Enrique Sacau (CEO of Kneip, a leader in fund data management and reporting solutions for the asset management industry) speaks with Xquadrant's Founder Richard Medcalf.
We are continuing our season "The CEO Learning Curve". Interesting and inspiring CEOs reflect on what got them the top job, what they've learned over the first few quarters in the role, and what lies ahead.
In this conversation, you’ll discover:
- The four things that ideally positioned Enrique for the Group CEO role.
- The "A,B,C" method that helped Enrique turn around the business and sell it to Deutsche Börse within just 20 months.
- Where over-communication really needs to happen, and how that impacts revenue.
- Why success will involve dropping several balls, and letting certain fires burn.
"I work on the assumption that everything is my fault."
Resources/sources mentioned:
"Remember to sign up for our free email series on the CEO Learning Curve"
Subscribe to The Impact Multiplier CEO Podcast
Watch
More of a video person? No problem.
You can watch this episode and discover more videos on strategy, leadership and purpose over on the Xquadrant YouTube channel.
Richard Medcalf
Hi Enrique and welcome to the show.
Enrique Sacau
Thank you for having me, Richard.
Richard Medcalf
Hey, this is gonna be fun because first of all, you're in in very interesting individual. You're a musician and a historian turned CEO turned red regulatory tech or data technology CEO. So there's definitely a story there and then you've had a really interesting journey over the last couple of years. I know you are divisional CEO within equity, and then you manage the 200 million pound profit and loss, you then you then became Group CEO at canape and within 20 months, you kind of turned around that business, sold it on to a much larger group, and you've kind of become a divisional CEO once again. So I think you've had a really action packed couple of years, I'm looking to find out a little bit about your learnings over that that journey.
Enrique Sacau
Of course, and with great pleasure, I suppose I shouldn't say that the musician piece, I'm a bit of an imposter there. Because I studied history as an undergraduate and I wanted to do a PhD to write a book about the uses of music as propaganda. So not knowing anything about music, the advice I got was that I should do a master's in musicology, which I did at Oxford, but when I ran to the music faculty, I was a bit of an alien octopus, because I am not a musician. I studied the piano for two or three years as a teenager, like many middle class people do but there was no real knowledge of the notes, you know, of the score. So they found me a bit strange, but I still enjoyed it greatly and then I did a PhD in what I wanted, but with some kind of grounding of how music gets studied. So just to set the record straight, should any musicians get offended? equal the musician?
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, that's that I understand it. I am. Yeah, I'm a very much similar actually, I play electric guitar. I play guitar but I say I'm a guitarist. I'm not a musician. I got there. Anyway. Let's, let's jump in. Before we go any further, Jonathan, tell us a little bit about what is canine and perhaps just a context about what you're doing before and how you ended up in that business.
Enrique Sacau
Right, I look back at my career after doing my PhD in history and propaganda, was always in financial services technology, it was an exchanging then I was the CEO in Europe of Fnz group, which is now the largest wealth management platform out there, then I joined liquidity as the head of these RegTech business liquidity digital, and eventually can add to my sort of background led me to, to run in a company that's a data taking in the financial services, space sort of regulated business, for kind of high touch financial services institutions. What can I does, in very simple terms, is one of Europe's two leading data management company. So we help asset managers particularly and now increasingly distributors as well, but we help asset managers, particularly to ensure that they can distribute that product by supporting them on the data journey, we start by registering the funds, we create all the documents, the key investor documents that are required for them to be on the market, we then disseminate those documents, we disseminate the data, and we make sure that everything we do regulatory filing with regulators, so we make sure that every bit of data that's necessary for these funds to be bought and invested in is out there in the market.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, so you're really a platform, you know, you kind of provide all the all the infrastructure so that people can then get on with the commercialization of those boats. Exactly. Yeah. Got it. So So looking back what got you ready for that role? You know, or perhaps why do you think you know, you were you were chosen as the man for the job? In Can I was a previous history already had with that business? Yeah, what what did they see in you, do you think? And it's a hard question to ask, but perhaps but you know, what were what was it was the angle that you bought?
