Podcast Episode 19: Naive or ballsy? Building a company from scratch in an industry you don’t know with Helen Walton

Leo Judkins: [00:00:00] Welcome to the iGaming Leader. Today I'm joined by Helen Walter, and I'm super excited to talk to you today, Helen, because I've spoken to you, to Paul, and not quite a few things about G Games now, but you have such an interesting backstory.

So,  yeah. I've been super excited to talk to you. First of all, welcome to the iGaming leader.

Helen Walton: Thank you. It's lovely to be here. Great way to spend an afternoon.

Leo Judkins: Helen. I wanted to start off with something you said, which is, in your house, there will be at least one product that you helped made. 

[00:02:00] And I found that, like I know that that is outside of gaming, but I found that such an intriguing statement that I saw. Because you've had a, you know, varied history and career. I'd love to hear a little bit more about that and how it all started and, and where that statement comes from.

Helen Walton: Well, it helps that I have worked for Unilever, for Boots and for PZ cousins,  in my life. 

So that means that I can pretty much guarantee I can go through your bathroom and there will be something I've worked on. So do you use Dove or links acts does your partner use Santara play that?

They will, I will find something in your bathroom that I have worked on. and I've also worked for a, you know, a really large range of. Of clients doing different things. 

I worked for,  for the National Trust, ante, Nuno Mendez, Danielle Ryman, Gemma Kidd,  her makeup range. I've even written the column for the Daily Mail as a, a ghost writer. Yeah, I've done all sorts of things. 

Leo Judkins: [00:03:00] And then, and then 12 years ago, you founded G Games and like how did you roll into that? And I know it was a crazy idea to start with, and it all evolved from there, but how did you roll into it in the first place?

Helen Walton: Well, Dan, Paul and I, we are the three co-founders of ge and we met at a different startup, which was, creating a series of courses for enterprises to deliver software products better at scale. 

And we wrote a series of books together, that then became these, course called VFQ value flow quality about how to do agile at scale.  and it became the qualification for the British Computing Society. 

And it's now used by some ridiculous percentage of the FC three 50 or something like that. and it, yeah, it still exists and it's, it's going really strong. And as we were sort of coming towards the end of that project, which we'd worked on as a tight small team, we started talking about what were we going to do next? 

[00:04:00] And meeting business partners is not easy because you are looking for quite specific things. You, you need to share values. You need to be at roughly the same stages in your career, and that often means you're at roughly the same stages in your life. 

You need to have roughly similar appetite for risk and roughly similar amounts of money to be able to put into the idea and survive. And your skills need to be complimentary, so. Here we were, the three of us,  we'd worked together for like two and a half years, so we knew we worked well together and that we trusted each other and we knew we had complimentary skills. 

Paul was really good at finance and product, and Dan was really good at leading the IT and the software development.

[00:05:00] And I had a marketing product, concept development and sales background. So we, you know, it is not that usual complimentary skills, roughly the same age in life experience and 

So when we said, and we kind of all said it together, why don't we build another company together? 

That was what we knew first. We knew we were gonna do something together before we knew what it was. We didn't start with some brilliant idea. We started by going. This is our chance to be entrepreneurs at scale together. What are we gonna do?

Leo Judkins: Yeah.

Helen Walton: That was how it went.

Leo Judkins: And how, how did that then get to gaming,  Helen? Because like, you've got a very different product anyway, but, but how did you get to, to gaming as a, as, as the outcome of that 

Helen Walton: Well, at the time we were, we were particularly struck by. TV game shows continue to be massive business despite the

fact that you might have thought that they were dated and they were going out of fashion. As you know, as the rise of online gaming and mobile gaming was happening, you might think that TV game shows are going outta business.

[00:06:00]  But we noticed that no, they were actually picking up and that some insane number of people were watching Million pound drop and while they were doing it. We were playing on second screen as they watched. 

Now a quirk of UK entertainment licensing meant that TV companies couldn't monetize in the most obvious way, which is getting people to pay to take part in order to win a share of a prize, because that's called gambling. 

So we went, huh? Some kind of massive. Multiplayer events with real money prizes played out online. Seems like a really good idea to us. We are going to do that. Looking back, I think we were insanely naive. But you know, probably if we'd known more, we wouldn't have dared do it.

We'd have known all the objections and all the problems and listen, we failed totally. 

