At the end of every episode of the Evolve to Succeed podcast, we ask our guests what their definition of success is. We did our first roundup in July last year—we thought it was time to look at some more…
Heather Ashley – Co-founder of Ashley Property Group
“Contentment. If you wake up in the morning and you’ve got a plan for the day that’s going to lift the people around you, and you’re healthy and strong, then I think you’ve pretty much succeeded in life.”
Glenn St-John Colgan – MD at Augmentas
“I would say balance of your mind and balance of your time. I have no issues working seven days a week if it’s in the right place and for the right causes. I also have no problems not working a Thursday if I want to go to my motorbike licence. If you can get that balance in all things in life, that’s what success looks like for me.”
Alastair Humphreys – Adventurer
“It took me years to allow my definitions of things to evolve. For many years I thought, ‘Adventure equals this!’ ‘My identity equals this!’ Even though 20 years was passing and I was very much changing; so allowing your definitions to evolve I think is really helpful and important. These days, success for me would be to get to the end of the day feeling that I’m calm and happy, that I’ve got a thousand words of my next book written, that I’ve been out into nature for a bit and I’ve been a good dad and friend for the day—that’s all I’m after these days.”
Adam King – CEO at SwipeStation
“I wake almost every morning and look forward to the day. There’s something in that day that’s exciting to me or is going to be fun or interesting, or challenging. Of course, it’s not all rainbows and unicorns, but I take great pride that I’ve built a life for myself where every day I bounce out of bed.”
Photo by Jared Rice on Unsplash
Alan Mahon – Founder of Brewgooder
“My dad passed away when he was 38, and I’ve got about seven years until I reach that age. If I get to that age and, for whatever reason, that’s it, my idea of success would be to know I’m happy with the person I am and with the business success I’ve had. If I can leave it all in the field and know I tried to do the thing that I wanted to do, with no barriers, that would be success for me.”
Ruth Saunders – Co-author of ‘Female Entrepreneurs – The Secrets of Their Success’
“We think the success of an entrepreneur is down to having a great idea, but that is not true. The success of an entrepreneur is the determination to be one, the courage to take the leap, the resilience to keep going, the confidence to learn from your mistakes.”
Paul Spiers – Speaker and Founder of The New P&L
“Because I’ve been an entrepreneur my whole life, it’s hard to get past the financial measurement of success—you can’t necessarily be successful as an entrepreneur if you can’t pay the mortgage; that’s got to be part of it, so there’s no point pretending that it isn’t. But, I feel, with my new business, that for the past 18 months, I get up and I feel like I’m doing something with meaning; I feel like I’m doing something that, however small it might be, it’s changing a small proportion of the world. And I feel like I have personal purpose in my life because I genuinely believe in everything I’m doing, and it flavours a lot of the decisions I make both in my business and personal life.”
Marianne Storey – CEO at Dorset Mind
“It’s about having that sense of calm. Being in a place where you are not being sidelined or curve balled by anything; you know that you have the resilience to cope with something, and that you can manage your emotions in a way that doesn’t throw you off course.”
Liz Willingham – Founder of Liz Lean PR
“Being able to live comfortably, not looking over your shoulder financially. To be able to bring a child into the world who is now loving and thriving on the opportunities I’ve created, feels like a huge measure of success. Also, being able to connect with like-minded people on the volume I have, and to work with some amazingly talented people.”