On Tuesday, Jason headed down to London to join the 15 year anniversary celebration of the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses scheme. He’d expected an enjoyable evening surrounded by friends from the alumni, but was rather surprised to return with an award.
The 10,000 Small Businesses course (10ksb) is a mini MBA business course, on which business owners dive deep into their business with the help of some fascinating lectures and workshops. Jason took the superb course back in mid 2019. He loved the learning and challenges, but found the greatest benefit was the alumni, particularly the fellow members of Cohort 10, and the amazing growth group he was in, The Rebels.
Jason knew that he’d been nominated for the Resilience Award, which was to be announced at Tate Modern. However, like his fellow nominees, he knew the quality of the competition, and figured shortlisted was a great achievement, so just sit back, enjoy the evening and congratulate the winners. However, that wasn’t how the evening panned out.
Sitting in an amazing building, surrounded by hugely inspiring people, as the judges read the story of the person about to be announced as the winner of the Award for Resilience, Jason was in complete denial that there was any chance it’d be him. Though it did cross his mind that ‘the story sounds a bit like mine’. And that’s because, it was! So after successfully avoiding falling up or down the stairs to the stage, he came away with a substantial gong and a lot of congratulations.
Knowing the resilience story of many other alumni members, Jason was in two minds about promoting the win. As his great friend Graham (a fellow Rebel) said, that’s just imposter syndrome, you deserve this award because people have nominated you.
So why did Jason win?
Well the lovely people who nominated him, said it was because the last seven years have been interesting for him and for Deepdale, yet the businesses have continued to flourish despite the challenges.
That’s a fair summation of the time since the course. As many of you will know, Jason’s father, who was also his business partner, died in September 2019. While contending with the grief and the fall out of that, weather in early 2020 caused significant flooding of Deepdale Farm, forcing a complete rethink of the way the land was farmed. And having thought ‘2020 hasn’t started well’, it got significantly worse with Covid hitting and the tourism business having to close for much of the next year. Then in 2021, Jason had to step back from all the businesses. The past couple of years had caught up with him and he was struggling with his mental health. The term ‘burnt out’ would be used in many businesses, but Jason prefers to call it what it is, a mix of anxiety and depression brought on by the pressures of work.
Thankfully, the incredible support and love of his wife and daughter helped keep Jason going long enough to find a way to step back. He passed the running of Deepdale Farm over to his two sisters, Fiona and Anna, which was a huge baptism of fire for them, but one they have embraced and are enjoying. His business partner in the tourism business, Chris, took on even more responsibility for Deepdale Camping & Rooms, and promoted two team members to management roles. And Estelle kindly took on the day to day management of Dalegate Market.
Jason thought he’d have to step away completely, but with the support of his incredible business partners and team, they helped him find the right balance where he could continue to be involved, while stepping away enough to allow him space. No person is an island, and Jason is very aware that none of the last seven years of development and change could have happened without the incredible support of a lot of amazing people, who cared, supported and worked incredibly hard.
One of the main things nominations identified, is that out of each crisis the Deepdale teams created opportunities. From the flooding came the move to organic and regenerative agricultural practices on the farm, rebuilding the soil health, and supporting wildife. From Covid came a complete redesign of the offering from the tourism business, changing the setup of rooms in the Stables and Granary, and investing in new services and facilities. From Jason’s mental health crash, came the opportunity to bring in family and other team to new roles, and redefine Jason’s involvement.
It won’t be a surprise, that although it was Jason who stepped onto that stage at Tate Modern, he was on the shoulders of an incredible support network. So Jason wants to dedicate the award to his amazing family, business partners and team. Thank you to them all, without them the last seven years would have been very different.
Thank you to everyone who nominated Jason too, and congratulations to all the other nominees and winners, particularly Jason’s hugely inspiring friend Angela Spang, the other Cohort 10 winner.
Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses Course
If you run a small business, then you should definitely do the course. Its free, but a big commitment in time, and quite a complex application process. However its well worth it, and if you find a growth group like Jason found in The Rebels, or your cohort is as proactive and connected as Cohort 10, then you will have won in so many ways.
www.goldmansachs.com/community-impact/10000-small-businesses/uk
