I really had to share this beautiful letter our Founder and Chief sent out to our company this morning. If you believe that love and respect cannot thrive in a corporation, you are wrong. It’s completely inspiring that Shawn left his job 8 years ago, and now oversees 100 employees in 11 offices around the country. Centro was recently named 119 in Inc Magazine’s 500 Fastest Growing Private Companies. Well worth the read.
-kc
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Centrons,
Good morning, I hope you’re feeling like champions this morning.
I’m emailing to let you know it is Centro’s 8th birthday today!! It was eight years ago today, 10/15/01, that Intégrent (Centro’s first name) was officially incorporated. And so, the story began…
Wow. Eight years. I was 29 when I started Centro, now I’m 37 (and, I think, now considered the old guy in the company;-). I guess time does fly when you’re having fun!
I remember vividly quitting my job with not much in my bank account but some ridiculous belief that I could do it better. For those interested, the closest way I can describe what it feels like to quit your job without a safety net, not get a steady paycheck every two weeks, not know if you’ll ever make a dollar with your idea, not know if this is the dumbest thing you’ve ever done and not know if you’ll end up bankrupt in the process is equivalent to jumping from an airplane without a parachute and knowing that you need to figure out how to grow wings and learn how to fly before you hit the ground. Haha…it was a crazy time.
When I talk about doing it better, I didn’t just mean doing local online better (although I thought that too), but that I could build a better type of company. One where people enjoyed coming to work each day. And one where we could take business seriously but not take ourselves seriously. Where we could create rules based on a new generation of thinking and new philosophies. And a place where the company would do its best to take care of its people and the people would do what they could to take care of the company.
Eight years later, although we’re far from perfect, I’m soooo happy with where we’re at. Success and growth are extremely important don’t get me wrong, but how you get where you’re going in life is a lot more important than where you arrive. And if the success of a company is measured by the character and integrity of its people, then I consider Centro to be a fantastic success story. I tell other executives in the industry all the time that I’m so lucky and so blessed that I get to wake up each morning and get to come to work with such amazing people.
For some reason, I’ve always considered life to be short. Really short. If we talk about fears, mine isn’t dying…it’s dying not having done all I could do and experienced as much as I could while I’m alive (for anyone who reads or listens to Wayne Dyer, he talks about “not dying with your music in you”–exactly). It’s for this reason, I talk about happiness a lot. I know talking about happiness and happiness in the work place may sound soft or hokey to a lot of people but, to me, it’s everything. I’ve told many in the “Ways of Centro” training that I’m not going to get up and come to work unhappy each day…it’s not worth it to me. Life is way too short to be unhappy.
So, eight years into this, I want to let you know how much I appreciate you. And how impressed I am with you and what you’ve accomplished. And how much I enjoy getting to work beside you each day.
I thank those, from the bottom of my heart, who have been with me for many years and I thank those who have recently joined Centro. The young talent we have inside Centro is both amazing and inspiring. With these folks as future leaders and managers, I believe the next few years are going to be more fun, more exciting and a lot more successful than our first few years. As I’ve said for many years, I believe with the quality of our people, we can set our sights on any market and, over time, we will always win through our passion, hard work, perseverance and doing things the right way—the Centro way.
So, please enjoy this red letter date in history as we celebrate turning eight years old. Happy Birthday Centro!!!
Sincerely,
Shawn
shawn riegsecker | president-founder | centro
