The Inner Chief: Recent Episodes
Greg Layton
The Inner Chief | Executive Coaching for a successful career and life with Chief Maker, Greg Layton
If you believe as I do that learning from the masters, coupled with consistent personal growth, is instrumental to a successful career an life then this is your podcast. Every Thursday I’ll bring you a deep diving interview with a CEO or GURU with their best wisdom and advice and every Monday I post a short, sharp minisode with the best tips I can muster to help you in your career.
Interviews with Noel Whittaker, Nicky Sparshott, Jennifer Holland, Jeff Brown, John Lee Dumas, Geoff Lloyd, Hetty Johnston and Damien Price
"I was attempting to be the smartest person in the room, trying to add value to somebody else's work. It was not facilitating others' greatest contributions. In fact, it shuts people down."
In this Best of Series episode, we replay a chat I had in 2019 with Tracey Burton, Executive Director of Uniting, on experiential learning, 360 degree feedback and the future of the health industry.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/391 👂
DISCOVER HOW THE CHIEF MAKER MINI MBA WILL DRIVE PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT IN REAL-TIME. JOIN THE WAITLIST: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Tracey has been the Executive Director of Uniting NSW/ACT since April 2018.
She has more than 35 years' experience in the Australian health and community services sector including leadership roles at St John of God Health Care, Ramsay Healthcare and St Vincent's Health Australia.
In addition to her executive management roles, she has also served as a Board Director for aged care services, disability services in New Zealand and for a medical research foundation.
Tracey holds a Bachelor of Health Administration, an MBA, is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and has done an Executive program in Negotiation at Columbia University in New York.
In this Best of Series Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Why being the smartest person in the room won't help you lead
✅ How to supplement formal education with experiential continuous learning
✅ The do's and don'ts of 360 feedback and why it is so powerful; and
✅ The future of the healthcare industry and how these now measure up 7 years after our initial interview.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Tracey Burton You can connect with Tracey via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Your Leadership Diamond - by Paul Mitchell * The Untethered Soul - by Michael Singer
Similar Episodes on feedback * Paula Martin, Executive Director, Regional NSW and Visitor Economy at Business NSW, on Learning from everyone, adapting to shorter strategy cycles, and genuinely receiving feedback * Neil Craig, Former AFL Head Coach on High performance environments, your North Star and decision-making under pressure * Chief Maker Minisode Series on How to Give Feedback
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"When we sleep, a spinal fluid washes over our brain and gets rid of a peptide called beta-amyloid which is implicated in the Alzheimer dementia process. So if we're not getting enough sleep on a regular basis, we really do suffer the consequences later on."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Dr Carmel Harrington, an Executive Sleep Guru and Managing Director of Sleep for Health.
Her full episode is titled The myths and factors of sleep that drive optimal health, joy and performance.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/389 👂
PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT FRAMEWORK. Make sure you assess all your leaders using the same systemised approach with this performance assessment tool: chiefmaker.com/performance
Carmel is an internationally recognised sleep expert, having worked in the world of sleep for more than 20 years. She is the Managing Director of Sleep for Health and an Honorary Research Fellow at the Children's Hospital Westmead.
Following a career as a lawyer and educator, she obtained a PHD in Sleep Medicine from Sydney University and consults with companies and educational institutions both here and overseas on sleep health.
Amazed at the seemingly little importance given to sleep, she dove head-first into the emerging research that clearly demonstrated that sleeping well was a key component of optimal performance and health.
Carmel has also written two books, "The Sleep Diet" and "The complete guide to a good night's sleep".
In the full Sleep Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The crazy myths we carry about sleep and how short-circuiting this vital human function does far more than just make us tired.
✅ The different kinds of sleep and the optimal number of hours we need each night.
✅ Polyphasic sleep, caffeine, alcohol, diet, and
✅ What to do when you can't sleep!
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Dr Carmel Harrington You can connect with Carmel via her website, sleepforhealth.com.au
Books and Resources * The Sleep Diet - by Dr Carmel Harrington * The complete guide to a good night's sleep - by Dr Carmel Harrington * The 4-Hour Body - by Tim Ferriss
Similar Episodes on Sleep and Recovery * The Sleep Doctor, Dr Michael Breus, on How to fix your sleep, achieving maximum performance outcomes, and the four chronotypes * Chief Maker Minisode on How elite Chiefs do recovery properly * Chief Maker Minisode on Top 3 tips for beating overwhelm and burnout
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"The best annual performance reviews are built all year long."
Chief, in today's Minisode I run you through how to run Annual Performance Reviews really well, so much so that they are enjoyable, collaborative and result in your people giving sustained extra effort and kicking goals for the company.
I know for many of you, these meetings and processes can be stressful and you might not like delivering them. And if that's the case, you might find that the person you're reviewing will definitely not like experiencing them!
Today, I walk you through the exact frameworks I use for his process and how you can lead with distinction and be the leader to your people that you always wanted to be.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/390 👂
HAVING SOMEONE'S CAREER PROGRESSION IN YOUR HANDS IS A PRIVILEGE. Are you taking this responsibility seriously? Find out how with our Performance Review guide: chiefmaker.com/performancereviews
In this Minisode, I'll break down for you:
✅ Your mindset and role as a leader and coach in annual performance reviews.
✅ Preparation and context to ensure you're ready for the meeting.
✅ The CLEAR framework that provides a strong meeting agenda for maximum impact.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"Sales and marketing just seems to be like a lost skill so you have to learn to be the differentiator as the human bridge."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Nick Lissette, Founder & CEO of Blackpearl Group.
His full episode is titled Driving data into dollars, building human bridges in an AI world, and his "win or die" attitude.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/388 👂
JOIN THE WAITLIST FOR THE MOST PRACTICAL LEADERSHIP & EXECUTIVE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM ON THE MARKET (NPS: 91): chiefmaker.com/minimba
Nick is the Founder and CEO of Blackpearl Group, a global data and AI technology company based in Wellington, New Zealand.
With over 20 years in software, data and AI, he has built a career developing intelligent technology that drives measurable business growth.
Under Nick's leadership, Blackpearl has grown from a founder-funded startup to a publicly listed global company providing purpose-built AI-powered tools to small to medium enterprises, helping them find and convert customers without expensive ad dependence.
Nick is something of a serial entrepreneur, having founded an anti-spam SaaS service called Silver Cloud Mail in 2006, which he sold in 2012.
In the full AI Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Why AI speed only matters when it drives customer revenue outcomes.
✅ How to defend your business when code is no longer an obstacle.
✅ Why sales, marketing and human bridges still remain critical competitive advantages, and
✅ How executives can become AI-ready before AI takes their job.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Nick Lissette You can connect with Nick via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Creating Sustainable Advantage - by Jaynie Smith * Pitch Anything - by Oren Klaff
Similar Episodes on Artificial Intelligence * Joel Pearson, Director of the Future Minds Lab, on Leading in uncertainty, Future-proofing for the AI revolution, and De-risking innovation * Angus Stevens, Co-Founder & CEO of Start Beyond, on Putting guardrails on innovation and creating useful technology for tangible real-world problems * Kath Blackham, CEO of The VERSA Group, on Extracting huge value from diversity and inclusion, the 4-day work week, and using tech for good
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"When we sleep, a spinal fluid washes over our brain and gets rid of a peptide called beta-amyloid which is implicated in the Alzheimer dementia process. So if we're not getting enough sleep on a regular basis, we really do suffer the consequences later on."
In this Best of Series episode, we replay a chat I had in 2019 with Executive Sleep Guru, Dr Carmel Harrington, on the myths and factors of sleep that drive optimal health, joy and performance.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/389 👂
PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT FRAMEWORK. Make sure you assess all your leaders using the same systemised approach with this performance assessment tool: chiefmaker.com/performance
Carmel is an internationally recognised sleep expert, having worked in the world of sleep for more than 20 years. She is the Managing Director of Sleep for Health and an Honorary Research Fellow at the Children's Hospital Westmead.
Following a career as a lawyer and educator, she obtained a PHD in Sleep Medicine from Sydney University and consults with companies and educational institutions both here and overseas on sleep health.
Amazed at the seemingly little importance given to sleep, she dove head-first into the emerging research that clearly demonstrated that sleeping well was a key component of optimal performance and health.
Carmel has also written two books, "The Sleep Diet" and "The complete guide to a good night's sleep".
In this Sleep Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The crazy myths we carry about sleep and how short-circuiting this vital human function does far more than just make us tired.
✅ The different kinds of sleep and the optimal number of hours we need each night.
✅ Polyphasic sleep, caffeine, alcohol, diet, and
✅ What to do when you can't sleep!
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Dr Carmel Harrington You can connect with Carmel via her website, sleepforhealth.com.au
Books and Resources * The Sleep Diet - by Dr Carmel Harrington * The complete guide to a good night's sleep - by Dr Carmel Harrington * The 4-Hour Body - by Tim Ferriss
Similar Episodes on Sleep and Recovery * The Sleep Doctor, Dr Michael Breus, on How to fix your sleep, achieving maximum performance outcomes, and the four chronotypes * Chief Maker Minisode on How elite Chiefs do recovery properly * Chief Maker Minisode on Top 3 tips for beating overwhelm and burnout
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"Is your customer winning from using your product? Are they making or saving money from you? If so, how much and how is that measurable to your product?"
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Nick Lissette, Founder & CEO of Blackpearl Group, on Driving data into dollars, building human bridges in an AI world, and his "win or die" attitude.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/388 👂
JOIN THE WAITLIST FOR THE MOST PRACTICAL LEADERSHIP & EXECUTIVE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM ON THE MARKET (NPS: 91): chiefmaker.com/minimba
Nick is the Founder and CEO of Blackpearl Group, a global data and AI technology company based in Wellington, New Zealand.
With over 20 years in software, data and AI, he has built a career developing intelligent technology that drives measurable business growth.
Under Nick's leadership, Blackpearl has grown from a founder-funded startup to a publicly listed global company providing purpose-built AI-powered tools to small to medium enterprises, helping them find and convert customers without expensive ad dependence.
Nick is something of a serial entrepreneur, having founded an anti-spam SaaS service called Silver Cloud Mail in 2006, which he sold in 2012.
In this AI Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Why AI speed only matters when it drives customer revenue outcomes.
✅ How to defend your business when code is no longer an obstacle.
✅ Why sales, marketing and human bridges still remain critical competitive advantages, and
✅ How executives can become AI-ready before AI takes their job
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Nick Lissette You can connect with Nick via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Creating Sustainable Advantage - by Jaynie Smith * Pitch Anything - by Oren Klaff
Similar Episodes on Artificial Intelligence * Joel Pearson, Director of the Future Minds Lab, on Leading in uncertainty, Future-proofing for the AI revolution, and De-risking innovation * Angus Stevens, Co-Founder & CEO of Start Beyond, on Putting guardrails on innovation and creating useful technology for tangible real-world problems * Kath Blackham, CEO of The VERSA Group, on Extracting huge value from diversity and inclusion, the 4-day work week, and using tech for good
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"If you've got good relationships and you're building alliances around ideas and issues, you can get things done."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features David Borger, Executive Director for Business Western Sydney and former NSW Politician.
His full episode is titled Building alliances with your enemies, finding your executive courage, and championing legacy projects.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/386 👂
DISCOVER HOW THE CHIEF MAKER MINI MBA WILL DRIVE PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT IN REAL-TIME. JOIN THE WAITLIST: chiefmaker.com/minimba
David is the Executive Director of Business Western Sydney, where he champions the growth, infrastructure and innovation precincts shaping one of Australia's most important regions.
A former Lord Mayor of Parramatta (the youngest ever at just 30), David has also been the State Member for Granville and Minister for Roads and Housing, and has has spent his career bringing people together around big ideas and getting things done.
He has served on a range of Boards across government, business, transport, culture and urban development, including NRMA and the Powerhouse Museum.
David is still as passionate as ever about ensuring that all communities are great places to live, regardless of where they are located.
In the full Relationship-building Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Building alliances around ideas, by communicating even with your enemies.
✅ Finding the courage to speak up when you first get elevated to a senior position.
✅ Advocating for large projects in small decision time windows, and
✅ Championing Western Sydney's infrastructure, innovation precincts and legacy projects.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with David Borger You can connect with David via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Freedom's Forge - by Arthur Herman * The New Geography of Jobs - by Enrico Moretti
Similar Episodes from Business NSW * Paula Martin, Executive Director, Regional NSW and Visitor Economy, on Learning from everyone, adapting to shorter strategy cycles, and genuinely receiving feedback * Paul Nicolaou, the Executive Director of Business Sydney, on The 3Ps of building an insanely valuable network, daring to be different, and making people happy * Zaklina Craig, Executive Director – People, Culture & Workplace, on Optimising role design for peak performance, managing differences in confidence between men and women, and navigating the decision to fire someone
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"This framework is the core of what we do at Chief Maker. We join leaders' intuitive abilities with a framework and a process they can follow and repeat and really make it their own."
Chief, in today's Minisode I run you through the High Performance Teams framework that is behind the Chief Maker MiniMBA Program we run every quarter for executives and other aspiring senior leaders.
Recently, in Episode 385, I spoke about the I AM GREAT method, which I believe is crucial to implement if you desire to lead a high-performing team.
Today, I walk you through the 5 pillars of the HPT framework so that you get a clear understanding of what separates good teams from great ones.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/387 👂
EQUIP YOUR MIDDLE MANAGERS AND SENIOR LEADERS WITH THE TOOLS TO DRIVE CHANGE AND RESULTS. JOIN THE WAITLIST: chiefmaker.com/minimba
In this Minisode, I'll break down for you:
✅ How and why I developed the High Performance Teams framework ✅ The 5 pillars: Mission, People, Culture, Tools, Execution, and ✅ How leaders can unite their intuition with a framework for repeatable implementation.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"I remember being a young bloke as Lord Mayor and I was almost reticent to ask my small team to do the job. I felt guilty. Over time I realised that delegating is actually giving people opportunities."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to David Borger, Executive Director for Business Western Sydney and former NSW Politician, on Building alliances with your enemies, finding your executive courage, and championing legacy projects.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/386 👂
DISCOVER HOW THE CHIEF MAKER MINI MBA WILL DRIVE PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT IN REAL-TIME. JOIN THE WAITLIST: chiefmaker.com/minimba
David is the Executive Director of Business Western Sydney, where he champions the growth, infrastructure and innovation precincts shaping one of Australia's most important regions.
A former Lord Mayor of Parramatta (the youngest ever at just 30), David has also been the State Member for Granville and Minister for Roads and Housing, and has has spent his career bringing people together around big ideas and getting things done.
He has served on a range of Boards across government, business, transport, culture and urban development, including NRMA and the Powerhouse Museum.
David is still as passionate as ever about ensuring that all communities are great places to live, regardless of where they are located.
In this Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Building alliances around ideas, by communicating even with your enemies.
✅ Finding the courage to speak up when you first get elevated to a senior position.
✅ Advocating for large projects in small decision time windows, and
✅ Championing Western Sydney's infrastructure, innovation precincts and legacy projects.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with David Borger You can connect with David via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Freedom's Forge - by Arthur Herman * The New Geography of Jobs - by Enrico Moretti
Similar Episodes from Business NSW * Paula Martin, Executive Director, Regional NSW and Visitor Economy, on Learning from everyone, adapting to shorter strategy cycles, and genuinely receiving feedback * Paul Nicolaou, the Executive Director of Business Sydney, on The 3Ps of building an insanely valuable network, daring to be different, and making people happy * Zaklina Craig, Executive Director – People, Culture & Workplace, on Optimising role design for peak performance, managing differences in confidence between men and women, and navigating the decision to fire someone
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"What I noticed was that a lot of the self-help material out there really just didn't give you a sense of how to build the high performance system in order to achieve excellence and flow."
Chief, in today's Minisode I am going to give you the background on how I developed the I AM GREAT framework for executive mastery, and how I've evolved it over time.
As a leadership and executive coach for nearly 20 years, I have witnessed the extremes of performance: what makes teams succeed beyond their capacity, and what causes them to fail spectacularly.
Over time, I've developed and iterated a framework which I believe is crucial to implement if you desire to lead a high-performing team.
Today, I give you the step-by-step actions you need to take in order to rise above the pack, inspire your people, and leave a legacy.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/385 👂
WANT TO BE A SOUGHT AFTER, IN-DEMAND EXECUTIVE? DISCOVER THE NEXT STEPS YOU SHOULD TAKE TO BUILD TRUST, GAIN RESPECT AND ACCELERATE YOUR CAREER: chiefmaker.com/IAMGREAT
In this episode, I'll break down for you:
✅ Why I developed the GREAT Method for achieving excellence in your career ✅ The evolution to I AM GREAT and why this difference matters, and ✅ How this framework fits into building a High Performance Team.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"Consumers are rightly demanding more transparency from retailers on price, so we're using AI pricing tools and the results have been pretty instant in terms of uptick on where we're competitive ."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Jamie Kristow, CEO of Cotswold Outdoor Group.
His full episode is titled Optimising the retail value chain, adapting your pace of leadership, and championing AI innovation.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/384 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Jamie is the CEO of Cotswold Outdoor Group, a leading outdoor clothing and equipment retail group based in the UK.
His career has spanned more than 25 years globally and includes direct-to-consumer retail experience across Australia, UK, Canada and South Africa.
Jamie has led incredible merchandising transformations for big brands like Target, Myer, Woolworths, Hudson's Bay and Sussan Group, while championing innovation such as a retail media network.
He is just a wonderful operator with a brilliant track record of delivering results through data-driven decision-making, empowered teams and customer-first thinking.
In the full Retail Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ A wonderful explanation of the busy and complex retail value chain, and how to optimise for each component.
✅ Following the "rivers of money" and building product range through evolution not revolution.
✅ Why time in store and walking in a customer's shoes are vital to turnarounds, and
✅ How shifting search behaviour, retail media and AI pricing are reshaping retail growth.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Jamie Kristow You can connect with Jamie via LinkedIn.
Similar Episodes on retail * Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora and Fauna and CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on Being adventurous, bootstrapping a business, and first mover advantage * Angus McPherson, MD Australia of Diageo, on Creating momentum, difficult conversations, and simplifying your message * Cliff Gale, former Managing Director of Lite n' Easy for over 20 years, on Leading with passion, respect for your people and keeping the soul alive in your business
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📃 Grab one of the many FREE Leadership Resources
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"Understanding how the customer journey is changing and how you adapt is going to radically change retail in the coming years."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Jamie Kristow, CEO of Cotswold Outdoor Group, on optimising the retail value chain, adapting your pace of leadership, and championing AI innovation.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/384 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Jamie is the CEO of Cotswold Outdoor Group, a leading outdoor clothing and equipment retail group based in the UK.
His career has spanned more than 25 years globally and includes direct-to-consumer retail experience across Australia, UK, Canada and South Africa.
Jamie has led incredible merchandising transformations for big brands like Target, Myer, Woolworths, Hudson's Bay and Sussan Group, while championing innovation such as a retail media network.
He is just a wonderful operator with a brilliant track record of delivering results through data-driven decision-making, empowered teams and customer-first thinking.
In this Retail Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ A wonderful explanation of the busy and complex retail value chain, and how to optimise for each component.
✅ Following the "rivers of money" and building product range through evolution not revolution.
✅ Why time in store and walking in a customer's shoes are vital to turnarounds, and
✅ How shifting search behaviour, retail media and AI pricing are reshaping retail growth.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Jamie Kristow You can connect with Jamie via LinkedIn.
Similar Episodes on retail * Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora and Fauna and CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on Being adventurous, bootstrapping a business, and first mover advantage * Angus McPherson, MD Australia of Diageo, on Creating momentum, difficult conversations, and simplifying your message * Cliff Gale, former Managing Director of Lite n' Easy for over 20 years, on Leading with passion, respect for your people and keeping the soul alive in your business
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
" When we talk strategy, we mean let's get through the next 12 months. Have a three year outlook, but be prepared to change it in six months' time if we have to."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Paula Martin, the Executive Director, Regional NSW and Visitor Economy at Business NSW.
Her full episode is titled Learning from everyone, adapting to shorter strategy cycles, and genuinely receiving feedback.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/383 👂
ARE YOU GIVING THE RIGHT FEEDBACK? LEARN HOW TO EMBED EFFECTIVE FEEDBACK IN YOUR CULTURE: chiefmaker.com/feedback
Paula is the Executive Director, Regional NSW and Visitor Economy at Business NSW, where her focus is to champion growth through collaboration with government, industry and business.
She leads Business NSW's regional office network, shaping policy that reduces red tape and creates employment opportunities.
Paula also founded the award-winning Australian Business Consulting & Solutions, delivering innovation, commercialisation and programs for SMEs.
Under her leadership, Paula achieved many firsts including the set-up of an operation in Shanghai to help Australian SMEs find genuine, authentic buyers in China, as well as the design of leading HR Management System, HR Advance.
In the full Business Growth Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Why "stable ground" matters to achieving operational excellence and sustainable business scaling.
✅ The one thing a mentor said to her that changed how she embraced continuous learning.
✅ How shorter strategy cycles are key to navigating an era of uncertainty and volatility, and
✅ Being truly present and vulnerable when absorbing feedback so as to unlock better decision-making.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Paula Martin You can connect with Paula via LinkedIn.
Similar Episodes on strategic planning * Minisode: The AAR Method of Strategic Planning * Angela Tsoukatos, CEO and 20 years executive team member, on How to manage key priorities to ensure focus on core business * David Knoff, Antarctic Expedition Leader, on Being adaptable around your mission
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
" I want people to walk away from any engagement they have with me saying that I'm not a bad bloke, that I was keen to listen, and that I wanted to help."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Paul Nicolaou, the Executive Director of Business Sydney.
His full episode is titled The 3Ps of building an insanely valuable network, daring to be different, and making people happy.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/382 👂
JOIN THE COUNCIL OF CHIEFS. Break the isolation and stretch your thinking with a network of like minded C-Suite executives and business owners: chiefmaker.com/councilofchiefs
Paul is a highly experienced executive leader and board member, having been Executive Director for Business Sydney since September 2021.
Prior to this, he was Director for the Business Leaders Council, Membership and Events for the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) for seven years.
He is a Board Member of the Estia Foundation, and Ambassador for both Vinnies CEO Sleepout and Start Up Australia.
Paul has held several senior roles in his distinguished career, such as at UNSW and UNSW Foundation, the CEO of the Australian Hotels Association of NSW, the NSW President of the Marketing Institute of Australia, and he served as Executive Chairman of the fundraising and business engagement arm of the Liberal Party in NSW.
In the full Networking Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ How he has built incredibly reliable and insanely valuable networks using the "3 Ps" model.
✅ Leading with energy and daring to be different.
✅ Why his daily KPI is making people happy, and
✅ Cutting through red tape to run a business without being superhuman.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Paul Nicolaou You can connect with Paul via LinkedIn.
Similar Episodes on networking * Minisode: How to Think Like a CEO: Leveraging your network * Ted Prodromou, America's #1 LinkedIn Coach, on Perception, connecting properly with purpose, and standing out online * Steve Sims, the Concierge to Billionaires, on How to gamify life and work, going for stupid and building priceless relationships
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"Imagine if you could. You need to imagine a future. You need to imagine growth. You need to imagine what success looks like."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Paula Martin, Executive Director, Regional NSW and Visitor Economy at Business NSW, on learning from everyone, adapting to shorter strategy cycles, and genuinely receiving feedback.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/383 👂
ARE YOU GIVING THE RIGHT FEEDBACK? LEARN HOW TO EMBED EFFECTIVE FEEDBACK IN YOUR CULTURE: chiefmaker.com/feedback
Paula is the Executive Director, Regional NSW and Visitor Economy at Business NSW, where her focus is to champion growth through collaboration with government, industry and business.
She leads Business NSW's regional office network, shaping policy that reduces red tape and creates employment opportunities.
Paula also founded the award-winning Australian Business Consulting & Solutions, delivering innovation, commercialisation and programs for SMEs.
Under her leadership, Paula achieved many firsts including the set-up of an operation in Shanghai to help Australian SMEs find genuine, authentic buyers in China, as well as the design of leading HR Management System, HR Advance.
In this Business Growth Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Why "stable ground" matters to achieving operational excellence and sustainable business scaling.
✅ The one thing a mentor said to her that changed how she embraced continuous learning.
✅ How shorter strategy cycles are key to navigating an era of uncertainty and volatility, and
✅ Being truly present and vulnerable when absorbing feedback so as to unlock better decision-making.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Paula Martin You can connect with Paula via LinkedIn.
Similar Episodes on strategic planning * Minisode: The AAR Method of Strategic Planning * Angela Tsoukatos, CEO and 20 years executive team member, on How to manage key priorities to ensure focus on core business * David Knoff, Antarctic Expedition Leader, on Being adaptable around your mission
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
" It's never about Paul Nicolaou; it's about other people, because you want to appreciate and show your passion towards them and helping them achieve an end result."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Paul Nicolaou, the Executive Director of Business Sydney on the 3Ps of building an insanely valuable network, daring to be different, and making people happy.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/382 👂
JOIN THE COUNCIL OF CHIEFS. Break the isolation and stretch your thinking with a network of like minded C-Suite executives and business owners: chiefmaker.com/councilofchiefs
Paul is a highly experienced executive leader and board member, having been Executive Director for Business Sydney since September 2021.
Prior to this, he was Director for the Business Leaders Council, Membership and Events for the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) for seven years.
He is a Board Member of the Estia Foundation, and Ambassador for both Vinnies CEO Sleepout and Start Up Australia.
Paul has held several senior roles in his distinguished career, such as at UNSW and UNSW Foundation, the CEO of the Australian Hotels Association of NSW, the NSW President of the Marketing Institute of Australia, and he served as Executive Chairman of the fundraising and business engagement arm of the Liberal Party in NSW.
In this Networking Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ How he has built incredibly reliable and insanely valuable networks using his "3 Ps" model.
✅ Leading with energy and daring to be different.
✅ Why his daily KPI is making people happy, and
✅ Cutting through red tape to run a business without being superhuman.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Paul Nicolaou You can connect with Paul via LinkedIn.
Similar Episodes on networking * Minisode: How to Think Like a CEO: Leveraging your network * Ted Prodromou, America's #1 LinkedIn Coach, on Perception, connecting properly with purpose, and standing out online * Steve Sims, the Concierge to Billionaires, on How to gamify life and work, going for stupid and building priceless relationships
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
" Let's create an army of light and just get out there and be a positive force in the world."
Chief, welcome to 2026. In today's Minisode I am going to share with you my tips for being the leader that the world needs right now.
If you've felt the weight of the negative news cycle, the anxiety of the unknown and the relentless pace of change, you're not alone.
Therefore, it's time to be a positive leader who brings light, energy, and direction when others feel overwhelmed.
Yes, you can't pretend the world's perfect and you can't ignore hard realities. But you can choose to impart a contagious culture of positivity and light.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/381 👂
BREAK THE ISOLATION. Discover the benefits of C-Suite networking for shared learnings, innovation, and business growth: chiefmaker.com/councilofchiefs
In this episode, I'll break down for you:
✅ Why this matters in the world right now ✅ The 3 actionable principles you need to get moving quickly, and ✅ Protecting your energy fiercely.
Here's to hitting 2026 out of the park, Chiefs!
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my free Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"It all starts with a good night's sleep. There is very clear research that cognitive performance declines when we're sleep-deprived."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Justin McNamara, Psychometrics Guru.
His full episode is titled Improving recruitment selection, performance prediction and acing psychometric tests.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/380 👂
NEED TO GET YOUR HIRING RIGHT? Discover 30 unique and powerful interview questions used by CEOs to help make sure you hire the right person for the right role: chiefmaker.com/interview
Justin is an Occupational Psychologist who loves working at the intersection of people and data, in order to support companies to solve tricky problems.
During his career, he has been privileged to learn from great minds at the University of Queensland, and both Kent and Cambridge Universities in the UK, while happily immersing himself in the latest research.
His passion for psychometrics, machine learning and data have resulted in deep expertise in the creation of custom assessment solutions for a variety of businesses in most industries to improve the performance of their people and selection processes.
In his own words, he loves bringing the nerdier things to life for clients in a pragmatic and business-focused way.
In the full Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ What Psychometrics are - and aren't - and which ones are useful in the recruitment process.
✅ Knowing the markers for success for predicting both performance and leadership.
✅ The future of Psychometrics and big data, and
✅ The key factors in ensuring you can ace a psychometric test.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Justin McNamara You can reach Justin via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * People Excellence website * Practice psychometric tests: + https://www.shldirect.com/en/practice-tests + https://www.savilleassessment.com/practice-tests + https://www.trytalentq.com
- Talent Intelligence – by Nik Kinley
- Mind Over Mood – by Dennis Greenberger
Similar Episodes on hiring talent * Chief Maker Minisode: 7 unique interview questions used by CEOs * Nancy Slessenger, Founder and CEO of Vinehouse Hiring, on Scientific recruitment, the do's and don'ts of interviewing, and staff retention * Linda Carroll, Chief People Officer of G8 Education, on Hiring for attitude and the critical power of human capital
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
" A setback is that reinforcement that this is your opportunity to be the best of yourself. That's really exciting. It's the next step, the next day, the next week, the next season."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Rupert Guinness, author and ultra-endurance cyclist.
His full episode is titled Choosing growth and opportunity and discovering untapped physical and mental capacity through extreme adversity.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/378 👂
ARE YOUR PEOPLE RESISTING CHANGE? Learn to lead the right way right now with the Chief Maker Guide to Situational Leadership: chiefmaker.com/fixresetgrow
Rupert is a Sydney-based sports writer, author, public speaker and media consultant, as well as an accomplished ultra-endurance cyclist, adding extraordinary personal experience to his storytelling.
Rupert spent nine years living in Belgium and France covering the Tour de France from up close in inside the tent. Since then, he has written for major publications including The Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian and The Daily Telegraph.
Across his career, Rupert has reported on an exceptional array of sports, covering many of the world's biggest events, including the Rugby World Cup, four Olympic Games and an extraordinary 31 Tours.
Beyond journalism, Rupert has held senior media and communications roles with the Australian Rowing Team, the NSW Waratahs and the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race. He has also written 15 books, including Power of the Pedal, Overlander, and The Tour.
In the full Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The harsh reality of life inside the Tour de France and the unseen battles at the back.
✅ His personal accounts of mental toughness, setbacks and breakthroughs in finishing ultra endurance races.
✅ How he used resilience and composure to reframe weaknesses into growth areas, and
✅ Why seizing opportunity, embracing uncertainty and pursuing adventure matters more in midlife.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Rupert Guinness You can connect with Rupert via LinkedIn or Instagram.
Books and resources * The Tour - by Rupert Guinness * Power of the Pedal - by Rupert Guinness * Overlander - by Rupert Guinness * The Fight - by Norman Mailer
Similar Episodes on high-stakes adventure * David Knoff, Antarctic Expedition Leader and author, on High-stakes risk and crisis management, and being adaptable around your mission * Rory Hunter, Founder of MODEL, on Seeking solitude and healing on the ocean, and the adventure of a lifetime after buying an island in his twenties * Ian Snape, CEO of Frontline Mind, on Resilience by design, leading Antarctic expeditions and relaxing in high-stakes environments
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"Resumés don't actually have that much useful information; your experience as a candidate can vary wildly based on the environment that you're in and your motivations to perform."
In this Best of Series episode, we replay a chat we had in 2019 with Psychometrics Guru, Justin McNamara, on improving recruitment selection, performance prediction and acing psychometric tests.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/380 👂
NEED TO GET YOUR HIRING RIGHT? Discover 30 unique and powerful interview questions used by CEOs to help make sure you hire the right person for the right role: chiefmaker.com/interview
Justin is an Occupational Psychologist who loves working at the intersection of people and data, in order to support companies to solve tricky problems.
During his career, he has been privileged to learn from great minds at the University of Queensland, and both Kent and Cambridge Universities in the UK, while happily immersing himself in the latest research.
His passion for psychometrics, machine learning and data have resulted in deep expertise in the creation of custom assessment solutions for a variety of businesses in most industries to improve the performance of their people and selection processes.
In his own words, he loves bringing the nerdier things to life for clients in a pragmatic and business-focused way.
In this Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ What Psychometrics are - and aren't - and which ones are useful in the recruitment process.
✅ Knowing the markers for success for predicting both performance and leadership.
✅ The future of Psychometrics and big data, and
✅ The key factors in ensuring you can ace a psychometric test.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Justin McNamara You can reach Justin via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * People Excellence website * Practice psychometric tests: + https://www.shldirect.com/en/practice-tests + https://www.savilleassessment.com/practice-tests + https://www.trytalentq.com
- Talent Intelligence – by Nik Kinley
- Mind Over Mood – by Dennis Greenberger
Similar Episodes on hiring talent * Chief Maker Minisode: 7 unique interview questions used by CEOs * Nancy Slessenger, Founder and CEO of Vinehouse Hiring, on Scientific recruitment, the do's and don'ts of interviewing, and staff retention * Linda Carroll, Chief People Officer of G8 Education, on Hiring for attitude and the critical power of human capital
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
" The key here is not perfection, it's all about just doing the very best we can in the current state of our life."
Chief, in our last episode of 2025, I'm going to share with you the exact end of year review process I've refined over more than two decades that gives me clarity, alignment, and meaningful progress.
You can complete this on your own or with your partner, but in the Council of Chiefs we take it further by building a full Executive Playbook that guides both your career and life.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/379 👂
JOIN THE COUNCIL OF CHIEFS. Break the isolation and stretch your thinking with a network of like minded C-Suite executives and business owners: chiefmaker.com/councilofchiefs
In this episode, I'll break down for you:
✅ Why this process matters and why the goal is alignment, not perfection ✅ The 2 mindsets you need in order to set yourself up for success, and ✅ The exact 5-step process I follow in my End of Year Review.
Here's to hitting 2026 out of the park, Chiefs!
I wish you and your families a tremendous festive season and a safe and fulfilling new year.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my free Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"It's now obvious to me that it's harder to maintain that sense of community unless you've got things like parkrun that are driving that connection."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Tim Oberg, former CEO of parkrun Australia.
His full episode is titled Escaping the rat race, building a vibrant community and managing anxiety.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/377 👂
WANT TO ACCELERATE YOUR NEXT PROMOTION? COMPLETE YOUR FREE CAREER SCORECARD: www.chiefmaker.com/score-card
Tim has a background in teaching and travel, having set up his own tour business in London in the early 2000s. He stumbled upon the parkrun concept in the UK in 2010 and pitched to the owner to be the one to take it to Australia, thereafter leading the regional business for nearly 12 years.
Tim is now the Founder of Next Stars Sports Academy and the Healthy Kids Project, as he uses his vast experience in health and wellbeing to tackle some of the biggest challenges amongst the younger generations.
He is also a Board member at Little Athletics Queensland and lives in Airlie Beach with his wife and 4 kids (congrats to them as they recently welcomed a little baby girl!).
In the full Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ His epic back story that got him to where he is today - you'll really love this as it's one of the most in-depth, interesting and crazy ones we've ever had on the Inner Chief podcast!
✅ The courage he showed in repeatedly escaping the rat race to start his own businesses.
✅ Growing the parkrun Australia community from nothing to the biggest of its kind in the country, and
✅ How he has survived and thrived despite living with and managing anxiety.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Tim Oberg You can reach Tim via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Headspace app * Beating Anxiety - SBS Insight TV show that Tim appeared on * parkrun, anxiety and me - article posted by Tim after his recovery * Dare - by Barry McDonagh
Similar Episodes on community building * Juliette Wright OAM, Founder of GIVIT, on Revolutionising misguided charitable giving, having a million conversations, and leaning into anxiety * Daniel Penny, MD of Mustard Creative, on Going beyond the brief and understanding your influence * Mike Smith, Founder and CEO of Zero Co, on Building a tribe of loyal customers, and creating a better world through business
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"As human beings we have a lot more physically and mentally than we give ourselves credit for. When we think we're done, I don't think we're near."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Rupert Guinness, legendary sports writer and ultra-endurance cyclist, on choosing growth and opportunity at every turn, and discovering untapped physical and mental capacity through extreme adversity.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/378 👂
ARE YOUR PEOPLE RESISTING CHANGE? Learn to lead the right way right now with the Chief Maker Guide to Situational Leadership: chiefmaker.com/fixresetgrow
Rupert is a Sydney-based sports writer, author, public speaker and media consultant, as well as an accomplished ultra-endurance cyclist, adding extraordinary personal experience to his storytelling.
Rupert spent nine years living in Belgium and France covering the Tour de France from up close in inside the tent. Since then, he has written for major publications including The Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian and The Daily Telegraph.
Across his career, Rupert has reported on an exceptional array of sports, covering many of the world's biggest events, including the Rugby World Cup, four Olympic Games and an extraordinary 31 Tours.
Beyond journalism, Rupert has held senior media and communications roles with the Australian Rowing Team, the NSW Waratahs and the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race. He has also written 15 books, including Power of the Pedal, Overlander, and The Tour.
In this Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The harsh reality of life inside the Tour de France and the unseen battles at the back.
✅ His personal accounts of mental toughness, setbacks and breakthroughs in finishing ultra endurance races.
✅ How he used resilience and composure to reframe weaknesses into growth areas, and
✅ Why seizing opportunity, embracing uncertainty and pursuing adventure matters more in midlife.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Rupert Guinness You can connect with Rupert via LinkedIn or Instagram.
Books and resources
- The Tour - by Rupert Guinness
- Power of the Pedal - by Rupert Guinness
- Overlander - by Rupert Guinness
- The Fight - by Norman Mailer
Similar Episodes on high-stakes adventure * David Knoff, Antarctic Expedition Leader and author, on High-stakes risk and crisis management, and being adaptable around your mission * Rory Hunter, Founder of MODEL, on Seeking solitude and healing on the ocean, and the adventure of a lifetime after buying an island in his twenties * Ian Snape, CEO of Frontline Mind, on Resilience by design, leading Antarctic expeditions and relaxing in high-stakes environments
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"Start telling your story really early. By the time the actual capital raise comes around, you can create something that's oversubscribed."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features James Schofield, Founder of Insight Investor Relations.
His full episode is titled Pitching your business, raising capital and winning investor trust.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/376 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
James speaks the language of investors - over a 25-year career in capital markets, he's advised from both sides of the table: first as a top-rated equity analyst with Merrill Lynch, UBS, and Deutsche Bank, and now as the founder of Insight Investor Relations.
Since launching IIR in 2018, James has worked with NZX-listed CEOs and CFOs across companies valued between $300 million and $3 billion.
His team is trusted to design and execute investor relations strategies at pivotal points in a company's growth story, with their clients' aggregate market value more than doubling to $10.8 billion over the past 12 months.
James and his team have also helped founders raise between $2-$15 million in growth capital through leveraging investor-side language and insights.
In the full Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The right time to pitch and raise capital, and when not to.
✅ How to position your business to attract investors through clarity, credibility and consistent messaging.
✅ Why founders should treat investors like customers by understanding their needs and motivations, and
✅ The five Ps of pitching for investor success: purpose, product, proof, playbook, and promise.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with James Schofield You can connect with James via LinkedIn.
Books and resources
- Essentialism - by Greg McEwen
Similar Episodes on Capital Raising * Ben Lipschitz, Co-Founder and CEO of FoodByUs, on Being data-driven, starting and exiting a business, and successfully securing funding * Ant Moorhouse, Co-Founder and CEO of EarthTech, on Purpose-driven leadership, and changing the planet by harnessing technology and capitalism * Jack Delosa, Founder and Chairman of The Entourage, on Frameworks for success, building customer connection, and raising capital from an investor's viewpoint
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"It's now obvious to me that it's harder to maintain that sense of community unless you've got things like parkrun that are driving that connection."
In this Best of Series episode, we replay a chat we had in 2019 with Tim Oberg, Former CEO of parkrun Australia on escaping the rat race, building a vibrant community and managing anxiety.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/377 👂
WANT TO ACCELERATE YOUR NEXT PROMOTION? COMPLETE YOUR FREE CAREER SCORECARD: www.chiefmaker.com/score-card
Tim has a background in teaching and travel, having set up his own tour business in London in the early 2000s. He stumbled upon the parkrun concept in the UK in 2010 and pitched to the owner to be the one to take it to Australia, thereafter leading the regional business for nearly 12 years.
Tim is now the Founder of Next Stars Sports Academy and the Healthy Kids Project, as he uses his vast experience in health and wellbeing to tackle some of the biggest challenges amongst the younger generations.
He is also a Board member at Little Athletics Queensland and lives in Airlie Beach with his wife and 4 kids (congrats to them as they recently welcomed a little baby girl!).
In this Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ His epic back story that got him to where he is today - you'll really love this as it's one of the most in-depth, interesting and crazy ones we've ever had on the Inner Chief podcast!
✅ The courage he showed in repeatedly escaping the rat race to start his own businesses.
✅ Growing the parkrun Australia community from nothing to the biggest of its kind in the country, and
✅ How he has survived and thrived despite living with and managing anxiety.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Tim Oberg You can reach Tim via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Headspace app * Beating Anxiety - SBS Insight TV show that Tim appeared on * parkrun, anxiety and me - article posted by Tim after his recovery * Dare - by Barry McDonagh
Similar Episodes on community building * Juliette Wright OAM, Founder of GIVIT, on Revolutionising misguided charitable giving, having a million conversations, and leaning into anxiety * Daniel Penny, MD of Mustard Creative, on Going beyond the brief and understanding your influence * Mike Smith, Founder and CEO of Zero Co, on Building a tribe of loyal customers, and creating a better world through business
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"The best founders are constantly pitching – for customers, recruits, suppliers and capital."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to James Schofield, Founder of Insight Investor Relations, on Pitching your business, raising capital and winning investor trust.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/376 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
James speaks the language of investors - over a 25-year career in capital markets, he's advised from both sides of the table: first as a top-rated equity analyst with Merrill Lynch, UBS, and Deutsche Bank, and now as the founder of Insight Investor Relations.
Since launching IIR in 2018, James has worked with NZX-listed CEOs and CFOs across companies valued between $300 million and $3 billion.
His team is trusted to design and execute investor relations strategies at pivotal points in a company's growth story, with their clients' aggregate market value more than doubling to $10.8 billion over the past 12 months.
James and his team have also helped founders raise between $2-$15 million in growth capital through leveraging investor-side language and insights.
In this Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The right time to pitch and raise capital, and when not to.
✅ How to position your business to attract investors through clarity, credibility and consistent messaging.
✅ Why founders should treat investors like customers by understanding their needs and motivations, and
✅ The five Ps of pitching for investor success: purpose, product, proof, playbook, and promise.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with James Schofield You can connect with James via LinkedIn.
Books and resources
- Essentialism - by Greg McEwen
Similar Episodes on Capital Raising * Ben Lipschitz, Co-Founder and CEO of FoodByUs, on Being data-driven, starting and exiting a business, and successfully securing funding * Ant Moorhouse, Co-Founder and CEO of EarthTech, on Purpose-driven leadership, and changing the planet by harnessing technology and capitalism * Jack Delosa, Founder and Chairman of The Entourage, on Frameworks for success, building customer connection, and raising capital from an investor's viewpoint
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"You can't make good choices from a cluttered mind."
Chief, today I'm going to introduce you to one of the most powerful tools in leadership: The Decision Clarity Matrix.
Every part of your life and career is shaped by the quality of your decisions. From relationships to investments, to how you respond in tough moments, your reputation and legacy all come down to one thing. Decision-making.
Yet, no one really teaches us how to make good decisions. Until today, that is!
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/375 👂
ONE THING IS CERTAIN, TO BE A TRUE CHIEF, COGNITIVE CLARITY IS CRITICAL. WHERE DO YOU SIT ON THE CHIEF MAKER DECISION CLARITY MATRIX? chiefmaker.com/decisionmaking
In this episode, I'll break down for you:
✅ The Decision Clarity Matrix - how clear thinking drives high-impact decision making ✅ Managing your state to shift from cluttered thinking to clarity before key decisions, and ✅ The four decision zones: Breakthrough Territory, Danger Zone, Delegation, and the Vortex.
You can follow along and download the full resource: chiefmaker.com/decisionmaking.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my free Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
"Your values and philosophy about why you do things are your North Star; without them your decisions will be wishy-washy."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Neil Craig, Former AFL Coach and England Rugby High Performance Manager.
His full episode is titled High performance environments, your North Star and decision-making under pressure.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/373 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Neil was best known as being a former Australian rules footballer and as the Head Coach of the Adelaide Crows Football Club.
His other stints in the AFL have included being the fitness adviser at the Crows, and having various coaching roles at the Melbourne Demons, Essendon Bombers, Carlton Blues and Gold Coast Suns.
Between 2017 and 2022, he was England Rugby's High Performance Manager under head coach Eddie Jones.
In the full Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ What a high performance environment is and how to create one
✅ Why knowing your North Star - your purpose and values - is critical to success
✅ How to make complex decisions under pressure, and
✅ Why leadership is not about you, but all about you.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Neil Craig You can reach Neil via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Legacy - by James Kerr
Similar Episodes on coaching * Chief Maker Minisodes on Coaching Principles and Power Coaching Questions * Conrad Tracey, Addiction Coaching Specialist, on Breaking points, dealing with resistance in others, and self-acceptance * Golf Master Coach, Steve Bann, on Coaching the world's best golfers, turning practice into confidence, and the improvement lifecycle
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Chiefs who take a one-size-fits-all approach to leadership will ALWAYS end up failing.”
Chief, today I'm diving into one of the most powerful models in business performance and leadership: the Fix, Reset, Grow, Change the Game journey map.
This is the framework I use with almost every executive or organisation I coach.
It gives you clarity, confidence and direction as a leader by showing you exactly where your business is, where it’s heading, and what to do next.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/374 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER SITUATIONAL LEADERSHIP GUIDE AND IMPLEMENT THE LEADERSHIP STYLE YOUR BUSINESS NEEDS RIGHT NOW: chiefmaker.com/fixresetgrow
In this episode, I’ll break down for you:
✅ Why the model and the business performance journey map matter ✅ The 4 stages fully explained and how to self-assess where you are, and ✅ Putting in place the appropriate steps in order to adapt your leadership style and get you into the most exhilarating stage - changing the game.
You can follow along and download the full resource: chiefmaker.com/fixresetgrow.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my free Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“It's not about you, but it's all about you. If you're able to think that way, you'll get feedback when you need it without asking for it and you'll be amazed how many problems just go away.”
It's AFL grand final week so we're bringing you a Best of Series episode from 2019 with Neil Craig, former AFL Head Coach, on high performance environments, your North Star and decision-making under pressure.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/373 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Neil was best known as being a former Australian rules footballer and as the Head Coach of the Adelaide Crows Football Club.
His other stints in the AFL have included being the fitness adviser at the Crows, and having various coaching roles at the Melbourne Demons, Essendon Bombers, Carlton Blues and Gold Coast Suns.
Between 2017 and 2022, he was England Rugby’s High Performance Manager under head coach Eddie Jones.
In this Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ What a high performance environment is and how to create one
✅ Why knowing your North Star - your purpose and values - is critical to success
✅ How to make complex decisions under pressure, and
✅ Why leadership is not about you, but all about you.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Neil Craig You can reach Neil via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Legacy - by James Kerr
Similar Episodes on coaching * Chief Maker Minisodes on Coaching Principles and Power Coaching Questions * Conrad Tracey, Addiction Coaching Specialist, on Breaking points, dealing with resistance in others, and self-acceptance * Golf Master Coach, Steve Bann, on Coaching the world’s best golfers, turning practice into confidence, and the improvement lifecycle
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Building an operating rhythm and sticking to it requires energy and fortitude.”
