Success Story - Stephen Ward

"50% Reduction in Working Hours in Year 1 & 10 X Profit in 3 Years"

Stephen had built a good business, but he was working all hours, unable to enjoy time with his family, and had no idea how to get off the hamster wheel.

Now Stephen is able to spend as much or as little time as he likes in his business. He now enjoys his time following his passions; travelling, motorsport and photography and spending all the time he wants with his family.

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"I was tired, overworked, exhausted with no idea how to get out of the hamster wheel. Working all hours, not enjoying my work, and no thoughts about increasing profit."

I now love to say that I "own”

a successful business.

Stephen Ward,

Co‑Founder & Managing Director - Clerksroom

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Stephen's Success Story

Here's Stephen's inspiring story going from being unsure how to get off the "hamster wheel", working long hours for little return to building a business that can run without him.

Stephen is now able to spend as much time as he likes following his passions and spending time with his family.

1: What was your situation before working with John?

When I first met John I was exhausted working around the clock. And I simply didn't have any time or energy for anything.

To be honest when I first met John I didn’t really see how John was going to help me because John just wanted me to do more work which seemed to be completely silly.

So I met John and started the process with John because I didn’t really feel there was any way, there was any other way to do it. Because if you're working all hours of the day and you're exhausted and you have a young family, then you need to find another way.

I didn't know what it was, then I met John.

We were growing at about 10% per year but our costs were growing in line with our income. So we ended up growing bigger and working longer hours for exactly the same amount of money.

So the whole sort of concept of working towards profit and profitability was something that I just simply had never really understood.

I mean, everybody knows a business needs to keep it’s expenses below it’s cost but growing a business and growing the cost base in line with the profit, or in line with the income, was something that I hadn't quite grasped. And that was I guess the basics of what John taught me.

I was getting more and more tired. You've got a small family, a young family, you can’t spend time with them.

When I approached John, a bit in total despair I would say, and the two things that I was, I really wanted was, for John to show me how we could change the business so it started to earn a bit of profit. And secondly, how I could release some of my time so that I could enjoy what I wanted to do with my time and with my family.

2: Could you give details of where your business was to where you are at now?

We’ve gone from about £6 Million turnover five years ago when we first met to about £60 Million now.

We had about 60 barristers that we were looking after and one business, we now have three businesses and 200 barristers and we're now the largest public access provider in the country, which is the large part of our turnover.

We built that business from scratch since we’ve been working, which is very exciting because it's a cash business. So, we sell the service, we take the money and then we instruct the barrister which means we can have cash first so there's no debt.

So the numbers are good.

We've built our own software, which is great. So we've taken an enquiry time from 20 minutes down to 1 minute by building our own software. We spent, I think, nearly £1 Million on software now.

So we've taken control. We've built the business. We have our dashboards that show us what's going on. I can bring up the dashboard anywhere the world in real time and see exactly if everything's alright. Which it always is.

Next year we’re looking at growing 50% from where we are now in the next 12 months because we've set ourselves up now for growth.

And then of course there's exit strategy at the end of that.

We're now in excess of £2 Million. So what that means is, exit wise that gives us a good number. So yeah, things are good.

So, life is good. It's good.

3: Why were you stuck in that situation, and how did that make you feel at the time?

I've been on honest with John. I think that the problem is lack of knowledge. I think you feel you’ve been doing your job for 20 years, you know how to do your job.

That's not the issue and you know as I'm sure we said many times over, I knew how to do my job. I just didn't know how to run the business. And that's quite a difficult thing to put your hands up and accept.

Working with someone who's an ex-military person who can grill you and put you through your paces, you soon realise that there is a lot to learn.

And I was very open to learning.

4 : How did you feel, in yourself, being kind of stuck in that situation?

I hated it!

It was very emotional. I hated it. I didn't enjoy my job. I'm sure that was affecting family life.

You're stuck on a treadmill, as I think you said. It's just, you get sort of in a bit of despair to be absolutely honest. And so I didn't really see when I first started working with you that I didn’t have many choices to be honest. I needed something to change.

