese Managing Director. He was very knowledgeable about all aspects of business and would spend time teaching and speaking to everybody about business matters.
• Our customers are our inspiration. It is inspiring to be part of their success stories, despite all the hurdles.
• Our forefathers. Now on the 5th generation, Peter Hodgson couldn’t wish for better inspiration and guidance than his father Alan, still involved daily in the business.
• My father, down to his ability to adapt to any situation. He owned a chip shop, became an electrician, learned to be a plumber. He started a publishing company through his passion for aviation. I have always looked to him for advice and inspiration.
• Rosa Parks, Malala Yousafzai and Greta Thunberg, because all three women were willing to stand up for what they believed in, and act differently (with courage and defiance) to challenge the thinking of the general public and change the course of history.

4.    What’s the best piece of business advice you’ve ever been given?

• Debt is not your friend. Don’t be embarrassed about making money, when you aren’t making it, there is no-one there to help.
• Always stay curious.
• Understand what your weaknesses are, and employ someone better than you are at them.
• Surround yourself with good people and treat them like you would like to be treated. Stay true to what you believe in.
• Be persistent, curious and to have tenacity. Without these three core principles you won’t succeed in enabling others or advancing beyond the competition.
• Cash is king!
• Learn from your mistakes instead of beating yourself up.
• Don’t save the pennies and miss the pounds!
• “What goes around comes around.” Treat people with respect, provide a courteous, compliant service, at a fair price, and customers will return with more business.
• Don’t be afraid of failure. If you fall down, get back up and learn why you fell over. Do something different and it won’t happen again.
• Be there when others aren’t.
• Watch your cashflow and everything else will fall into place.

5.    What one thing about your business makes you most proud?

• Growing the business following a management buy-out, then going on to achieve Supplier of the Year with a large global customer.
• Our people. We’re a down to earth bunch, with a positive culture and a shared hunger to succeed.
• In thirty-five years in business, our team has become a resilient squad.
• Making the first drink in a bucket 20 years ago was memorable – but even more memorable is changing the public perception of old fashioned slush, which was of a sugar-filled artificial drink, to what we have today with natural colours and flavours – and sugar free.
• Our culture. We are a group of open, honest, fair and diverse people, working together with a common goal and strong ethics.
• Our people make us proud. Their expertise, their enthusiasm, their energy. It’s these people that make the business what it is today – 550 people globally, across 3 continents, with a desire to grow the business and to reap the rewards.

Contributors: Ally MacDonald, Director – Tyne Gangway, Brett Jacobson, Managing Director – Mediaworks, Dave Collins, Managing Director – DC Handrails and Ironwork Parts, David Mitchell, Managing Director – Katmex Holdings Limited, David Roberts, CEO – Hitachi Construction Machinery UK, Dominic Edwards, CEO – SaleCycle, Fokhrul Islam, CEO – Northern Gas & Power, Graham Conway, Managing Director – Maxim Facilities Management, James Huntington, Managing Director – Dunelm Geotechnical & Environmental Ltd, Jon Paul Seed, Managing Directo r- DFP services, Jonas Reynisson, CEO – eMerchantPay, Lucy Armstrong, Commercial Director – Lucion Services, Matt Stephenson, Managing Director – Sweetdreams Ltd, Neal Robinson, Managing Director – Geoffrey Robinson, Paul Goldfinch, Owner & Managing Director – Polar Krush, Paul Ryan, CFO & Co-founder – Arcinova, Peter Cussins, Executive Chairman – Cussins Limited, Robert Scott, Managing Director – A&J Scott, Roger Kilburn, CEO – Arcinova, Scott Henderson, Operations Manager – Heliguy, Simon Jones & Ian Kennedy, Operations Manager & Operations Director – Hodgson Fish, Steve Tate, Managing Director – Washington Metalworks