Persistence Is the Key to Success: Gerard Murtagh on Focus and Family

Jul 31, 2014

5 min read

Updated: Oct 30

Persistence built Gerard Murtagh's career. The same persistence, aimed at every new opportunity, nearly cost him the things it was meant to protect. Gerard is a serial entrepreneur with importing and exporting businesses and a mold removal company in high growth. His paper napkin reads "persistence is the key to success." He grew up with dyslexia, found school extremely difficult, and leaned on sport and the example of Michael Jordan. The lesson he carried into business was to work harder than everyone else and keep getting up. For founders who say yes to everything, his story turns on what came next. Hard work spread across too many businesses and side projects left his team alienated and his family frustrated. His answer was not to work less. It was to cut the distractions and focus.

Inspired by Paper Napkin Wisdom Episode 92 with Gerard Murtagh.

Why persistence matters more than talent

Gerard calls persistence a mantra he lives by every day. He says if he had tattoos, it would be across his chest.

He learned it in sport. As a kid with dyslexia, school was hard and sport got him through. Michael Jordan was his icon. The part of Jordan's story that stuck was being dropped from his high school team and then working harder than everyone else to prove he belonged. When school was ending and fear set in about what came next, Gerard realized the same lessons applied to life. Work harder than everybody else. Keep going regardless of the situation. Keep your focus on the goal.

His best friend, a professional athlete, is his living example. In Gerard's telling, he was never the most talented, fastest or strongest. He was the hardest working, and that is why coaches kept picking him. One works on a football field and the other in a boardroom, and they push each other.

When should you stop persisting with a bad business?

Gerard is clear that persistence has a limit. You can persist and persist with a bad idea or a bad business, and sometimes you just have to let it go. He has had that experience himself. He thought working hard on a business would make it succeed, and it was never going to.

His view is that hard work helps you see the truth faster. If you work harder than the next person looking at the same opportunity, you find out sooner whether it is a great one, a bad one, or one that does not fit you.

Over the years, many businesses have come across his desk. Early on he tried to do all of them. Now he lets more go. He can research an opportunity quickly and walk away from it, and he accepts that some of those ideas will go on to great things with other people.

What chasing every opportunity costs your business and family

Gerard explains it with two cups of water. One is the business and one is the family, and both are full. Every new thing you add, another business, a hobby, drinks with friends, pours water out of one of them. Take it from the business and the business suffers. Take it from the family and before long that cup is empty, and that is when you get in trouble.

He described what it looked like in his own home. A new opportunity meant working late into the night on top of the existing work. Emailing on a Sunday night. Checking a company dashboard at the park instead of pushing his daughter on the swing. Telling himself it was all for the family. His family experienced someone tired, cranky and frustrated.

When I reflected this back to him, it sounded less like a balance problem and more like distraction. He agreed. The opportunities looked like businesses, but they pulled him away from what mattered and alienated his staff and his family.

How to say no to good opportunities

Gerard married young and had children young, and calls it the greatest thing he has ever done. So he made a decision. When an opportunity comes across his desk now, he shakes the person's hand, congratulates them on a great idea, and points them to someone else because he is not getting involved.

He admits he used to be driven by fear of missing out. He did not want to be the person who missed investing in Facebook. That fear limited the time he could invest in the people around him.

He has also been eliminating cups. Hobbies and other things he would like to do get put back, so the business and the family get his full effort. At the park or at a tea party with his daughter, he leaves social media and his phone aside. The bigger picture is more time with his family as his daughter grows up. Being an entrepreneur also gives him room to leave the office in the afternoon for a swimming lesson.

How to build a focused workday that supports persistence

Gerard is an early starter. He is often at work at six in the morning and gets hours of work done before anyone else is out of bed. His staff tease him about it. For him it is a jump on the day.

His process is structured:

Shut down distractions, phones and email, and keep the office peaceful.
Write down every task for the day, then prioritize them.
Check each task against the end goal and the weekly, monthly and quarterly goals.
Set time limits on tasks so he does not get stuck, unless it is the most important task.
Share the load with his team instead of carrying it alone.

Everyone on his team writes down what they have to achieve that week and puts it on their desk or on the board. The team meets three times a week, and each meeting is about improving the company. He even keeps a very large screen in front of him so he cannot see around it and get curious about what others are doing. In his words, if you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.

How to apply this in your business this week

Persistence is powerful when it is pointed at the right things. I notice that many owners never decide what those things are. Gerard's approach gives a simple starting point.

Draw your own two cups. List everything currently taking water from your business or your family.
Pick one item on that list and stop it this week.
The next time an opportunity lands on your desk, congratulate the person and refer them on.
Each morning, write your tasks down, prioritize them, and check them against your quarterly goal.
Choose one family moment this week where your phone stays out of reach.

There are seasons for pushing hard. The work is noticing which season you are in, and keeping your persistence aligned with what matters most.