Dylan Rudney shares insights from his journey building Verano Energy, offering advice on business planning mistakes he'd correct if he could speak.
Dylan Rudney shares insights from his journey building Verano Energy, offering advice on business planning mistakes he'd correct if he could speak to his younger self. The discussion covers his entrepreneurial leap from hydro to solar, scaling the company, and fundraising over $1 billion for renewable energy projects, highlighting the importance of strategic business growth and financial acumen.
Let's say I bring you back in time to and and now you're able to have a chat with that younger Dylan that is coming out of the private equity firm. Before launching a business, what would you tell that younger Dylan and why given what you know now? Oh man, we've learned so many lessons along the way. Um I think number one is is um don't believe in a don't be fooled by by uh how attractive a business plan looks on paper. Um I think you often think that you know you're within 10 or 15% of your projections. I find that your costs tend to be much higher than you expected and your revenues tend to be much lower than you expected. So, our planning has been really you know, at the beginning was consistently well off and that's why we had to go back and raise money. We weren't able to sell as fast as we wanted. So, everything was distorted generally speaking, right? I mean, against your what
your your best wishes were. So, I wish I I wish I had had better planning and projection projections. And the other thing is and I and I and I tell entrepreneurs this when they ask me is is very careful with fixed costs. Especially if you going to you don't have a big backer at the beginning like we never have had. Is I wish I was more careful about hiring, spending, anything that was month-to-month you have to pay for. The the impact on how successful you have to be and might push you to make bad decisions is how much spending you have to make. I wish I was more cautious in that way.