Can Working Remotely Foster Growth?

William Kyle moved his company from San Francisco, CA to Lexington, KY, and now runs it from Lisbon, Portugal. Along with a tour operator business in Italy. Curious about how to manage remote work teams, how distance can foster growth? Ask William, CEO of hydra Brands and Resonate Tours.

 1:10-1:45 – sound of handbells…

 6:45 – “It (COVID and hiring a new COO) allowed me… to see the possibilities of expanding… living away from the office, away from the manufacturing, away from the day-to-day, that we could do a lot of things remotely that we didn't think we could do before, because the technology wasn’t there, or we didn’t make the leap.”

7:26 – … the best part of working off-site “it has made it obvious that there are people doing work autonomously, that I might have micro-managed before… and how they’re doing work and we have a project-based system and we’re using technology and people have stepped up, out of my (CEO’s) shadow.”

10:20 – “Before I was feeling like I had to make all the decisions, and this made it so I could delegate more effectively, being farther away, I had to delegate.”

11:42 – “From a personal standpoint this has been fantastic, growing as an entrepreneur and owner and understanding what my strengths are.”

22:45 – Advice for other CEO’s leaning into remote work: “Understanding how to make best use of technology is absolutely critical… and you have to stand your ground… take those moments and opportunities and reinvent if you need to.”

 25:37 – “… and now our sales manager is in Montana, I don’t know if we would have hired a remote sales manager… now we have a team that can operate differently than before, so in some ways we reinvented how we do business.”

27:35 – “All of that seems to have been catalysts for making distance help the growth of your business… I have not let place ever get in the way of what I want to be doing.”