Chief, today I'm going to talk about three important tips to help you bring your operating rhythm to life and to ensure that it is high impact and drives results consistently.
I'm also going to talk through three of the most classic problems that executives face when trying to implement a new one or refine an existing operating rhythm.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/372 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ The Chief Maker Performance Lifecycle: P2R2 ✅ Owning the plan and embedding it culturally in your organisation, and ✅ Ensuring it is always impactful and doesn’t become stale.
You can also find out more about what an operating rhythm is by checking out some previous episodes:
Building a personal operating rhythm
High Performance Teams Series - Operating Rhythm
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my free Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“To win your people’s hearts and minds, you have to have a compelling vision or proposition to offer them.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features George Hunt, Former CIO of the Year.
His full episode is titled Winning hearts and minds, technology as a strategy, and the little things of leadership.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/371 👂
WONDERING WHAT CAREER MOVE TO MAKE NEXT? GET THE CHIEF MAKER BOOK AND BE GUIDED BY THE GREAT METHOD FOR CAREER ACCELERATION: chiefmaker.com/book
At the time of the recording, George was the Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Sydney Water. He is currently the Chief Strategy Officer of Smart Energy Water in the UK, a role he has held since November 2020.
George is a recognised technology leader within the global utility sector, with a successful track record in implementing technology infrastructure to support increasing customer expectations, challenging regulatory outcomes and corporate business goals.
He has also held roles as a Global Consulting Partner at Wipro Digital in the UK and CIO for Wessex Water.
George has a Bachelor of Engineering from Birmingham University and a Master of Information Systems from Kingston University in London, and was awarded CIO Australia’s CIO of the Year in 2018.
In the full Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ How to win the hearts and minds of your people and aligning to achieve a vision
✅ Why Technology has evolved to become a key strategy for most organisations
✅ Some great analogies for leading a business through rapid change, and
✅ The Little Things of Leadership like the power of goodwill.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with George Hunt You can reach George via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Be Like Amazon - by Jeffrey Eisenberg, Bryan Eisenberg, Roy H Williams * The Advantage - by Patrick Lencioni * Who Moved My Cheese - by Dr Spencer Johnson * Leading on the Edge - by Rachael Robertson * Be The Business: CIOs in the New Era of IT - by Martha Heller
Similar Episodes on strategic technology * Ant Moorhouse, Co-Founder & CEO of EarthTech, on Purpose-driven leadership, and changing the planet by harnessing technology and capitalism * Greg Steele, Global President of Arcadis Mobility, on The importance of broad experience, bringing people with you and dealing with difficult issues * Angus Stevens, Co-Founder & CEO of StartBeyond, on Taking learning by experience to new frontiers, putting guardrails on innovation, and creating useful technology for tangible real-world problems
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you think your people aren't using AI, you would be in denial.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Kate Newey, HR Chief of Adaptalift Group.
Her full episode is titled The secret life of HR professionals, having it all and AI in the workplace.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/370 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Kate is a highly experienced HR leader and has held various roles at Adaptalift Group since 2012, currently overseeing 650 staff in her role as HR Chief.
She is a champion of flexible executive roles, balancing part-time leadership and parenting, something that became almost non-negotiable during the COVID pandemic.
In the full Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The secret life of HR professionals…the real, messy and rewarding reality in the current business environment.
✅ How leading from the middle builds influence, trust and a seat at the strategic table.
✅ Navigating burnout, boundaries and part-time leadership through parenting and a modern lifestyle, and
✅ HR’s growing leadership in AI strategy and how this links to company strategy and and what “buy, borrow, build, bot” means for HR.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Kate Newey You can connect with Kate via LinkedIn.
Books and resources
- Mindful High Performer - by Chelsea Pottenger
Similar Episodes on Human Resources * Linda Carroll, Chief People Officer of G8 Education on Driving business success through the development of your people * Zaklina Craig, Chief People Officer of Business NSW, on Optimising role design for peak performance, managing differences in confidence between men and women, and navigating the decision to fire someone * Angela Tsoukatos, CEO and 20 years executive team member, on Pivotal career moments, how to focus on core business, and the most effective ways the Board and C-Suite can work together
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The one analogy I use for technology change programs is that we're trying to upgrade an aircraft whilst it's in flight. This allows people to understand the risk profile.”
In this Best of Series episode, we replay a chat we had in 2019 with George Hunt, former CIO of the Year, on winning hearts and minds, technology as a strategy, and the little things of leadership.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/371 👂
WONDERING WHAT CAREER MOVE TO MAKE NEXT? GET THE CHIEF MAKER BOOK AND BE GUIDED BY THE GREAT METHOD FOR CAREER ACCELERATION: chiefmaker.com/book
At the time of the recording, George was the Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Sydney Water. He is currently the Chief Strategy Officer of Smart Energy Water in the UK, a role he has held since November 2020.
George is a recognised technology leader within the global utility sector, with a successful track record in implementing technology infrastructure to support increasing customer expectations, challenging regulatory outcomes and corporate business goals.
He has also held roles as a Global Consulting Partner at Wipro Digital in the UK and CIO for Wessex Water.
George has a Bachelor of Engineering from Birmingham University and a Master of Information Systems from Kingston University in London, and was awarded CIO Australia’s CIO of the Year in 2018.
In this Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ How to win the hearts and minds of your people and aligning to achieve a vision
✅ Why Technology has evolved to become a key strategy for most organisations
✅ Some great analogies for leading a business through rapid change, and
✅ The Little Things of Leadership like the power of goodwill.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with George Hunt You can reach George via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Be Like Amazon - by Jeffrey Eisenberg, Bryan Eisenberg, Roy H Williams * The Advantage - by Patrick Lencioni * Who Moved My Cheese - by Dr Spencer Johnson * Leading on the Edge - by Rachael Robertson * Be The Business: CIOs in the New Era of IT - by Martha Heller
Similar Episodes on strategic technology * Ant Moorhouse, Co-Founder & CEO of EarthTech, on Purpose-driven leadership, and changing the planet by harnessing technology and capitalism * Greg Steele, Global President of Arcadis Mobility, on The importance of broad experience, bringing people with you and dealing with difficult issues * Angus Stevens, Co-Founder & CEO of StartBeyond, on Taking learning by experience to new frontiers, putting guardrails on innovation, and creating useful technology for tangible real-world problems
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“It's really important to keep a sense of humour, especially if you're in a stressful environment. Show people that you're human.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Linda Carroll, Chief People Officer, G8 Education.
Her full episode is titled Driving business success through the development of your people.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/369 👂
DO YOU UNDERSTAND THE REAL IMPACT OF OVERLOAD? Learn how to stay focused, optimise your effort and prioritise what’s really important. chiefmaker.com/focus
As an experienced People and Culture Leader, Linda Carroll joined G8 Education in June 2024.
With more than a decade of executive experience in the early childhood education and care sector, Linda has honed her skills in building and managing high-performing teams across diverse networks.
Her expertise lies in people and culture transformation, talent acquisition, capability development, and employee and industrial relations.
Linda’s accolades include the HR Director of the Year award at the Australian HR Awards in 2019 and she has also obtained an MBA in Human Resource Management from Griffith University.
In the full Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The significance of developing people within an organisation through continuous learning.
✅ Hiring for attitude and creating a loyal culture through recognition and embracing humour
✅ Overcoming the crisis of confidence upon returning to work post-maternity leave, and
✅ The evolving role of HR and its strategic importance in driving business success via the power of human capital.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Linda Carroll You can connect with Linda via LinkedIn.
Books and resources
- 7 Habits of Highly Effective People - by Stephen R. Covey
- Emotional Intelligence - by Daniel Goldman
Similar Episodes on Human Resources * Zaklina Craig, Chief People Officer of Business NSW, on Optimising role design for peak performance, managing differences in confidence between men and women, and navigating the decision to fire someone * Angela Tsoukatos, CEO and 20 years executive team member, on Pivotal career moments, how to focus on core business, and the most effective ways the Board and C-Suite can work together * Fiona Crawford, CHRO of Creditor Watch, on Doing extra, celebrating success, and enabling the business
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“HR is such a diverse role. At any given time we see people at their worst, and people at their best. We’re expected to be lawyers and are constantly making commercial decisions.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Kate Newey, HR Chief of Adaptalift Group, on The secret life of HR professionals, having it all and AI in the workplace.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/370 👂
IS YOUR PROGRESS BLOCKED BY DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS? Download this step-by-step guide to build trust, get buy-in and turn difficult stakeholders into ambassadors: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Kate is a highly experienced HR leader and has held various roles at Adaptalift Group since 2012, currently overseeing 650 staff in her role as HR Chief.
She is a champion of flexible executive roles, balancing part-time leadership and parenting, something that became almost non-negotiable during the COVID pandemic.
In this Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The secret life of HR professionals…the real, messy and rewarding reality in the current business environment.
✅ How leading from the middle builds influence, trust and a seat at the strategic table.
✅ Navigating burnout, boundaries and part-time leadership through parenting and a modern lifestyle, and
✅ HR's growing leadership in AI strategy and how this links to company strategy and and what “buy, borrow, build, bot” means for HR. Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Kate Newey You can connect with Kate via LinkedIn.
Books and resources
- Mindful High Performer - by Chelsea Pottenger
Similar Episodes on Human Resources * Linda Carroll, Chief People Officer of G8 Education on Driving business success through the development of your people * Zaklina Craig, Chief People Officer of Business NSW, on Optimising role design for peak performance, managing differences in confidence between men and women, and navigating the decision to fire someone * Angela Tsoukatos, CEO and 20 years executive team member, on Pivotal career moments, how to focus on core business, and the most effective ways the Board and C-Suite can work together
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“HR has shifted towards partnering with the business as a trusted advisor to the executive team, as people have started to realise the value of human capital.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Linda Carroll, Chief People Officer of G8 Education, on driving business success through the development of your people.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/369 👂
FEELING OVERLOADED? Constant emails and meeting requests flooding in? Too much to do and not enough time? Learn how to prioritise your time with this strategic focus tool. chiefmaker.com/focus
As an experienced People and Culture Leader, Linda Carroll joined G8 Education in June 2024.
With more than a decade of executive experience in the early childhood education and care sector, Linda has honed her skills in building and managing high-performing teams across diverse networks.
Her expertise lies in people and culture transformation, talent acquisition, capability development, and employee and industrial relations.
Linda’s accolades include the HR Director of the Year award at the Australian HR Awards in 2019 and she has also obtained an MBA in Human Resource Management from Griffith University.
In this Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The significance of developing people within an organisation through continuous learning.
✅ Hiring for attitude and creating a loyal culture through recognition and embracing humour
✅ Overcoming the crisis of confidence upon returning to work post-maternity leave, and
✅ The evolving role of HR and its strategic importance in driving business success via the power of human capital.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Linda Carroll You can connect with Linda via LinkedIn.
Books and resources
- 7 Habits of Highly Effective People - by Stephen R. Covey
- Emotional Intelligence - by Daniel Goldman
Similar Episodes on Human Resources * Zaklina Craig, Chief People Officer of Business NSW, on Optimising role design for peak performance, managing differences in confidence between men and women, and navigating the decision to fire someone * Angela Tsoukatos, CEO and 20 years executive team member, on Pivotal career moments, how to focus on core business, and the most effective ways the Board and C-Suite can work together * Fiona Crawford, CHRO of Creditor Watch, on Doing extra, celebrating success, and enabling the business.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“There's work guilt because you worry that you're not delivering 100%. There's guilt that you're not being the best mum possible. So, it really is guilt on all fronts if you're not careful.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Nicolette Rubinsztein AM, Professional Board member and author.
Her full episode is titled Removing guilt, building female confidence, and overcoming busy-ness.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/367 👂
RIGHT PERSON, WRONG ROLE? Use this checklist of questions to determine the right future development plan for your leaders: chiefmaker.com/performance
Nicolette is a qualified actuary and is currently the Chair of Greenpeace Australia Pacific and CBHS Health Fund, and a Non-Executive Director at Zurich Australia.
She has previously been a Director at UniSuper and OnePath Insurance, and was the President of the Actuaries Institute for 4 years after an extensive career in senior management roles as an actuary.
Nicolette received a Member of the Order of Australia in the King’s Birthday 2024 Honours List for her significant service to the finance and commerce sectors.
She is also the author of “Not Guilty”, a powerful book providing strategies for successful career mums.
In the full Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ The resilience learnt from losing her job twice due to overnight industry changes
✅ How to balance work with motherhood without feeling guilty or putting your career on hold
✅ Why lower confidence in females has led to a lower uptake of STEM careers, and
✅ Overcoming busy-ness as parents and the concept of “career mum staff”.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Nicolette Rubinsztein AM You can reach Nicolette via LinkedIn or on her website.
Books and Resources * Homo Deus and Sapiens - by Yuval Harari * The Confidence Code - by Katty Kay and Claire Shipman
Similar Episodes on the evolving workplace * Alison Mirams, CEO of Roberts Co, on Transforming an industry and leaving a legacy by putting workers and their families at the heart of your business. * Grainne O'Loughlin, CEO of Karitane, on Parenting for executives and the first 2000 days of a child's development, and the inspiring legacy she is building. * Dr Bronwyn Evans AM, CEO of Engineers Australia, on Theory vs practice, empathetic performance management, and advancing society through great engineering
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“When you develop all three traits, you become bulletproof. You create momentum, confidence, and long-term impact.”
Chief, today we dive into what I consider to be a core framework that I’ve observed after working with hundreds of top-tier executives and CEOs through the podcast and our day job at Chief Maker over a number of years.
These three traits keep showing up, without fail, in every high-performing leader I meet. If you don’t have these in your toolkit, I can almost guarantee you’ll struggle to hit your definition of success.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/368 👂
WANT TO ACCELERATE YOUR NEXT PROMOTION? COMPLETE YOUR FREE CAREER SCORECARD: www.chiefmaker.com/scorecard
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ The 3 key traits that every great leader has in spades ✅ A brilliant little tool to diagnose where you need to create some real momentum shifts ✅ What will happen if you don’t act now
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my free Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“You’ve got to get yourself in a position to exit, and then give yourself the time to exit properly. The biggest advice I give sellers is to not be in a rush to sell.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Dean Salakas, Former CEO of The Party People.
His full episode is titled Being sale-ready, Forecasting like a CFO, and Selling confidently on your terms.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/366 👂
EQUIP YOUR MIDDLE MANAGERS AND SENIOR LEADERS WITH THE TOOLS TO DRIVE CHANGE AND RESULTS. JOIN THE WAITLIST: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Dean is a retail advisor, keynote speaker, and former CEO of The Party People, Australia’s largest party store, which sold in late 2024.
With three successful business exits and a track record of retail innovation, Dean now helps businesses grow through strategic advice and execution support and also as a fractional Head of Growth at Party Hire Group.
This is the second time we have had Dean on the show; during episode 234 we covered how he saw change as an opportunity, coping with growth, and evolving as a leader.
In the full Evolved CEO Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The art of the sale - how to create buyer FOMO, go public with your sale, and drive up valuation.
✅ Why staying ‘match-fit’ with reporting and forecasting is key to a successful exit.
✅ The power of understanding your customer beyond product, and why this matters when selling, and
✅ What BATNA is and why deal structure matters more than just the multiple on offer.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Dean Salakas You can connect with Dean via LinkedIn.
Books and resources
- The One Minute Manager - by Kenneth Blanchard Ph.D. &, Spencer Johnson M.D.
Similar Episodes on Selling a business * Roland Frasier, CEO of All Channels Media, on Creative business deals, modelling and masterminding * Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora & Fauna and now CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on Bootstrapping a business from start to $30M exit * Ben Lipschitz, Co-Founder and CEO of Foodbyus, on Being data-driven, starting and exiting a business, and successfully securing funding
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter with insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn or Instagram
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“There's work guilt because you worry that you're not delivering 100%. There's guilt that you're not being the best mum possible. So, it really is guilt on all fronts if you're not careful.”
In this Best of Series episode, we replay a chat we had in 2019 with Nicolette Rubinsztein AM, Professional Board member and author, on removing guilt, building female confidence, and overcoming busy-ness.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/367 👂
RIGHT PERSON, WRONG ROLE? Use this checklist of questions to determine the right future development plan for your leaders: chiefmaker.com/performance
Nicolette is a qualified actuary and is currently the Chair of Greenpeace Australia Pacific and CBHS Health Fund, and a Non-Executive Director at Zurich Australia.
She has previously been a Director at UniSuper and OnePath Insurance, and was the President of the Actuaries Institute for 4 years after an extensive career in senior management roles as an actuary.
Nicolette received a Member of the Order of Australia in the King’s Birthday 2024 Honours List for her significant service to the finance and commerce sectors. She is also the author of “Not Guilty”, a powerful book providing strategies for successful career mums.
In this Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ The resilience learnt from losing her job twice due to overnight industry changes
✅ How to balance work with motherhood without feeling guilty or putting your career on hold
✅ Why lower confidence in females has led to a lower uptake of STEM careers, and
✅ Overcoming busy-ness as parents and the concept of “career mum staff”.
Connecting with Nicolette Rubinsztein AM You can reach Nicolette via LinkedIn or on her website.
Books and Resources * Homo Deus and Sapiens - by Yuval Harari * The Confidence Code - by Katty Kay and Claire Shipman
Similar Episodes on the evolving workplace * Alison Mirams, CEO of Roberts Co, on Transforming an industry and leaving a legacy by putting workers and their families at the heart of your business. * Grainne O'Loughlin, CEO of Karitane, on Parenting for executives and the first 2000 days of a child's development, and the inspiring legacy she is building. * Dr Bronwyn Evans AM, CEO of Engineers Australia, on Theory vs practice, empathetic performance management, and advancing society through great engineering
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter for insanely valuable career tips
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“You’ve got to get yourself into a position to exit and then put time on your side. Don't be in a rush to sell, but when you are ready, put a deadline in place for buyers to make an offer.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Dean Salakas, former Party People CEO, on Being sale-ready, forecasting like a CFO, and selling confidently on your terms.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/366 👂
EQUIP YOUR MIDDLE MANAGERS AND SENIOR LEADERS WITH THE TOOLS TO DRIVE CHANGE AND RESULTS. JOIN THE WAITLIST: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Dean is a retail advisor, keynote speaker, and former CEO of The Party People, Australia’s largest party store, which sold in late 2024.
With three successful business exits and a track record of retail innovation, Dean now helps businesses grow through strategic advice and execution support and also as a fractional Head of Growth at Party Hire Group.
This is the second time we have had Dean on the show; during episode 234 we covered how he saw change as an opportunity, coping with growth, and evolving as a leader.
In this Evolved CEO Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The art of the sale - how to create buyer FOMO, go public with your sale, and drive up valuation.
✅ Why staying ‘match-fit’ with reporting and forecasting is key to a successful exit.
✅ The power of understanding your customer beyond product, and why this matters when selling, and
✅ What BATNA is and why deal structure matters more than just the multiple on offer.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Dean Salakas You can connect with Dean via LinkedIn
Books and resources
- The One Minute Manager - Kenneth Blanchard Ph.D. &, Spencer Johnson M.D.
Similar Episodes on Selling a business
- Roland Frasier, CEO of All Channels Media, on Creative business deals, modelling and masterminding
- Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora & Fauna and now CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on Bootstrapping a business from start to $30M exit
- Ben Lipschitz, Co-Founder and CEO of Foodbyus, on Being data-driven, starting and exiting a business, and successfully securing funding
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Get my Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe for free to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe for free to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Imagine any city with 50% job losses, it's a completely different place. I don't see governments getting things ready. It's going to take time.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Professor Joel Pearson, Director of Future Minds Lab.
His full episode is titled Leading in uncertainty, Future-proofing for the AI Revolution, and De-risking innovation.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/364 👂
EQUIP YOUR MIDDLE MANAGERS AND SENIOR LEADERS WITH THE TOOLS TO DRIVE CHANGE AND RESULTS. JOIN THE WAITLIST: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Joel is a psychologist, neuroscientist, author and Director of the Future Minds Lab, and an ARC Future Fellow at the University of New South Wales. He initially studied art and filmmaking at the College of Fine Arts before turning to the scientific mysteries of human consciousness and the complexities of the brain. He is now a prolific public speaker, writer, and world expert in Intuition, the psychology of AI, mental imagery, and Aphantasia, which is the inability to picture things visually.
His debut book, The Intuition Toolkit: The New Science of Knowing What, Without Knowing Why, came out in 2024 and he is now helping companies like Pixar, Google, KPMG, Macquarie Group, Lexus and Toyota prepare for the disruptive change of the AI revolution.
Joel hosted the popular ABC Sydney radio show "The Brain Box," blowing people's minds about their minds.
In the full AI Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ How he is at the forefront of accelerating innovation through agile science, rapid experimentation and minimum viable experiments
✅ Some practical tools and mental models to build resilience in an uncertain and rapidly changing AI-driven world
✅ Preparing humans and not just systems for exponential change from Artificial Intelligence, and
✅ Mind-wandering and cognitive recovery as competitive advantages for modern executives.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Joel Pearson You can connect with Joel via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * The Intuition Toolkit - by Professor Joel Pearson * Future Minds Newsletters on Substack
Similar Episodes on Artificial Intelligence * Brad Krauskopf, Founder & CEO of Hub Australia, on Designing inspiring flexible workspaces for the future * Angus Stevens, Co-Founder & CEO of Start Beyond, on Putting guardrails on innovation and creating useful technology for tangible real-world problems * Kath Blackham, CEO of The VERSA Group, on Extracting huge value from diversity and inclusion, the 4-day work week, and using tech for good
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“We need to get better, better, better at core. Not newer, bigger, different.”
Chief, today we cover something that is absolutely dominating everyone’s thoughts in a hyper-distracted world, and that is cutting out the noise and getting back to strategic intent and focus.
Executive teams are under relentless pressure; from technological change, shifting workforce expectations, and increasing compliance, to the ever-present noise of geopolitics and market urgency, it’s easy to get pulled in a hundred directions and lose sight of what actually drives value. When leadership spreads itself too thin, focus disappears, risk increases, and performance suffers.
Chief, getting back to your core business is more important now than ever. I share the framework I use with Chiefs and boards across the globe to help them identify their true strategic priorities, cut through distraction, and optimise their systems to deliver real impact. Because when leaders waste energy on the wrong things, the business pays the price: in culture, in profit, and in reputation.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/365 👂
JOIN THE WAITLIST FOR THE MOST PRACTICAL LEADERSHIP & EXECUTIVE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM ON THE MARKET (NPS: 91): chiefmaker.com/minimba
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ The 5 forces overwhelming executive teams and driving strategic distraction
✅ A practical model to define and refocus on your core business
✅ The cost of non-core work and how to reset strategic priorities for impact.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“By the time that person's come to work, it's cost them 50 bucks for transport, lunch, coffee. So what is the experience they’re going to get going into work for a day, because they could easily just stay at home.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Brad Krauskopf, Founder & CEO of Hub Australia.
His full episode is titled Designing inspiring flexible workspaces for the future, and Building workplace engagement and experience.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/363 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Brad is an industry pioneer and has been at the forefront of the coworking and hybrid work revolution for more than a decade, having co-founded and Co-Chaired Flexible Workspace Australia, the peak-industry body for flexible and coworking space in Australia.
dership, Hub Australia has expanded nationally, delivering human-centred, sustainable workspaces that help businesses attract the best talent and to thrive.
Hub Australia is widely considered the market-leading workspace hospitality operator in Australia, and has been ranked 6 years running by the Great Places To Work program.
Brad is a passionate advocate for the future of workplace experience, bringing deep expertise in workplace strategy and property innovation.
In the full CEO masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Why businesses must now earn their employees’ commute by creating community and purpose.
✅ How to champion flexible modern workplaces that drive connection and performance.
✅ Strategies for scaling culture and impact in a hybrid and distributed workforce, and
✅ The evolving role of leaders in designing work experiences that empower the humans behind your brand.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Brad Krauskopf You can connect with Brad via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Hub Australia - Love Where You Work Report 2024
Similar Episodes on hybrid working * Stephen Shedletzky, author and TEDx speaker coach, on How to foster a speak-up culture where people feel safe, trusted and worthy * Tristan Sternson, CEO of ARQ Group, on Being answerable to investors, systemising values and culture, and building equality through technology * Nick Bell, Founder of Superist, on The threat of AI on addressing productivity gaps, looking after his A-players and living to 150
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I think the internet will be gone. AIs will have all the information and entertainment for us whenever we want.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Professor Joel Pearson, Director of the Future Minds Lab, on Leading in uncertainty, Future-proofing for the AI revolution, and De-risking innovation.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/364 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Joel is a psychologist, neuroscientist, author and Director of the Future Minds Lab, and an ARC Future Fellow at the University of New South Wales.
He initially studied art and filmmaking at the College of Fine Arts before turning to the scientific mysteries of human consciousness and the complexities of the brain. He is now a prolific public speaker, writer, and world expert in Intuition, the psychology of AI, mental imagery, and Aphantasia, which is the inability to picture things visually.
His debut book, The Intuition Toolkit: The New Science of Knowing What, Without Knowing Why, came out in 2024 and he is now helping companies like Pixar, Google, KPMG, Macquarie Group, Lexus and Toyota prepare for the disruptive change of the AI revolution.
Joel hosted the popular ABC Sydney radio show "The Brain Box," blowing people's minds about their minds.
In this AI Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ How he is at the forefront of accelerating innovation through agile science, rapid experimentation and minimum viable experiments
✅ Some practical tools and mental models to build resilience in an uncertain and rapidly changing AI-driven world
✅ Preparing humans and not just systems for exponential change from Artificial Intelligence, and
✅ Mind-wandering and cognitive recovery as competitive advantages for modern executives.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Joel Pearson You can connect with Joel via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * The Intuition Toolkit - by Professor Joel Pearson * Future Minds Newsletters on Substack
Similar Episodes on Artificial Intelligence * Brad Krauskopf, Founder & CEO of Hub Australia, on Designing inspiring flexible workspaces for the future * Angus Stevens, Co-Founder & CEO of Start Beyond, on Putting guardrails on innovation and creating useful technology for tangible real-world problems * Kath Blackham, CEO of The VERSA Group, on Extracting huge value from diversity and inclusion, the 4-day work week, and using tech for good
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The 80/20 curve also applies to time: 1% of your time produces 50% of all your productivity.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Perry Marshall, Author and Sales & Marketing Guru.
His full episode is titled Redefining the 80/20 Rule, buying time for superhuman productivity, and solving tough problems.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/362 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Perry is endorsed in FORBES and INC Magazine, and is one of the most expensive business consultants in the world. His reinvention of the Pareto Principle is published in Harvard Business Review; in fact, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Labs at the California Institute of Technology uses his 80/20 Curve as a productivity tool.
He founded the $5 million Evolution 2.0 Prize, with judges from Harvard, Oxford and MIT, where the object is to solve the biggest mystery in biology.
His Google AdWords book laid the foundations for the $100 billion Pay Per Click industry and his other book, Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords, is the world’s best-selling book on internet advertising. He’s consulted in over 300 industries and served as an expert witness for marketing and Google AdWords litigation.
In the full Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ What the 80/20 rule actually is and how he redefined it
✅ How to buy back time by saying no and what to remove from your life
✅ His secrets to running more efficient meetings
✅ The 80/20 productivity curve and its application in business efficiency, and
✅ Solving tough problems and appearing superhuman.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Perry Marshall You can reach Perry on on X and via his website.
Books and Resources * 80/20 Sales and Marketing - by Perry Marshall * Evolution 2.0 - by Perry Marshall * Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords - by Perry Marshall
Similar Episodes on productivity * John Lee Dumas, Founder of Entrepreneurs on Fire, on Being insanely valuable, thinking outside the box and unlocking discipline to win * Kath Blackham, CEO of The VERSA Group, on Extracting huge value from diversity and inclusion, mental health in the workplace and using tech for good * Joe DeMaria, Founder of Teach To Scale, on The art of learning, career excellence and value creators
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“When I think about the workplace of the future, it's about the experiences you provide when bringing people together. It’s an extension of your brand.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Brad Krauskopf, Founder & CEO of Hub Australia, on Designing inspiring flexible workspaces for the future, and Building workplace engagement and experience.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/363 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Brad is an industry pioneer and has been at the forefront of the coworking and hybrid work revolution for more than a decade, having co-founded and Co-Chaired Flexible Workspace Australia, the peak-industry body for flexible and coworking space in Australia.
Under his leadership, Hub Australia has expanded nationally, delivering human-centred, sustainable workspaces that help businesses attract the best talent and to thrive.
Hub Australia is widely considered the market-leading workspace hospitality operator in Australia, and has been ranked 6 years running by the Great Places To Work program.
Brad is a passionate advocate for the future of workplace experience, bringing deep expertise in workplace strategy and property innovation.
In this CEO masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Why businesses must now earn their employees’ commute by creating community and purpose.
✅ How to champion flexible modern workplaces that drive connection and performance.
✅ Strategies for scaling culture and impact in a hybrid and distributed workforce, and
✅ The evolving role of leaders in designing work experiences that empower the humans behind your brand.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Brad Krauskopf You can connect with Brad via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Hub Australia - Love Where You Work Report 2024
Similar Episodes on hybrid working * Stephen Shedletzky, author and TEDx speaker coach, on How to foster a speak-up culture where people feel safe, trusted and worthy * Tristan Sternson, CEO of ARQ Group, on Being answerable to investors, systemising values and culture, and building equality through technology * Nick Bell, Founder of Superist, on The threat of AI on addressing productivity gaps, looking after his A-players and living to 150
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“80-90% of my job is to engage the business. It's a KPI.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Ben Marsonet, CEO of Altus Group.
His full episode is titled The 6 stages of executive evolution, leading with visibility, and how powerful stories shape culture.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/361 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
With over 15 years of experience in the traffic management industry, Ben has held various operational, commercial and senior management roles at Altus Group, the largest and leading provider of traffic management services across Australia and New Zealand.
Starting on the frontline as a traffic controller, Ben worked his way up into executive roles before being appointed to the role of Group CEO in July 2021.
Since his appointment, he has led the business through a successful private equity investment, as well as doubling revenue and earnings of the business through a mix of organic growth and acquisition activity.
Ben has an immense passion for the safety and growth of people, and about leading a business that has a genuine impact on its employees and the communities it operates in.
In the full CEO masterclass, we talk about:
✅ How curiosity and saying ‘yes’ to challenges will accelerate your career growth
✅ Integrating new teams during M&A while protecting a cohesive company culture and momentum
✅ Why spending time on the frontline strengthens employee connection authentically, and
✅ How vulnerability and sharing real stories builds trust, unity and a thriving workplace
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Ben Marsonet * You can connect with Ben via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Shaka Project by Sean Weir
Similar Episodes on storytelling * Shane Russell, CEO of Havas Red Australia, on How to avoid PR disasters and build your company brand and customer engagement. * Dean Hawkins, CFO Adidas, Chairman SKINS and CEO of EO Lab, on The power of a brand, creatively telling the story of the business, and turning alchemy into the extraordinary. * Daniel Hunter, CEO of Business NSW, on The new breed of CEO, purposeful storytelling and building teams.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Step one, write down 25 things that you really, really want to do in your life. Step two, order the list in importance to you. Step three, put a circle around the top five and cross off the bottom 20. That's how you succeed.”
In this Best of Series episode, we replay a chat we had in 2019 with Perry Marshall, Author and Sales & Marketing Guru, on Redefining the 80/20 Rule, buying time for superhuman productivity, and solving tough problems.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/362 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Perry is endorsed in FORBES and INC Magazine, and is one of the most expensive business consultants in the world. His reinvention of the Pareto Principle is published in Harvard Business Review; in fact, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Labs at the California Institute of Technology uses his 80/20 Curve as a productivity tool.
He founded the $5 million Evolution 2.0 Prize, with judges from Harvard, Oxford and MIT, where the object is to solve the biggest mystery in biology.
His Google AdWords book laid the foundations for the $100 billion Pay Per Click industry and his other book, Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords, is the world’s best-selling book on internet advertising. He’s consulted in over 300 industries and served as an expert witness for marketing and Google AdWords litigation.
In this Best of Series Masterclass we talk about:
✅ What the 80/20 rule actually is and how he redefined it
✅ How to buy back time by saying no and more efficient meetings
✅ The 80/20 productivity curve and its application in business efficiency, and
✅ Solving tough problems and appearing superhuman
Connecting with Perry Marshall You can reach Perry on X and via his website.
Books and Resources * 80/20 Sales and Marketing - by Perry Marshall * Evolution 2.0 - by Perry Marshall * Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords - by Perry Marshall
Similar Episodes on productivity * John Lee Dumas, Founder of Entrepreneurs on Fire, on Being insanely valuable, thinking outside the box and unlocking discipline to win * Kath Blackham, CEO of The VERSA Group, on Extracting huge value from diversity and inclusion, mental health in the workplace and using tech for good * Joe DeMaria, Founder of Teach To Scale, on The art of learning, career excellence and value creators
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The biggest risk for executives and corporations is distance from the customer. It’s the number one thing that will kill you.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Jack Delosa, Founder & CEO of The Entourage.
His full episode is titled Frameworks for success, Building customer connection, and Raising capital from an investor’s viewpoint.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/360 👂
ARE YOU GIVING THE RIGHT FEEDBACK? LEARN HOW TO EMBED EFFECTIVE FEEDBACK IN YOUR CULTURE: www.chiefmaker.com/feedback
Jack is a successful entrepreneur, investor, and best-selling author, having founded The Entourage in 2010, Australia's largest business growth agency, through which he has helped clients generate over $6 billion in revenue.
Just 5 years’ prior, Jack had enrolled in a Commerce & Law Degree, only to drop out three months later to found a marketing agency in Melbourne.
Since then, he has been named on the Australian Financial Review's 'Young Rich List' five times, and founded and invested in multiple businesses across diverse industries such as biotechnology and aviation.
Jack is the author of Unprofessional and Elevate and stars in the TV show Entrepreneurs, in which he shares insights from top business leaders.
In the full CEO masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Using frameworks to guide you to solving a unique problem in the market
✅ The benefits and pitfalls of raising capital versus bootstrapping your business
✅ The crucial role of both employee and customer feedback in continually refining your business operations, and
✅ The immense value of personal growth practices such as meditation for maintaining resilience and focus.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Jack Delosa You can connect with Jack via his website.
Books and resources * We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine - by Jordan Peterson * Books on Carl Jung - by James Hollis
Similar Episodes on customer journey * Siobhan O’Sullivan, on Customer experience, looking at yourself in the mirror and how martial arts helped her accelerate her career * Kevin Gaskell, on Transforming customer experience, driving extraordinary results, and daring to dream * Jonathan Barouch, on Transforming Customer Experience with Technology and Culture
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you want to know how you actually build a culture, it’s through stories you tell of the amazing things that people do inside of the business that make you sit back in awe.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Ben Marsonet, CEO of Altus Group, on The 6 stages of executive evolution, leading with visibility, and how powerful stories shape culture.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/361 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
With over 15 years of experience in the traffic management industry, Ben has held various operational, commercial and senior management roles at Altus Group, the largest and leading provider of traffic management services across Australia and New Zealand.
Starting on the frontline as a traffic controller, Ben worked his way up into executive roles before being appointed to the role of Group CEO in July 2021.
Since his appointment, he has led the business through a successful private equity investment, as well as doubling revenue and earnings of the business through a mix of organic growth and acquisition activity.
Ben has an immense passion for the safety and growth of people, and about leading a business that has a genuine impact on its employees and the communities it operates in.
In this CEO masterclass, we talk about:
✅ How curiosity and saying ‘yes’ to challenges will accelerate your career growth
✅ Integrating new teams during M&A while protecting a cohesive company culture and momentum
✅ Why spending time on the frontline strengthens employee connection authentically, and
✅ How vulnerability and sharing real stories builds trust, unity and a thriving workplace
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Ben Marsonet You can connect with Ben via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Shaka Project - by Sean Weir
Similar Episodes on storytelling * Shane Russell, CEO of Havas Red Australia, on How to avoid PR disasters and build your company brand and customer engagement. * Dean Hawkins, CFO Adidas, Chairman SKINS and CEO of eo, on The power of a brand, creatively telling the story of the business, and turning alchemy into the extraordinary. * Daniel Hunter, CEO of Business NSW, on The new breed of CEO, purposeful storytelling and building teams.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Too many leaders sit in fancy offices assuming what customers want, and then wonder why their product or service isn’t landing.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Jack Delosa, Founder and CEO of The Entourage, on Frameworks for success, Building customer connection, and Raising capital from an investor’s viewpoint.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/360 👂
ARE YOU GIVING THE RIGHT FEEDBACK? LEARN HOW TO EMBED EFFECTIVE FEEDBACK IN YOUR CULTURE: www.chiefmaker.com/feedback
Jack is a successful entrepreneur, investor, and best-selling author, having founded The Entourage in 2010, Australia's largest business growth agency, through which he has helped clients generate over $6 billion in revenue.
Just 5 years’ prior, Jack had enrolled in a Commerce & Law Degree, only to drop out three months later to found a marketing agency in Melbourne.
Since then, he has been named on the Australian Financial Review's 'Young Rich List' five times, and founded and invested in multiple businesses across diverse industries such as biotechnology and aviation.
Jack is the author of Unprofessional and Elevate and stars in the TV show Entrepreneurs, in which he shares insights from top business leaders.
In this CEO masterclass, we talk about:
✅ Using frameworks to guide you to solving a unique problem in the market
✅ The benefits and pitfalls of raising capital versus bootstrapping your business
✅ The crucial role of both employee and customer feedback in continually refining your business operations, and
✅ The immense value of personal growth practices such as meditation for maintaining resilience and focus.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Jack Delosa You can connect with Jack via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine - by Jordan Peterson * Books on Carl Jung - by James Hollis
Similar Episodes on customer journey * Siobhan O’Sullivan, on Customer experience, looking at yourself in the mirror and how martial arts helped her accelerate her career * Kevin Gaskell, on Transforming customer experience, driving extraordinary results, and daring to dream * Jonathan Barouch, on Transforming Customer Experience with Technology and Culture
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“You've got to have the wherewithal and the EQ to know when to stick your nose in and ask the questions, and other times to trust and let people get on with it. Noses in, fingers out.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Angela Tsoukatos, CEO and 20 years executive team member.
Her full episode is titled Pivotal career moments, how to focus on core business, and the most effective ways the Board and C-Suite can work together.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/356 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Angela is an experienced Executive with a successful track record in Australia’s largest water utility, local government, and the Not-for-Profit sector, having held senior roles in Corporate Public Affairs & Company Secretary, Customer Services, People Leadership & Culture, and Corporate Services.
Angela was the CEO of Participate Australia up until May 2023, facilitating a successful merger with SydWest Multicultural Services, which she is now the Chair of. She is also a member Director with SSI, is the Chair of SSI Legal, and was recently appointed to the Board of the NSW Energy and Water Ombudsman as a community director.
Angela is passionate about ethical and inclusive leadership and creating constructive cultures where people live the values, put clients first and work together towards a fairer society for all.
She holds a Bachelor of Social work, a Master of Management (Public Sector), is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and a certified Gallup Strengths coach. In 2018, Angela was selected as one the Top 50 NSW Public Sector Women.
In the full CEO masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The 4 fundamental questions she asks when taking on a new role
✅ How to manage key priorities to ensure focus on core business
✅ On turning a toxic relationship around to one which flourished and changed her career decisively, and
✅ Getting boards and executive teams to work together properly.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Angela Tsoukatos You can connect with Angela via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Lean In - by Sheryl Sandberg * The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People - by Stephen Covey
Similar Episodes on Board-Executive relationships * Isabelle Nüssli, author of the book “Cockfighting”, on CEO-Chairperson relationship and overcoming the drivers of conflict. * Alison Gaines, MD & Founder of Gaines Advisory, on Hiring great executives, becoming an NED, and characteristics of successful boards. * Scott Williamson, Managing Director of Blackstone Minerals, on The CEO-Chair relationship, taking career risks and injecting fun into business.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Being difficult to give feedback to means people will stop giving it completely and you'll have no idea about your true performance and reputation.”
In today’s minisode, we finish our series on How to Give Feedback and we're going to bring this home by giving you some strategies to implement a culture of feedback within your department or organisation.
Remember, as a leader, their performance is also your performance and you’ve both got to own it, otherwise you risk negatively affecting your track record.
Chief, if you haven't listened to Part 1 (preparing like a coach) or Part 2 (tools and strategies), please go back and listen to them first as it will give you some vital context to the final episode.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/359 👂
ARE YOU GIVING THE RIGHT FEEDBACK? LEARN HOW TO EMBED EFFECTIVE FEEDBACK IN YOUR CULTURE: www.chiefmaker.com/feedback
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ Three vital strategies to build a culture of feedback in your team,
✅ The secret ingredient to harnessing these strategies as a collective, and
✅ Why it is so important - personally and professionally - to foster a feedback culture.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“An insight made by the coach is owned by the coach. An insight made by the client (or the person you're giving feedback to), is owned by the client.”
In today’s minisode, we continue with our series on How to Give Feedback and we're going to talk about how to deliver like a true chief with some specific feedback methods and scripts that might help you bring this process to life.
Chief, if you haven't listened to Part 1 in the series, please go back and listen to it as it will give you some vital context.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/358 👂
HAVE YOU BUILT ENOUGH TRUST AS A FOUNDATION TO GIVE FEEDBACK? DISCOVER HOW CRUCIAL THIS STEP IS: www.chiefmaker.com/feedback
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ The SIX methods for giving effective feedback that will land properly, and
✅ A series of quotes, scripts, templates and ideas around how to deliver the message.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Feedback is never done in isolation; there's a whole range of things going on around someone in your team, and so it's really helpful to prepare properly before you give feedback.”
Chief, today we are kicking off Part 1 of our How to Give Feedback Series.
In today’s episode, we are diving into the essentials of preparing to give feedback like an elite sporting coach, as well as some core principles of this process.
Feedback is the breakfast of champions of high-performance teams and is vital for personal and team growth. And you, as the leader, are your team’s coach, helping to guide them to kicking business goals, ultimately which reflects on you, Chief, and your track record.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/357 👂
ARE YOU GIVING THE RIGHT FEEDBACK? LEARN HOW TO EMBED EFFECTIVE FEEDBACK IN YOUR CULTURE: www.chiefmaker.com/feedback
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ The core principles and mindsets for effective feedback preparation.
✅ The importance of feedback for all team members, from low to high performers.
✅ Factors to consider before giving feedback, such as business performance, team culture, and trust levels.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“One of the big lessons anyone can take out of COVID was that everyone was forced to live in a world that was out of control and you just had to adapt and respond.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features David Knoff, Antarctic Expedition Leader and author of 537 Days of Winter.
His full episode is titled: High-stakes risk and crisis management, and being adaptable around your mission.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/355 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
David brings over 15 years of experience and expertise in diplomacy, conflict resolution, resilience and remote leadership in some of the world's most challenging environments, where he has faced extreme adversity head-on.
From serving as a young Platoon Commander in the Solomon Islands to a pivotal diplomatic posting in Pakistan during a period of intense regional conflict, David’s journey has been shaped by moments that demand empathy, adaptability, and strength in uncertainty.
David took a sabbatical as a photographer in Turkey, capturing the Dastories of refugees escaping the Syrian conflict, before working in high-stakes environments to contribute to the international fight against ISIS.
More recently, he led Australia’s Davis Research Station in Antarctica, navigating the isolation of COVID-19 and an extended mission in one of the harshest environments on earth. Off the back of that, he has just released a book called 537 Days of Winter, and he discusses in the episode the harrowing life and death story that inspired it.
In the full Masterclass we will share:
✅ Being comfortable with uncertainty and not being under control
✅ His anecdotal evidence on human response mechanisms to fear and threat
✅ How to factor in risk and crisis management in strategic planning, and balancing this process with instinctive action, and
✅ Being adaptable around your mission, in particular his experiences during the COVID-induced extended mission where they were stranded in the Antarctic.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with David Knoff You can connect with David via LinkedIn or Facebook and E-mail.
Books and resources * 537 Days of Winter - by David Knoff * Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage - by Alfred Lansing
Similar Episodes on high-stakes environments * Ant Moorhouse, Co-Founder and CEO of Earthech, on Purpose-driven leadership, and changing the planet by harnessing technology and capitalism * Ian Snape, CEO of Frontline Mind, on Resilience by design leading antarctic expeditions and relaxing in high stakes environments * Peter Scott, Former Chief of Submarines on Leadership in high stakes environments and keeping purpose alive in your team
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“You've got to have the wherewithal and the EQ to know when to stick your nose in and ask the questions, and other times to trust and let people get on with it. Noses in, fingers out.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Angela Tsoukatos, CEO and 20 years executive team member, on pivotal career moments, how to focus on core business, and the most effective ways the Board and C-Suite can work together.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/356 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Angela is an experienced Executive with a successful track record in Australia’s largest water utility, local government, and the Not-for-Profit sector, having held senior roles in Corporate Public Affairs & Company Secretary, Customer Services, People Leadership & Culture, and Corporate Services.
Angela was the CEO of Participate Australia up until May 2023, facilitating a successful merger with SydWest Multicultural Services, which she is now the Chair of. She is also a member Director with SSI, is the Chair of SSI Legal, and was recently appointed to the Board of the NSW Energy and Water Ombudsman as a community director.
Angela is passionate about ethical and inclusive leadership and creating constructive cultures where people live the values, put clients first and work together towards a fairer society for all.
She holds a Bachelor of Social work, a Master of Management (Public Sector), is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and a certified Gallup Strengths coach. In 2018, Angela was selected as one the Top 50 NSW Public Sector Women.
In this CEO masterclass, we talk about:
✅ The 4 fundamental questions she asks when taking on a new role
✅ How to manage key priorities to ensure focus on core business
✅ On turning a toxic relationship around to one which flourished and changed her career decisively, and
✅ Getting boards and executive teams to work together properly.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Angela Tsoukatos You can connect with Angela via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Lean In - by Sheryl Sandberg * The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People - by Stephen Covey
Similar Episodes on Board-Executive relationships * Isabelle Nüssli, author of the book “Cockfighting”, on CEO-Chairperson relationship and overcoming the drivers of conflict. * Alison Gaines, MD & Founder of Gaines Advisory, on Hiring great executives, becoming an NED, and characteristics of successful boards. * Scott Williamson, Managing Director of Blackstone Minerals, on The CEO-Chair relationship, taking career risks and injecting fun into business.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“In 10 years’ time, are you going to look back and be happy with how you spent the last 10 years?”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Nigel Marsh, Former CEO Leo Burnett and Y&R Brands, Founder Earth Hour, viral TEDx Talker, bestselling author and podcaster.
His full episode is titled Following your own path to achieve balance, getting cut-through, and authentic success.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/352 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Nigel is the former National CEO of D’Arcy and Leo Burnett, Regional Group CEO of communications group Y&R Brands ANZ, and the Chairman of strategic and research consultancy, The Leading Edge.
Alongside his 30+ years experience in business leadership roles, Nigel has pursued a number of creative ventures including writing four bestselling books (‘Fat, Forty and Fired’, ‘Overworked and Underlaid’, ‘Fit Fifty and Fired-Up’ and ‘Smart, Stupid and Sixty’), co-founding the global environmental initiative Earth Hour, founding The Sydney Skinny and creating The Five Of My Life podcast.
His TEDx speech on work-life balance, with nearly 6 million views, remains the most watched talk ever given outside of the US.
In the full Masterclass we will share:
✅ Why you should stop following the masses and rather seek balance by treading your own path.
