THE former chief executive of ABC Learning Centres, Eddy Groves, spoke yesterday of the dark moments he experienced during his company's collapse.
Speaking in Queensland at a lunch of the Ipswich Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Mr Groves said preventing his downfall was like "trying to hold back a dam that was about to break".
Mr Groves appeared to be in good humour, resembling the confident young man of 2006 who was Australia's richest man under 40 with a personal fortune of $325 million and cracking jokes about his new day job of "watching Dr Phil and Oprah" at home.
His fall from grace has been rapid and devastating. On September 30, after amassing millions of dollars of debt in a failed attempt to break into the US market, Mr Groves parted ways with the company he had built.
He said if he knew now what a US push would bring, he would not have tried it.
"I don't regret that we went into the US, but I do regret that we probably weren't as prepared as we needed to be because no one could have sat there and said, 'This is going to happen with the US dollar' and 'This is what's going to happen with the global markets'," he said.
Mr Groves said that when he realised the writing was on the wall for his company he began to feel afraid. "That's a scary place to be, when you feel like you are holding back a dam that is about to break - and the reason why it is about to break is not because of the foundations of the dam but because there is so much water coming," he said.
"No matter how strong the foundations are, it's going to knock it over. So, of course, during those times there were a lot of dark moments, a lot of lost sleep."
Mr Groves said his thoughts rested with his employees during the collapse - the child-care workers and office staff employed in ABC's 10,000 centres.
Under its new chairman, David Ryan, ABC is rebuilding the business. And while he may be free to watch even more daytime TV, Mr Groves urged budding entrepreneurs not to be deterred by his experiences.
