“My parents put me in tennis lessons when I was five. Growing up, there was a big wall at our house and I’d always be practicing, just hitting against it for hours. I eventually got quite good and, for over a decade, I competed in a lot of junior and state tournaments, up until I was 18.
My favourite part about tennis was the grind of matches, especially when you’ve got the mental edge over someone as you’re deep in a set or a tiebreak. I really hated losing. I wouldn’t miss a lot and would consistently hit my winners, so I could generally out-grind the other players. But as we got to the next level, I had some shoulder problems that meant I couldn’t ever serve as big as a lot of the other guys. That was eventually why I didn't try to pursue it further overseas.
Today, I feel like the startup world and tennis have the same lessons, just at a different pace. In both, you have to stay focused and take calculated risks at the right times, and I love that parallel. But more than anything, tennis taught me about grit. And that’s just as important in a startup as it is on the court.”
Hudled is a SaaS startup providing a real-time dashboard for teams in growing companies to track and optimise their software stack.