Elisa Birnbaum speaks with pioneering social entrepreneur Bruce Poon Tip about his new book, Looptail: How One Company Changed the World by Reinventing Business. In the interview, the founder of award-winning G Adventures and bestselling author candidly shares his company’s road to success, its varied challenges and the lessons learned from running a business that elegantly balances financial success with greater purpose.
I first interviewed Bruce Poon Tip last year at the Toronto headquarters of his brainchild, G Adventures. Though I had been avidly following the evolution of his company for years, impressed by its unique social entrepreneurial approach and much-celebrated corporate culture, after that meetup (you can view the video interview here) I was a believer.
For one thing, here was a guy who not only talked the talk but walked it too. Sure, G Adventures has established itself as the world’s most successful adventure travel company—with operations in over 100 countries and serving more than 100,000 inspired travelers a year. But it goes beyond that.
The company also carved an impressive reputation for its dedication to sustainable tourism and community development. In 2003, armed with a belief in the value of giving back, Poon Tip founded the Planterra Foundation, with a mission to raise funds for communities where G Adventures operates. The foundation today boasts close to 40 projects worldwide – supporting communities in the areas of education, healthcare, environment and social development.
Here’s the other thing I enjoyed about my meeting with Poon Tip: he was honest, candid and forthright. Essentially, he was everything that most interview subjects aren’t. And it was refreshing. Thankfully, that’s exactly the voice I found in his new bestselling book, Looptail. And it pays off. Part memoir, part business book and even part self-help, this story is a riveting, heartwarming and inspirational account of one man’s entrepreneurial journey. It’s no surprise that Inc. Magazine named it a “Best 2013 Book for Entrepreneurs” and that it debuted on the New York Times and Globe and Mail’s bestsellers lists, at #4 and #1 respectively.
The book traces a veritable roller-coaster ride of success – from the company’s launch and very first steps (thanks, in part, to a generous couple, the details of which you’ll have to read for yourself), to its varied challenges and bold decision-making that led G Adventures to where it sits today, an award-winning company with an endless list of accolades. Along the way, we meet a host of intriguing characters like the Dalai Lama – and my personal favourite, Richard Gere — and we learn about entrepreneurship from a unique, thought-provoking and highly entertaining vantage point.
Certain themes permeate the book, including Poon Tip’s intense focus on branding, employee engagement and corporate culture. And then there’s his unabashed commitment to social responsibility, a commitment he adopted far before social entrepreneurship became the trendy, hot-button bandwagon upon which others cling to in spades today.
Not only did he pioneer a socially responsibility approach to business, Poon Tip achieved something many social entrepreneurs struggle with: profitability. The founder of G Adventure makes no apologies for that profit motive – just not at the expense of purpose. Sure, there were struggles, there were dark days, and even a dark year or two. But Poon Tip figured out a way to make it work – tremendously well, proving himself a model for others.
It’s hard to imagine a company today that doesn’t incorporate social responsibility into their mission. For those looking how to do it right, look no further than Looptail.
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You talk in the book about “Disruptive Innovation”. How important is that approach to your success and would you advise other entrepreneurs to adopt it too?
For me, it’s everything. It’s not necessarily for everyone but I’m in a very crowded space so for me the only way is to be disruptive. For example, last year we launched tours to Australia for the first time. For years we’d been asked to do tours in Australia. There are a thousand companies running tours up and down the coast. But we couldn’t just run tours like everyone else and we never thought we could run our brand promise in the developed world, without getting heavily criticized.
So it took us years to develop Australia in ways we could do it differently. We started relationships with Aboriginal communities, we stay at a sheep farm, do spear fishing, we listen to stories from the elders, all kinds of different things. We don’t do buses – we take trains, boats, do everything fun on the way up the coast. And our tours just exploded down there. We went from zero to 5000 passengers overnight.
For us, everything we do has a disruptive component to it. But, again, it’s not for everyone. There are different types of entrepreneurs. Very few create new industries, new products. Lots of entrepreneurs own franchises. The entrepreneur that puts new products in front of people that they never thought of before, are very rare and even fewer in Canada – you can count them on one hand.
You say you have a “change-or-die” mentality and speak a lot about the need to embrace change. In fact, every five years or so you reinvent your company in some way. Can you explain the importance of change?
Yes every five years we go through change. I’m in my fifth year cycle now – my staff is very scared [he laughs]; I’m making tons of changes here. I think you have to feel it. You can’t push it. It has to feel organic and it depends on your industry too. You always have to stay sharp in my industry, you have to stay nimble, no matter how big you get. To me there’s huge value and currency in being nimble as an organization.
