Episode 235: How to Succeed in Business and Give Back with Simon Dent
Are you thinking of changing your career path? Maybe you want to follow your passion and build a business around it. Let me tell you, it’s possible! In this episode, Adam Stott and Simon Dent talk about Simon’s diverse journey of a career change, discovering passion and purpose to succeed, mindset shift, business launch, giving back, and highlight the fact that it is never too late to start something.
Simon Dent is an agent, entrepreneur, mentor, lawyer, co-founder, and former CEO of the sport-focus creative agency Dark Horses, and sits on the board of The British Sports Museum. He’s one of the most recognised entrepreneurs within the sports industry that has supported the careers of the biggest sports personalities. Simon recently started HERO talent agency, which aim is to help sports personalities with commercial deals and give back to the community.
Show Highlights:
- How Simon changed careers from solicitor to pursuing sales
- What is his marketing strategy in London’s nightclubs
- How he was able to build trust with sportspeople
- Discover the impact of learning from other experts; and
- Why Simon built a business that genuinely gives back
Links Mentioned:
Follow Simon Dent on Twitter @SimonJDent and visit his website www.sjdent.com
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Virtual Office:
Join the Ultimate Three Day Business Event and learn more Business Growth Secrets
Be part of our Facebook Group Big Business Events Members Network
Connect with me on Instagram @adamstottcoach
Transcript:
Please note this is a verbatim transcription from the original audio and therefore may include some minor grammatical errors.
Adam Stott:
Hello, everybody, and welcome to this very, very special episode of Business Growth Secrets. I’m here today with Simon Dent. And Simon and I have been having a pre-chat. We’ve got so much to bring you on this episode today. Now Simon is the founder of a hugely successful advertising agency called Dark Horses and has been super successful on his journey towards building that business and has even more recently started the talent agency hero, which looks after high profile professional footballers, sports presenters and much, much more. Simon’s had a really diverse journey.
He has been speaking to me about some of the things that he’s done in the past from running nightclubs, originally to having shops in Covent Garden, and so much more. So he’s had a real entrepreneurial journey. And I am really looking forward to uncovering that and packing it and giving some Business Growth Secrets to the audience today. So thanks for coming on Simon, welcome. Looking forward to hearing more things. I always think therapy sessions are certainly the cheapest form of therapy for me.
Simon Dent:
Well, we’ll say this sounds like good therapy. Right.
Adam Stott:
So thanks for coming on Simon. And obviously as our pre-chat that we’ve just had, you told me about the fact that you’ve had quite a diverse journey. started your first business at age 35. Correct. Is that right?
Simon Dent:
Around that. Yeah.
Adam Stott:
And, you know, for the last decade built really successful companies. But you’ve had some of your own words, some different journeys, and ups and downs and different things that have happened. So, I really want to hear a little bit more about that. Why don’t you tell us a little bit about you? A little bit about your background and how you came to start your first ventures. And we’ll take it from there, my friend.
Simon Dent:
Thanks again for having me. Yeah, it’s been quite a colorful sort of journey today, as we were speaking sort of off camera earlier. It’s interesting. I’m 45. Now I really feel like I’m sort of just getting started, which hopefully, should be reassuring for some of your listeners. Yeah, you know, I pre sort of standard education. I was always felt, I mean, I was a very hard worker, I certainly wasn’t someone who was in any way naturally talented academically, worked my nuts off, which basically, ultimately ended up basically becoming a solicitor.
I love studying law. But actually, when I started practicing law in London, I just felt really sort of that place. It was quite a challenging environment for me, which ultimately led to me not being very well. So I left the profession after practicing for four or five years, in my sort of mid to late 20s. And, yeah, I sort of had a very difficult time for me, but I look back now on that song responders, because actually having that sort of life experience when you, you know, end up in five or six months a day patient with severe anxiety and depression.