✅ That clarity of purpose is the most fundamental pillar of any business, and how to do it in a simple way.
✅ How he got cut-through in launching Earth Hour globally and how you can use that in your marketing and communications, and
✅ Using reflection to achieve authentic success in your life and career.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Nigel Marsh You can connect with Nigel via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Halo Effect - by Phil Rosenzweig * Nigel’s TEDx Talk - How to make work-life balance work * Deep Work by Cal Newport * The 5 of my life Podcast
Similar Episodes on work-life balance * Minisode on Is work-life balance actually possible? * Damien Price, Spiritual Guru on Balance, Life Chapters and Your Rhythm * Mike Schneider, Managing Director of Bunnings Group, on Career diversity, genuine empathy, and the 4Hs of authenticity
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“One of the big lessons anyone can take out of COVID was that everyone was forced to live in a world that was out of control and you just had to adapt and respond.”
In this episode, I chat to David Knoff, Antarctic Expedition Leader and author of 537 Days of Winter, on high-stakes risk and crisis management, and being adaptable around your mission.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/355 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
David brings over 15 years of experience and expertise in diplomacy, conflict resolution, resilience and remote leadership in some of the world's most challenging environments, where he has faced extreme adversity head-on.
From serving as a young Platoon Commander in the Solomon Islands to a pivotal diplomatic posting in Pakistan during a period of intense regional conflict, David’s journey has been shaped by moments that demand empathy, adaptability, and strength in uncertainty.
David took a sabbatical as a photographer in Turkey, capturing the Dastories of refugees escaping the Syrian conflict, before working in high-stakes environments to contribute to the international fight against ISIS.
More recently, he led Australia’s Davis Research Station in Antarctica, navigating the isolation of COVID-19 and an extended mission in one of the harshest environments on earth. Off the back of that, he has just released a book called 537 Days of Winter, and he discusses in the episode the harrowing life and death story that inspired it.
In today’s Masterclass we will share:
✅ Being comfortable with uncertainty and not being under control
✅ His anecdotal evidence on human response mechanisms to fear and threat
✅ How to factor in risk and crisis management in strategic planning, and balancing this process with instinctive action, and
✅ Being adaptable around your mission, in particular his experiences during the COVID-induced extended mission where they were stranded in the Antarctic.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with David Knoff You can connect with Davidl via LinkedIn or Facebook and E-mail.
Books and resources * 537 Days of Winter - by David Knoff * Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage - by Alfred Lansing
Similar Episodes on high-stakes environments * Ant Moorhouse, Co-Founder and CEO of Earthech, on Purpose-driven leadership, and changing the planet by harnessing technology and capitalism * Ian Snape, CEO of Frontline Mind, on Resilience by design leading antarctic expeditions and relaxing in high stakes environments * Peter Scott, Former Chief of Submarines on Leadership in high stakes environments and keeping purpose alive in your team
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“No high performance happens without those three big things, so make sure they're embedded into a new year ahead.”
In today’s episode, I've just got three big questions for you.
If you can answer these, I think you can make 2025 your best year ever.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/354 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Make it your goal in 2025 to not just simplify, but focus. Get more dialed in on just a few things, stuff that will make a difference. Make some hard calls.”
In our final episode for 2024, we are going to cover the five big themes from 2024 that are going to be vital in 2025.
I'm seeing these 5 themes emerge more and more through the work we do with executives and boards. And what I'm seeing is if we don't all lean in and get better at these five things, life is going to get more difficult and frustrating and we're going to find it harder and harder to win.
Chief, the best executives right now are nailing these things. And all the best organisations need people with these five traits right now, more than ever.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/353 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you spend too much time worrying about the outcome and not about the process, then you just create anxiety and a lack of focus.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Rob Patterson, Managing Director of Parkins Lane.
His full episode is titled Humility, relationships and scaling fast.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/351 👂
IS YOUR PROGRESS BLOCKED BY DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS? Download this step-by-step guide to build trust, get buy-in and turn difficult stakeholders into ambassadors: http://chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Rob is a CEO and COO with extensive experience in leading the significant growth of national professional service firms.
He is the former COO of HWL Ebsworth, where he played a key role overseeing the metamorphosis of a small Melbourne-based legal practice (40 employees, turnover $3m) into a national commercial law firm of over 600 people and turnover in excess of $150m, now Australia’s largest firm by partner numbers.
Rob then joined Macpherson Kelley as COO and led a similar transformation there, followed by an MD stint at Rankin Business Lawyers. For the past 2 years, Rob was GM of FCW Lawyers but has returned to Parkins Lane Consulting Group as the Managing Director once again. The firm focuses on creating and executing on strategy, growth and marketing for professional services firms.
Outside of work he is a keen surfer and he also grows Sangiovese vines.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How he grew their business from $3M to $150M
✅ The importance of relationships and being a known quantity when going for roles
✅ Humility and self-regulation
✅ How to grow your personal brand and business
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Rob Patterson You can reach Rob on LinkedIn and on X.
Books and Resources * Built to Last - by Jim Collins * Good to Great - by Jim Collins * Starts with Why - by Simon Sinek
Similar Episodes on scaling fast * Vince LeBon, CEO of Rollie Nation, on Streamlining systems, scaling up and business rhythm * Ben Lipschitz, Co-Founder and CEO of FoodByUs, on Being data-driven, starting and exiting a business, and successfully securing funding * Celebrity Apprentice Mentor, Nick Bell, on the threat of AI on addressing productivity gaps, looking after his A-players and living to 150 years old
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“A CEO client of mine said that when he dies, his to-do list will be full. Not empty, full. In 10 years’ time, are you going to look back and be happy with how you spent those 10 years?”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Nigel Marsh, Former CEO Leo Burnett and Y&R Brands, Founder Earth Hour, viral TED Talker, Bestselling Author and Podcaster, on following your own path to achieve balance, getting cut-through, and authentic success.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/352 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Nigel is the former National CEO of D’Arcy and Leo Burnett, Regional Group CEO of communications group Y&R Brands ANZ, and the Chairman of strategic and research consultancy, The Leading Edge.
Alongside his 30+ years experience in business leadership roles, Nigel has pursued a number of creative ventures including writing four bestselling books (‘Fat, Forty and Fired’, ‘Overworked and Underlaid’, ‘Fit Fifty and Fired-Up’ and ‘Smart, Stupid and Sixty’), co-founding the global environmental initiative Earth Hour, founding The Sydney Skinny and creating The Five Of My Life podcast.
His TEDx speech on work-life balance, with nearly 6 million views, remains the most watched talk ever given outside of the US.
In today’s Masterclass we will share:
✅ Why you should stop following the masses and rather seek balance by treading your own path.
✅ That clarity of purpose is the most fundamental pillar of any business, and how to do it in a simple way.
✅ How he got cut-through in launching Earth Hour globally and how you can use that in your marketing and communications, and
✅ Using reflection to achieve authentic success in your life and career.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Nigel Marsh You can connect with Nigel via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Halo Effect - by Phil Rosenzweig * Nigel’s TED Talk - How to make work-life balance work * Deep Work - by Cal Newport * Nigel’s podcast - 5 of My Life
Similar Episodes on work-life balance * Minisode on Is work-life balance actually possible? * Damien Price, Spiritual Guru on Balance, Life Chapters and Your Rhythm * Mike Schneider, Managing Director of Bunnings Group, on Career diversity, genuine empathy, and the 4Hs of authenticity
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Subscribe to The Inner Chief podcast on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“What are the things that I do daily to build and maintain relationships with people I deeply care about. And then I just do that to the people that are the next sphere out from me.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Mike Smith, Founder and CEO of Zero Co.
His full episode is titled How to build a tribe of loyal customers, creating a better world through business, and personal growth.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/350 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Mike’s travels around the world exposed him to the devastating effects of plastic pollution, particularly in remote areas.
Inspired to find a solution, he founded Zero Co, an Australian company he launched in 2019 to eliminate single-use plastics in everyday household products by facilitating consumers to switch to eco-friendly, refillable alternatives.
Mike’s background was in advertising and marketing, and bringing products to market and he worked with some of the world’s largest brands, including Coca Cola. He then co-founded, launched and sold Hot Chip, a surfing technology start-up developed in collaborations with some of the world's best surfers and Billabong.
He was also the Co-Founder of Cake Wines, a disruptive winery that aimed to make wine fun again, which he scaled and sold to one of the biggest wine brands in Australia.
Mike is committed to broader environmental change, advocating for responsible production processes and raising awareness about the impact of plastic pollution on the planet.
In this CEO masterclass, we talk about:
✅ How to build a tribe of loyal followers for your organisation.
✅ On why a social enterprise can help you to balance meaningful work with making money.
✅ The evolution of Zero Co’s operating model from a buy-return-refill model to a circular economy model, and
✅ The immense work he has done on self-awareness and personal growth.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Mike Smith You can connect with Mike via LinkedIn.
Similar Episodes on social impact businesses * Rory Hunter, Founder and CEO of MODEL, on Spearheading the build-to-rent movement towards sustainability, seeking solitude and healing on the ocean, and the adventure of a lifetime after buying an island in his twenties * Rochelle Courtenay, Founder and MD of Share the Dignity, on Leading volunteer armies, witnessing female trauma inside prison and eradicating period poverty * Juliette Wright, founder and former CEO of GIVIT, on Revolutionising misguided charitable giving, having a million conversations, and leaning into anxiety
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you spend too much time worrying about the outcome and not about the process, then you just create anxiety and a lack of focus.”
In this Best of Series episode, we replay a chat we had in 2019 with Rob Patterson, Managing Director of Parkins Lane, on humility, relationships and scaling fast.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/351 👂
IS YOUR PROGRESS BLOCKED BY DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS? Download this step-by-step guide to build trust, get buy-in and turn difficult stakeholders into ambassadors: http://chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Rob is a CEO and COO with extensive experience in leading the significant growth of national professional service firms.
He is the former COO of HWL Ebsworth, where he played a key role overseeing the metamorphosis of a small Melbourne-based legal practice (40 employees, turnover $3m) into a national commercial law firm of over 600 people and turnover in excess of $150m, now Australia’s largest firm by partner numbers.
Rob then joined Macpherson Kelley as COO and led a similar transformation there, followed by an MD stint at Rankin Business Lawyers. For the past 2 years, Rob was GM of FCW Lawyers but has returned to Parkins Lane Consulting Group as the Managing Director once again. The firm focuses on creating and executing on strategy, growth and marketing for professional services firms.
Outside of work he is a keen surfer and he also grows Sangiovese vines.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How he grew their business from $3M to $150M
✅ The importance of relationships and being a known quantity when going for roles, especially useful when you hit a career crossroads
✅ Humility and self-regulation, and
✅ How to grow your personal brand and business
Connecting with Rob Patterson You can reach Rob on LinkedIn and on X.
Books and Resources * Built to Last by Jim Collins * Good to Great by Jim Collins * Starts with Why by Simon Sinek
Similar Episodes on scaling fast * Vince LeBon, CEO of Rollie Nation on Streamlining systems, scaling up and business rhythm * Ben Lipschitz, Co-Founder and CEO of FoodByUs, on Being data-driven, starting and exiting a business, and successfully securing funding * Celebrity Apprentice Mentor, Nick Bell, on The threat of AI on addressing productivity gaps, looking after his A-players and living to 150 years old
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“We built this school. And then over the next 12 months, we ended up building two more schools in other, other villages around. And it completely changed my perspective on what meaningful work is.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Mike Smith, Founder and CEO of Zero Co, on how to build a tribe of loyal customers, creating a better world through business, and personal growth.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/350 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
Mike’s travels around the world exposed him to the devastating effects of plastic pollution, particularly in remote areas.
Inspired to find a solution, he founded Zero Co, an Australian company he launched in 2019 to eliminate single-use plastics in everyday household products by facilitating consumers to switch to eco-friendly, refillable alternatives.
Mike’s background was in advertising and marketing, and bringing products to market and he worked with some of the world’s largest brands, including Coca Cola. He then co-founded, launched and sold Hot Chip, a surfing technology start-up developed in collaborations with some of the world's best surfers and Billabong.
He was also the Co-Founder of Cake Wines, a disruptive winery that aimed to make wine fun again, which he scaled and sold to one of the biggest wine brands in Australia.
Mike is committed to broader environmental change, advocating for responsible production processes and raising awareness about the impact of plastic pollution on the planet.
In this CEO Masterclass, we talk about:
✅ How to build a tribe of loyal followers for your organisation.
✅ On why a social enterprise can help you to balance meaningful work with making money.
✅ The evolution of Zero Co’s operating model from a buy-return-refill model to a circular economy model, and
✅ The immense work he has done on self awareness and personal growth.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Mike Smith You can connect with Mike via LinkedIn.
Similar Episodes on building culture * Rory Hunter, Founder and CEO of MODEL, on Spearheading the build-to-rent movement towards sustainability, seeking solitude and healing on the ocean, and the adventure of a lifetime after buying an island in his twenties * Rochelle Courtenay, Founder and MD of Share the Dignity, on Leading volunteer armies, witnessing female trauma inside prison and eradicating period poverty * Juliette Wright, founder and former CEO of GIVIT, on Revolutionising misguided charitable giving, having a million conversations, and leaning into anxiety
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Good character is essential because talent isn't enough to navigate through a messy time.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Zaklina Craig, Executive Director - People, Culture & Workplace of Business NSW.
Her full episode is titled Optimising role design for peak performance, managing differences in confidence between men and women, and navigating the decision to fire someone.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/348 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Zak is an experienced people, culture and change leader with over 20 years of experience working with businesses in every aspect of their employee lifecycle.
She has led large teams in enabling core business functions delivering systemic and sustainable change. Her niche expertise is integrating strategy, systems, culture and leadership.
Zak commenced her career as a lawyer in private practice and is also degree-qualified in human resources management and industrial relations. She also holds several leadership and coaching qualifications and is one of few practitioners in Australia accredited in Requisite Organisation and Stratified Systems Theory.
She has also held senior roles with Sydney Water and the Australian Retailers Association, and has been the Chief People Officer of Business NSW since February 2022.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How to optimise role design, complexity and clarity for higher performance
✅ Overcoming the natural tension between operations, support and commercial teams
✅ The mindset shifts that HR leaders need to have in order to get a seat at the executive table
✅ Moving past confidence barriers for both men and women, and
✅ Hiring and firing people and having difficult coaching conversations.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Zaklina Craig You can connect with Zaklina via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Dancing with the Divine - by Julie Vance
Similar Episodes on building culture * Carolyn Creswell, Founder and MD of Carman’s Kitchen, on How to fire people, doing what you love, understanding menopause and having genuine work-life balance * Mike Schneider, Managing Director of Bunnings Group, on Career diversity, genuine empathy, and the 4Hs of authenticity * Cliff Gale, former MD of Lite N’ Easy for22 years, on Leading with passion, respect for your people and keeping the soul alive in your business.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Your brand or your reputation is what people say about you when you're not in the room.”
Chief, today we are going to guide you through the process of mastering the art of influencing stakeholders and partners, such that it catapults you forward (and upwards!) in your career.
Stakeholders have a huge impact - negatively and positively - on your career and your personal life whether you like it or not. These people can be your corporate peers, suppliers, customers, board members, executive team members, your boss, the community, media, anyone out there who's got a key stake in what you do.
As such, getting buy-in from difficult stakeholders is one of the most important tasks and skills of all senior executives and leaders.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/349 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ Sharing a few personal success stories of why strong stakeholder management works
✅ The 4 most powerful tips for building key stakeholder relationships, and
✅ A free downloadable we’ve created for you to develop plans and strategies, and then to be able to execute them with confidence.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“For me, the four H's were a very simple way of outlining what I stood for as a leader.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Mike Schneider, Managing Director of Bunnings Group.
His full episode is titled Career diversity, genuine empathy, and the 4Hs of authenticity.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/347 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Before being appointed to the top role, Mike was the Managing Director of Bunnings Australia & New Zealand and had also led the store operations teams, having joined Bunnings in 2005.
His career has seen him hold a range of senior operational, commercial and human resource roles, both in retail and financial services, most notably at Target, Westpac and The Warehouse Group.
Mike holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of NSW and has completed the Advanced Management Program at INSEAD, and the Advanced Strategic Management Program at IMD.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How having a diverse career path has been to his benefit
✅ Why genuine empathy and being a consistent, not predictable, leader is vital to success
✅ What he means by an integrated life as opposed to work-life balance, and
✅ His 4Hs Framework that allows him to lead an authentic life.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Mike Schneider You can reach Mike on LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * World’s Best by Ric Charlesworth * On Violence by Natasha Stott Despoja
Similar Episodes on Retailers * Carolyn Creswell, Founder and Managing Director of Carman’s Kitchen, on Running a multinational business, loving what you do and having a genuine work-life balance * Cass Spies, food industry innovator, founder & CEO of Twisted Healthy treats, on Being nimble, promoting from within, and winning globally * Julie Mathers, founder of Flora & Fauna and now CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on Bootstrapping a business from start to $30M exit
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“You're a business leader first, and a HR professional second.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Zaklina Craig of Business NSW, on optimising role design for peak performance, managing differences in confidence between men and women, and navigating the decision to fire someone.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/348 👂
EQUIP YOUR MIDDLE MANAGERS AND SENIOR LEADERS WITH THE TOOLS TO DRIVE CHANGE AND RESULTS. JOIN THE WAITLIST: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Zak is an experienced people, culture and change leader with over 20 years of experience working with businesses in every aspect of their employee lifecycle.
She has led large teams in enabling core business functions delivering systemic and sustainable change. Her niche expertise is integrating strategy, systems, culture and leadership.
Zak commenced her career as a lawyer in private practice and is also degree-qualified in human resources management and industrial relations. She also holds several leadership and coaching qualifications and is one of few practitioners in Australia accredited in Requisite Organisation and Stratified Systems Theory.
She has also held senior roles with Sydney Water and the Australian Retailers Association, and has been the Executive Director - People, Culture & Workplace of Business NSW since February 2022.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How to optimise role design, complexity and clarity for higher performance
✅ Overcoming the natural tension between operations, support and commercial teams
✅ The mindset shifts that HR leaders need to have in order to get a seat at the executive table
✅ Moving past confidence barriers for both men and women, and
✅ Hiring and firing people and having difficult coaching conversations.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Zaklina Craig You can connect with Zaklina via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Dancing with the Divine - by Julie Vance
Similar Episodes on building culture * Carolyn Creswell, Founder and MD of Carman’s Kitchen, on How to fire people, doing what you love, understanding menopause and having genuine work-life balance * Mike Schneider, Managing Director of Bunnings Group, on Career diversity, genuine empathy, and the 4Hs of authenticity * Cliff Gale, former MD of Lite N’ Easy for22 years, on Leading with passion, respect for your people and keeping the soul alive in your business.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The danger for CEOs is to allow yourself to be surrounded by people who tell you how good your ideas are. You actually need a balance of people who tell you when you’ve got something wrong or if you could have handled something in a different way.”
In this Best of Series episode, we replay a chat we had in 2019 with Mike Schneider, the Managing Director of the Bunnings Group, on career diversity, genuine empathy, and the 4Hs of authenticity.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com.au/347 👂
BE MORE EFFECTIVE WITH YOUR TIME AND TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR CALENDAR: chiefmaker.com/saveanhour
Before being appointed to the top role, Mike was the Managing Director of Bunnings Australia & New Zealand and had also led the store operations teams, having joined Bunnings in 2005.
His career has seen him hold a range of senior operational, commercial and human resource roles, both in retail and financial services, most notably at Target, Westpac and The Warehouse Group.
Mike holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of NSW and has completed the Advanced Management Program at INSEAD, and the Advanced Strategic Management Program at IMD.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How having a diverse career path has been to his benefit
✅ Why genuine empathy and being a consistent, not predictable, leader is vital to success
✅ What he means by an integrated life as opposed to work-life balance, and
✅ His 4Hs Framework that allows him to lead an authentic life.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Mike Schneider You can reach Mike on LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * World’s Best by Ric Charlesworth * On Violence by Natasha Stott Despoja
Similar Episodes on Retailers * Carolyn Creswell, Founder and Managing Director of Carman’s Kitchen, on Running a multinational business, loving what you do and having a genuine work-life balance * Cass Spies, food industry innovator, founder & CEO of Twisted Healthy treats, on Being nimble, promoting from within, and winning globally * Julie Mathers, founder of Flora & Fauna and now CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on Bootstrapping a business from start to $30M exit
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The biggest thing a leader can bring to the business is the responsibility to put the right people on the bus. And to have the bravery to say that there's a reason that they need to hop off the bus.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Carolyn Creswell, Founder and MD of Carman’s Kitchen, on how to fire people gracefully, doing what you love, understanding menopause and having genuine work-life balance.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/346 👂
INFLUENCE DIFFICULT STAKEHOLDERS USING THIS STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE: chiefmaker.com/stakeholders
In 1992, as an 18-year-old university student, Carolyn founded Carman’s when she bought the small muesli business she was working at, for $1,000.
More than 30 years later, Carman’s Kitchen is now Australia’s favourite muesli brand, alongside being a market leader in deliciously good for you snacks.
Carolyn’s determination and focus on producing quality products using whole foods, has seen Carman’s grow internationally, exporting to more than 30 countries.
Carolyn won the 2007 Ernst & Young’s Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award and was named the 2012 Telstra Australian Business Woman of the Year. She is also a graduate member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Her philosophy on continuous improvement and evolution as a business leader.
✅ The mindset and process required for better hiring and firing; and
✅ Why menopause in the workplace is a critical issue, and how she is navigating this for her own wellbeing and those in her organisation.
Stay epic,
Greg
Connecting with Carolyn Creswell You can connect with Carolyn via LinkedIn. You can learn more about Carman’s on their website.
Books and resources * Jim Collins interview - Tim Ferriss show
Similar Episodes on Retailers * Cass Spies, food industry innovator, founder & CEO of Twisted Healthy treats, on Being nimble, promoting from within, and winning globally * Julie Mathers, founder of Flora & Fauna and now CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on Bootstrapping a business from start to $30M exit * Vince Lebon, footwear brand trailblazer, CEO of Rollie Nation, on Streamlining Systems, scaling up and business rhythm
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Your direct reports actually want you to provide a clear framework and guidance, and then get out of their way so they can do the job you're paying them to do.”
Chief, today we complete our Think Like a CEO Series, and we’re going to look at how great chiefs work on the business, not in the business.
As you move up the ranks, your role increasingly becomes about working on the business.
If you are in a senior or executive role, this is about stepping out of the day-to-day operational grind: the thousands of tasks, the endless emails, the back-to-back meetings, the constant demands of stakeholders.
That is what your employer actually employs you for. The best leaders I've ever met embrace this responsibility. They look beyond their immediate role and work to improve the entire organisation.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/345 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ Being a person of value and having the courage to start letting go
✅ Building a tight operating rhythm to engage a high performing team, and
✅ Not going it alone and bringing in trusted advisors to help you on your journey.
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“All the best leaders of change I've noticed, bring their people with them.”
Chief, today we continue with Part 4 of our Think like a CEO Series, and we’re going to cover how to overcome resistance to change.
This is one of the most difficult and stressful parts of running a business. Getting people on the train, keeping them inspired and creative, and not slowing momentum down can be an incredibly difficult journey.
I've been involved in a lot of transformations now, and I've seen every mistake under the sun. And what I've learned is that the CEOs and the senior leaders who successfully drive change happen to do a few things that others seem to skip.
So I want to share with you five things that I know that if you apply them properly, it will make an immediate, tangible difference to the momentum you are getting in leading change in your organisation.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/344 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ Taking a step back and understanding your business and your people, and how they relate to the change curve
✅ Knowing your role and managing yourself to be able to perform at your peak, and
✅ A unique but hugely effective tactic around breaking fixed mindsets.
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Correctly diagnosing your people’s performance issues will mean you enjoy the benefits of watching your people grow and thrive, and they will never forget that you did that for them.”
Chief, today we continue with Part 3 of our How to think like a CEO Series, and we’re going to look at how to build confidence in your people.
I believe that one of the biggest problems in both sport and business - and I have seen this over and over and over again - is misdiagnosis of performance issues.
Leaders will talk about their people not having the right capability, but they simply lack the skills. Luckily, misdiagnosis of performance issues is something we can fix, and I will take you through this process in this episode.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/343 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ How leaders misdiagnose performance issues and why this hampers confidence
✅ How to correctly diagnose confidence blockers, and
✅ Overcoming confidence struggles properly and building confidence over time.
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“They're thinking I must be really famous and know what I’m doing, but I'm just laughing because I wrote 20% of the content I'm sharing and 80% I'm sharing other people's.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Ted Prodromou, America’s #1 LinkedIn Coach.
His full episode is titled Perception, connecting properly with purpose, and standing out online.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/340 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Ted has bounced back from many setbacks; not only did he survive the dot com crash, which wiped out his successful 20-year tech career working for companies like IBM, he then came out the other side of the Global Financial Crisis of 2008, which turned his consulting business upside-down.
Today, Ted is America’s #1 LinkedIn coach and he helps clients to super-charge their online profile and presence, and how to connect properly with purpose.
He is the author of the Ultimate Guide to LinkedIn for Business and has also been featured on Entrepreneur.com, the New York Times, CNBC, and Forbes.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How he got made redundant 3 times in 12 years
✅ How co-writing a book with Perry Marshall launched his LinkedIn coaching career
✅ Some simple tips on how to make your LinkedIn profile really stand out, and
✅ How to dial up your LinkedIn content management so that you are perceived to be associated with well-known brands.
A special thanks to former guest, Alex Mandossian, for introducing me to Ted.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Ted Prodromou You can connect with Ted via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Ultimate Guide to Linked In for Business - by Ted Prodromou * Contribution to an article on predicted LinkedIn trends for 2019 on Digital Marketer (Ted’s piece is two-thirds down the article) * Snappr, a great resource for taking a high-quality LinkedIn professional photo * How to Win Friends and Influence People - by Dale Carnegie * Leadership and Self-Deception - by The Arbinger Institute
Similar Episodes on Social Media * Natalie Speers, Founder & CEO of Social Ally, on being an early adopter, how anyone can thrive on social media, and visual disruption * Alex Mandossian, CEO and Founder of Marketingonline.com, on ethical influence and the art of storytelling * Jack Slade, Managing Director of Luxity Media, on being an accidental entrepreneur, saying no to increase revenues, and the future of new media
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“A strong track record earns you a network. As a result, you get called upon straight away to solve a problem and that is the power of having a great network with ambassadors.”
Chief, today we continue with Part 2 of our How to think like a CEO Series.
And we’re going to cover something that is 100% linked to your ability to get promoted faster, and that is the size and value of your network.
I’m going to outline five core principles that CEOs and leading executives use to leverage their network fully and these will help you to get your network to work for you when you're not in the room.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/342 👂
JOIN THE WAITLIST FOR THE MOST PRACTICAL LEADERSHIP & EXECUTIVE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM ON THE MARKET (NPS: 91): chiefmaker.com/minimba
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ Thinking about what you can do for your network, not what your network can do for you
✅ Being the problem solver in your network
✅ Understanding how your network is your network’s network, and
✅ How to ask someone you’ve helped without it seeming like a favour being returned.
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
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📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
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🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“A positive brand can mean opportunities for promotion. It can mean a lack of resistance when you're trying to get results, and an endless list of positive outcomes for you and your family.”
Chief, today we are kicking off Part 1 of our How to think like a CEO Series.
And we’re going to cover something that is one of the most crucial elements to career progression and outcomes, and that is personal branding.
Every single time you turn on a Zoom or you walk into a meeting room or every single time you send an email, people have a filter and a bias for or against you. Your reputation enters the room before you do. People are always watching.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/341 👂
BE MORE EFFECTIVE WITH YOUR TIME AND TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR CALENDAR: chiefmaker.com/saveanhour
In this episode, I talk about:
✅ Thinking and behaving like a professional services firm of one
✅ Working up at level to the top team you’re in
✅ An exercise that will help you discover whether you’re likeable, reliable and capable to your peers, and
✅ Why meetings are where your personal brand either sinks or swims.
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
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🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“83% of people will look at your LinkedIn profile now before they take a meeting with you.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Ted Prodromou, America’s #1 LinkedIn Coach, on perception, connecting properly with purpose, and standing out online.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/340 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Ted has bounced back from many setbacks; not only did he survive the dot com crash, which wiped out his successful 20-year tech career working for companies like IBM, he then came out the other side of the Global Financial Crisis of 2008, which turned his consulting business upside-down.
Today, Ted is America’s #1 LinkedIn coach and he helps clients to super-charge their online profile and presence, and how to connect properly with purpose.
He is the author of the Ultimate Guide to LinkedIn for Business and has also been featured on Entrepreneur.com, the New York Times, CNBC, and Forbes.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How he got made redundant 3 times in 12 years
✅ How co-writing a book with Perry Marshall launched his LinkedIn coaching career
✅ Some simple tips on how to make your LinkedIn profile really stand out, and
✅ How to dial up your LinkedIn content management so that you are perceived to be associated with well-known brands.
Deal hope,
Greg
A special thanks to Alex Mandossian for recommending Ted.
Connecting with Ted Prodromou You can connect with Ted via LinkedIn.
Books and Resources * Ultimate Guide to Linked In for Business - by Ted Prodromou * Contribution to an article on predicted LinkedIn trends for 2019 on Digital Marketer (Ted’s piece is two-thirds down the article) * Snappr, a great resource for taking a high-quality LinkedIn professional photo * How to Win Friends and Influence People - by Dale Carnegie * Leadership and Self-Deception - by The Arbinger Institute
Similar Episodes on Social Media * Natalie Speers, Founder & CEO of Social Ally, on being an early adopter, how anyone can thrive on social media, and visual disruption * Alex Mandossian, CEO and Founder of Marketingonline.com, on ethical influence and the art of storytelling * Jack Slade, Managing Director of Luxity Media, on being an accidental entrepreneur, saying no to increase revenues, and the future of new media
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I define speak-up culture as an environment in which members of a team feel that it is both psychologically safe and worth it to raise ideas, as long as it’s to make things better.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Stephen Shedletzky, author of Speak-Up Culture: When Leaders Truly Listen, People Step Up.
His full episode is titled How to foster a speak-up culture where people feel safe, trusted and worthy.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/338 👂
DISCOVER HOW THE CHIEF MAKER MINI MBA WILL DRIVE PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT IN REAL-TIME. JOIN THE WAITLIST: chiefmaker.com/minimba
“Shed”, as he is known to everyone, is a leadership author and coach who helps leaders and organisations create a culture where people feel encouraged, safe and valued in speaking-up.
He became the fourth person to join well-known leadership expert Simon Sinek’s team and has had the roles of Chief of Staff and Head of Brand Experience, Training & Development. The two still collaborate together.
He is also a TEDx Speaker Coach.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How he overcame a stutter and fear of public speaking to become a guru in speak-up culture.
✅ His framework and principles for helping you build a speak-up culture at work, and
✅ The most important things to consider in delivering a TEDx level presentation.
Deal hope,
Greg
Thanks to former guest, James Whittaker, for introducing me to Shed.
Connecting with Stephen Shedletzky You can connect with Stephen via LinkedIn and the Shed Inspires website. You can also see his Speak-Up Matrix on his website (see more details below in the show notes).
Books and resources * Man's Search for Meaning - by Viktor Frankl * The Attributes - by Rich DeVinney * Culture Map - by Erin Meyer * Outliers - by Malcolm Gladwell * Don’t sleep, there are snakes - by Daniel L. Everett
Similar Episodes on Communication * Matt Abrahams, author of Think Faster, Talk Smarter, on Managing your reputation before you enter a room, thinking on your feet, and getting to the point * Roger Love, World’s #1 Voice Coach on Teaching Bradley Cooper, Reese Witherspoon, The Beach Boys and more to use their voice to change the world * Minisodes by Greg Layton - Meetings as a Performance Theatre and BREAC a leg!
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Without these 3 strategies, your peers will start saying things about you like you’ve hit a glass ceiling or you’ve gone as far as you can. And you absolutely do not want that, Chief.”
Chief, in today’s minisode, I’m going to discuss three incredibly powerful tactics that you need to implement immediately when working in a leadership role.
As a manager of people, you need to be doing less in the weeds and more driving strategy and coaching those who report to you. That doesn't mean losing your finger on the pulse, but it does mean you now need to spend a good portion of your time working on the business and getting results as an organisation.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/339 👂
WANT TO ACCELERATE YOUR NEXT PROMOTION? COMPLETE YOUR FREE CAREER SCORECARD: www.chiefmaker.com/score-card
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The soul of the business was maintained because I drove the culture of the business so passionately.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Cliff Gale, former MD of Lite ‘n Easy for over 20 years.
His full episode is titled Leading with passion, respect for your people and keeping the soul alive in your business.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/337 👂
WANT TO ACCELERATE YOUR NEXT PROMOTION? COMPLETE YOUR FREE CAREER SCORECARD: www.chiefmaker.com/score-card
I met Cliff through a former Inner Chief podcast guest, Sara Chamberlain, in 2019.
Cliff started his career running Bob-Jane T Mart Franchises. He then bought into Lite n’ Easy after he saw a two line ad in a paper in its very early days.
He proceeded to lead the business for over two decades and grew it into one of the most successful businesses of its type.
Lite n’ Easy is a 100% Australian owned healthy food business and has been around nearly 40 years.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Keeping his finger on the pulse by respecting and listening to his people and customers
✅ How he kept the emotion and energy in the business as it grew to dizzying heights
✅ Building the soul of the business by focusing on the things that count and profit will come, and
✅ The difference between givers and takers.
Deal hope,
Greg
Similar Episodes on Retail * Cass Spies, Founder & CEO of Twisted Healthy Treats, on being nimble, promoting from within, and winning globally * Vince Lebon, CEO and Founder of Rollie Nation, on streamlining systems, scaling up and business rhythm * Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora & Fauna and CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on being adventurous, bootstrapping a business, and first-mover advantage
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Know that if you are a leader, you have an impact on the health and wellbeing of the people around you. That's why leadership is either a life-depleting or life-feeding line of work.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Stephen “Shed” Shedletzky, Author and Speaker Coach, on how to foster a speak-up culture where people feel safe, trusted and worthy.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/338 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
“Shed”, as he is known to everyone, is a leadership author and coach who helps leaders and organisations create a culture where people feel encouraged, safe and valued in speaking-up.
He became the fourth person to join well-known leadership expert Simon Sinek’s team and has had the roles of Chief of Staff and Head of Brand Experience, Training & Development. The two still collaborate together.
He is also a TEDx Speaker Coach and the author of Speak-Up Culture: When Leaders Truly Listen, People Step Up.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How he overcame a stutter and fear of public speaking to become a guru in speak-up culture.
✅ His framework and principles for helping you build a speak-up culture at work, and
✅ The most important things to consider in delivering a TEDx level presentation.
Thanks to former guest, James Whittaker, for introducing me to Shed.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Stephen Shedletzky You can connect with Stephen via LinkedIn and the Shed Inspires website. You can also see his Speak-Up Matrix on his website (see more details below in the show notes).
Books and resources * Man's Search for Meaning - by Viktor Frankl * The Attributes - by Rich DeVinney * Culture Map - by Erin Meyer * Outliers - by Malcolm Gladwell * Don’t sleep, there are snakes - by Daniel L. Everett
Similar Episodes on Communication * Matt Abrahams, author of Think Faster, Talk Smarter, on Managing your reputation before you enter a room, thinking on your feet, and getting to the point * Roger Love, World’s #1 Voice Coach on Teaching Bradley Cooper, Reese Witherspoon, The Beach Boys and more to use their voice to change the world * Minisodes by Greg Layton - Meetings as a Performance Theatre and BREAC a leg!
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“There's been too much focus on profit outcomes in business rather than maybe building the process along the way through empowering people, through effective delegation.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Cliff Gale, former Managing Director of Lite n’ Easy for over 20 years, on leading with passion, respect for your people and keeping the soul alive in your business.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/337 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
I met Cliff through a former Inner Chief podcast guest, Sara Chamberlain, in 2019.
Cliff started his career running Bob-Jane T Mart Franchises. He then bought into Lite n’ Easy after he saw a two line ad in a paper in its very early days.
He proceeded to lead the business for over two decades and grew it into one of the most successful businesses of its type.
Lite n’ Easy is a 100% Australian owned healthy food business and has been around nearly 40 years.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Keeping his finger on the pulse by respecting and listening to his people and customers
✅ How he kept the emotion and energy in the business as it grew to dizzying heights
✅ Building the soul of the business by focusing on the things that count and profit will come, and
✅ The difference between givers and takers.
Deal hope,
Greg
Similar Episodes on Retail * Cass Spies, Founder & CEO of Twisted Healthy Treats, on being nimble, promoting from within, and winning globally * Vince Lebon, CEO and Founder of Rollie Nation, on streamlining systems, scaling up and business rhythm * Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora & Fauna and CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on being adventurous, bootstrapping a business, and first-mover advantage
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The truth is, these 5 traits are disappointingly quite uncommon amongst leadership teams, but if you follow them, you will be closer to outsmarting the competition.”
Chief, in today’s minisode, I’m going to discuss five leadership lessons from a powerhouse executive team with whom I have worked for around five years.
Having played just a small part in their journey, I wanted to share with you five traits that each of us can take from this group.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/336 👂
BE MORE EFFECTIVE WITH YOUR TIME AND TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR CALENDAR: chiefmaker.com/saveanhour
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“There's no faster way to learn than to do. And the beauty of VR is that it allows you to learn through experience without the physical or emotional risk.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Angus Stevens, Co-Founder and CEO of Start Beyond.
His full episode is titled Taking learning by experience to new frontiers, putting guardrails on innovation, and creating useful technology for tangible real-world problems.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/334 👂
BE MORE EFFECTIVE WITH YOUR TIME AND TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR CALENDAR: chiefmaker.com/saveanhour
Angus is the CEO and Co-Founder of VR and AR studio, Start Beyond, which was named in the Top 10 2023 AFR Most Innovative Tech Companies as well as in the Top 20 Australian Startup Employers.
They’ve delivered more than 1.2million AR and VR learning experiences and work with the likes of Accenture and Meta, as well as US-based VR software giant, Strivr, and Australian companies like Westpac, University of Technology Sydney, St John’s Ambulance, and Woolworths.
Angus started out in writing, directing and producing television, documentaries, theatre and short films for Southern Cross Austereo and Nova, working with artists such as Bob Geldof, Ed Sheeran, Lady Gaga, Katy Perry and Taylor Swift.
He was named a 2023 Australian Top 50 Small Business Leader, and is the Chair and Co-Founder of the Australian Metaverse Advisory Council (AMAC), and is also a recent first-time author, having released Viewer Discretion Advised in 2023.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ The pioneering work he did in radio a decade ago by bringing a visual element to a live broadcast
✅ Recognising when to act on the tension between gaining enough experience and launching his own business
✅ How he has taken learning by experience to stratospheric heights while putting guardrails on innovation, and
✅ His thoughts on where education is going to be in 10 years’ time.
Deal hope,
Greg
Thanks to Sam Dybac and her team at The PR Hub for introducing us to Angus.
Connecting with Angus Stevens You can connect with Angus via LinkedIn and the Start Beyond website.
Books and resources * Viewer Discretion Advised - by Angus Stevens
Similar Episodes on Learning * Mark John, Founder & CEO of frntlne, on Partnering with the world’s top performers and business people, what a leader’s natural state is, and feeling lucky every day * Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D on debunking the 10,000 hour mastery rule through accelerated learning, and how this will drastically improve business outcomes * Minisode by Greg Layton - Choosing the right course or program to boost your career
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“One of the great pitfalls is that we just throw them in the deep end and assume they're going to swim. And when they fail, we say, oh well, they just weren’t up to it.”
Chief, in today’s minisode and YouTube video, I’m going to dive into some reasons for why so many people struggle with the shift from a technical, hands-on role into a leadership role, and how you as their leader can ensure a more smooth transition.
The reality is that a lot of leaders are promoted based on their technical abilities and not so much on their leadership capabilities, the misconception being that you ‘earn your stripes’ through being hands-on and experienced. This approach so often leads to poor outcomes and staff turnover, and for the promoted person feeling hopelessly out of their depth.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/335 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
So today, Chief, we’re going to talk about:
✅ Why technical staff land up being poor fits for strategic and leadership roles
✅ The Professional Excellence Framework known as the Chief Maker GREAT Method, and
✅ How to help your leaders and up-and-coming management avoid the poor performance and isolation that often comes with not supporting this role transition.
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you can simulate a problem by removing all of the normal, easy, well-travelled roads, then you're forcing yourself to be truly creative in getting to the end result."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Roland Frasier, CEO of All Channels Media.
His full episode is titled Pulling off creative business deals with no money down, and modelling your mentors.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/333 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
At the time of our conversation in 2018, Roland was the CEO of War Room Mastermind.
He is currently the CEO of All Media Channels, and is also a Principal in DigitalMarketer.com, The Scalable Company, EPIC Network and Traffic & Conversion Summit.
Roland is the co-founder and/or principal of multiple Inc. Magazine fastest growing companies (e-commerce, e-learning and SaaS) and a serial entrepreneur who has founded, scaled or sold almost two dozen different businesses ranging from consumer products to industrial machine manufacturing companies with adjusted sales ranging from $3 million to $337 million.
His expertise covers digitally-centric customer acquisition, activation, referral, retention, revenue and growth strategies and plan implementation and he is a guru in the art of the deal. He is also one of the most humble and generous chiefs you’ll ever meet.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How to buy property and businesses for no money down
✅ Infusing creativity into business deals and structuring deals even if you are a full-time employee
✅ What made his mastermind, The War Room, such a winning program, and
✅ The lineage of his learning way back to the greats like Milton Erickson, John Grinder and Richard Bandler..
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Roland Frasier You can connect with Roland via LinkedIn, his podcast or his website.
Books and resources * Business Wealth Without Risk - by Roland Frasier and Jay Abraham * Nothing Down - by Robert Allan * The Psychology of Winning (Audiobook) - by Denis Waitley * Unlimited Power - by Tony Robbins * The works of Milton H Erickson * Measure What Matters - by John Doerr * High Output Management - by Andy Grove * Uncommon Therapy - by Jay Haley * The 4 Disciplines of Execution - by Chris McChesney, Sean Covey, Jim Huling * Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends On It - by Kamal Ravikant * Rebirth - by Kamal Ravikant
Similar Episodes on Investors * Jay Abraham, Founder and CEO of The Abraham Group on How to achieve business wealth without risk through acquisition and the most powerful marketing strategies in the world * Bushy Martin, CEO of KnowHow Property on playing the long game and living a life by design not default * Joel Holland, CEO of Harvest Hosts on Buying versus building a business
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“There's no faster way to learn than to do. And the beauty of VR is that it allows you to learn through experience without the physical or emotional risk.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Angus Stevens, Co-Founder and CEO of Start Beyond on taking learning by experience to new frontiers, putting guardrails on innovation, and creating useful technology for tangible real-world problems.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/334 👂
WANT TO ACCELERATE YOUR NEXT PROMOTION? COMPLETE YOUR FREE CAREER SCORECARD: www.chiefmaker.com/score-card
Angus is the CEO and Co-Founder of VR and AR studio, Start Beyond, which was named in the Top 10 2023 AFR Most Innovative Tech Companies as well as in the Top 20 Australian Startup Employers.
They’ve delivered more than 1.2million AR and VR learning experiences and work with the likes of Accenture and Meta, as well as US-based VR software giant, Strivr, and Australian companies like Westpac, University of Technology Sydney, St John’s Ambulance, and Woolworths.
Angus started out in writing, directing and producing television, documentaries, theatre and short films for Southern Cross Austereo and Nova, working with artists such as Bob Geldof, Ed Sheeran, Lady Gaga, Katy Perry and Taylor Swift.
He was named a 2023 Australian Top 50 Small Business Leader, and is the Chair and Co-Founder of the Australian Metaverse Advisory Council (AMAC), and is also a recent first-time author, having released Viewer Discretion Advised in 2023.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The pioneering work he did in radio a decade ago by bringing a visual element to a live broadcast
✅ Recognising when to act on the tension between gaining enough experience and launching his own business
✅ How he has taken learning by experience to stratospheric heights while putting guardrails on innovation, and
✅ His thoughts on where education is going to be in 10 years’ time.
Deal hope,
Greg
Thanks to Sam Dybac and her team at The PR Hub for introducing us to Angus.
Connecting with Angus Stevens You can connect with Angus via LinkedIn and the Start Beyond website.
Books and resources * Viewer Discretion Advised - by Angus Stevens
Similar Episodes on Learning * Mark John, Founder & CEO of frntlne, on Partnering with the world’s top performers and business people, what a leader’s natural state is, and feeling lucky every day * Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D on debunking the 10,000 hour mastery rule through accelerated learning, and how this will drastically improve business outcomes * Minisode by Greg Layton - Choosing the right course or program to boost your career
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“My mother has this wonderful saying: Tell the time, don't build the clock. Many of us are clock builders when we communicate, but if we can structure our messages to be concise and clear, we can be much better communicators in any situation.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Matt Abrahams, author of ‘Think Faster, Talk Smarter’.
His full episode is titled Managing your reputation before you enter a room, thinking on your feet, and getting to the point.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/332 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Matt is a leading expert in communication with decades of experience as an educator, author, podcast host, and coach.
As a Lecturer in Organizational Behavior at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business, he teaches popular classes in strategic communication and effective virtual presenting.
Matt is also a sought-after keynote speaker and communication consultant. He has helped countless presenters improve and hone their communication, including some who have delivered IPO roadshows as well as TED, World Economic Forum, and Nobel Prize presentations.
He is the author of Think Faster, Talk Smarter: How to Speak Successfully When You’re Put on the Spot and his previous book, Speaking Up without Freaking Out: 50 Techniques for Confident and Compelling Presenting has helped thousands of people manage speaking anxiety and present more confidently and authentically.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How you can actively build your reputation and make great first impressions
✅ Why you need to train for spontaneous, on-the-spot conversations
✅ What martial arts has taught him about managing his physiology when communicating effectively
✅ His 6 step method to think faster and talk smarter, and
✅ A fool-proof way to construct the perfect email.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Matt Abrahams You can connect with Matt via his website or LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Think Faster, Talk Smarter - by Matt Abrahams * Speaking Up without Freaking Out - by Matt Abrahams
Similar Episodes on Communication * Roger Love, the World’s #1 Celebrity Voice Coach, on teaching Bradley Cooper, Reese Witherspoon and The Beach Boys to use their voice to change the world * Paul Jones on Getting cut through and building trust through your writing * Minisode by Greg Layton - Meetings as a Performance Theatre
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
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🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I believe that everything that you want to accomplish can be accomplished with mentoring, modelling and masterminding.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Roland Frasier, CEO of All Channels Media, on pulling off creative business deals with no money down, and modelling your mentors.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/333 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
At the time of our conversation in 2018, Roland was the CEO of War Room Mastermind.
He is currently the CEO of All Media Channels, and is also a Principal in DigitalMarketer.com, The Scalable Company, EPIC Network and Traffic & Conversion Summit.
Roland is the co-founder and/or principal of multiple Inc. Magazine fastest growing companies (e-commerce, e-learning and SaaS) and a serial entrepreneur who has founded, scaled or sold almost two dozen different businesses ranging from consumer products to industrial machine manufacturing companies with adjusted sales ranging from $3 million to $337 million.