Enrique Sacau
So they got in touch with me via headhunting. So I've never met them before and you often I, as I said, one of the leaders in European in Data Management, I think they were, what they wanted about me was that I was the sort of CEOs, often the ultimate generalist, so I have been exposed to all sides of a p&l, the technology, the compliance, the growth, the product, and everything, as a divisional CEO, which I think is a good place to start before you become a Group CEO. I had had that growth focus, and that's what the board can I thought was the priority. When I was appointed. I wonder if they knew what the job was. Whether they would have appointed me or somebody with a different with a different background, but I'm happy to touch upon that and then I think was the relevant industry experience. nd I think once I did those three boxes, it was a question of whether I was going to be temperamentally well suited to join, join the team and the chemistry with the chairman and the main shareholder was just incredible from minute one and that's how we got got it got it down.
Richard Medcalf
I mean, that the growth focus, what kind of questions do you ask yourself? Or did? Were you asking yourself as you went into that business?
Enrique Sacau
I mean, the first question was, is is what this business is the business model of this business, right? So is what they're doing in demand because if what they're doing is in demand, and they offer it, they have to market these adequate, then whether they're going through a good or a bad phase, going back to a music, to music analogy, there is what you have to learn whether the problem was that the piano is broken, or whether the pianist needs to learn how to play the piano. So I sort of satisfied myself as I went into the door, that the piano was okay but there wasn't anything fundamentally wrong with the piano and that people wanted to go to piano recitals, meaning asset managers wanted to listen to piano music and on the back of that, whether the key challenge was growth, or whether the key challenge was still in the piano, whether the key challenge was through replacing the pedal, I said very, it's a bit of a, it's like opening a melon until you've done it, you don't know how DSD is going to be but I knew, I think I got myself satisfied that, that there was something very solid there, even though very transparently, the chairman and shareholder told me that there was quite a bit of fixing to do, and we didn't always be extended to the fixes that was required. When I joined.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, well, my mind is actually racing with all these analogies of broken camos and over mature melons. So it's a great, great visual analogy. But yeah, difference about Yes. Are there structural? Is it's is it a structural problem, that it's yeah, that the business model was not responding to a need? Or is it that there's more pragmatic or more fundamental things just to just to tweak or fix it within the system? So I know, You've been a Group CEO, before, you know, you mentioned you've been very close to CEOs in the past. So what was the difference between perhaps moving from that group CEO role into? So from from the divisional CEO role into the Group CEO role? So was there anything that surprised you about that, or way that you had to adapt the patch you hadn't had to do before?
Enrique Sacau
I think I knew the theory, because I had been very close in reporting to CEOs for a number of years and I carried the back of a CEO before. But, and I think there are four things I had realized when working with CEOs, groups, years, that had, of course, mattered to me and obviously, work confirm when I became one, you told me how they affect you personally. That's interesting. So one is, of course, that companies are not democracies, you know, it's ultimately, everybody goes to the CEO with with the recommendations that the CEO has to make a decision. The second one, I think, is nobody is more incentivized than the CEO, the Group CEO and I'm not just talking financially, which is also true. But also in terms of career. I mean, we've all worked for CEOs that perhaps didn't do so well and then we went to a job interview, it was never our fault, it was always the fault of the Group, Group CEO, you know, and that sort of career drive does matter enormously, that nobody is more invested and the Group CEO and also the Group CEO knows everything that there is to know. So for me, the challenge when I became the Group CEO was, first of all, managing that level of investment and incentivization. So understanding, not letting it become my life and I largely failed to start with, of course, as most of us do, the second one is is kind of walking the line very carefully, because between the statement companies are not democracies to create an a culture of, of people just telling you what you want to hear and I will give myself a pass on that one. I think it's something I manage well, by establishing a culture of trust in which you know, we have a conversation, and other musical analogy. We all agree what is orchestrates play. We can disagree during the rehearsals, but when we go on stage, if anybody plays a different tune, that person is very likely, of course to leave the orchestra very soon and then knowing everything is how much you share and how much you don't share. So we tend to overshare on gossip and under sharing what the people need to know because then it's you know, goes If he's like currency, you traded for things and, and he's only steak I made early on. So being too open about certain things, and perhaps not sharing some of the fundamentals and ensuring that the whole orchestra knew exactly what we were going but these are kind of mistakes that y'all was making and largely, I mean, I think I got that right and we will go to the read results but you know, it's when you're awake at night, looking at the ceiling. Isn't that nice?
