Businesses go through different phases – each has a distinct set of characteristics. Each cycle brings its own set of challenges about leadership style, cash flow, marketing activities, customer base, processes, systems etc. Over time the focus and importance on any given activity changes as the business matures. My time as CEO (chief experience officer) is 50% with customers, listening, learning and responding. The other part of my role is all about staying focussed on the vision, delivering on our values and of course keeping everyone in the team and our supply community aligned with the plan.

In the early days – my job was survival…I had no customers for 2 months and 4 days which seemed like eternity (the longest 64 days of my life – ‘is this baby every going to fly?’). When we did make our first sale (order number 14) I had done 13 before to keep checking that the website worked, I called our first customer Damian Chown to ask how he experienced our website. The news was not good. He gave me some very frank feedback on how horrendous the website was to use. We are now on version six of the site…each enhancement carefully architected based on what we had learned from our customers. Not all developments were a hit…hence the six versions. But it is a process of evolution.

My children regularly ask when we are travelling ‘Are we there yet mum?’ It is a standard family joke. I respond ‘it’s all about the journey – we might never get there’.

RedBalloon has come along way from its very humble beginnings in the front room of my home, with me literally doing everything (except cutting code).

Now we have systems, processes and structures to support growth and fabulous people who are specialists in their field and committed to what we are up to. A customer base that gives us bucket loads of ideas.

My role now is about providing a guiding hand. I appointed general managers six months ago to run the business on a daily basis. Highly skilled individuals who are accountable for delivering their plans. As they say ‘a founder needs to know when to get out of the way’.

We have a Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG) that 10% of the Australian population will have had a RedBalloon Day by 2015. And we are on target to achieve this but we have bigger purpose which is to change gifting in Australia for ever (so people reduce the clutter in their lives – no more stuff!).

But what I’m working on now is really fun. I’m painting a picture in words. Letting our imaginations run wild. Not limiting ourselves to the ‘how’ will we get there. Just imagining what our world will be like when….

The painted picture document is only 2 years out. The end of the decade. It is all about enjoying the journey, every moment of it…. But having a clear understanding of what the destination could be like… if we create it. As Jobs once said ‘the best way to create the future is to invent it’ and we want to create our own destiny. It is a very valuable picture to allow all those in our organization to share the journey equally.

I've always run my business based on our shared values. They really work. If I'm not sure how I should act on a particular decision I will often refer back to our values for guidance.

Our third value is generosity... As such when any of the team has come to me to ask to attend a training course or seminar – I have never refused them. When my HR leader joined some months ago and she reviewed our training and development spend – she remarked that 'per person it is very generous – upward of what many corporation would spend'. That's good I thought to myself. The question she posed to me was 'And what is the bottom line return you are getting for that investment?'. I'd not really thought about it.

There are two things here – one is relevance of the education and the second is how it is applied when the participant returns to work.

We have chosen as an organization to make available to every employee on commencement the Gallup Strengths Finder. This is a great way to get to know someone and to ensure that the new starters KPIs are set based on their strengths. The second program that we offer for each person once they complete their three months probation is the Landmark Forum and Advanced course. Both really operate in the area of personal development.

Then there is also vocational training – and this is where I have the most challenges (and where I believe that there is a fine line between living our values and being taken for a ride).

One employee asked to do elocution lessons (speech training) she was in sales and on the phone a lot and she said she wanted to get rid of her broad Australian twang. Over a period of expensive one on one coaching sessions over many months this took place. She completed the course successfully, she had a new manager, whom she did not get along with, then one Monday morning she arrived and with out so much as a goodbye to her peers she cleaned out her desk and left – taking with her my newly invested speech training.

I had heeded my technical people's request to attend a technical development conference. My credit card statement had not even returned when one decided he had met an interesting organization at the event and he was off.

There have been many examples in the past year.

I spoke to my mentor about it and he said that he has had a training guarantee payback scheme in place for years. He ask a person to sign a document on the expected deliverables of the training for the organization and also that if they leave the company within 12 months a proportion (depending on the length of time) is repaid to the company.

My HR leader said that such a practice is quite common in major corporations. However when I presented the idea to my GMs – one particularly was not pleased (saying it made us look stingy.) he said why 'punish' everyone for the selfishness of a few past people.

Well running a business is not a democracy and sometimes you have to make decisions based on commercial returns not just what people would like. Remember I am committed to the development of our people – and always will be. But it has to be a two way street.

1. Eat properly. Breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a pauper. (I simply cannot sleep if I have a large evening meal – quite happy with a hot breakfast and a bowl of soup for dinner.)

2. Thinking time. I need time to create the day – work out what I want to get from the day. Problem solve, look at different point of views. I need to have time to think things through and imagine what could be possible.

