“My nickname is ‘Lucky,’” said Simer Mayo, CEO of Valor Global.
And the harder he works, as the saying goes, the luckier Mayo gets.
“I outwork the competition,” said Mayo, whose company provides customer support 24/7 by phone, email, chat, social media and the web. “I dream big and work toward it.”
One of Mayo’s big dreams is to grow Valor Global, now operating in the U.S., Costa Rica and the Philippines.
“Our ‘Big Hairy Audacious Goal’ at first was, for 2012, to get to $100 million in revenue,” he said. “For 2025, it is to get to 5,000 employees. Right now, we’re just shy of 2,000.”
Still, Mayo measures Valor Global’s achievements in more than heads and dollars.
“I define success not as the monetary part, but by accomplishing goals we’re setting, aligning our goals with our values. That’s my comprehensive strategy,” he said. “In business and in my personal life I have the same mission: Take the road less traveled.”
Mayo’s company takes the road less traveled, too. For example, Valor Global has no vacation policy.
“We just let people enjoy time to recharge their batteries and spend time with people important to them,” he said. “Now, the way tech is, even on vacation there’s no real out-of-office time anymore. Life is beautiful with so much to offer. Go explore. Enjoy life.”
Toward that end, Valor Global has a full-time, in-house position with the title Dream Manager.
“The concept comes from the book ‘The Dream Manager’ by Matthew Kelly,” he said. “We need to get out of survivability mode and into ‘thrivability’ — start being kids again and dreaming again.”
Another of Mayo’s big dreams is to purchase a professional sports team.
“Sports unify people and get communities together,” he said. “What I’d love to do is bring a championship-winning team to Arizona.”
Meanwhile, on his own squad, he’s a player with skin in the game.
“What’s most critical is surrounding myself with the right people, the right team, the right leaders at the right place,” he said. “And also to be able to change, to be able to grow and align with customer needs and market needs.”
Mayo credits his network for shoring up his success.
“I’m blessed to have a great group of support people I reach out to — a forum of eight other entrepreneurs. Whether family or personal or business-related, they share their experiences,” he said.
His support group bolsters him when he’s feeling the lonely-at-the-top syndrome.
“Being an entrepreneur is a very lonely place. There’s a world of expectations on you to be successful and help others be successful. It’s a journey, not about trying to get to a destination. On this journey, you have to evolve, grow, learn to fail and fail fast. An entrepreneur is somebody who has the passion to make a difference and is willing to go over and beyond to accomplish that.”
And if he weren’t serving as CEO of Valor Global, Mayo said, he’d be working on a different kind of passion project.
“I’d be playing guitar on the side of the street. That’s my second passion. And I don’t play guitar at all.”
Post originally appeared in Phoenix Business Journal on 6/21/2019