Pros
Over my career, I’ve found that many people who are business minded enjoy talking about start ups …more yet enjoy talking about start-ups that turned into great companies. It’s challenging to start a business – making a business succeed on a small scale is difficult – the great majority of new businesses fold within 5 years. Of course some businesses succeed (some wildly so) --- and power America ahead. I’ve been at Zayo since its inception. Zayo has grown by many orders of magnitude since we completed our first acquisition in the summer of 2007. By any measure Zayo was (or depending on your perspective, is!) an extremely successful start-up. There are a ton of phenomenal employees who have enabled this to take place – I suspect the vast majority of which will look back at this time in their careers and realize that they played a significant role in creating a major, successful new company. That’s something very few people can claim! Most top notch pro football players tend to gravitate towards winning coaches and QBs..they want to play on winning teams ... I imagine it’s hard work playing for Brady or Manning (or Flacco!).. if you’re a wide receiver there are probably ‘easier’ paths to take…. If you play for one of the top QB’s I suspect you’re stretched and pushed..but the reward is success/making it to the playoffs & for some, winning the Super Bowl. Zayo has been fortunate in that we’ve been able to recruit and retain a ton of talented, enthusiastic and versatile employees. Zayo has always been (and is likely to remain) a dynamic, rapidly changing organization. People who tend to really like working at Zayo enjoy challenging, fast paced environments; they enjoy accelerating their careers. Zayo has a ~6 yr consistent track record creating equity value. That’s hard work – much harder than a static/steady state environment.. but, similar to the NFL analogy, has been rewarding for those who enjoy working hard and winning! I’d speculate that the fiber assets that Zayo has in the ground and the services that we provide over that fiber will be around for the next 100+ yrs.. the same dynamic has held true for other critical infrastructure industries (think Railroads) over the last hundred. The exact service or mode to deliver the service might change (no more steam engine; no more caboose); however, the fundamental service & the assets (RR Tracks) will very likely be around for many years. Another reason why employees enjoy working at Zayo is that there is a very clear career path forward (from an industry perspective). That is, if you know how the infrastructure services we provide work, it is highly likely you’ll be highly employable for the rest of your career.
Cons
Many steps along the way have been challening. Our company looks nothing like it did ~6 yrs ago. The playbook you use when you’re a three person company is vastly different than the playbook you use when you’re a $1B run rate business. Change is hard..it’s frequently easier to keep doing the same thing over and over again. Many people (such as myself) enjoy and thrive on change; we get bored doing the same thing over and over. That’s a must have for working at Zayo. It’s also a must to be able to navigate your way through a rapidly changing/evolving organization. Employees who don’t like change, rapid growth and the hard work it takes to enable an ever growing business won’t like working at Zayo.