Neil Crofts

"I feel extremely fortunate. My life turns out to be very happy and peaceful. I have a wonderful wife and family, we live in a beautiful place and I love the work that I do.”

By conventional standards my formal education was not a success. I spent most of my time very confused as to why I was there and what was expected of me.

The beauty of this education was that I was never taught how to think and I find one of the greatest strengths is to be able to question everything and think differently.

My real education was started by going motor racing. Three years of race driving, running the team, finding the money and preparing the car taught me a lot and left me in debt (a bit like university). I learned about management and motivation, organisation and planning, selling and media and fear, focus, flow and commitment. I still don't think I have had another flow experience like the last 2 hours of a 24 hour race that I did.

After I lost my first “proper” job I bought my first Apple Mac and set up my first business.

The Mac was amazing, I chose it because I felt that I would not have to learn to use a computer in those pre-Windows days. The Mac allowed me to communicate in writing for the first time and this was a huge liberation.

After a few bumpy years of experience that involved starting, running and selling a business, venture capital, jobs and more I got a job with a little web design company near London Bridge called CHBi. The atmosphere and energy of this place were entirely different to anything I had experienced, there was passion, idealism and energy. This group of people, together with the internet, were going to change the world. I loved it.

Over 2 years the 16 person company I had joined transformed into Razorfish, one of the largest and certainly the coolest web design company that flourished briefly during what became known as the dot com boom.

When the party was over I had a few months off while I worked out what to do and turned the rest of my life upside down as well, I also cycled over the Pyrenees.

I moved out of London to Bath and one day I was in our sitting room flicking through a couple of business magazines and wondering why I never read them.

I realised that it was because the magazines were about businesses that were simply for profit and that I did not find that inspiring. No wonder I had so often felt uncomfortable in those meetings. I realised that I wanted to read a magazine that wrote about inspiring businesses that existed for more than just profit.

After a few seconds of research I realised that such a magazine did not exist and that I would have to start one. It was in this moment that the term and the concept of authentic business came to me as both a personal and a global solution to the issues we face.

That was in December 2001. Since then the concept and my ability to articulate it has evolved into my work on authentic business and authentic leadership and some amazing work with equally amazing clients.

In September 2007 we moved to Mallorca where I had already been running the Authentic Transformation events. My wife Benedicte and I live near the sea with our children Minnie and Casper.

Neil Crofts, February 2011.

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