Yeah, it was a really valuable experience. And it was almost like a sort of life reset. For me, I think, everything I’ve been telling myself from the age of 16, you know, a lawyer is a good profession and doing that. I think suddenly putting so much effort into that and then realizing actually it wasn’t a view, was quite distressing. But off the back of that I think I sort of reset, really enabled me to find a profession. That wasn’t a professional career that wasn’t in any way money would take but was something that I felt passionate about. And that’s what really put my journey on my journey to numerous businesses that have been involved in sport. Absolutely.
So I used to working as a solicitor and found that it frankly, brought you down there. Yeah, it was incredibly hard. And I think even you know, in the last few years, the world has certainly embraced mental health a lot more back then. It was a bit of a taboo subject. It was something that wasn’t really addressed, obviously, you know, it was certainly something that happened to me that was no fault of anyone at the firm I worked at, but it was sort of no one really knew what to do with me, and how to address it and how to explain to colleagues what happened to me. And it was sort of it was, it was a challenging time. But as I said, I look back so fondly on it now and we stand up quite a strange thing.
It then forced me down my road of, of, you know, working in sport, obviously, I couldn’t refresh for sports when that ship had sailed. The first venture I had out after that was opening a sports memorabilia shop in Covent Garden, and I’d always been a collector of sports memorabilia, really passionate about collecting it. And it was funny, I’ve had no experience in retail, I think my friends and family were sort of scratching their heads as they attended my opening in my shop.
But again, it was a fascinating time, it was real frontline sales, you know, going from being a solicitor to experience for people, you know, I mean, I didn’t have any staff. So we’re open seven days a week. So, you know, I’d get down to Covent Garden, and probably at seven o’clock, I’d clean the shop, I’d open the door, we opened a half a and I’d close a half, seven, and that was seven days a week. And it was a fascinating experience in sales. I mean, what didn’t help me is that two weeks after opening, the shop 2008 play would crash. So suddenly, going into an environment where I was selling sort of what you’d call sort of luxury items. And Lehman Brothers gang up business, it didn’t help.
Adam Stott:
But that’s when I started my first business, though. 1000, I think, you know, even interjecting there already, is that I talked to a lot of people, and I’m sure you do. So know that you do. The same way helping business owners and you find a lot of people in their current day job, just feel like they’re passing the day, they’re not doing something that they’re passionate about.
Because of that, you know, it really can lead can really affect them and affect their ability to put things in place, the ability to do things, their ability to get motivated, and it’s a horrible place to be, you know, and I think it’s really good that you acknowledge and talk about that, and then show that you actually went on a different journey. But the question I want to ask you is, you know, you go from being a solicitor to feeling down about it, not enjoying it. So opening a new shop now works seven days a week, increasing your hours. Yeah, but feel burnt out at this point? Or was there something else driving you?
Simon Dent:
That’s a really good question. I think a big part of me wanted to have something that I enjoy by time. And I think a lot of people over the last two years have actually noticed that and realize that suddenly, once you’ve got time on your hands, and you’ve got more time to think it can be quite dangerous, not dangerous. That’s the wrong word. But, you know, thoughts come into your mind that never did when you’re on the hamster wheel or, you know, in a rat race.
It was incredible. I worked very, very hard at the shop. But as I said, I really enjoyed it. Because, you know, I’m what you’d call a people person. So every day of the week, I’d have people coming in and chatting. Obviously, they’re always the people that would just come in for chat, which isn’t ideal, because when you’re actually fundamentally not trying to make friends or people you want to buy things, you sort of the people that come in on lunch breaks for chats. There were quite a few of them still making some money.
It’s your question, was it exhausting? And did it burn out? To be honest, I wouldn’t say burnt out what happened was in light of that, that the economy crashed, I managed to keep the shop open for two years. And actually now I did sell a part of the business when I’m now still a shareholder in a business called the British Sports Museum. And a lot of my stock off me and I work closely with them today. So yeah, there was certainly a silver lining.
