I need you

Over the past few years, I've received countless invitations to various events and marketing conferences. FIVOSZ invited me about five times, universities called, and a bunch of other organizations I can't even name, all asking me to give a presentation, inspire, or simply share how I did it, how I went from nothing to leading a multi-billion-forint enterprise.

I never attended these because I saw no point. I just couldn't picture myself walking in and explaining everything needed for someone to become a successful entrepreneur in 45 minutes or even 2 hours. I didn't see the point because it doesn't quite work by someone telling you how, and then you'll just know. It's about skills, intuition, understanding people, and, last but not least, self-belief, trust, and innate abilities.

The sum of the factors listed above is intangible, indefinable, and cannot be learned from textbooks. LifeTILT is especially not that, as LifeTILT is a love brand built around one person. LifeTILT is the manifestation of a specific person's emotions and instincts, and now try to summarize that in 50 minutes to strangers who expect a miracle from you, a secret, or I don't even know what, but certainly something, because they would have been sitting there for a reason.

I also don't believe in conferences because I've never been to one. I haven't learned anything about marketing, I've never held a book on leadership theory or corporate governance in my life, I don't know what marketing management is, and even if you killed me, I couldn't name a single marketing term, so I won't even try to list what I haven't dealt with. 

I have no professional background, only visions. I have a world in my head that has nothing to do with reality or numbers, so much so that we are now opening markets in 12 countries, and the girl leading it all asked me for a marketing plan, to which I replied that there isn't one, just make it happen, and when it's done, I'll know what to do. 

Well, that pretty much perfectly describes how I built the Hungarian market. I always knew what to do and nothing else mattered, I didn't listen to anyone, I just went where I thought the direction would be good. I still do it this way, and I always have. 

I can't tell you the big secret, so instead, I'll list the most important focus points that you must possess if you ever want to start a business. 

Go with your gut

Everything I did, I did from feeling, with heart, I wanted good, I wanted to help, and if I wasn't sure about something, I simply listened to my heart. I believed in what I was doing, and I didn't care what anyone said or thought about me. 

This is the very first phase of entrepreneurial life when you start something you haven't done before. Your environment initially listens with a smile, then comes the clever advice, the dissuasion, and the counter-arguments, and then when they see that you're still doing it, comes the undermining and the obstruction. 

It doesn't matter what you start; if you do something different from what people are used to from you, if you want something new, people will, on the one hand, never understand why you're doing it, and on the other hand, people are always afraid of novelty. By starting it, doing it, having enough courage for it, you hold up a mirror to a lot of people, and they will see themselves in this mirror. They will see the part of themselves that didn't dare to take the step, that didn't have, or don't have enough courage to do it, or are simply too weak to jump into the unknown and take risks. And if they can't or don't dare, then no one else should be able to, and no one else should be brave. If they didn't succeed, no one else should either. 

So, the first step in your business is to never listen to anyone. Not your parents, not your friends, and especially not smartass strangers, no matter what they say. If you believe in it, whatever it is, and you work for it, then it doesn't matter what some idiot babbles in the background, because it has no relevance. This is your life, your decision, and you have something that others don't and can't have. You have your own heart, which only you feel, and which will never disappoint you. 

If you can't go with your gut and make decisions, don't even start, because you're doomed to fail. If you can't listen to your heart, you don't trust yourself, and if your self-belief isn't strong, then the business world will sweep you away as if you were never there. If you don't believe in yourself, you don't believe in what you represent. If you market a product, you yourself will be in it. Every company is like its leader. If you create a company and you're this weak, self-doubting piece of shit who isn't even sure what they represent, but most importantly, is uncertain about their own abilities and decisions, then really, just give it all up. 

Delegate

Everyone thinks, especially if they own their own company, that no one can do anything better than them. More precisely, beginner entrepreneurs and fools think this. As long as the company employs a few people, this might even work, but after a certain point, you either delegate areas to other people, or you will completely fall apart and become bad at what you're good at, what you really understand, and what no one else could do better than you. I also fell into this trap; I also thought I had to interfere in everything, and then life nicely knocked me into shape. I learned through shocking burnouts and total breakdowns that I can't control everything. 

I have to deal with what I'm good at, and delegate everything else to people who are capable of leading those areas that I'm simply not good at.

There's no such thing as a universal person; even being good at something requires great luck, meaning innate instinctive talent and abilities.

