Tech entrepreneur and author Karen Dendas (©Ad Astra Photo Studio)
From pitch in the mailbox of a publisher to a place on the longlist for ‘Management Book of the Year’ in about a year’s time, it’s a timeline that many authors would sign up for. Karen Dendas did it with ‘YOLOpreneur’, a book in which she converts her own practical experience into a bite-sized manual for every entrepreneur who wants to become indispensable in his own company. But how did Dendas manage to do that herself, so that she could work on the book, her company and herself? We asked her.
Karen Dendas is co-founder of Datalink, founder of Teamify and recently also author of YOLOpreneur. Datalink was the first company in the row, and also the breeding ground from which the two branches grew. “I started Datalink when I was twenty, together with my partner. We applied for our VAT number when we had been together for about six months,” the entrepreneur laughs. “But we are a good tandem. Where my partner was always the technical brain, I was more of the visionary entrepreneur who wants to make things bigger. That interaction made our story catch on.”
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Knowing more?
What followed for the IT company was the classic story. “First it was one more two-men-showuntil at some point you come to the realization that you need a team. So you start recruiting and before you know it you suddenly have a lot of ‘assistants of your own’ walking around. Until then, we were guided by gut feeling, which led us to micro-manage and thus remained the key figures ourselves.” And that worked… in the beginning. “The fundamentals were good and the company grew. Until we realized that our employees were doing well, and could, for example, take regular holidays, but that that was still not an option for us.”
Transformation project on vacation
The real click, that came during the trip. “The two of us went abroad, but actually our entire office was in our suitcase. We were still answering questions from employees and customers all the time, but at the pool.” It made Dendas and her partner decide to set up a transformation project.
“First of all, I wanted to make sure we weren’t essential anymore. So we started looking for tools for repetitive things and gave people more responsibility so it wasn’t just the Karen-and-Danny show anymore. Then, together with our team, we carefully documented all the knowledge that was in our heads. Our software developer has developed a platform especially for this. And since then we’ve had a kind of relief, because we didn’t always have to be there ourselves.”
IT entrepreneurs with a helicopter view
That software, Teamify, was eventually even licensed at the request of other entrepreneurs. “But an empty tool is usually not the answer, in the end it’s about a mind shift. How do you start with that documentation, who should do it, and how? This is where many entrepreneurs get stuck. That’s also why I started writing out our trajectory during the lockdown – until I suddenly had a manuscript. It was my husband who then told me to send it to a publisher. And I did.”
We are IT entrepreneurs, which means that we very often look at processes from a helicopter view. This overview is sometimes lacking in entrepreneurs from other sectors, because they are by nature more experts than real process thinkers
The book is a practical guide to making yourself indispensable in your business as an entrepreneur, based on the shift that Dendas and her partner made themselves in their business. “The fact that our process was so easy to put into a step-by-step plan has to do with the sector. We are IT entrepreneurs, which means that we very often look at processes from a helicopter view. That overview is sometimes lacking in entrepreneurs from other sectors, because they are by nature more experts than real process thinkers.”
Employees play a crucial role
It starts with a helicopter view of your own company, but in the end it is mainly about getting your employees on board, says Dendas. “It helps to have someone who likes structure. In our case, that was an office manager, who really became our sidekick for the project. You can also do that with consultants, but the difficult thing about it is that they disappear after a while, while the shift has to live on in the culture of your company.”
Keeping your employees small is a well-known pitfall for perfectionist entrepreneurs
To keep that alive, Dendas made sure that the knowledge base they built was actually useful. “We started with the most important, most common processes, so that people quickly realized the added value. The documentation we draw up is also very practical, just think of checklists that you can check off, or model e-mails that can be used as is. By tackling it that way, we didn’t really feel any resistance.”
On the contrary, she says. “Employees are happy with more autonomy.But being able to give that autonomy is not easy. “Keeping your employees small is a well-known pitfall for perfectionist entrepreneurs. But if you give them confidence, they will develop even more. It’s surprising what can happen when you take a step back.”
Choose your own role
It is not the case that Karen Dendas has handed over everything, she emphasizes. “I still do certain things myself, but those tasks are transferable. You have to keep doing things you like to do. For example, I still do a lot of marketing myself, but with a freelancer who could take over if necessary. My husband still enjoys auditing and improving IT infrastructure, so he continues to do so.”
“It is nice that as an entrepreneur you can choose: this is my role and I can let go of everything else that I am less strong at. It was difficult in the beginning, but the tools and checklists have made it easier because you know there is a method available so that the team will not forget anything.”
It is nice that as an entrepreneur you can choose: this is my role and I can let go of everything else that I am less strong at
At the moment, Dendas only works operationally in the business for ten hours, the rest of the time she works on strategies, processes and who knows, even a new book. “Before I wrote YOLOpreneur, I made sure I was dispensable so that at one point I only worked four days in the business and had one day left to work on other cases. Now it’s even the other way around: I work one day in the business and four days on growth, strategy and new projects. That’s a big switch, but I’m lucky to be able to count on a team that likes to pull the cart.”
What does Dendas do with that time gained? “I want to write a book about that,” she laughs. “You are looking for a thing that is not working, to perfect it. Or you take something that just works well, to maximize it. A concrete example of this: last year our office manager was on maternity leave for a while. I took that role back myself to see what I could improve on. For example, there was still a lot of room for automation, so that the entire function could be rethought. It is only by doing such things that you begin to question existing habits again.”
Learn from the experience of others
The entrepreneur herself has also benefited greatly from other books. “I don’t read novels, only management books”, says Dendas. “I like to learn from the experience of others. I became an entrepreneur from a non-academic perspective, so I wanted to supplement that knowledge in a practical way.”
I am sure that with the knowledge I have today, after fifteen years of entrepreneurship, I would not have started as a jack of all trades
“My favorite book is The E-myth. It describes how you should view your company as the first branch of a very large franchising. By that they don’t mean that you really have to do that, but that you do have to organize your company in a way that you can multiply it as a chain.”
But Dendas could also have learned a lot from her own book in the early years. “I am sure that with the knowledge I have today, after fifteen years of entrepreneurship, I would not have started as a jack of all trades. Instead of switching from one role to another, I would have proactively thought about the role that best suits my talents.”