But the thing I took most from that sort of two years running a shop was sales. And you know, you mentioned in the intro, I worked in nightclubs again, that was a fascinating period, because this was pre social media. So the business I worked for, called London parties meant 17 of us, we ran 22 parties a night in central London nightclubs.
And it was, as I said, pre social media. So we effectively used to, you know, we used to fill nightclubs. We used to take the door, money off the venue that keep the bar money, and we promoters and so we were we’re putting 15 20,000 people into nightclubs a week in London through text messages, phone calls, and direct marketing flyering postering and so that that again, was an I didn’t realize at the time, but going from sort of face to face sales in the shop to then actually move maneuvering people around venues. I was becoming a really good salesperson.
Adam Stott:
Yeah, I did training for a group that looks after Kota day and I did a sales process training course, I love it. I think it’s essential for any business owner to ask them, which is a group of successful business owners, business owners that have got revenues anywhere from 250,000, up to 10 million. I said to him, how many of you have had actual sales training or been in sales environments before going and starting new businesses? How many of you have none and when I said, How many had no, like every hammer, and I think it’s astonishing.
So I think one of the biggest skills that a business owner needs to succeed is the ability to be able to go out and sell themselves. Now the irony is, all my training was sales training, that’s all I ever did. And I think a business owner is in a really good state, because you gain an ability to be able to make things happen. And I think if you haven’t got that ability to make things happen, you know, it can be quiet, it can put a lot of barriers up for people on it.
Simon Dent:
It astonishes me that even you know, today sales is a dirty word in some circles. What people don’t realize is that it’s the backbone of every single business. And it’s funny how in different departments of businesses across all walks of life, some people turn their nose up at the sales team. As a business owner, and having your own business across all sorts of verticals, anyone that can bring new business in is of huge value.
When push comes to shove, if you’re doing your job really well, alongside someone also doing their job very well, but they’re bringing in new business. And obviously, you know, that I think, you know, it’s a massive life skill, but not, you know, just in business across everything we’re selling every day even to our family members. Absolutely. And it’s really interesting, you found that you got that from the nightclubs, you got that from the previous run of the shop as well.
So what happened next, you know, you did that for a long time, three or four years but one of the amazing things that fell out of that was because of the type of nightclubs that we were working in. In London, I was meeting a lot of professional sports men and women, men and women.
And I became friends with lots of well known professional football and rugby players from the early 2000s. I won’t name any names, or the names are protected, but became very good friends of them and again when you’re in that environment, and it’s their social and obviously, again, this is in the era of the news, the world and the sort of those were times I had to make sure that when these guys were at the events were organizing they were looked after and people weren’t taking advantage them with paparazzi or whatever.
So I built trust with all these guys and you know when I look back and then you know, I can combine my legal skills, my commercial contract skills with having network freshers. Suddenly a light bulb moment was actually I’m effectively an agent. So I started working with a lot of these guys. It was a brilliant experience. Eventually I built up a business that was purchased by a company called rule global and now talent. And I had a roster of clients the likes of Vinnie Jones, Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, Jimmy Bullard, to name a few. Yeah, it was incredible and what was also strange again.
I come from… I didn’t have any background in talent management, I taught myself on the job. But again, going back to talent management, what I ended up doing was 80% sales, whether you’re selling your talents to the professional club, they pay for to try and increase their weekly wage, or I’m trying to increase their value off the field and selling the brands to get them roles as ambassadors for brands. So again, it was very much sales and that was a path that was thoroughly enjoyable. I loved it when I met my wife. Just after 2012. We were discussing that as quite a pivotal year for me. And yeah, brilliant, again, brilliant life experience.
Adam Stott:
So you met your wife in 2012. Why do you feel it was a pivotal moment for you?
