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to a fantastic inventory which it could sell online. You get lucky sometimes!


“We had to handcraft everything back then. Nothing was available off the shelf, there was precious little advice and it seemed that nothing worked. Strange as it may seem to today’s generation it was particularly hard to connect computers together in a network. We would spend hours with monitors on the lines trying to figure it out.”


Space-Time Systems was then sold, which saw Mike continue to work part-time at the company as well as take up external consultancy projects. Mike began work on an inter-bank research project for a Finnish bank that wanted to replace its IT systems and then returned to Midland Bank to work on a strategy project for its incoming Chairman, Sir Kit McMahon. It was during that very project that Mike saw the opportunity to pitch Firstdirect to McMahon. Firstdirect was launched in 1989 with Harris as CEO, and despite creating the world’s first telephone bank, rival banks and the media at the time made fun of it. Did that initial external doubt act as a driving force for Harris?


“I am relatively unaffected by external opinion and I have always just gone for what I believe in” he says. “I do listen to what people say in case they see something that I don’t but their opinion of me or what I’m doing has never ever been a driver for me. I am driven by a vision of perfection – that whole idea of ‘I want to create something that looks like this!’


“Back then industries were scared of this next wave of technology that would inevitably transform their business model and they still are today. Throughout history every industry has been threatened by the next technological wave and the way they respond to it is to ridicule it or ignore


“Say you do become successful - what would be the impact of your company in the next 100 years?”


it, but either way they will have to respond and it is usually too late.


“I used to speak at MIT on a mid-career MBA course and did a lot of research with them into global markets and innovation. Professor Jim Utterback is MIT’s great innovation guru and he wrote a book on the topic. The reality is that large companies don’t innovate and it is start-ups and entrepreneurs who come in and innovate instead. Railways didn’t create airlines, established computer companies didn’t create the PC revolution, big telcos didn’t innovate around mobile or the internet, the list goes on.


“Established companies don’t like risk and it is hard to create change in a big conservative organisation. It is why new entrants to an industry are such a powerful force for change – without them we would all stagnate.”


Along with his work at MIT, Mike regularly takes up speaking engagements with business owners and corporates, where he addresses the architecture needed to create world- changing companies. What signs told him that a start-up was thinking and behaving like an iconic brand?


“I always look for long term vision” says Mike, “and I always ask people the same question. Say you do become successful and leave a legacy - what would be the impact of your company in the next 100 years – what would the company go on to do after you are gone?


“I want to see a big vision. What I was doing at Firstdirect and Egg was recreating banking and financial services – the bank, customer and money relationship had to change to put the customer at the centre. Banks had to start helping customers make the most of their money rather than helping themselves to customers’ money – that’s a 100 year job and it continues with multiple new entrants to financial services, some of whom I’m mentoring and many of who were inspired by, worked for or learnt from Firstdirect and Egg.


“After vision I look for what is needed within the business to make them stand out from the competition in terms of how they look after customers as well as treating their own people. They should embrace big ideas and liberate the human spirit at work. Most workplaces suppress creativity, co-operation and commitment and end


10 entrepreneurcountry


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