Eight years ago today, Eximia officially opened its doors.
I founded the business with a mission to help simplify the complex – creating communication campaigns that made technical, legal and financial topics more accessible and meaningful to employees.
When you’re pushing forwards building a brand, it’s easy to forget where you started, so key milestones like this are a great reminder to stop, take a breath and realise what’s been achieved.
With this in mind, to mark our 8th birthday, here are eight lessons I’ve learned on my journey so far:
1: You’re not alone
Everyone has different talents – and as long as you’re humble enough to admit you don’t have all the answers, you can maximise a team’s skill sets and achieve amazing things by embracing collaboration. In my experience, the success of a project greatly depends on how well you can bring the right people together and create a positive, productive environment to get the best out of them.
2: Be true to who you are
In and outside of the office, you’re constantly presented with different routes to take, but how do you know which opportunity is right for you? My answer is to refer back to your values; this is the compass that should guide your decision-making process. If the direction you’re taking doesn’t support what your brand, or you as a person, stands for, it’s time to rethink the choices you’re making.
3. Keep good company
It’s vital to spend time with good people, be it friends, family, teammates or industry friends. You may not always agree (it would be wrong if you did!), but if you surround yourself with those who have the best intentions for doing what’s right for the whole – and not just for personal gains – and you have the same mentality, you will all achieve great things.
4. Don’t sweat the small things
This isn’t always straightforward, but don’t let the little things drive you up the wall. Try your best to put any small annoyances into perspective to stay more relaxed and stress-free. Worrying about issues not affecting ‘the bigger picture’ only wastes energy. If you can find a quick solution to put an annoyance to bed, do it, but if decisions are out of your hands, forget them and only focus on those things you have control of.
5. Embrace creativity
Making time to free your mental space for creative thinking – no matter your role – cannot be overlooked. Our Creative Lead, Carl Adamson, explains this in more depth here.
6. Don’t let others dictate your life – take your own path
It’s important to listen to others’ advice, but ultimately we must decide what’s the best next step for our journey. Just because you do something differently to others, it doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong. However, if you realise you’ve made a mistake, don’t be too proud to learn your lesson, rectify the mistake and move on. It’s important we play our life cards differently, but as Kenny Rogers sang: “You’ve got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em.”; which takes me nicely to lesson seven, and that’s…
7. Be willing to adapt
We like to avoid corporate buzzwords at Eximia, but one word that’s difficult to avoid in 2020 is the importance of ‘pivoting’ – this need to quickly adapt to a shifting global landscape cannot be overestimated. Yes, we’ll all make mistakes, but make them quickly, draw a line under it and shift gears. Many businesses are in the fight of their lives, and the ones who are agile, who can reinvent themselves in this new reality, are the ones who’ll save jobs, survive and hopefully thrive.
8. Challenge the process
Eximia was born out of the need to ‘challenge the process’. We heard too many people say, “but that’s how we’ve always done it,” so we passionately set about helping businesses find a better way to simplify the complex and engage with employees. This doesn’t mean teams and individuals have to always rip it up and start again, but putting processes and procedures under the microscope to see what can be refined and improved is vital to long-term growth and success.
When I think about our history so far, I feel a mixture of pride and excitement.
I’m proud of what the team has achieved in such a relatively short space of time – and excited about what’s next.
We’ve got big plans for 2021 and beyond, so here’s to the next eight years of inspiring conversations, simplifying the complex and challenging the process.