His expertise covers digitally-centric customer acquisition, activation, referral, retention, revenue and growth strategies and plan implementation and he is a guru in the art of the deal. He is also one of the most humble and generous chiefs you’ll ever meet.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How to buy property and businesses for no money down
✅ Infusing creativity into business deals and structuring deals even if you are a full-time employee
✅ What made his mastermind, The War Room, such a winning program, and
✅ The lineage of his learning way back to the greats like Milton Erickson, John Grinder and Richard Bandler.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Roland Frasier You can connect with Roland via LinkedIn, his podcast or his website.
Books and resources * Business Wealth Without Risk - by Roland Frasier and Jay Abraham * Nothing Down - by Robert Allan * The Psychology of Winning (Audiobook) - by Denis Waitley * Unlimited Power - by Tony Robbins * The works of Milton H Erickson * Measure What Matters - by John Doerr * High Output Management - by Andy Grove * Uncommon Therapy - by Jay Haley * The 4 Disciplines of Execution - by Chris McChesney, Sean Covey, Jim Huling * Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends On It - by Kamal Ravikant * Rebirth - by Kamal Ravikant
Similar Episodes on Investors * Jay Abraham, Founder and CEO of The Abraham Group on How to achieve business wealth without risk through acquisition and the most powerful marketing strategies in the world * Bushy Martin, CEO of KnowHow Property on playing the long game and living a life by design not default * Joel Holland, CEO of Harvest Hosts on Buying versus building a business
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I just want to make sure the right people get the right things in the right way. And I also want to make sure that people like you and me could have a direct impact on a disaster event that's happening overseas."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Juliette Wright OAM, Founder & Director of GIVIT and Recovere.
Her full episode is titled Revolutionising misguided charitable giving, having a million conversations, and leaning into anxiety.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/330 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Juliette is an Australian social entrepreneur who has devoted herself to alleviating poverty and addressing crises since founding GIVIT in 2009.
What started as a simple desire to donate baby clothes evolved into the creation of a groundbreaking world-first platform that offers efficient and effective disaster relief across Australia.
Under Juliette’s leadership, GIVIT grew into one of the country’s largest and most successful donation platforms, garnering endorsements from government bodies and facilitating over 8.5 million donations and supporting over 4,500 non-profit organisations nationally during crises and disasters.
Juliette's experience in developing innovative IT platforms, navigating stakeholder and government relations and managing rapid growth, positions her uniquely in her current role as CEO of Recovere, a social enterprise that supports international communities to manage donations post-crisis.
Juliette has been recognised with numerous awards, including being named an Australian of the Year Local Hero in 2015 and receiving the Order of Australia Medal (OAM) in 2019.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ The origins of GIVIT, which was born out of addressing the negative side of donations
✅ How she handles the “million conversations” rule of social enterprises and getting past bureaucracy
✅ Why and how she leans into anxiety in order to be happy, and
✅ Her new role with Recovere and solving the biggest headache in disaster events.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Juliette Wright OAM You can connect with Juliette via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Shoe Dog - by Phil Knight
Similar Episodes on Not-for-Profits * Rochelle Courtenay, Founder of Share the Dignity on Leading volunteer armies, witnessing female trauma inside prison, and eradicating period poverty * Casey Lyons, Co-Founder and CEO, LIVIN on The rollercoaster of grief, being not weak to speak, and practising self-care * Hetty Johnston AM, Former CEO of Bravehearts on Passion, resilience and negotiating with Prime Ministers
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“My mother has this wonderful saying: Tell the time, don't build the clock. Many of us are clock builders when we communicate, but if we can structure our messages to be concise and clear, we can be much better communicators in any situation.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Matt Abrahams, author of ‘Think Faster, Talk Smarter’ on managing your reputation before you enter a room, thinking on your feet, and getting to the point.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/332 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS FOR CANDIDATES OR INTERVIEWERS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Matt is a leading expert in communication with decades of experience as an educator, author, podcast host, and coach.
As a Lecturer in Organizational Behavior at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business, he teaches popular classes in strategic communication and effective virtual presenting.
Matt is also a sought-after keynote speaker and communication consultant. He has helped countless presenters improve and hone their communication, including some who have delivered IPO road shows as well as TED, World Economic Forum, and Nobel Prize presentations.
He is the author of Think Faster, Talk Smarter: How to Speak Successfully When You’re Put on the Spot and his previous book, Speaking Up without Freaking Out: 50 Techniques for Confident and Compelling Presenting has helped thousands of people manage speaking anxiety and present more confidently and authentically.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How you can actively build your reputation and make great first impressions
✅ Why you need to train for spontaneous, on-the-spot conversations
✅ What martial arts has taught him about managing his physiology when communicating effectively
✅ His 6 step method to think faster and talk smarter, and
✅ A fool-proof way to construct the perfect email.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Matt Abrahams You can connect with Matt via his website or LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Think Faster, Talk Smarter - by Matt Abrahams * Speaking Up without Freaking Out - by Matt Abrahams
Similar Episodes on Communication * Roger Love, the World’s #1 Celebrity Voice Coach, on teaching Bradley Cooper, Reese Witherspoon and The Beach Boys to use their voice to change the world * Paul Jones on Getting cut through and building trust through your writing * Natalie Speers on Being an early adopter, how anyone can thrive on social media, and visual disruption
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you say honesty is a core value, are you kidding me? Do you want people working in your organisation that are dishonest? That doesn't make sense!”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
In this edition of the Mini Chief we feature a snippet from our Best of Series with Group CEO of Nuix, Jonathan Rubinsztein.
His full episode is titled Bringing values to life, compressing time, and the 3 key principles of motivation.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/329 👂
BE MORE EFFECTIVE WITH YOUR TIME AND TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR CALENDAR: chiefmaker.com/saveanhour
At the time of our conversation in 2018, Jonathan was the CEO & Managing Director of Infomedia, an ASX-Listed global provider of SaaS solutions to the parts and service sector in the automotive industry.
Jonathan is now the Group CEO of Nuix, another ASX-Listed Company, and a leading provider of investigative analytics and intelligence software.
Prior to his time at Infomedia, Jonathan was the CEO and founding shareholder at UXC Red Rock Consulting, the largest Oracle Consulting business in ANZ with 8 offices and 600 staff.
Jonathan was previously on the boards of both Missionvale Australia and Humanitix, and has been a guest lecturer at the University of Sydney Business School and a regular participant at TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) conferences.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Bringing values to life in a meaningful, practical way rather than just words on a wall
✅ How to get things done faster and why he treats everything in life as a project
✅ Three key principles of motivation – purpose, mastery and autonomy, and
✅ Learning from a range of different people, industries and fields.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Jonathan Rubinsztein You can reach Jonathan on LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Drive - by Daniel Pink * Homo Deus - by Yuval Noah Harari * Sapiens - by Yuval Noah Harari * The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People - by Stephen Covey * Not Guilty - Nicolette Rubinsztein
Similar Episodes on values * Chief Maker Minisode, on Key Business Terms * Isabelle Nüssli, Author of the book "Cockfighting", on Managing the CEO-Chair relationship and overcoming the drivers of conflict * Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora & Fauna and CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on being adventurous, bootstrapping a business, and first-mover advantage
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“What do I do with a group of leaders who have risen up through functional roles and are now really struggling to work on the business and to be strategic? It's causing a fair amount of chaos and tension across the group.”
Chief, in today’s minisode and YouTube video, I’m going to cover the exact strategies you need to use in order to get your leadership team to think strategically at the organisational level.
The reality is that a lot of leaders are technically great, but they need to get out of their functional roles and into driving the business strategy and the company forward, otherwise they risk pouring their energy and resources into all the wrong places.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/331 👂
BE MORE EFFECTIVE WITH YOUR TIME AND TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR CALENDAR: chiefmaker.com/saveanhour
So today, Chief, we’re going to talk about:
✅ The 7 steps you need to follow in order to drive your business forward, and
✅ How to get your leaders out of their day-to-day and collaborate so that they can help your organisation beat the competition.
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“You are best defined by what you say no to.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Juliette Wright OAM, Founder and Director of GIVIT and Recovere, on revolutionising misguided charitable giving, having a million conversations, and leaning into anxiety.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/330 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Juliette is an Australian social entrepreneur who has devoted herself to alleviating poverty and addressing crises since founding GIVIT in 2009.
What started as a simple desire to donate baby clothes evolved into the creation of a groundbreaking world-first platform that offers efficient and effective disaster relief across Australia.
Under Juliette’s leadership, GIVIT grew into one of the country’s largest and most successful donation platforms, garnering endorsements from government bodies and facilitating over 8.5 million donations and supporting over 4,500 non-profit organisations nationally during crises and disasters.
Juliette's experience in developing innovative IT platforms, navigating stakeholder and government relations and managing rapid growth, positions her uniquely in her current role as CEO of Recovere, a social enterprise that supports international communities to manage donations post-crisis.
Juliette has been recognised with numerous awards, including being named an Australian of the Year Local Hero in 2015 and receiving the Order of Australia Medal (OAM) in 2019.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The origins of GIVIT, which was born out of addressing the negative side of donations
✅ How she handles the “million conversations” rule of social enterprises and getting past bureaucracy
✅ Why and how she leans into anxiety in order to be happy, and
✅ Her new role with Recovere and solving the biggest headache in disaster events.
Thanks to former guest, Natalie Cook OAM OLY, for introducing me to Juliette.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Juliette Wright OAM You can connect with Juliette via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Shoe Dog - by Phil Knight
Similar Episodes on Not-for-Profits * Rochelle Courtenay, Founder of Share the Dignity on Leading volunteer armies, witnessing female trauma inside prison, and eradicating period poverty * Casey Lyons, Co-Founder and CEO, LIVIN on The rollercoaster of grief, being not weak to speak, and practising self-care * Hetty Johnston AM, Former CEO of Bravehearts on Passion, resilience and negotiating with Prime Ministers
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“My mantra is first you build it, then you buy it. Finding product-market fit with a startup is by far the hardest thing in the world, but when you buy a company, you probably skip that.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Joel Holland, CEO of Harvest Hosts.
His full episode is titled Why unhappiness is a requirement for entrepreneurialism, switching seats from CEO to Chair.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/328 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Joel is the CEO of Harvest Hosts, a membership program that connects RVers (caravaners) with unique overnight experiences at 5,000+ wineries, farms, breweries, museums, golf courses and other interesting destinations in the US and Canada.
Earlier in his career, after stints in investment banking and in media organisations, he founded Storyblocks, the world’s first stock media subscription service, which was purchased by private equity firm Great Hill Partners in June 2020.
Joel has been named one of the "Top 25 Entrepreneurs Under 25" by BusinessWeek Magazine, and "Young Entrepreneur of the Year" by the United States Small Business Administration, and "Entrepreneur of the Year" for the Greater Washington DC Region by Ernst & Young, and also recognised on the Inc. "30 Under 30" list.
When he isn't working, Joel is outside as much as possible with his family in Vail, Colorado. He is proud to be a member of Vail Mountain Rescue, the search and rescue team for Eagle County.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How in high school he hosted a show where he interviewed celebrities, athletes, politicians and Fortune 500 CEOs, including Arnold Schwarzenegger and Steve Forbes.
✅ Switching seats from CEO to Chair at Storyblocks, and why burnout forced such a move.
✅ The incredible operational principles which help him achieve success but also balance in life, and
✅ How he took Harvest Hosts from a solid business and on an explosive growth trajectory, and why he suggests building a business first, and buying thereafter.
Thanks to former guest, Shane Russell, for introducing me to Joel.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Joel Holland You can connect with Joel via LinkedIn, and you can view the Harvest Hosts website.
Books and resources * Storyblocks - a stock media company * All Trails - an app for hiking
Similar Episodes on buying companies * Jaimie Fuller, former CEO of SKINS on coping with rapid growth * Julie Mathers, CEO of Snuggle Hunny on first-mover advantage * Ben Simon, Partner of Rose Partners on diffusing heated negotiations and identifying red flags during a deal
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Often the people you speak to are in the same industry and that creates an echo chamber. If you don’t have communication with people outside your industry, you're going to be someone else's lunch or dinner in this crazy world of disruption.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature Group CEO of Nuix, Jonathan Rubinsztein, on bringing values to life, compressing time, and the 3 key principles of motivation.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/329 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
At the time of our conversation in 2018, Jonathan was the CEO & Managing Director of Infomedia, an ASX-Listed global provider of SaaS solutions to the parts and service sector in the automotive industry.
Jonathan is now the CEO or Group CEO of Nuix, another ASX-Listed Company, and a leading provider of investigative analytics and intelligence software.
Prior to his time at Infomedia, Jonathan was the CEO and founding shareholder at UXC Red Rock Consulting, the largest Oracle Consulting business in ANZ with 8 offices and 600 staff.
Jonathan was previously on the boards of both Missionvale Australia and Humanitix, and has been a guest lecturer at the University of Sydney Business School and a regular participant at TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) conferences.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Bringing values to life in a meaningful, practical way rather than just words on a wall
✅ How to get things done faster and why he treats everything in life as a project
✅ Three key principles of motivation – purpose, mastery and autonomy, and
✅ Learning from a range of different people, industries and fields.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Jonathan Rubinsztein You can reach Jonathan on LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Drive - by Daniel Pink * Homo Deus - by Yuval Noah Harari * Sapiens - by Yuval Noah Harari * The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People - by Stephen Covey * Not Guilty - Nicolette Rubinsztein
Similar Episodes on values * Chief Maker Minisode, on Key Business Terms * Isabelle Nüssli, Author of the book "Cockfighting", on Managing the CEO-Chair relationship and overcoming the drivers of conflict * Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora & Fauna and CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on being adventurous, bootstrapping a business, and first-mover advantage
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I feel that if you understand finance and economics, you understand how most of the world works.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Joel Holland, CEO of Harvest Hosts on why unhappiness is a requirement for entrepreneurialism, switching seats from CEO to Chair, and buying versus building a business.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/328 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Joel is the CEO of Harvest Hosts, a membership program that connects RVers (caravaners) with unique overnight experiences at 5,000+ wineries, farms, breweries, museums, golf courses and other interesting destinations in the US and Canada.
Earlier in his career, after stints in investment banking and in media organisations, he founded Storyblocks, the world’s first stock media subscription service, which was purchased by private equity firm Great Hill Partners in June 2020.
Joel has been named one of the "Top 25 Entrepreneurs Under 25" by BusinessWeek Magazine, and "Young Entrepreneur of the Year" by the United States Small Business Administration, and "Entrepreneur of the Year" for the Greater Washington DC Region by Ernst & Young, and also recognised on the Inc. "30 Under 30" list.
When he isn't working, Joel is outside as much as possible with his family in Vail, Colorado. He is proud to be a member of Vail Mountain Rescue, the search and rescue team for Eagle County.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How in high school he hosted a show where he interviewed celebrities, athletes, politicians and Fortune 500 CEOs, including Arnold Schwarzenegger and Steve Forbes.
✅ Switching seats from CEO to Chair at Storyblocks, and why burnout forced such a move.
✅ The incredible operational principles which help him achieve success but also balance in life, and
✅ How he took Harvest Hosts from a solid business and on an explosive growth trajectory, and why he suggests building a business first, and buying thereafter.
Deal hope,
Greg
Thanks to former guest, Shane Russell, for introducing us to Joel.
Connecting with Joel Holland You can connect with Joel via LinkedIn, and you can view the Harvest Hosts website.
Books and resources * Storyblocks - a stock media company * All Trails - an app for hiking
Similar Episodes on buying companies * Jaimie Fuller, former CEO of SKINS on coping with rapid growth * Julie Mathers, CEO of Snuggle Hunny on first-mover advantage * Ben Simon, Partner of Rose Partners on diffusing heated negotiations and identifying red flags during a deal
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“We're trying to ease the financial pain for the next generation in the green and gold.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Gold medallist and 5-time Olympian, Natalie Cook OAM OLY.
Her full episode is titled How to out-think the opposition, and why it takes an ecosystem to win a gold medal.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/326 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Nat is a five-time Olympian, Gold and Bronze Medallist in beach volleyball, representing Australia in the Summer Olympics between 1996 and 2012.
A passionate athlete advocate, Nat has always been a champion of the transformational power of sport and the life lessons learnt pursuing your dreams.
Her trademark authenticity, energy and ease, combined with her success as both an elite athlete and influential business leader, make Nat a powerful motivational speaker and strategic sports and wellbeing advisor.
Serving as a Director of Brisbane 2032, Olympic and Paralympic Games Organising Committee, and holding a position on the World Olympians Association Board, Nat is a firm believer in the Games' potential to create enduring legacies for individuals, businesses, and society as a whole.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ The ecosystem of things required to go right for the eventual winning of a gold medal
✅ How, in competition, she used the metaphor of attacking the opposition from the top of the hill
✅ The mindsets and mind techniques she learnt being an elite full-time athlete, including how to make the crowd work for you
✅ Working with a former Chief Maker guest, Dr Jeff Spencer, on adjusting to life after an Olympics, and
✅ The incredible work she is doing behind the scenes to support not only Brisbane 2032 but also prospective Australian athletes striving to make the Games.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Natalie Cook OAM OLY You can connect with Nat via LinkedIn, her website and Aussie Athlete Fund.
Books and resources * $1 Million Challenge - Aussie Athlete Fund launch video * The Art of War - by Sun Tzu * Way of the Peaceful Warrior - by Dan Millman
Similar Episodes on high performance sport * Dr Jeff Spencer, The man behind 40+ Olympic gold medals and Tiger Woods on Building your champion mindset and your pathway to your potential with the Olympic champion maker * Leah Amico, Triple US Olympic Team Gold Medallist on How to build a GOLD standard, boosting confidence and empathetic teamwork * Ben Darwin, Co-Founder and Director of GAIN LINE on Cohesion analytics, understanding versus skill, and sacking staff too soon
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Sometimes you've got to save them from themselves and have some really honest, heart-to-heart conversations about their role.”
Chief, in today’s minisode and YouTube video, I’m going to cover a little problem that has come up repeatedly over the last few years and that is right person, wrong role.
This is when you have a great employee in your stables, but they’re not performing to the standards required of the role. But this is not always what it seems; often this is due to the role not being a good fit for their skill set or experience.
This can have all sorts of implications on the business, so you need to make some bold calls and have some difficult conversations, but always with respect.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/327 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
So today, Chief, we’re going to talk about:
✅ The 5 scenarios where job fit becomes an issue and why these are occuring, and
✅ What you can do as a leader about ensuring you give your employee hope that they can perform and contribute to the organisation.
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Our job as a coach is to find out why the swing has changed, because the only way you can fix it is by identifying the real bottleneck, the real constraint. But without being reactive.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
In this edition of the Mini Chief we feature a snippet from our Best of Series with Golf master Coach, Steve Bann.
His full episode is titled Working with the world’s best golfers, turning practice into confidence, and the improvement lifecycle.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/325 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
I interviewed Steve for this podcast in 2018.
Steve is a partner in BannLynchMcDade, a coaching team that has coached their students to 29 USPGA Tour wins and multiple international amateur and professional titles.
After turning professional in 1979, Steve played on the Australian PGA Tour from 1981 to 1996.
However, since 1996, Steve has travelled the world, coaching at over 40 Majors and five Presidents' Cups. His students have included Stuart Appleby, Robert Allenby, Ian Baker-Finch, Greg Norman, Vijay Singh, and Adam Scott.
Steve has been described by his clients as the most knowledgeable coach in the world. He is also the author of Simply Golf: Back to Basics.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Why a lot of coaches focus on fixing technique, which leads to a reactive cycle, and often has the opposite effect
✅ How the improvement life cycle of technical, physical, mental and strategic changes, is a far greater process to undertake
✅ The 6,500 skills the professionals have to learn to master golf and how this translates to the business world, and
✅ The 4-step routine to gaining confidence.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Steve Bann You can reach Steve on his Coaching website or YouTube.
Books and resources * Simply Golf: Back to Basics - by Steve Bann * Practical Golf - by John Jacobs
Similar Episodes on coaching * Peter Knight, Golf coach on Putting in place the steps to become a true master of your craft * Roger Love, The World’s #1 Celebrity Voice Coach on The man who taught Bradley Cooper, Reese Witherspoon, The Beach Boys and more to use their voice to change the world * Dr Jeff Spencer, The man behind 40+ Olympic gold medals and Tiger Woods on Building your champion mindset and your pathway to your potential with the Olympic champion maker
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Amateurs do it until they get it right; professionals do it until they can't get it wrong.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Natalie Cook OAM OLY on how to out-think the competition, and why it takes an ecosystem to win a gold medal.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/326 👂
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Nat is a five-time Olympian, Gold and Bronze Medallist in beach volleyball, representing Australia in the Summer Olympics between 1996 and 2012.
A passionate athlete advocate, Nat has always been a champion of the transformational power of sport and the life lessons learnt pursuing your dreams.
Her trademark authenticity, energy and ease, combined with her success as both an elite athlete and influential business leader, make Nat a powerful motivational speaker and strategic sports and wellbeing advisor.
Serving as a Director of Brisbane 2032, Olympic and Paralympic Games Organising Committee, and holding a position on the World Olympians Association Board, Nat is a firm believer in the Games' potential to create enduring legacies for individuals, businesses, and society as a whole.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The ecosystem of things required to go right for the eventual winning of a gold medal
✅ How, in competition, she used the metaphor of attacking the opposition from the top of the hill
✅ The mindsets and mind techniques she learnt being an elite full-time athlete, including how to make the crowd work for you
✅ Working with a former Chief Maker guest, Dr Jeff Spencer, on adjusting to life after an Olympics, and
✅ The incredible work she is doing behind the scenes to support not only Brisbane 2032 but also prospective Australian athletes striving to make the Games.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Natalie Cook OAM OLY You can connect with Nat via LinkedIn, her website and Aussie Athlete Fund.
Books and resources * $1 Million Challenge - Aussie Athlete Fund launch video * The Art of War - by Sun Tzu * Way of the Peaceful Warrior - by Dan Millman
Similar Episodes on high performance sport * Dr Jeff Spencer, The man behind 40+ Olympic gold medals and Tiger Woods on Building your champion mindset and your pathway to your potential with the Olympic champion maker * Leah Amico, Triple US Olympic Team Gold Medallist on How to build a GOLD standard, boosting confidence and empathetic teamwork * Ben Darwin, Co-Founder and Director of GAIN LINE on Cohesion analytics, understanding versus skill, and sacking staff too soon
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Decision friction is when you deliberately interrupt your thoughts before forming a judgement. You adopt a series of prompts or questions that are like a speed bump for your mind if you’re in a hot state.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Nuala Walsh, Founder & CEO of MindEquity and author of Tune In: How to make smarter decisions in a noisy world.
Her full episode is titled The art of decision-making like a ninja, and learning to control your emotions and recognise your biases.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/323 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
With over 30 years’ experience in FTSE-50 and Fortune 500 financial services firms, Nuala is Founder & CEO of MindEquity Consulting, as well as a Founding Director of the world’s first Global Association of Applied Behavioural Scientists. Prior to that, she was an award-winning Chief Marketing Officer at Standard Life Aberdeen, and has had previous executive roles with Merrill Lynch, BlackRock, and PA Consulting.
Today, she sits on multiple Advisory Boards including The British & Irish Lions Rugby Union, Basketball Ireland, and The Innocence Project, is President of The Harvard Club of Ireland, is Deputy Chair of The Football Association’s Inclusion Board, and is a Gender Taskforce Advisor at World Athletics.
Listed among the Top 100 Most Influential Women in Finance, she holds degrees in multiple disciplines including a Masters in Behavioural Science from the London School of Economics, a Masters in Business Studies; and a BA in Philosophy.
Nuala is a seasoned lecturer and keynote speaker, with her work on behavioural science research published and aired on the Harvard Business Review, TEDx, the Economist, the Telegraph, Forbes, BBC, and Fox Business.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How choices shape your decision mindset and outcomes
✅ The 2 Systems of thinking and how to optimise them for decision-making scenarios
✅ What you can do to control your emotions such as regret and rage so as to de-risk bad decisions
✅ Recognising your biases, of which there are over 200, and
✅ Why not making a decision, is still a decision!
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Nuala Walsh You can connect with Nuala via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Tune In: How to make smarter decisions in a noisy world - by Nuala Walsh * How to Overcome Indecision: TEDx talk - by Nuala Walsh * Thinking Fast and Slow - by Daniel Kahneman * The Power of Regret - by Daniel Pink * The Top 5 Regrets of The Dying - by Bronnie Ware
Similar Episodes on decision-making * Izzy Silva, MD of Wolters Kluwer APAC on Using EQ to good effect, making the vision visible, and data-led decision-making * Nancy Slessenger, Founder and CEO of Vinehouse Hiring on Scientific recruitment, the do’s and don’ts of interviewing, and staff retention * Mark Pomeroy, CEO of Pomeroy Pacific on Managing risk, asking great questions, and succeeding in a family business
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“We see Tiger Woods get angry and throw clubs, but when he does something he’s done a million times, like hole a 6-foot putt, he gets super excited and dances across the green pumping his fist. Why? He's emotionally anchoring that success.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature Golf master Coach, Steve Bann, on working with the world’s best golfers, turning practice into confidence, and the improvement lifecycle.
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DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
I interviewed Steve for this podcast in 2018.
Steve is a partner in BannLynchMcDade, a coaching team that has coached their students to 29 USPGA Tour wins and multiple international amateur and professional titles.
After turning professional in 1979, Steve played on the Australian PGA Tour from 1981 to 1996.
However, since 1996, Steve has travelled the world, coaching at over 40 Majors and five Presidents' Cups. His students have included Stuart Appleby, Robert Allenby, Ian Baker-Finch, Greg Norman, Vijay Singh, and Adam Scott.
Steve has been described by his clients as the most knowledgeable coach in the world. He is also the author of Simply Golf: Back to Basics.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Why a lot of coaches focus on fixing technique, which leads to a reactive cycle, and often has the opposite effect
✅ How the improvement life cycle of technical, physical, mental and strategic changes, is a far greater process to undertake
✅ The 6,500 skills the professionals have to learn to master golf and how this translates to the business world, and
✅ The 4-step routine to gaining confidence.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Steve Bann You can reach Steve on his Coaching website or YouTube.
Books and resources * Simply Golf: Back to Basics - by Steve Bann * Practical Golf - by John Jacobs
Similar Episodes on coaching * Peter Knight, Golf coach on Putting in place the steps to become a true master of your craft * Roger Love, The World’s #1 Celebrity Voice Coach on The man who taught Bradley Cooper, Reese Witherspoon, The Beach Boys and more to use their voice to change the world * Dr Jeff Spencer, The man behind 40+ Olympic gold medals and Tiger Woods on Building your champion mindset and your pathway to your potential with the Olympic champion maker
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Yeah, it was brutal, a very, very difficult period of my life. I’d hired a lot of people who didn't have technology experience. What I actually did was I set them and the business up for failure.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features Jeremy Hastings, Founder & Managing Director of both Hutly and Bondable.
His full episode is titled Being fired from his own company and successfully returning to transform the real estate industry after working on his inner chief.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/322 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
After a career in mining at Rio Tinto, Jeremy experienced his first business success through a gelato shop, which sold 16 tonnes in its second year.
Following an unsavoury experience with a crooked real estate agent, Jeremy made it his life’s mission to leverage technology to power a more positive, transparent, and human-centred real estate industry, creating Hutly as the world’s only Living Contracts platform and a place where all parties can transact real estate with trust.
He is also the founder of Bondable, Australia’s first subscription-based residential bond service, which launched in 2024.
Jeremy went to the University of Canberra, where he studied a Bachelor of Business Administration and a Bachelor of Management. He also has three postgraduate qualifications – a Graduate Certificate in Community Relations (Resources Sector) from the University of Queensland, a Masters of Mining Engineering from UNSW and a Masters of Commercial Law from the University of Melbourne.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How an accidental guinea pig brood was seven-year-old Jeremy’s first foray into entrepreneurship
✅ Successfully negotiating the rights to IP he created at Rio Tinto, that he wanted to commercialise after leaving the mining giant
✅ Being fired as CEO from his own company, and returning after working deeply on his inner chief where he is now transforming the real estate industry, and
✅ Recognising that there are different types of CEO that are suited to the various stages of a business.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Jeremy Hastings You can connect with Jeremy via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Good to Great - by Jim Collins * Team Topologies - by Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais
Similar Episodes with Startup Founders * Mark John, Founder & CEO of frntlne, on partnering with the world’s top performers and business people, what a leader’s natural state is, and feeling lucky every day * Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora & Fauna and CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on being adventurous, bootstrapping a business, and first-mover advantage * Mark Calabro, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of HungryHungry and OrderMate, on digitising human-to-human connections, succeeding in two tech startups, using fear of failure to your advantage.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Are you or someone else owning the developmental pathway for your career?”
Chief, in today’s minisode I’m going to cover how to choose the right course that will significantly boost your career.
In today’s busy world, there are just so many options, so it’s incredibly hard to know how to sift out the bad options from the good ones. And then, to compound the challenge, you end up having to commit to something where there is no guarantee!
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GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
So today, Chief, we’re going to talk about:
✅ Defining out the step-change performance improvement you need to gain from doing the course
✅ Time management and value for money, and
✅ The 70-20-10 rule of learning.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“We live in this highly overstimulated world, people are rushing to judgement more than ever, people are feeling unheard, and the reality is, they are unheard, because we can't hear them, because we're too busy, too distracted.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Nuala Walsh, Founder & CEO of MindEquity and author of “Tune In”, on the art of decision-making like a ninja, and learning to control your emotions and recognise your biases.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/323 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
With over 30 years’ experience in FTSE-50 and Fortune 500 financial services firms, Nuala is Founder & CEO of MindEquity Consulting, as well as a Founding Director of the world’s first Global Association of Applied Behavioural Scientists. Prior to that, she was an award-winning Chief Marketing Officer at Standard Life Aberdeen, and has had previous executive roles with Merrill Lynch, BlackRock, and PA Consulting.
Today, she sits on multiple Advisory Boards including The British & Irish Lions Rugby Union, Basketball Ireland, and The Innocence Project, is President of The Harvard Club of Ireland, is Deputy Chair of The Football Association’s Inclusion Board, and is a Gender Taskforce Advisor at World Athletics.
Listed among the Top 100 Most Influential Women in Finance, she holds degrees in multiple disciplines including a Masters in Behavioural Science from the London School of Economics, a Masters in Business Studies; and a BA in Philosophy.
Nuala is a seasoned lecturer and keynote speaker, with her work on behavioural science research published and aired on the Harvard Business Review, TEDx, the Economist, the Telegraph, Forbes, BBC, and Fox Business.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How choices shape your decision mindset and outcomes
✅ The 2 Systems of thinking and how to optimise them for decision-making scenarios
✅ What you can do to control your emotions such as regret and rage so as to de-risk bad decisions
✅ Recognising your biases, of which there are over 200, and
✅ Why not making a decision, is still a decision!
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Nuala Walsh You can connect with Nuala via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * How to Overcome Indecision: TEDx talk - by Nuala Walsh * Tune In: How to make smarter decisions in a noisy world - by Nuala Walsh * Thinking Fast and Slow - by Daniel Kahneman * The Power of Regret - by Daniel Pink * The Top 5 Regrets of The Dying - by Bronnie Ware
Similar Episodes on decision-making * Izzy Silva, MD of Wolters Kluwer APAC on Using EQ to good effect, making the vision visible, and data-led decision-making * Nancy Slessenger, Founder and CEO of Vinehouse Hiring on Scientific recruitment, the do’s and don’ts of interviewing, and staff retention * Mark Pomeroy, CEO of Pomeroy Pacific on Managing risk, asking great questions, and succeeding in a family business
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
📈 Join the waitlist for the Chief Maker MiniMBA
🎓 Take one of the Chief Maker Academy courses
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“It includes self-reflection as that's not often talked about. Each person should think about their worldview and how it’s been shaped, and how it affects the way they act and behave.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
In this edition of the Mini Chief we feature a snippet from our Best of Series with Isabelle Nüssli, author of the book, “Cockfighting”.
Her full episode is titled The CEO-Chairperson relationship and overcoming the drivers of conflict.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/321 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
I interviewed Isabelle for this podcast in 2018. She is the former US CFO and chairperson of the NUSSLI Group, a leading international provider of portable and permanent infrastructures for sport and cultural events like the Olympics. They built the iconic Bondi Beach Volleyball Stadium at the Sydney 2000 Olympics, and have been involved in FIFA World Cups.
Isabelle is the author of the Amazon bestselling book “Cockfighting: Solving the Mystery of Unconscious Sabotage at the Top of the Corporate Pyramid“ and “Beyond Corporate Governance”.
Drawing on the latest research and interviews with more than 70 chairpersons and CEOs, Cockfighting presents Isabelle's findings on the conscious and unconscious drivers of conflict, and provides invaluable tools for overcoming differences.
Isabelle has an MBA from Kellogg School of Management and she also sits on a number of Boards, including as Chairwoman of the European chapter of the Chief Executives Organization.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ The sheer simplicity and beauty of a handshake, but why you still need a contract
✅ That doubting yourself is absolutely normal, and how to use these thoughts productively
✅ The contradictions of power and its relationship with your actions, and
✅ How she developed the Chairperson-CEO Collaboration Contract to build trust.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Isabelle Nüssli You can reach Isabelle on LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Cockfighting - by Isabelle Nüssli * Beyond Corporate Governance - by Isabelle Nüssli
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Yeah, it was brutal, a very, very difficult period of my life. I’d hired a lot of people who didn't have technology experience. What I actually did was I set them and the business up for failure.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Jeremy Hastings, Founder & Managing Director of both Hutly and Bondable, on being fired from his own company and successfully returning to transform the real estate industry after working on his inner chief.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/322 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
After a career in mining at Rio Tinto, Jeremy experienced his first business success through a gelato shop, which sold 16 tonnes in its second year.
Following an unsavoury experience with a crooked real estate agent, Jeremy made it his life’s mission to leverage technology to power a more positive, transparent, and human-centred real estate industry, creating Hutly as the world’s only Living Contracts platform and a place where all parties can transact real estate with trust.
He is also the founder of Bondable, Australia’s first subscription-based residential bond service, which launched in 2024.
Jeremy went to the University of Canberra, where he studied a Bachelor of Business Administration and a Bachelor of Management. He also has three postgraduate qualifications – a Graduate Certificate in Community Relations (Resources Sector) from the University of Queensland, a Masters of Mining Engineering from UNSW and a Masters of Commercial Law from the University of Melbourne.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How an accidental guinea pig brood was seven-year-old Jeremy’s first foray into entrepreneurship
✅ Successfully negotiating the rights to IP he created at Rio Tinto, that he wanted to commercialise after leaving the mining giant
✅ Being fired as CEO from his own company, and returning after working deeply on his inner chief where he is now transforming the real estate industry, and
✅ Recognising that there are different types of CEO that are suited to the various stages of a business.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Jeremy Hastings You can connect with Jeremy via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Good to Great - by Jim Collins * Team Topologies - by Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais
Similar Episodes with Startup Founders * Mark John, Founder & CEO of frntlne, on partnering with the world’s top performers and business people, what a leader’s natural state is, and feeling lucky every day * Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora & Fauna and CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on being adventurous, bootstrapping a business, and first-mover advantage * Mark Calabro, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of HungryHungry and OrderMate, on digitising human-to-human connections, succeeding in two tech startups, using fear of failure to your advantage.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I knew I was going to be sued by Nike, but I did my research and I knew that they couldn't just come and sue me, they had to issue you a cease and desist.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features the former CEO of SKINS and now Chair of eo, Jaimie Fuller.
His full episode is titled Unlocking the secrets of the world’s greatest athletes and teams, coping with rapid growth, and “persivilience.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/319 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Jaimie has built a successful business career around his greatest passion – sport.
He was the CEO of international compression apparel brand SKINS from 1998 to 2019, and he is now Chair and co-founder of eo, an Australian-based sports technology company that is developing a range of products designed to improve performance, accelerate recovery and adaptation, prevent injury, and aid rehabilitation.
Jaimie is also a prominent sports activist, initiating campaigns and speaking out against cheating, systemic corruption, homophobia and human rights abuses at the highest levels of several international sports including cycling, football and the Olympics.
He is a regular contributor to public forums and conferences around the world, on the role sport can play in helping to change society for the better.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Finding fulfilment by owning SKINS and taking it on an explosive growth trajectory
✅ What he learnt about the inner workings of athletes, their preparation and sacrifices
✅ How great teams set the standards of work ethic and being grounded, and
✅ How his new business eo is accelerating human performance through sport, including the groundbreaking work they are doing on concussion, which has FDA approval..
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Jaimie Fuller You can connect with Jaimie via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * eo Lab and Library
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“When you start paying attention in a handshake, it actually tells you something about the general openness and willingness to trust, even momentarily.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature Isabelle Nüssli, author of the book, “Cockfighting” on the CEO-Chairperson relationship and overcoming the drivers of conflict.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/321 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
I interviewed Isabelle for this podcast in 2018. She is the former US CFO and chairperson of the NUSSLI Group, a leading international provider of portable and permanent infrastructures for sport and cultural events like the Olympics. They built the iconic Bondi Beach Volleyball Stadium at the Sydney 2000 Olympics, and have been involved in FIFA World Cups.
Isabelle is the author of the Amazon bestselling book “Cockfighting: Solving the Mystery of Unconscious Sabotage at the Top of the Corporate Pyramid“ and “Beyond Corporate Governance”.
Drawing on the latest research and interviews with more than 70 chairpersons and CEOs, Cockfighting presents Isabelle's findings on the conscious and unconscious drivers of conflict, and provides invaluable tools for overcoming differences.
Isabelle has an MBA from Kellogg School of Management and she also sits on a number of Boards, including as Chairwoman of the European chapter of the Chief Executives Organization.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The sheer simplicity and beauty of a handshake, but why you still need a contract
✅ That doubting yourself is absolutely normal, and how to use these thoughts productively
✅ The contradictions of power and its relationship with your actions, and
✅ How she developed the Chairperson-CEO Collaboration Contract to build trust.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Isabelle Nüssli You can reach Isabelle on LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Cockfighting - by Isabelle Nüssli * Beyond Corporate Governance - by Isabelle Nüssli
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The reason you want to build a model is because people have all these assumptions that aren't actually true.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
In this edition of the Mini Chief we feature a snippet from our Best of Series with the Chief Science Officer of ACSILabs, Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D.
Her full episode is titled Debunking the 10,000 hour mastery rule through accelerated learning, and how this will drastically improve business outcomes.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/318 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
I interviewed Lia for this podcast in 2018, when she was the President and CEO of WTRI, an organisation that builds cutting-edge cognitive science into products that can improve performance in business. Currently, she is the Chief Science Officer for ACSILabs.
She has developed many innovative non-verbal methods of assessing skill and business judgement among executives, such as the FutureView™ Profiler, which has been recognised as a theoretical and methodological breakthrough in executive intelligence.
Lia is best known for the development of an activity-based “strategic rehearsal” that has been shown to greatly accelerate learning through cognitive reorganisation, in some cases by several months.
She received her Ph.D in cognitive psychology at CUNY Graduate School in New York, and her work at WTRI has attracted 17 research funding awards from the National Science Foundation, NASA, and The Russell Sage Foundation.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Unlocking your potential for accelerated learning
✅ How it is possible to cut the 10,000 hour rule of mastery down to 16 hours in a business context
✅ The number one mistake most leaders make in their learning that is costing them
✅ Using learning to drastically improve business outcomes.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D You can reach Lia on LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Accelerated Expertise: Training for High Proficiency in a Complex World - by Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D * The Oxford Handbook of Expertise Research - by Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“By removing 20% of meetings that suck 80% of your energy and attention, you get 20% of your time back immediately, but you also remove 80% of the stuff that's draining you.”
In today’s minisode, I’m going to cover my top 3 tips for beating overwhelm and burnout.
Life is fast and it will flash by if you don’t take control of your calendar, whether that be at work, socially or at home.
I’m going to give you some immediately actionable strategies to get back on track!
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/320 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
We’re going to talk about:
✅ My regular process of mind mapping and why this works
✅ The science behind getting in - and staying in - flow, and
✅ Owning your time.
Stay epic,
Greg
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🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“People just want to hear the truth and just want to be talked to as humans by brands.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This Mini Chief episode features the CEO of Havas Red Australia, Shane Russell.
His full episode is titled How to avoid PR disasters through campaigns that build your company brand and customer engagement, and the ever-changing media landscape.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/317 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Shane is Chief Executive Officer of Havas Red Australia, which merges best-in-class PR, social media, influencer and experiential storytelling, with content at the heart.
In a 20+ year PR career that has spanned both Australia and the United States, Shane has a track record for leading high-growth teams and brands that aren’t afraid of taking creative risks.
Through specialised practice areas, Havas Red represents world-class brands across health and wellness, corporate, technology, automotive, travel, and more.
For a decade prior to joining Havas Red, Shane served as Executive Vice President at New York-based 5W Public Relations, helping it become one of the largest independent firms in America.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ His early years in the PR world and how he strived to be a person of value with some incredibly famous individuals
✅ Taking the plunge by selling everything and moving to New York
✅ How not to stuff up a PR campaign while still standing for causes that are important to you, and
✅ The rapid pace of change in the media world and how to keep adapting.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Shane Russell You can connect with Shane via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Red Sky Predictions 2024 - by Havas Red * Shoe Dog - by Phil Knight
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I knew I was going to be sued by Nike, but I did my research and I knew that they couldn't just come and sue me, they had to issue a cease and desist.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Jaimie Fuller, Founder and former CEO of SKINS and now Chair of eo, on unlocking the secrets of the world’s greatest athletes and teams, coping with rapid growth, and “persevilience”.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/319 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Jaimie has built a successful business career around his greatest passion – sport.
He was the CEO of international compression apparel brand SKINS from 1998 to 2019, and he is now Chair and co-founder of eo, an Australian-based sports technology company that is developing a range of products designed to improve performance, accelerate recovery and adaptation, prevent injury, and aid rehabilitation.
Jaimie is also a prominent sports activist, initiating campaigns and speaking out against cheating, systemic corruption, homophobia and human rights abuses at the highest levels of several international sports including cycling, football and the Olympics.
He is a regular contributor to public forums and conferences around the world, on the role sport can play in helping to change society for the better.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Finding fulfilment by owning SKINS and taking it on an explosive growth trajectory
✅ What he learnt about the inner workings of athletes, their preparation and sacrifices
✅ How great teams set the standards of work ethic and being grounded, and
✅ How his new business eo is accelerating human performance through sport, including the groundbreaking work they are doing on concussion, which has FDA approval.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Jaimie Fuller You can connect with Jaimie via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * eo Lab and Library
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🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“How do I make them significant in a business that we only contribute 3 or 4 percent of the revenue? Well, we have the ability to try new things, because if it doesn't work, I'm not going to pull down the whole company.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
This episode features the Managing Director of SAP Concur ANZ, Fabian Calle.
His full episode is titled Being agile in a large corporate, leading as an introvert, and the career skills obtained from martial arts.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/315 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Fabian is the Managing Director of SAP Concur, Australia and New Zealand.
He has over 15 years’ experience working with SMBs in the computer software industry in a variety of roles at SAP Concur, including: General Manager for SMB; Senior Director of Regional Sales for SMB; and Director of Regional Sales for Enterprises.
Fabian’s expertise is in Business Process, Negotiation, Business Planning, Growth, Sales, and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and has a business degree from Deakin University in Corporate Law, Business Systems and Finance.
Fabian is also a keen martial arts enthusiast, having competed in karate, Muay Thai and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, claiming a national title in the latter only six years after starting.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How working in the family business making boxes of strawberries for 2 cents each shaped his work ethic
✅ Manifesting agility and ideation in a large corporate organisation - Fabian articulates a wonderful story about creating a new product that led to it being 30% of the SAP global revenue
✅ The exact strategies he uses to manage his energy and get people to follow him as an introvert leader, and
✅ The incredible life and leadership lessons he has learnt from honing his craft as a martial arts competitor.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Fabian Calle You can connect with Fabian via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less - by Greg McKeown
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“HR is normally an advocate of the employer, normally to the detriment of the employee and I was not that way.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
In this edition of the Mini Chief we feature a snippet from our Best of Series with the Chief Growth Officer of ACS (Australian Computer Society), Siobhan O’Sullivan.
Her full episode is titled Customer experience, looking at yourself in the mirror and accelerating your career and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/314 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Siobhan for this podcast in 2018, when she was the COO of HashChing, Australia’s first mortgage hub. She has since moved on to become the Chief Growth Officer for ACS (Australian Computer Society).
Siobhan started her career in Human Resources at Armaguard and then progressed through the ranks of Woolworths and into executive roles as COO of Finware Australia and then CEO of The Mortgage & Finance Association of Australia (MFAA), the peak industry body providing service and representation to more than 12,500 Professional Finance Brokers.
She has also been a Director of Running for Premature Babies and is currently on the Board of Wych Money and BrainSTEM Limited.
Siobhan has trained in martial arts since she was 8 years old and also holds an MBA from Macquarie Graduate School of Management.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How she rose from bluecollar roots to lead one of the most exciting fin-tech businesses
✅ What she learnt from becoming a black belt in multiple martial arts forms, including spending time with a Sixth Dan in the USA
✅ How to stop being a victim and accelerate your career
✅ How to look at the person in the mirror and like what you see.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Siobhan O’Sullivan You can reach Siobhan on LinkedIn.
Books and resources * To grow your career, grow yourself first - by Siobhan O’Sullivan via LinkedIn * The Man in the Mirror - by Dale Wimbrow
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The brain doesn't actually have a sense of time; it has a sense of trial and error cycles.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D on debunking the 10,000 hour mastery rule through accelerated learning, and how this will drastically improve business outcomes.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/318 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Lia for this podcast in 2018, when she was the President and CEO of WTRI, an organisation that builds cutting-edge cognitive science into products that can improve performance in business. Currently, she is the Chief Science Officer for ACSILabs.
She has developed many innovative non-verbal methods of assessing skill and business judgement among executives, such as the FutureView™ Profiler, which has been recognized as a theoretical and methodological breakthrough in executive intelligence.
Lia is best known for the development of an activity-based “strategic rehearsal” that has been shown to greatly accelerate learning through cognitive reorganisation, in some cases by several months.
She received her Ph.D in cognitive psychology at CUNY Graduate School in New York, and her work at WTRI has attracted 17 research funding awards from the National Science Foundation, NASA, and The Russell Sage Foundation.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Unlocking your potential for accelerated learning
✅ How it is possible to cut the 10,000 hour rule of mastery down to 16 hours in a business context
✅ The number one mistake most leaders make in their learning that is costing them
✅ Using learning to drastically improve business outcomes.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D You can reach Lia on LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Accelerated Expertise: Training for High Proficiency in a Complex World - by Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D * The Oxford Handbook of Expertise Research - by Dr Lia DiBello Ph.D
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
I love the Churchill quote, “Success is not final. Failure is not fatal. What matters is the courage to go on.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
In this edition of the Mini Chief, we feature Rory Hunter, a world-renowned hotel developer and CEO of MODEL.
His full episode is titled Spearheading build-to-rent sustainability, seeking solitude and healing on the ocean, and the adventure of a lifetime.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/313 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Rory has led multiple organisations and the development of award-winning properties across Australia and South-East Asia, including the Song Saa Private Island, which was named one of the top 10 Luxury Hotel Developments of the last decade globally.
His latest venture is MODEL - a new, Australian build-to-rent group that is committed to creating meaningful impact for future generations.
Rory previously founded SoHo Partners, and in 2013, he established the Song Saa Foundation, an independent NGO dedicated to preserving Cambodia's marine environment. A highlight of the foundation includes creating the country's first ever Marine National Park in partnership with Monaco's Prince Albert.