Simon Dent:
Interesting. Yeah, it really was, I think I think it’s interesting. A lot of people, you know, most people who have success in business do have some kind of settled personal life behind the scenes don’t. You know, I was 35 at the time, and I’ve pretty much given up all hope. I think my family had given up all hope of ever going through my wedding. I was very blessed by that and I met her in the autumn of 2012, just after the Olympics, actually.
So it was a really special time in London. There’s a real buzz around the place and obviously working in sport around them turns out to be 12 games, it’s just such an exciting time. And yeah, got to know her. And we actually went on our first day to a rugby match, which I don’t think she ever forgives me. The second date was a White Hart Lane.
So yeah, she still has not forgiven me for that. But yeah, it was a really interesting time. And I think just off the back of that, I think that your priorities really changed and very quickly. I think that you know, I realized I met the woman at once for the rest of my life and when that happens, a lot of things that I think occupy your time, fall away. And that’s when I really put it down to what I would call. We’ll start on my personal development journey as well, you know, you know, we’ll come on to it. But yeah, crazy habits of getting up at 5am trying to read four or five books a month, it all started down. And I think I give credit to, to all of that for, you know, some of the success I’ve had.
Adam Stott:
Awesome. So brilliant. So he talks about your personal development journey, and you see it with, like, most successful people. I think in sport it is slightly different, because most people in sport have coaches and mentors anyway. Right? Because they’ve been mentored and coached in every area of their life, right? But a lot of time people work as agents or people that perhaps don’t have that. So what sort of personal development did you do to kind of improve yourself and start to start to grow? What are some things that you remember about the staff, either some books or training coaches? What kind of helped you?
Simon Dent:
Yeah, that’s a really good question. And I often try to sort of share this information with other people, because I think it really did change my life. But I think one thing that up until 2012, and in my 20s, and 30s, I think I’d felt a sad, quite closed mindset. And I wasn’t, wasn’t I was willing to, not willing to learn, but , I didn’t really read that much. And also, if you think back then YouTube wasn’t really a big thing. I mean, it’s around, but it’s certainly one of the resources there. And I think it was really okay.
As I said, in various things, my life happened that I went out searching for the information. And what I’ve pretty quickly found was, as a resource, YouTube was fantastic. You know, the ignorance suddenly was a choice, like, back in the day, if you wanted to, to learn something, you probably have to go to a library, get a book out, or, you know, search in the Self Help section of Waterstones, which is like one shelf worse.
You know, I think that it became a lot more accessible. And so, in answer to your question, I think that there are some brilliant books I’ve read. I mean, I’m trying to think of them now. But I say the real, the backbone, and almost, I suppose, cornerstone of the sort of books I read. Were people like Richard Branson, Alan Sugar. James Caan, Darren Hardy. I’m looking at my bookshelf. Now, people like Lewis Howes, Grant Cardone, Sir Michael Ovitz. I mean, all sorts of people.
So, you know, real powerful books around, I suppose key traits in, in what it takes to actually sort of get that perceived success. And I think for me, there’s a number of things I took from that. And I think, probably the biggest three were really around goal setting, consistency of habits, and actually putting into practice the resilience I’d learned throughout that period of my 20s.
When, as I said, I wasn’t very well, I’d invest a lot of time, and my parents money in the legal profession. And then the shop, which ultimately failed. Like, there’s a number of failures that historically I guess I perceived as failures, whereas actually, now I look back and think they were the best things that ever happened to me, and I really embrace them. Yeah, I think. So really, it’s all about mindset change time.
I mean, for me, being totally open, honest, and willing to never be the smartest person in the room. And I think off the back of up until 2012, I think that for whatever reason, and am almost embarrassed about it now, but I always felt I had to have the answers. And if I didn’t have the answers, I’d be embarrassed.
Whereas the success and then I’m sure we’ll come on to it of the agency that built dark horses, was all about bringing people who are brighter and smarter than me and surrounding myself with experts and willing to be the, the least important quietest voice in the room, and that that that was a real lightbulb moment for me. And it’s amazing when you get some good people around you how far you can travel, or how much further you can travel than you actually thought you could, you know, you’ve got a vision, somebody else has a different vision.