You know, the one thing that I've taken away from working with you is you're not, you don't sit there claiming to be an expert in my business.

You don't say; “I know better than you how to run a barristers chamber”.

You just say to me; “Look, you know how to run the business. What I need to do is focus on “ON” the business.

And say, "Let's get the best we can out of this business."

And it's that change in mindset that really was the best learning that I could have done.

I don't think you realise it at the time. I don't think you have any idea the way you are when you're in that position.

I remember the very first meeting with you where you asked my wife to come along as well which terrified me. You asked me lots of questions about the business and what we wanted to achieve and what was the point in all this?

It was very, very emotional. And I think if you look back now, what are we five years on? And it's very difficult to imagine where you were at that time. You know, I simply had no time to myself.

You know, we weren't making enough profit to do fun things in life. So, as you said, we were just on a treadmill.

5 : What did that situation prevent you from doing, and why was that a problem back then?

I think when you're just working all hours of the day and night, you don't even begin to think about what you want.

I remember in the very first meetings with yourself we spent a lot of time, I think it was a full day, just trying to work out what we wanted to achieve, if we achieved our business plan, if we set out and actually earned more money and we had more time.

I remember you pushing us very hard about what that meant. And at the time I don't think we knew what it meant.

As you asked us at the time we didn't want Rolex watches, we don't want private jets. We want family time and we want enough money to be able to go and enjoy time with the family take them places, do things.

And so I think it's really impossible to know what it was like at that time.

I think you have to work your way out of it before you can then do it, but you certainly have to have a plan.

We said our dream, at the time, was to do a three-month holiday in New Zealand. But you know, I remember as clear as day that at the point we discussed it, it was a pipe dream. And I was almost sitting there with John saying

“Why are you asking us this? Because it seems irrelevant.

But we, Claire and I, both agreed that we would like to go to New Zealand for 3 months. But it was impossible. Because

A) we couldn’t afford it, and

B) the business wouldn't run itself and

C) if I did go to New Zealand I wouldn't enjoy it because the 12 hour time difference and I would just get emails 24 hours a day and phone calls.

So it would have been ridiculous.

So that was the plan, and …

... 2 years later we went to New Zealand for 3 months.

And the business survived, and I didn't get a one phone call or email while I was away.

6: Before you started working together, what else did you try to remedy the situation?

Nothing. Just accepted that’s life in a suit, life in business life in a barrister’s chambers.

I think the key things that I learned working with John is, I mean, first of all that the saying,

“If you if you go to work and you’re just working IN the business all day long then you have a job. If you go and you work ON the business then you have a business."

I think understanding that and getting that psychology right is the starting point.

And then I think the second thing is to learn to let go, let other people, trust in people, which I found very difficult to start with. But when you do it you find all the people around you are amazing, normally, and I think everybody I know that has done it has found the same thing.

So, most of the people you work with and surround yourself with are great people. So, you know, let them be great people, which is good.

So yeah, trust in people, delegating, letting people do it and having a focus to work ON the business. And then really you move, once you've done that.

It was then moving onto understanding, understanding the business from a numbers point of view, from a dashboard point of view.

Knowing what you need to know, where you're trying to go, have you got access to the information, do you have data to show you if where you are going is correct.

And all of those things combined start to build confidence, and when you build confidence then you can really push forward.

And by knowing all the numbers the profitability side of it, I think just comes naturally to be honest. You start realising that if I do that, that, and that the combination is more.

So, it's all of those things, but working through little steps, obviously 90 Day plans and so on.

It's a totally strange mindset to think I'm going to invest my time in learning, or doing something different when you're too busy and don't have enough hours in the day. It's it's just not something you would naturally do.

So, I totally understand when people say

“Well I'm too busy to do business development”

“We haven’t got enough money to invest in software, because the company is not making much money”

So, the all the things you need to do are not natural. I get that, and

I spend a lot of my time now talking to other business owners just reinforcing the fact that if you're really serious about doing it, you've just got to do it.