Rory has won numerous awards, including National Geographic’s Leader in Sustainable Tourism, and is also a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader, and a Global Board Member of the Young Presidents’ Organization Sports and Outdoors Network.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ How he harnessed the entrepreneurial spirit he possessed from a young age
✅ Buying an island in his twenties and building an acclaimed resort on it
✅ Build-to-rent development that considers the planet, local environment and the locals instead of profit, and
✅ Finding forgiveness, love, acceptance and inner peace by sailing solo across the ocean on his way home to Australia.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Rory Hunter You can connect with Rory via LinkedIn and the MODEL website.
Books and resources * Tomorrow’s too late (white paper) - by Rory Hunter
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“People just want to hear the truth and just want to be talked to as humans by brands.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to the CEO of Havas Red Australia, Shane Russell, on how to avoid PR disasters through campaigns that build your company brand and customer engagement, and the ever-changing media landscape.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/317 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Shane is Chief Executive Officer of Havas Red Australia, which merges best-in-class PR, social media, influencer and experiential storytelling, with content at the heart.
In a 20+ year PR career that has spanned both Australia and the United States, Shane has a track record for leading high-growth teams and brands that aren’t afraid of taking creative risks.
Through specialised practice areas, Havas Red represents world-class brands across health and wellness, corporate, technology, automotive, travel, and more.
For a decade prior to joining Havas Red, Shane served as Executive Vice President at New York-based 5W Public Relations, helping it become one of the largest independent firms in America.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ His early years in the PR world and how he strived to be a person of value with some incredibly famous individuals
✅ Taking the plunge by selling everything and moving to New York
✅ How not to stuff up a PR campaign while still standing for causes that are important to you, and
✅ The rapid pace of change in the media world and how to keep adapting.
Deal hope,
Greg
Connecting with Shane Russell You can connect with Shane via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Red Sky Predictions 2024 - by Havas Red * Shoe Dog - by Phil Knight
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I asked this executive team whether any of them had ever regretted removing a toxic high performer and what was quite amazing was that they not only emphatically said no, they couldn't believe they took so long to do so.”
In today’s minisode, I’m going to cover toxic high performers. These individuals can cause a lot of problems in your business, especially amongst other projects and colleagues, and you need a strategy to be able to deal with them.
A toxic person is someone who can bully, be mean to other people in the business, and are really difficult to deal with. They have all the power, or so they think, and very often, the executive team and the board assume that they are indispensable due to their performance and the outcomes they achieve.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/316 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
We’re going to talk about:
✅ What toxic high performers are and why they behave so poorly
✅ Seeking support from the executive and other stakeholders to make a move
✅ A 5-step process to re-align the person to the business priorities, or to remove them from their role.
Deal hope,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“A manager once told me to stop trying to be so perfect; instead, get it 80% right, and we'll work out the rest, because otherwise you'll never do anything.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to the Managing Director of SAP Concur ANZ, Fabian Calle, on being agile in a large corporate, leading as an introvert, and the career skills obtained from martial arts.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/315 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Fabian is the Managing Director of SAP Concur, Australia and New Zealand.
He has over 15 years’ experience working with SMBs in the computer software industry in a variety of roles at SAP Concur, including: General Manager for SMB; Senior Director of Regional Sales for SMB; and Director of Regional Sales for Enterprises.
Fabian’s expertise is in Business Process, Negotiation, Business Planning, Growth, Sales, and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and has a business degree from Deakin University in Corporate Law, Business Systems and Finance.
Fabian is also a keen martial arts enthusiast, having competed in karate, Muay Thai and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, claiming a national title in the latter only six years after starting.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How working in the family business making boxes of strawberries for 2 cents each shaped his work ethic
✅ Manifesting agility and ideation in a large corporate organisation - Fabian articulates a wonderful story about creating a new product that led to it being 30% of the SAP global revenue
✅ The exact strategies he uses to manage his energy and get people to follow him as an introvert leader, and
✅ The incredible life and leadership lessons he has learnt from honing his craft as a martial arts competitor.
Connecting with Fabian Calle You can connect with Fabian via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less - by Greg McKeown
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I'm an advocate of not getting splinters in my bum or sitting on a fence. Make hard choices, make them now, rip the BandAid off.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature the Chief Growth Officer of ACS (Australian Computer Society), Siobhan O’Sullivan, on customer experience, looking at yourself in the mirror and accelerating your career.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/314 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Siobhan for this podcast in 2018, when she was the COO of HashChing, Australia’s first mortgage hub. She has since moved on to become the Chief Growth Officer for ACS (Australian Computer Society).
Siobhan started her career in Human Resources at Armaguard and then progressed through the ranks of Woolworths and into executive roles as COO of Finware Australia and then CEO of The Mortgage & Finance Association of Australia (MFAA), the peak industry body providing service and representation to more than 12,500 Professional Finance Brokers.
She has also been a Director of Running for Premature Babies and is currently on the Board of Wych Money and BrainSTEM Limited.
Siobhan has trained in martial arts since she was 8 years old and also holds an MBA from Macquarie Graduate School of Management.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How she rose from bluecollar roots to lead one of the most exciting fin-tech businesses
✅ What she learnt from becoming a black belt in multiple martial arts forms, including spending time with a Sixth Dan in the USA
✅ How to stop being a victim and accelerate your career
✅ How to look at the person in the mirror and like what you see.
Connecting with Siobhan O’Sullivan You can reach Siobhan on LinkedIn.
Books and resources * To grow your career, grow yourself first - by Siobhan O’Sullivan via LinkedIn * The Man in the Mirror - by Dale Wimbrow
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
I love the Churchill quote, “Success is not final. Failure is not fatal. What matters is the courage to go on.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to world-renowned hotel developer, Rory Hunter, on spearheading the build-to-rent movement towards sustainability, seeking solitude and healing on the ocean, and the adventure of a lifetime after buying an island in his twenties.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/313 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Rory has led multiple organisations and the development of award-winning properties across Australia and South-East Asia, including the Song Saa Private Island, which was named one of the top 10 Luxury Hotel Developments of the last decade globally.
His latest venture is MODEL - a new, Australian build-to-rent group that is committed to creating meaningful impact for future generations.
Rory previously founded SoHo Partners, and in 2013, he established the Song Saa Foundation, an independent NGO dedicated to preserving Cambodia's marine environment. A highlight of the foundation includes creating the country's first ever Marine National Park in partnership with Monaco's Prince Albert.
Rory has won numerous awards, including National Geographic’s Leader in Sustainable Tourism, and is also a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader, and a Global Board Member of the Young Presidents’ Organization Sports and Outdoors Network.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How he harnessed the entrepreneurial spirit he possessed from a young age
✅ Buying an island in his twenties and building an acclaimed resort on it
✅ Build-to-rent development that considers the planet, local environment and the locals instead of profit, and
✅ Finding forgiveness, love, acceptance and inner peace by sailing solo across the ocean on his way home to Australia.
Thanks to former guest, Daniel Penny, for introducing me to Rory.
Connecting with Rory Hunter You can connect with Rory via LinkedIn and the MODEL website.
Books and resources * Tomorrow’s too late (white paper) - by Rory Hunter
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“In the second half of life, you shift from focusing on serving the self to focusing on serving family and community. That's what it means to be a true Chief, to be beyond self.”
In today’s minisode, I give to you my top 15 lessons and learnings from this year. And what a year it’s been! This year we passed 300 episodes, and we passed six years as a business with Chief Maker.
And what I like to do at the end of every year is sit back and reflect and ask myself some questions. One question that got raised this year was by our podcast guest Jay Abraham: “What got you here?”
And I thought, what better way to finish the year than a conglomeration of lessons from chiefs, from our own experiments as a business and as individuals, to see if some of the things that we have tried have played out. Because if there's one thing we know through coaching is that you're not alone.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/312 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“People believe that the voice they have is the voice they were born with, and it's not true. They were born with an instrument and they have to learn how to play it.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Roger Love, The World’s #1 Celebrity Voice Coach.
His full episode is titled The man who taught Bradley Cooper, Reese Witherspoon, The Beach Boys and more to use their voice to change the world.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/311 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Roger is recognized as indisputably the #1 voice coach in the world.
He coaches singers such as John Mayer and Selena Gomez, as well as speakers like Anthony Robbins, and actors including Reese Witherspoon, Zoe Saldana, Keira Knightley, and Bradley Cooper.
Amazingly, by the time he was 16, Roger became the voice coach for the Beach Boys, Chicago, The Jackson 5, and Earth, Wind and Fire.
Roger has vocally produced more than 150 million unit sales worldwide and written three top-selling books.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Why your most powerful communication tool is your voice, and how it can be effectively utilised to be your best perceived version of you
✅ How to overcome your fear of public speaking by understanding and correcting the components of your voice
✅ What leaders can do to ensure they land a message with their people, and
✅ Saving the world from the threat to communication that has been caused by AI.
✅ Roger also gives me a Voice Coaching lesson during the podcast!
Connecting with Roger Love You can connect with Roger via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * The Missing Piece Meets The Big O - by Shell Silverstein * Set Your Voice Free - by Roger Love
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“People believe that the voice they have is the voice they were born with, and it's not true. They were born with an instrument and they have to learn how to play it.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to the World’s #1 Celebrity Voice Coach, Roger Love, the man who taught Bradley Cooper, Reece Witherspoon, The Beach Boys and more to use their voice to change the world.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/311 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Roger is recognized as indisputably the #1 voice coach in the world.
He coaches singers such as John Mayer and Selena Gomez, as well as speakers like Anthony Robbins, and actors including Reese Witherspoon, Zoe Saldana, Keira Knightley, and Bradley Cooper.
Amazingly, by the time he was 16, Roger became the voice coach for the Beach Boys, Chicago, The Jackson 5, and Earth, Wind and Fire.
Roger has vocally produced more than 150 million unit sales worldwide and written three top-selling books.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Why your most powerful communication tool is your voice, and how it can be effectively utilised to be your best perceived version of you
✅ How to overcome your fear of public speaking by understanding and correcting the components of your voice
✅ What leaders can do to ensure they land a message with their people, and
✅ Saving the world from the threat to communication that has been caused by AI.
✅ Roger also gives me a Voice Coaching lesson during the podcast!
Thanks to former guest, Jay Abraham, for introducing me to Roger.
Connecting with Roger Love You can connect with Roger via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * The Missing Piece Meets The Big O - by Shell Silverstein * Set Your Voice Free - by Roger Love
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“It's not about starting up, it's about staying up.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest episode is from our Best of Series with the Co-Founder of The Real Estate Stylist, Sara Chamberlain.
Her full episode is titled Being a rebel, becoming unemployable, and knowing your business inside-out and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/310 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Sara for this podcast in September 2018.
A serial entrepreneur, Sara has been in business for 20 years, launching her first internationally stocked homewares range at just 21. She has bought and sold businesses, worked on the world’s largest advertising accounts in London, including Coca-Cola, Cadbury and Pizza Hut, and doubled the turnover of a retail store in under 18 months.
Along with her sister, Amy, they created Australia’s premier property styling company, The Real Estate Stylist, with the business growing from effectively a one sofa enterprise to a multi-million dollar one in a short space of time.
Their list of clients include A-listers such as Rebecca Judd and Zoe Foster Blake and the team is regularly called upon for partnerships and collaborations with RealEstate.com, Domain, and The Collective.
Sara has also launched a business coaching seminar series, published a small business strategy guide and trained as an executive coach.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How the stories we tell ourselves reflect the life we live
✅ Her resilience through brutally tough health issues as a child
✅ The importance of not making your hobby your business and why she became unemployable
✅ Knowing your business inside-out and building human-to-human experiences.
Connecting with Sara Chamberlain You can reach Sara on LinkedIn and you can follow TRES on Instagram
Books and resources * The Power of Now - by Eckhart Tolle
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
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🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“It's not about starting up, it's about staying up.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature Co-Founder of The Real Estate Stylist, Sara Chamberlain, on being a rebel, becoming unemployable, and knowing your business inside-out.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/310 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Sara for this podcast in September 2018.
A serial entrepreneur, Sara has been in business for 20 years, launching her first internationally stocked homewares range at just 21. She has bought and sold businesses, worked on the world’s largest advertising accounts in London, including Coca-Cola, Cadbury and Pizza Hut, and doubled the turnover of a retail store in under 18 months.
Along with her sister, Amy, they created Australia’s premier property styling company, The Real Estate Stylist, with the business growing from effectively a one sofa enterprise to a multi-million dollar one in a short space of time.
Their list of clients include A-listers such as Rebecca Judd and Zoe Foster Blake and the team is regularly called upon for partnerships and collaborations with RealEstate.com, Domain, and The Collective.
Sara has also launched a business coaching seminar series, published a small business strategy guide and trained as an executive coach.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How the stories we tell ourselves reflect the life we live
✅ Her resilience through brutally tough health issues as a child
✅ The importance of not making your hobby your business and why she became unemployable
✅ Knowing your business inside-out and building human-to-human experiences.
Connecting with Sara Chamberlain You can reach Sara on LinkedIn and you can follow TRES on Instagram
Books and resources * The Power of Now - by Eckhart Tolle
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I am grateful for everything I have. But for me, feeling lucky is a lot more animated and holds a lot more curiosity and open-mindedness to opportunity and possibility.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Mark John, Founder & CEO of frntlne.
His full episode is titled Partnering with the world’s top performers and business people, what a leader’s natural state is, and feeling lucky every day.
You can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/309 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Mark is the CEO of frntlne, an edutech business he founded in 2021 that makes it easy to train frontline staff across a variety of industries, with engaging and memorable TikTok-style content.
frntlne boasts a number of high-profile global and multinational retail and consumer clients including Coles, L’Oreal, P&G, Swisse and Mumm Champagne.
In May 2023, Mark was successful in securing a consortium of strategic investors, closing a AU$4.6million seed funding round. He has also established an impressive advisory board, including professor Dr Mathew Knowles PhD, who is the architect behind the careers of his daughters Beyoncé and Solange, as well as supergroup Destiny's Child.
Mark, who was born in Singapore, has had careers in entertainment, retail and video technology and now calls country Victoria home.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How he has delivered value to global music superstars
✅ How he has built partnerships that create sustained value for all involved
✅ His fascinating career path and early life and how he came to be at the helm of an edtech company
✅ What he means by a leader being in their natural state, and
✅ Unlocking your inner creative and why he feels lucky every day.
Connecting with Mark John You can connect with Mark via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Elon Musk - by Walter Isaacson * My Life in Full: Work, Family and Our Future - by Indra Nooyi
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The big online course providers have got about a 5 to 9% completion rate. Attention spans are really low. No-one's got 20 minutes for a course anymore, but they've probably got 20 seconds.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Mark John, Founder & CEO of frntlne, on partnering with the world’s top performers and business people, what a leader’s natural state is, and feeling lucky every day.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/309 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Mark is the CEO of frntlne, an edutech business he founded in 2021 that makes it easy to train frontline staff across a variety of industries, with engaging and memorable TikTok-style content.
frntlne boasts a number of high-profile global and multinational retail and consumer clients including Coles, L’Oreal, P&G, Swisse and Mumm Champagne.
In May 2023, Mark was successful in securing a consortium of strategic investors, closing a AU$4.6million seed funding round. He has also established an impressive advisory board, including professor Dr Mathew Knowles PhD, who is the architect behind the careers of his daughters Beyoncé and Solange, as well as supergroup Destiny's Child.
Mark, who was born in Singapore, has had careers in entertainment, retail and video technology and now calls country Victoria home.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How he has delivered value to global music superstars
✅ How he has built partnerships that create sustained value for all involved
✅ His fascinating career path and early life and how he came to be at the helm of an edtech company
✅ What he means by a leader being in their natural state, and
✅ Unlocking your inner creative and why he feels lucky every day.
Connecting with Mark John You can connect with Mark via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Elon Musk - by Walter Isaacson * My Life in Full: Work, Family and Our Future - by Indra Nooyi
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I used to believe that fitness wasn't part of my work day; nowadays, if I do a workout five times a week and it costs me five hours, that's work hours.”
In today’s minisode, I’m going to cover executive health, executive fitness and why you should treat it as part of your daily working life, as opposed to something additional. If anything, Chief, you should fit your working life around your health, and not the other way around.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/308 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
We’re going to talk about:
✅ What my protocols for success are and how to develop your own
✅ The importance of rest, recovery and mindfulness
✅ Why you should consider a coach or mentor for your health
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I started Share the Dignity because somebody bloody had to do it. And it was just something that should never have been around.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Rochelle Courtenay, the Founder & Managing Director of Share The Dignity.
Her full episode is titled Leading volunteer armies, witnessing female trauma inside prison, and eradicating period poverty and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/307 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Rochelle is the Founder and Managing Director of Share the Dignity, a national charity founded in 2015 with the mission to ensure that everyone is afforded the dignity in life that so many of us take for granted.
The statistics on women who experience or are at risk of homelessness, domestic violence or poverty are quite astounding and Rochelle is passionate about advocating for change and creating long-term solutions.
The charity is powered by over 6,000 volunteers and Rochelle’s contagious spirit, and has collected and distributed over 4 million period products through multiple initiatives across Australia.
She has received accolades for her work including being a Finalist for Australian of the Year, Cosmopolitan Humanitarian of the Year and Pride of Australia.
Also, please get involved with Share The Dignity’s Christmas appeal campaign, #ItsInTheBag and help make this Christmas brighter for vulnerable women and girls.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Why her short time in prison allowed her to be the person she is today
✅ The heartbreaking stories of women whose dignity had been compromised, and what spurred her to be the changemaker
✅ How Share the Dignity was born, why it pivoted and how it is carefully structured as a volunteer-led army, and
✅ Why she believes her health is her wealth and how she consciously invests her time.
Connecting with Rochelle Courtenay You can connect with Rochelle via LinkedIn and via her charity’s website.
Books and resources * What Happened to You - by Oprah Winfrey * Share The Dignity - It’s In The Bag Christmas Appeal
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Dream like you're gonna live forever, but live like you're gonna die tomorrow.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest episode is from our Best of Series with CEO of KnowHow Property, Bushy Martin.
His full episode is titled Playing the long game and living a life by design not default and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/306 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Bushy for this podcast in September 2018.
An architect by trade, Bushy is the founder of KnowHow Property. His team helps time-poor professionals that don't know who to trust or where to start to replace their income through property.
He is also the author of The Freedom Formula, a killer book I’ve read cover to cover. His other book, Get Invested, was named Best Personal Finance and Investment Book Award at the Australian Business Book Awards in 2019.
Bushy was named a Top 10 Australian Property Investment Specialist by The Property Investor Magazine in 2017 and he’s also the host of the Property Hub Podcast.
He also has an MBA in Business, Finance & Strategic Planning along with a land agent’s licence.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ His journey from being completely broke and wrestling crocodiles in Papua New Guinea, to being independently wealthy within 15 years
✅ How he came to see a better way than his father, who had slogged away for 40 years and had resultant health battles
✅ What it takes to start and build a successful business, and
✅ How he and his wife Sonya have helped more than 1,700 time-poor professionals secure over $600 million in property investments.
Connecting with Bushy Martin You can reach Bushy on LinkedIn and via his website.
Books and resources * The Freedom Formula - by Bushy Martin * Get Invested - by Bushy Martin (GET A FREE PDF VERSION)
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I started Share the Dignity because somebody bloody had to do it. And it was just something that should never have been around.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to the wonderful Rochelle Courtenay, the Founder & Managing Director of Share The Dignity, on leading volunteer armies, witnessing female trauma inside prison, and eradicating period poverty.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/307 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Rochelle is the Founder and Managing Director of Share the Dignity, a national charity founded in 2015 with the mission to ensure that everyone is afforded the dignity in life that so many of us take for granted.
The statistics on women who experience or are at risk of homelessness, domestic violence or poverty are quite astounding and Rochelle is passionate about advocating for change and creating long-term solutions.
The charity is powered by over 6,000 volunteers and Rochelle’s contagious spirit, and has collected and distributed over 4 million period products through multiple initiatives across Australia.
She has received accolades for her work including Finalist Australian of the Year, Cosmopolitan Humanitarian of the Year and Pride of Australia.
Also, please get involved with Share The Dignity’s Christmas appeal campaign, #ItsInTheBag - and help make this Christmas brighter for vulnerable women and girls.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Why her short time in prison allowed her to be the person she is today
✅ The heartbreaking stories of women whose dignity had been compromised, and what spurred her to be the one to be the changemaker
✅ How Share the Dignity was born, has pivoted and how it is carefully structured as a volunteer-led army, and
✅ Why she believes her health is her wealth and how she consciously invests her time.
Connecting with Rochelle Courtenay You can connect with Rochelle via LinkedIn and via her charity’s website.
Books and resources * What Happened to You - by Oprah Winfrey * Share The Dignity - It’s In The Bag Christmas Appeal
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Dream like you're gonna live forever, but live like you're gonna die tomorrow.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature CEO of KnowHow Property, Bushy Martin, on playing the long game and living a life by design not default.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/306 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Bushy for this podcast in September 2018.
An architect by trade, Bushy is the founder of KnowHow Property. His team helps time-poor professionals that don't know who to trust or where to start to replace their income through property.
He is also the author of The Freedom Formula, a killer book I’ve read cover to cover. His other Book, Get Invested, was named Best Personal Finance and Investment Book Award at the Australian Business Book Awards in 2019.
Bushy was named a Top 10 Australian Property Investment Specialist by The Property Investor Magazine in 2017 and he’s also the host of the Property Hub Podcast.
He also has an MBA in Business, Finance & Strategic Planning along with a land agent’s licence.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ His journey from being completely broke and wrestling crocodiles in Papua New Guinea, to being financially free within 15 years
✅ How he came to see a better way than his father, who had slogged away for 40 years and had resultant health battles
✅ What it takes to start and build a successful business, and
✅ How he and his wife Sonya have helped more than 1,700 time-poor professionals secure over $600 million in property investments.
Connecting with Bushy Martin You can reach Bushy on LinkedIn and via his website.
Books and resources * The Freedom Formula - by Bushy Martin * Get Invested - by Bushy Martin (GET A FREE PDF VERSION)
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“All you have to do is make it better, do different things and the world's at your feet. The funny thing is, we're the only ones who thought of doing this and that surprised the heck out of me."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Geoff Bell, CEO of MicroBioGen.
His full episode is titled How a stockbroker became a biotech success story, using patience as a competitive advantage, and why exercise is his best thinking time and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/305 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Geoff is a former stockbroker turned CEO of leading Australian biotechnology company, MicroBioGen, which has delivered yeast innovation technology solutions to industry leaders globally for more than 20 years.
Upon finishing high school and while studying, Geoff founded a family-run business hosting ski trips around Europe for 10 years, before selling it.
His career in investment banking spanned 15 years, holding senior roles at leading European bank BNP Paribas and winning numerous industry awards.
After reaching a career crossroads and trying to balance family life and his professional exploits, Geoff came to the helm of MicroBioGen in 2006, and has overseen $8 million in government funding, and profitability since 2018, with revenue growing at 65% per year.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Building his career track record by assessing his skills gaps to get ahead of the competition
✅ The ups and downs of running a biotech firm and how they almost became part of the 99% that fail
✅ Why their key competitive advantage is patience, and
✅ What’s next for the industry as the world transitions to more sustainable biotechnology and fuels.
Thanks to FTI Consulting for introducing us to Geoff.
Connecting with Geoff Bell You can connect with Geoff via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Ringworld - by Larry Niven * MicroBioGen Projects
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“All you have to do is make it better, do different things and the world's at your feet. The funny thing is, we're the only ones who thought of doing this and that surprised the heck out of me."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Geoff Bell, the CEO of MicroBioGen, on how a stockbroker became a biotech success story, using patience as a competitive advantage, and why exercise is his best thinking time.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/305 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER OPERATING RHYTHM HOW TO GUIDE AND PUT YOUR VISION AND MISSION INTO ACTION FAST: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Geoff is a former stockbroker turned CEO of leading Australian biotechnology company, MicroBioGen, which has delivered yeast innovation technology solutions to industry leaders globally for more than 20 years.
Upon finishing high school and while studying, Geoff founded a family-run business hosting ski trips around Europe for 10 years, before selling it.
His career in investment banking spanned 15 years, holding senior roles at leading European bank BNP Paribas and winning numerous industry awards.
After reaching a career crossroads and trying to balance family life and his professional exploits, Geoff came to the helm of MicroBioGen in 2006, and has overseen $8 million in government funding, and profitability since 2018, with revenue growing at 65% per year.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Building his career track record by assessing his skills gaps to get ahead of the competition
✅ The ups and downs of running a biotech firm and how they almost became part of the 99% that fail
✅ Why their key competitive advantage is patience, and
✅ What’s next for the industry as the world transitions to more sustainable biotechnology and fuels.
Thanks to FTI Consulting for introducing us to Geoff.
Connecting with Geoff Bell You can connect with Geoff via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Ringworld - by Larry Niven * MicroBioGen Projects
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The really successful companies will be the ones that realise that they can't set a bunch of policies at a company level and think it's going to work for everybody; rather, they will have highly personalised employee experiences."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is the CEO of The VERSA Group, Kath Blackham.
Her full episode is titled Extracting huge value from diversity and inclusion, mental health in the workplace and using tech for good and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/303 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER HOW TO GUIDE TO BUILD OPERATING RHYTHM: chiefmaker.com/operatingrhythm
Kath is the Founder and CEO of VERSA Connects and VERSA Agency. VERSA helps Operations, Marketing, Customer Service, and Digital Transformation to integrate conversational, voice, and AI technologies, leading to greater customer satisfaction.
She is a global leader in Conversational AI and is also an in-demand speaker on the topics of AI, Voice Technologies, The Future of Work, and Mental Health in the Workplace.
Kath is also a mentor for a number of women across different industries and a strong advocate for mental health in the workplace and is a pioneer of the four-day week in Australia.
Her career journey so far has included senior roles at both SEEK and The REA Group.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Leading the workforce to become more productive, balanced, and recovered
✅ Allowing employees to personalise their experience of the workplace
✅ Leveraging diversity to find everyone’s superpower, and
✅ Being transparent about topics such as menopause
Connecting with Kath Blackham You can connect with Kath via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * fourdayweek.io * Culture Map - by Erin Meyer * The One Thing - by Gary Keller * Start with Why - by Simon Sinek
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“You nail your mission, vision, values, strategy and tactics, and you will get unity, spirit, meaning, inspiration, direction, alignment and results. And that is a high performance team!”
In today’s minisode, I’m going to cover some key business terminology and how they not only link together, but why it is so important to have these clearly articulated and operationalised into your business. If you do them wrong, it can be really detrimental to your organisation, your team, and even your own personal performance.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/304 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
We’re going to talk about:
✅ The difference between vision, mission and purpose
✅ How values, strategy and operating rhythm all fit together to serve your vision and mission
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“The really successful companies will be the ones that realise that they can't set a bunch of policies at a company level and think it's going to work for everybody; rather, they will have highly personalised employee experiences."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Kath Blackham, CEO of The VERSA Group, on extracting huge value from diversity and inclusion, mental health in the workplace and using tech for good.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/303 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Kath is the Founder and CEO of VERSA Connects and VERSA Agency. VERSA helps Operations, Marketing, Customer Service, and Digital Transformation to integrate conversational, voice, and AI technologies, leading to greater customer satisfaction.
She is a global leader in Conversational AI and is also an in-demand speaker on the topics of AI, Voice Technologies, The Future of Work, and Mental Health in the Workplace.
Kath is also a mentor for a number of women across different industries and a strong advocate for mental health in the workplace and is a pioneer of the four-day week in Australia.
Her career journey so far has included senior roles at both SEEK and The REA Group.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Leading the workforce to become more productive, balanced, and recovered
✅ Allowing employees to personalise their experience of the workplace
✅ Leveraging diversity to find everyone’s superpower, and
✅ Being transparent about topics such as menopause
Connecting with Kath Blackham You can connect with Kath via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * fourdayweek.io * Culture Map - by Erin Meyer * The One Thing - by Gary Keller * Start with Why - by Simon Sinek
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Don't try to teach your salespeople to sell the way that you do; no-one is ever going to sell the way that you do, because they don't have your DNA, they don't have the drive that caused you to push through whatever you had to push through.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest episode is from our Best of Series, with Co-Founder and CEO of Better Sales Coach, Dean Mannix.
His full episode is titled Overcoming your limitations to design and live a bigger life and selling like the best in the world and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/302 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Dean for this podcast in September 2018.
Dean is the author of Australia’s largest library of video sales and service training and has delivered sales performance projects in over 25 countries.
He is recognised as one of Australia’s leading sales performance coaches with 30 years of legal, finance, sales and management experience, advising coaches and training senior executives from many of the world’s leading corporations.
Dean has also been the CEO of a leading property development and childcare management company which he built to a team of 140 employees. He then developed and led a highly successful sales team in the technology space and simultaneously grew his consulting business.
Dean has got an Executive MBA from AGSM and is also a qualified yoga teacher.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How as a 15-year old he coped with the murder of his father and the framing of his brother who ended up in jail as a result
✅ How he built a multi-million dollar childcare business and then lost it all by 26
✅ How he has become the trusted sales coach of the world's biggest companies and the most important steps to sell like the best in the world, and
✅ Resilience and living a bigger, better life by design.
Connecting with Dean Mannix You can reach Dean on LinkedIn and via his website.
Books and resources * The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People - by Steven R. Covey
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Don't try to teach your salespeople to sell the way that you do; no-one is ever going to sell the way that you do, because they don't have your DNA, they don't have the drive that caused you to push through whatever you had to push through.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature Co-Founder and CEO of Better Sales Coach, Dean Mannix, on overcoming your limitations to design and live a bigger life and selling like the best in the world.
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I interviewed Dean for this podcast in September 2018.
Dean is the author of Australia’s largest library of video sales and service training and has delivered sales performance projects in over 25 countries.
He is recognised as one of Australia’s leading sales performance coaches with 30 years of legal, finance, sales and management experience, advising coaches and training senior executives from many of the world’s leading corporations.
Dean has also been the CEO of a leading property development and childcare management company which he built to a team of 140 employees. He then developed and led a highly successful sales team in the technology space and simultaneously grew his consulting business.
Dean has got an Executive MBA from AGSM and is also a qualified yoga teacher.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How as a 15-year old he coped with the murder of his father and the framing of his brother who ended up in jail as a result
✅ How he built a multi-million dollar childcare business and then lost it all by 26
✅ How he has become the trusted sales coach of the world's biggest companies and the most important steps to sell like the best in the world, and
✅ Resilience and living a bigger, better life by design.
Connecting with Dean Mannix You can reach Dean on LinkedIn and via his website.
Books and resources * The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People - by Steven R. Covey
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🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Through acquisition, you can acquire competitors that you can integrate into your business and eliminate duplicative areas, which can give you far greater profit."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Billionaire business guru, Jay Abraham.
His full episode is titled How to achieve business wealth without risk through acquisition and the most powerful marketing strategies in the world and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/301 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
As Founder and CEO of The Abraham Group, Jay has spent his entire career solving complex problems and fixing underperforming businesses.
He has significantly increased the bottom lines of over 10,000 clients in more than 1,000 industries, and over 7,200 sub-industries worldwide, improving their performance by billions of dollars.
Jay is recognised as one of the world’s most successful and impactful marketing strategists, business innovators, entrepreneurial advisors and mentors; he is the coach and advisor to Anthony Robbins, Daymond John, Grant Cardone and many others.
He has written multiple best-selling books, with his latest being released in September 2023, titled Business Wealth Without Risk: How to Create a Lifetime of Income & Wealth Every 3 to 5 years.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The various mental models he uses to achieve massive business growth
✅ The best coaching questions you can ask as a leader
✅ Why his strategy of acquisition over starting up is a far less risky and higher impact approach when done the right way, and
✅ Being the strategist and big thinker, not the operator.
Thanks to James Whittaker of Win The Day for introducing us to Jay.
Connecting with Jay Abraham You can connect with Jay via his website.
Books and resources * Business Wealth Without Risk - by Jay Abraham
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🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
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🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Through acquisition, you can acquire competitors that you can integrate into your business and eliminate duplicative areas, which can give you far greater profit."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to business guru, Jay Abraham, on how to achieve business wealth without risk through acquisition and the most powerful marketing strategies in the world.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/301 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
As Founder and CEO of The Abraham Group, Jay has spent his entire career solving complex problems and fixing underperforming businesses.
He has significantly increased the bottom lines of over 10,000 clients in more than 1,000 industries, and over 7,200 sub industries, worldwide improving their performance by billions of dollars.
Jay is recognized as one of the world’s most successful/impactful marketing strategists, business innovators, entrepreneurial advisors/mentors, he is the coach and advisor to Anthony Robbins, Daymond John, Grant Cardone and many others.
He has written multiple best-selling books, with his latest being released in September 2023, titled Business Wealth Without Risk: How to Create a Lifetime of Income & Wealth Every 3 to 5 years.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The various mental models he uses to achieve massive business growth
✅ The best coaching questions you can ask as a leader
✅ Why his strategy of acquisition over starting up is a far less risky and higher impact approach when done the right way, and
✅ Being the strategist and big thinker, not the operator.
Thanks to James Whittaker and his team at Win The Day for introducing us to Jay.
Connecting with Jay Abraham You can connect with Jay via his website.
Books and resources * Business Wealth Without Risk - by Jay Abraham
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“One trait amongst elite Chiefs is they just get back on the horse every day. No matter what's happened the day before, they just keep turning up and delivering.”
In today’s minisode I am going to share with you something that perhaps we haven't spoken about as much on the show previously, and these are the 5 Mindsets of elite CEOs and Chiefs.
What’s important to know is that these 5 Mindsets are not necessarily demonstrated all of the time by our great leaders; we're not pretending as though they're flawless.
One of the other great things we have learned about CEOs and Chiefs over the years is that they come in all colours of the rainbow and they are really such a diverse group of people.
Remember, our definition of a true chief is not necessarily that you are in a CEO role, it's actually that you have found your level, a role that is right for you and that is aligned to your values, and one that allows you to demonstrate your skill and achieve a level of mastery.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/300 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
We’re going to talk about:
✅ Working on the business by getting strategic items done
✅ Owning your time and your calendar and pushing through hard times
✅ Compartmentalising problems and using curiosity to drive your track record
Stay epic,
Greg
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🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
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🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I used to say to my team all the time, come to me with solutions, don't come to me with problems. And someone actually asked me to stop saying that because they won't always have the whole solution, but they don't want to be shut down."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Taryn Williams.
Her full episode is titled How to scale a start-up in different ways, the insane value of intrepreneurship, and curing workaholism and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/299 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Taryn is a multi-award winning Founder and CEO, who, over the course of the last 2 decades, has earned a reputation as one of Australia’s most prolific entrepreneurs at the intersection of talent, media, and technology.
Her latest project is #Gifted, a Shopify plug-in enabling brands to manage their influencer contra gifting at scale, and is already being used by some of the biggest brands around the world.
A former model, at just 21 Taryn founded WINK Models, which grew to become one of Australia's most successful modelling agencies. In 2016 she launched a marketplace platform called The Right Fit, which has over 17,000 talent and 11,000 clients making thousands of bookings a month across APAC. Taryn sold it just a few months ago.
She is also a board member, influencer and media commentator and has won numerous business awards, including being named in B&T’s Women in Media Power List for the third consecutive year.
In her full episode we talk about:
✅ Being fully prepared for investor conversations when raising capital
✅ How to be an intrepreneur by leading with innovation
✅ Finding balance as a recovering workaholic, and
✅ Controlling your personal brand.
Thanks to Sam Dybac and her team at The PR Hub for introducing us to Taryn.
Connecting with Taryn Williams You can connect with Taryn via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The hard thing about hard things - by Ben Horowitz
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I used to say to my team all the time, come to me with solutions, don't come to me with problems. And someone actually asked me to stop saying that because they won't always have the whole solution, but they don't want to be shut down."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Taryn Williams on how to scale a start-up in different ways, the insane value of intrepreneurship, and curing workaholism.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/299 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Taryn is a multi-award winning Founder and CEO, who, over the course of the last 2 decades, has earned a reputation as one of Australia’s most prolific entrepreneurs at the intersection of talent, media, and technology.
Her latest project is #Gifted, a Shopify plug-in enabling brands to manage their influencer contra gifting at scale, and is already being used by some of the biggest brands around the world.
A former model, at just 21 Taryn founded WINK Models, which grew to become one of Australia's most successful modelling agencies. In 2016 she launched a marketplace platform called The Right Fit, which has over 17,000 talent and 11,000 clients making thousands of bookings a month across APAC. Taryn sold it just a few months ago.
She is also a board member, influencer and media commentator and has won numerous business awards, including being named in B&T’s Women in Media Power List for the third consecutive year.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Being fully prepared for investor conversations when raising capital
✅ How to be an intrepreneur by leading with innovation
✅ Finding balance as a recovering workaholic, and
✅ Controlling your personal brand.
Thanks to Sam Dybac and her team at The PR Hub for introducing us to Taryn.
Connecting with Taryn Williams You can connect with Taryn via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The hard thing about hard things - by Ben Horowitz
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“As a leader, you have to create an environment where you can happily give feedback to people; good, bad or indifferent.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest episode is from our Best of Series, with Former Wallabies’ captain, Stirling Mortlock AM.
His full episode is titled Going from amateur to professional and connecting success and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/298 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Stirling for this podcast in October 2019.
Stirling is a former Wallabies, Brumbies and Rebels Captain, as well as a Keynote Speaker, Leadership and Coaching Consultant. He is a Founding Partner of XV Capital Advisory, a sports advisory and investment firm that invests in global sports innovation.
Stirling played in 80 Test matches for the Wallabies, captaining them on 29 occasions and scoring 489 points. He scored the decisive try in the 2003 World Cup Semi-Final in Melbourne and nailed a sideline penalty in 2000 to help the Wallabies claim their maiden Tri-Nations Trophy.
He has a Bachelor of Science from the University of Sydney and also worked for NAB as a Wealth Director in the Institutional Banking sector.
In 2012, Stirling was awarded the Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for services to rugby.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The transition from amateur to professional rugby in the mid-1990s
✅ Giving and receiving feedback in elite high performance environments
✅ Being curious, setting goals and connecting success, and
✅ Who he feared the most on the rugby field and how he looked to dominate the competition.
Connecting with Stirling Mortlock * You can reach Stirling on LinkedIn and via his website.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“You can change somebody's sleep and you will change every single area of their life."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is The Sleep Doctor, Dr Michael Breus.
His full episode is titled How to fix your sleep, achieving maximum performance outcomes, and the four chronotypes and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/297 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Dr Michael is a double board-certified Clinical Psychologist and Clinical Sleep Specialist.
He is the author of four books and an expert resource for most major publications, doing more than 400 interviews per year (Oprah, Dr. Oz, The Doctors, NY Times, Wall Street Journal, etc.).
He has been in private practice for more than 2 decades and recently relocated to Los Angeles, where he was named the Top Sleep Doctor in the city by Readers Digest.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How to fix your sleep through understanding your chronotype
✅ Why executives need to sleep optimally, but how all their staff can too
✅ The do’s and don'ts of sleep readiness and waking up in the middle of the night, and
✅ The science behind dreams, sleep therapy and power naps.
Connecting with Dr Michael Breus You can connect with Michael via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * FREE Chronotypes Test * Energize! Go from dragging Ass to kicking it in 30 days - by Dr Michael Breus * The Power of When - by Dr Michael Breus
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“As a leader, you have to create an environment where you can happily give feedback to people; good, bad or indifferent.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature former Wallabies’ captain, Stirling Mortlock AM, on going from amateur to professional and connecting success.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/298 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Stirling for this podcast in October 2019.
Stirling is a former Wallabies, Brumbies and Rebels Captain, as well as a Keynote Speaker, Leadership and Coaching Consultant. He is a Founding Partner of XV Capital Advisory, a sports advisory and investment firm that invests in global sports innovation.
Stirling played in 80 Test matches for the Wallabies, captaining them on 29 occasions and scoring 489 points. He scored the decisive try in the 2003 World Cup Semi-Final in Melbourne and nailed a sideline penalty in 2000 to help the Wallabies claim their maiden Tri-Nations Trophy.
He has a Bachelor of Science from the University of Sydney and also worked for NAB as a Wealth Director in the Institutional Banking sector.
In 2012, Stirling was awarded the Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for services to rugby.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The transition from amateur to professional rugby in the mid-1990s
✅ Giving and receiving feedback in elite high performance environments
✅ Being curious, setting goals and connecting success, and
✅ Who he feared the most on the rugby field and how he looked to dominate the competition.
Connecting with Stirling Mortlock You can reach Stirling on LinkedIn and via his website.
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“You can change somebody's sleep and you will change every single area of their life."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Dr Michael Breus, and we’re going to talk about how to fix your sleep, achieving maximum performance outcomes, and the four chronotypes.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/297 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Dr Michael is a double board-certified Clinical Psychologist and Clinical Sleep Specialist.
He is the author of four books and an expert resource for most major publications, doing more than 400 interviews per year (Oprah, Dr. Oz, The Doctors, NY Times, Wall Street Journal, etc.).
He has been in private practice for more than 2 decades and recently relocated to Los Angeles, where he was named the Top Sleep Doctor in the city by Readers Digest.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How to fix your sleep through understanding your chronotype
✅ Why executives need to sleep optimally, but how all their staff can too
✅ The do’s and don’t of sleep readiness and waking up in the middle of the night, and
✅ The science behind dreams, sleep therapy and power naps.
Connecting with Dr Michael Breus You can connect with Michael via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * FREE Chronotypes Test * Energize! Go from dragging Ass to kicking it in 30 days - by Dr Michael Breus * The Power of When - by Dr Michael Breus
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you expect to learn life lessons from perfect people, you're not going to learn anything from anybody. It's our own judgement that prevents us from having amazing experiences."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Dr Jeff Spencer, the man behind 40+ Olympic gold medals, and Tiger Woods’ and Lance Armstrong’s success.
Chiefs, this was so good, that we have prepared 3 Mini Chiefs for you - this is the third one on recovery and the second half of your life.
His full episode is titled Building your champion mindset and your pathway to your potential and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/295 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
Jeff has spent the last four decades helping athletes win over 40 Olympic gold medals, as well as coaching Lance Armstrong and Tiger Woods, and helping our own Natalie Cook OAM OLY to represent Australia at 5 Olympic Games.
When he was 11 years old, Jeff wrote a contract with himself that a decade later he would make the 1972 USA Olympic Games team, a goal he achieved by competing in two separate cycling events.
He has also authored three books, been awarded International Sports Chiropractor of the Year, and is the creator of The Champion’s Blueprint methodology.
He is also an award-winning Glass Blower with his art appearing in some of the world's top galleries.
These days, Jeff is a mentor to athletes, businesses and other high profile clients, including the likes of Sir Richard Branson, the band U2, Nike, Hitachi, and the health brand Bulletproof.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Why winning is a skillset underpinned by you starting in a place of receivership
✅ Taking charge of our automatic fear-based survival reactions
✅ The difference that makes the difference with clients like Tiger Woods, Lance Armstrong, and Natalie Cook OAM OLY
✅ Internal personal congruence towards a champion’s mindset on the day.
Connecting with Dr Jeff Spencer You can connect with Jeff via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * Turn It Up! - by Dr Jeff Spencer * Six Pillars of Self Esteem - by Nathaniel Branden * Man's Search for Meaning - by Viktor Frankl
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you expect to learn life lessons from perfect people, you're not going to learn anything from anybody. It's our own judgement that prevents us from having amazing experiences."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Dr Jeff Spencer, the man behind 40+ Olympic gold medals, and Tiger Woods’ and Lance Armstrong’s success.
Chiefs, this was so good, that we have prepared 3 Mini Chiefs for you - this is the second one on the champion mind(set) and the 4 key questions.
His full episode is titled Building your champion mindset and your pathway to your potential and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/295 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Jeff has spent the last four decades helping athletes win over 40 Olympic gold medals, as well as coaching Lance Armstrong and Tiger Woods, and helping our own Natalie Cook OAM OLY to represent Australia at 5 Olympic Games.
When he was 11 years old, Jeff wrote a contract with himself that a decade later he would make the 1972 USA Olympic Games team, a goal he achieved by competing in two separate cycling events.
He has also authored three books, been awarded International Sports Chiropractor of the Year, and is the creator of The Champion’s Blueprint methodology.
He is also an award-winning Glass Blower with his art appearing in some of the world's top galleries.
These days, Jeff is a mentor to athletes, businesses and other high profile clients, including the likes of Sir Richard Branson, the band U2, Nike, Hitachi, and the health brand Bulletproof.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Why winning is a skillset underpinned by you starting in a place of receivership
✅ Taking charge of our automatic fear-based survival reactions
✅ The difference that makes the difference with clients like Tiger Woods, Lance Armstrong, and Natalie Cook OAM OLY
✅ Internal personal congruence towards a champion’s mindset on the day.
Connecting with Dr Jeff Spencer You can connect with Jeff via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * Turn It Up! - by Dr Jeff Spencer * Six Pillars of Self Esteem - by Nathaniel Branden * Man's Search for Meaning - by Viktor Frankl
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“All great Chiefs have learned how to have difficult conversations and give feedback properly and they do this regularly.”
In today’s minisode, I want to give you the tools to help you make difficult performance conversations easy, or at the very least, easier than they have been for you in the past.
As an experienced coach, I've had a number of opportunities to work with people on shifting the dials for them personally and in their careers to help them achieve success. Sometimes, that means giving hard feedback. Chief, it really is a privileged position for me.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/296 👂
DOWNLOAD THE CHIEF MAKER GUIDE FOR SENIOR LEADERS ON HOW TO HAVE DIFFICULT PERFORMANCE CONVERSATIONS: chiefmaker.com/difficult
We’re going to talk about:
✅ The top 5 mistakes I’ve seen leaders make repeatedly when giving feedback and running performance reviews
✅ How to frame the message correctly, such that the person you’re talking to, helps themselves to find appropriate solutions, and
✅ A download of the ultimate toolkit that prepares and guides you through these hard conversations in the future that will help you reduce stress and increase success.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you expect to learn life lessons from perfect people, you're not going to learn anything from anybody. It's our own judgement that prevents us from having amazing experiences."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Dr Jeff Spencer, the man behind 40+ Olympic gold medals, and Tiger Woods’ and Lance Armstrong’s success.
Chiefs, this was so good, that we have prepared 3 Mini Chiefs for you - the first one is around survival and seeker instincts and how to operate in seemingly contradictory states.
His full episode is titled Building your champion mindset and your pathway to your potential and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/295 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Jeff has spent the last four decades helping athletes win over 40 Olympic gold medals, as well as coaching Lance Armstrong and Tiger Woods, and helping our own Natalie Cook OAM OLY to represent Australia at 5 Olympic Games.
When he was 11 years old, Jeff wrote a contract with himself that a decade later he would make the 1972 USA Olympic Games team, a goal he achieved by competing in two separate cycling events.
He has also authored three books, been awarded International Sports Chiropractor of the Year, and is the creator of The Champion’s Blueprint methodology.
He is also an award-winning Glass Blower with his art appearing in some of the world's top galleries.
These days, Jeff is a mentor to athletes, businesses and other high profile clients, including the likes of Sir Richard Branson, the band U2, Nike, Hitachi, and the health brand Bulletproof.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Why winning is a skillset underpinned by you starting in a place of receivership
✅ Taking charge of our automatic fear-based survival reactions
✅ The difference that makes the difference with clients like Tiger Woods, Lance Armstrong, and Natalie Cook OAM OLY
✅ Internal personal congruence towards a champion’s mindset on the day.