[00:07:00]So I don't want anyone, you know, thinking that we've got some brilliant success in our background that we just have never told you about. No, it was a total failure, but we learned a great deal. 

We were, I think, at the wrong time, we weren't well connected enough because, you know, there is a company out there doing massive online real money game shows.

They're called Evolution. They've done pretty damn well out of it. And there's a whole bunch of other people that are delivering their own versions of those. 

We were just these, you know, scrappy trio of idiots who didn't know anything about the gambling industry and who thought we could do it first. We were wrong. But along the way, we have succeeded in. 

You know, building a studio that delivers a range of games, some more innovative others, less innovative. and, we are still working on our dream. It's a different dream. We're still working on multiplayer, though. That is, that remains the big concept that G is working on today, and we're still really excited about it.

Leo Judkins: [00:08:00] What were some of the things that you found most surprising, perhaps, or fascinating about moving into gaming? It's such a different industry from what you had done before, so I'd love to hear a little bit about what, what surprised you the most?

Helen Walton: It felt like quite an old fashioned, small industry to me. So I don't think I've ever worked anywhere before where sort of everyone knows everyone.

And the idea that everyone just goes from place to place to place to place. You know, that was fairly new to me even working in FMCG and Beauty, where people talk about that, they laugh about it.

Oh, you went from this company to this company, just, but not really. Not in the same way. And also the fact that like physical trade shows were such a big thing

that sales happened to such an enormous degree through relationships. All of that was. Felt, felt different, felt weird. still feels a little bit weird to be honest.

Leo Judkins: Yeah. Outside of the industry, people don't really get it. Right. Especially the trade, trade show,  conference type of stuff. And [00:09:00] how, how, how's that gone for you over time? Has that, has your approach changed there and what are some of the things that worked well for you, didn't work well for you as you've gone through those, those 12 years, specifically around events and, and around networking?

Helen Walton: Well, we've built that network.

We built it from scratch. aGain, depends on how you look at it. Was it naive or ballsy? The whole point is you can do it right, but we, we made our journey a lot longer and arguably harder by not having any network at the beginning by not knowing people who would invest, by not knowing customers, by having to build that from scratch. 

We did gain attention through being outsiders and through doing things a little bit differently, whether we were coming up with gimmicks and stunts at events. I still get people coming up to me asking about, oh, you, you were the woman who put those guys in stilettos, right.

And eyes, or you were the person that had those grannies going around? so, you know, stunts and gimmicks because we were outsiders that worked. we still have a slightly, irreverent approach to doing business and to advertising.

[00:10:00] You won't find us doing the kind of typical sponsorships or the, or the typical ways of marketing. So I think we're still known for doing things a little bit differently.

You have to build a relationship with your customer that's different to that, that's, that's built on a different form of authenticity.

Leo Judkins: You know, as you started, you guys started out, you like naive failure. were there moments where you really questioned the decisions that you'd made? And, 

Helen Walton: Oh my God, all the time.

Leo Judkins: So tell, tell us a little bit more about that. Like, how did you persevere? What did you learn from it?

Helen Walton: You know, I cannot tell you how many sort of awful moments we have had as a company. We've been running out of money. 

We've had a kind of a minded to revoke notice through something that genuinely still wasn't our fault. Still stings that one we've had all sorts of challenges and issues, deals that you thought were gonna happen that collapse at the last moment. 

[00:11:00]That you were totally reliant on products that you were completely invested in, that you thought were gonna be huge, that flopped Totally. Spent years working on and that were a complete waste of time. 

Working on the wrong priority, falling out, you know, there have been so many issues and at each of those points, yeah, you question, why am I doing this? I'm tired. This feels hopeless. Oh, we're never gonna get anywhere. 

Nothing's gonna be delivered, but something keeps you going. Of course you know the answer that everyone wants you to say, the answer that sounds like a really good narrative is, oh, you keep going because of your team, or because you still believe in the vision.

And of course there's some of that, but there's also just being bloody minded and stubborn and going, I refuse to give up. I'm gonna show those bastards or sunk cost fallacy. 

Never underestimate sunk cost fallacy. You've, you've given so much to the business, you can't bear for it, not to be worth it.

It may be wrong, but it does keep you going through the hard times.

