As you might have noticed during the week some bits and pieces have changed on this site. The biggest change is that every ‘we’ is changed for an ‘I’. When I started Le Petit Garcon more than two years ago I had an idea of building a digital design studio with many employees. Occasionally, there have been employees in various forms; Andreas did some very good programming work for us and these days my wife is also helping me out with admin-stuff.
The other day I read something in ReWork (business book from 37Signals) that caught my attention:
Why grow?
People ask, “How big is your company?” It’s small talk, but they’re not looking for a small answer. The bigger the number, the more impressive, professional, and powerful you sound. “Wow, nice!” they’ll say if you have a hundred-plus employees. If you’re small, you’ll get an “Oh… that’s nice.” The former is meant as a compliment; the latter is said just to be polite.
….
Do we look at Harvard or Oxford and say, “If they’d only expand and branch out and hire thousands more professors and go global and open other campuses all over the world.. then they’d be great schools.” Of course not. That’s now how we measure the value of these institutions. So why is it the way we measure businesses?
Maybe the right size for your company is five people. Maybe it’s forty. Maybe it’s two hundred. Or maybe it’s just you and a laptop.
….
Don’t be insecure about aiming to be a small business. Anyone who runs a business that’s sustainable and profitable, whether it’s big or small, should be proud.”
Maybe it’s just you and a laptop. I realise that I have been working so hard to give the illusion that Le Petit Garcon is something much bigger because I thought that would make it look more professional and successful, instead of cherishing the fact that Le Petit Garcon is a great company providing good design solutions for it’s clients. Today it’s just me and that’s amazing.