18. TM Insight

Revenue: $9 million
Growth: 166.5%
Founders: Milan Andjelkovic, 40 and Travis Erridge 39
Head Office: Melbourne, VIC
Year Founded: 2010
employees: 27
Industry: Consulting and strategy
Website: www.tminsight.com.au

TM Insight cost less than $25,000 to set up in 2010, but over the past seven years it has grown into a global company turning over close to $9 million in annual revenue.

Despite this, its co-founder Milan Andjelkovic says the company was born out of necessity, rather than choice.   

Headquartered in Melbourne, TM Insight offers consulting services and industry experience in supply chain improvement and industrial property development. It was created in the wake of the global financial crisis after the construction industry was faced with a dramatic slowdown in work and funding.

“In the wake of the GFC, the construction industry was rocked by seismic fallout as all construction ground to a halt and funding for projects stopped,” Andjelkovic says.

“At this time our company founders were (like many others) retrenched from Australia’s largest industrial property developer.”

Andjelkovic and Travis Erridge decided to put their skills to good use, identifying a gap in the market where their experience in the construction industry could deliver value on the client side.  

After bringing on customers like Kmart, Asahi, Woolworths and Bunnings with its construction-management services, TM Insight has since set up offices in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Hong Kong.

However, Andjelkovic says making the move to startups from the support of the corporate world proved to be challenging.

“Coming from a large corporate business … we were the beneficiaries of significant administrative support to assist with travel arrangements, invoicing, marketing, accounting, presentations,” he says.

“Starting a new business meant we had to create and nurture every business opportunity, whilst also taking care of all required administrative tasks …We often found ourselves working through these administrative tasks late at night, which kept us away from our families.”

Andjelkovic admits the long hours, stressful work, endless travel and “constant pressure to perform” wore the founders down, preventing them from taking long breaks to recharge.

Realising this situation was unsustainable and faced with founder burnout, Andjelkovic says a turning point in the business came when it started hiring managers to take care of day-to-day operations.

“By sharing ownership of the business we have not only significantly grown revenue, but also achieved a far greater work life balance,” he says.

“This allows us to focus on key business development opportunities, with the added benefit of no longer having to work late into the night undertaking arduous administrative tasks.”    

Since embracing the power of delegation, the TM Insight team has grown to 27 staff, and has been experiencing a revenue growth rate of 166.5% over the last three years. Backed by this strong growth, Andjelkovic says the company is now looking to grow through acquiring complementary businesses that will enhance the team and client base.

TM Insight has also been approached for acquisition itself, Andjelkovic says, but despite this interest he believes there is still “a lot of growth potential” in the business that he wants to explore both locally and internationally in the next five years.