I'm good at community building. I'm good at leading the LifeTILT community, at showing the way, at knowing where I want to take LifeTILT, what it should be about, what the message should be, and what and who we represent. I have a vision in my head years in advance, and I already know what LifeTILT will be about in 2023. 

As I mentioned, I have visions. I have an image in my head, a look I want to see, a feeling I want to convey, and I have a team that makes all this happen.

To this day, I decide what LifeTILT products and packages there will be, how much they will cost, how we will sell them, when there will be promotions, what the design should be, what kind of box the stuff should go into, and I also come up with the slogans.

This is what I understand, this is what I'm good at. 

What I am absolutely not good at, in fact, what I explicitly don't give a damn about, is finance, accounting, logistics, and any legal aspects. I am completely incapable of paying a bill, and I simply don't care if the tax authority sends a demand letter. In 2014, there was a letter from the tax authority or the municipality, I don't even remember, which I didn't open for 2 years, but I think I even threw it away. That's how much I don't care about it.

At the company, I am responsible for creativity and marketing, and no one can interfere with that. But there's also the part of the company that I've completely delegated to others. This is the only point in company building that requires luck. You need luck to find the person and people who will lead the areas within your company that you don't understand and don't feel like dealing with. 

You have to delegate certain areas and only deal with what you're good at, but then be good at that, very good. 

People in the company.

The third point is closely related to the second, that certain delegation. 

You are the leader. You have to dream, set the direction, and give instructions. But for your visions to become reality, you need people to make them happen. Although it may seem like it, LifeTILT is not a one-man show where I am the protagonist and everything is thanks to me. That is not the case at all. This is teamwork, and there are many different areas where you have to choose the people and trust them, or rather, trust their expertise. Your business is your dreams, your products, your company is your house, your world. You have to decide who you let into your house, but to hire good people, you will need people skills and trust. 

Graphic designers, web developers, marketers, billers, package dispatchers, warehouse staff, managers and department heads, customer service representatives, financial officers, lawyers, and accountants. They all work for you, and they are the ones to whom you owe gratitude always and in every case. 

You must love your people and never forget that without their daily work, you wouldn't be who you are, and without them, you wouldn't be where you are. You cannot forget what you owe them. The people who work for you are not your employees, but the talented individuals who make your dreams come true. 

I don't think I'm the best leader in the world, because I'm very strict and I dictate a very strong pace of work. I tell someone something twice, the third time I can't tell them anymore because the person I'd have to tell a third time is no longer at the company by then. I'm sure I've been cursed a thousand times, but they also know that I would go through fire for them anytime and they can always count on me. I respect them and appreciate their work. Not just with words.

In 7 years, only 2 people left the company by their own decision. One girl left because she graduated; she has wanted to come back since, and another girl who only came for a few months until she started her own business. So, that's how bad it is to work for me.

Maintain discipline, demand quality work, dictate a crazy pace, but always put a package on the other side that makes people love working for you. I've always paid attention to that. 

You as a leader.

It's not enough that you have a company and you're the boss there. That's damn little. Your people need to believe in you, and you need to be someone they can follow. The bigger your company, the smarter, more capable, and more valuable people you'll need for your company to be on a continuously developing path. 

However, truly good people will not be able and will not want to follow someone they cannot believe in, someone in whom they see nothing that would make them want to work for you. You must possess charisma, or if you don't have that, then you must be insanely good at something. 

Quality people will not follow idiots, conceited jerks, bossy clowns, self-proclaimed assholes. And you need to convince increasingly better people that they are indeed in a good place with you, and that you can provide development opportunities even for already good professionals. After a certain point, salary is no longer enough; in fact, as you move up the employee quality ladder, salary becomes increasingly secondary. It will always be important, but beyond that, the work environment, the aforementioned development opportunities, and who they will work with and for will become much more important. 

You don't become a leader because you founded your company, but because you possess problem-solving and leadership skills, which you must prove to your people when life demands it.

Many companies fail because their leader was a dilettante idiot. I was able to bring fantastic people to the company because the owner of their previous workplace was an unacceptable, stupid jerk. 

Be a general, chart the path, show the direction, and move forward. This is not a war, this is the business world. This is much tougher, and for this fight, you must go into battle with the best people. If you are not a general, they will not follow you, and they will not believe in you. 

This cannot be learned either. You either have it or you don't. It's not in any textbook.