And that vision and that new voice takes to a different place. Isn’t that for sure. But also, it’s something I’ve noticed since stepping down from the leadership role of dark horse’s back in 2020 through 2020. And, you know, coming on to lawn chair, one of the things I’ve missed over the last 18 months is that being surrounded by really bright people, obviously, we’re all sort of put into a lockdown and so therefore working from home, you will start that somewhat but yeah, it’s one of the things I really crave and, you know, I love being around people and I sort of I love being around people I can learn from and that’s, you can get a degree of that on you know, by reading and I read lots of books or workshops. concept, but you can’t quite be in the room with people.
Adam Stott:
Absolutely. So let’s talk about the agency. What kind of happened then? So where did that happen? How did that evolve? But what was different this time around? In your mind, potentially. So when you started this project, what do you feel was different for you starting out?
Simon Dent:
So with regards to that when we lost our horses? Yeah. So as I said, I fell out of the talent agency world, probably in around 2015, as I was given a very good opportunity. By a friend of mine, who had gone into an advertising agency for [00:20:35-00:20:37] sport. And so between 2014 and 2016, I had this incredible exposure at one of the best ad agencies in the world. [00:20:47-00:20:49] was the CEO, Lawrence was sort of bringing in all the business and I was surrounded by these incredible people. It’s really my time there, I sort of had a bit of a lightbulb moment and really just spotted a gap in the market for a sports focused creative agency. To be able to do that.
Going back to what we just talked about, I knew that I couldn’t do by myself. I knew that I had to approach people who were already smashing the world of advertising. And I did that, I approached three founders of an agency called Lucky Generals and had Danny. We sat down in the spring of 2016 by presenting the idea about a sports folks advertising agency, and then by June launched it, and it was incredible, I think, from that day, one of going into their existing agency and borrowing their resources and building it by myself. And it was brilliant. But I think with humility to understand that, you know, I wasn’t the advertising, but I’ve been in the sports contact, because they’re complementing that with the advertising experts and advertising experience. It worked really well.
The first six months was hard, you know, and they always and we didn’t have a single piece of business and the Christmas of 2016, we won our first piece first piece of business that enabled me to bring in one employee, who was brilliant, and Dan became head of new business ultimately, and it was a fantastic time the agency inside grew.
We had some massive wins, we won Nissens global sports portfolio, which to this day is now still an agency client, we launched a Peloton in the UK, which is, you know, a brand. So we did the first advertising campaign here, and what the likes of Puma just stay in some big brands and in 2018, so two years in we were close to 50 employees, we’re having amazing growth. And again, it was sort of the underlying essence of that business was that humidity we’ve developed a really good culture.
And just going back to the names, it was really worth stressing that, you know, the name was chosen as dark horses, because we wanted to be underdogs. We wanted everyone sort of, I guess, a second type of competition by surprise, really. And we didn’t you know, we didn’t shout from the rooftops we got about our business very quietly. And we have a really good reputation for making great work. So the agency is doing incredibly well to this day, still going really well. Melissa is now the CEO who stepped down in the autumn of 2020, which was the right thing to do in personal circumstances. I moved that London we’ve done the pandemic, it’s sort of taken its toll in various ways. And so yeah, as a sort of business to still be involved in shareholders. But yeah, without a shadow of a doubt.
I learned so much in that time. And as we mentioned, at the end of last year, I’ve just launched my new talent agency. So I’ve obviously gone back to the world of talent. And I’m hoping to incorporate some of the lessons I’ve learned through the dark horse experience and through sort of combining all the different things you’ve done in and then it’s just being on a journey and picking things up and different things that work that didn’t work. And I think just being really honest about always being a student, and that’s the thing every morning, I wake up and I am genuinely excited about what I’m going to learn every single day because, again, back to my 20s. I thought I probably knew it all then. And I didn’t have a clue.
