Castle Hill Values - 4 of 4 - Control
There was a point in my career where I had 4 jobs in 4 years…and not by choice. These career transitions were the direct result of the decisions and actions of other people. The decisions of bosses, colleagues, and corporate chieftains affected my life and the security of my family. Fire me once, shame on me. Screw with my security 2..3…4 times? Extra shame on me. It’s time for a change!
As I recovered from these events and evaluated my employment options, a question kept popping up, ”What is it about working for someone else that is LESS risky?” Considering the career volatility that I was currently experiencing, I had no good answer to that question. So I started Castle Hill.
What became clear is that while entrepreneurship is hard as hell, you have control to make your own decisions and mistakes and move at your speed and pick the risk you want to take. When you take control, you’re swapping short-term revenue risk for career instability risk, or bad month performance risk, or boss gets divorce risk. I refused to be subjected to the same decisions of others. It was time to make my own decisions.
Control at Castle Hill takes many forms:
Time: Work on your timeframe, not someone else's. Get up at 4:00 AM or work until 1:00 AM. No unnecessary face time or internal meetings.
Compensation: Compensation is contractual and formulaic. No more discretionary bonuses or capricious HR moves or netting risk or that can affect one’s compensation.
Clients: Choose the teams, strategies and opportunities that you represent. Don’t attach your name and reputation to mediocre strategies or questionable characters.
Counsel: When you are independent and contractually compensated you can offer clear, value-added advice and counsel. You do not have to bite your tongue because you fear an awkward conversation with the boss affecting your year-end bonus. The clear alignment of interests allows for the best possible collaboration model.
Investor interaction: You decide how to manage your sales and marketing effort based on the information needs of your clients - not be dictated to by those less experienced. It builds even more trust and depth in the relationship to avoid introducing something that is clearly not of interest or outside their comfort zone.
Project Flexibility: Whereas I started out with expertise in hedge funds, I found that I could represent private credit, specialty finance, commodities and private companies equally well.
Materials: Send out what you know works. Make sure what you send meets your standards.
Nothing is easy about what we do but when you are in control of your own business - you don’t have to adhere to someone else’s schedule, reporting infrastructure, or idea of what your job should be…you can just get to work.
Life’s too short. Take control.