One-Year In, A Bigger Expedition Ahead

“There is more in us than we know if we could be made to see it; perhaps, for the rest of our lives we will be unwilling to settle for less.” ― Kurt Hahn  (Founder, Outward Bound)

I’m reflecting on progress and opportunities one year into my role as CEO & Executive Director of BEN Colorado, where I served as a longtime advisor before taking the helm.

With macroeconomic uncertainty, entrepreneurship and, by extension, BEN’s mission is more important than ever. We have a dream: if conventional wisdom says 90 percent of startups fail, we’d like to see 90 percent of startups get to the scaleup stage and succeed, dramatically flipping statistical expectations.

Looking back on my first year in the role, I feel unbridled optimism yet typical entrepreneurial impatience for the opportunities ahead. We’ve added earlier and later stage programming, accelerated the curation of ever more advisor and entrepreneur matches, diversified funding, and served as a bridge for growth-minded entrepreneurs in a “no entrepreneur left behind” mindset - if BEN isn’t the right fit, we can point you toward community partners who are. My team tracked over 600 ecosystem meetings I had in my first year to survey stakeholders and work toward a bright, collective future.

Like BEN companies, BEN is also scaling, and I take that challenge personally. While I’m deeply steeped in social enterprises, I’ve only run two nonprofits in my career, Outward Bound Wilderness and BEN Colorado - both my two favorites! In many ways, BEN reflects Outward Bound’s mission and impact.

As some know, I moved to Colorado to work with Outward Bound, which had a seminal effect on me in my youth with a month-long sailing course in Maine in high school and a week-long leadership course in Colorado in college. Founded by Kurt Hahn in the early days of World War II to help young sailors improve their survival chances at sea during the worst era of U-boat attacks by simulating extreme physical and emotional challenges where compassion for others was an overarching value. Outward Bound still comprises a structured set of personal and team-based challenges with a group of strangers in challenging wilderness environments.

Similar to the entrepreneurial journey, Outward Bound helps “crews” navigate challenge and change and learn to develop “an enterprising curiosity, indefatigable spirit, tenacity in pursuit, readiness for sensible self-denial and, above all, compassion”. These five pillars have endured for 80+ years from the program’s founding in Aberdovey, Wales, to 11 schools in the United States and 37 internationally.

Sound familiar yet? The phrase “Outward Bound” is represented by the “blue peter” flag, which is flown to symbolize that a ship is departing the safety of harbor and heading out into unknown waters. Is there a better symbol for entrepreneurship? 

The similarities are uncanny. Outward Bound builds better, stronger people, through challenge, adventure, and dissonance, and BEN helps build sustainable entrepreneurs and enterprises by offering support through a myriad of personal and team-based challenges.

At Outward Bound, personal challenges included ropes courses, rock climbing, morning run and dips (in icy water), and perhaps most notably, the seminal “solo”, a time of isolation, reflection, and nature immersion. You’re truly on your own, e.g., I spent four days on a Maine Island, fasting and watching the tide go in and out, ebbing and flowing, my thoughts and journal my only companions other than the morning and evening lobsterman puttering nearby, gawking at me from afar. Doesn’t entrepreneurship feel like that at times? You can feel like you’re on your own, judged, and left to thrive with meager resources, while the reality is that staff support was close at hand, just like entrepreneurs often have teammates, board members, and investors standing by to help.

Once a day, staff in a motorboat would do a rapid driveby to ensure I hadn’t been eaten by a kraken, and instructions were for me to jump up and down, wave my arms wildly, and dance a jig - basically to act crazy - and that would be a signal that I was okay. The lesson for entrepreneurs is that it's okay to act a little crazy to show you’re fine and to invite help by making it clear you’re not. Asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness.

(Side note: the power of a self-imposed solo (e.g., personal retreat day, long hike, electronics off for a half-day, etc.) is clear, yet one often needs a nudge and permission to take reflective time to the next level. Think meditating on steroids, it’s good for your soul and your business. Make the time, bring a journal.)

BEN entrepreneurs are screened for a growth mindset, as well as vulnerability, humility, and coachability. Like Hahn, BEN believes that its entrepreneurs have more in them than they know, that they’ll need to find that deep resilience to succeed, and that impact is an ultimate goal. BEN advisors are often still entrepreneurs, too, and often overcame hardship and perceived risks to find empowerment and fulfillment. It’s the powerful curation of ambitious entrepreneurs and humble advisors that creates impact and sustainability.

Outward Bound ultimately is about service to others, even in the hardest of times. BEN advisors carry that ‘give first, pay it forward’ mindset in every engagement. Sometimes, knowing someone has your back is everything.

As I think about the year behind and the year ahead, I’m convinced that entrepreneurship is about self-actualization that begets enduring businesses that foster economic development, professional freedom, societal impact, and thus personal and professional legacies that inspire others to take the entrepreneurial journey. The most virtuous of cycles.

In the year ahead, we’ll serve more Signature companies, expand our statewide programming, and curate a record number of matches between entrepreneurs and advisors. I can’t wait.

Thank you for allowing me and the BEN Colorado team to support you on our expedition together. We can’t wait to sail with you to an exciting future together, and we’ll do our best to help you avoid rocks, shoals, rip currents, and even U-boats.