Hill sees bright future through closed eyes

Michael Hill tells the Thrive Auckland conference how meditation has helped him develop his vision for his company.

Jeweller Michael Hill credits a single daily ritual with much of his business success: transcendental meditation.

And to his captive audience of 2000 business people at Thrive Auckland on Wednesday, he demonstrated how this could be done.

"You just sit in a chair for 20 minutes in the morning and when you get home. Close your eyes and relax. Open your eyes, then close them again. Then repeat your mantra to yourself."

This exercise was all about quietening the mind from the negative thoughts that play on it daily, said Hill.

Pushing those aside during the 20-minute session would see them eventually diminish, he said.

"In the stillness and quietness we discover our true self, all the potential of all our inner-strength and abilities to do things are there to be taken.

"After meditation I'm so full of ideas and afterwards I start dreaming and visualising the steps I will take through my future."

Currently, he's looking at the steps towards his goal of 1000 Michael Hill stores dotted around the globe, creating the world's first "middle-class jewellery chain".

"As arrogant as it might seem, I bet we get our 1000 stores. And there'll be a day when I will be addressing all the Michael Hill troops at a conference like this," said Hill.

But the 67-year-old has not always harboured such ambition.

Until he reached his 40s, running a single jewellery shop in Whangarei was all he could see.

"That was as far as my vision went. I didn't dare visualise any further than that."

Speaking at the Aotea Centre, in Auckland, on Wednesday on how we went from "small fry" to "that guy ", Hill was sure many small business owners would feel the same.

It took the tragic loss of his house in a fire in 1978 to make him aware of his potential.

The story is widely known. Watching the dream house he had just finished building with wife Christine savaged by flames something snapped.

"I realised there was more out there and I had missed opportunities."

Primarily, he realised he had lacked the guts to tell his uncle he wanted to buy the family jewellery store he was working in.

"But I got the guts that day."

There and then Hill wrote on the back of a business card: "I am going to own my uncle's business."

The flat refusal of his three offers didn't hold him back and the next year he opened his own jewellery store down the road, with revenue overtaking his uncle's within 18 months.

More adjustments followed the company's listing in 1987 and its expansion into Australia.

Hill realised that of his time at work only 20 per cent was vital to building a global chain so he reassessed how he spent his time.

The other thing he said he learnt was how to "see into the future".

"How did I do that? By quietening the mind. My mind was always a whirl of different ideas coming and going and negative thoughts would reoccur day-in day-out such as, 'I can't do that' or, 'that's too difficult', keeping me in that space."

In adopting his meditation, the mist of 30 years ago had cleared and, "I can see as far as I like," said Hill.

Within seven years, he believes the company should have 120 to 150 stores in Canada. Currently there are 12.

Then the strategy will be to push across the border into the US or into the UK - or both.

But the growth will be carefully managed, keeping things simple and taking one step at a time.

"It would be foolish to move too quickly with plans for the UK and US as that would be a distraction," Hill said.

"I can't emphasise enough that the formula has to be perfect and people should hold off doing anything until everything is perfect.

"But there comes a point where you've got to fire the bullet."

That sort of discipline also runs through Hill's life outside work - something he enjoys more of these days.

Playing golf on the international golf course he's building on his Queenstown property is one of his favourite pastimes, and he has always made time for exercise.

"I've always tried to do gym work and resistance work.

"Exercise is usually the thing people pull back on as they get older but I'm determined to keep going."

He believed work-life balance was important for all business people.

It was one thing to amass a lot of money, "but if you can't take time to smell the roses and hug your wife, what the hell are we here for?"

His marriage to Christine, who he met when she brought a repair into his uncle's shop, has also played a big part in his business success.

"Having a soulmate makes a huge difference because there's two of you aiming at something rather than one."