New CEO seeks support in navigating a growing, global business

Erling Magnus Solheim is no stranger to the adrenaline rush. Climbing, snowboarding, skateboarding…and start-ups. He landed in his first start-up while still in school (at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology - NTNU). This was back in 2011, when he and his fellow classmate launched Douchebags – travel bags designed for the type of gear that doesn’t quite fit in a Samsonite.

Erling spent five years fully immersed in Douchebags, behaving like every good founder and doing a little bit of everything to get the company going. It’s the start-up story to which everyone aspires, with positive results year-on-year, a growing global business and fantastic people joining the ranks along the way. It wasn’t long before Douchebags was in full bloom, which Erling took as a sign that it was time for his next adventure.

Injury leads to introspection and a new business

This next chapter in Erling’s story doesn’t go quite as smoothly as the last one. After pursuing what ended up as a failed opportunity in New York, he suffered a serious injury while downhill cycling in the mountains of Norway. It was a life-changing event for Erling; and it led to some serious introspection on what he wanted to do next with his life.

“My injury led to a time of reflection for me, and once healthy enough in 2015-2016, I found myself back at NTNU, this time as a consultant. It was here that I met a Ph.D. student who had a brilliant idea for a new company,” said Erling.

The idea was to converge the video game experience with exercise, giving users a genuine gaming experience from a stationary bike. Erling went in as the co-founder of the company, now called Playpulse, focusing his time on business development. Over the past three years, Playpulse has been tried and tested in hospitals, fitness centers, municipalities, co-working spaces and the like, and people love it – especially gamers. Erling is now CEO of the company, and he and his team have enormous ambitions for growth. They are currently exploring a launch in China with a new partner.

New challenges as CEO require new methods

“Until Playpulse, my experience as a formal leader was fairly limited. Now, as a CEO, I face new issues and challenges beyond those I faced as a founder. I’ve had mentors throughout my career, but I’d never had a coach until I met Jon Erik,” said Erling.

Erling spent the first half of 2019 in coaching sessions to work on his leadership during times of transition. He was in a challenging phase at Playpulse, having shut down one office, hiring in another office, and eventually trying to enter the Chinese market.

“I was looking for a coach who had experienced corporate-level challenges, who had dealt with complex, global issues, and who possessed the tools to guide me through the problems,” added Erling. “I knew that Jon Erik had coached higher-level executives, and I was curious how that could apply to me as a start-up CEO.”

A job title doesn’t necessarily come with the tools needed for the role

In Erling’s CEO role, he faced a high degree of uncertainty and complexity, which he had never dealt with on this level before. He was globalizing his business, dealing with financial matters, engaging with investors and trying to grow, all at once. He needed support in understanding his role and to become the leader that the company needed at any given point in time.

“Jon Erik gave me the tools I needed to better understand my role, to tackle complexity and to be prepared for any situation,” said Erling.

One of the tools that proved valuable for Erling was ‘visualization’. By imagining a variety of situations that he may encounter, Erling was able to visualize and prepare for these types of high stakes meetings. This allowed him to talk through the scenario, analyze it and work out the challenges he may face. He then was able to prioritize the challenges, determining where to invest his time and effort, and which to set aside. This proved quite effective for Erling, especially at a time when he was truly straddling the line between the start-up world and the corporate world.

You’re not in the start-up world anymore, Erling

“As a new CEO, I needed to make things happen, and Jon Erik proved to be the right person at the right time to support me at this stage,” said Erling. “And I needed to be confident in my own decision-making. Jon Erik helped me to understand my role, to prioritize the challenges I faced, and to encourage me to reflect on how my role will evolve as the company grows.”

Erling just may be on his ultimate adventure to date, as he stands on the precipice of success, along with the complexity, uncertainty, and every kind of adrenaline rush that comes his way. But he now has the tools in tow to take his company all the way to the top.