7: What were your fears and concerns about business coaching and working with John?

I'm not sure I had any fears I think you just you just go into the unknown and most people don't like getting out of their comfort zone.

I didn't really understand how someone like John with no experience in my business profession could really help me.

You find yourself saying “Oh, yes, but in our profession you can't do

that because of …”

You very soon realise that that’s just your own lack of knowledge speaking not the truth.

And, the sort of the Eureka moments came with John when you realise John is not there to tell you the answers, John is only there to help you explore the answers that you know are in your head.

And John will laugh because we will be in a session which is booked for a day, and an hour into the session. I'll just suddenly go

“John, John, I've got it”

And run out the building and go back to the office.

He will just stand there and go

“What, what's going on, where's he gone?”

But John has helped me solve the problem that I've been trying to solve. And you suddenly go, “Wow! How powerful was that!”

Because John just interrogates you and doesn't let go until we find a solution, and sometimes it's easy, sometimes it's really difficult.

So yeah. I wouldn't say I had any particular fears. I think it's just your own ability to understand that other people can help you.

I think as you get older and more experienced you get less confident that other people can help you.

8: Now you've been working with John, how has the situation changed?

Well the situation has changed beyond recognition, really, because I now don’t have a job which may sound a bit strange.

But I now prefer to say instead of “I have a job” “I own a successful business” which is, which is nice.

I don't have any hours, I don't need to go into work in the morning, whenever, I can spend basically all my time with family.

Profitability has gone up quite a lot!

So I can now afford to do the things I want to do.

We’ve got into the habit now of my three passions in life are photography, motorsport and travel.

So basically I do all three all the time now. I travel around the world, go to motorsports events and take photographs and log on and double check the one or two emails I've got each day wherever I am, so my life's a bit different.

9: What have you stopped doing?

I’ve stopped being involved on a day-to-day basis. So, I’m a board member and a shareholder and I don't have any day to day involvement in the business.

So, I’m there as a mentor if any member of staff wants to come to me and say, you know

“We're stuck on this. Can you help me?”

I'm always willing to give a view. But the key thing that I say to all my staff now is that I'm not prepared to make a decision for you. So they can come to me and they can share it with me and they can make a decision.

And if they get the decision wrong, they get the decision wrong, nobody dies in our profession, we’re quite fortunate.

But when you empower people to make decisions, they almost always make the right decision. And this is a very strange perception that if they come to me and I make a decision, I've made the right decision. I'm just as likely to make the wrong decision as they are.

So, you know, if people have thought about it and made a decision, then it's probably the right decision.

10: What have you started doing?

I think the key things that I’ve started to do is build systems that enable staff to have more time, try to be more efficient, and then allow staff to do things more efficiently. And I think it's very difficult because staff start to think that you're trying to automate them out of the business.

And their first reaction is if you're going to automate that you're going to get rid of me.

So that was the biggest challenge that we faced was trying to get staff on board.

Once they realised that we could grow the number of enquiries we can process but with the same number of people, which then makes you more profitable, then we really started to go down that route.

Because building things, and people think you know, you've got to get people on board with it. And that's probably one of the most difficult challenges.

We have 23 staff, by reducing our processing of an enquiry from 20 minutes to 1 minute, we saved 19 minutes. Times that by 2,000 enquiries per month and then divide that by 23 staff, and it worked out at 2 ½ hours per member of staff per week.

So we reduced everybody's contract from a 42 ½ hour contract to 40 hours, we didn’t reduce pay or anything we just reduced the hours. So everybody basically got half an hour back per day.

And I think at that point they started to realise that actually if we help grow the system and we help make the processes more efficient then we get a bit more back.

We also introduced a discretionary bonus scheme so 10% of all our profit goes in a pot and it’s distributed to staff so they get more time and they get more money.

So, they’re happy.

11: What benefits do you now enjoy, and how does that make you feel?

I think the best thing is just knowing that you own a successful business.