Leo Judkins: [00:12:00] That some cost fallacy. I always love that. Right, because that is so true also in what you just described. You have projects that you've put years into and at some point you've gotta decide to pull the plug because it's just hopeless. 

It's not gonna go anywhere. aNd that stings a lot, right? It happens to, I think it happens to all of us. How have you stayed sane throughout the years with all those like, difficult decisions and, and difficult moments that you're talking about 

Helen Walton: I mean, some would argue whether I've managed to stay sane at all. That's acceptable. I, I, I would say this is, this is, this is life, right?

It's not just work. Just anyone who's a parent would also say, how do you stay sane through all the. Dreadful bits that go on with raising children, but there's always something just when you are at your most exasperated, there's also something lovely. 

And the same is true of running a business. You're at your most exhausted and fed up and everything feels awful. 

[00:13:00] But then you hear something lovely from a team member or from a customer that keeps you going, or you're absolutely sick of your team and you are arguing with one another and you feel like you're misaligned on your values.

But you, you get a breakthrough in a product and you think it's all gonna be worth it, or, or, or a deal comes in and you realize that it is gonna work out. You have little moments that keep you going even when everything's terrible and just when you think everything is perfect, there's a a little moment that brings you down to earth.

Leo Judkins: On the flip side of that, what, what's, what have been, what have been some of the highs that you've experienced throughout those 12 years? What are some of your proudest moments?  big or small? What did they look like?

Helen Walton: The first time we persuaded I, this sounds tiny. It is tiny, but you know, the first two people we persuaded to join us as our employees. I mean, that was massive. 

They were so brave. We had sold all funding. We had just what we put in and some consulting and freelance gigs that we kept going for the first like year that was all we had, and two people believed in us enough to go, yeah, okay, we're gonna give up our nice paying jobs and join you for less money to help you fulfill this vision. 

It's easy actually, as you get established that you get a bit used to the idea that you're paying people a decent wage and that they have expectations of you and you have expectations of them. But I guess I never quite forget those first early employees where we were all taking the most enormous shared risk together. 

And you feel incredibly committed to those people forever after because of what they did in taking that leap of faith with you. So that, that was an enormous high, first product going live, oh my God, the first. This is so ridiculous. It's so many years ago, but we did this,  this social game, a Facebook game. 

[00:15:00] And the first time somebody bought one of our like, big packages on that game. Paul, I can still remember Paul ringing me up going, someone. And like, you know, here we are today with like millions going through and wages, you know, every day. And you, you, you don't even think about it. I think it was like 50 quid. 

We were so overexcited and then, you know, even now, so we're doing this big new multiplayer product and it looks fucking fantastic and every time we have a play test. I am just so happy to see how much further it's come on and to see people enjoying it. When I see a customer playing it getting so involved that they're going die, die as they like smash the screen. You're like, yeah, okay. 

This is great. First time, the first time somebody signed the contract for it, you know? Every time actually someone signs a contract, I'm really excited because I just go, yeah, this is going to deliver. It's going to be worth it.

Leo Judkins: Yeah. Love it. Paul was telling me how people just in kind of the sales, the sales presentation, just, just play the game rather than, than doing the, doing the pitch deck. 

Helen Walton: [00:16:00] Yeah. And they get so engaged and involved and Yeah. They're smashing screens. People throw the phone across the room. Yeah.

Leo Judkins: Crazy. Hey, Ellen, how's that changed over time and, with Paul down, it's like a marriage, right? You, it's 12 years. There's the ups and downs, like, how's that changed over time? 

And, and what are some, maybe some, some advice that you could give to people that co-founder a business with, with others?

Helen Walton: There's this, diagram or theory of teams I've always found very helpful that forming, storming, norming, performing, and you, you go through that cycle several times when you have a really long-term relationship with people. So it's interesting, you know, 'cause people don't have that, that often anymore in business.

And until I found a g. The longest I'd ever worked for any company was seven years and I mean, that felt like forever.

[00:17:00] And you know, now we've been working together. If you put our previous company with G, we've been working together for 15 years now. 

That is seriously unusual, so we know each other really well. Sometimes we get on brilliantly and sometimes we're arguing really badly over something and sometimes we're just fed up with each other or something. Niggly or stupid annoys you about someone you've worked with that long. 

The thing that helps is, first of all, you do have this weirdly deep underlying trust of just knowing that you can rely on them too. to just get on with something to do. 