We continue to grow at a rapid pace of 40%, huge numbers now. But you hit plateaus at times and you have to restructure the business to stay nimble. If I had the same structure in 2000 or 2005, we would be half the staff. We could still be a great company, a very profitable and exciting company. But we’ve been a startup for 23 years. That’s what people find amazing. We’ve had double-digit growth with our business for 23 years. And that comes with pain. A little bit of pain for gain.
So can I assume there’s lot of change on the horizon now? For an outsider looking in, you seem to be at the height of your business success. What more do you want from this company?
Yes, tons. I can’t become complacent. I’m terrible [laughs]. We don’t fire people. I just dictate what I need and people are either onboard or not. There’s great stuff going on. It’s very exciting times. I love it but you have to ask them! [the staff]. Right now we are restructuring. We are growing so quickly. We are a $250 million organization so we’re not tiny. We have over two thousand employees. We have to work harder to be quick to market – and still be able to be nimble.
If you work in a business, you know the times you’re stalling because you’re not getting good communication, these things happen over time when going through growth phases. But when you have five years of double-digit growth every year and you don’t take stock and re-evaluate how you restructure your business, to ensure you’re prepared for the next level, you start putting bandaids on things. And that becomes very ineffective.
What are some new initiatives you’re undertaking?
Last year we launched a relationship with IDB [Inter-Development American Bank] and we’re now developing all those projects, with Planeterra doing a lot of international development. At the same time, we’ve been called on to consult with different countries on sustainability. We’ve been down to Haiti and are talking to Colombia on how to build tourism in their region. These are all unchartered waters, and it’s rare air right now because there’s never been a company that looked like us.
Speaking of IDB, many in the social enterprise sector talk about the need for cross-sectoral collaboration. You had some frustrating experiences working with NGOs in the past. What did your collaborative experience with IDB recently teach you and vice versa?
It’s definitely different. The IDB and MIF [Multilateral Investment Fund] are twin dinosaurs. We have way more people than needed to work [on these projects] and there’s so much reporting that needs to be done back to them. If I had to figure it out myself, I’d go mental. And it wouldn’t be worth it; time is money for us. We just view things differently.
But now that we have Planterra, their mandate can be more entrepreneurial, yet still very innovative. We’re learning a ton from each other. IDB loves us and thinks we’re “cute” and we can teach each other so much. They see how successful private enterprise can be – they’re studying it so much and it will have a positive impact on their view of working with the private sector.
2007 was a defining year for you. You faced some major challenges and had to step up with bold decision-making. What did you learn about yourself that year and how did it impact your next steps?
As an entrepreneur, you hit very high highs and very low lows. 1997, for instance, was very low low and I had some high highs in between. Going through the Explorer [referring to the sinking of their tour cruise ship, the M/S Explorer off the coast of Antarctica, an incident Poon Tip referred to in the book as “our company’s greatest test”] and then getting a $100-millon offer to buy the company, for me reawakened my urgency and also gave me a new purpose.
It allowed me to create my new purpose, of why I wanted to be here. When I was dead broke and we were bankrupt and someone offered me a million dollars in 1997 [an offer he received toward the beginning of the company’s history], it seemed like I could live off it forever, considering at the time I was living in a garage, bankrupt, couldn’t pay my bills etc. But 2007 was that kind of awakening when I knew I had to really redefine my purpose.
In the book I talk about the summer of despair – that was a very long summer. I had come to the conclusion that I still had enough gas in the tank but it was a very cathartic, difficult time. Entrepreneurs are notoriously self-centered, they’re egomaniacs. Not me but others [laughs]. So to self-evaluate like that is very difficult. And very painful. Entrepreneurs don’t like to admit mistakes.
But all of that just came together for me, it was a turning point. I took all the stuff I learned about happiness, purpose and a more spiritual side to life. I mean, business to me up until 1997 was considered cold, black and white, right and wrong and unemotional. I was taught that from the very beginning, that that’s what business is, and I made myself out to be that person.
In the book you share the story of a couple whose generosity helped save your company, at the very beginning. Explain your ongoing relationship with “paying it forward” and Karma.
I came into Karma early. I always felt guided by what I was doing and knew I had to listen to my heart more. My company shouldn’t exist with that act of kindness. They gave me substituted Karma. I was grateful to two people but didn’t look at it more holistically, that I can create it and that it could be a perpetually good energy. The real turning point was 2007 when I changed everything. It took me a decade to incorporate it all. To absorb it, have my own experiences, stabilize my company and then realize that this is my destiny.
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Elisa Birnbaum is the co-founder, publisher and editor-in-chief of SEE Change Magazine, and works as a freelance journalist, producer and communications consultant. She is also the president of Elle Communications.