Advice from successful entrepreneurs across the world on achieving success and growth in the second decade of the 21st century

1. “ Know what you want
to do, don’t lose your
hard ”
Cristóbal Colón
Founder, La Fageda
Summary
As one of Europe’s leading social entrepreneurs, Cristóbal Colón has grown his Catalonian dairy
business into a company that takes on multinationals while providing dignity and meaning to the lives
of individuals suffering from mental illness. Colón believes that in addition to having absolute clarity
and consistency over the vision of their business, an entrepreneur has to assess their own personality
in order to succeed. This means being able to look objectively at their own skills, to understand that
you don’t know everything, and to ask for help whenever required. “Try to be surrounded by people
who know more than you,” Colón explains. “A lonely entrepreneur doesn’t go too far.”

2. La Fageda 142
Timeline
1971 Colón joins the staff “Imagine someone wanting to set up a business, except it will be
of a mental hospital
employing crazy people and is run by a psychiatrist whose name is
1982 Founds La
Fageda as a social
enterprise in rural
Catalonia This was the unconventional business plan psychiatrist Cristóbal
2005 Named Spanish Colón took to the mayor of a small rural town in Catalonia over
Social Entrepreneur
of the Year by 30 years ago. Despite the protestations of the local authorities,
the Schwab
Foundation
over 10 years of experience initiating work therapy treatments in
a Spanish mental hospital had convinced Colón that mentally ill or
2009 La Fageda annual
turnover exceeds handicapped people needed to be given real work, paid jobs that
€9.8m
were meaningful and involved making products recognised by the
2011 La Fageda employs
over 250 people, market.
of whom over 140
suffer some form “I did not know what a social entrepreneur was, or anything like
of mental illness or
handicap this,” Colón explains. “These concepts have been developed later
need to look for a solution to a problem.”
La Fageda was founded at a time when Spanish legislation did
not consider that people with disabilities could work. Things have
changed since then, but the labour market continues to regard
people with mental disabilities with suspicion and fear. “A key skill
for me and probably for all entrepreneurs is perseverance. When
things don’t go well, try again but keep changing your strategies – if
you always do the same thing you keep failing. Many times we have
gone wrong and many times we have changed direction, but we
never ever thought about giving up on the project.”
“What inspired me was
the need to look for a This commitment and dedication enabled La Fageda to overcome
solution to a problem” the obstacles that any new business faces, as well as those unique
to the particular project.
“It is very important to have failures along the way in order to learn,
but you don’t have to look for reverses, they come along just
by living. It is because of this that being realistic is so important
– the better you analyse the situation, the better you will sort the
problems out.”
Colón’s efforts and energies may be directed towards helping

3. 143 La Fageda
others, but there is no doubt that he is uncompromising when it
an entrepreneur has to have is objectivity, to interpret reality as it is,
not as I want it to be,” he says. “Being honest to oneself and others
is vital, as is the quality of humility: to understand that you don’t
know everything, and ask for help from people who know more
than you about those things you don’t know.”
Far from being a negative experience, for Colón this approach is entrepreneur has to
actually extremely liberating. “When you understand what you don’t have is objectivity, to
know, what you then do is learn every day, and try to be surrounded interpret reality as it is,
by people who know more than you. That is fundamental: all or not as I want it to be”
most entrepreneurs end up building a successful team, because a
lonely entrepreneur doesn’t go too far…”
A dedicated team
La Fageda, best known for its excellent dairy products including
whom suffer from some form of mental illness or handicap. So what
does Colón ask for in his staff?
“I ask mainly for commitment to the project, and the same attitude
of objectivity and honesty, which are the fundamentals. When you
have people like this, these are very powerful forces to drive your
project.”
compensation. “When one is committed to a project like ours, in
addition to remuneration you have a big reward on another level,
which is being proud to participate in a social project, where not only
the strict economical dimension,” Colón explains. “Commitment
always comes with the important satisfaction of being part of and
feeling like a key player in the project.”
Now that the business has been running over 30 years, competing
with giant multinationals such as Danone and Nestlé and with
an annual turnover of close to €11m, can Colón recall any of the
of great effort and many doubts – we didn’t know if it was going
to work.

4. La Fageda 144
“For example, we didn’t have a settled business plan, so we have
tried many things that haven’t worked. When we started with the
dairy products, we made mistakes because we didn’t have things
clear; they could be huge mistakes, or tiny mistakes which, if you
don’t correct them, become very important ones.
“What is crucial is to observe very carefully what you are doing well
and badly. We did well and grew because, even when we did badly,
Commitment to the vision
What is also clear about La Fageda is that, while there may have
been no settled business plan in the early days, the vision for the
project has never been in doubt.
“Our project has a great virtue which is consistency; we have been
30 years knowing what we wanted to do and have never digressed
from that,” says Colón. “This is absolutely essential for any company
or entrepreneur. You have to know what you want to do, you have
to be very coherent and not lose your path.
“After that, it comes down to building a team of competent and
committed people – and praying to have luck. Luck is a very
important element. You can do things very well and have bad luck
and then they don’t work.”
Colón is not the type to trust everything to luck, however – good or
bad. “There’s another element too – work very hard. To be honest,
I think the general trading conditions for businesses are getting
“We did well and grew worse, much worse, which means entrepreneurs will need to push
because, even when harder and make greater efforts.”
we did badly, we
Given that he has such a passion for the project he founded, does
have to be working always. Work is a very important part of life,
but it is important that work is not everything in life; you have to
complete life with other things. Most of the productive moments of
often when I’ve gone for a walk in the mountains.”
www.fageda.com