In this episode, I chat with Kyle Redelinghuys about how he manages to stay on top of four business ventures while maintaining good relationships and still has time to exercise at the end of the day. The perfect advocate for starting things, Kyle offers a wealth of knowledge about how to scale businesses sustainably.

Kyle originally hails from Johannesburg, South Africa. His professional history includes working for an international agency, moving to Cape Town and settling abroad in the United Kingdom. Over his career, he’s worked for VISA and several other global corporations, but his forte lies in starting his own companies. BVNK - a core banking startup - an exercise project, Travel Advice API and COVID19 API capture his current attention.

“Overcoming awkward” is all about learning

When a person starts something or just dips their toes into a new industry, concept, idea, or hobby, there’s an awkward phase where things are uncomfortable and they don’t know the ins-and-outs. Most people tend to back out and don’t launch what they want or follow through with their idea. Overcoming - or even leaning into - the awkward feeling is pivotal in launching a business or side hustle. Kyle frames this awkwardness simply as learning taking place:

“Discomfort, where you feel like you know a little bit, but not enough - it’s not a great feeling, but it is where you are learning. That is the most active learning time. I’ve learnt when that discomfort occurs, I’m busy growing. Then I ask myself: Do I want to carry on or not?”

The incentive of reward to start something

Instead of fearing risk when starting something, Kyle chooses the potential the reward as a focal point. If something is exciting and grabs your attention, he suggests that it’s worthwhile going for. He suggests that while the risk is still something to consider, it’s better to think about whether the achievement after the work has been put in, will justify the potential for failure. A question to pose before diving in is:

“Am I pumped enough about the reward which outweighs this risk?”

Satiating curiosity and “filling up” your interest

Often, one of the obstacles curious people hit is just an overwhelming amount of things which intrigue them and having too many interests. With only 24 hours in a day, diving into everything is simply not an option.

Because of time limitations, picking what feeds curiosity almost becomes a calculated consideration. Kyle’s approach to satiating curiosity is to go all into something, researching or reading; spending time and investing energy into it until it’s either not as interesting anymore or until it just becomes a part of his life.

“The baseline is choosing whatever I have found interesting over consecutive years. But then there’s the other side, like an immediate curiosity where I’m interested in a project and I spend everything I can on it. It’s almost like there’s a well there and it keeps going until it’s run out. And then, it’s not that the interest has dwindled, but the fire subsides and I move on.”

Focusing on the big picture and narrowing down

When starting something, it’s easy to keep your head in the clouds and not get to the nitty gritties and launch something with a viable product. On the flip side, it’s easy to lose confidence and enthusiasm if you have only the details in place without a dream or vision. In an ideal world, having both in place is the best approach. As Kyle put it:

“When you’re starting, it’s always in the big picture. But when you focus on the ideal vision, you bring it down to what you can reasonably build or test. If you try to get into the detail without a big vision, you are going to go nowhere because you’ll start and try to plan for eventualities that will never happen.”

Should you delegate or do it yourself?

Founders tend to have a hard time letting go of certain things and often want control over every aspect of their business. It makes sense, especially if it’s something new that they’re excited about. But it’s important to recognise that there is sometimes better use for your time and it’s okay to let someone else step in and do something which will ultimately be better for the business. This is particularly true when starting something while working a full-time job or balancing life at the same time as building a side hustle.

“Sometimes, letting go and outsourcing is the difference between things getting done and not getting them done.”

So doing it yourself is ideal if there is time capacity, because it means you likely have to learn something new and things are done in the way you want them to be. But learning to delegate is crucial, especially when your business starts to scale. 

If you want to get in touch with Kyle or find out more Covid19 API, find him on his website, Twitter, or check out Covid19 API.