So that just deepens over time and therefore, a lot of the other stuff, a lot of the irritation, I often think of it, it's like, it's like weather. It will just pass. You're just, yes, you're annoyed. Yes. It feels very intense in the moment you're disagreeing over something really bad, you think they're a complete idiot for not agreeing with you.

[00:18:00] You, you think they're being outrageous and not properly listening to you or appreciating you, or understanding how much you know, all of those feelings that are real feelings that happen in, in everyday working life.

But you also learn to stand a little bit outside of it and just go, yeah, okay, that's for today. Maybe it's even for this week or even for this month, but it's not forever and you trust that it's not forever. 

You should never underestimate how important staying with a group of people, how much it ups your performance over time because when you know them so well, you really know how to compliment each other's strengths and weaknesses and build on them. 

Leo Judkins: Yeah. It's that, it's that idea of psychological safety, right? And being able to trust each other and you know each other. And even if, even if you know, you piss each other off, you'd still know it's gonna be okay. Right? 

We, we'll be okay. And I think that's such a. Such an important area. One of the things you said to me before is about how sometimes that is also, can also almost become a weakness, right?

[00:19:00] Where you, because you compliment each other, you go so narrow almost in your focus that you don't, you, you don't widen your skills as much anymore because you're leaning on, on perhaps people next to you, right? That's that, develop those skills. 

Helen Walton: Well, I think you do become a little bit codependent if, when again, you've been together such a long period, you just go, okay, you are going to do this thing so much faster and better, and I'm gonna do this thing so much faster and better that we don't ever. 

Experiment with that. That is, I think, a risk. I think it's, it's helped by having a lot of other people in as well.

So it's not as if it's just the three of you. You know, we are a team of, I dunno, 80 people nowadays, so that's not easy either. I think that's something you have to really think about when three of you have worked together for so long we tend to have quite high retention.

So we've got a lot of people that have been with us seven plus years. How does somebody new come into that team and find a role amongst people who've been working together so long? How does that work?

Leo Judkins: [00:20:00] Yeah, that's difficult. So how do you deal with that? Because like, I'd love to talk a little bit about your organizational structure in a bit as well, because it's fascinating. But,  before we do, like, when you've had people that have been there for so long and know the ins and outs of the business ins and outs of you, like how do you onboard new people and make sure that they also feel that they're part of that bigger thing that you want 'em to be part of?

Helen Walton: We do a lot of the basics that you'd expect us to do,so we run quite an in depth onboarding with each new person who joins that. 

You know, covers all the basic stuff, but also talks a great deal about the ethos of the company and shows how the ethos of the company works through the various different tools and the various different processes that we have, so that we try and, you know, map everything to our values. We make sure everyone has a buddy that they work with, and we tell people very clearly it's their responsibility to ask for feedback and to ask for how they are. 

[00:21:00] Doing.  and we have some kind of formalization around that, but not really that much. although all of that is true and all of that happens, the honest answer is, I dunno, that we are always brilliant at it.

I would say we have really high retention, but I would also say we probably have a, you know, a reasonable failure rate as well, where. We fail to onboard people properly where they go, this is not the environment for me. I don't find this liberating and exciting and filled with autonomy. I find it scary and isolating and I dunno how to find my place. I, you know, I think that's true too. And I can only say that I passionately believe personally. 

Everyone you bring on, you bring on 'cause you think they're good. They want to do their best. They have nothing but their, you know the best motivation to be doing things well. And if both of you go, this isn't working out, you try and find them a role or something that works better for them within the organization.

[00:22:00] And we've had, we've had quite a few successes with that actually. So we've had people who joined in one capacity and who have ended up doing something totally different, that they've been much better at. Amon joined us as a product owner. A product manager.  and it just, it wasn't for him.

He wasn't enjoying it. It wasn't particularly good for him. He became a sales manager and he was the best sales manager I think I've ever met. He's a fantastic sales manager, and eventually he felt that he needed to spread his wings beyond. 

What can I say? Except, yeah, you're gonna be absolutely fantastic when, wherever you go, anyone is gonna be really lucky to have you. And yeah, he's, he's gone on to greater heights in his career and will go on too far greater heights. I have no doubt. And I still harbor a hope that one day he'll come back because,

[00:23:00] Again, it's back to any relationship, right? That if something's not working, it's normally not the person. It's normally the circumstances, and you just have to, if you can't for some reason, change the circumstances, maybe you can't pay them enough. Maybe you can't give them something particular they want, okay?

