How four people, their comments, their insight, and their support has driven the first 100 days of Digital 51.
‘Just make sure you force yourself to have some downtime, otherwise you will find yourself 2 years in without having taken a holiday!’
This message dropped into my inbox just yesterday from Andrew Bloch, PR and CEO extraordinaire. I know this is going to be ‘one’ of my personal challenges, work life balance as people call it has never been my forte! 100 days in with 1 day taken off during that time is proof alone.
In my defence below is a short story of the last 100 days:
We opened the doors for Digital 51 on March the 1st 2021, a date that will now be forever etched into my memory.
We signed our first exclusive 5 role partnership project 48 hours after opening the doors. We secured the first person into a role for that business 4 days after that. We were up, we were running. 24 days after signing the original agreement all 5 roles were offered, accepted, and booked to start.
The people who we worked with during those first 3 weeks all knew we were very much in green, start-up mode, but they liked what we were doing. However, I don’t think they will ever know how important they were in getting us off the mark.
From there it has been a wild, eventful, challenging and an immensely rewarding whirlwind of days. I certainly won’t sit here and wax lyrical that everything has been amazing. I would be lying if I did not admit there have been times when I have fleetingly questioned ‘what am I doing?!’ But the desire to build something, establish something and ultimately be an employee-owned business is so powerful to me.
‘I’ve been so disorganised; week has not gone as I wanted! I run the risk of a negative spiral, so I’ll stop there and pull my socks up!’
When going through WhatsApp messages from the first month I came across this one I had sent to Farooq Mohammed, my current sounding board. This shows the roller-coaster of emotions as 24 hours later I sent Farooq some amazing news we’d received in a video update as I bounced home!
This message however is a reminder that time management continues to be one of my personal challenges. Even as I type these words I can hear my Viking comrade Jeremy Snell advising me; there is enough time in everyday, however it’s my decision how I use that time. As always I remember Jeremy is right.
‘I am just going to ask, can you still do it mate? Can you really go back on the tools?
I will always love Kevin Hogan. Kevin is a friend first and foremost, a friend who came from long days working and ‘socialising’ in the City, but he is also a recruitment machine. I spoke to Kevin at the turn of the year and told him my news. I was leaving my leadership role at Digital Gurus to setup my own agency, and central to that would be me leading from the front; back on the tools. Kevin asked the question so many were thinking, ‘how long has it been since you have been on a desk Simon? Can you still do it?’
I will leave it for others to decide whether I can still ‘do it’ or not, but Kevin reminded me how important it is to surround yourself with inspiring people who are honest with you. This question as much as anything else has driven me out of bed and into battle everyday for the last 100 days.
Thank you my old friend.
So that’s it, 100 in the bag, lots learned, lots still very much to do, and much more to achieve.
Digital 51 was formed on 3 core values – Freedom, Expression, Personal Choice. The journey continues.
This article was written by Simon Brown, Founder of Digital 51 and time management trainee. Simon would love to know your thoughts on this article, so why not drop him a line on