An Interview with Jim Rae, docs24 Ltd Founder and CEO: Core to our growth is our defined culture. Our culture bible – and the talented people who work for the business

The Silicon Review

“We can create dazzling solutions for our clients but if we fail to have trust, it’s all for nothing.”

Teams all over the world are creating more content than ever before, across a multitude of platforms and mediums and for a wide variety of markets and industries. Creating such a wealth of content requires a serious investment of time, energy, and resources, without even considering the storage, global access, and distribution of these print and digital assets. That is where docs24 Ltd comes in, providing one central asset management platform that gets global and local teams on the same page for real-time collaboration and editing.

Established in 2013, docs24 has grown over the last seven years to become one of the most agile marketing, business content, and brand asset management platforms in the world, giving clients simple, efficient, tailored, and controlled management of a business or brand. The name docs24 is the perfect acronym for exactly what the firm offers through its exceptional services and products. docs24 works with digital documents and their clients brand assets, managing it, and organizing marketing, print, and company content. From there, the client has complete control through one simple tailored portal, and they can benefit from the streamlined business, saving time, and money. All of this is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Such is the excellence of docs24 and the services it provides for clients.

Jim Rae, docs24 Ltd Founder CEO, spoke exclusively to The Silicon Review. Below is an excerpt.

Q. Business owners trying to compete in this highly competitive market usually find themselves facing a dilemma with their digital marketing strategies. How do you help them find the right tool that they can use and focus on?

docs24 uses the term ‘voyage of discovery’ and this is an extremely important element within the scoping phase of any project. It’s where we spend the most time as it’s of the utmost importance to us. At the forefront of everything is ensuring the success of our client experience; bringing them new ideas and procedures and always having them at the very center of our values. We always go the extra mile to show our clients we care. That is always the bottom line for docs24. We can create dazzling solutions for our clients but if we fail to have trust, it’s all for nothing. Our clients know that what we propose to them is always what is best for them and not what is best for us.

Q. Is online presence an integral part of the marketing campaign? How can a business choose the right branding avenue?

docs24 do not believe that one-size-fits-all and a multi-channel approach to marketing generally provides the best return on investment for businesses. What is right for one business or sector, may not be right for another so taking time to understand a client, their goals and aspirations, their customers, and competition normally point us in the primary direction on what is best for them. Businesses will need to try different routes to find out what is most effective for them as not every company will be the same.

Q. Growing the company based on employees’ passions must be the priority. Do you ask your employees what they are interested in doing and how they would like to see their career unfold?

Weencourage our colleagues, within the business or outside of it. For those who wish to develop certain skills, we facilitate self -learning, coaching sessions, and provide the opportunity to test these skills in a real-life business environment. You can only get the best from your colleagues when they are valued, listened to, and encouraged to be the very best they can be. We always look to promote from within and the culture we have created enables our colleagues to reach for the stars if that is what they wish to do.

The important element in this is never to force a colleague into doing something they are not comfortable in doing. This only leads to stress and unhappiness. Nobody has ever left our business and that is something we are very proud of, and allowing self- development is a key aspect of why this is the case.

Q. A good workplace stresses teamwork while still encouraging individual achievement and creativity. Does your company follow the same strategy?

Teamwork is the most important word within docs24. We are genuinely all in it together. Nobody is more important within the business than anybody else. Everyone helps each other to achieve the very best for our clients, as they are the most important people to us. Interestingly, we never set individual goals, only team ones. If we succeed, we do it together and if we fail, we also do this together. I do not think you can work effectively as a team, whilst also having individual goals, as if you have individual goals, people will put themselves first rather than doing what is best for the team and our clients. At certain times of the year, we will have monthly goals and if we succeed, we go out together as a team and have some fun.

Q. Trust is a difficult attribute to measure and a delicate dynamic to maintain. How do you maintain this with your employees?

This goes back right to the beginning of the recruitment process. We use our culture book as the bible for recruiting people. More often than not, we recruit people who may not be as highly skilled as others but they have a much better cultural fit. I have a firm belief that you can train people to be better at what they do but you can never change who people are so we always focus on the person rather than the ability level. I also have three people within the business who have worked with me in two older businesses and this helps a lot, especially with encouraging new employees. I think trust is also having the belief in the ability and judgment of employees to do the right things and not be scared about making mistakes, as this is the only way in which you can improve.

Q. What does the future hold for doc24 and its employees? Are exciting things on the way?

I am hoping that the future of docs24 is very bright. We have a lot of plans to expand further within the US, along with the possibility of new offices in other countries. We will be doing a funding round in 2021 and potential acquisitions will form part of this plan. At the very core of what we do are our clients and colleagues. Importantly, when the opportunity arises to sell our business in the future, all our colleagues will benefit considering their major contribution to the success of the company.

Jim Rae: A Reliable Leader

Jim Rae, founder, serves as the Chief Executive Officer of docs24. He first kicked a soccer ball at the age of three and started playing professionally at the age of 16 with Dundee FC where he played as a defender. He remained at Dundee for three years during that time they won the Reserve League Cup in 1986. He subsequently had spells with league teams below the Scottish Premier League.

Post his soccer career, Jim moved into sales after having worked for global businesses including Xerox and Hays. Later, Jim joined the board of Docuserve, Inc as Sales & Marketing Director, followed by a Managing Director position. He led an MBO of the company which subsequently rebranded as Elevate in 2004.

After creating and selling other small businesses, Jim launched docs24 in 2013. docs24 works with some of the largest blue-chip companies across the globe, within financial services, home improvements, pharmaceutical, education, and retail.