“The only thing worse than starting something and failing… is not starting something.”
– Seth Godin
Success in business is a long game.
It starts out slow with a small glimpse of where it might go long term.
It begins with a vision and commitment of one person or a team who see the need for the product or service, recognises the value they can add in delivering it to their customers or better still identify a service or product that’s not in the market but is severely needed.
What’s not seen from the outside is the drive, deliberations and decisions that become necessary along the way. They are all a matter of course along the entrepreneurial journey. But when a business is selected among its peers as best in class for an aspect of its business, a celebration is in order and acknowledgement that success is a long game.
Success is a long game in the case of Cahir and Company, William and I recognise it’s been a 40-year journey in the making. Liam Cahir Solicitor, our dad, began the business 4 decades ago. The extent of technology then was a typewriter, and even with that, I am unsure you could call the clickety-clack clickety-clack of the manual typewriters the earliest technology in our profession. But none the less, the tools of the trade had advanced from the Quill to notebook and pen for shorthand to the high rise typewriter and dial telephone. Technology has progressed, but the speed with which it did, has really only gathered momentum in the last decade. It is a known fact that innovation is vital if a business is to stay relevant. Little by little, we advanced gradually our tech expertise and implemented more technology in the last decade. Some have worked, and some have failed miserably, but it’s the courage to try new things, the effort to implement and often the decision to recognise what’s not working and move onto the next piece of technology that mattered.
We may be a traditional law firm but we are a modern law business, and we are delighted to accept the 2018 Award for Innovation in Technology in Business. We decided over a decade ago that talking about how technology would disrupt our business would not assist us to stay ahead and we made a commitment to dip in our toes. Each year we would recommit and add more technology or throw out some as the case may be. Over the recession, we had a choice to keep investing or stop for a few years. We choose to continue to invest, all be it on a smaller scale, but the small steps consistently made lead to standout results.
So what have we learnt along the way? Action speaks louder than words, and although new technology is daunting with the right team and mindset we can embrace the tech aspect of the 21st century without fear!
Listen back to some comments from all the winners at the Ennis Chamber Clare Business Excellence Awards 2018.
“The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity.”
– Amelia Earhart