Jackie Cook - My Biggest Challenge Was Balancing Business And Family (Founder and CEO)

Focusing on building a business that others would find valuable to acquire or invest in helps you prioritize projects and opportunities and stay focused.

1.Tell us more about your company and your journey. 

The company was founded in 2007. Initially, it was more of a consultancy than the data provider it ended up being. 

I was working with investors that we're concerned about issues such as climate change, executive pay and corporate political influence – providing strategic data-driven insights to shareholder campaigns and supporting reports and outreach with analyses of corporate governance, corporate disclosures and investor voting. 

However, as time went by and as more investors started seeing that so-called ‘ESG’ issues are material to a firm’s performance, the data and analysis that the business was producing started gaining more interest from clients serving mainstream investors and corporate issuers.


2.How did you come up with this idea and go about executing it? 

The business grew organically out of a combination of my academic research interests and the values that I felt very strongly about. I started working on questions of corporate governance and corporate form and purpose as an academic researcher at Cambridge University in the late 1990s. 

I became very interested in developing automated approaches to scraping and indexing data contained in unstructured corporate reports to support this research. 

And I could see that bringing visibility to how large investors used their voting power to shape corporate governance practices could really move the dial on important environmental and social issues. 

In the early stages of the business, I also needed to have flexibility as I had young children.


3.What has been your biggest challenge that you faced and how did you overcome that? 

My biggest challenge was balancing business and family.


4. What do you think are the most important qualities of a successful entrepreneur? 

I think there are many definitions of success – even when you narrow it down to entrepreneurship. But, on top of the particular qualities that you need to run a specific type of business, every entrepreneur needs energy and optimism.


4.What are some of the most important factors for running a successful business?

• Treat the people you work with respectfully and kindly.
• Be cost-conscious, but not pound foolish.
• Come up for air regularly – it’s important to step back from time to time to make sure that your business is still heading in the right direction.
• Talk to your clients and prospective clients to really understand their needs.

5.What are your tips for the first time and aspiring entrepreneurs?

Right from the start, think about your exit strategy. Focusing on building a business that others would find valuable to acquire or invest in helps you prioritize projects and opportunities and stay focused.


6.How can one overcome a hurdle of lack of funds when starting up?

I would recommend having a business partner from an early stage as possible in the development of your business. This allows each partner to specialize in a different aspect of the business. One partner can specialize in raising funds.


- Jackie Cook (Founder and CEO)

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackiecook1


Interviewed By Pratibha Sahani