You just have to acknowledge it's not working right now, but maybe it'll work differently at another time, and you do your best to help them, to support them, to, to find the place that they're going to be really happy.

And it will help as well. 

Leo Judkins: And the thing is that you can't filter everything out during an interview process anyway, right? I mean, you can do so many interviews. But is it a cultural fit? Like,  all the small, tedious things that might happen in an organization might not necessarily be for that person.

It might be the wrong tools that you're using or something, you know, that annoys them. I dunno, whatever it is. And you can't filter all of that out beforehand.

Helen Walton: [00:24:00] and what do interviews tell you anyway? Really? Paul and I,  actually completely agree on this. We always say there are two things that we are looking for. Pretty much two things only. So the first is, can you learn and can you demonstrate that you learn quickly? And then the second thing is, do you work hard? 

And if you do those two things, then almost nothing else matters. ' cause if you haven't done something before, if you don't have a skill, well you are going to work hard to learn and get better at it.

Great. So we are very uninterested normally about, do you have the exact experience in the past? 

Have you done the exact same thing before? We definitely believe an interview is often about figuring out if you want to take a chance on somebody, if you go. I believe you could be great. 

And a lot of what the role is going to be is about, is about trying to make sure that you've got everything you need in order for you to become great, because you are going to do the learning and the hard work that will get you there.

[00:25:00] That's why we're big believers in, sometimes you take people on in one role and they end up in a completely different one, or you build the role around the person that, that

Leo Judkins: yeah, yeah. I love that. I also love the approach on autonomy, taking responsibility for your own actions and, and just being your own person and, and if it's a good fit from a, from a personal perspective, I. Then all the skills, will they, they will happen, right? You can 

Helen Walton: Yeah, you'll, you will build them. You will get them. You will go develop them. You will find, just like in our crazy way, we built a network from scratch without knowing anybody in the gambling industry.

Not saying it was the fastest thing, but it's entirely possible and doable.

I think sometimes when people hear about the way G structures itself, that we have a, a pretty flat structure, that we tend not, we, we don't really have formal reporting lines.

People sometimes kind of think that we must be all fuzzy and warm and delightful and hippie and I, I don't think we are, I think we're pretty tough actually, because, you know, we're big believers in descent. It's not all let's all agree on everything. 

[00:26:00] No, it's, it's, let's ensure people have the freedom to disagree, to say, I won't work on that. I'm going to work on this. I believe this is more valuable to have those arguments openly. To keep bringing up the argument, to, to share the information, to make sure people have access to really good information so that they can make those decisions to make sure meetings are open so that people can be involved and can speak up. 

Things like being responsible for asking for feedback yourself. There's no, oh no, you're, you know, your mentor is gonna check in with you and check how you are, we're like. You are an adult, you are responsible for your own career. 

If you are concerned that maybe people don't think you are doing well, you, you should be asking, do you think I'm doing a good job? Do you think I'm contributing value to the company? 

You know, those can be uncomfortable questions to ask, but they're really important and we would say they're your responsibility. So, you know, again, one of my pet hatreds is someone saying, well, I didn't know that. 

[00:27:00] Nobody told me, well, did you know there was some information that you needed? Why didn't you ask for it then? Why didn't you go find it out? because nobody in our company is trying to hide it from you. 

There's no secret discussion group. If there's something you don't know, you need to go find it out. And of course, the things you don't know, you don't know. Sure. But where there are, you know, areas, whole areas where you go, that's funny.

I've heard nothing about this project. Or the priority. Well, why haven't you joined the prioritization call? Why aren't you checking that board?  I'm just saying there's a, obviously there's a mix of two-way communication, but on the whole we believe in putting quite a lot of responsibility on individuals as well as giving them quite a lot of freedom.

Leo Judkins: No, I love it, Helen, because I think. With lots of people, there is a serious lack of ownership and, own responsibility, right? 

And, even from a stress management perspective, I think it's so, disempowering when you lay blame with everything else but yourself.

[00:28:00] But when you actually start taking control of your own actions and start taking responsibility for, okay, what can I do about this situation? 