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, that's really interesting. Yeah, this idea of oversharing and gossip, because it provides some kind of emotional currency. But actually not giving people in the business context as much. Yeah. How did that, you know? How did that happen? I mean, because I could totally see that I can really understand it. I think it's a great, great point, I think it's really helpful insight is like, what am I actually sharing? How did you come to that realization that perhaps you are not sharing the right thing as the start.
Enrique Sacau
On the gossip runtime as the agent, very little of that? So it was, I think I was good enough to avoid that, because gossip is indeed very toxic. I think what the communications piece is, when you're in a meeting, or you hear a colleague of yours, a direct report of us talking about something in a way that's most emphatically not the music we had agreed to play without any intention and initially, because you're full of fear, paranoia, you think, Oh, what is this person trying to deviate from the party line, but in reality, is that you have not communicated the party line well enough and you have not double checked that the party line has been communicated and I'll confess something. So we have tomorrow, a workshop with all the sales teams to go through the main pitch of our main products, or something, which is 50% of our revenue, very significant and we've replaced the technology last year, which changes the pitch very considerably and over the last three weeks, I've been to sales calls with salespeople with clients and I realized that they don't understand it and of course, they go terribly frustrated with these people. I didn't tell them, but I was frustrated and then three days into the frustration, if this is your fault, that your biggest technology investment, the some salespeople in the company, do not know how to explain it to the client is ultimately your fault to fix the problem. So we're going to go into the orchestra is going to meet up, we're going to discuss these infine until everybody understands why we spend money, we didn't have time in buying these technology that has transformed the future.
Richard Medcalf
I think it's really, it's really important but a lot of times I see companies going through transformations and one of the big issue is the sales guys, they don't sell the new stuff. They're stuck in the old ways that I think scratching the surface, there's a real question about has have really enabled them if we just tick the box on a list of 20 things we need to do and sales enablement is one of those boxes and I suspect that often, we haven't actually done that work of really embedding that new message, right? It's it's one of those high value activities, if you can just increase sales force confidence in what it is they're selling, and why it really matters and what the differentiations really are, then has a huge leverage effect but it's not that sexy work, right doing that kind of workshops and trainings and mentoring isn't that sexy, but I think it has a big effect.
Enrique Sacau
So of course, and also, if it's 50% of your revenue, you have to take it very seriously. So in this workshop, I'm leading myself tomorrow, the reason element of I work on the assumption that everything is mindful that when things don't work, and quoting an ex colleague of mine, he always said that people don't go to the office to do a lousy job. People don't wake up in the morning thinking today, I'm going to mess up big time. That's not how employees operate, because they go home happier if they do a good job and if they get a pat on the back. So if they you're not giving them the tools to do their job, then they have some right that everything is my fault.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, I think it's a fantastic line. I've heard it before I try and apply it to my own life and I suppose for listeners, I want to make that point. Like, if you're not working on the assumption that everything is your fault, then actually, you know, you're disempowering yourself because you can't do anything about it, you end up in a victim kind of stance. And it means that it's really hard to progress where if you really own everything and say everything is my fault. In reality, obviously, you can't change everything but if you actually work on the basis, it's my fault, then we things become possible but with that, you have to give yourself some grace, right? You have to not beat yourself up about it but see it instead as empowerment. Yeah. How did you How do you find are you able to balance that like taking on the responsibility without beating yourself up?
Enrique Sacau
I think so you have to delegate effectively but if you're delegating effectively so forth, so that is not that. I think the line to be very aware of is that we You cannot, everything is my fault doesn't mean I do everything. You know, it's your fault. If you appoint the wrong people and don't remove them quickly, it's your fault. If you don't delegate effectively to authority, if there is no clarity in communication, it's your fault. If you don't take in feedback that would you have decided before it's wrong, and you should change scores. Now, of course, that doesn't mean that you have to do everything because otherwise it's impossible to scale and we all need to scale because we need to make room for other people to grow and we need to make a path for ourselves to continue growing and 43 I hope and intellectually yet I'm not sure Korea was I've gone back to the US and pointed out, but I hope I haven't leaked intellectual because it'd be quite sad. I feel that still Yeah.
