Duane Jackson - Four Thousand Days: My Journey From Prison To Business Success

First published in 2015

Copyright Duane Jackson 2015

The right of Duane Jackson to be identified as the Author
of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without
the prior written permission of the author, nor be otherwise circulated
in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and
without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchases

Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1511431927

Published by

CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

To those who helped me in the process of putting this book together: Patrick Johnson, Barbara Benton, Steve O'Hear and Richard Newton

To the awesome people I've worked with over the years who don't get a mention none of this would have been possible without you.

To everyone who works for or supports The Prince's Trust and the amazing work they do.

And most importantly, for her infinite patience and faith: Nadia Jackson

If you don't design your own life plan, chances are you'll fall into someone else's plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much.

- Jim Rohn

When I first met Duane I was quite taken with his business. This was long before The Cloud was thought of and the idea of keeping the program on your own server and leasing access to it to your customers was so remarkable that I quite overlooked the fact that his customers were barely into double figures. I made the mistake that most of us who invest in technology companies make. We look at the idea, at the technology used and overlook the person behind it.

I knew that Duane had been in jail, had been sentenced for something that I was told was drugs related and I also knew that the Prince's Trust had recently given him his chance. I had been part of the Prince's Trust for many years and that was how we met. In time I became his Mentor and the rest is in this book. What I did not appreciate at the time, and only realised as the years went by, was how quite remarkable, and unfortunately how unusual, his journey had been.

At the beginning I was helping him as part of my work for the Prince's Trust. As the months and then the years went by I began to realise that here was a young man of ability with drive and determination, who had had little chance, up to then, to show what he was made of. As the business grew, his self-confidence grew with it and as his confidence grew, so did his abilities. How, I began to wonder, could someone with little or no formal education achieve what he was in the process of achieving. Eventually I realised his achievements were in spite of his education and not because of it. How many, I wondered, had switched off during their early years at school, and when they left, at the first opportunity, had little to show for it. Even more, how many had let their lack of success in school convince themselves that they were failures?

A few years later I was back in government and as part of my responsibilities created Start-Up Loans, which gave an opportunity, for anyone who wanted to work for themselves, to have a loan of 5,000 and a Mentor. Many hundreds are doing so week after week. This time I remembered Duane and we have introduced a scheme that will enable people still in jail to create their business plan and then start their business as soon as they leave, of course with the continuing help of a Mentor. It is still early days, but I hope that in time we will create many more Duanes, who, even if they are not as successful as he has been, will be able to support themselves and their family and regain their full place in society.

One of the unexpected results is that I have gained even more than Duane from our association. I had all the fun and excitement of being involved with a successful start-up (although, happily, little of the hard work), the continuing excitement as the business grew and of course the successful conclusion with the sale of the business. I think I enjoyed my time with Duane and KashFlow more than I had any time with any of my own businesses. Then I also began to realise that my own conventional upbringing had been a very sheltered one and that there were very many in society had not been so fortunate, people with skills and ability that have been denied even the modest start in life that I had enjoyed.

Although I had been long concerned with young people who obtained little or no benefit from their school years, going back to the days of the Youth Training Scheme in the early eighties, I had not considered the innate ability of many who have fallen by the wayside. I hope that a result of the work I did then and I shall be doing over the next few years in education, we shall see that many, who even if they do make a mistake, will be given an opportunity to recover.

This is a story which should give heart to many.

David Young
Graffham, April 2015

The flight from London to Atlanta was was pretty uneventful. I was glad of the chance to get some sleep after a heavy night drinking.

My hand luggage was stuffed with drugs and as I got to the top of the escalator, I spotted two sniffer dogs. My heart skipped a beat. I couldnt turn back. I could only stand in the crowd on the escalator slowly descending. It took forever. I could see them getting closer and closer. Every passing second seemed to add weight to my bag. I had no idea if Ecstasy had a smell that could be detected by dogs. Its not something I had even thought about. I was trying to keep calm and not look nervous, even as my stomach was tying itself in knots. I became paranoid that one of the dogs was staring at me. My palms were sweating and I felt nauseous. I stepped off the escalator and waited for the dogs to pounce. They didnt.

A wave of relief came over me. Id never taken Ecstasy myself but if I could have bottled the feeling I had just endured I am sure I could have sold it and made a fortune. Thank fuck this was to be my last trip, I never wanted to go through that experience again. I just needed to collect my checked-in suitcase, complete the deal and be on my way to see Simone. I couldnt wait to tell her about what just happened. I laughed to myself about how scared I was.

Excuse me sir, do you have all of your luggage? asked a man in uniform who had just materialised in front of me.

No. Im still waiting, I replied.

He smiled, nodded and walked away.

Ahead of me I could see lots of Customs officers busy checking cases. At Gatwick, Heathrow or JFK I had never seen all of the Customs tables in use. But here it was like a jumble sale - every table had an open suitcase on it with a uniformed officer searching.

My bag appeared and I headed straight for the Nothing to Declare lane. My mind was telling my legs to move faster and my legs were shouting back to slow down, dont attract attention! That initial relief disappeared and I began to panic again.

Step this way please, an officer ordered. FUCK!

He took my suitcase and gave it a thorough going over. It was clean, of course.

But my shoulder bag would they notice it?

Pathetically, I tried to push it further round my back, willing it to disappear.

And that one, he demanded, indicating the bag that refused to disappear between my shoulder blades. Now I knew the game was up.

He pulled out the talcum powder, took off the lid and emptied it onto the stainless steel counter. I saw clouds of talcum powder, followed by dozens and dozens of tubes of Ecstasy tablets, all wrapped in cling film. Not a word was uttered but I could tell the officer was pleased with himself. How? Because the bastard started humming a merry tune as he worked through the rest of the bag.