Ryan Under Development

Sean Kiewiet (CIO) founded Priority Payment Systems in Atlanta, GA with John Priore (CEO), Richard Harris (COO) in 2006. Today, they are a very successful merchant services company providing bank card services to restaurants and retail stores across the country. This year they will do about 6 billion in transactions (that's 4x what square does) with over 50,000 merchants in their portfolio.

For the past 6 years, they have been quitely building a solid, very profitable business and, in a terrible economy, managed to double growth every year. I've been working with them on an iphone project for the past 6 months and have had a chance to get a deep look into how a company like this is successful.

What I've learned is that the success of this company has everything to do with the management team.

Sean has been teaching me about business strategy as well as setting life goals in general. I consider him a mentor in many ways. I've learned a lot about how to run a business. But beyond the business strategy, one of his most insightful ideas is what he calls his number. This number is the dollar amount that he needs to have aquired to feel successful. Everything beyond that number is just gravy. At this point he has reached that goal. But what that frees him up to do is either donate the rest, invest in the people in his community, or spend the money however he feels will make the most impact. His choices at this point may or may not have a financial gain in mind.

This is such a powerful idea. Most of America is driven by a desire to aquire more assets and money. That's fine to a point, but if that's the only thing driving you in the long term, you'll never reach a higher plane of existance. You'll always be desparate to "make it" and never truly fulfill your true purpose.

We all should "pick a number" and live by this model. Yes, to reach that goal you may need to sacrafice and work very hard, but once you reach it, your mode should switch from "I'm going to hit that number" to "I'm going to make the world around me better". If more people lived by this, our world would be a completely different place. 

It's wisdom like this that helps Sean to be generous, thoughtful, and strong for those around him. In an insecure world, he works to make it better. It's people like him that make companies successful.