Stairway to Seven My seven steps for business success
Orlagh Kelly is a barrister, tech visionary and disruptor. In the past 20 years she has established two successful businesses. Her company Briefed uses cutting-edge technology and the expertise of its specialist barrister team to offer innovative self-led digital training to the legal, medical, business, education, charity and tech sectors. Briefed’s suite of compliance products removes stress, providing solutions which empower its clients to be confident they are legally compliant in an ever-risky and rapidly changing world where one mistake could cost an organisation its reputation and see it shackled with heavy fines for non-compliance. Equality, Diversity & Inclusion; Data & Cyber Security, Anti-Money Laundering, and Third-Party Risk are just some of the self-led digital training Briefed offers. Briefed’s barristers work with their clients to provide bespoke solutions genuinely solving client problems.
1. HAVE CONFIDENCE Have confidence – In my early days as a barrister I was told ‘you won’t make it at
the bar unless you’re related to the right people,’ and later, when I was launching my tech business Briefed, I was constantly met with ‘that won’t work’ or ‘that’s not how it’s done’. I no longer allow naysayers to drain my energy. Both my businesses have been very successful and when I reflect on my 20-year entrepreneurial journey I can clearly see that having the confidence to ignore some ‘advice’ was key. 2. DEVELOP YOUR RESILIENCE Running a business is not easy in a fastpaced world. There are many day-to-day challenges, let alone a global pandemic where all the rules change in an instant. You need to be able to ride out the storms and enjoy the wins as they come. 3. YOUR TEAM IS EVERYTHING The people you surround yourself with determine whether you and your business will sink or swim. To succeed, it’s crucial you foster a creative and entrepreneurial organisational culture where your team’s ideas are heard, they feel trusted (not micromanaged) and there is plenty of room for challenging conversation, collaboration and creativity. I believe in the positive stance when it comes to my team – they want to do a good job, therefore it’s my priority to support them to excel. 4. FIND A MENTOR Being an entrepreneur often means loving bright shiny new ideas – you need a wise pair of eyes and ears that will challenge
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you, offer insight and ask you the hard questions. I’ve been privileged to have great mentors throughout my career, and this has been critical to my success. 5. BE A DISRUPTOR Don’t be afraid to challenge the norm, be scared of disagreement. Be the dissenting voice in the room. See if you can break things, ask ‘why’ and find a better way to create a solution for your clients. Great ideas are generated by teams who are willing to disrupt the status quo, try things never done before and merge seemingly unconnected things – this is where innovation happens. 6. BE AGILE Embrace change and always have the ability to pivot quickly. Adapting quickly, failing fast, and being willing to change direction at the drop of a hat if necessary to find a better way to move forward. 7. DIVERSITY AND DEEP THINKING Actively seek out diversity of thought and encourage deep thinking within your business. A book well worth reading is Rebel Ideas by Matthew Sayed which tells the story of how ‘great minds think unalike’. I firmly believe organisations thrive when they have a diverse-thinking team. This creates opportunities to see client problems and therefore the solutions through a broader lens.