Adam Stott:
Absolutely, absolutely. And how’s he been with the new agents to the runners we call? Well, it’s been really good. People on board.
Simon Dent:
Yeah, it’s been great. I mean, you know, my biggest client, Chris Kamara, as I’m sure you know, I’ve worked with [00:24:41-00:24:42] for a long time now anyway, and even adult horses, you know, I was helping him on the side. And, but we’re doing some brilliant things. We’re working with lots of big brands. We’re doing lots of charities, I mean, the essence of heroism and the reason we’ve called it here is that we want to create a platform where. Yes, we will be doing commercial deals for these well known existing sports men and women and retired but also doing a lot of random mentorship space, whether that’s then becoming mentors of other people or getting them correct mentors.
A big part of it is giving back. I mean, obviously, you know, the likes of Marcus Rashford and the amazing work he did around school meals for the COVID pandemic. We really want to help our personalities give back because I think a lot of the time they don’t really know how to give back to the community that they come from so it’s been really exciting.
We’re working with a couple of well known current figures we can’t find mentioned. Yeah, or working with a young lead rugby union player just been that captain of these rhinos. So yes, it’s a really exciting time. And I think at the moment, I’m, we’ve obviously just ended when entering spring, which is amazing. But I sort of, I’m trying to work out the sort of the next phase because you know, we are incredibly busy. I’ve got two brilliant people now helping me in the dark for courses, that hero.
It’s really the sort of junction that is about rolling the dice. It’s about do I want to get an office? Do I have the skill set at the moment to build an agency where everyone’s working from home? So yeah, we’re just mapping out at the moment, because I think there’s, as I stressed earlier, I love being around people. I think an agency needs to define its own culture. But yeah, we’ve sort of four months in, we’re going really well. But it’s sort of, you know, is now the right time to go and get an office somewhere. I don’t know. And I don’t know if any, I love to hear your views now. What has your experience been over the last sort of six months of people going with purses?
Adam Stott:
I know, I’ve got a lot of successful clients that have moved their businesses to working from a home base. And, actually, you know, I’ve got a good example of a guy that I work very closely with, probably doing about 10 million a year. And he doesn’t have an office anymore, right? He has been running everything from home. Yeah, I talked to him as a partner of mine in some different businesses. And he tells me that he still misses that office, and he misses that environment, but he’s working so smoothly. It’s such a low cost base. It’s a difficult decision.
So I don’t understand sort of where you’re where you’re coming from, I think. So I, personally, have my own offices. I love to have the people around, I think that you can’t be able to go in and talk to the individuals and perhaps put them together for a meeting. And, you know, it’s just slightly different. But I do also recognize that we did a lot of good work during a pandemic. Yeah, really a lot of work. And people were really focused and some people worked from home. So it is a difficult one, isn’t it?
Simon Dent:
I think if you had a business with an office pre-pandemic, I think it’s easier to go back to an office. Yeah, launching a business without an office is quiet. I just can’t see how we’re going to do it. But I also think the role of the office may have changed. And again, I’m not really sure. And I don’t necessarily want to commit to a lease or anything like that just yet, because I think I certainly experienced the pandemic, working a lot more productively at home, because there’s less distractions.
So maybe there’s a sort of model where the office in London, for example, isn’t just a place where you go and do your work. But its way actually you go in and you share ideas, and it becomes a sort of cultural hub for the business. And I think that’s quite interesting, because I reckon most people get more work done at home, to be perfectly honest with you. And then, yeah, it is quite interesting that you do go to London, to spend time with your colleagues in the office and do other things. I don’t know how it’s gonna work out.