Connecting with Dr Jeff Spencer You can connect with Jeff via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * Turn It Up! - by Dr Jeff Spencer * Six Pillars of Self Esteem - by Nathaniel Branden * Man's Search for Meaning - by Viktor Frankl
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you expect to learn life lessons from perfect people, you're not going to learn anything from anybody. It's our own judgement that prevents us from having amazing experiences."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Dr Jeff Spencer on building your champion mindset and your pathway to your potential.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/295 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
Jeff has spent the last four decades helping athletes win over 40 Olympic gold medals, as well as coaching Lance Armstrong and Tiger Woods, and helping our own Natalie Cook OAM to represent Australia at 5 Olympic Games.
When he was 11 years old, Jeff wrote a contract with himself that a decade later he would make the 1972 USA Olympic Games team, a goal he achieved by competing in two separate cycling events.
He has also authored three books, been awarded International Sports Chiropractor of the Year, and is the creator of The Champion’s Blueprint methodology.
He is also an award-winning Glass Blower with his art appearing in some of the world's top galleries.
These days, Jeff is a mentor to athletes, businesses and other high profile clients, including the likes of Sir Richard Branson, the band U2, Nike, Hitachi, and the health brand Bulletproof.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Why winning is a skillset underpinned by you starting in a place of receivership
✅ Taking charge of our automatic fear-based survival reactions
✅ The difference that makes the difference with clients like Tiger Woods, Lance Armstrong, and Natalie Cook OAM
✅ Internal personal congruence towards a champion’s mindset on the day.
Connecting with Dr Jeff Spencer You can connect with Jeff via LinkedIn and his website.
Books and resources * Turn It Up! - by Dr Jeff Spencer * Six Pillars of Self Esteem - by Nathaniel Branden * Man's Search for Meaning - by Viktor Frankl
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🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
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🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Organisations that we see that are doing really well have a strong mix of leading and lag indicators, with those things that inform you about what you're doing proactively to improve safety.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest episode is from our Best of Series, with Liz Nicol, Co-Founder & Former CEO of SafetyWorks.
Her full episode is titled Leading safety change, 20 years of business ownership and how to get on a Board and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/294 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Liz for this podcast in September 2019.
Liz is Co-Founder and Former CEO of SafetyWorks Group, one of Australia’s foremost providers of safety culture change solutions for performance improvement.
She is also the Deputy Chair of Uniting, and the Chair of the Hunter Region Committee of the AICD.
Liz is an experienced executive and non-executive director, who is determined to improve the lives of others, particularly in the area of safety and wellbeing, and those who are vulnerable in our community.
She is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, previous Chair of Leapfrog Ability, and Board member of St Philips Christian Education Foundation.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The experience she gained in 20 years of business ownership
✅ Leading safety change, developing a chronic sense of unease and where leaders get it wrong
✅ Why metrics are not useful if they don’t drive the behaviours that align to your business strategy and vision, and
✅ How to get on a Board and how to make the most of non-executive positions.
Connecting with Liz Nicol You can reach Liz on LinkedIn and via email.
Books and resources * Safe By Accident - by Aubrey Daniels and Judy Agnew * Radical Candour - by Kim Scott * Setting the Tone from the Top - by Melinda Muth and Bob Selden (AICD) * Deepwater Horizon (movie)
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🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Organisations that we see that are doing really well have a strong mix of leading and lag indicators, with those things that inform you about what you're doing proactively to improve safety.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature Liz Nicol, Co-Founder & Former CEO of SafetyWorks, on Leading safety change, 20 years of business ownership and how to get on a Board.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/294 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Liz for this podcast in September 2019.
Liz is Co-Founder and Former CEO of SafetyWorks Group, one of Australia’s foremost providers of safety culture change solutions for performance improvement.
She is also the Deputy Chair of Uniting, and the Chair of the Hunter Region Committee of the AICD.
Liz is an experienced executive and non-executive director, who is determined to improve the lives of others, particularly in the area of safety and wellbeing, and those who are vulnerable in our community.
She is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, previous Chair of Leapfrog Ability, and Board member of St Philips Christian Education Foundation.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The experience she gained in 20 years of business ownership
✅ Leading safety change, developing a chronic sense of unease and where leaders get it wrong
✅ Why metrics are not useful if they don’t drive the behaviours that align to your business strategy and vision, and
✅ How to get on a Board and how to make the most of non-executive positions.
Connecting with Liz Nicol You can reach Liz on LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Safe By Accident - by Aubrey Daniels and Judy Agnew * Radical Candour - by Kim Scott * Setting the Tone from the Top - by Melinda Muth and Bob Selden (AICD) * Deepwater Horizon (movie)
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“There's always time. It's what you make a priority in life."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Celebrity Apprentice Mentor, Nick Bell, the Founder of Superist.
His full episode is titled The threat of AI on addressing productivity gaps, looking after his A-players and living to 150 and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/293 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Superist is a digital agency group with 18 agencies and over 2,000 employees worldwide.
The agency hand-selects businesses in the $1-5 million annual recurring revenue range, advises and mentors the founders while a team of scaling specialists look to improve existing systems and processes. The group has remarkably acquired one digital services agency per month since its inception.
Nick left university after six weeks, and after persevering through two failed business ventures, he used the last $350 to his name to launch an SEO digital marketing agency from his bedroom, a business he’d go on to sell for $39 million nine years later.
Nick was also one of two Australian Celebrity Apprentice advisors to Lord Alan Sugar and is also a former AFR young rich-lister.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The post-COVID productivity challenge and the threat and benefits of AI
✅ Looking after the A-players in his teams
✅ What he looks for in the Founder when purchasing a business, and
✅ How his health and wellness regime is going to help him live to 150!
Connecting with Nick Bell You can connect with Nick via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Out of the Crisis - by William Edwards Deming * Dr. David Sinclair * Losing My Virginity - by Sir Richard Branson
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🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“There's always time. It's what you make a priority in life."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Nick Bell, Founder of Superist, on the threat of AI on addressing productivity gaps, looking after his A-players and living to 150.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/293 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Nick is the Founder of Superist, a digital agency group with 18 agencies and over 2,000 employees worldwide.
The agency hand-selects businesses in the $1-5 million annual recurring revenue range, advises and mentors the founders while a team of scaling specialists look to improve existing systems and processes. The group has remarkably acquired one digital services agency per month, since its inception.
Nick left university after six weeks, and after persevering through two failed business ventures, he used the last $350 to his name to launch an SEO digital marketing agency from his bedroom, a business he’d go on to sell for $39 million nine years later.
Nick was also one of two Australian Celebrity Apprentice advisors to Lord Alan Sugar and is also a former AFR young rich-lister.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The post-COVID productivity challenge and the threat and benefits of AI
✅ Looking after the A-players in his teams
✅ What he looks for in the Founder when purchasing a business, and
✅ How his health and wellness regime is going to help him live to 150!
Connecting with Nick Bell You can connect with Nick via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Out of the Crisis - by William Edwards Deming * Dr. David Sinclair * Losing My Virginity - by Sir Richard Branson
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“According to InsideHR, only half of recruitment decisions end up being good for either the employer or the employee, and that is just staggering.”
In today’s minisode, I go back through the archives. Over the course of the last 6 years of this podcast, I have asked dozens of CEOs what their number one question is that they ask candidates in interviews and how they get to hire high performers.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/292 👂
GET THE FREE CHIEF MAKER TOP 30 INTERVIEW QUESTIONS: chiefmaker.com/interview
We’re going to talk about:
✅ Why hiring is so crucial, and how it really can make or break a business
✅ The top 7 interview questions from our guests, and
✅ Encouraging you to adapt some of these questions for your own business.
Stay epic,
Greg
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🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I know that even in stressful periods, if you stop for a second to breathe, you’ll realise that it's never as bad or as urgent as you think it is at the time."
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Ben Cohn, Co-Founder and CEO of TAXIBOX.
His full episode is titled Infusing fun and creativity into your brand, lessons on building a high performance culture, and coping with anxiety and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/291 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Ben co-founded TAXIBOX, Australia’s leading mobile storage company, in 2010.
He is also the co-founder of Calcumate, a proprietary online storage calculator initially developed for TAXIBOX that has since become the most in-demand storage calculator available to self-storage and moving providers worldwide.
In the last three years alone, TAXIBOX has successfully doubled the business and significantly grown its leadership team.
Ben was born in South Africa and moved to Israel with his family in the 1990s, before settling in Australia, where he completed a Bachelor of Commerce in Commercial Law and Finance from the University of Sydney.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How TAXIBOX has purposefully built a brand personality around fun and creativity
✅ Weaving this brand into the culture of the organisation
✅ But also where some of those cultural efforts have gone too far, and
✅ His personal struggles with anxiety and how he manages it on a daily basis
Connecting with Ben Cohn You can connect with Ben via LinkedIn.
Books and resources Inner Chief Podcast Episode 209 - Jennifer Holland (“today’s no is tomorrow’s yes”)
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I know that even in stressful periods, if you stop for a second to breathe, you’ll realise that it's never as bad or as urgent as you think it is at the time."
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Ben Cohn, Co-Founder and CEO of TAXIBOX, on infusing fun and creativity into your brand, lessons on building a high performance culture, and coping with anxiety.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/291 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Ben co-founded TAXIBOX, Australia’s leading mobile storage company, in 2010.
He is also the co-founder of Calcumate, a proprietary online storage calculator initially developed for TAXIBOX that has since become the most in-demand storage calculator available to self-storage and moving providers worldwide.
In the last three years alone, TAXIBOX has successfully doubled the business and significantly grown its leadership team.
Ben was born in South Africa and moved to Israel with his family in the 1990s, before settling in Australia, where he completed a Bachelor of Commerce in Commercial Law and Finance from the University of Sydney.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How TAXIBOX has purposefully built a brand personality around fun and creativity
✅ Weaving this brand into the culture of the organisation
✅ But also where some of those cultural efforts have gone too far, and
✅ His personal struggles with anxiety and how he manages it on a daily basis
Connecting with Ben Cohn You can connect with Ben via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Inner Chief Podcast Episode 209 - Jennifer Holland (“today’s no is tomorrow’s yes”)
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I’m in a position that, if I don't show resilience, I can't expect everyone else to show resilience.”
In this Best of Series episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we feature Melbourne Rebels CEO, Baden Stephenson, on leading high performers and giving clarity to your organisation.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/290 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Baden for this podcast back in August 2018.
Baden's path to become CEO of professional rugby club, The Melbourne Rebels, has been different to most. He transitioned from the Coaching and Operations departments and finally got his first CEO role with them in 2017.
He was heavily involved as the GM of Rugby, when, in 2017, the Melbourne Rebels luckily managed to save their Super Rugby licence, under controversial circumstances.
Ultimately, when that process concluded, he was selected to lead the club into the future and is still at the helm.
Baden’s prior experience was as the Director of Operations and EGM at Sydney University Football Club, after a number of years involved as a coach both in Australia and in Japan.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Having empathy for your people and showing they are valued
✅ Dealing with huge uncertainty and keeping staff motivated
✅ The contagion of your emotions within an organisation, and
✅ Leading high performers in a professional environment
Connecting with Baden Stephenson You can connect with Baden via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Mindset - by Carol Dweck
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🎧 Subscribe to The Inner Chief Podcast on your favourite app
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“What does working at your company say about me? And do you embody the badge value that I want to say about myself when I tell someone where I work?"
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Simon Mainwaring, CEO of We First.
His full episode is titled Bringing Purpose to Life, Growing a Brand Movement and Nailing a Pitch and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/289 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Simon is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic brand consultancy based in Los Angeles, California, that has helped companies like Sony, The Coffee Bean, Timberland, and Toms, to accelerate their growth and impact.
His first book, We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World, was an Amazon, New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller, and was named the Best Business Marketing Book of the Year. His latest book, Lead With We: The Business Revolution that Will Save Our Future, was voted the McKinsey Top Business Bestseller on Workplace & Culture.
Simon started his career as a writer and Creative Director at agencies including DDB (Sydney), Saatchi & Saatchi (London), Wieden & Kennedy (Portland) and Ogilvy (Los Angeles) winning awards at all major advertising festivals on clients such as Nike, Toyota and Motorola.
Simon has been named one of the top keynote speakers in the world, is a regular columnist for Forbes, and in 2015 was a finalist for Global Australian of the Year.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The 3 things you need to nail a pitch and convert the naysayers
✅ Leading with We, and shifting away from Me First
✅ How the role and responsibility of business has changed, and
✅ The evolution and power of a brand movement
Connecting with Simon Mainwaring You can connect with Simon via LinkedIn and his personal website.
Books and resources * Lead With We - by Simon Mainwaring * We First - by Simon Mainwaring
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👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“What does working at your company say about me? And do you embody the badge value that I want to say about myself when I tell someone where I work?"
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Simon Mainwaring, CEO of We First, on Bringing Purpose to Life, Growing a Brand Movement and Nailing a Pitch.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/289 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Simon is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic brand consultancy based in Los Angeles, California, that has helped companies like Sony, The Coffee Bean, Timberland, and Toms, to accelerate their growth and impact.
His first book, We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World, was an Amazon, New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller, and was named the Best Business Marketing Book of the Year. His latest book, Lead With We: The Business Revolution that Will Save Our Future, was voted the McKinsey Top Business Bestseller on Workplace & Culture.
Simon started his career as a writer and Creative Director at agencies including DDB (Sydney), Saatchi & Saatchi (London), Wieden & Kennedy (Portland) and Ogilvy (Los Angeles) winning awards at all major advertising festivals on clients such as Nike, Toyota and Motorola.
Simon has been named one of the top keynote speakers in the world, is a regular columnist for Forbes, and in 2015 was a finalist for Global Australian of the Year.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The 3 things you need to nail a pitch and convert the naysayers
✅ Leading with We, and shifting away from Me First
✅ How the role and responsibility of business has changed, and
✅ The evolution and power of a brand movement
Connecting with Simon Mainwaring You can connect with Simon via LinkedIn and his personal website.
Books and resources * Lead With We - by Simon Mainwaring * We First - by Simon Mainwaring
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“When you go into a room and run a meeting with full preparation and excellence, you will automatically get buy-in from the people around you.”
In today’s minisode, I am going to go through how to be a master of conducting meetings.
I’m actually going to demonstrate how to BREAC a leg! Yes, you heard that right. Our team has come up with this wonderful model, the B-R-E-A-C a Leg set of benefits for becoming a master of meetings. And by using this model, you will start to see how you automatically get buy-in from those around you.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/288 👂
REGISTER FOR OUR NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
We’re going to talk about:
✅ Lifting a meeting room’s energy
✅ How to get action and traction as a result of a meeting
✅ 3 key tips on navigating difficult meetings.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“There's this idea that wanting to promote yourself is a dirty thing; it absolutely isn't. It should be celebrated!”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Public Relations Guru to Executives, Sam Dybac, CEO & Founder of The PR Hub.
Her full episode is titled Brand-building beyond the boardroom and rebuilding confidence and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/287 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Sam is the CEO & Founder of The PR Hub, which she set up after working in government relations for former politician, Kerry Chikarovski, and had built up an impressive list of clients.
During her career, Sam worked closely with entrepreneurs in the personal care and health supplement industry, helping to build their personal brand.
She’s also worked in marketing and sponsorship in television, co-launched an organic skincare business and been the director of a personal training business.
Today, The PR Hub is a seven-figure business that helps award-winning entrepreneurs, CEO’s and disrupters to build their brand story as a foundation for developing trust, credibility and awareness for the businesses they’re in.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ From humble beginnings in the PR game to working with the likes of Deborra-Lee Furness and her husband Hugh Jackman
✅ Operationalising her business and becoming a better leader
✅ Some top tips on building your executive profile, and
✅ Rebuilding confidence
Connecting with Sam Dybac You can connect with Sam via LinkedIn and her PR Hub website.
Books and resources * Atomic Habits - by James Clear
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👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“For years my parents had watched me go up and down in business, but I got to bring them along to the Sydney event I ran for Hugh Jackman and his wife. So for them to see what I do was really nice.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Sam Dybac, CEO & Founder of The PR Hub, on Executive and profile brand-building beyond the boardroom and rebuilding confidence.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/287 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Sam is the CEO & Founder of The PR Hub, which she set up after working in government relations for former politician, Kerry Chikarovski, and had built up an impressive list of clients.
During her career, Sam worked closely with entrepreneurs in the personal care and health supplement industry, helping to build their personal brand.
She’s also worked in marketing and sponsorship in television, co-launched an organic skincare business and been the director of a personal training business.
Today, The PR Hub is a seven-figure business that helps award-winning entrepreneurs, CEO’s and disrupters to build their brand story as a foundation for developing trust, credibility and awareness for the businesses they’re in.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ From humble beginnings in the PR game to working with the likes of Deborra-Lee Furness and her husband Hugh Jackman
✅ Operationalising her business and becoming a better leader
✅ Some top tips on building your executive profile, and
✅ Rebuilding confidence
Connecting with Sam Dybac You can connect with Sam via LinkedIn and her PR Hub website.
Books and resources * Atomic Habits - by James Clear
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I think I have faith in journalism. I think that there are some outstanding individuals and goodness gracious. I don't go down to my Brisbane office very regularly, but when I walk in there, the talent around that room is staggering. It really is.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our latest guest is Senior Sports Writer, the late great Wayne Smith.
His full episode is titled Professional mastery, journalistic integrity and the future of Australian Rugby and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/286 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
This episode is particularly close to my heart, given Wayne’s recent passing at the age of 69.
Wayne was an esteemed Australian sports journalist with a career spanning over 40 years. He was known for his unwavering integrity and profound knowledge of sport, particularly rugby union.
He started his journalistic career as a cadet at The Courier-Mail in Brisbane back in 1972, and three years later he ventured to Sydney to write for The Australian, where he provided comprehensive coverage of rugby union, cricket, and the Olympics and swimming. Wayne’s pieces also appeared in The Sydney Morning Herald and The Daily Telegraph.
Wayne’s legacy goes far beyond just his journalism as he played a pivotal role in advocating for Brisbane's successful bid for the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
In 2021, Wayne semi-retired to the Sunshine Coast and I was privileged enough to interview him not long afterwards.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Choosing the path of professional mastery over senior leadership positions
✅ Making decisions on whether to publish a story or not, or taking an angle that is at odds with your employer
✅ How a stroke a few years ago impacted his life and focusing on what’s important in life
✅ We go into some rugby chat, including what the future of Australian rugby holds and his thoughts on some of the potential star players at the next Rugby World Cup, which is being played in France in September and October this year.
Read Wayne Smith articles Sydney Morning Herald
Books and resources * 1984 - by George Orwell * Vale Wayne Smith
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👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I think I have faith in journalism. I think that there are some outstanding individuals and goodness gracious. I don't go down to my Brisbane office very regularly, but when I walk in there, the talent around that room is staggering. It really is.”
In this Best of Series episode, we feature Senior Sports Writer, the late great Wayne Smith, on professional mastery, journalistic integrity and the future of Australian Rugby.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/286 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
This episode is particularly close to my heart, given Wayne’s recent passing at the age of 69.
Wayne was an esteemed Australian sports journalist with a career spanning over 40 years. He was known for his unwavering integrity and profound knowledge of sport, particularly rugby union.
He started his journalistic career as a cadet at The Courier-Mail in Brisbane back in 1972, and three years later he ventured to Sydney to write for The Australian, where he provided comprehensive coverage of rugby union, cricket, and the Olympics and swimming. Wayne’s pieces also appeared in The Sydney Morning Herald and The Daily Telegraph.
Wayne’s legacy goes far beyond just his journalism as he played a pivotal role in advocating for Brisbane's successful bid for the 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
In 2021, Wayne semi-retired to the Sunshine Coast and I was privileged enough to interview him not long afterwards.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Choosing the path of professional mastery over senior leadership positions
✅ Making decisions on whether to publish a story or not, or taking an angle that is at odds with your employer
✅ How a stroke a few years ago impacted his life and focusing on what’s important in life
✅ We go into some rugby chat, including what the future of Australian rugby holds and his thoughts on some of the potential star players at the next Rugby World Cup, which is being played in France in September and October this year.
Read Wayne Smith articles Sydney Morning Herald
Books and resources * 1984 - by George Orwell * Vale Wayne Smith
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Understanding the performance-recovery curve is vital to nailing peak performance more consistently and with greater energy.”
In today’s minisode, I am going to go through what elite chiefs do to recover properly.
Recovery is not just a simple task, it is a process and needs to be done properly in order to maximise peak performance, consistently. It is vital if you want to be at your best and be able to make bold decisions. In short, recovery is a weapon.
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ Why recovery is important for your physical, spiritual and mental wellbeing
✅ The performance and recovery curve and how to optimise it
✅ How to restore yourself through active and passive recovery techniques.
Stay epic,
Greg
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🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you can't look after your body, how can you look after a company? You need to be healthy to be a good leader.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our guest today is the CEO of Stride Equity, Maria Halasz.
Her full episode is titled "Merging career experience to find your niche, equity crowdfunding, and why healthy leaders make better organisations" and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
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Growing up in rural Hungary, and following family tragedy, Maria arrived in Perth as a 19-year old refugee. Taking full advantage of what Australia had to offer, she graduated with a science degree and an MBA.
Her executive career spans more than 25 years, including several years in investment banking and venture capital, mostly focused on the biotech sector. Maria was the CEO of ASX-listed health and wellness company, Anagenics, for 17 years and also honed her skills on the AICD’s Chairs Mentoring Program.
She is currently the CEO of Stride Equity, the first venture-backed equity crowdfunding platform in Australia.
Maria is also a non-executive director of the Garvan Research Foundation, a member of the Commercialisation Committee of the Digital Health Cooperative Research Program and a Councillor of the Australian Industry Group (AiG).
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Her rise to executive roles and, in many cases, within male-dominated industries and how she approached these situations
✅ How she created her own personal value to ensure her career journey was full of opportunities
✅ Why she started Stride Equity and what makes it different, and
✅ The importance of fit and healthy leaders, which makes for better organisations.
Connecting with Maria Halasz You can connect with Maria via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Outlive - by Peter Attia, MD * The Little Prince - by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry * Chairs Mentoring program at the AICD
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🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
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🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If you can't look after your body, how can you look after a company? You need to be healthy to be a good leader.”
In this episode, we chat to the CEO of Stride Equity, Maria Halasz, on merging career experience to find your niche, equity crowdfunding, and why healthy leaders make better organisations.
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REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Growing up in rural Hungary, and following family tragedy, Maria arrived in Perth as a 19-year old refugee. Taking full advantage of what Australia had to offer, she graduated with a science degree and an MBA.
Her executive career spans more than 25 years, including several years in investment banking and venture capital, mostly focused on the biotech sector. Maria was the CEO of ASX-listed health and wellness company, Anagenics, for 17 years and also honed her skills on the AICD’s Chairmen’s Mentoring Program.
She is currently the CEO of Stride Equity, the first venture-backed equity crowdfunding platform in Australia.
Maria is also a non-executive director of the Garvan Research Foundation, a member of the Commercialisation Committee of the Digital Health Cooperative Research Program and a Councillor of the Australian Industry Group (AiG).
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Her rise to executive roles and, in many cases, within male-dominated industries and how she approached these situations
✅ How she created her own personal value to ensure her career journey was full of opportunities
✅ Why she started Stride Equity and what makes it different, and
✅ The importance of fit and healthy leaders, which makes for better organisations.
Connecting with Maria Halasz You can connect with Maria via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Outlive - by Peter Attia, MD * The Little Prince - by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry * Chairs Mentoring program at the AICD
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I think the biggest mistake is we wait. We wait for other people to recognise our greatness instead of claiming our own greatness.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our guest today is Mastery of Money Guru and Founder of The Shred Method, Adam Carroll.
His full episode is titled Owner’s Mentality and Building a Bigger Life and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
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I interviewed Adam for this podcast back in July 2018.
Adam is an internationally recognised financial literacy expert, author and speaker.
He is a two-time TED talk speaker, with one of his talks surpassing 6 million views.
He is the founder of The Shred Method™ a fintech business that guides you step-by-step to optimize your income, eliminate debt & build real wealth in record time.
Adam is also the founder and curator of www.MasteryOfMoney.com, and creator of the documentary film, Broke Busted & Disgusted.
His passion is helping people build a bigger life, not a bigger lifestyle.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Cultivating an owner’s mentality in ourselves and our people
✅ The biggest mindset shift we as individuals need to make
✅ Giving kids the ability to make mistakes around money at a very early age, and
✅ Why he greets each day with love in his heart.
Connecting with Adam Carroll You can connect with Adam via The Shred Method website or LinkedIn
Books and resources * The Greatest Salesman in the World - by Og Mandino * Watch Adam's TED Talk - When money isn't real * Listen to Adam’s epic podcast - Build a Bigger Life * Read his blog - Mastery of Money * Watch his movie - Broke, Busted and Disgusted
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Every one of us had taken ownership and we wanted the ball in our hands. We wanted to be on that field. Pick me so I can go and show you why I'm the best there is.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our guest today is Triple US Olympic Team Gold Medallist, Leah Amico.
Her full episode is titled How to build a GOLD standard, boosting confidence and empathetic teamwork and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
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Leah is a three-time Olympic gold medalist with USA Softball, a two-time World Champion, and in the National Softball Hall of Fame.
While at the University of Arizona, Leah was a three-time national champion, a three-time First Team All-American, and a three-time First Team Academic All-American for her excellence both on the field and in the classroom.
Nowadays, Leah is a motivational speaker, with more than 20 years of experience on stage. She’s also a college softball commentator and analyst with ESPN.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Attaining mastery through preparation and focus
✅ How the team went from 3 straight losses to a gold medal at the Sydney Olympics
✅ Dominating not just winning, and
✅ The GOLD Standard and how she applies this to her life and work.
Connecting with Leah Amico You can connect with Leah via her website.
Books and resources * The Power of Positive Leadership - by Jon Gordon
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If a bald-headed British biker can be swanning around with the Pope, Elon Musk and Richard Branson on his speed dial, then you have no excuses.”
This is a special episode only available to our podcast subscribers, which we call The Mini Chief. These are short, sharp highlights from our fabulous CEO guests, where you get a 5 to 10 minute snapshot from their full episode.
Our guest today is the Concierge to Billionaires, Steve Sims.
His full episode is titled Going for Stupid, how to gamify life and work, and building priceless relationships and you can find the full audio and show notes here:
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Steve is the visionary founder of the world’s first luxury concierge that delivers the highest level of personalised travel, transportation, and cutting-edge entertainment services to corporate executives, celebrities and professional athletes.
Entrepreneur Magazine labelled Steve as “The Real Life Wizard of Oz” because he has developed a reputation for making the impossible, possible.
His best-selling book, “Bluefishing”, documents how he built a business on social currency, and he has spoken for Harvard, The Pentagon, and Fortune 500 Companies.
What is most striking about his achievements is that Steve was a young guy who was only qualified to lay bricks on a construction site, so he really has built an extraordinary life from the ground up.
In the full episode we talk about:
✅ Becoming desired and different and building credibility
✅ Giving your clients value by not giving them what they ask for
✅ Gamifying solutions and acting without fear of ridicule, and
✅ What he means by “Go for Stupid”
Connecting with Steve Sims You can connect with Steve via LinkedIn or his website.
Books and resources * Bluefishing - by Steve Sims * Go for Stupid - by Steve Sims
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I think the biggest mistake is we wait. We wait for other people to recognise our greatness instead of claiming our own greatness.”
In this Best of Series episode, we feature Mastery of Money Guru, Adam Carroll, on Owner’s Mentality and Building a Bigger Life.
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REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
I interviewed Adam for this podcast back in July 2018.
Adam is an internationally recognised financial literacy expert, author and speaker.
He is a two-time TED talk speaker, with one of his talks surpassing 6 million views.
He is the founder of The Shred Method™ a fintech business that guides you step-by-step to optimize your income, eliminate debt & build real wealth in record time.
Adam is also the founder and curator of www.MasteryOfMoney.com, and creator of the documentary film, Broke Busted & Disgusted.
His passion is helping people build a bigger life, not a bigger lifestyle.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Cultivating an owner’s mentality in ourselves and our people
✅ The biggest mindset shift we as individuals need to make
✅ Giving kids the ability to make mistakes around money at a very early age, and
✅ Why he greets each day with love in his heart.
Connecting with Adam Carroll You can connect with Adam via The Shred Method website or LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Greatest Salesman in the World - by Og Mandino * Watch Adam's TED Talk - When money isn't real * Listen to Adam’s epic podcast - Build a Bigger Life * Read his blog - Mastery of Money * Watch his movie - Broke, Busted and Disgusted
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“Every one of us had taken ownership and we wanted the ball in our hands. We wanted to be on that field. Pick me so I can go and show you why I'm the best there is.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Triple US Olympic Team Gold Medallist, Leah Amico, on how to build a GOLD standard, boosting confidence and empathetic teamwork.
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REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Leah is a three-time Olympic gold medalist with USA Softball, a two-time World Champion, and in the National Softball Hall of Fame.
While at the University of Arizona, Leah was a three-time national champion, a three-time First Team All-American, and a three-time First Team Academic All-American for her excellence both on the field and in the classroom.
Nowadays, Leah is a motivational speaker, with more than 20 years of experience on stage. She’s also a college softball commentator and analyst with ESPN.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Attaining mastery through preparation and focus
✅ How the team went from 3 straight losses to a gold medal at the Sydney Olympics
✅ Dominating not just winning, and
✅ The GOLD Standard and how she applies this to her life and work.
Connecting with Leah Amico You can connect with Leah via her website.
Books and resources * The Power of Positive Leadership - by Jon Gordon
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“I have a weekly reset where I sit down for about an hour every Monday morning, and I look at everything on my plate personally and from a business perspective, and I plan my week in a fair amount of detail.”
In today’s minisode, I am going to go through how I build my operating rhythm and how you can too.
There is a great quote from author William Edwards Deming, "If you can't describe what you're doing as a process, you don't know what you're doing." And this is absolutely a process.
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ Optimising your personal routine for your career strategy
✅ How to incorporate quarterly, monthly, weekly, and daily activities into your business or department’s operating rhythm
✅ Why offsites are essential, for both your personal and work planning.
Stay epic,
Greg
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“If a bald-headed British biker can be swanning around with the Pope, Elon Musk and Richard Branson on his speed dial, then you have no excuses.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to the Concierge to Billionaires, Steve Sims, on Going for Stupid, how to gamify life and work, and building priceless relationships.
🎧👉 chiefmaker.com/280 👂
REGISTER INTEREST FOR THE NEXT MINI-MBA INTAKE: chiefmaker.com/minimba
Steve is the visionary founder of the world’s first luxury concierge that delivers the highest level of personalised travel, transportation, and cutting-edge entertainment services to corporate executives, celebrities and professional athletes.
Entrepreneur Magazine labelled Steve as “The Real Life Wizard of Oz” because he has developed a reputation for making the impossible, possible.
His best-selling book, “Bluefishing”, documents how he built a business on social currency, and he has spoken for Harvard, The Pentagon, and Fortune 500 Companies.
What is most striking about his achievements is that Steve was a young guy who was only qualified to lay bricks on a construction site, so he really has built an extraordinary life from the ground up.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Becoming desired and different and building credibility
✅ Giving your clients value by not giving them what they ask for
✅ Gamifying solutions and acting without fear of ridicule, and
✅ What he means by “Go for Stupid”
Connecting with Steve Sims You can connect with Steve via LinkedIn or his website.
Books and resources * Bluefishing - by Steve Sims * Go for Stupid - by Steve Sims
Follow Chief Maker 📝 Subscribe to the Finish Strong monthly newsletter and podcast drops
👍 Follow Chief Maker on LinkedIn
🍏 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts
🎵 Give The Inner Chief podcast a 5-star rating on Spotify
🎬 Subscribe to the Chief Maker YouTube channel
🤝 Connect with the Chief Maker
“A story wins the heart, and then the moral of the story wins the head.”
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from globally-acclaimed freelance direct marketer, Alex Mandossian, on ethical influence and the art of storytelling.
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I interviewed Alex for this podcast back in July 2018.
Alex is the Founder & CEO of MarketingOnline.com, a business he founded in 1995.
He is considered to be one of the top 10 freelance direct marketers in the world today. Over the last two decades, he has helped his clients generate over $203 million in sales from TV spots, infomercials, direct mail and web marketing.
He has coached George Foreman, Larry King, Russell Brunson, Jay Abraham, Brian Tracy, Jack Canfield, Brendon Buchard, Alexandria Brown, and Barbara DeAngelis to name a few.
He is also the subject of many books on marketing and selling, and host of the iTunes top podcast “All Selling Aside” and is proudly BG - Before Google!
In this episode, you’re going to hear Alex talk about:
✅ The keys to ethical influence through storytelling
✅ The most powerful ways to build trust and influence
✅ How people can have a more meaningful and impactful career
✅ Helping you overcome your fear of selling.
Connecting with Alex Mandossian You can connect with Alex via MarketingOnline.com and his podcast, All Selling Aside.
Books and resources * MarketingOnline.com Resources * Alexisms - by Alex Mandossian
“A plan executed aggressively now is better than a plan executed perfectly in a week's time. Let's just get on with it and we can finesse and refine as we go, as opposed to sitting on it and dreaming for another week.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Paris Thomson, Founder and Creative Director of SIRAP, on manifesting success and inspiration through full-sensory visualisation, and relationship-building in the flesh.
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Paris is the award-winning Founder and Creative Director of SIRAP, a full-service creative studio founded in 2013 that produces best-in-class content for some of Australia’s most prestigious and recognisable brands including Lexus, David Jones, Visit Victoria and Crown Casino.
She is a globally in-demand creative and her work has also taken her internationally to Venice, Hong Kong, Milan and New York.
Paris has earned a reputation as a highly-respected leader, entrepreneur, and businesswoman. She was named best Film Director in the inaugural B&T ‘Best of the Best’ Awards category in 2021, and shortlisted for B&T’s 2021 Women in Media Awards in the Creative category.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Her experiences with meditation, flow and her full-sensory visualisation techniques
✅ What she does in moments of pressure and how she has built up her “resilience bank”
✅ Her creative process and how she harnesses moments of inspiration, and
✅ Stepping back so as to step up and empower her team to make decisions.
Connecting with Paris Thomson You can connect with Paris via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Courage for Profit - by Steve McLeod * Former CEO Brian Dyson's Commencement speech
“I can't imagine coaching without these three strategies in my toolkit because it would be nearly impossible to deal hope.”
In today’s minisode, we are going to talk about how to prepare to run performance reviews. These are your one-to-one coaching sessions when you are assessing talent, or when you're about to go through a performance management process.
Often, managers can run into trouble; either you can’t get a low performer to lift, or you are running out of inspiration and dealing hope to a high performer. So I will give you three strategies to move past stalling in a review.
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ Understanding the goals and aspirations of your staff
✅ Assessing areas for improvement in the system around and within your team
✅ Knowing what the broader company objectives are
Stay epic,
Greg
“For anyone in a position that requires responsibility and decision-making, if you are un-overwhelm-able, you bring an enormous amount to the table.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Nicho Plowman, Co-Founder of the world’s number 1 meditation app, Insight Timer, on beating overwhelm and stress to think clearly everyday.
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Nicho is the Co-Founder of world #1 meditation app Insight Timer. It has 22 million users, all obtained organically.
Nicho spent the best part of his 20s working at ESPN and signing major multi-million dollar media deals like the rights to the Superbowl. From there he went on to a NZ software technology company, raising millions in funding.
But amongst all of this success, he was burning the candle at both ends, suffering chronic back pain, and abusing drugs and alcohol. It was at this time that he decided to completely overhaul his life; while meditation had eased his pain and abated his vices, he soon realised that it could be the key to business success and balance.
He now teaches vedic meditation to industry leaders and CEOs and more time has been spent on Insight Timer than all the other 2,500 meditation apps combined (over the last 10 years the Insight Timer community has spent 24 billion minutes meditating, that's more than 45,000 years!).
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The differences between monastic and household meditation techniques and adapting them to your lifestyle
✅ Why everyone has the capacity to use meditation as a recovery weapon
✅ How, as a leader of people, you can beat overwhelm and stress to think with clarity all of the time, and
✅ The Insight Timer business model and what sets them apart from their competitors.
Connecting with Nicho Plowman You can connect with Nicho via his website or Insight Timer.
Books and resources * Man's Search For Meaning - by Viktor Frankl * Tim Brown - Meditation teacher in Sydney, Australia
“One of the things that can make it a dream job is that if you're suck factor is 20% or less, sweet spot baby!”
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from speaker and author, Mitch Matthews of Dream, Think, Do, on bringing science to dreaming, and igniting your career.
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I interviewed Mitch for this podcast back in June 2018.
Mitch is a keynote speaker, success coach, and best-selling author.
He speaks to student, corporate, non-profit, and association audiences around the world on the power of ‘dream, think, do'.
In 2006, Mitch held a big dream gathering, which was originally supposed to be something his friends and family could do for a few hours to get clear on their dreams. But this simple concept became a movement that hasn't stopped since and thousands of dreams have been launched as a result!
Mitch has his own podcast called “Dream, Think, Do.” where he inspires people around the world to dream bigger, think bigger, be better, and do more
In this episode, you’re going to hear Mitch talk about:
✅ The original Dream Gatherings and their growth to massive events
✅ Where people go wrong with their dreaming and what the way is to get it right - and the science behind this
✅ The importance of sharing our dreams, and
✅ Why even dream jobs will have 20% suck factor.
Connecting with Mitch Matthews You can connect with Mitch via his website.
Books and resources * The Dip - by Seth Godin * Ignite - by Mitch Matthews (FREE Audiobook) * Dream Job Redefined - by Mitch Matthews
“We've seen a societal shift on inclusivity and parenting and there's no magic bullet. Every family is quite different and unique.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Grainne O'Loughlin, CEO of Karitane, on parenting for executives and the first 2000 days of a child's development, and the inspiring legacy she is building.
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Grainne was born in Northern Ireland and has over 30 years’ experience in the public healthcare sector in the UK and Australia.
Before becoming the CEO of Karitane in 2014, she held a variety of senior health executive roles, including Director of Allied Health at Sydney’s St Vincent’s Health Network.
Grainne started her career off as a qualified speech pathologist. She then completed her Masters of Business Administration in 2011 through the University of New England.
She is currently President of the NSW Health Services Association (HSA), and a Director on the Australasian Association of Parenting and Child Health (AAPCH), and the National Ability Roundtable.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The fundamental societal shift on inclusivity and parenting;
✅ Why early intervention is crucial in the trajectory of a child’s life;
✅ Managing a passionate workforce while still being commercially-minded; and
✅ How being a collegiate CEO will drive better, longer-term outcomes.
Connecting with Grainne O'Loughlin You can connect with Grainne via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * How every child can thrive by five - by Molly Wright
“So many times we’re waiting for someone to save us. We’re not taking that ownership. No one’s coming.”
In today’s episode we are going to turn the tables! That’s right, our Head of Production, Rob Flude, is going to interview me.
Chiefs, we have recorded 272 episodes and it has been all me. I’ve either been the interviewer or the bloke giving you some short, concise advice in the form of minisodes.
So today, I’m jumping into the hot seat and you are going to hear from me about my background, and my journey towards founding and running Chief Maker and the Inner Chief podcast, as well as searching for a life beyond my wildest dreams. I’ll also answer some of the regular Inner Chief CEO episode questions, and you’ll get to hear my no bull advice I have for future generations of leaders and executives.
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Stay epic,
Greg
“Too much granular data can stifle creativity and innovation, and it can also make people feel like they're carrying the weight of the world around on their shoulders.”
In this episode, we are launching a Chief Maker first! And that is a panel interview where we deep dive on a particular topic, which today is how these 3 Council of Chiefs members and former Inner Chief podcast guests go about using data, metrics and scoreboards to run their businesses.
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On the panel, we have:
- Kristen Podagiel, a former Managing Partner at McCullough Robertson, a leading independent Australian law firm. You can listen to Kristen’s episode here.
- Ron Gauci, a leader and executive in the technology and sporting worlds and known as the Turnaround CEO. You can listen to Ron’s episode here.
- Baden Stephenson, the CEO of the Melbourne Rebels rugby club. You can listen to Baden’s episode here.
Today, the panel is going to cover:
✅ What data, metrics and scoreboards are used by these leaders in their respective industries and businesses
✅ How to get it right in setting inputs up correctly and removing any bias
✅ The pitfalls of data, and developing dashboards around human psychology, and
✅ Data they would love to be able to measure.
Connecting with the panel * Kristen Podagiel - LinkedIn * Ron Gauci - LinkedIn * Baden Stephenson - LinkedIn
“Often, CEOs get fixated on their competition. I think it's a really big mistake because you just end up impersonating them. Just look after your customers and give them a great product and service, such that you don't even have to be concerned about your competition.”
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from Accidental CEO of AV1, Keith Wootton, on finding inspiration, daily disruption, and crafting a magnetic culture.
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I interviewed Keith for this podcast back in June 2018.
Keith is the Founder and Managing Director of AV1, a multi-award-winning business that produces over 1,000 events per year for some of the most important conferences, events and exhibitions around Australia and the world.
He is a self-labelled ‘accidental CEO’ but make no mistake, Keith is a true leader of a significant business.
Keith was born in Ireland and moved to Australia with his family when he was 11. After a brief stint back in Ireland working in the music industry, including working with U2, he has spent the last 3 decades in the events industry.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Keith talk about:
✅ Using inspiration from different fields to lead your industry;
✅ Not getting fixated on your competition, or becoming a replica of them
✅ Making your intention to be better than you were yesterday through disruption, and
✅ Giving latitude to your people so that they thrive.
Connecting with Keith Wootton You can connect with Keith via LinkedIn.
“Do you want to work in a company where your values align or are you okay with the fact that they don't?”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Julie Mathers, Founder of Flora and Fauna and CEO of Snuggle Hunny, on being adventurous, bootstrapping a business, and first mover advantage.
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Julie and her husband Tom co-founded Flora & Fauna in 2014, an online store specialising in vegan and eco-friendly products, with a clear vision to be the most responsible retailer possible with the best customer service.
She sold the business in 2021 to an ASX-listed company and exited the business in February 2022. She is now the CEO and Owner of Snuggle Hunny, a fast-growing Australian baby brand.
Julie has over 30 years’ experience in retail and has worked across medium and large retailers before starting her entrepreneurial journey.
In 2018 she won the Telstra New South Wales Small and Succeeding Business Award, and was named Number 1 in the 2019 and 2021 “Top 50 People in Australian eCommerce” - she also took out the Industry Person of the Year at the 2021 Online Retail Industry Awards and 2022 Retail Fest.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Being adventurous and treading a different path to your peers
✅ The genesis of Flora & Fauna and her “A-ha” moment
✅ The harsh realities of working for yourself
✅ Scaling a business without taking on investment and moving first in a crowded industry.
Connecting with Julie Mathers You can connect with Julie via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Win Your Lottery - by Sharry Cramond * When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing - by Daniel Pink
“As a Chief, working on the business is both defining what it is you need to do AND how the business performance is assessed, and then executing and doing this consistently.”
In today’s minisode, we are going to talk about how to work on the business, and in particular, the mindset that you can bring in order to absolutely nail your role as a senior executive.
Working on the business is the role of a Chief, but it took me a number of years to truly understand that the business is actually an asset. It's something that has a value, it's something that has an impact, something that plays a role.
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ Shifting your mindset to view the business as an asset
✅ Setting out your systems and processes so as to determine the business value and success factors
✅ Executing a strategy via your operating rhythm
Stay epic,
Greg
“Let's approach these problems humbly and not try to tell the customer what we think, but rather how can we offer a service that is definitely wanted now and that can grow into a software solution over time.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Ben Lipschitz, Co-Founder and CEO of FoodByUs, on being data-driven, starting and exiting a business, and successfully securing funding.
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Born in South Africa, Ben graduated with a law degree before realising he wanted to pursue an entrepreneurial journey. At age 24, he started his first business, Flipsters, which was a brand of foldable women’s shoes designed to fit in a standard clutch bag. After scaling and launching into 16 countries and selling to more than 300 Australian retailers, he sold Flipsters in 2014.
In 2016 Ben teamed up with Gary Munitz and Tim Chandler, both formerly of Menulog, combining their expertise in hospitality and technology to launch FoodByUs, the only online hospitality marketplace in Australia which allows venues to not only choose from a curated list of thousands of top suppliers, but offers an entire procurement solution.
In the past twelve months the company has more than doubled its headcount to 75 people, closed a $10M Series A funding round backed by global marketplace investor F J Labs and Macquarie Capital, and continues to smash existing revenue figures by as much as 40% MoM. As a result, Ben was recently awarded the 2022 Entrepreneur of the Year at the CEO Magazine's Executive of the Year Awards.
Ben is a volunteer Director on the Board of Redfern Legal Centre, and he is also a keen runner and triathlon participant.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Lessons on starting, scaling and selling a business (and starting again!)
✅ Being humble and curious by using your customer data to keep nailing ‘product-market fit’
✅ Finding the right partners in business and his three pillars for business success
✅ Successfully securing VC and private equity investors.
Connecting with Ben Lipschitz You can connect with Ben via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Shoe Dog - by Phil Knight * Zero to One - Peter Thiel
“Don't let other people control your agenda or the dynamics of your diary. I don't have any qualms saying to people that I’m postponing meetings and focusing on five things that are going to move the dial.”
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from former MD & CEO of The Pact Group, Mal Bundey, on making a difference and bringing your ‘A Game’.
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I interviewed Mal for this podcast back in June 2018.
Between 2015 and 2019, Mal was the MD & CEO of Pact Group Holdings Limited, one of the primary businesses within the Pratt family empire, and is currently still the largest manufacturer in Australasia of rigid packaging with 133 factories across 16 countries and with over 6,000 employees.
Prior to joining Pact, Mal held several senior executive leadership positions for the Graeme Hart-owned Rank Group, including being President & CEO of Graham Packaging and Closure Systems International (CSI), both with a combined market cap of US$4.8bn back then.
Mal was previously a Partner at Deloitte in Corporate Restructuring and Management Consulting, spanning over 16 years from 1987 to 2003.
He is currently on the Board of Brickworks, an ASX Top 200 company in the building industry, and up until recently, was the CEO of a private equity firm.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Mal talk about:
✅ Staying focused and learning to say “no” clearly and deliberately.
✅ Finding the right people for your executive team.
✅ The questions every leader should ask themselves every day, and
✅ Being relentless in striving for a result in business and in life.
Connecting with Mal Bundey You can connect with Mal via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The 3G Way - by Francisco de Mello
“There's 1.35 million tech-enabled impact-focused startups created every single year around the world. Entrepreneurs are spending 60% plus of their time trying to raise capital in a market that they don't understand because it's a dark art.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I speak to Ant Moorhouse, Co-Founder and CEO of EarthTech, on purpose-driven leadership, and changing the planet by harnessing technology and capitalism.
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Before becoming the purpose-driven serial entrepreneur and leader that he is today, Ant was a Counter Terrorism Commander in the Australian Special Forces.
After a decade in the military, he started a crisis response and medical evacuation company with $19,000 on his kitchen table. 10 years later he sold his firm to a multi-national insurance company.
Ant spent 4 years inside the tech scene in Boulder Colorado, honing his craft, before returning home to Australia.
