Pingar Founder and CEO Peter Wren-Hilton: Don't Do Your Startup Alone

The worst thing you can do to your startup is to act as if you are the only person who can make it work. Startup culture demands collaboration and a startup is the perfect opportunity to build a spirit of camraderie and inspiration. We interview Pingar CEO Peter Wren-Hilton about Pingar, a metadata discovery tool and a BizSpark company. 

Here are some insights into management culture and startup creation. 

BizSpark: What have you learned about managing a technological business that you would pass on to the next generation?

Wren-Hilton: You cannot do it all yourself. Recruit a strong team around you at both an executive management and at a Board level. There will be times when you will require the expertise and networks of your wider team in order to execute your company strategies more effectively.

BizSpark: What was the most difficult challenge your business faced this year?

Wren-Hilton: Growth: Headcount and cost have increased exponentially as we have built up our product development, sales, marketing & support teams. This has required additional investor funding and a significant investment in hiring the right people to build up these teams. This is an ongoing process and one that consumes a lot of management time.

BizSpark: Who is your mentor, and what was the last great thing he or she told you and your team?

Wren-Hilton: My wife, Jacqui (also a director of Pingar): She frequently reminds me that ‘I have my head in the clouds and that she has her feet on the ground’. Jacqui is my reality check. Every entrepreneur in this crazy start-up world needs one! Saying ‘NO’ to what sounds like a great new opportunity is a strength that I am very slowly acquiring.

BizSpark: What has overjoyed you in the past month?

Wren-Hilton: Without doubt, the announcement by Microsoft that they had launched the beta Office 2013 Store. The Pingar team is very proud to be the only Microsoft partner to have different applications in both the Office 2013 & the SharePoint 2013 Store categories. As a New-Zealand based start-up, it is great that our research and development team’s capabilities have been recognised in this way. Hobbits across the country are celebrating!

BizSpark: Who inspired you the most this week, and why?

Wren-Hilton: Bradley Wiggins. Watching him pick up an Olympic Gold Medal having just won the Tour de France demonstrated how a total commitment to a dream can come true, delivering amazing outcomes. In the case of Bradley Wiggins, this was not just a personal victory, but one shared by a whole nation. Very inspirational.   

BizSpark: Has starting your own company provided any answers about your life? Have you discovered something about yourself that you didn’t know before?

Wren-Hilton: For a time, starting Pingar was my life. It was a complete 24/7 existence. Learning how to delegate was not a natural instinct for me, but over time I have become much more comfortable delegating key tasks to people far better qualified than I. That has not only helped the business grow, but it has also enabled me to experience life outside work once more. Fish in the Bay of Plenty are no longer safe and I am beginning to think of new ways of reducing that golf handicap.  

Further Information about Pingar

Pingar was interviewed by Robert Scoble last year and Wren-Hilton and his team spoke about Pingar for about 15 minutes. The content mentions the company's SharePoint integration.

You can also check out these product videos.