The entrepreneurial aspect of our company comes out again and again as I interact with people and explain what it takes to make a dream a reality.

Recently, I had the opportunity to speak to an audience of entrepreneurs at the 2nd Annual New Product Innovation Awards at Suffolk University in Boston. It was the perfect group of individuals, young and old, all of whom were budding, hopeful entrepreneurs.

I explained how Davison has achieved unprecedented success in getting new products to the stores. One of the main lessons I tried to impart is that success only comes after repeated failure.

While talking with many of them after my presentation, I found that the farther along they are in the development cycle, the more they think they’re right – that’s a problem.

If someone has already spent a lot of time and money on a project, they often don’t listen to advice that might require them to move in a different direction; it’s falling on deaf ears. Some in the audience had patents but none, even a patent attorney, had tested their idea. Unfortunately, people with patents often need to go backwards before they can move forward.

Other entrepreneurs might only have a sketched idea, and from that they think they’re on the fast track to the big time. But it takes so much more. If you’re going to do it on your own, you have to jump in with heart, body, soul and everything else. Those who go it alone need to be prepared to make a lot of mistakes, which are going to cost time and money.

I started Davison to provide another option for entrepreneurs. We develop their ideas while saving money because we’ve eliminated the common mistakes; our experience and knowledge gets built into a project right from the beginning. It also requires a customer with an open mind.

That is a very big issue with this business. You want to respect your customer, but you need to have the freedom to do the job properly for them. If you’ve never put a slate roof on your house, the first time you do it you’re going to make a lot of mistakes. It’s the same with a new product. You have to have the right mindset. The best corporate client who comes to us will say, “Here’s our business, here’s what we do – Go make new stuff for us.”

No matter the route you take to follow your dream, it’s very clear you have to make a full life commitment, as I have. One individual asked me if the 18 years of hard work and struggle to get this company to where it is today have been worth it.

It’s absolutely worth it; somebody has to fix this thing known as new product development. That’s where our calling is.

Another entrepreneur I met was second guessing his own calling and letting criticism affect his commitment. I told him he had to wake up, be responsible, do it himself and not care about what his critical “friends” were saying. Why let that negative energy into your life? Go commit your life to your dream. Make it happen.

Thomas Edison made it happen by staying in his lab for days on end, sometimes sleeping on his lab table. That inventor mindset is what it takes to change the world; a lot of hours, a lot of commitment.

Entrepreneurs who come to us don’t have to do that; we make that commitment. Those who do it on their own have to work 10 times harder than we do because they haven’t failed thousands of times, like we did in the beginning.

If you’re going to pursue a new process or product, the difficult times are coming. The competition is not going to let you simply walk in and take market share. You’re only going to come out the victor if you do the entire thing yourself, soup to nuts. If you skip steps you’re guaranteed to have communication breakdown.

Despite all the hardships, I still encourage people who really want to make their own way to go out and do it – absolutely. They’ll create their own process. It’s tough; they just need to know how rough the road is going to be.

One of the most telling moments of my speech was when I displayed two graphs – one showing the perceived rate of failure and one showing the real, incredible failure rate before success is achieved.

That’s the real deal. I gave them realism. I gave them straight answers. They weren’t discouraged. They came up in droves.

At Davison, we really enjoy creative people. It’s just great fun to see what creative people can do when given the opportunity.

Turning away from conventional practices and fostering creativity in our employees has been a hallmark of this company since its beginning. The magic that can happen as a result always makes me smile.

The people who work here were encouraged to have some fun with their imaginations on Halloween. It was an event to remember.

Our people challenged themselves to see who could create the most fun costume. Coworkers smiled as they looked for clues to figure out who was inside a clever disguise. Other costumes delighted with their hand-crafted originality. A free-wheeling spirit transformed himself into a BikeBoard, one of our signature products, and an artistic individual became a famous painting, “The Scream.” The throng also included an authentic-looking Tin Man wielding an axe and wearing his heart on a string and a large wheel who looked like he was about to roll around the room. The setting also was the height of creativity with fanciful decorations everywhere, even in the mouth of “Balzer” the shark, who appeared to have found a pirate’s missing leg.

Several employees actually had photos of themselves in full costume on their name badges for the day with new monikers, such as “Mad Inventionman,” printed under creepy or silly photos. Conversation and laughter filled the building, as members of all our various departments mingled and got to know each other a little better.

The experience reinforced a lesson I learned long ago as the leader of this company – let creative people have their fun; it will reward you. Let their spirit come out as often as you can. Not only do they gain creative freedom, but also a greater sense of camaraderie.

I don’t have to worry about such fun activities at work inhibiting productivity, not at all. If that were the case, we wouldn’t be riding BikeBoards around the curved walkways of Inventionland to get from one design set to another.

If I don’t see increased productivity the day of the party, I know I’ll see it next week. How do you free up the creative mind? I’ll tell you how you don’t – You don’t put a ball and chain on that person. I don’t tell them what to do; I don’t have to. They know what to do.

I really think the rest of the world has it wrong. Sometimes, the hardest thing for companies to do is to ‘let go.’ They are often too restrictive because they’re run by bean counters or second generation owners trying to guide somebody else’s dream.

Companies should allow creative types to be creative. When experimenting on inventions, I think our designers get it right quicker when they’re in their creative mode. So long as you make the goal and mission of the company clear, they’re going to get you there faster.

Sometimes, you’ve got to ‘shake it loose’ and break out of the conventional way of doing things. When your mind lets go, the answers start to flow. And when you free up creative people, you are rewarded with renewed energy, imagination and dedication from employees, which are essentials in growing a company.

In order to build a dream you need a lot of people to build it with you. And that’s what we do – We build dreams all day long.