4 things that helped me make a radical career change
I once sent an email to 2 million people asking them to send a message to their member of ‘Congres’. I didn’t bother counting the replies alerting me to the typo.
It was a different era of technology. Thankfully, autocorrect makes it rather difficult for me to replicate that error now. Over the course of a decade, I used an evolving set of tools to engage tens of millions of people around the world to take action to change the world around them. I was a digital campaigner for the Democrats in the US and Labour in the UK, Bono’s ONE campaign, and later a regional managing director for Change.org, the world’s largest petition platform.
I was lucky enough to work with many brilliant and ambitious people who were making significant positive changes in the world by using technology to empower people to have their voices heard. I trained other campaigners around the world, and even co-founded Campaign Bootcamp to help out hundreds of others just starting down the career path I’d taken.
But then a year ago I stepped back from my career to start making running shoes.
These aren’t just any running shoes, they’re Kenyan running shoes. They’re designed to link runners around the world to Kenyan running culture and increase the amount Kenya benefits from it’s well earned running reputation. We call ourselves Enda.
There are two big reasons Kenyan running shoes made sense as a new career path for me.
- I’ve been a keen runner since I started training in 2006 for my first marathon. I become obsessed with shoes after transitioning out of big heavy trainers in 2012, and making my own shoes would be a chance to turn a passion into profession.
- I’ve always been driven in my work to try and have as much of a positive impact as possible. Certainly mobilising millions of people to participate in the democratic process was valuable work. But armed with a seldom-used economics degree, I’ve always been aware of the power of markets to shape people’s wellbeing. When I saw the chance to have a significant social and economic impact by creating Kenyan running shoes, I knew I had to take the chance.
We’re certainly not a thriving business yet, but with our Kickstarter campaign cruising past our initial funding goal I’m suddenly reflecting on the major career change I’ve gone through in the past year and how I got here.
First: make space for your dream
I think the phrase work-life balance is misleading. It’s really about having a good work-life ecology, the two fitting together well so that you’re enjoying both work and life. Sometimes this means work and life change. You take time off work for family and friends and sometimes have weeks where you don’t see anyone so you can make the most of a work opportunity. But if you don’t make space in your life, then there won’t be room for your dream to grow.
I met my business partner Navalayo (Nava) at a social enterprise pitching event. She was presenting on a school that would balance physical and academic education. We kicked off a conversation about the potential of sports for social impact, and agreed quickly that one of the most impactful things would be a company producing Kenyan running shoes. Enda was born.
Immediately we both recognised there were (and still are) a huge number of challenges to making this happen, but were so taken with the idea that we started find a path around all those barriers.
Doing this required putting some things aside. Learning to play guitar, reading James Joyce, and political campaigning all got set aside. Big difficult things take time, and Enda has taken all sorts of hours. Getting to where we are now required shifting hours around to have the time necessary to work on Enda.
Second: Networks are everything.
Especially if you don’t know an industry, social recommendations are critical to show the people you are connecting with that you’re a credible person. It’s also the best way to ensure the person you’re connecting with is credible and trustworthy too.
The vast majority of people Nava and I have worked with on making Enda are people we’ve met through dedicated, intentional networking. We’d find someone interesting on LinkedIn and ask for a recommendation. Sometimes a friend would say, “you should talk to my old colleague”. They’d then introduce us to three other people. Eventually we found people to advise us, invest in us, and work with us.
Networks have their limitations, but persistent and purposeful networking is critical to finding the people you’ll work with.
Third: Go Further, and faster, together
There’s a Maasai saying, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” But in both running and business you’ll actually go farther and faster with others.
First, in running both training and racing with a group will help you go faster.
Second, Enda wouldn’t have gone from inception to Kickstarter in a year without two co-founders working together. Many hands really does make light work, and many minds means better and more efficient solutions. Also when one of us has a tough time — a family crisis, illness, or welcoming a new member to the family — we’re there to support each other and pick up the slack. Yes, working with others will always have challenges. We’ve certainly had ours. But if you want to go the distance as quickly as possible, do it with a team.
Finally, it just hasn’t been the Enda team only on this journey. Like running an ultra-marathon, it wouldn’t be possible without an amazing support team. Friends, family, and our spouses, Ilana and David, have made this journey possible. If you’re going to make a big life-change, make sure to be there for those people as often as you can be, because there will be tough moments you’ll need them to be there for you.
Fourth: Admit your weakness and ceaselessly ask for advice.
After our second conversation, Nava and I agreed that we were going to make this happen. We would create Kenyan running shoes. There was just one problem: neither of us had ever made a shoe.
Through extensive networking we found designers and developers who not just helped us create an excellent shoe, but given us critical advice on establishing our brand, business, and production in Kenya.
If we’d just tried to figure it out, we could have bought the books about shoes design and perhaps eventually made something happen. But it’s a counterfactual I don’t need to worry about, because we did admit what we didn’t know and sought out the advice and help we needed.
I can’t say that I’m done with this career change. I’ve yet to go to an expo and certainly Enda has a long way to grow yet until it can be truly be deemed successful. But I’m on the way, and wouldn’t be here without each of these 4 things.