In 2019, he and business partner Brian Keayes co-founded EarthTech, a platform on a mission to help mobilise the global resources needed to positively impact 1 billion lives and achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ What he learnt about himself and others during his military career
✅ The pitfalls of transitioning from Special Forces to entrepreneurship
✅ Growing pains of a scaling business
✅ How EarthTech is harnessing the power of technology and capitalism to create positive change at scale.
Connecting with Ant Moorhouse You can connect with Ant via LinkedIn and check out the EarthTech website.
Books and resources * The Rise of Superman - by Steven Kotler
“Make building a track record of success the core thing from now because you can't possibly say you've made a difference in your job unless it's measurable.”
In today’s first minisode for 2023, I wanted to give you a bit of guidance on how to focus on starting this year strong.
I want you to look through the lens of executive excellence such that you will turn up every day in your job in a way that magnetically attracts opportunities, brings about that motivation and energy, and gets results. I want you to feel that you make an impact, that you do something that actually makes a difference in this world.
Chief, starting strong is so important. So if you're feeling like the motivation isn't there anymore, or you’re overwhelmed, you’re not recognised for your efforts, you're not growing anymore or you feel like you can't lay down a track record, then this is for you!
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ Looking ahead and looking back to benchmark your status
✅ Unlocking the GREAT method to plan out and stand out in your career
✅ Executing a strategy to bridge any gaps
Stay epic,
Greg
“If you think the relationships you have to build are just at your level, then there's a very good chance down the track you're going to run into some trouble.”
In today’s minisode, I wanted to bring to you five new lessons from the Chiefs from 2022, and we wanted to bring to you and share with you these lessons to help you finish out the year and then come out fighting even better next year.
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ Hiring people smarter than you and letting them bring their magic
✅ Getting external support from your peers in roles similar to you
✅ Investing generously in your team
✅ Building strong relationships with the Chair and the Board
✅ Keeping things simple
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Casey Lyons, Co-Founder and CEO of LIVIN, on the rollercoaster of grief, being not weak to speak, practising self-care.
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In this episode I get to hang out with an unsung hero.
He's one of those humans that goes about every day making a difference in other people's lives, yet there's no fanfare, no cheers, to him it's getting on with the job, a role he stepped into with the death of his best mate Dwayne Lally to suicide nearly a decade ago.
Casey is the CEO and Co-Founder of LIVIN, an Australian registered charity that has been on a mission since 2013 for the world to accept that “It Ain't Weak to Speak.”
Dwayne's death was the catalyst for Casey to start LIVIN as he didn't want other friends and family to go through what Dwayne and his family were going through.
LIVIN is breaking the stigma of mental health and getting people talking about how they are feeling, making mental health part of the everyday conversation.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Riding the bumps of the rollercoaster that is life, and coping with grief
✅ Showing that #itaintweaktospeak
✅ Building resilient kids who know it’s ok to lose
✅ Being kind to yourself and practising self-care
Connecting with Casey Lyons You can connect with Casey via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Legacy - by James Kerr * The Trillion Dollar Coach - by Eric Schmidt * Aro Ha Wellness Retreat * How to have a deeper conversation with a mate - Chief Maker Minisode
“When I don't put thinking time into my life, I just feel like the world is starting to close in around me and there's too many big things that are happening that I can't control.”
In today’s minisode, I want to help you to make massive moves by allocating time in your diary to slow down and be more strategic.
I’m sure there are busy periods of your life where you’re rushing around, and not delivering to capacity. You don’t slow down and stop to think, so as a result you end up with low quality consequences, possibly in several areas of your life.
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ Why owning your time will help you own the outcomes
✅ Setting yourself up for success so that you can nail this process
✅ Some techniques for drawing out great solutions during deep thinking time.
Stay epic,
Greg
“I've got this simple mantra: I refuse to listen to problems or issues, but I'll listen to opportunities and challenges.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Angus McPherson, Managing Director Australia of Diageo, on creating momentum, difficult conversations, and simplifying your message.
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Angus took on the role of Diageo Australia Managing Director in April 2020, joining in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and Australia’s widespread lockdowns. He has led them through to the other side, where Diageo currently represents 30% of the spirits market in Australia, producing more than 10 million cases annually.
Prior to this role he spent close to a decade at Treasury Wine Estates holding various Managing Director roles. In his last position, he had accountability for the largest business in North America and led the global sales function.
Angus grew up in the wine industry, with his parents having a wine bottling business. After graduating from Sydney University with a degree in economics, he held several positions with alcohol-related enterprises.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Empowering your team to build momentum
✅ Turning problems into challenges, and then into opportunities and solutions
✅ Having honest conversations about performance
✅ Simplifying your message for greater effect
Connecting with Angus McPherson You can connect with Angus via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Legacy - by James Kerr * Chief Maker Minisode - Why you should run across a desert and love it * Chief Maker Minisode - The All-in Mindset
“I believe in the universal bank; I keep putting the positive in the universal bank and it keeps paying it back with interest.”
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from personal finance guru, Noel Whittaker, on rising out of adversity, consistently turning up, and why honesty works.
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I interviewed Noel for this podcast back in May 2018.
Noel is one of the world’s foremost authorities on personal finance and investment.
His newspaper columns reach over three million readers each week, and he is broadcasted on over 50 radio stations. He is one of Australia’s most successful authors, with 20 bestselling books achieving total worldwide sales of more than two million copies. His first book, Making Money Made Simple, set sales records and was named in The 100 Most Influential Books of the Twentieth Century.
For 30 years, Noel was the Director of Whittaker Macnaught, one of Australia’s leading financial advisory companies, with more than two billion dollars under management.
In 2003, he was awarded the Australian Centenary Medal in recognition of his services to the financial services industry and in 2011 he was made a Member of the Order of Australia for service to the community in raising awareness of personal finance.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Noel talk about:
✅ His incredible career journey including how he nearly lost everything
✅ The bolt of insight that changed his life and led to the writing of his book
✅ The powerful messages he received from mentors and most influential books that shaped his career
✅ The role of money, honesty and passion in a great career.
Connecting with Noel Whittaker You can connect with Noel via his website and Twitter.
Books and resources * Think and Grow Rich - by Napoleon Hill * Think and Grow Rich – The Legacy - by James Whittaker * Watch the Think and Grow Rich - The Legacy film
“Everything we do has to be win-win-win; a win for business owners, a win for consumers, which equals a win for us.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Mark Calabro, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of HungryHungry and OrderMate, on digitising human-to-human connections, succeeding in two tech startups, using fear of failure to your advantage.
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Mark is one of few co-founders in Australia to have two successful start-ups in the hospitality tech space spanning his two decades within the industry. In 2003, with business partner Shannon Hautot, Mark started OrderMate, a Point Of Sale solution that was acquired in 2021, and more recently their current business, HungryHungry.
What started as a QR code order & pay at table has now evolved into a suite of technology products and services that absolutely boomed during the period of ongoing lockdown restrictions.
HungryHungry has recently been recognised with several awards including winner of the 2021 Finder Award for Most Innovative Business Response to COVID-19.
Mark has a double degree in Engineering and Applied Sciences from Swinburne University, the institution where he met Shannon.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How friends can make it work as business partners
✅ The challenges of digitising human-to-human connections
✅ Starting and scaling two successful tech companies
✅ Using fear of failure and focus to build resilience and result
Connecting with Mark Calabro You can connect with Mark via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Future Shock - by Alvin Toffler * Useful Belief - by Chris Helder
“We thought that instead of running a franchise, why don't we go and get our own funding and set up our own brand for this unserviced segment? We know that we're going to have a fair amount of market share from day dot.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Ryan Gair, Co-Founder and CEO of Rate Money on backing yourself, knowing your customer, and operational investing.
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Ryan is a country kid at heart, but a serious entrepreneur. Following school, he spent a few years in telemarketing, and then fell into mortgage broking at a friend’s recommendation, taking the steep learning curve from zero to expert to become a top salesperson within 12 months.
He has more than two decades of experience in the mortgage sector spanning the likes of Mortgage House and Australian First Mortgage, as well as RAMS, where he was awarded ‘Rookie of the Year’, ultimately leading to him opening his own RAMS franchise where he settled over $1.7 Billion in loans within 3 years.
Spotting a massive gap in the self-employed market segment, he started Rate Money with co-founders Luke Sheales and Glenn Maynard in 2019, growing the business to 30 branches, handling over $3 billion in assets.
In 2022, Rate Money won the Mortgage Manager category in the Mortgage and Finance Association of Australia Awards and was named 5-star Mortgage Innovator by Australian Broker Magazine.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Focusing on what could go right, not what could go wrong
✅ Knowing your internal and external customers
✅ Seeing your operations as investment opportunities
✅ Living and breathing generosity and changing peoples’ lives.
Connecting with Ryan Gair You can connect with Ryan via LinkedIn.
“One of the greatest gifts in life is to know our fragility and that we are weak. And it’s out of the fragility that we can be our very best self.”
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from spiritual guru, Damien Price, on spirituality and how it fits in the corporate world.
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I interviewed Damien for this podcast back in April 2018.
Damien is a Christian Brother and has taught for over thirty years in schools throughout Australia and New Zealand.
Over the past twenty years he has worked with disadvantaged youth, homeless men and women, refugees, and asylum seekers.
Damien has Masters Degrees in Counselling and Pastoral Guidance, and a Doctor of Philosophy degree which focused on the sense of self that youth grew into as they engaged with homeless people over an extended period of time.
He is now Regional Ministry Coordinator for PNG, Philippines and Timor Leste in a role that has him travelling and organising all over South East Asia.
I have known Damien for 25 years and he is my own spiritual mentor. We also produce a podcast together called The Universal Man.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Damien talk about:
✅ Religion and spirituality and their context in business
✅ What vows he takes as a Christian Brother
✅ How to develop spirituality in your own way
✅ Where busy professionals get spirituality wrong.
Connecting with Damien Price You can connect with Damien via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Power of Now - by Eckart Tolle
“The addicted person has to be ready and prepared, and they have to hit a point where there are ramifications to their future health and happiness because of their drug use.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Addiction Coaching Specialist, Conrad Tracey, on breaking points, dealing with resistance in others, and self-acceptance.
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Conrad has dedicated his life to helping people break the addiction cycle and regain control of their life and choices.
His experience with addiction on one side, and marked professional success on the other, has seen him develop incredibly successful programs for individuals and corporations across Australia and New Zealand.
Conrad prides himself on his integrity, work ethic and direct approach to helping people break the cycle of addiction and regain control of their lives and choices.
He has quickly become one of Australia's leading authorities on addiction support and education as the Founder and Head Coach of Addiction Coaching Australia & NZ.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The biggest behavioural predictors of addiction
✅ The myths around addiction and why they can be so damaging to recovery efforts
✅ What the first step is towards overcoming addiction
✅ How to offer someone support where they are resistant to change.
Connecting with Conrad Tracey You can connect with Conrad via LinkedIn, Instagram and the Addiction Coaching Australia & NZ website.
Books and resources * Legacy - by James Kerr * Inner Chief Minisode #182 - How to have a deeper conversation with a mate
“Too many people are dominated in their mind by a sense of fear of all the things that could possibly go wrong. That’s no way to take control of a situation.”
In today’s minisode, I want to help you to regain control and shift the power dynamic in a professional relationship.
This topic is actually inspired by one of my clients, who was getting into some situations with a powerful stakeholder at work where he'd go into a meeting with them and he just wouldn't nail the meetings like he wanted to.
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Today we’re going to talk about:
✅ Taking ownership of the outcomes of this relationship
✅ Two simple tricks to reset the power dynamic with integrity
✅ How to seek more information from the other party that helps both of you
Stay epic,
Greg
“A leader doesn't make a great business; the people make a great business. The leader just helps bring out the best in its people.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Mark Pomeroy, CEO of Pomeroy Pacific, on managing risk, asking great questions, and succeeding in a family business.
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Since 2005, Mark has been the CEO of Pomeroy Pacific, one of Australia's premier development and project management firms with over 50 years of funding and delivering successful projects.
Before he joined the family business, Mark completed a Law Degree from Monash University and spent 3 years on KPMG’s Graduate program.
He is also an alumni of the Harvard Business School, having studied on their Real Estate Program.
Mark is an executive of the YPO Yarra Melbourne chapter, having been involved for the last 9 years, including a 2 year stint as Chair.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The incredible mentoring he got from his father, Dug, after coming into the business without much experience in the industry
✅ Why they have succeeded where many family business have failed
✅ How managing risk is the most critical activity in construction
✅ Understanding the “why” before making any decisions.
Connecting with Mark Pomeroy You can connect with Mark via LinkedIn.
Books and resources Good to Great - by Jim Collins
“When you're creating your own business, there are going to be knocks and it is going to be devastating. But you need to keep getting back up, because no-one else is going to.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to food industry innovator, Cass Spies, the Founder and CEO of Twisted Healthy Treats, on being nimble, promoting from within, and winning globally.
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Cass studied a Bachelor of Science majoring in Food Technology, before travelling to London where she spent 13 years in the Financial Services industry, reaching the level of Global IT Programme Manager at Barclays Bank.
Upon returning to Australia in 2009 with a young family, Cass fulfilled her dreams of starting her own business by founding Twisted Healthy Treats, a company that produces food with lower levels of sugar and calories, based on clean, natural recipes.
Twisted products are available in 2,000 supermarket stores nationally, 5000 school canteens across Australia and New Zealand, and they are now stocked in the USA and China.
Together with her team, she has built an amazing Australian brand and has a vision of creating Australia’s best Healthy Treats.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ The origins of Twisted, how it almost shut down and why it is a significantly different business nowadays
✅ The highs and lows of being a global retail brand, and always getting up from the knockdowns
✅ Having an all-female executive team in a male-dominated industry
✅ Why Twisted reinvests so much back into its business.
Connecting with Cass Spies You can connect with Cass via LinkedIn.
Books and resources Dare to Lead - by Brené Brown
“The research is bulletproof; when you're in love with your job, the people with whom you live and who report to you are 80% more likely to be thriving as well.”
In today’s minisode, I want to help you move up by moving past.
Fundamentally, your career is a journey. There are peaks, troughs, stalls, rises, plateaus and everything in between. And unless you have the tools to create your own destiny, then your career journey will be in someone else’s hands, you’ll become part of the 80% who don’t progress and you will get more and more frustrated.
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ A Career Journey Map and where the plateaus can occur
✅ What you could be missing from your career that results in a career stall
✅ Using the GREAT Method to get promoted faster
Stay epic,
Greg
“I always say I want entrepreneurs in the company and I want them to act like entrepreneurs by making decisions that are good for the business.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Travel industry disruptor, André Schwämmlein, the Co-Founder and CEO of Flix, on art versus science, creating new markets, and daring to better the world.
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André is one of three Flix founders, launching the business in 2012 as FlixBus, a global travel platform with more than 100 million customers in 28 European countries as well as in the USA.
Prior to founding Flix, he worked as a Strategic Consultant for Boston Consulting Group in Munich for 5 years.
André studied industrial engineering at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, and is also a board member of both tech companies Scout24 and About You.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Leading a team by transparency and clarity of a long-term vision
✅ Taking a giant leap of faith from a secure job to founding a business
✅ Why Flix is not a travel company, but rather a technology and data analytics business
✅ How a travel company survived the COVID pandemic and is thriving again.
Connecting with André Schwämmlein You can connect with André via LinkedIn.
“This human condition to protect and help others is there from the moment we are born. People who feel soulless simply lack this instinct. Incorporating it into our daily routine will make all the difference.”
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from Hetty Johnston AM, Founder and Former CEO & Chair of Bravehearts, on passion, resilience and negotiating with Prime Ministers.
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We interviewed Hetty in April 2018 when she was the Chair of an organisation she founded, Bravehearts, which is Australia’s leading child protection advocacy.
For over 20 years, Hetty has been leading the charge in child protection and built Bravehearts into a powerful not-for-profit with global reach.
Hetty had a career in politics, as the Queensland State Leader of the Australian Democrats.
She has accumulated many accolades in her time, including Australian Businesswomen’s 2016 Hall of Fame Inductee, Queensland Australian of the Year in 2015, and a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in 2014.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Hetty talk about:
✅ The full story of the horrific circumstances that led to the beginnings of Bravehearts, after her 6 year old daughter disclosed that she was being assaulted
✅ Her resilience over more than two decades in battling resistance to change from some of the most powerful groups in our community
✅ Some of her techniques for negotiating with Prime Ministers
✅ The ultimate career advice if you want to be a GREAT Chief.
Connecting with Hetty Johnston AM You can connect with Hetty via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Gift of Fear - by Gavin De Becker
“The businesses that generally fail are where the founder says they have a backup plan, like a job. My mentality was if it failed, I would start another business. So I may as well make this one work.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to footwear brand trailblazer, Vince Lebon, the CEO and Founder of Rollie Nation, on streamlining systems, scaling a business and operating rhythm.
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Vince founded Rollie Nation, a footwear brand, in 2012 and sold nearly 500 pairs in a South Melbourne market.
He formally trained as a multimedia designer who fell in love with footwear and product design, developing and refining his craft with shoemaker Andrew McDonald in Sydney, SLEM Innovation & Training Institute in the Netherlands and Pensole Footwear Academy in Oregon, USA.
Vince applied and won a Pensole Scholarship and then won the ‘Future of Footwear’ Master Class sponsored by Foot Locker and asics in 2016. In 2021, he ranked 4th in the Internet Retailing Top 50 People in E-Commerce.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Designing shoes for some of the top celebrities and athletes in the world
✅ Using design thinking to constantly improve systems and processes
✅ Starting Rollie Nation by creating a business model and operating rhythm first
✅ His hiring process and the value of making it intentionally difficult
Connecting with Vince Lebon You can connect with Vince via LinkedIn or via his Instagram account.
Books and resources * Scaling Up - by Verne Harnish * Brand Gap - by Marty Neumeier * Zag - by Marty Neumeier
“It’s not about saying “no” or trying to dodge work; you’re actually trying to be better for the company you work for. You’re putting them first.”
In today’s minisode, I want to save you some time. You know the score, you’ve accepted a meeting invite and you turn up to the meeting and there’s no agenda, no plan, no defined outcome, and you probably weren’t even needed or the meeting could have been replaced by an email. Or it’s a project that you don’t have capacity for based on your current agreed workload.
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ Acknowledging that meetings are the performance theatre for executives
✅ Establishing the purpose of a meeting and whether you have the information to make it meaningful
✅ Working with your boss to prioritise tasks, initiatives and, therefore, meetings
Stay epic,
Greg
“It's not enough to have a good-sounding idea. Is that idea executable in a way that is sustainable or do you have dependencies on things that are just outside your control?”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to Skins Co-Founder and current CEO of eo Lab, Dean Hawkins, on the power of a brand, creatively telling the story of the business, and turning alchemy into the extraordinary.
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Dean is a vastly experienced senior executive having held a variety of senior and advisory roles over the last 25 years with international businesses across a range of industries including sports, fintech, television, broadband, apparel, and venture capital.
He has also held many Board positions including of adidas, Ten Network Holdings, I-Med Australia, Apparel Group and the Sydney Dance Company.
Dean was the Co-Founder and then Chairman of SKINS Global, a household name in compression clothing and activewear. He has also been the CFO of adidas, during which time the company’s market capitalisation grew from €1.5bn to €8bn. Prior to this he was an investment banker at UBS in Zurich where he led the successful IPO of adidas.
Dean returned to Sydney from London in late 2021 to become CEO of eo Lab, an exciting new sports technology business.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Moving into a career where he could own the consequences of his decisions
✅ Turning adidas around by reigniting the brand with customers
✅ The intersection of a positive brand story, people and a great product and other lessons from Skins
✅ Changing the rules of the game of sports technology with his latest venture
Connecting with Dean Hawkins You can connect with Dean via LinkedIn
Books and resources * The Hard Thing About Hard Things - by Ben Horowitz
“You've got to smell the roses. If there's ever any doubt, you only really have to look back and see the results and achievements. It just puts you in a completely different frame of mind.”
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from Brad Gordon, CEO of Laneway Resources, on how to create a vision and game that inspires your team and attracts the best talent.
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We interviewed Brad in early 2018 when he had just left his role as CEO of Acacia Mining, a position he had held since 2013.
Prior to that he was the CEO of Entrepid Mines Limited, Emperor Mines Limited and was Managing Director of Placer Dome, New Guinea.
Brad has been in his current position as CEO of Laneway Resources since March 2021, and also sits on the Board of Firefinch Limited.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Brad talk about:
- The magic and tranquility of working in a team 2000 metres underground;
- Why having vastly different career experience, including overseas, trumps a linear journey;
- How the game of attracting and maintaining the best talent works; and
- What he does in moments of doubt.
Connecting with Brad Gordon You can connect with Brad via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Good to Great - by Jim Collins * The Outsiders - by William Thorndike
“Things will always go wrong; my engineering background taught me to remain calm, avoid blame and just work through the problem.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, we speak to telecommunications industry disruptor, Alex West, CEO of Swoop, on being the calm in the chaos, trust and vulnerability, and building a high performing culture through metrics.
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Alex is currently the CEO of Swoop, a telecommunications company backed by Andrew Forrest’s Tattarang, and which has had a stellar year, including listing on the ASX followed by six acquisitions.
Alex has been involved in around 50 company acquisitions while in senior roles with some of Australia’s leading telcos, including Superloop and PIPE Networks (now TPG), and has also raised more than $66 million in equity in his 20-year career.
He cut his teeth as a graduate engineer at Telstra, before climbing the ranks to Chief Operating Officer at Vocus Group.
Alex holds a Bachelor of Computer Engineering from the University of Newcastle, and a Master of Engineering Management from the University of Technology, Sydney.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ How remaining calm, even when things go wrong, is his superpower;
✅ The shift from executive to CEO when you’ve spent two decades in the same industry;
✅ Leading a high-performing team through trust and vulnerability; and
✅ Cultivating a strong company culture of using metrics and dashboards.
Connecting with Alex West You can connect with Alex via LinkedIn
Books and resources Start with Why - by Simon Sinek
“I don't want you to just take the path less travelled; I want you to stop and pause and actually use a little bit of deep thinking and a bit of science to then take the path best, most congruent for you, and that will make all the difference.”
In today’s minisode, we look at a question that I have been inundated with in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, and that is a career crossroads. People are getting to this point as they’ve realised what’s truly important in life or they’ve had new opportunities come out of the blue.
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We’re going to talk about:
✅ How to assess any opportunities and how this links to career excellence
✅ Some tools to arm you with making the most informed decision about which path to take that align to your career vision and values
✅ Applying the Chief Maker GREAT Method to affirm your chosen path.
Stay epic,
Greg
“We started every board meeting talking about what impact we made in the last month, before we even got to the CEO report or financials.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from tech industry pioneer Tristan Sternson, CEO of ARQ Group, on being answerable to investors, systemising values and culture, and building equality through technology.
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Tristan is an Australian tech industry pioneer and CEO of multi-award-winning company, ARQ Group. ARQ is one of Australia’s leading providers of digital and tech services, with a client base spanning Government and more than half of Australia’s top 20 ASX-listed companies.
A serial entrepreneur and growth expert, Tristan boasts a decades-long career in IT, including advisory, experience and design, engineering and managed services.
Since being appointed CEO of ARQ in December 2019, Tristan led one of Australia’s greatest turnaround stories, resulting in ARQ’s $290 million acquisition by Singtel subsidiary NCS in April 2022.
Tristan’s actions have also had a direct impact on Australia’s tech skills shortage, establishing education programs within ARQ’s Academy and growing their headcount by 75%.
In this episode we talk about:
✅ Starting a data business off the back of the GFC in 2009;
✅ Being answerable to investors while systemising values and culture;
✅ How technology like blockchain and the Metaverse is building equality into the world; and
✅ What a high-performance culture looks like in the technology industry.
Connecting with Tristan Sternson You can connect with Tristan via LinkedIn
Books and resources Good to Great - by Jim Collins
“As an industry, we are stopping women from working in all levels of society by our six-day working week. And that's not okay.”
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from construction industry game-changer, Alison Mirams, CEO of Roberts Co, on transforming an industry and leaving a legacy by putting workers and their families at the heart of your business.
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Alison has more than twenty years’ experience in the construction sector. In 2017, after successfully operating in executive roles at both Brookfield Multiplex and Lendlease, Alison became the CEO of boutique tier one construction firm, Roberts Co.
Alison also sits on the Boards of TAFE NSW and AeroPM, and has an engineering degree from the University of Technology Sydney.
In this episode we talk about:
- Leading from the front and changing an entire industry through promotion of a 5-day working week;
- How this change impacts families, but also addresses huge gender equity issues well beyond the first-order set of consequences;
- The jaw-dropping results of the research she did in conjunction with UNSW that enabled a data-led approach to shifting attitudes; and
- What’s next for her and how she plans to leave a legacy for the next generation of construction workers.
Connecting with Alison Mirams You can connect with Alison via LinkedIn
Books and resources * Wall Street Journal
“I can’t tell you the number of Mini-MBA graduates who have taken action on low performers or toxic high performers and it has made a fundamental difference to everyone’s lives.”
In today’s minisode, we cover some of the main reasons why graduates of the Chief Maker Mini-MBA program decide to join a cohort and the main benefits they get from it.
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One of the most common reasons why people take up the Chief Maker Mini-MBA is one that I hear repeatedly before we kick off the sessions, and that is, “How do I work at level? How do I work in a leadership capacity, on strategy, and with the executive team and really add value to the organisation?”
So, today we’re going to talk about:
- Stopping to look up at the broader market trends and other external factors;
- How to do an organisational analysis and deal with the wrong people on the bus; and
- Building your strategic playbook so that you can deliver on your track record.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Daniel Penny, Co-Founder and MD of Mustard Creative Agency, on going beyond the brief, working with agencies, and understanding your influence.
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Daniel co-founded Mustard Creative Agency in 2001 with his business partner.
The agency has worked with well-known brands like Target, Hertz, Hisense, Coles and The Good Guys.
Daniel is also the founder of LearnSpring, an online learning digital platform.
In this episode we talk about:
- Starting a marketing and creative agency from scratch and how word-of-mouth recommendations have fuelled the business since launching;
- Why responding to a brief beyond what is requested is the best outcome for a client;
- Leading an organisation of humans and understanding your influence; and
- His core principles in driving employee and client engagement.
Connecting with Daniel Penny You can connect with Daniel via LinkedIn
Books and resources * Almanack of Naval Ravikant - by Eric Jorgenson * Atomic Habits - by James Clear
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from Angela Buglass, former CEO of Trilogy International, on creating your own destiny, cross-functional experience, and being at the pinnacle of a listed company.
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We interviewed Angela in early 2018 when she was the CEO of Trilogy International, the parent company for popular consumer brands across such categories as skincare and luxury home fragrance products.
She is currently the MD of Hello in New Zealand, a women’s health brand, while also serving as the Chair of Cosmetics New Zealand and sitting on the board of The Beauty Collective.
After just over 3 years at Trilogy, Angela went on to become CEO of Antipodes Water.
Her experience also includes roles with leading FMCG players Procter & Gamble, L’Oréal and Estée Lauder, and these roles have taken her all around the world.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Angela talk about:
- How gaining a variety of experience at smaller organisations was fundamental to her development in landing senior roles at large multinational brands;
- Her routines and recovery methods that allow her to achieve life balance;
- What she looks for when recruiting executives to her team; and
- Why communication and honesty will allow you to be the creator of your own destiny.
Connecting with Angela Buglass You can connect with Angela via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Five Dysfunctions of a Team - by Patrick Lencioni * The Fish Rots from the Head - by Bob Garrett
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, I chat to Jay Bonaretti, Founder & CEO of Amino Z, on ownership over victimhood, being in competition with yourself, and distributed leadership.
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Jay is the Founder and CEO of Amino Z, an Australian manufacturer and retailer of nutritional products and supplements.
He founded the business in 2006 as a one-man organisation and continues to be at the helm of a now large workforce, servicing hundreds of thousands of customers.
Jay is incredibly vulnerable about his childhood battle with chronic fatigue syndrome, a situation that led him to depression and isolation, but ultimately to recovery.
He is also the author of “How to Transform the Average Joe in 12 Weeks”.
In this episode we talk about:
- Being bed-ridden for 9 months to winning Australia’s BodyBlitz Challenge a few years later;
- Why your physical capability is based on your mental capability, regardless of age;
- Surrounding yourself with people who are smarter than you and giving them accountability; and
- How he has a “stop doing list” and builds that into his quarterly review process.
Connecting with Jay Bonaretti You can connect with Jay via LinkedIn
Books and resources * The Road Less Stupid - by Keith Cunningham
“The research says it takes one and a half years for us to really be fully valuable to a mid- to large-sized organisation. But there are ways to cut that period down.”
In today’s minisode, we have a question from one of our listeners, Louise, who asks about returning to work and how to get back into the swing of things after a long break.
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We’re going to talk about:
- Understanding how your life has changed since you were last at work;
- Why the success markers are different in your life and how to be kinder to yourself; and
- How to craft 30, 60, 90 day plans and weave in continuous learning.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Dean Salakas, CEO of The Party People, on seeing change as an opportunity, coping with growth, and evolving as a leader.
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Dean is the Chief Party Dude of The Party People, a business he and his brother bought from their mother in 2007.
Before taking on the ownership, Dean and his brother worked in the business in various positions, from driver to retail assistant to website manager.
Dean is now an accomplished speaker, a Board member of both eTail Australia and Online Retail Summit. He has also pitched The Party People to the investment TV show, Shark Tank.
In this episode we talk about:
- The full background to him and his brother buying The Party People from his mother;
- Being the first Google and Bing customers, and leading the business to triple digit growth, and all the challenges that brought;
- How he developed a culture that change is an opportunity; and
- How the business survived the COVID-19 pandemic through innovation, communication and engagement with customers.
Connecting with Dean Salakas You can connect with Dean via LinkedIn
Books and resources * The One Minute Manager - by Kenneth Blanchard Ph.D and Spencer Johnson M.D.
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from Greg Steele, Global President of Arcadis Mobility, on the importance of broad experience, bringing people with you and dealing with difficult issues.
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We interviewed Greg in late 2017 when he was the CEO of the Asia Pacific business of Arcadis, one of the world's largest professional service consultancy firms with over 28,000 people in 70 countries.
Greg has nearly 40 years' experience as an engineer and manager, having been involved at a leadership level for some of Australia's largest and most complex infrastructure projects.
He is also the Chair of Engineering Aid Australia, a not for profit organisation which strives to inspire indigenous Australians to become engineers. He has also been a Board Member of Roads Australia, and an MD of Hyder Consulting.
Greg has a degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Queensland and also a PostGrad Diploma in Management from Deakin University.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Greg talk about:
- The importance of making mistakes, re-charting your course and developing broad experience;
- His list of three keys to leadership;
- How to show your staff that you are serious about cultural change, especially around gender diversity; and
- Dealing with difficult issues by taking them head-on.
Connecting with Greg Steele
You can connect with Greg via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Five Dysfunctions of a Team - by Patrick Lencioni * The Discipline of Market Leaders – by Michael Treacy and Fred Wiersema * Kaleidoscope Strategy - building success that lasts
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Brigit Esselmont, Founder & CEO of Biddy Tarot on executive intuition, busting the myths of tarot, and from zero to 7 figures.
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Brigit is the Founder & CEO of Biddy Tarot the world’s leading online learning community for people who read Tarot.
She is the best-selling author of Everyday Tarot and is on a mission to bring Tarot out of the closet and into the mainstream.
Brigit has been featured in Huffington Post, The Oprah Magazine, and appeared on numerous podcasts including Being Boss and Truth Telling, and has appeared on stage in front of live audiences across the US and Australia.
Before diving full-time into Biddy Tarot, Brigit was a management consultant and human resource strategist at organisations such as Telstra and ANZ.
In this episode we talk about:
- Busting the myths around tarot, and what it actually is;
- Executive intuition and how elite chiefs use its principles to execute their game plans;
- How she quit her corporate career and developed what is now a multi-million dollar business; and
- A live tarot reading with me!
Connecting with Brigit Esselmont You can connect with Brigit via the Biddy Tarot website
Books and resources The Big Leap - by Gay Hendricks
“People overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in 10.”
In today’s minisode, we have a question from one of our listeners, Ben, who asks how he can really nail a year and achieve all or most of his goals.
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We’re going to talk about:
- The visioning process and timing of check-ins;
- Managing time and energy to fit in with your busy life;
- The value of structured thinking time.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Izzy Silva, MD, APAC at Wolters Kluwer, on using EQ to good effect, making the vision visible, and data-led decision-making.
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Izzy was born in Sri Lanka, moved to New Zealand when he was 9 but has called Australia home for the last 25 years.
He is currently the MD in the APAC region of Wolters Kluwer, a global information services and solutions provider focusing on health, tax and accounting, risk and compliance, finance and legal sectors.
Since graduating from Monash University with a Bachelor of Information Management & Systems, Izzy’s career has seen him take on roles at well-known organisations such as HP, Deloitte Australia, Telstra and Equifax.
His first CEO role came at GetCreditScore, a start-up based in Sydney. He has been at Wolters Kluwer APAC for nearly 4 years, having been promoted to MD from Chief Commercial Officer in late 2018.
In this episode we talk about:
- How his EQ is his secret sauce and how he uses it to lead change;
- Living and breathing the vision and setting the example;
- Why data is the key to realising client and company value; and
- The technological future of privacy, diversity and creativity.
Connecting with Izzy Silva You can connect with Izzy via LinkedIn
Books and resources * Homo Deus - by Yuval Noah Harari * Principles for Dealing With The Changing World Order - by Ray Dalio * Think Again - Adam Grant
“Life’s too short for instant coffee and cheap shoes.”
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from former CEO of Water Corporation, Sue Murphy, on leading transformation, and how to be honest, fun and make a difference in your work.
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We interviewed Sue back in November 2017, when she was the CEO of Water Corporation in Perth, having led the organisation since 2008. Sue finished up there in 2018, having joined Water Corp as the GM of Planning & Infrastructure in 2004.
Preceding this was a 25 year stint at Clough Engineering, where she started as a scholarship recipient after completing an Engineering degree from the University of Western Australia, where she was one of only two women out of 300 students.
Sue is now an accomplished Director. She has sat on the board of The Fremantle Dockers and the Water Services Association of Australia, and currently is a Director of the West Australian Treasury Corporation and MMA Offshore Limited. She’s also come full circle and serves on the Senate of the University of Western Australia.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Sue talk about:
- Building people-first organisations through empowerment;
- The joy and experiences of working on construction projects;
- Why the path to leadership should only be for those who aspire to it; and
- Leading transformations and bringing people along on the journey.
Connecting with Sue Murphy You can connect with Sue via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Why Should Anyone Be Led By You? – article by Robert Goffee and Gareth Jones
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Alison Gaines, MD & Founder of Gaines Advisory, on hiring great executives, becoming an NED, and characteristics of successful boards.
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Alison founded Gaines Advisory in 2020 to provide a unique board search and board advisory service, while also specialising in the provision of strategic support to leaders to develop and implement their corporate strategy.
She currently sits on the board of Blackstone Minerals (we had their MD, Scott Williamson on the show in episode 222), Tura New Music Ltd, is the Chair of Hiremii recruitment, and is the Governor of the College of Law Ltd. She is also the independent Chair of the Nominations Committee of Hockey Australia and member of the Nominations Committee of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (WA).
Alison was Global CEO and Head of the Board Practice for international boutique search firm, Gerard Daniels, for nearly 15 years, following a career as a CEO of a law society and senior executive in government responsible for government boards and committees and the Senior Executive Service.
In this episode we talk about:
- The traits she looks for when hiring a CEO and appointing Board members;
- Career journeys and transitioning into NED roles;
- How the changing world has impacted the expectations of boards and Chairs; and
- What makes a Board successful and how tenures are managed.
Connecting with Alison Gaines You can connect with Alison via LinkedIn
Books and resources International Directors Programme at INSEAD in Fontainebleau, in France - it’s a very sophisticated, very focused, small, higher education institution with amazing faculty and research.
In today’s minisode, I am going to share my top 10 tips for running an executive retreat or a strategic offsite.
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We’re going to talk about:
- What to do if you don’t have a budget for bringing in a facilitator or coach;
- How to define an agenda that measures the success of the event;
- Ensuring follow-up tasks are absorbed into your operating rhythm.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Nickie Scriven, CEO of Zenith Media Australia, on leaning into challenges, responding not reacting, and sonic branding.
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Nickie has had a tremendous career in marketing, advertising and media. Before moving into agency leadership, she spent eight years on the client side, holding marketing and sales leadership roles for the likes of AustralianSuper, NAB and News Corp, as well as running her own consultancy.
She joined Zenith Media in Melbourne as Managing Director in October 2014, and within two years was promoted to Australia CEO.
She has been instrumental in helping Zenith achieve global account wins like Disney and TikTok, while guiding the agency through the pandemic, achieving consecutive year-on-year double-digit revenue growth.
Nickie is also an accomplished triathlete, having competed internationally for Australia.
In this episode we talk about:
- Leaning into challenges and smashing goals;
- Responding not reacting to career setbacks and learning to value yourself;
- How to get the most out of the agency-client partnership model; and
- Why sonic branding is often overlooked as a marketing weapon.
Connecting with Nickie Scriven You can connect with Nickie via LinkedIn
Books and resources * The Growth Mindset - by Carol Dweck * Shoe Dog - Phil Knight * Attention economy article
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from former Wallaby rugby player Daniel Herbert, CEO of SSKB on what executives can learn from elite sport, what made him stand out from the pack and how to be indispensable to an organisation.
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Daniel played 67 tests for the Wallabies, Australia’s national rugby union team. He was a part of the glory era of Australian rugby, winning the Rugby World Cup in 1999, the Bledisloe Cup contested between Australia and New Zealand, and also beating the British and Irish Lions in 2001, a series that Wallaby players only contest every 12 years.
He also captained the Queensland Reds and was World Player of the Year in 1999. In short, he is an Australian sporting great.
Since retiring from rugby, Daniel has gone onto a successful corporate career, having been involved on the commercial side of sportswear brand Skins and the Queensland Reds, and is now the CEO of property services firm, SSKB.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Daniel talk about:
- Lessons from elite sport, and what hasn’t translated into the corporate world;
- Living by his mantra of ‘Hard work will beat talent when talent doesn’t work hard’;
- How he became indispensable to his team, and how this applies in the corporate world; and
- Why an aligned executive leadership will knock it out of the park.
Connecting with Daniel Herbert You can connect with Daniel via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Good to Great – by Jim Collins * Sapiens – by Yuval Noah Harari * Grit – by Angela-Lee Duckworth
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Ben Simon, Partner at Rose Partners, on diffusing heated negotiations, identifying red flags during a deal, and managing founders.
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Ben has spent his entire career at Rose Partners, and has worked his way up to become a Partner at the professional services firm.
His specialties are in Business Advisory, Mergers & Acquisitions, Business Valuations, Tax and structuring, and Large business transaction and he has performed these duties across many industries. This is critical for all executives to understand strategy and getting ahead.
As a testimony to his wealth of knowledge, Ben has also been asked to sit on several clients’ advisory boards.
In this episode we talk about:
- The role of an advisor and bringing transacting parties together;
- What a good advisory team looks like;
- Identifying red flags during the deal process; and
- Managing founders after a sale.
Connecting with Ben Simon You can connect with Ben via email
Books and resources * Chief Maker Minisode: How to get and keep a CEO mentor
We have a question from one of our listeners, Charlotte from Liverpool in the UK, and she asks whether work-life balance is actually possible, especially in the top jobs.
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We’re going to talk about:
- Understanding what work-life balance is and how to measure it;
- Having a mindset of a life of different chapters;
- Some tools to get work-life balance.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Scott Williamson, MD of Blackstone Minerals, on the CEO-Chair relationship, taking career risks, and injecting fun into business.
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Scott has been the Managing Director of Blackstone Minerals for 4 and a half years, and has extensive experience in the mining & metals industry over a 20 year career.
He graduated from the West Australian School of Mines and Curtin University of Technology and also holds a WA First Class Mine Manager’s Certificate and is a member of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy.
In this episode we talk about:
- The cyclical nature of the mining industry and how he was often in and out of jobs;
- The role of the Chairperson and their relationship with the CEO;
- Taking risks in your career to get ahead, and then becoming a CEO for the first time;
- The fun side of business; and
- What the future holds for the mining industry.
Connecting with Scott Williamson
You can connect with Scott via LinkedIn
Books and resources * Good to Great - by Jim Collins * Blackstone Minerals Investor Presentation
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from Nicky Sparshott, CEO of Unilever Australia & New Zealand, on being brave, taking the path less trodden and differentiating yourself.
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Nicky has been involved with FMCG firm Unilever since 2006, as a senior manager and executive in various roles and locations around the world.
She became the CEO of Unilever Australia & New Zealand in March 2020, but we interviewed Nicky back in October 2017 when she was the Global CEO of T2 Tea, a luxury retailer and Unilever brand.
Nicky is also a non-executive director for a number of organisations and has built up quite the impressive resume and expertise across FMCG, Retail, Luxury, and Ecommerce.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Nicky talk about:
- her lessons from a failed product launch;
- taking the path less travelled, even if others don’t think it’s a good idea for you;
- being brave and not being scared to fail; and
- creating a track record that differentiates you from your peers.
Connecting with Nicky Sparshott You can connect with Nicky via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Elon Musk: How the Billionaire CEO of SpaceX and Tesla is Shaping our Future - by Ashlee Vance * A Whole New Mind - by Daniel Pink
Our topic today is the All-in Mindset.
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We look at how you can elevate yourself to a new level of being through the all-in mindset.
We’re going to talk about:
- Making a conscious decision to shift course;
- Looking back to plan a way forward;
- Using small moments to go all in, that compound into massive changes.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Ian Snape, CEO of Frontline Mind, on resilience by design, leading Antarctic expeditions and relaxing in high stakes environments.
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Ian has over 30 years of experience leading and managing teams in strategy, innovation, and adventure. His speciality in coaching and training is on the topics of resilience, performance, recovery and wellbeing, especially to people who operate in complex high-risk situations such as Special Forces, police, paramedics, as well as Olympic athletes, company directors and senior executives.
He has a PhD in Geochemistry from the University of Edinburgh and also has a Graduate Certificate in Neuro-linguistic Programming. He has led teams on expeditions to the Antarctic to conduct research on pollution issues in cold regions that were crucial to policy and regulatory decisions.
He is the co-founder of two related coaching and training companies, The Coaching Space and Frontline Mind and is the author of the book, Resilience by Design.
In this episode we talk about:
- Building a foundation of focusing on relaxation instead of stress;
- Resilience strategies to manage tricky situations and decisions;
- Leading Antarctic expeditions; and
- The difference between your state and your emotions.
Connecting with Ian Snape You can connect with Ian via LinkedIn
Books and resources * You Are What You Risk - by Michele Wucker * The Gray Rhino - by Michele Wucker
In this Best of Series episode, we hear from Trevor Matthews on how a leader is a dealer in hope, building a track record and thinking globally, acting locally.
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We interviewed Trevor back in September 2017 when he told us the story of his remarkable career from Actuary to CEO and Chair of some of the world’s biggest insurance companies.
He is also the Former MD/CEO of Legal & General Australia, Manulife Canada and Japan, and has since gone on to become a trusted advisor, Chair and Board member at companies like Bupa, CMC Markets APAC, State Insurance Regulatory Authority and Preferred Global Health.
In short, Trevor is an elite Chief and we were privileged that he came on the show.
In this episode, you’re going to hear Trevor talk about:
- Why a leader is a dealer in hope;
- How he got new roles as a result of building a track record of solving problems;
- How he brought ideas from around the world and implemented them locally; and
- Earning your seat at the Executive Team’s table.
Connecting with Trevor Matthews You can connect with Trevor via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff - by Richard Carlson * Young Presidents Organisation: www.ypo.org
In this episode of The Inner Chief podcast, you’ll hear from Fiona Crawford OLY, Chief Human Resources Officer of CreditorWatch, on doing extra, celebrating success, and enabling the business.
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Fiona joined fintech startup, CreditorWatch, in September 2021 as GM of People & Culture.
Her career spans almost 20 years in human resources, training and coaching across a range of industries including sport, fitness, finance, hospitality and automotive.
Fiona is a dual Olympian softballer, claiming the bronze and silver medals for Australia at the 2000 Sydney and 2004 Athens Olympic Games respectively.
In this episode we talk all about:
- How she got a place on the team by always doing extra;
- Why the successful teams are the ones that encourage feedback;
- Teaching organisations to celebrate success; and
- Removing the noise and enabling the business.
Connecting with Fiona Crawford OLY You can connect with Fiona via LinkedIn
Books and resources The Man in the Mirror - by Wayne Bennett
Our topic today is self-belief.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/216
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We look at how you can harness self-belief in a constructive way to build your track record.
We’re going to talk about:
- The physical impact of positive and negative mindsets;
- Myth-busting negative self-belief; and
- Finding a place where negative self-talk is non-existent.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this latest episode of our Best of Series, you’ll hear from Todd Hunter, Group CEO of Turners Automotive, on asking great questions, humility and how pressure is a privilege.
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We interviewed Todd back in August 2017 and he is the brother of Daniel Hunter, another chief we have featured recently on the Best of Series - episode 202.
Todd has had broad career experience, from being a Financial Accountant with Ernst & Young, to a Marketing Manager with Microsoft New Zealand, to Corporate & Government Sector Manager at New Zealand Post.
He spent 7 years at Turners before assuming the role of CEO.
Today, you’re going to hear Todd talk about:
- Having the courage of your convictions and dealing with hostile people;
- Asking great questions versus having every answer;
- Why humility is such an important quality for a CEO to have; and
- How the pressure of a leadership position is a privilege.
Connecting with Todd Hunter You can connect with Todd via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Podcast - Desert Island Discs * Shoe Dog - by Phil Knight * Todd's nominated charity is SDAA – Students Against Dangerous Driving
In this episode of The Inner Chief, you’ll hear from Dr Bronwyn Evans AM, CEO of Engineers Australia, on theory vs practice, empathetic performance management, and advancing society through great engineering.
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Bronwyn is the CEO of Engineers Australia, the Chair of Building4.0 CRC, and a Director of the Australia-Japan Foundation.
She has previously held positions in innovation initiatives, including as Chair of the Industry Growth Centre for Medical Technologies and Pharmaceuticals, and previously as the CEO of Standards Australia and VP of Finance of the International Standards Organisation (ISO).
She has over 35 years’ experience in various engineering roles and was recognised as a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in 2021. She’s also been recognised as one of Australia’s 100 most influential engineers and is in the list of top 100 Women of Influence.
She is also a Member of the Champions of Change STEM Group which aims to achieve a significant and sustainable increase in the representation of women in leadership positions in STEM fields.
In this episode we talk all about:
- Her varied career pathway and putting theory into practice;
- Performance management tactics that benefit both parties;
- How excellence and innovative engineering can advance society; and
- Her organisation’s role as the voice of engineering in Australia.
Connecting with Dr Bronwyn Evans AM You can connect with Bronwyn via LinkedIn
Books and resources * Voss - by Patrick White * Exactly: How Precision Engineers Created The Modern World - by Simon Winchester
Our topic today is the number 1 performance environment for executives - meetings.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/213
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We look at being a high performer in the meeting room, and how to unlock the power of this environment in bringing your entourage along with you and building your track record.
We’re going to talk about:
- Preparing for meetings with an outcomes-based approach;
- Why this environment should be seen as your theatre; and
- Creating an experience for the attendees.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this latest episode of our Best of Series, you’ll hear from Jonathan Ling, Chairman of Planet Innovation, on telling wow stories, top 3 skills to be CEO, and pulling the right levers.