3. Walking time. I sold my car years ago – I walk every morning to work (except if it is raining). This is half an hour to myself it is almost meditative. This might be the only exercise that I get in a day.

4. Cuddle the kids – Children are really caught up in their own world – listening to their trials and tribulations and remembering what my own childhood was like brings me back to earth. Being in someone else's world is amazingly stabilising.

5. Mentors, buddies and coaches – A problem shared is a problem halved. I have lots of people I can talk to if I get myself tied up in knots and I cannot see my way forward.

6. Being Trusting – As a business owner I often want to control everything. I have had to let this go. I really cannot do it all, and if I try I just upset people on the way through. I simply trust other peoples contribution even if it is different from mine.

7. Email Efficiency – I'm the boss. I have spoken on this before. I can control when email is turned on and when it is off. Just because I get a request by email does not mean I have to stop doing what I was doing and respond straight away.

8. Quieten the voice in my head – It can be very noisy in my head, debates rage, judgments abound and opinion rampant. But I have the power to choose how I react to any circumstance that arises. Breathe before reacting, think of the implications. Choose the bigger picture.

9. One hour off before bed – I don't have a 'crackberry', I had a Treo and I threw it in the harbor I hated it so much. The mind needs time to wind down. I am a movie addict – I subscribe to Quickflix and I read. Escape to someone else's world – mine looks pretty good then.

10. Friends – Laugh out loud and get seven hugs a day and life seems pretty good. It is why I have retained the services of Dexter Dog. He has been with me for four and a half of the six years of RedBalloon as the head of security. Really he is my gorgeous dog who is always with me – and always ready for a cuddle and play, and he never gets mad if I stay out late.

Context is important – there are always people that have more to do, or are not as well off – in fact I am very fortunate to have such a great life...even if it is the last days of the financial year and I am still chasing a result – it has been an amazing year.

One of my entrepreneur friends said to me recently: "If it was easy running a business, wouldn't everybody do it?" I have been having a good long look at not only where I add the greatest value to my business, but what I enjoy doing the most.

What I love the most is meeting with customers, hearing about their businesses and then discovering ways that we can support them in their endeavors. I've worked out that I am better "out" than "in". I heard somewhere that every CEO needs to spend at least 20% of their time with customers. I am looking to out-do this.

In realising that I just could not do it all, I have appointed a general manager to run the daily operations of the business, and I promoted from within. Jemma has been part of the RedBalloon story for four years – and quite frankly was looking for the next challenge herself. I have found someone who thrives on detail – when I just don't.

So what has this meant to me personally in just a few weeks? I've had more client meetings than I have in the whole year, I have gone two weekends in a row without doing any work. (In fact I have probably got about 20 hours back a week – much of which I have spent hanging out with my children.) I am working in an area I know a lot about and am good at. So I am enjoying myself.

It's not just about how fast you are running, you've got to be heading in the right direction for it to have any value at all.

I've taken some of my own medicine and reminded myself it is all about the good times...

I have gone silent, I have stopped writing my blogs, and even become almost quiet at work.

My book has just arrived from the printers documenting the trials and tribulations of the first five years in a fast growing business. The launch event is next week. I should be on top of the world.

The next five years are more daunting than the first. The first were all about "one for all and all for one". Fast growth is an adrenalin rush. Anything less than three digit growth is not really playing full out.

In the past few weeks, since returning from the Advanced Entrepreneurial program at MIT in Boston, I have come to the realisation that I might be getting in the way of continued sustainable growth of the business.

To have dramatic growth you need dramatic stability – and am I the one truly to deliver that?

I have always had comments such as 'we get so much done when you're not here' or 'one more idea and I think we'll explode'. My team are amazingly resilient, patient and calm. But at what point is it time to get out of their way and let them get on with it.

My concern is that the larger you become, no matter how in touch you think you are – you eventually become like the emperor with his new clothes. No one wants to tell you how it really is.

It is so humbling to be acknowledged as a successful business leader – but it does not mean that we have it on easy street, that we do not face challenges every day that we don't necessarily have the exact answers to.

I remember Tim Pethic (Nudie juice fame) saying being a true entrepreneur is like being a punching clown – we get knocked down and then we pop back up to fight another day. Punch – pop up – punch – pop up...

I've found that it has just taken longer than a few minutes to pop up this time. But I'm not ready to roll over and play dead. Call me the "Duracell" bunny – we just keep on keeping on.

I'll keep you posted as we move into the next phase. We are no longer a start up.

