It's all about inspiration and communication

Theo Mason came to leadership when he decided to start his owncompany S-Cool! which today runs the UK's second largest educationwebsite, after the BBC.

When he left Bristol University, after an engineering degree, hehad no idea what he wanted to do next and fell into accountancy.

He trained with KPMG and spent three years there auditingbusinesses before deciding to set up S-Cool! with a friend who hadpreviously also worked at KPMG.

For about the first five months they worked out of a bedroom, butas time went on the business, now based in Elmdale Road, Clifton,expanded to the point where it employs almost 50 people and providesIT services to education, from Government, to universities, colleges,training groups and employers.

Mr Mason found his role changing: "I had always been quite anautonomous person, though I had seen myself becoming an entrepreneur.The relationship between you and the people you work with becomescompletely different.

"One of the most challenging things is having to delegate to otherpeople, and then you find yourself not only delegating to otherpeople but also having to lead them.

"When there are about five people you are close and there is agood atmosphere. But by the time you get to 20 you have to have aleadership role to someone you rarely see on a day-to-day basis; evenmore so by the time you get to 40 people.

"You still need to come across as an inspiring leader. A more andmore important part of my role is communicating a single directionthat we can all work in together, the constant communication of aconstant message."

That means explaining to staff where the company is and how itfits in with where it previously said it would be at this point.

Although he had no specific leadership training, Mr Mason had helpfrom Business West and says his experience of auditing with KPMG hascome in very useful.

He said: "What you are doing is going from one business to anotherand looking into the mechanism of how it works.

"Over the three years I probably saw 50 to 60 businesses, and whatworked and didn't work, and got to talk to people at all levels.

"That gives you an enormous understanding of what makes peopletick and a good idea of how you would manage your own business."