Rather than management, or rather than the government or rather than whatever it is, it allows you to feel in charge again and it will help you get out of whatever that stress is that you are experiencing.

And it's, I think it's the most frustrating thing there is when I. When it's no longer in your control and you feel absolutely helpless, but a lot of people are actually in that mindset where they feel everything, everybody else and everyone else should be telling me what to do, whereas actually it's you that should be doing it. 

But the problem with it is that it's uncomfortable, right? Because you will make decisions with not all of the information, and you will probably make mistakes as well. And that's okay.

Helen Walton: Yes. Yes, it being okay to make mistakes and to stand up and admit when you've made a mistake and to say when you are wrong. That's a really important part. I've never understood either why it is that people don't realize it is much more disarming when you say, yeah, I got that wrong. I'm sorry guys. I. It almost instantly stops people being cross with you

[00:29:00] It is much better to take ownership but of course you have to, you know, you have to model that behavior. You have Your own mistakes and that mistakes can happen. But you know, if you're making the same mistake on the fourth time, that might be exactly the same kind of,  thing that you reflect on and go, well, why am I making these mistakes? Is it because I hate that thing? Or I don't care about that thing and therefore I shouldn't be doing it? And if that means I shouldn't be doing this entire job, maybe that's the right answer.

Leo Judkins: I'd love to hear a little bit more about your journey from kind of starting, starting the business up to now. 80 employees. Right. So, it's not just about like that, that comes with structural changes. Comes with, teething problems, but also comes with challenges for yourself.

[00:30:00] Right? And how you develop as a leader,  leading a, an organization. It's very different, I'd imagine from. From being there with the 3, 4, 5 people to now with 80. So what have been some of the most, biggest changes that you've experienced in, in your role within the company?

Helen Walton: I mean, I suppose I, you know, I personally have had to get a lot better at, you know, not interfering.

So a classic of startup founders, right? Is that they meddle in everything because they think they know better, they think they can do it better, they care more perhaps because it's theirs. So they, you know, they really wanna be involved. yeah. I am not claiming to be immune from that. 

You know, you have to let other people take ownership and control and make mistakes and get better and grow beyond what you could do. So you also have to acknowledge the things that you're not very good at, I mean, that, that's actually helped by, there's always stuff that you also have to do that you hate doing. 

Just as it's quite difficult to let go of control over things that you passionately care about. That's balanced by the fact that it's great to let go of things that you were always a bit shit at and you always hated doing. I mean, God, there's a whole bunch of stuff that I can't wait until I can let go of that as well. I'm still stuck doing,

Leo Judkins: [00:31:00] but how did you, how did you deal with that, Helen? Because of that, I think that's actually the hardest bit, the hardest part for founders is, is because you are so deeply involved, not just in the vision, but in the actual operation. Bits of it. You understand everything better than somebody that's come, comes in new, right?

And, maybe their skillset is more advanced in certain areas. You understand the detail far better. And so that makes it super difficult to let go of stuff, right? Because you see things and you'll, your fingers will just start burning, right? You'll just go, I, I can fix this, you know? But then you become the crutch as well.

And, and the bottleneck. Did you have a moment where you realized that you were doing that?

Helen Walton: I will just say that this is one of the benefits of there being three of you as three co-founders. Yeah. You get very good at pointing out to each other the times that you are becoming a bottleneck or meddling or interfering. 

[00:32:00] Now, not saying that's always easy, but you know, th at's one of the things Paul, Dan and I do to each other.

You've become a bottleneck on this. You need to stop. You need to delegate that. And then also, you know, you just get, you get pushback from your employee. You reflect, so you, you, you have some moments of self-reflection where you go, am I doing that thing? 

I just criticize Paul for doing. Hmm. and there's somebody who's been working with you for a certain amount of time and you can feel their frustration over something, whether they express it or you are just sensing it and you recognize that part of their development is to take something on, is to go further with something and that you need to support them in that or just let them do it because that's part of them choosing to stay with you.

Yeah. And, and there's also, again, so a little bit like we were saying things that are like sunk cost fallacy can be a good thing. There's also the good thing that you're just tired. You're only human. You can't do everything. 

[00:33:00] You've got a life, you've got child and a partner and a house, and you know you can't do everything. So some things have to let go and there is actually nothing worse. Then when you let something slip yourself, you're too busy, you're trying to do too much. You let something drop, you are embarrassed by that. It feels shit. 