Richard Medcalf
So what about this question of managing the level of investment? Right, you said, you failed a bit of not letting it become your life? So I'm curious about that. Right? Because, obviously, a lot of these jobs are very involved and you know, you really into that and so I guess the question is, when you when you talk about that, you know, is it like a kind of a humble brag as in? Well, you know, I was completely into it but that's the way it is. I failed, but I'm okay about it? Or was there actually like a cost to that, that you felt you actually over rotated? And yeah, it kind of suffered as a result? It wasn't sustainable? I'm kind of curious as to, you know, was it just a totally immersive experience? That was, that was fun, even though you meant you lost some of the personal side? Or do you feel that actually, it was, it was a step more than perhaps you need to go?
Enrique Sacau
I mean, I suppose I'll take this advice, I'm not a fan of the expression work like that, because it sort of presumes that when you're at work, you're dead wouldn't work, you're alive, which is something I'm very much alive at work. It's a very fundamental part of my enjoyment and my happiness in life. I think when I arrived at an emergency situation when the company was very, in a very bad shape, and, and it required every minute of the day, and a lot of minutes of the weekend, I think on some level that became addictive. So once we turn the corner, which we did, within, I would say, eight to 10 months and then you start feeling guilty because you go home at eight, that's not healthy and that's not right. Because a company of this size of Kinect, which I cannot reveal, but it's not 200 million pounds, like my previous p&l should not require I work 20 hours a day, every day of the week. It just should not require it. There's something I'm doing incorrectly, if I need to put on one and put in 100 hours but there was a getting us you know, like to that I read recently that Rafael Nadal after winning in Australia, he the first thing he went to the to the to the local woman and hit the bike, and he was pedaling for an hour and a half, which is what of course, he was advised by his doctors to kind of come down gradually and not ruined his muscle. There is a bit of that when you're working under the pressure of existential pressure, we be here in three months or not and what will my CV investment, what will my CV if the market thinks I chose the wrong blades, and then I didn't turn it around, when things to be better do dividends. The other thing is to be better to do this. It's an execution. So you have all these anxieties and then when you're at home on a Saturday, or Saturday, because it's you have this kind of thing in your mind that, oh, you're losing focus now and we can go back to what you were doing three months ago.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, yeah. And it's actually often in those moments of relaxation, that we can be creative actually. One of the things that really impacted me is, is a phrase I heard somewhere I've adopted it, I now steal it uses mine, which is you know, you can be you can be productive, or you can be creative in one moment and it's actually quite painful. Because you know, you know, so much time we run around doing things, ticking things off our list, which is important. But creativity is the opposite of that it is daydreaming a bit it is having a blank piece of paper or trying and going in one direction the music analogy right, you know, you kind of sit down and write a masterpiece of music like productively write it out x notes per second, right? It doesn't work like that. It don't you sit there for two days, and then you might get a breakthrough but where those two days productive? Well, not at the time they didn't feel it, they felt probably painful because you're sitting there with a blank piece of paper. So giving yourself permission, I think is what I'm hearing give yourself permission to not feel to turn off. Yeah. So what would you do with all that in? In in your mind? Yeah, what? What would your top tips be for or for other new CEOs or people who are perhaps stepping up from a divisional CEO role to having that full ownership? Cuz I know you've you've been there you've you've been back again, what would your tips be for those two kinds of individuals?