He cited many interesting examples during his presentation on the power of organisations without known leaders. Alcoholics Anonymous an organization with how many members? It is not clearly documented. More's the point is that it operates without leadership. All you need is a few people who have a shared set of beliefs, are committed to an outcome and then they get together and make a difference. Rod notes that Alchiada operates in a similar way. That is why the Americans are having so much trouble tracking them down.

The most vivid example was how the Spanish conquered South America. With only 500 men the Spaniards took on the Aztec population of fifteen million – and within two years they had defeated them. The conquistadors found the king and the kings family – they killed them all. And because the Aztec society depended on the head for direction it quickly crumbled. The Spaniards did this throughout the whole of South America – and in just one century every civilization had been concurred. He uses the analogy that if you take the head of a spider it cannot survive.

However this differed when the Spaniards came to America. Unlike the social structures of the Mayan's and Aztec's the American Indians whilst they had villages – became nomadic. The conquistadors could not find the leader. They thought it was Geronimo – 25% of military resources went into trying to track this person down. Even when he was killed the civilization did not falter. This was a starfish type of structure – you could break off a group and it would then regenerate by itself – it does not require a head to survive.

The examples were vivid, but also the possibilities that were created were enormous. Rod posed the idea of peace on the planet, not based on a 'war on terrorism' but pods of people simply standing committed to a purpose.

I saw real parallels for organisational structures – I was working at Apple when Steve Jobs did not work there. When Steve returned what a vastly different organization it became. This is a spider type organization. But then consider Limewire this is a completely Starfish organization. You literally cannot find it. Because it resides not even on servers but on people's local hard drives.

Consider the history of music. Before recordings the only way you could hear an artist was in person, then there were many recording studios that 'owned the music', this was consolidated into only a few. They 'owned' the worlds music. But then Napster started. The big recording studio's think they won the legal battle because they got a payment settlement. But something changed forever. Music was no longer owned by a few. Napster had servers where music is downloaded from. It was an organization that could be sued. It had a leader and infrastructure. But the community now knows a new world of music so the likes of Limewire emerged. There are no servers, or infrastructure to speak of. It is a community of people sharing the songs on their individual hard drives. There is no one to sue. This is a star fish – there is no leader. Starfish are hard to destroy.

As I look at my own expansion plans there was so much that I gleaned on evolving an organization based on starfish rather than being a spider. More information about the book.

Now Rod is a very interesting entrepreneur and there is much more to learn from him.

I would classify at least one of the participants as a serial entrepreneur. Peter Sage wouldn't be much more than 40 and already he has started, purchased and sold 22 businesses. He is the sort of guy that sees opportunity everywhere and anywhere.

His current project is bigger and more exciting than probably any other entrepreneurial endeavour I've heard of in a long time. He is only trying to raise $US10 billion and in so doing could change how we consume fossil fuels on the planet forever.

It was pretty funny when sipping a cocktail and asking the obvious question: "So tell me a bit about your business."

"Well," Peter responds, "I am co-founder of the Space Island Group. We are in the process of commercialising NASA technology that will put solar panels into space in 2010, and by 2012 we will be sending 43 million kilowatts of power to Earth at only 10¢ per kilowatt. (The cheapest currently delivered is 23¢.)

I've met hundreds of entrepreneurs, and I believe common threads with the most successful is that they have purpose and vision. Peter and his scientist colleagues have a very big vision. It is truly humbling to think that in our lifetime fossil fuels could be history.

In his words: "For the past two years, the Space Island Group (SIG) has actively and aggressively pursued a project to build and launch the world's first commercially viable space-based solar power satellites. The purpose of the project will be to enable environmentally clean and sustainable energy (in the form of electricity) to be delivered to Earth 24 hours a day with zero pollution.

"The overall cost to manufacture, launch and assemble the first satellite and its supporting infrastructure will be $US10 billion. A number of receptive sources for this have been identified, including the World Bank and several governments.

"The energy generated from this project in today's market would be valued at $200 billion over a 20-year period, and we are in advanced discussions with several prospective purchasers of this energy, including our current primary interest, the Government of India."

Thanks Peter for reminding us of what is really possible if we put our hearts and minds to something. I'll be keeping an eye on your Space Island Group to watch the developments.

I got a letter today from someone who said: "I can never get hold of CEOs. I hope you are different." It made me wonder when is it that CEOs stop being accessible?

I pride myself on being available to customers. I will regularly answer phones (in fact I have just been shunted to sixth in line for calls on hold – apparently I am out of the office too much); I listen, I learn, I answer. I love it. It is where I get my best stories from. You could question whether this just is the best use of my time. Perhaps, but some of our greatest innovations have come from listening to customer contribution.

