Always be willing to call on experts

In the second of her articles reflecting on the parallels between her experiences as an athlete and an entrepreneur, Guardian Angel Carers founder and former sailor Christina Handasyde Dick, talks about teamwork.

Christina set up the business that would become Guardian Angel Carers soon after qualifying for the 2009 Beijing Olympics. She has found that many of the same motivators – defined goals, meticulous planning, teamwork, hard work, competition, commitment – apply as much now as then.

Now, her target is to double the number of Guardian Angel Carers franchisees by February 2022.

Call on experts

You’ll rarely hear athletes these days saying, ‘I did this’ or ‘my goal was to achieve this’. Almost invariably they say, ‘this is what WE were trying to do’. Even in the individual events, there’s a team that has helped get that person to the start and finish lines and, hopefully, on to the podium.

Not even the most single-minded or confident of athletes thinks they can compete at the highest level nowadays without one or more technical, conditioning and mind coaches, a physio, a manager. It’s the same with any business. When you are starting out, you have to multi-task, you have to cover a lot of bases. But as the business evolves you have to recognise the moment when your marketing, your financial management, your HR, your training has to be carried out by dedicated specialists, giving you the time and space to keep your eyes on your core strategy and objectives.

When you have set up a business, it can be hard to let go of certain aspects, but trusting people is absolutely essential if you want your business to grow and thrive. And it’s one of the greatest pleasures of being a business-owner when you see people starting to blossom into a role, and to deserve a share of the credit for growth and success.

As I said in my last blog, my favourite moment since founding Guardian Angel Carers was being award an outstanding rating by the CQC. I said at the time, ‘I’m so hugely proud of our team, our Angel family’, and that was one of the first times that I really knew I had a team behind me to take on the world.

My second favourite moment was when an investor wanted to put money into the business. Knowing that an expert in another field had such belief in our business gave us so much confidence and belief in what we were doing. Perhaps most importantly of all, it led to my next favourite moment – buying that investor out several years later!

They were happy – they’d doubled the value of their initial investment – but it meant we were in a position to hire some great new talent to the team. And now we now have real specialists in a range of positions, and that gives us an even better chance of winning more ‘medals’ in the future.

Franchisee opportunities at Guardian Angel Carers

If you are interested in discussing a Guardian Angel Carers franchise, please contact us here.