Today we’d like to introduce you to Shawn Khorrami
Hi Shawn, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
Simply put, I’m a serial entrepreneur, having started and managed more than a dozen companies from the ground up with me as employee one. Over that time, I’ve managed every single department within those companies, from IT to operations, finance and accounting, to marketing and sales and everything in between, and as teams and tasks grew, brought in experts to lead those departments.
I started when I was 16, quite by accident, trying to help my father who was struggling to manage a couple of small income properties he had purchased shortly after we immigrated from Iran. I saw a problem, and wanted to solve it. That’s what began my entrepreneurial career, and that single drive of identifying a problem and wanting to solve it is what has driven virtually every venture since.
Along the way, I attended college where I obtained degrees in mathematics, computer science, and economics, and went on to get a law degree as well. I also obtained substantial formal education in accounting, marketing, and sales. All of that, to me, was really part of the backbone of running a business.
While I started being an entrepreneur by accident, that I was eventually going to become one was hardly ever in doubt. My father started his own construction company in Iran before I was born. So, as long as I could remember, even as a child in Iran, he would take me to the office and even some construction sites. Watching him run his company, which grew to get involved in some substantial projects, was all I knew. So, I always believed that I would eventually be either taking over his or starting my own.
As things turned out, I would never come to run his company as we had to leave Iran shortly after the 1979 revolution there, which meant leaving everything behind. But I did end up starting my own companies. In fact, I have never received a W-2 from a company in which I did not have ownership interest.
For as long as I have memories, my father taught me various lessons that either directly or indirectly have guided how I start and manage companies. For example, early on in my career, he emphasized to me that if I’m going to run a business, I should be familiar with every piece of that business. That’s a philosophy that’s not necessarily universally accepted. But it’s one that I adopted. So, my decision to start and grow each department personally was in trying to be true to that. This not only allowed me to learn each aspect of my business, but provided a very steep learning curve on developing skills and expertise in a wide range of disciplines.
In part because of that range of skills, I was regularly approached by various small and medium sized businesses, almost always in a time of crisis – either because something terrible had occurred or something wonderful had happened (both can cause crises). From this grew what I considered a number of mentorships, but also a number of wonderful business ventures.
Through that process, I was exposed to hundreds of SMBs, allowing me to identify a number of common challenges, which I could lump into three main categories. I decided to formalize my little mentorship program into a business. And that’s the start of my latest company. We’ve developed a unique process with which we can help SMBs turboboost their revenues in the short-term, and build their brands, and create a multi-channel presence in the longer term.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It has not been a smooth road by any means. There have been plenty of bumps and bruises along the way. Some have been more painful than others, but all of them have been painful. One of the earliest struggles came as I was trying to get one of my early businesses off the ground. Having secured a few contracts which at that time signified great financial security, I spent aggressively for growth in the business, and was less than prudent in my personal expenditures.
My spending decisions were based on the faulty assumption that once signed, the contracts would translate into money in the amounts and timing that I expected. Not so! When one of the contracts underperformed and another was delayed substantially, I quickly found myself heavily overleveraged while at the same time facing a steep drop in my cash flow.
I clearly had placed very high risk bets on the contracts, as what were relatively small changes in the status of the contracts had caused complete upheaval for me both professionally and personally. I had bet on three contracts, and when two of them did not perform – one in terms of returns and the other in terms of timing – even for a relatively brief period, it had placed me in a doomsday scenario.
It took nearly a year, a lot of maneuvering and negotiating, and a number of sleepless nights to right the ship. And while it was a tough lesson, I have remained a risk taker. I just take much better risks now. I am better at navigating through the challenges, and when there is a cliff ahead, I am better able to see it and avoid it.
Each of the struggles have been agonizing when I was dealing with them, but incredible lessons that have helped me sidestep plenty of landmines. Perhaps more importantly, they’ve also helped me help countless other businesses (and their owners) avoid pitfalls that would have been devastating for them, their employees, and their families.
We’ve been impressed with ePlaybooks, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
My newest venture is ePlaybooks.com. As with a number of my companies, I started it simply because I saw a problem and wanted to help fix it. At ePlaybooks, we use a unique process that I created based on helping hundreds of SMBs over the years. It’s geared toward helping ecommerce companies turbo boost their revenues in the short-term, and build their brands, achieve reliable margins, and create a multi-channel presence in the longer-term. At the same time, we help them build the infrastructure they need in order to support their expanding business.
Our unique process begins with us working with a brand on single sales channel, such as Amazon. During that initial period, we assess the catalog, the market, and understand the vision of the leadership and/or founder(s). Concurrently, we create and execute on marketing plans in order to generate immediate sales, optimizing to meet any budgetary constraints as well as growth and profits goals. We can also handle other front-facing aspects of the business, such as customer care. At the same time, we work closely with the company to assess their logistics and sourcing, and to fill any holes that may exist.
We like to take the risk alongside our clients. So, we have an incentive-based compensation system where we are only compensated if we generate revenues.
The crisis has affected us all in different ways. How has it affected you and any important lessons or epiphanies you can share with us?
There are number of lessons that I learned from the COVD-19 pandemic. I’ll stay clear of the personal and health aspects. Clearly, COVID brought plenty of personal and health tragedies for people across the globe. At the same time, it delivered crucial lessons in business. The first one is that it taught us that anything can happen, even the unthinkable. That the entire world can literally shut down in a matter of days. So, be prepared to adapt, pivot on a dime, and figure out a way to survive, and thrive. And while it brought us face to face with potential economic doom, the pandemic taught us that when it comes to business, everything can present an opportunity.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.eplaybooks.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eplaybooks/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eplaybooks/