Adam Stott:
With the tools and things out there. Now, you know, that you can use and have those virtual offices online. Just trying to think of the software we use. We had a Virtual Office Online, which was pretty cool. And I can’t think of the tool that we use, but you can see everyone where they were when the office is on. They chose where they were sitting, you can click where they’re sitting, and you can just go and sit with them. You can enter that room with them. Think of the software. Yeah, it was cool. thing. Yeah. So we had a virtual office. And literally, we’re using it all online, and everyone was there.
So what they did is they logged on, and they populate in this office right on your screen. And if you want to talk to him, you click and it brings everybody up and you talk to him instantly. Someone else you bring it up and you do it like that. That was pretty cool. For us. You have a live feed running in that office where you can talk to everyone on that live feed. And if somebody clocks off, they clock off so you know when people are working you know they have a big block.
Simon Dent:
So, it sounds great. Do you think that existed before the pandemic? It’s really a shame because we’re in a live podcast, but I will look it up.
Adam Stott:
In the show notes description, I’ll tell you what software we use for it. I genuinely can’t deny myself my big problem there. Yeah, yeah. And there’s obviously other tools like Slack, which a lot of people use, which are good, but I found this kind of virtual office was quite cold. And then I think you can hybridize a mandala where you can go into, you know, I don’t know if you ever watched the story of how we work and things like that. It’s a crazy story. That’s a great book, if you don’t read it.
Simon Dent:
Never seen it.
Adam Stott:
Oh, it’s a phenomenal book that was. But those workspaces and stuff, there’s a lot of those other than where you can get places where maybe you do go and meet that you do, too. You can certainly hybrid it now. And I think that businesses need to consider, yes. It’s also an attractive proposition for people when they come and work for people that you can say, hello, it’s three days from home, it’s two days in London, and we have the sort of joint office that we go into. And it’s, you know, it’s not a long lease, it’s a monthly lease, it’s not expensive, you know, for the business owner, plus, you can get the best of both worlds sort of thing.
Simon Dent:
But also, as you said, from a business owners point of view, second to salaries is the second biggest cost, or it’s the you know, the biggest cost, so it’s definitely launching a business, why give yourself that headache? If you don’t have to like that, that’s, you know, you’re always gonna obviously give yourself a salary headache.
Adam Stott:
So by giving yourself a headache. Absolutely, absolutely. And if you can, you’d be better off spending on growing the business model, then into a location that is barely used, right? Yeah, absolutely. Well, look, yeah. So it’s certainly been an interesting journey, then, Simon, I’ve been to see where the hero goes. And it’s really cool to hear a bit about those horses, and how that business is, you know, you build that business and will power that journey. So what’s next for you then? Where do you want to take care of? What’s your kind of ambition for this business? You’re working, obviously, some really high profile.
Simon Dent:
And staying I think we’ve got some fascinating projects on the go, you know, globally, some really exciting things happening in the NFT podcast space. And even in the metaverse now, which is mind boggling for me, but you know, being a big football World Cup year, it’s always going to be big in the world that I’m operating in.
So yeah, I’m really excited. You know, I don’t want to build a business for the sake of building a business on you know, based on headcount, all that sort of stuff. But you know, I want to build a business that can genuinely give back. And that was a whole point around the corner, the business here, I want to help people in sport with big profiles give back to the community. So that’s very much the mission that we’re on. And I think we know, we’ve had a really fast start. And for me, personally, it’s really exciting.
Adam Stott:
So lovely USP, isn’t it and you’re doing some giving back yourself. As we discussed earlier, you’ve got an ultramarathon that you’re going to be running and that you’re going to be doing. Do you want to describe that a little bit?
Simon Dent:
Thank you. Yeah, so myself and three friends are running 100 miles around London on the 16th of April. So we’ve we’ve thunderbolts, yeah, we’ve plotted a route around London. So it’s we’re running for a charity called Greenhouse Sports to provide basically coaches for schools that don’t have access to sport, which, you know, from personal experience is something very close to my heart. You know, I often look back to my childhood, and my fondest memories are without doubt, playing sports with friends. And so, in a very, you know, in a city, children, a lot of schools don’t even have PE for me. I just don’t know where I’d be like the social skills you learned from it, that sort of thing. It’s invaluable.
