This Week Tested Me Full Breakdown | Founder's Diary - EP2

Founder Journey

About this week's journey

This Founder Journey entry captures a week where the biggest challenge was not a lack of opportunity, but deciding where to put limited time and attention. Chris is balancing Thread A Pixel, Two Krakens and the growing Built Not Born In Business brand, with each business creating its own urgent demands.

One encouraging sign came from the podcast studio. A previous customer returned after trying another provider and asked for details such as 4K delivery and more natural camera framing, only to find those were already part of the standard service. For Chris, it reinforced a simple commercial lesson: the studio may have more potential than current bookings suggest, but it needs to be promoted properly.

At Thread A Pixel, a major focus is automation and systemisation. The aim is not to remove people, but to take repetitive work away from the team so they can spend more time communicating with customers, overseeing quality and handling production. There is also a wider strategic reason. Chris and Helen want to free more of Helen's time to support sales for Two Krakens while Built Not Born In Business continues to expand.

That same week also included preparation for a new starter, Gemma. Recruiting the right person was only the beginning. Induction, training, systems, responsibilities and the months it can take for somebody to become fully effective all add work and cost before the benefits are felt. It is the part of hiring that is easy to underestimate from the outside.

Two Krakens had a busy production week, with several days spent filming on location and more shoots already booked. The pressure then moves into post-production, where editing often takes longer than the filming itself. Chris describes the challenge of keeping delivery moving when the visible filming days are only one part of the total workload.

There were also several positive business moments. Helen agreed to move forward with a collaboration involving Stuart Trevor's current brand and Thread A Pixel, following his earlier appearance on the podcast. A film created for KDR's charity event at The Belfry received strong engagement, and Thread A Pixel was approached by Zeiss after the company had been let down by another supplier.

Not everything went smoothly. The delayed delivery of a new Kia PV5 meant extra vehicle hire costs after the previous van had already been sold. A no-show showroom appointment created another reminder that apparently small disruptions still consume preparation time, staff availability and attention.

The central issue running through the week is the mental load of steering three businesses at once. Chris describes feeling pulled from one priority to another and admits there is no instant answer. The current plan is to keep improving systems, automation and prioritisation, while accepting that simplifying the workload will take deliberate planning rather than one quick fix.

Built Not Born In Business is also beginning to become more than the podcast itself. Alongside the weekly Founder Journey, Chris and Helen want to share practical business lessons drawn from around 15 years of entrepreneurship and from the conversations they have with founders both on and off camera. That creates another opportunity, but also makes the question of focus even more important.