How HECK! found a better way to grow through the Amazon Innovation Accelerator

Growing pains are unavoidable for most businesses. It’s part of the process of getting bigger – figuring out how to grow more effectively and manage more people as you expand. 

For Debbie Keeble, co-founder of HECK!, this was an all too familiar scenario. But through the Amazon Innovation Accelerator she has been able to turn it completely on its head. 

Adapting workplace culture for growth 

HECK! is a food manufacturer specialising in premium sausages. Starting in 2013 on a farm in North Yorkshire, the team has grown to 130+ full-time employees and their products are stocked in every major UK supermarket. 

As HECK! gets bigger, implementing changes gets harder. We’re no longer sat around the kitchen table making and communicating decisions in real time. As a family run business, there can be an assumption that only the owners can make decisions. We’ve always worked on the basis that our leaders own their space, and we want them to feel confident making decisions, learning as they go.

As the team grew, the ability to drive change in the business got harder: 

Our growth outpaced the tools we were using to drive and communicate change. They worked when we were a team of 20 but not all of them scale effectively. We knew we had to be intentional about changing that.

So, when an opportunity to join the Amazon Innovation Accelerator in Leeds came along, it felt like a good time to work through solutions that would help accelerate HECK!’s change programme. 

Inspiring team confidence 

During the accelerator, Debbie was introduced to many of Amazon's ways of working. The biggest win came from a session on emotional intelligence. 

Learning about Amazon’s EPIC model has been really beneficial. It taught us you need to have the right mindset to encourage people to have ideas, that there’s no such thing as real failure. It’s about helping people move away from the negative and toward solution-focused thinking. That doesn’t sound like a big change, but it really has been. 

As a result, she has seen a difference in how she leads in her business: 

My confidence in leading change and innovation has grown significantly since the accelerator. I’m able to change the mood of the room much more easily and ensure everyone is in the right mindset when coming to the meeting. That's been a huge shift. 

That confidence isn’t only evident in Debbie, it’s also had a real impact on her team: 

While we were already on the journey to creating a more confident, high performing leadership team, attending the Amazon Innovation Accelerator has helped speed up our work. We’re future-proofing the business as we’re more able to inspire confidence and autonomy in our people.

Small changes lead to big results 

Since the Amazon Innovation Accelerator, HECK! has continued to go through a state of change. Armed with new leadership skills, Debbie has tackled these changes head on. 

Right now, we’re going through a lot of change as a business. We’ve been improving our use of AI, cybersecurity and product sustainability. The programme has taught us how to more effectively take the team along with us and ensure these changes aren’t met with negativity.  

These lessons have stacked up into impressive results: 

This year, our revenue has grown by about 20%. That’s partly down to the little things we’ve been changing since being on Amazon’s Innovation Accelerator. It's helped us to grow more quickly and overcome challenges more easily. 

Ultimately, Amazon has given HECK! a more effective way to grow. Debbie and her team have better quality discussions; they’re building a better culture and are more productive in everything they do. 

I’m most proud of the improved structure in our business and the way in which we focus on innovation. We’ve gained a new discipline and can encourage our team to have freedom within a framework.