Enrique Sacau
It's a difficult question because I kind of give you the, the oldest one just being called was growth, engage the teens make sure you communicate, but some of the things I think we have touched upon, already, if I were to, and I continue with analogies, I suppose but there are so many kinds of balls on the table, kind of rapidly approaching the edge of the table but you have to be comfortable letting balls drop, and you have to be very comfortable letting things break but it is, and here comes the analogy I was asked in an interview with my best business training course ever was on it was first aid at work, which I took when I was doing my PhD 15 years ago and it's the idea that, you know, you arrive at the scene of an accident, and there is A B, C, airways, breathing circulation, if you focus on the blood, and the patient has a blocked airway, the patient dies, this may be a very important thing in a company that's in crisis, but apply to less traumatic things like when a deal or you don't win a critical deal. If you focus on see when a is a problem. That is so I suppose the key advice, and I'm afraid there is no recipe for these but the key allies, to any person who's becoming a Group CEO is you must get that one, right. So you must take the time that Saturday, that Sunday, even without realizing to understand what a waste, what breathing and work circulation and you shouldn't even bother about D E, F, because you have too much to do. So letting balls fall off the table is inevitable. We all need to figure out what A B and C is in our business in a different time as well because A, B and C cannot be the first six months was different from A, B and C before the acquisition by torture person. And a, b and c now for sure. Yeah. But I think we're all outrageously well paid not to get that one. Right? And if we don't get it right, then we should lose our jobs and move on and find another job somewhere else. You know, it's there is no on that one there is no, we can't wait it out on the job is that so that is a piece of advice I would give to two people who are coming into that role and you know, just get it right. So which means Think carefully and devote time period. You'll get it right sometimes and actually, it's good right?
Richard Medcalf
Yeah. And it's actually great advice, because there's so many voices, so many things calling on your time, so many fires that could be fought. What you're saying is that some of these fires need to burn, because you can't do everything.
Enrique Sacau
Of course, I'm glad he's so spectacular. Whereas an airway that's blocked, you cannot see it. Yes. You know, you have to open the mouth and look for the for the for the cork that got stuck. Where blood is there. It's inviting blood is beautiful. Do you see blood? Tend to it? Has this kind of red, hypnotizing red black color. I'm afraid that that is if you do that your business will not do anywhere.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, that's that's a great answer. Great analogy, actually. And it's yeah, it's a cool, as you said to reflection, strategic thinking. And what's hard is often people, I think, have lower levels, you actually are almost asked to deal with the blood, right? Often, you know, they'll do that spout off and you build your success credentials. It's because you've made some dramatic and visible changes. Yeah, so sometimes, yeah, you have to move from and then it isn't there this summer. analogy. I can't quite get it. Yeah. But it's but it Yeah, but it's a very visceral visual image. I think it's a fantastic image. So thank you for that. Well, let's move on. And let me ask you some quickfire questions. What's the favorite quote of yours that kind of guides who you are or how you lead?
Enrique Sacau
I think it's one from my mother, because he always said to us being bright is not enough. It may not be even the most important thing and as you need to kind of federate and negotiate and compromise. It's something that I've always kept in mind in business. I have colleagues who are all focused on the right, and I keep on telling them yeah, you may be right, but if they raise you might be cool with that. So that's my mother's my mother's quotation.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, it's nice. Yeah, we'll see. A group that I was I was running last week, you know, we talked a lot about, you know, it's better to have a 70% Good idea with 100% engagement and commitment, way and execution rather than the opposite, right. Having, you know, and presenting good idea, which of course, is never 100%. Good idea. It's just your idea, but at least you think it's 100% good. With only 70% engagement and buy in amongst the team. I think that's, it's really
Enrique Sacau
Yeah.
Richard Medcalf
What about a favorite? What about a favorite app or something you turned to on your phone that you know, that perhaps keeps you going makes you productive? Whatever it is, is there anything that special for you on that? So before
Enrique Sacau
I moved to Luxembourg, 20 months ago, it used to be WhatsApp because I use it all the time. Now, it's BBC sounds. So I can listen to radio three and way before I become even though, I'm a dual nationals, Spanish, and I have all the craziness of British people abroad, like listening to radio for when you were making your cup of coffee abroad in the wilderness of continental Europe.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, that's, that's pretty amazing. Yeah. Because you're born Spanish. If you live in Luxembourg, I think and you have both of the BBC. So I think I do I do concur. Yeah. Have about a book? What's the book that's that's really influenced you and the way that you think?