I remember years ago when I was working for an airline. It spent a fortune running a cultural change program. They flew everyone to Melbourne and all 15,000 staff were guided through a two-day program to teach us to "reach out" to customers, to listen to them, acknowledge them and ultimately be seen to act on what they suggested. The airline is no longer in business so clearly something did not quite go according to plan.

But at the time I could not help but marvel that the general manager, despite what he had spent on "cultural change" could walk through an airport without ever looking anyone in the eye, let alone thank them for doing a great job or saying hello to a customer. So all the customer focus training in the world was not going to make one iota of difference if it was not truly "lived" from the top.

I said to myself, 'I will never be like this. I'll make sure I always listen'. I do listen, I definitely look people in the eye and I act on what I hear. Have I set myself up to fail? If I miss a call, or do not respond in time – is that taken that I no longer care?

I've learned that with the first 100,000 customers there are 100,000 opinions on how we should be doing things. Listening for real opportunity among the myriad ideas and endless opinions is the challenge. Not being overwhelmed, taking one call at a time and acting on opportunities has kept us innovating.

Look what we discovered this week: More than half of Australians feel they are missing out on quality family time and sacrificing their social lives as a result of work commitments.

We are not talking about business owners here; this is about employees. We hear a lot about companies that are committed to work life balance. All the employer-of-choice awards have just been named. But I was curious to know whether there is really a trend towards a greater leisure time or a handful of employers who are committed to work life balance for their people.

An email survey to investigate the causes of work-life imbalance in Australia and explore possible solutions, attracted 3675 responses, 83% of them from females. Was the high skew towards women because they are the ones that really wanted to have a say on the matter?

Thirty-eight percent of respondents rate excessive workload as the main contributor to work-life imbalance, followed by workplace culture (22%), the desire to meet pressing deadlines (12%), management expectations (11%) and habit (9%).

It is a worrying trend when you consider that close to a quarter of those surveyed log on to work email after-hours every day, and that more than a third work on a Saturday or Sunday at least once a fortnight. This is a considerable workload that eats into personal time; 62% log in during their personal time.

We know that putting in the "hard yards" is considered part and parcel of having a successful career, but this is often to the detriment of our personal lives and goals, particularly for women, who often have the bulk of family responsibility on their shoulders.

This doesn't mean we should all quit our jobs and pursue a more carefree existence. In fact, I was interested to see that only 5% of respondents listed decreasing workloads as a solution to the problem.

Among the top solutions listed to improve workplace conditions were providing more flexible working conditions (28%) and hiring more staff (27%). Others included actively promoting a healthy lifestyle in the workplace (21%) and providing reward and recognition schemes to recognise overtime (13%).

We have noticed a real melding between what was the work week and the weekend; the distinction is becoming more blurred. It is a challenge for employers to make the work week as interesting as the weekend.

We have always been a company committed to work life balance. (After all, that is why I started the business.)

We entered a RedBalloon team into the Bridge to Beach race a few weeks ago. We had training activities and everyone got into it. We have a series of team events coming up where we will also get the team involved in raising money for our charities of choice.

One that we have in the calendar is the Foxtel Lap fundraiser for Murdoch Childrens Research Institute. September 14 is not far away; our 20-strong team are already pounding the pavements.

I have been asking a lot of other business owners: when do you recruit an HR manager?

It is such a critical role in the development of any business. Chatting with Steve Vamos recently (before he jetted off to the US to take up his new global role for Microsoft) he attributed much of his success to having great HR managers. "Without them it is very hard to have and keep great people around you."

Many fast-growing businesses are driven by the leader, who has The Idea and is able to attract people that also engage with the vision of where the business is going.

I know I personally have been very involved with all things to do with the people on the team, whether it be recruiting or performance reviews. But as my business now has nearly 50 people in three locations it is simply more than a full-time role.

Most of my peers have told me that when you get to 50 people an HR professional is essential, not just for the recruitment and induction area of the business but also to have an independent view of remuneration and benefits.

We have always practised what we preach and we have a great online reward and recognition program. But remuneration is something different, and such a sticky subject in any business. You want to pay well, but you have to justify the return on it; you want to attract and keep great people but what is the rest of the industry paying? Are you ahead or behind?

We have taken the plunge and are recruiting an HR manager, but for 50 people it may not be a full-time role. So I have recruited someone who was in a very senior role, who could be considered way over-qualified but – really, what I need is a true leader: someone who can take initiative but also has real experience in remuneration and packaging of salaries, recruiting, OH&S etc. The independent authority.

Now I'm looking for a hosted HRM system. We have the best hosted CRM system on the planet and I am looking for something as slick to manage the team, from leave forms to reviews. Spreadsheets just are no longer cutting it.

I'm committed to getting rid of the paper chase and getting it all online. If you know one please do tell!