Hey Carmicheal, I think we might be getting somewhere after your last reply- which I really appreciate.
You're right, there are two game objects I am telling the game to get on start: I use 'Get Owner' on both the Game Manager game object and Level Manager game object- so I can store them as global variables.
Assuming I stick with store them as global variables, any ideas how I could get around the problem I'm having now? As you say, if I am indeed getting a gameobject on start before the object is created.