The 2016 Alberta Fast Growth 50 List. Adster Creative Makes the Cut!
The team at Adster is honored to be listed in Venture Magazines Fast Growth 50 2016 Edition. For the past 16 years, the Fast Growth 50 program has been the most prominent ranking of Albertan businesses with significant growth in revenue, assets, capital expenditures, client retention / satisfaction and employees! A huge shout out to our wonderfully talented and dedicated staff, our clients and our colleagues, and here’s to making 2016 the best year yet!
Adster Creative was also asked to answer a few questions to be published in the January edition of Venture Magazine, Q&A can be found here:
1. What’s the top entrepreneurial tip you’ve received in your life, and from whom did it come?
‘Follow your dreams and do what makes you happy’ – Mom & Dad.
While it loosely qualifies as an entrepreneurial ‘tip’ (and is maybe even a tad hokey), my parents unyielding support – regardless of what idea I was getting behind – has been invaluable.
Their instilling of key values and virtues such as faith, confidence, and humility provided a strong foundation to deal with the uncertainty and risk required in conceptualizing and executing on big ideas, the passion to rally incredible people around those ideas, and the perseverance to succeed.
2. Which Albertan businessperson do you most admire and why?
In our journey, we’ve had the privilege of meeting hundreds of entrepreneurs and business owners from varying backgrounds, all of whom have had an influence on us. I’ve found that there’s no shortage of ‘experts’ willing to give you their opinions, theories and tips on what you should, and shouldn’t do, and many times, are more than happy to dispense this wisdom with or without request. In my experience, these “experts” very rarely practice what they preach – enter Art Angielski, Alberta’s king of automotive radio. No other business person that I’ve had the privilege of meeting embodies the “walk the talk” mantra better than Art.
It’s apparent that Art very much loves what he does and has carved out a role for himself in his endeavors that’s a perfect match for his personality and ambition. Art clearly demonstrates his entrepreneurial passion by being involved in numerous businesses, some silent … and others not so silent.
Art is very effective in rallying to his cause the individuals needed to realize his goals, but is equally happy operating in any level of business venture that he wishes or enjoys.
3. Which businessperson from beyond Alberta do you admire most and why?
While no one individual comes to mind, we would applaud anyone with their sites set on creating innovation in technology. The technology space is fiercely competitive and moves quickly, but provides unparalleled opportunity for creativity and big thinking.
Every day we are continually impressed and humbled by the sheer volume of incredible new businesses with amazing solutions that are passionately pursuing their dreams.
4. Is there a book you would recommend to another businessperson?
For the true entrepreneur, I would suggest ‘Built to Sell’ by John Warrillow. So many business owners we see at Adster have simply created a job for themselves. While this is an admirable goal with more near term financial gains & reward (and indeed creates the luxury of ‘being your own boss’), this book talks about creating a business that is something larger than the individual, and a stand alone entity that can operate without you.
If the idea of truly building a ‘business’ resonates with you, this is an inspiring read.
5. An author?
An admittedly popular answer and author, I am very fond of Malcolm Gladwell’s work (especially the first few books). While not directly business related, the sweeping perspective Gladwell provides on topics like success are fascinating, and transcend many traditional business concepts found in garden variety entrepreneurial books.
6. Do you have an inspirational quote pinned to your metaphorical (or real) corkboard? What is it?
Know thyself.
In our entrepreneurial experience (and indeed in those we’ve met), we started off doing it all and quickly became the personification of ‘jack of all trades, master of none’. When scaling, it becomes painfully apparent that we as leaders must evolve, and focus on those things that we truly excel at.
Take an honest, critical inventory of yourself, focus on where you’re strong and surround yourself with quality people where you’re weak. Be realistic about what can be effectively delegated, and contrarily, where genuine personal development is applicable.
7. What has been the greatest challenge with growing quickly and how have you managed it?
It would likely come as no surprise that balance is one of the greatest challenges with rapid growth. Business and work soon become all encompassing, and the ‘bubble’ from which we operate contracts to a very claustrophobic size. Further, the ‘more is better’ mentality is exponential; how much growth is enough?
Rapid growth tends to manifest itself in other areas of your life – specifically one’s identity and self image. Business successes or failures soon become synonymous with personal success which can become a slippery slope. Setting goals, creating boundaries, and adopting a regime of physical, mental, and spiritual self maintenance is key to managing these exciting, yet stressful periods.
8. What are you doing to ensure growth during these troubled economic times?
As a digital marketing agency, it’s imperative to ‘practice what we preach’ insofar as adopting a consistent marketing message. We have, and will continue to stay consistent with our marketing efforts, but will measure this output and its effectiveness a little more diligently during these ‘troubled times’.
Adherence to this process will help to ensure that Adster’s value proposition continues to resonate clearly with our target market in varying verticals and stages of economic flux.