Transforming Failure into Success: My Journey

Transforming Failure into Success: My Journey. When we started our company 26 years ago, everyone laughed at us. “What do Friedel and Alison know about running a company?” they said. 

We didn’t have a traditional business background. I had been a political activist for almost 20 years. My husband, Friedel, had battled severe dyslexia at school. However, he became exceptionally skilled in many different trades.

What we realised retrospectively is that our unique backgrounds as maverick creatives had actually become a strange advantage. 

It made us think differently, it humbled us and gave us a huge work ethic. 

As a political activist, I had worked under many remarkable leaders, who had taught me relentless strategy and sheer determination. We worked until the job was done with very little resources. I had helped organise a mass meeting of 10,000 people and many other events. I had been a journalist, a media organiser, amongst many other roles. We lived and breathed strategy 24/7. There was no off button. 

This set me up for remarkable resilience against all odds. My husband had built roads in Uganda, harbours in Pakistan, and beautiful barns in the UK under a master builder. Both our backgrounds were steeped in collaboration and service rather than focusing on financial reward. 

It was that ethos of service we used when we founded our company, The Creative Stone Company, in 1998. We had done a year’s market research before our formal launch. We presented ourselves with professionalism, design acumen, and stand excellence from our very first home show, even though we were only testing the market. 

Now, as a speaker and writer, focusing on entrepreneurship and personal transformation, I emphasise the power of first impressions. Our motto was “Creating Beautiful Spaces”. That was our mantra and our mission, not selling products.

We never regarded anyone as “opposition”, we just studied the best players in the world in our industry. Within 12 years, we were winning awards and we were flying. Our staff had grown from three workers to a staff of 150 with an extensive indoor and outdoor showroom, three factories, a transport and R&D division. We had been featured on radio, television, and in entrepreneur magazines. 

And then we crashed.

We discovered that our trusted bookkeeper of eight long years had been defrauding us to the tune of $1.2 million in today’s currency. She had come through an established employment agency we had worked with for some time. They had not done due diligence. Otherwise, they would have picked up that she already had a suspended sentence for fraud. Our auditors landed up not being nearly as qualified as their large offices and impressive fleet of cars suggested. 

We were on our knees. We had egg on our faces, just as everybody had predicted when we started the company. But that fraud became our greatest gift. 

We were forced to build elaborate new systems. We worked with a remarkable coaching organisation called GROW for 13 years.

Rebuilding staff morale took time. But when we started to win awards again, they felt inspired to be part of the mission to build a new way forward. Now that we had more resources to work with, it actually became easier to grow. We had to rebuild the trust in our marriage because we had both retreated into our respective caves of shame.

And finally, I had to rebuild myself. I had to find a different way.

Having battled anxiety, depression, and emotional eating, I went on a health journey that literally changed my life.

It was hard at first. As a stressed workaholic entrepreneur, I had never exercised much. At 52, I slunk into the gym for the first time in my baggy black track suit, 30 kgs heavier than I am now. I knew I could not do it alone. 

I was in victim mode for the entire first year. Then something shifted. I began running, culminating in regular 21km races. I had been disassociated from my body for 50 years, living in my head. So began a journey of change – from the inside out. 

Now turning 66, I look and feel younger than I did at 52 when I started this journey, my own long walk to freedom. I enjoy Pilates, weights, swimming, hiking, dancing.

I have literally changed identity. My husband says he cannot recognise his “first” wife. And I have not weighed myself for 8 long years, not once. I am no longer defined by a number or my age. I am living proof that it is possible for failure to become your greatest gift, for your maverick uniqueness to be your greatest asset. 

And finally, I am living proof that it is never too late to reinvent yourself. It was this evolution that led me to become fascinated in the field of Identity Intelligence, which I explore in my book “Belonging: Finding Tribes of Meaning”.

Identity Intelligence is the rocket fuel of manifestation rather than goals. Goals can be like a prescriptive diet. Identity is what builds exponential growth. It is my life’s legacy to speak about the lessons I have learned. 

Having grown up in a bipolar family, I am a passionate advocate of lifting the lid on mental health, particularly for founders and entrepreneurs. I have changed not just the shape of my body, but the shape of my soul. I believe it is my deeply vulnerable tone as a storyteller that positions me as a unique maverick voice. 

My message to the world is, Don’t wait sixty years to start believing in yourself. Don’t wait sixty years to own your story because your story might change someone else’s life. 

That is how we heal some of the anguish in the world, one conversation at a time.