Okay. That's a really good sign. You need to be delegating more stuff to other people.

Leo Judkins: yeah. It's always better to have something,  done at 80% of your quality than having it not done at all because you didn't have time. Right. So it's always better to delegate it. And one of the big things that we always talk about in our mastermind is, is. Understanding what you no longer do.

Right. You, we, we talk about not do lists rather than to-do lists and You know, they're almost like the things, the rabbit holes that trap you every time that you go down into and, and you can't find yourself coming out of.

And. And when you start doing that, the problem is that employees start getting really disengaged as well. Because you're constantly meddling, like you said.

Helen Walton: [00:34:00] Yeah. Or, or they come and check stuff with you. That they don't need to check with you. That's another really good sign, actually,

If someone's checking stuff with you, is it because they're genuinely asking for your creative input to make something better? And they're talking through their thinking, that's totally fine.

Or are they checking something that is already the right answer because they're worried that you're gonna interfere? 

Leo Judkins: Yeah. You can almost become somebody's crutch right by. By doing that all the time. 

Helen Walton: Yeah. 

Leo Judkins: Okay.  you talked a little bit about, change. You mentioned change and courage, giving people chances as 

Helen Walton: We've touched on it a bit by saying, you know, what matters is not whether someone has the experience or has done a similar kind of job before, or even comes from inside the same industry.

You know, be looking for and finding people from different industries, but who have skill sets or personality traits that are highly applicable, and give them a chance, don't assume that you need somebody with a degree or somebody with, you know, proof that they've done that type of slot maths before.

[00:36:00] Maybe they've done something different, you know? I, I would argue that we are quite good actually at looking from outside industry. Perhaps from necessity we couldn't match salaries. but also from, genuine ideological belief that that's a good way to bring in fresh thinking and give people individuals chances.

So. Famously, we got thrown out of our shared working office because we hired their barman to,  be an account manager for us, and they were so annoyed with us for having stolen their fabulously wonderful barman that they kicked us out of the office. 

So, you know, we were like, he's great. He's fantastic at customer service. He's really clever, he's really personable and he wants to change industry. Why would we not give him a chance?

Leo Judkins: I think so many companies are just too isolated on only hiring, hiring inside of industry, and it's really kind of, I think diversity is just such an important topic in general, right? Well beyond kind of male versus female, just in, in general. 

You need to diversify your team to have diversified thinking and,  I think it's some, it's a massive opportunity that, that most businesses just.

[00:37:00] I dunno. Pass that one. You know, and it makes, it makes no sense in my head.

Helen Walton: I think it's, it is often about safety, right? You, you don't wanna make a mistake you are recruiting someone, and you don't wanna be blamed for having recruited the wrong person as opposed to going, we're gonna take a chance on someone. And the risk is more on their side, and we should then make a decision much faster about whether we are working well together or not. So You have more riskier hires, but you have more honest conversations earlier 

Leo Judkins: No. Makes a lot of sense. Honesty, integrity,  personal accountability. I love all of it. Ellen, so for somebody that is maybe, that is growing quickly in their, in their role is, progressing really fast in their career, but maybe feeling that they're hitting a bit of a ceiling, what's, what's one piece of advice that you could give them?

[00:38:00] What's, the thing that you've seen in others that inspired you the most?? 

Helen Walton: I think the danger in our industry in particular is that when you feel that happening in most companies, you need to move jobs. You need to actively move to a different company in order to be seen differently in order to get a new role. 

One of the things we try to do is that because we don't have levels or you know, promotions in that traditional sense, what we try to do is just go, you have more responsibility, more, you know, if you are an account manager, more higher value customers, do more things on your own.

Take on more challenges, you decide to improve this process. Just go do it. And as a direct result of the value that you can be seen to be contributing to the company, a percentage of that value should come back to you in a pay rise.

[00:39:00] How is the comp? And we often talk about pay rise as we say. How is the company doing and how much are you the individual contributing to that?

Obviously, if the company's not making any money, there is no money for pay rises, no matter how brilliant you are.

The company's doing brilliantly, but you are not perceived and cannot demonstrate that a great deal of that value or so any of that value is due to you. Well, you're not gonna get above whatever the standard raise is that is being given out. that's the kind of the golden ideal. I'm not saying we always 100% do it, but you know, that is definitely how we to work.

