2020 has been a difficult year for most of us. Whether it’s adjusting to the work-from-home environment, managing both our work and family life at the same time, or being confined to periods where even visiting our parents is against the law, 2020 has thrown us a multitude of problems that we never expected to deal with.
At DollarsAndSense, we had to cope with our own challenges – some tricker than we expected. While we added a few new people to our team, we also had team members leaving us for greener pasture. We had to quickly adapt to work-from-home and decided this could continue indefinitely, even though many of us still choose to come to the office at least 1-2 times a week (when it’s allowed). During the year, we covered four Singapore budgets and also had two major elections. And let’s not forget, the biggest stock market crash in recent memory back in February/March.
Every year, we set ourselves targets to achieve. For a media site like ours, targets are generally straightforward. Pageviews, revenue and business growth areas.
In spite of the pandemic, we were able to hit our targets for 2020. We also launched DollarsAndSense Business – a site to help SME business owners in Singapore make better business finance decisions.
Equally important, we were able to achieve all these while keeping our operations sustainable.
Perseverance, Passion & People
I would love to list down all the clever strategies we implemented that helped us in 2020 but that would simply distract us from the actual reasons why we managed to achieve what we set out to do in 2020 – Perseverance, Passion and People.
As entrepreneurs, we fail often.
On a business level, we lose clients. At a leadership level, we let our employees – both current and ex – down. At a strategic level, we make lousy business decisions that don’t always make sense in hindsight.
But one thing that keeps us going is perseverance. Losing money, failed projects or poor decisions. All of these sucks but no matter how bad something is, it’s not the end. We can move on. When it comes to building a startup, if you can’t accept failure (or rejection), it’s better to not start in the first place.
By itself, perseverance isn’t valuable if you don’t know what you are in it for. In this regard, it’s easy for us. We started DollarsAndSense because we wanted to help people in Singapore make better financial decisions. Along the way, we decided that this didn’t just need to be our hobby, but our business as well. Today, our passion for what we do at DollarsAndSense is stronger than what it was when we first started.
Which brings me to the final point. People. After all, there is only so much a small team can do. To really impact the world, we have to work with like-minded individuals who share our passion to help people make better financial decisions. And whenever you find such people, the aim should be to work with them for as long as possible. We have been truly lucky to be working with some outstanding talent here.
Whether you are starting a media site, a tech startup or a traditional business, it’s important to remember these three things – Perseverance, Passion and People. You need all three.
To all of you reading this, whether it’s our colleagues, clients, partners, loved ones or readers, thank you for supporting us at DollarsAndSense.
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