So, yeah, we’re looking to raise around 100 grand for the Greenhouse. We’re doing two laps of London. And there’s four of us setting out on the 100 mile route. So it’s to Marleybone, down to Richmond background over to Greenwich in a city and says I’m doing that twice. Well, I reckon it takes about 20 hours. It’s gonna be a long day. We’ve got lots of other people on the marathons hard enough for time yeah. So we’ve got quite a few other people joining us on the route as well.
So yeah, it’s gonna be a lot of fun and fingers crossed we raised some money so yeah, I’ve definitely run around so yeah, again, going back to sort of mental health and well being is something that again, I got into a run the first marathon in 2014 and never really looked back. It’s for me, it’s my favorite time of the day. I try to get out every day, whether it’s to just clear my head or to listen to a podcast. This is actually probably why there’s so many podcasts because I probably run about 10 hours a week. And yeah, I’d say I really enjoy it and I’ve got a really good little group of mates now here.
So yeah, you know, when you’re able to sort of give back and it’s actually quite selfish but I get to go running but you’re also doing good. So yeah, it’s good, it’s good.
Adam Stott:
Awesome. And they can go to you’ve got a just giving page to raise money.
Simon Dent:
I’ll share, I’ll send that to you to share in the show notes as possible.
Adam Stott:
That’d be brilliant. Yeah, we’ll put that in the show notes. So if you would like to, I think bloody 100 Miles probably deserves a few donations. The miles to supply greenhouse sports with PE coaches and trainers in inner cities to allow people to get that help. I think it’s really good balls. And you know, certainly make a donation as well. Simon, someone put that in the show notes for you, buddy. So well, I want to say a big thank you for coming on.
Simon Dent:
Yeah, you’re doing it’s really inspiring. And I think you know, being able to share what you do, I think it’s really valuable. And, you know, I encourage the show, and I’ll certainly share this one.
Adam Stott:
Thank you, very kind of you. Okay, so thanks very much, everybody for tuning in. And where can people follow you, Simon, they want to find you.
Simon Dent:
@SimonJDent, that’s probably the best place.
Adam Stott:
@SimonJDent on Twitter. So go and follow Simon. And of course, if you haven’t already, make sure you go and hit the five star review on this podcast. So more people can listen to the fantastic guests and stories that we’re bringing on to help you succeed in business. You know, hopefully, you’ve really drawn some things from statements today, in the fact of never giving up right? If you’re one moment away from actually discovering your passion, your purpose is to go and succeed. And of course, remember that, you know, life is a journey.
I think Simon really wanted to get that across. No matter where you’re starting from, he started his first business at 35 an hour to achieve some great success in a decade. But it doesn’t matter where you’re starting from, you know, it’s never too late. You’ve got to be passionate in order to go and grow and get the results that you want passionate patients equal the results that you want to get. So thanks so much for coming. And I look forward to seeing you soon. Thank you very much. Good.
Hi, everybody, Adam here. And I hope you love today’s episode. Hope you thought it was fabulous. And if you did, I’d like to ask you a small favor. Could you jump over and go and give the podcast a review. Of course, I’ll be super grateful if that is a five star review with putting our all into this podcast for you, delivering you the content, giving you the secrets.
And if you’ve enjoyed it, please go and give us a review and talk about what your favourite episode is perhaps every single month, I select someone from that review list to come to one of my exclusive Academy days and have lunch with me on the day meeting hundreds of my clients so you want that to be yo then you’re going to be in with a shout if you go and give us a review on iTunes. Please, of course do remember to subscribe so you can get all the up to date episodes. Peace and love and I’ll see you very very soon. Thank you.