Partners

At this point, I'd really just like to swear constantly. I once calculated how many millions of forints I lost because of partner companies I had been involved with over the years, only for them to turn out to be incompetent or simply idiots. I wanted to calculate it, but I stopped around 130 million because I didn't want to have a stroke.

That certain learning curve, which unfortunately everyone has to pay for. Well, I paid for it, because I fell for companies and people who presented themselves as incredibly professional, and then it was just a face-plant. 

This is a very difficult and even more costly process, but with the passing of years, and of course, after a few big, nasty slaps, you will know from the first minute what the signs are that tell you who you shouldn't continue negotiations with. 

I don't believe anyone anymore, no matter what they say or what graphs they show me. One would think that the larger a company, the more professionals work in it, and that's true. The problem, unfortunately, starts when you're small, life brings you partners who are also small, thus affordable. This is also a kind of corporate evolutionary process that you have to go through. As a beginner entrepreneur, you still believe everything, and they feed you whatever they want, but over the years, experience, failures, and unnecessarily paid millions will teach you who not to work with. Who to absolutely not work with.

As your company grows, you will have the resources to work with increasingly larger, more professional, and of course, more expensive companies.  

It's hard for me to make this understood by those who don't live in the entrepreneurial sphere and can't think like a CEO. I used to not understand how someone could charge millions of forints for a logo design; now I do, but if someone had tried to shove that down my throat 10 years ago, they certainly wouldn't have succeeded. The goal of this post is not to make you believe anything now. I've walked a path, and I speak from experience. Then you either heed what I write or you don't, that's up to you. Everyone thinks they're so smart, that they'll know, that they'll show everyone. I've seen enough self-proclaimed smartasses who really believed in themselves, but the good news is that in business, only those who are truly capable can survive. 

On a daily basis, I receive inquiries from manufacturers and various companies wanting to work with LifeTILT. These inquiries are pre-screened for me, and those whose inquiries even reach me, I do the following, and you should do this too.

I pre-screen them in Bisnode. This is a company information database. I look at their revenue, but not just last year's, but going back at least 5 years. I don't even talk to companies founded less than 2 years ago. And I go back 5 years to see how they've developed. But I don't just look at revenue, I also look at employment. If both show an upward trend, it's okay; if they're stagnant, especially if they're declining, then there's nothing to talk about. After that, I check the CEO, the company network, who they are connected with, what kind of taxpayer rating they have, and only then do I look for references. If all of that is in order, then and only then do I schedule a meeting. A lot is decided in a meeting, from the quality of the handshake to whether I, personally, can even work with the owner in question.

This is very important.

Only work with companies where you are on the same wavelength as the owner.

The details and agreement are secondary questions after that. You always do business with a person, never with the company, because by the time you even get to making a deal, the company behind it is already fine because you've already checked it. 

If I had to summarize, I'd be in a very difficult situation because, as you can see, there's no secret formula. There are human qualities that you either possess or you don't. What I'm talking about now applies to managing a company with annual revenues of several billion forints. 

Thousands of companies and hundreds of thousands of entrepreneurs operate in Hungary. Some have a boutique and will always only have that much. Earning a few hundred thousand forints a month, maybe a million, but that's it. I'm not saying it's little, but not everyone can create and manage a company with hundreds of millions in monthly or even annual turnover. Of course, everyone dreams of these at the start, but it must also be understood that everyone has their limitations. For years, I explained, even in the context of weight loss, that limitations exist in people's minds, but to break down these limitations, you need strength, courage, self-confidence, and self-belief, all while everyone around you wants to tell you what to do, how to do it, or what not to do. 

In 2011, I heard that you could earn a maximum of 5,000 forints a month from blogging and that it wasn't worth bothering with. I didn't believe it. My last year was over 3 billion. I heard from my childhood friend that I would fail anyway, and I heard that for another 3 years. I didn't believe him. Now I haven't heard that from him for a few years.

The hardest part at the beginning is not to listen to what people say and not to believe anyone who tells you that you can't succeed. It will still be hard afterwards, because as your company grows, so will the problems. People start businesses to not depend on anyone and to earn much more money with much less work. If you do it well, this will be the case, but be prepared to be exhausted at the beginning and for it to be very difficult. You can't do this half-heartedly. You have to give it 100%, work 16 hours a day if necessary, and continue the next day. Every day, for years if needed. 

Many things are needed for a successful company, and we've only scratched the surface, but no matter what. Only one thing is needed for a successful company. 

You are needed.