I think it's a very powerful thing when you meet people and they say

“What do you do? And how come you're here on holiday and not at work?”

And you say, “Well, I own a successful business.”

It's a very it's very nice thing to say.

I think it's great for our staff that they all feel they are remunerated better, they have a better working environment because we can afford to do nice things in the offices and so on.

And it's a very nice feeling that you're providing a business that everybody, even our clients remark how relaxed and happy everything is.

Which, it's a spiral that just sort of keeps going. We work with really nice suppliers, we work with nice clients, we work with nice people like you John.

It’s a much more pleasant place to work.

12: Can You Give More Details On The Numbers In Terms Of Turnover, Profit, And Anything Else You Think Relevant, From Where Your Business Was To Where You Are Now?

We’ve gone from about £6 Million turnover five years ago when we first met to about £60 Million now.

When we first met we were making about £200,000 excess, and that was good. We're now in excess of £2 Million.

So we build that business from scratch since we’ve been working, which is very exciting because it's a cash business. So, we sell the service, we take the money and then we instruct the barrister which means we can have cash first so there's no debt. So it’s highly profitable and really worth pushing?

So yeah, the numbers are good.

We've built our own software, which is great. So we've taken an enquiry time from 20 minutes down to 1 minute by building our own software. We spent, I think, nearly £1 Million on software now.

So yeah, we've taken control. We've built the business. We have our dashboards that show us what's going on. I can bring up the dashboard anywhere the world in real time and see exactly if everything's alright. Which it always is.

When we first met, there was no consideration of exit because there wasn't really anything to exit from it. It was just a very busy job that not many people would want. Now we have a successful business So when we do come to exit we will have some something very nice to pass on for the family for the children and so on.

So, yeah, life is good. It's good.

13: Where do you think you would be now, both in business and mentally, if you hadn’t started working with John?

Exactly where I was.

Working all hours of the day and night for people I didn't like working with, fed up, strained at home I guess, financially strained.

Not a good place.

14: What excites you about the future and where do you see this going?

This may sound a bit old. But what excites me about the future is knowing that business is stable, secure, nice, and that all of my team, and even the barrister clients to be honest, that the business is sustainable, that it's a nice place to work.

And to be honest, that's what excites me most about the future.

It’s knowing that I've created something which I set out to create.

It was just difficult to start with, but we've created something that will be there with an ethos of people enjoying themselves and being a pleasant place to work.

Our unofficial strapline is; “A pleasant place to work with pleasant people.”

That’s it, that’s all we want to do.

15: What would you say to someone else who's thinking about working with John?

Don’t do it!

😊 😊 😊

(John - Can we cut that bit?)

😊 😊 😊

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It's very, I've said this John many times, it's a very strange position really.

The people who most need to work with somebody like John or any business coach or getting advice from anybody who’s qualified to help, it’s really difficult because I think most people who need it, don't realise they need it.

And that I think the hardest thing for people to understand.

So, all I would say is, you know one of the things John said to me very early on is he can't take a bad business and make it good.

If you've got a bad business in the first case, it's unlikely that John can make it good or help you to make it good.

So, all John can do is take a good business and make it great. So you know, John’s got a catch phrase “From Good To Great.”

So, I realised at a very early stage that we had a good business, we really did have a good business. We just weren't doing things as well as we could, because we didn't have the knowledge and so working with John took us from good to great I think that's, that's the thing.

So, if you've got a good business and you honestly believe that there's ways and means of taking it to another level or even 10 times higher level, because that's one of the things John will want you to think about. Then, have a chat with John.

And as I say, he's not going to do for you. That’s one of the common misconceptions is thinking, well,

“I’ll get John in and I’ll pay him a lot of money and he'll just do it for me”

Well, he doesn't, he doesn’t do much actually.

What he does is he pushes you, he pushes you, makes you take a step out of the business, makes you look at it and makes you understand what you need to do to get it from good to great, or if you want to go 10 times bigger or sell, whatever.

John will point you in that direction, and that's really it I think.