Enrique Sacau
I think so. If I had to choose a novel, I would say East of Eden by John Steinbeck, which I read 25 years ago, and it allowed me to understand family relationships, I remember being frustrated with my siblings being different from me before then and then the book kind of taught me that it's a futile thing, and that they come from different durations. That, obviously is a very important book and if I could choose another one, I'm very keen reader. I would choose Eric Potsdam, nations and nationalism is exhibiting at which is a book that taught me a lot about how nations are invented one of them. No exceptions and, and that mattered to me a lot as a person interested in history and politics.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, well, actually, we'll hold the question of nations and nationalism is a massive topic at the moment, right? I mean, our world I think it's, it's as big as it ever has been, if not more, in any way. What advice would you give your 20 year old self?
Enrique Sacau
Threat less fretless, I would leave it there, dude is so full of factors. I was a happy boy, I've always been genetic and have a bright side of life that doesn't, but the fretting about the future, we like to fret less.
Richard Medcalf
Interestingly, at this CEO group I was running. It turned out a lot of people had quite a lot of anger, you know, they're often quite anxiety driven people actually, interestingly, you know, which has worked for them in one level, but it also creates that internal journey, which is can be painful and
Enrique Sacau
That if I may, I mean, I don't want to make this section too long but I mean, there is a thing to say when people go through a life changing experience, and then they say, Oh, this has given me perspective and I realized that work matters less than or that what is that these great and I not had that experience, I cannot relate? The truth is that we were all relaxed and happy to enjoy life, then there will be no innovation, there will be no medical advancements, there will be no rockets on the moon. That we are under pressure is okay because otherwise, yeah but the fretting is just so unhelpful. It's it's a feeling that doesn't do anything for you, when you spend your 20s and your 30s fretting God no.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, suddenly, Will said, we look back at it, all the things you fret about, then none of them ever really happened and the really bad things that did happen. You weren't you didn't you couldn't have possibly predicted anyway. I don't think that actually happened and so you know. So, yeah, that's, that's great. fretless I think it's short, simple and I think it's love profound wisdom in that. Many of our guests, my best guests on the show come from referrals. So I'm always curious, you know, who's an impactful CEO, perhaps somebody who's impacted your life, or that you've worked with or you've worked for, you know, who you'd recommend the guests for, for a future episode? And, you know, what do you admire about them?
Enrique Sacau
So I could think of two but one doesn't as a matter of principle to public speaking or interviews. So I'm going to mention the other ones I'm going to mention die wicked was the CEO of liquidity who trusted me with running equity to digital and the man is fantastically bright and is fantastically bright and incredibly articulate. What I did admire and what I learned from him was this discipline, that execution is ultimately you know, you can think you can plan then the resource, McMillan said, events, dear boy events that get in the way, and the job is all about you. As it happens, as we say the things you've read about on material realize that all the things that did not expect come from raining on you and and how these men managed to deal with events and how he was, you know, just driven by discipline. It was beautiful to see and something to aspire to.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah. Yeah, it's like yeah, good discipline. Yeah, that thank you. That's, yeah, yeah, managing events, because so often, it's in those moments that real leadership comes out, right. It's what you have to do when things go wrong or when things happen. So thank you, and thank you for honoring him on that. Level, let's get to what I think is often my favorite question, which is thinking about the next level, because that's the game I love playing with people, right? It's like, no matter how much we've achieved, there's always another level, there's always another order of magnitude, there's almost more we can we can do, as you said, you do want to be peaking thoroughly, you want to find the next next level. So what's the opportunity for the business at this point? You know, where do you want to take it? Because I know you came in, you turned it around, you sold it sorted on, you're still running the business? Where do you go from here?