Leo Judkins: You know why? I think that's also really important, a, I'd love to hear your take on this is because I think the reason why a lot of people disengage from jobs, right? When they've, when they no longer engage, they no longer feel that they, um. They just basically hate their job. They just turn up and leave.

 I think that often happens because you don't see the value that you're bringing to the wider picture. You know, you know what I'm saying? Like that they necessarily see how their, their work contributes 

Helen Walton: [00:40:00] I think you often feel, I think you often feel blocked.

So when I think about the kind of the worst, the most frustrated I've been in a job, it's not just because I felt like, oh, I'm not sure if I'm a, a valuable part of the experience. I felt like my bosses were actively blocking me from delivering what I knew to be valuable for the company. When I wanted the freedom to run a marketing campaign or a sales campaign that I knew would make a difference, it was too difficult to do, or, you know, it couldn't get done on time or a launch couldn't happen, or there was always something in the way. And not because of trade-offs, which happened in every company,  where you are prioritizing between different things.

[00:41:00] But just because internal kind of petty fogging rules. Halted value contributions. So I think the absolute worst is when you feel not just that are you really valuable or not, but you are actually stopped from delivering the value that you want to deliver. 

Leo Judkins: I love that you're saying that because I think that happens a lot. I don't think, I know it happens a lot and I know a lot of listeners will,  will probably experience that as well. So what would you recommend for people feeling that they are in that situation?

Specifically people that are high achievers and that feel that perhaps, you know, by their manager, even by the person that is, you know, kind of signing off the stuff. Things are just not progressing.

Helen Walton: So you see, I wanna give the cheap, easy answer, Which is instantly leave and start up your own company. But, and also I think, actually by the way, I think, I think there is nothing more valuable than working as an entrepreneur to give you a really good idea of the other side of the coin, of just how painful those trade offs sometimes are and how invisible they sometimes can be to other people. 

So that's, that's very good because having got that side of it, you are gonna be a lot more sympathetic in the future to people

[00:42:00] But the key, the key thing really Yeah. Is that the more information you have, so the more you understand the deep trade offs that exist within a company, the more likely you are to make sure that the things that you want to do. Deliver the true value that the company needs right now. 

So it may be that you've got a brilliant idea that's gonna make the company loads of money, but for some reason you're being blocked from doing it. 

And it could be as simple as there's a cashflow crisis and your company is not very good at being, being honest with you and saying therefore you can't spend this money to make this money. 

So a lot of companies aren't good at sharing that kind of information 'cause they're scared of what employees might do with it. We don't act that way, but I know a lot of companies do.

Trying, trying to understand what are the levers and the trade-offs that the company is facing, but also that the individual manager, boss, whoever it is that feels like they're blocking you, what they are facing, that will help you get something done.

[00:43:00] I think I was quite late on in my career actually, before I really understood the power of making my boss look good. And I think a lot of people don't learn that. For me it was because I think I'd grown up in quite a, kind of an adversarial,  academic environment where you got high grades by just winning arguments and that was what you did.

And I think I carried that slightly adversarial. I'm right into my early career and  you know, that's disastrous. 

Leo Judkins: Yeah. Let's argue over everything.

Helen Walton: Yeah, don't do that. But also, you know, don't obsess about being right and definitely don't obsess about winning and all the things that you can do that make other people look good, that make their lives easier, that offer them quick wins, make it so much more likely that the other things you really want to do. 

[00:44:00] Will get greenlit will go through, and that sounds manipulative in a way that I really don't intend it to be. Actually, I, I, I mean it that you are, you are all collaborating. You all of you actually believe most of the time that you are trying to create value for the company. 

And if if you come from a place where that's what you believe most mo people's motivations are, they want to do a good job, they want to do what's best. Trying to understand why their motivation for that, why their behavior feels quite antithetical to what you are doing. Both of you share the same motivation that can really help you get to a better place.

So if you are blocking me from. Making loads of money from the company is because there's something else that is truly important to you that I'm not understanding, and it's probably not something selfish or stupid.

It's probably something also really important to the company that I'm not understanding and I need to get a grasp of.

Leo Judkins: Love it. Helen, thank you so much for today's, podcast. Really enjoyed talking to you. You've been fantastic.

Helen Walton: thank you. It's lovely to chat to you, Leo.