Recognize
The pattern
A business that could operate without me. A platform people could use themselves. An admiration for infrastructure that outlives the people running it. Those thoughts, over time, became one idea — the seed of SpurrOpen.
About the author
About
Wendell Lawrence.
Entrepreneur, technologist, musician, and long-time student of what it takes to move an idea from someone’s imagination into something the world can experience.
This page is about Wendell in the context of Finish What You See. For the broader picture of his work — speaking, coaching, and other ventures — see wedlawrence.com.
A life of ideas
A résumé isn’t the point.
The through-line is.
For a long time I thought of them as different things I had done — technology, music, church, entrepreneurship, teams, companies, failures, rebuilding. Eventually I saw the common thread: I was constantly working with ideas — and learning how to bring them into reality.
- 01
Early curiosity
Born in Spanish Town, St. Catherine, Jamaica, in a home with a preacher, a teacher, and six older siblings. Interested in how things worked, how agreements were made, and how something could be created from what was available — long before I had language for entrepreneurship.
- 02
Technology
One of my brothers introduced me to computers. That opened an entirely different world and became a career in technology — building software products and solutions used by organizations and people in different parts of the world.
- 03
Music
A drummer, artist manager, booking agent, and consultant working with some of the best talent in Jamaican Gospel music. For more than a decade I built a music business alongside a team, learning what it meant to serve creative people and their careers.
- 04
Church and community
Involved in ministry and community initiatives — including the Christmas Day Feeding Project (later the I Fed One Foundation) — where I watched an ordinary Christmas-morning question grow, through consistent review, into something that touched thousands of lives across Jamaica.
- 05
Teams and ventures
I have built teams and I have lost teams. I have built companies and had to shut companies down. I have experienced financial confusion, emotional burden, deep grief, and unexpected breakthrough. Each one became a teacher.
- 06
SpurrOpen
A software platform for events — the idea that started as a passing thought in 2014, survived the collapse of another company in 2019, and became the work I gave one last full-year push before letting go. Then 2020 arrived.
One idea — over the long arc
Recognized in 2014.
Nearly lost in 2019.
Needed in 2020.
One last push
2019
When one of my companies collapsed, SpurrOpen was the only product still standing. I told my wife I would give it one last full year. If it didn’t work, I would let it go. That final push demanded everything I had — and revealed the perseverance, focus, and conviction still inside me.
Release meets reality
2020
Then the world changed. Almost overnight, the solution I had struggled to keep alive became one that people suddenly needed. Looking back, none of the years were wasted, and none of the detours were accidental.
This is one story. The book carries several more — successes, failures, and the lessons that turned into the Five-R Framework.
Why Finish What You See
I did not write it because I had it all figured out.
I wrote this book because I have spent more than two decades building, rebuilding, succeeding, failing, learning, and beginning again. Through every season, I found myself asking the same question: why do some ideas become reality while others remain only possibilities?
The answer, I discovered, was rarely found in the quality of the idea alone. More often, it was found in the process.
Ideas do not become reality by accident. They require careful stewardship. They must be recognized before they can be understood, researched before they can be trusted, planned before they can be built, released before they can create impact, and reviewed before they can mature.
I wrote this book for the person who is tired of carrying unfinished visions — the entrepreneur who starts enthusiastically but struggles to finish, the creative with notebooks full of possibilities and few finished projects, the leader carrying something meaningful that needs structure to move forward.
Beyond this book
Wendell’s wider work
lives at wedlawrence.com.
This site exists for Finish What You See. For everything else — speaking, coaching, other ventures, and the broader story — see the personal site.
More on this site
Related on this site
The Book
The manual that came out of more than two decades of finishing — and not finishing — the ideas I carried.
Read more
The Five-R Framework
The framework that emerged from paying closer attention to the process around each idea.
Read more
wedlawrence.com
Wendell's broader work — speaking, coaching, and other ventures.
Visit site