Enrique Sacau
It's a quality journey. So data is now everything in financial services, you know, they say it's the new oil, I don't think it's any oil but once you refine, it does become the new. So for us to be the go to data provider on a global basis would be the thing to do. We regain trust of customers out which were pretty unhappy with us because of the lack of focus and we're growing again, which is very pleasing that we have the deep pockets of torture person behind to help us fund growth but I would like them to think of us as you want quality you go to tonight, and you go to tonight, everywhere. So we need to be provided that says yes. Not a provider that says Oh, yes, but not in Singapore, or yes, but we cannot do that product. I would like to be you know, always a specialist. Always data always data management, always financial services. In that part of the value chain. I want us to be the best. We are very good but but being perfect is still not there and we need to keep keep keep going to that place.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah. Beautiful. Beautiful. Yeah. It's so is inspiring when you hear people with that sense of attention to detail, right intention to will the service that can be created, as I mentioned on another episode is Jeff Bezos, you know, he said you can only have missionaries, and you have mercenaries who run companies is the mercenaries are looking to flip their stock and the the missionaries are there because they care about the product. Yeah, they also want to make a return to and actually normally they actually make more money than the mercenaries because they're focused on the value that they're providing and I think it's an interesting, she, he writes quite a lot about it, he talks quite a lot about that. It's quite interesting to hear those distinctions. So I love this idea of knowing the line you're playing in, and then being the best you can be in that. So tell me, as you think about that, being the go to data provider globally, being seen as the best the quality option? How are you going to need to multiply your own impact, you know, what will you need to do differently as a leader in order to release that next level within the business?
Enrique Sacau
I have to answer the question in two years time, but I have to stay and I'm asking myself the question. So now as part of your business, so I will put into groups zero, Clearstream, which is a large company that endogenous it really is a very large company had a quite close relationship with it with one of the key board members there rantle, the post trade business and and watching demand, and trying to understand how you manage that kind of 1.8 billion p&l and whether I am not that I need to jump to that but I would like to hand it over to at a much larger show but I would then have to learn that I don't perhaps need to know the name of every every year but I do not need to kind of know as much as I do now. So which bigger goals I would let fall off to focus on much, much bigger goals that may be there that I don't even know about and that's I think my challenge for the next period, if I want to be the CEO of a medium to large sized company, as opposed to remaining kind of small to medium sized company, which is what I've done to date.
Richard Medcalf
I think that's actually a great way of framing that is this idea of, of exponential growth. Actually, the put in a really nice way, which is we often say what get us here won't get us there. But we go back to it. I think it's simply that we're used to By keeping a certain size of ball on the table if you like, and we're really, we get damn good at that, and people like us and respect us for that and then to really succeed at the next level, the the, the board that we were dealing with are no longer relevant, almost and so it's compete with..
Enrique Sacau
Their brand errors.
Richard Medcalf
Yeah, they're not exactly there, they become rounding errors. Exactly. So suddenly, the things that you have built your reputation reputation on, if you focus on those at this point in your career, you're not going to succeed because you're going to be dealing with rounding errors, as you say and I think it's a great way of framing it, I think it's what I see a lot in my my clients who are already you know, they're all super successful, you know, whatever stage they're at, a lot of them are, you know, running billion dollar companies or, you know, whatever, of all sizes. Or occasionally I run a program where there's more junior leaders, but it's still the same thing. It's just a different set of balls that they're dealing with and it's a question of, you know, which ones am I going to let it fall off the table even though I know how to do it if I focused on it, I could stop that ball. There's no longer the game which I think it's a great image actually. So thank you for using match I'll probably still have that in future as well. So it's a great it's Well, hey, that's that's fantastic. Enrique if people want to find out more find out more about you or about can I how do they do that?
Enrique Sacau
I suppose Canadians you go to a website or you do a Google search ended with me similarly, but if it really is very interested, they can always get in touch on always have.
Richard Medcalf
Okay, great. Well, hey, this has been a conversation I've enjoyed tracing your your experience from those days of being a musical imposter, all the way through to to this journey you can i and and the turnaround and the whole conversation we've had here about what it means to focus on the ABC of the business and not get distracted. So thanks so much for sharing your insights. I look forward to following the story.
Enrique Sacau
Thank you very much for having me. It's been a pleasure.
Richard Medcalf
Thank you.
**Note: This transcript is automatically generated.
Please excuse any errors.
Beyond the podcast...
Once you've subscribed to the podcast, why not go deeper and subscribe to the Xquadrant Insider?
This is our complementary email newsletter that focuses on multiplying value and impact at the intersection of leadership, strategy and purpose. Originally designed for our private clients, we've made this available to a wider audience of high-achieving and purpose-driven leaders.