Faisal Butt went to a fee-paying school in Islamabad. The private institution is renowned for equipping students for an international future, and alumni often leave Pakistan for the Western culture of the United States and Europe.
And Faisal too moved from Pakistan to the States to study at university. After graduating in the class of 99’ at UCLA Anderson on the West Coast, he moved into a business analyst’s role in a management and IT consulting firm in in Los Angeles.
Exactly ten years later, he graduated from the University of Oxford’s Said Business School. And three months ago, in the UK’s business capital, London, he poured a seven-figure investment into the Britain’s leading online estate agent with his mentor, James Caan – a serial entrepreneur and one of the wealthiest business figures in the UK.
Yet if you’d have told the young man back in America that he’d soon slide through an MBA degree in England and found or invest in almost a dozen businesses, he’d have likely laughed you out of the room.
Faisal got a taste for entrepreneurship, quit consulting in 2003 and founded Tribal Monsoon, a social e-business start-up that went on to claim an award under his guidance as CEO.
After four years, another venture came calling. Faisal co-founded a local chapter of The Indus Entrepreneurs, which would become the world’s largest not for profit organization promoting entrepreneurship
Faisal has succeeded where so many MBAs have failed. He is an entrepreneur pure and simple, a man who changed his career trajectory, came out on top, and hasn’t looked back since. His property portfolio today has a ring of monopoly to it; he has founded and co-founded more companies than this page can fit.
And his investment strategy today makes his first business look like child’s play. His most recent strategic masterstroke, eMoov.co.uk, is part of a series of investments Faisal has begun making in a sector that is enjoying a glorious comeback since the financial crisis.
His playground today is not in Pakistan. It is in the UK’s property hot-spots. And much like on a Monopoly board, Mayfair, where he learned his trade, is the expensive preserve of the elite. So how did Faisal, a self-styled “outsider” in the UK, rise to such prominence? In truth, he has much to thank the UK for. Not only is it his new home and the place of his top-ranking MBA degree, but it was the making of Faisal Mark Two: the entrepreneur and investor.
Oh how many MBAs fight with fire to break into consulting, and stick with a pre-defined career-plan? One year turns into two, two turns into five and before you know it your too far up the corporate ladder to climb back down.
Entrepreneurship can be a more attractive option for today’s business graduate, yet only one in three start-ups makes it past their third year in the UK. Faisal has essentially been in entrepreneurship for past a decade. Talk about beating the odds.
So when he was deep in the “most exhilarating, exciting and stimulating” year of his life at Oxford, it’s a shock to my ears that he initially snubbed the chance to meet, perhaps, the UK’s most famous face in entrepreneurship and mega-business.
Caan has become something of a father-figure to Faisal, but back in 2008, when the legendary entrepreneur and Dragon’s Den member was a key-note speaker at an Oxford event, Faisal didn’t fancy attending. “I hadn’t heard of Dragon’s Den and didn’t know anything about it,” he confesses.
For those that still don’t; it is a show that pits would-be entrepreneurs in front of multi-millionaire investors, in, often, hilarious fashion. Caan was one of the show’s original investors and founded Alexander Mann, a UK recruitment business which with £130 million turnover with 30 offices worldwide, and Humana International, a franchising model, which established 147 offices in 30 countries. He did it all without any qualifications, but Faisal met him in quite audacious fashion while getting his second degree.
“I was very busy in the oxford MBA, it takes every minute of your time,” Faisal explains. “I wasn’t planning on going but my wife recommended it. I was sat in the second row and while James gave his talk I challenged him a few times and engaged the debate.
“I got the sense that he was building a business rapidly but he could do with some assistance with regards to the processes had probably not thought through what processes he had to gear up for growth.”
A bold move, no doubt, but Faisal went further. “Then I approached him and introduced myself. I said: James, I sense that you haven’t thought through what the blueprint of the business will be, you’re taking each day as it comes,” Faisal says.
“He said: you’re exactly right. We’re all in the trenches and haven’t really created a blueprint. I said let me put together a dream-team of Oxford MBAs and we’ll come in this summer, analyse your business from start to finish to make a blueprint, and come up with a best practice plan.”
Entrepreneurs are known for taking risks and this was surely his greatest. But Caan was humbled rather than enraged. The dragon didn’t breathe fire; rather, he gave this young buck a chance.
Faisal did exactly what he proposed and delivered a project for the multi-millionaire that summer. That was the start of a business partnership that is still in full-force today. Caan is the MBAs’ mentor and not only has he backed Faisal’s ventures with capital, but has invested in the property sector with him.
“It’s fortunate to have him back me and I invest with him, but it’s great to know I have someone behind me,” Faisal says. The financial backing is not as important as the wisdom, he insists, although I have no doubt that after spending thousands on an MBA degree, it was a welcome sight.
In truth, many commentators say an MBA is for managers, not entrepreneurs. When Faisal enrolled at Oxford, he had already run Tribal Monsoon for almost five years. Already achieving success, why did he even bother attending business school?
“I felt I’d outgrown the business I was running, I felt I was destined for much more,” he replies. “So I took a step back. It was a bit of time to pivot my life and the MBA gave me the opportunity to do it.” Faisal got onto the MBA program with a social entrepreneurship scholarship, and the schools’ focus on the ventures and not just the corporate world impacted his decision.
There is no doubt, however, that it has helped him establish himself in the UK’s property scene. “It was the most intense year of my life. I loved it and recommend it [for entrepreneurs],” Faisal says. “I’m an outsider in the UK so it was a stepping stone for me. It gave me a platform to springboard. And had I just come into London cold, it would be different.
“I’ve got an alumni network at entry level all the way to chief exec. It has also given me credibility. It’s been instrumental.”
Despite all the criticism these days, Faisal says b-school it is a great place to start your own business. Incubators are a common sight and students are able to choose SMEs for summer internships over big-name companies.
After a stint with Caan’s investment firm Hamilton Bradshaw Ltd, Faisal invested in and became a partner of 90 North Real Estate Partners LLP in 2011, a similar independent real estate investment advisory firm.
Faisal would spend the next few years working across London’s property sector, investing in and founding real estate ventures, in an industry that continues to boom.
London is still a firm favourite with investors seeking core and core plus assets, as it makes the most of its reputation as a safe haven for foreign investors.
Large amounts of sovereign capital from the Middle East are coming into London and funding deals is considered easy. PwC recently ranked London as top for development and as Europe’s economy improves, the real estate industry continues to develop.
The economic crash of 2008 was largely blamed on a property bubble, yet it is the same crisis that gave Faisal his way in. “It was just when markets imploded. But that’s a time when innovation happens and I started to see it, and I thought that I’d like to be at the centre of that movement,” he says. “I backed more property start-ups than most other investors in London.”
Another risk pays dividends. Faisal may have tamed a dragon, but he is creating a fire of his own in the UK’s hot property sector.
And the MBA is not done yet, he insists. “I’ll invest in a few more and then start harvesting. And after that? Watch this space.”
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