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Jonathan is currently the Chairman of Planet Innovation and of Pro-Pac Packaging, as well as a Non-Executive Director of The Pact Group, but was the CEO of GUD Holdings when we interviewed him back in July 2017.
His executive experience also includes having been CEO of Fletcher Building, Laminex Australia and Visy Recycling. He is the former Chairman of the Melbourne Rebels’ Advisory Board and has previously held a number of other board roles including ASB bank and Pacific Brands.
Jonathan’s story is a fantastic one of a little Chinese boy that rose from the frontline all the way through the ranks to becoming CEO. He has taken on some of the biggest challenges in business and succeeded commercially through the cultures he creates.
In this episode we talk all about:
- Standing out by telling ‘wow’ stories;
- The top 3 skills you need as a CEO;
- Pulling the right levers to get a solid track record; and
- Creating emotional intensity in a team.
Connecting with Jonathan Ling You can connect with Jonathan via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Covey’s Time Management Quadrants * Jonathan’s nominated charity is Disaster Relief Australia and I’ve made a donation of $250 in Jonathan’s name for coming on the show.
In this episode of The Inner Chief, you’ll hear from Antonia Mercorella, CEO of The REIQ, on tackling the hard stuff, resolving conflict, and sharing your vision.
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Antonia is the Chief Executive Officer of The Real Estate Institute of Queensland. She is the first female CEO, and also the youngest person ever appointed to lead the organisation, and has transformed the 103-year-old Institute into one of most progressive and high-profile industry associations in Australia.
Prior to her appointment as CEO, Antonia worked with the REIQ as Deputy CEO and before that, as General Counsel.
She has also worked as principal legal advisor to the Real Estate Institute of South Australia, and as a commercial lawyer specialising in property and real estate.
In this episode we talk all about:
- Tackling the hard stuff that no-one else wants to;
- Resolving conflict early and effectively;
- The key you skills you need to have as a CEO; and
- Sharing your organisation’s vision across the company.
Connecting with Antonia Mercorella
You can connect with Antonia via LinkedIn
Books and resources * Getting to Yes - by Roger Fisher and William Ury
Our topic today is 3 questions you MUST be able to answer about key stakeholders.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/210
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We look at how to build connection and trust with stakeholders, so as to improve how others view you when you're not in the room.
We’re going to talk about:
- Track records and integrity;
- Incentives;
- Pressure; and
- Personality.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this latest episode of our Best of Series, you’ll hear from Jennifer Holland, Founder & CEO of Throat Scope and Holland Healthcare, on preparedness, persistence and revolutionising the healthcare industry.
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Jennifer’s passion lies in inventing, designing and developing medical products that will revolutionise the healthcare industry.
Her first invention was Throat Scope, which was the recipient of $50,000 prize money for the ‘What’s Your Big Idea Queensland?’ in 2011, allowing her to build several prototypes and register a patent.
In 2015, she secured investment from Steve Baxter on Shark Tank Australia, helping the business grow exponentially and attract significant publicity.
Her mission is to raise awareness for Head & Neck Cancer & introduce an affordable oral health system for the underserved and she has received many awards for her entrepreneurship and volunteering, and actively participates in speaking and networking events internationally.
In this episode we talk all about:
- Preparing for Shark Tank and the lessons applicable to career growth;
- How she lives her motto: believe, act, persist;
- Balancing life as a mumpreneur with 4 kids; and
- Taking opportunities and turning a no into a yes.
Connecting with Jennifer Holland You can connect with Jennifer via LinkedIn.
In this episode of The Inner Chief, you’ll hear from Ben Darwin, Co-Founder of GAIN LINE, on cohesion analytics, understanding versus skill, and sacking staff too soon.
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Ben is the Co-Founder and GM of GAIN LINE Analytics, an operations and management consultancy dedicated to building consistently successful teams.
He represented the Brumbies in Super Rugby and played at international level 28 times for the Wallabies. In his last ever game of competitive rugby, he broke his neck, but extraordinarily, has since recovered.
Ben has considerable experience in coaching, player development and analysis in both Australia and Japan and is a highly-sought after speaker all around the world and in the media.
In this episode we talk all about:
- Achieving his boyhood dream of making the Wallabies and being surrounded by his own heroes;
- The science of cohesion, namely systems, interpersonal and positional understanding;
- How teams work in groups and what drives changes in behaviour; and
- Stories of where the data contradicted intuition.
Connecting with Ben Darwin You can connect with Ben via LinkedIn or via GAIN LINE’s website.
Books and resources * Chasing Stars - by Boris Groysberg * Article: The risky business of hiring stars - by Boris Groysberg
Our topic today is where strategy execution goes wrong.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/207
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We look at three key scenarios of when the execution of a strategy could fall over.
We’re going to talk about:
- Vertical and horizontal trust;
- Operating rhythm; and
- Resourcing.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode of The Inner Chief, you’ll hear from Eric Morris, CEO of The PAS Group, on culture shocks, lessons from sport and treading your own path.
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Eric has been CEO of The PAS Group since its inception in 2005 and has led nine of the Group’s acquisitions and the successful integration of the Group’s businesses.
He has held senior executive positions at the likes of Myer, Walt Disney International, Reebok International in both Hong Kong and Cape Town, and Woolworths South Africa. In total, he has over 36 years’ experience in retail, wholesale/supply, licensing, manufacturing and distribution.
In this episode we talk all about:
- His amazing journey working in different countries and the various culture shocks he had to endure;
- How sport has shaped his leadership style;
- Taking the leap of faith and going out on your own; and
- Finding positivity and navigating a new world post-COVID.
Connecting with Eric Morris You can connect with Eric via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Legacy - by James Kerr * Good to Great - by Jim Collins * Mindset - by Carol Dweck
Our topic today is coaching principles.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/205
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We look at three really powerful principles that you can use when leading your people or even coaching a client.
We’re going to talk about:
- Helping someone to create a congruent future vision of themselves;
- Ownership of all insights; and
- Believing in everyone’s ability to be great.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this fourth episode of our Best of Series, you’ll hear from Vivek Bhatia, CEO of Link Group, on lifelong learning, going beyond your job description, and having your antenna on.
chiefmaker.com/204
Vivek is currently the CEO of financial services firm Link Group, but was the CEO of iCare when we interviewed him back in July 2017.
He has over two decades of experience in financial services, government and management consulting, having also been CEO of Wesfarmers Insurance and the QBE Insurance Group APAC.
Vivek holds an undergraduate degree in engineering, a post graduate in business administration and is a Chartered Financial Analyst.
He is an Indian migrant and this episode is an inspiring story of how after arriving in Australia, he rose above the pack to become a CEO in just 10 years.
In this episode we talk all about:
- How to treat your boss like your most important customer;
- Looking for other opportunities in the business and going above your role description;
- What the most effective use of a leader’s time is; and
- Always having your antenna on.
Connecting with Vivek Bhatia You can connect with Vivek via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Road to Character - by David Brooks * Vivek’s nominated charity is The Starlight Foundation and I made a donation of $250 in Vivek’s name for coming on the show
Our topic today is powerful coaching questions.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/203
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I've been a coach now for nearly 14 years and throughout that time, what you learn to be is really good at asking questions and at interviewing people. The reason is because you have to be curious and you've got to listen very carefully to what people say, the pitch and tone of the voice when they say things, where their attention is, their nonverbal cues, and their body language that goes with it.
Remember, all leaders are effectively coaches. That means you, Chief, are also a coach. So when you're leading your people, or when you are even self-reflecting on your own career and challenges, have these questions somewhere to call upon regularly.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this third episode of our Best of Series, you’ll hear from Daniel Hunter, CEO of Business NSW, on the new breed of CEO, purposeful storytelling and building teams.
chiefmaker.com/202
Daniel is currently the CEO of Business NSW, but was the CEO of HealthShare NSW when we interviewed him back in June 2017.
His previous senior management roles include CFO of Services NSW, and two executive roles at Sydney Water, namely General Manager of Transformation and General Manager of People Leadership and Culture.
Daniel was our third ever Chief to be interviewed on the podcast and in this episode we talk all about:
- How the ‘command and control’ CEO is being replaced by a humble, empathetic one;
- Bringing a sense of purpose to the organisation through story-telling;
- Giving your leaders and their teams some space to achieve the organisation’s goals;
- Getting comfortable with uncomfortable conversations, and avoiding wasting time on people who don’t want to develop.
Connecting with Daniel Hunter You can connect with Daniel via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Good to Great - by Jim Collins * Recent article on COVID-19 in the Sydney Morning Herald featuring Daniel Hunter * Daniel nominated Running for Premature Babies for his charity and I have donated $250 in his name.
In this second episode of our Best of Series, you’ll hear from Mike Pratt AM, Secretary of Treasury in the NSW Government, on being well prepared, disciplined, transparent and keeping integrity in everything you do.
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Mike is currently the Secretary of the Treasury in the NSW Government. He is also the former Deputy Chancellor of Western Sydney University (WSU), a former Chairman of Bennelong Funds Management, and a former President of the Australian Institute of Banking & Finance.
His previous senior management roles include CEO of Consumer and SME Banking North East Asia with Standard Chartered Bank, Group Executive of Westpac Business & Consumer Banking, CEO of Bank of Melbourne, CEO of NAB’s Retail Financial Services arm, and CEO of Bank of New Zealand.
Mike was honoured as a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in the Queen’s Birthday 2016 Honours List, recognised as a role model for Australian society for providing significant service to public administration through reforms in customer service and communication, and also to the finance and banking industry.
Mike was our second ever Chief to be interviewed on the podcast, back in June 2017 and in this episode we talk all about:
- Why lifelong learning, including learning about yourself, is a critical discipline;
- The moments of truth when applying your core values;
- Celebrating success; and
- Having a network of people throughout the organisation.
Connecting with Mike Pratt AM You can connect with Mike via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * Leading Change - by John Kotter * The Long Walk to Freedom - by Nelson Mandela * The Service Profit Chain - by Heskett and Sasser
Mike nominated Plan International for his charity and I have donated $250 in his name.
Our topic today is the lessons learnt from 200 episodes.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/200
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It's a significant milestone to make it to 200 episodes. Right at the beginning, one of my podcasting mentors said to me not to bother unless I was going to give it 5 years. And here we are 4 years later. So today is a tribute to the CEOs and gurus we have had on the show, and a tribute to each of you who have followed and engaged with the podcast. Here are the 5 lessons:
- There is no such thing as an overnight success
- You learn the most when you climb without ropes
- It's not what you do, but how you do it
- Get really good at one thing
- Spend as much time with the highest calibre of people
Thank you again from all of us at The Chief Maker. Here's to another 200 episodes!
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode of our Best of Series, you’ll hear from Kevin Young, former MD of Sydney Water on how to seize the future, be proactive and take risks and how this will help you be successful in the modern business world.
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Kevin has been a CEO for over 13 years and is also the former MD of Hunter Water and sits on the board of Wateraid International. He was the MD of Sydney Water for 8 years, which is Australia’s biggest utility with turnover of over $2.6B and more than 2,500 employees.
We talk all about:
- How a manager is someone who achieves things through others;
- Being humble but maintaining fierce resolve;
- Deciding who should be on the bus with you; and
- Having a reputation of being a team player who has a track record.
Connecting with Kevin Young You can connect with Kevin via LinkedIn.
Books and resources * The Advantage - by Patrick Lencioni
Kevin nominated www.wateraid.org for his charity and I have donated $250 in his name.
Our topic today is the silver bullet in your business - strategy on a page.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/198
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This week, we’re going to be talking about the silver bullet story, and what you can do in order to change the game in your work. I’m going to share with you a story from one of my most important clients in the transformation he’s been leading. This is a true story and one that happened very recently, and it is one that really hits home on the importance of knowing the right moves to make as a leader.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, our guest is Aiden Wollner, CEO of Away Digital Home, on Talent Density, Meditation For Busy People, And Embracing Technology.
chiefmaker.com/197
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We talk all about:
- The importance of honesty in business;
- Talent density and finding star employees;
- Meditation techniques for busy individuals; and
- Embracing technological opportunities and turning them into meaningful strategies.
Connecting with Aiden Wollner You can connect with Aiden via LinkedIn. You can also find out more about Away Digital Home.
Books and resources * No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention - by Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer * Transcendental Meditation
In this episode, our guest is Elizabeth McIntyre, Group CEO of Think Brick on Eclectic Track Records, Creative Partnerships And Victory Through Tenacity.
chiefmaker.com/196
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We talk all about:
- How she has built a stellar track record despite an eclectic career path;
- Why a lack of resources was vital for stimulating creativity and innovation;
- Brainstorming your dream C-Suite role; and
- Lessons from Harvard and how being tenacious will get you heard as a marketing executive.
Connecting with Elizabeth McIntyre
You can connect with Elizabeth via LinkedIn. You can also find out more about Think Brick.
Books and resources
- The Alchemist - by Paulo Coelho
- Talking to Strangers - by Malcolm Gladwell
- The Art of War - Sun Tzu
- Bill Gates’ reading list
In this episode, our guest is Shelly Park, CEO of Australian Red Cross Lifeblood on the loneliness of leadership, gifting humanity and transforming an organisation.
chiefmaker.com/195
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We talk all about:
- How being the leader of an organisation can be a lonely place but how she has created peer networks;
- Leading with purpose in an organisation where giving blood is the ultimate gift of humanity;
- Why patience in your career progression is the quickest way to the top;
- Transforming her organisation into the modern world, navigating through COVID and accountability to taxpayers.
Connecting with Shelly Park
You can connect with Shelly via LinkedIn. And if you’d like to donate blood, you can find all the info you need on the Australian Red Cross Lifeblood website, LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram or on any of the above channels using the hashtag #lifebloodau
Books and resources
Why Should Anyone Be Led by You? - by Robert Goffee and Gareth Jones (Harvard Business Review)
In this episode, our guest is Wayne Smith, Senior Sports Writer on professional mastery, journalistic integrity and Australian rugby.
chiefmaker.com/194
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We talk all about:
- Choosing the path of professional mastery over senior leadership positions;
- Making decisions on whether to publish a story or not, or taking an angle that is at odds with your employer;
- How a stroke a few years ago impacted his life and focusing on what’s important in life;
- Then we go into some rugby chat, including his Super Rugby predictions for 2021, the future of Australian rugby and his thoughts on some of the potential star players at the next Rugby World Cup.
Connecting with Wayne Smith
You can view more of Wayne’s articles via his author profile on The Australian.
Books and resources
- 1984 - by George Orwell
In this episode, our guest is Peter Thurin, Speaker, Mentor, Coach on his business tagline, “Easy to Do, Easy Not to Do - Your Choice!”
chiefmaker.com/193
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We talk all about:
- How his father instilled an insatiable work ethic in him from a young age;
- Why customer care is at the heart of everything;
- Taking action simply starts with a first step;
- A few stories that personify his catch-phrase, “Easy to do. Easy not to do. Your choice”.
Connecting with Peter Thurin
You can contact Peter via LinkedIn or go to his website, peterthurin.com.
Books and resources
- Be the best you can be - by Peter Thurin
- The Slight Edge - Jeff Olson
In this episode, we meet with Jason Ritterman, CEO of Away Teams on Major Career Crossroads Moments and How to Outsource Talent.
chiefmaker.com/192
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We talk all about:
- How he handled two career crossroads moments
- Handling being retrenched during Covid
- Being offered a role out of the blue that was potentially life-changing
- Becoming the CEO of an off-shoring business
- Getting remote talent engaged the RIGHT way.
Connecting with Jason Ritterman
You can reach Jason via LinkedIn
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
How I Built This Podcast - by Guy Raz
In this episode, we meet with Sarah Prime, CEO of Champions Academy on total burn out, reigniting the community and being a role model.
www.chiefmaker.com/191
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We talk all about:
- Rebuilding her life from the memories of her youth
- Her rapid rise to CEO role and the complete and utter burn out that almost cost her her life
- How everyone is a mentor ALL of the time, whether you choose to be or not
- Her work with communities and how we can rebuild the social fabric of our own ones together.
In this episode, we meet Jack Slade, Managing Director of Luxity Media on being an accidental entrepreneur, saying no to increase revenues, and the future of new media.
Go to: chiefmaker.com/190
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Jack founded 'Boss Hunting', which is now one of Australia's most popular men's lifestyle websites. Out of this, Luxity Media was born, a new media company that now reaches over half a million men across the country, every month. Luxity also owns the titles The Versatile Gent and All The Young Dads.
Originally from Melbourne, Jack spent five years in London in an IT company, but is now based in Sydney.
In this episode we talk about:
- How Jack became an accidental entrepreneur and some of the epic adventures he and his team have been on;
- The increase in revenues that resulted from saying no;
- Growing and maintaining the culture of a small enterprise; and
- The future of new media.
Connecting with Jack Slade
You can reach Jack via LinkedIn or by email: jack@luxity.com.au
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
Zero to One - by Peter Thiel
In this episode, we meet with Kristen Podagiel, Managing Partner of McCullough Robertson and talk about how to never die wondering and failing fast.
www.chiefmaker.com/189
We talk all about:
- How she has made every post a winner in the law profession
- How she boldly leads change with a very personal and caring style
- The future of the law profession
- Asking yourself, "If not you, then who?
- Getting comfortable being uncomfortable to accelerate your impact and career
Our topics this week is “Mindfulness”
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/188
This is our first installment in the High Performance in Isolation series and it is all about Mindfulness. Today I’ll outline:
- What is mindfulness and why is it so important in lockdown for resilience
- What I learnt from the Shaolin monks in overcoming some of the common challenges in achieving mindfulness
- The best strategies to build mindfulness
- The role of flow in improving mindfulness
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How to us journaling as a tool to build mindfulness
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Thank you again to our episode sponsors - SSKB
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- Since 1995, SSKB have been making a positive difference to our strata communities. Servicing clients through Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria, we have a broad portfolio of schemes under management and are continually striving to make strata living as easy and seamless as possible for our clients.”
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Ron Gauci, Ron is the current CEO of AIIA, Chairman of Vic Sport and Brad Teal Real-Estate. He is also the former CEO of Fed Square, Melbourne Polytechnic, Melbourne Storm and MD of Verizon Australia.
See more at www.chiefmaker.com/187
Ron has become famous for his track record in turning around organisations and setting them on the path to fantastic success. He has been called Mr Fix-It and The Turnround CEO.
- We talk all about
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- The stories of some of his major turnarounds and the key principles that guided him
- His three step process for launching turnarounds
- How to have the difficult conversations and get buy-in from a wide range of often highly emotional stakeholders
Our topics this week is “Building Your Own Resilience Playbook”
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/186
This is our first installment in the High Performance in Isolation series and it is all about Building Your Own Resilience Playbook. Today I’ll outline:
- Why your current playbook (you do in fact have one even if you dont know it) according to Mike Tyson is out of date
- What I learn from living with the Shaolin Kung Fu monks that can translate to isolation with kids running around, work and isolation from friends and family
- How to builds your own new playbook with mantras and actions to trigger yourself into a more resourceful state of mind and flow
Thank you again to our episode sponsors - SSKB
-
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- Since 1995, SSKB have been making a positive difference to our strata communities. Servicing clients through Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria, we have a broad portfolio of schemes under management and are continually striving to make strata living as easy and seamless as possible for our clients.”
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Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Katrina McCarter, CEO and Founder of Marketing to Mums. Katrina is a world-wide authority on marketing to mums the most powerful consumer in the world.
Go to: chiefmaker.com/185
Katrina has recently completed a comprehensive study into how Covid-19 has effected Mum. We’ll cover;
- How the crisis has effected Mums purchasing behaviour
- How they’re handling remote learning and work
- What you need to do to lead and work with Mums better
- Some keys to marketing and delivering services to Mums
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com/score-card
DOWNLOAD THE #ISOMUMS REPORT HERE: www.marketingtomums.com.au
In this episode, we meet Jonathan Barouch, serial entrepreneur and the founder and CEO of Local Measure. Jonathan was also the founder of fastflowers.com.au one of Australia’s first e-commerce companies and is an ambassador for the Sydney Story Factory.
www.chiefmaker.com/184
We talk all about:
- What he learned from his early days starting, growing and selling one of Australia’s first e-commerce companies
- What most companies get wrong in measuring customer service
- How technology has helped transform the way we measure and engage with customer in real-time
- The importance of aligning technology and culture
- How employee experience is following the same path
- What the best leaders are doing right now to lead through the crisis
In this episode, we meet Patrick Coghlan, CEO and founding employee at, CreditorWatch.com.au. We talk about:
-
- Lessons from mentors on how to stay motivated and be valuable to your company
- How to interview candidates and find the best fit for your team
- The impending economic crisis as government support packages are phased out and what you need to do as a business to protect yourself and assist your business partners
- www.chiefmaker.com/183
Our topics this week is How to Have a Deeper Conversation with a Mate
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/182
Many of you will be experiencing some very challenging times mentally. Or be aware that perhaps a friend is going through a difficult time.
- This episode was recorded for The Universal Man podcast in honour of one our fallen brothers. It is all about how to have a deeper conversation with a friend. Either for your benefit or theirs.
- I've reposted here in its raw form. I know both men and women alike will get something from the wisdom of all the men who contributed.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Hayley Blieden, Founder, Chief Dietician and CEO at Australian Super Food Company. We talk about:
- How she discovered the incredible native foods that indigenous Australians have harvested for thousands of years
- The 3 years of research to bring new australian super foods to market
- The critical pivot they made which saved their business
- The project they’re leading across regional australia to bring consistent supply to market and create sustainable jobs in the regions for indigenous aussies and farmer
In this episode, we meet Cort Davies, Founder of 1 Habit, Cancer Thriver and Stress Management Expert and we talk about:
- The mental and biological side of stress that we all must understand
- The role of stress in cancer outcomes and stress management in improving survival rates
- What is stress doing to us and society
- What you can do to fundamentally reduce the amount of stress in your life
Our topics this week is Lessons from the Book Recommendations of Great Chiefs
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/179
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: chiefmaker.com/scorecard
- So what we’re going to cover today is:
- The power of a book;
- The 5 themes and 3 major topics;
- What to do if you don't like reading (like some of our chiefs)
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode we meet Michael Fox, CEO Shoes of Prey and Fable Food on lessons from research, creating a memorable stories and food with a purpose
Go to: chiefmaker.com/178
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com/score-card
We talk about:
- The Rise and Fall of Shoes of Prey
- The harsh lessons in consumer research and behaviour that we all must know
- Lessons from pivoting in hard times
- How he restarted his career after a purposeful break
- Combining passion into your work
- How Fable Food is carving a high quality presence in the meat replacement market
Our topic today Sinking Ship to Market Domination - The Four Stages of Transformation .
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/177
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: chiefmaker.com/scorecard
- So what we’re going to cover today is:
-
- How to go from a sinking ship to market domination;
- The different leadership style required in each stage; and
- What top do in each stage to get through it;
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Peter Scott, former Chief of Submarines for the Royal Australian Navy on Leadership in high stakes environments and keeping purpose alive in your team.
Go to: chiefmaker.com/176
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Peter Scott joined the Royal Australian Navy as a Midshipman in 1983. Commodore Scott’s led active service in Iraq, the Persian Gulf and Afghanistan. He was awarded a Commendation for Distinguished Service in the Australia Day Honours having previously been decorated with the Conspicuous Service Cross.
Commodore Scott served as Director General Submarines and Head of the Submarine Profession and was appointed as the inaugural Director, Defence NSW in June 2017.
Scott lives in Sydney and enjoys spending time with his wife Shaunaugh Worthington, their daughter Laura and the family dogs. His outdoor interests include cycling and competing in the occasional ultra marathon.
In this episode, he shares plenty of incredible stories from his time in the service and he outlines the five essential elements to submarine command:
- Combine knowledge and skill with experience;
- Exercise lucid judgment;
- make sound decisions;
- provide effective direction; and
- inspire your people.
Many of you will find yourself in a situation where your boss and the executive team are scrambling to save the business and wondering what it is you can to help. In this episode I outline:
-
The mindset you need to bring
-
The opportunity this presents to pursue major personal projects
-
Shifting roles
-
Re-educating yourself
-
Running innovation sessions
We are all in this together Chief. Together all of us can create a better world when we come through the crisis.
Stay epic
Our topic today is how to respond to crisis like a Chief.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/174
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: chiefmaker.com/scorecard
Today we will cover:
- The difference between fear and opportunity;
- The mindset of a Chief in a crisis; and
- 5 powerful principles to guide on how you should respond to crisis.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Kevin Gaskell, Former CEO of Porsche, Lamborghini and BMW on Transforming customer experience, driving extraordinary results, and daring to dream.
Go to: chiefmaker.com/173
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Kevin, who is currently Chairman of ITS Technology Group, is an experienced executive and sought-after conference speaker in the fields of leadership in challenging environments, creating extraordinary teams and building high performing companies.
As MD of Porsche GB he led Porsche from close to bankruptcy to the UK’s most profitable importer within 5 years, while as MD of BMW (GB) he helped improve sales by 80% and profitability by 500% during his 4 year tenure.
His company 'The Inspired Leaders Group' supports business leaders and their teams as they navigate the route to growth and success.
He is also an adventurer, having walked unsupported, with his son, to both the North and South Poles and recently rowed across the Atlantic Ocean in world record time.
In this episode we talk about:
- How he transformed the customer experience after taking the reins at Porsche;
- His method of Commit, Connect and Create when driving extraordinary results;
- The simple act of daring to dream; and
- His incredible story of crossing the Atlantic in an ocean rowing boat.
Connecting with Kevin Gaskell
You can reach Kevin via LinkedIn.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- What they don't teach you at Harvard Business School - by Mark McCormack
- Close to the Wind - by Pete Goss
- Inspired Leadership - by Kevin Gaskell
Our topic today is how to deal with Wayne Kerr.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/172
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Today we will cover:
- Why Wayne Kerr's real world behaviour is a reflection of their inner chief;
- 3 steps to dealing with the person effectively; and
- Spreading the love by helping them overcome their own challenges.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Suzie Shaw, Managing Director of We Are Social on Life and lessons in an advertising agency, why networking is working, and owning your career.
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Suzie is the Managing Director of the socially-led creative agency, We Are Social. She is a strategic and creative thinker with extensive comms and marketing experience both in Australia and the UK, across a broad range of categories.
She is passionate about championing the progress of women in leadership and is the founder of SWIMM Australia (Senior Women in Media and Marketing).
Suzie was named one of The Australian’s top 50 Women in Media, was featured in AdNews’ 40 under 40 and also AdNews’ Women of Influence.
In this episode we talk about:
- A day in the life of an ad agency and the lessons she learnt about the industry;
- Why networking is actually working and how it can enhance decision-making;
- How to own your career by being brave; and
- The good, the bad, the ugly of social media.
Connecting with Suzie Shaw
You can reach Suzie via LinkedIn.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Lean In - by Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO
- Her blog called “What do I know?”
Our topic today is "How to get motivated again."
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/170
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: chiefmaker.com/scorecard
Today we will cover:
- Reasons why you’ve lost your motivation already this year;
- What can happen to you if you don’t change your trajectory; and
- A few simple methods to get back on track and win the year!
Stay epic,
Greg
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance.
This week we meet Stirling Mortlock, former Wallabies’ captain on going from amateur to professional, Rugby World Cup and connecting success.
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Stirling is an Australian Rugby Legend and now a Partner at Unio Advisors.
In this episode, we talk about:
- The transition from amateur to professional
- Giving and receiving feedback
- Being curious and the mindset to constantly be better
- Setting goals and his mentors
- Rugby world cup tips
- Some of his best and worst moments in the gold jersey
- Who he feared the most and how he looked to dominate the competition.
Connecting with Stirling Mortlock
You can reach Stirlo via LinkedIn and his company’s website, Unio Advisors.
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance. In this episode we cover the power of high performance lifecycles and how to use them to automate the pursuit of excellence. The pursuit of excellence lies at the heart of all great performers. It means mastering your craft and continually working to improve yourself. It also means leading your team to work collectively to improve itself. The long term benefits have an incredible compound effect on your ability to get results and rise above the pack. I outline: - the Prepare, Perform, Recover, Review (P2R2) Lifecycle - How to lock this into as a system that drives performance - How to optimise each step - Some tricks to stay focused and embed the system
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance.
In this episode, we meet Cameron Schwab, 25 Year CEO of AFL Clubs on Leading in High Stakes Environments, Hard Decisions and Creating High Performance Systems.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/135
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Cameron was appointed CEO of the famous Richmond Football Club at age 24, the youngest in the history of the game.
For the next 25 years, he was CEO of Richmond, Melbourne and Fremantle, when those clubs were at their lowest ebb, both on and off the field. He is the second longest serving CEO in the modern game.
Having taken on some of the sport’s most difficult and daunting challenges, Cameron established a track record of building teams and organisations, unifying groups while navigating periods of genuine adversity and complexity.
In this episode we talk about:
- The question you need to ask yourself to see if you’re ready for a promotion
- The lessons he learned from the hardest decisions you can make - firing a close personal friend
- How to implement systems that drive performance
- What we can learn from sport and what isn’t so transferrable
- What we can all learn from fine art about life and work.
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance.
In this episode I talk about confidence and the critical role it plays in performance and career progression. The topics is huge and I’ve split it out of over two minisodes. In this episode we’ll focus on 7 big blockers that most of us can take practical action to turnaround if pay close attention to our performance.
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance.
In this episode, we meet Janine Shepherd AM, Resilience and Motivation guru on Cultivating gratitude, the 12 Pillars of Resilience and healing through laughter.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/136
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Janine was an Australian cross country skier, when in 1986, while training for the Winter Olympics on her bike in the Blue Mountains near Sydney, she was hit by a speeding truck. She broke multiple bones in her body, lost 5 litres of blood and spent the next 6 months in the spinal unit of a hospital where she began her long journey from probable death to recovery.
While learning to walk again, she gained her private and commercial pilot’s licences and has gone on to receive an instructor rating, an aerobatics rating and seaplane rating.
Janine has also completed multiple academic qualifications and written 6 books, inspired films and coached and spoken to millions of people.
She has 3 children, and received the Order of Australia (AM) in 2001 and the Outstanding Young Person of the World in 1998.
In this episode we talk about:
- How the power of cultivating gratitude and the gift of acceptance got her through her hospital experience;
- How letting go of her former identity helped her discover a new one beyond her wildest dreams;
- The resilience she developed while going through a marriage breakup, financial disaster and moving countries;
- Finding laughter and rewiring your brain for a different experience of life; and
- How the ketogenic diet helped her become pain-free.
Connecting with Janine Shepherd AM
You can reach Janine on her website and can find her various books on Amazon.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Janine’s TED Talk - A broken body isn't a broken person
- Defiant - by Janine Shepherd AM
- Test Your Resilience
- The Brain that Changes Itself - by Norman Doidge
- The 30-Day Ketogenic Cleanse - by Maria Emmerich
- Articles by Steve Phinney
- Anatomy of an Illness - by Norman Cousins
- Man's Search for Meaning - by Viktor Frankl
- Power of Now - by Eckhart Tolle
- New Earth - by Eckhart Tolle
- The Hero’s Journey - by Joseph Campbell
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance.
In this episode I talk about confidence and the critical role it plays in performance and career progression. The topics is huge and I’ve split it out of over two minisodes. In this episode we’ll focus on 7 big blockers that most of us can take practical action to turnaround if pay close attention to our performance.
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance.
In this episode, we meet Ali Terai, Founder & CEO of Future Golf on turning lemons into lemonade, business gestation and value exchange.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/138
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com.au/score-card
Ali founded Future Golf, a passion-driven business launched with less than $200 and a Facebook post, which is now one of Australia’s fastest growing startups
He also founded The Inspire Project, teaching young people Entrepreneurship, and has authored, crowdfunded and published a children’s book called A Little Penguin’s Guide to Life.
If that’s not enough, Ali has founded and launched a wallet, travel blog, pop-up burger restaurant, pub-crawl company, professional preparation program and number of smaller golf ventures.
He was a winner at the 2019 Telstra Business Awards and has been nominated for various other awards.
In this episode we talk about:
- How an eager young Ali found a loophole in the system of selling The AFL’s matchday program, The Record, and how he “turned lemons into lemonade”;
- How he has built passion-based businesses and loves speaking to young people about transformation;
- Why he spent a long time on the sidelines waiting for the businesses to gestate before jumping in full-time; and
- The value-exchange business models he has devised and how they have evolved.
Connecting with Ali Terai
You can reach Ali on LinkedIn and through his websites, Future Golf and AliTerai.com.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- The Lean Startup - by Eric Ries
- The E-Myth Contractor - by Michael Gerber
- The 4-Hour Workweek - by Tim Ferriss
- A Little Penguin’s Guide to Life - by Ali Terai
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance.
Take 3 deep breaths before you listen to this episode. Centre the soul. The 'busy-ness' syndrome is in plague proportions and is driving so many managers towards burn-out, low quality work, strained relationships and disconnecting from their purpose and meaning. Recovery is our great weapon in bringing our true spirit and greatest performances to the table. Without effective recovery we can not perform at our best and we look like we need development rather than a promotion. In this episode I cover the importance of recovery and a range of 'active' and 'passive' recovery techniques that work in the corporate world.
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance.
In this episode we hear from Golf Coaching legend Peter Knight on mastering your craft.
Peter Knight is one of only four master golf professionals in Australia. He is the author of Iron Golf Mind and has over 25 of years successfully coaching at State and National level as well as driving golf programmes for the Australian Institute of Sport, Golf Australia, Taiwan Golf, Golf Victoria, NSW Golf and NSW Institute of Sport.
In 2012 he was one of three coaches in Victoria recognised for his contribution to coaching in Australia over the past 100 years.
His book is called Iron Golf Mind: Five lessons to achieve an amazingly strong mindset for golf. And might I add - your career and life in general.
During this far reaching interview we explore:
- His 5 C's of Optimal Performance - Confidence, Concentration, Commitment, Composure and Competitiveness
- What is mastery and how you can apply it in your work
- How do you build the right routines around your performances
- The most important question you should ask yourself everyday if you want to master your profession
You can connect with Peter on Facebook here @MelbourneGolfCoach.
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance. We kick things off with a repeat of a one of our most popular episodes...
In this episode we talk about executing your Life Vision as part 2. If you haven’t listened to Episode 57 of building your Life Vision I’d recommend doing that first.
There is an old saying, “Vision without execution is just a dream”.
And, chief, I’ve got a confession so make this was me. I was a dreamer with all sorts of grand ideas about who or what I’d become. I always had new ideas and goals that all seemed to flow from my creative mind.
I was the line from poem “George Gray” by Edgar Lee Masters that I read in Ep 57 on building your life vision...“a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.” I was stuck in my own sheltered harbour. Not willing to do the hard work break the boundaries, to look inside myself at the things I liked about myself the least or the limiting beliefs I held and grow beyond them.
It was only when I realised that all greatness requires challenge. It will requires a thousand steps one after the other to change my game. One must have a vision and one must execute. I’ve seen too many people with only one part of the pie.
In Life Vision Part 1 we did some dreaming and created your life vision. Now we focus on execution. We take specific planned action towards our goals.
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance.
In this episode, we meet Neil Craig, AFL Coach and England Rugby High Performance Manager on high performance environments, your North Star and decision-making under pressure.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/123
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com.au/score-card
Neil is best known as being a former Australian rules footballer and as the Head Coach of the Adelaide Crows Football Club.
His other stints in the AFL have included being the fitness adviser at the Crows, and having various coaching roles at the Melbourne Demons, Essendon Bombers and Carlton Blues.
Since 2017, he has been England Rugby’s High Performance Manager under the head coach Eddie Jones.
In this episode we talk about:
- What a high performance environment is and how to create one;
- Why knowing your North Star - your purpose and values - is critical to success;
- How to make complex decisions under pressure; and
- Why leadership is not about you, but all about you.
Connecting with Neil Craig You can reach Neil on LinkedIn.
Thanks to Peter Knight for recommending Neil.
Welcome to the 2020 Summer Series as we take a bring you the best of the best episodes on from the world of elite sport and performance. We kick things off with a repeat of a one of our most popular episodes... In this episode we build your own Life & Career Vision.
"George Gray"
I have studied many times
The marble which was chiseled for me--
A boat with a furled sail at rest in a harbor.
In truth it pictures not my destination
But my life.
For love was offered me and I shrank from its disillusionment;
Sorrow knocked at my door, but I was afraid;
Ambition called to me, but I dreaded the chances.
Yet all the while I hungered for meaning in my life.
And now I know that we must lift the sail
And catch the winds of destiny
Wherever they drive the boat.
To put meaning in one's life may end in madness,
But life without meaning is the torture
Of restlessness and vague desire--
It is a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.
- Edgar Lee Masters, 1868 - 1950
To leave the harbour chief we must start with a destination. One that inspires us and drives us to personal greatness. In this episode we will talk through creating your own Life Vision. The very first time I did a vision board was in 2007. It was a transformative period of my life and I was reading self-help books by the dozen. They ALL said you need a vision. Without it you simply don’t know what direction you’re going. They said it’s like when you decide you want to go away for a weekend and what you do first is imagine what the perfect weekend would be like you create a vision in your head. Then you go about finding the right region, accommodation and activities that’ll help you achieve your vision. It all starts with vision. Without the vision you don’t even leave your home in the first place.
This is part 3 of a 3-part series on Career Crossroads and our topic today is make smart moves.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/156
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Today we will cover:
- How to create multiple options and actions whether you stay or go from your current role;
- Ensure you’re covering all of your bases to enable smart decision-making; and
- Get your “chief mindset” working well before you need to make your move.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Craig Murphy, Chief HR Officer of Henley Properties on the role of HR in a modern business, the business of people, and getting business transformation right.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com/155
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Craig’s full title is the General Manager, Customer, People and Culture at Henley Homes, a role he has held since July 2016.
He has significant multi-industry experience in telecommunications, mining, steel manufacturing, and property development and construction.
Craig is also a Certified Professional of the Australian HR Institute (CAHRI), an expert advisor to the People & Leadership Committee of Victoria University and Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
His expertise lies in HR strategy development and deployment, organization design & restructuring, union negotiation, learning & development and leadership of global HR teams.
In this episode we talk about:
- How employees can bring their unique value proposition to work every day;
- The role of HR in a modern business;
- Not forgetting that resources are humans too; and
- How to absolutely nail business transformation!
Connecting with Craig Murphy
You can reach Craig via LinkedIn.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- The Coaching Habit - by Michael Stanier
- The New HR Leader’s First 100 Days - by Alan Collins
This is part 2 of a 3-part series on Career Crossroads and our topic today is identifying the problem.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/154
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Today we will cover:
- A framework to identify the root cause of the problems you’re experiencing in your current role;
- We’ll look at how to evaluate the pros and cons of 3 areas in this process; and
- How to make the ultimate decision of staying or going from your current role.
Stay epic,
Greg
Our topic today is Should I stay or should I go? This is part 1 of a 3-part series on Career Crossroads.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/153
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: chiefmaker.com/scorecard
Today we will cover:
- A framework to help you to decide whether you should stay or go from your current role;
- We’ll discuss how to derive your career and life vision; and
- A process for defining your ideal role.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we talk with our resident spiritual guru, Damien Price.
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This is the third time we’ve had Pricey on the show; you can check out previous episodes by going to chiefmaker.com/31 and chiefmaker.com/101.
Damien is a Christian Brother and has taught for over thirty years in schools throughout Australia and New Zealand. Over the past twenty years he has been involved in working with disadvantaged youth, homeless men and women, refugees and Asylum Seekers.
He has Masters Degrees in Counselling and Pastoral Guidance. I have known Damien for 25+ years and he is my own spiritual mentor.
In this episode we talk about:
- Getting into the Christmas spirit with RAKs - Random Acts of Kindness;
- Why RAKs are a gift received not a gift given;
- Growing every day in your sense of self; and
- Recognising when your values are being compromised and staying true to them under pressure.
Connecting with Damien Price
You can reach Damien via LinkedIn.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
Don't die with the music in you - by Wayne Bennett
Our topic today is how to finish the decade strong.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/151
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: chiefmaker.com/scorecard
Today we will cover:
- We’ll discuss why you still have time to change some habits and finish 2019 strong; and
- The 3 areas of your life you can work on now that will set up 2020 with a bang.
And to celebrate getting to 150 Inner Chief episodes, I also mention a discount code for my Chief Maker Academy course titled Game Plan, which will help get your life back on track.
Stay epic,
Greg
Our topic today is How to Define and Leave a Legacy.
For more info check out chiefmaker.com/150
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: chiefmaker.com/scorecard
Today we will cover:
- We’ll discuss a few examples of others and how they have left a legacy;
- What legacy is and what it isn’t; and
- A few ways you can leave a legacy without turning your life upside down or quitting your job tomorrow.
And to celebrate getting to 150 Inner Chief episodes, I also mention a discount code for my course, Game Plan, which will help get your life back on track.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Josh Ellis, Editor-in-chief of SUCCESS Magazine on Learning from other great chiefs, getting ahead quickly and keeping it simple.
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SUCCESS is an American newsstand magazine that since 1897 has been devoted to the personal and professional growth of its readers.
An accomplished sportswriter before joining the SUCCESS staff in 2012, he originally served as the magazine’s features editor before being named to the top position in 2015.
In the years since, he built a staff that has won industry awards, including two nominations for editorial team of the year, and in 2017 the trade journal Folio named him a 30-under-30 honoree and one of the 100 most influential people in the magazine industry.
In this episode we talk about:
- What factors separate successful people from the rest;
- How to achieve balance in life, particularly as a leader;
- Why his age hasn’t hindered his achievements; and
- The fallacies of success and what to look out for.
Connecting with Josh Ellis
You can reach Josh via LinkedIn. But the best way to connect is via Twitter.
Our greatest thanks go to James Whittaker for connecting us to Josh.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- https://www.success.com/how-jamie-foxx-became-unstoppable/
- https://www.success.com/the-tim-ferriss-way-life-is-a-choose-your-own-adventure-game/
- https://www.success.com/what-happened-when-i-tried-to-cut-the-negative-people-out-of-my-life/
Our topic today is Promotion Speed Formula
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com/148
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com/score-card
Today we will cover:
- A formula that will help you or a colleague or mentee get promoted faster.
- We’ll discuss how your track record of achieving results is key to proving your measurable value; and
- The 5 elements of your entourage and why they are important in the context of promotion.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Joe DeMaria, founder of Teach To Scale on the art of learning, career excellence and value creators.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/147
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com.au/score-card
Joe DeMaria is the creator of "Dynamic Ascension Training" which is an 80/20 teaching system that focuses on breaking down even the most complicated skill sets into simple digestible training programs.
He is one of the most sought after course creation consultants on the planet -- having worked to create dozens of Dynamic Ascension Training Programs for high-end entrepreneurs, coaches, and consultants.
His company Teach To Scale also creates corporate learning and development programs to minimize training costs, recruiting costs, and ramp-up time for new or transitioning employees.
In this episode we talk about:
- How an illegal soda can business at the age of 9 ignited his early entrepreneurial spirit;
- The art of learning and how he researched his theories which he put into practice;
- How creating toy problems aligns with striving for career excellence; and
- The importance of being a value creator.
Connecting with Joe DeMaria
You can reach Joe via LinkedIn. Otherwise, if you have any questions for Joe, sign up at his website, Teach To Scale.
Our greatest thanks go to Alex Mandossian for connecting us to Joe.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Art of Learning - by Josh Waitzkin
Our topic today is “No, it won't be better after we get through this!”
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com/146
Today we will cover:
- How to create a pattern interrupt when times get busy;
- The framework I use that you can use too to manage your time and energy when you can’t see the wood for the trees;
- Doing your job well and doing it with grace, despite the hurricane happening at work.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Greg Dickason, Managing Director Pacific of LexisNexis on career opportunities, getting out of your comfort zone and the future of technology in business.
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In July 2019, Greg took on the role of Managing Director Pacific of LexisNexis, the leading provider of Content, Analytics and Software solutions for Legal, Risk and Compliance.
His previous positions were as CTO with CoreLogic RP Data, while earlier in his career, Greg held senior management positions at Virgin Mobile UK and Unisys.
In this episode we talk about:
- Taking career-defining opportunities by getting out of his comfort zone and moving countries;
- His top 3 tips for getting out of a stalling career;
- How he gets his executive team and their teams to focus on the most important tasks; and
- The future of technology, particularly AI and big data, and what this means for business.
Connecting with Greg Dickason
You can reach Greg via LinkedIn. You can read more about his company on the LexisNexis website.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten - by Robert Fulghum
- Maybe (Maybe Not) - by Robert Fulghum
Our topic today is Don't do ordinary; do extraordinary!.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com/144
Today we will cover:
- Why you should focus on doing lots of small things extraordinarily well;
- How you can lift the lid on your thinking and come up with some great ideas to raise the bar on your output;
- How you can make being extraordinary a part of your daily operating system.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Tracey Burton, Executive Director of Uniting on Experiential learning, 360 degree feedback and the future of the health industry.
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Tracey has been the Executive Director of Uniting NSW/ACT since April 2018, having had more than 30 years’ experience in the Australian health and community services sector including leadership roles in public and private hospitals.
In addition to her executive management roles, Tracey has also served as a Board Director for aged care services, disability services in New Zealand and for a medical research foundation.
Tracey holds a Bachelor of Health Administration, an MBA, is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and has done an Executive program in Negotiation at Columbia University in New York.
In this episode we talk about:
- Why being the smartest person in the room won’t help you lead;
- Experiential continuous learning outside of formal education;
- The do’s and don’ts of 360 feedback and why it is so powerful; and
- The future of the healthcare industry.
Connecting with Tracey Burton
You can reach Tracey via LinkedIn.
A special thanks to former guest, Liz Nicol, for connecting us to Tracey.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Your Leadership Diamond - by Paul Mitchell
The Untethered Soul - by Michael Singer
This week we meet Stirling Mortlock, former Wallabies’ captain on going from amateur to professional, Rugby World Cup and connecting success.
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Stirling is an Australian Rugby Legend and now a Partner at Unio Advisors.
In this episode, we talk about:
- The transition from amateur to professional
- Giving and receiving feedback
- Being curious and the mindset to constantly be better
- Setting goals and his mentors
- Rugby world cup tips
- Some of his best and worst moments in the gold jersey
- Who he feared the most and how he looked to dominate the competition.
Connecting with Stirling Mortlock
You can reach Stirlo via LinkedIn and his company’s website, Unio Advisors.
Our topic today is Reframing Difficult Situations.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com/141
Today we will cover:
- How you can reframe difficult conversations and meetings;
- Thinking positively about the outcome you're trying to achieve;
- How to think about what’s great for the other people involved.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Dr Carmel Harrington, Executive Sleep Guru on the myths and factors that drive sleep for optimal health, joy and performance.
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Dr Harrington has been working in the world of sleep for nearly 20 years. A former lawyer and educator, she has a PHD in Sleep Medicine from Sydney University and consults with companies and educational institutions both here and overseas on sleep health.
An internationally recognised sleep expert, she is amazed at the seemingly little importance given to sleep. Emerging research clearly shows that sleeping well is a key component to optimal performance and health and if we want to be at the top of our game we need to ensure we get the best sleep possible.
Dr Harrington is the Managing Director of Sleep for Health and an Honorary Research Fellow at the Children's Hospital Westmead. She has written two books "The Sleep Diet" (MacMillan Press 2012) and "The complete guide to a good night's sleep" (MacMillan Press 2014).
In this episode we talk about:
- The crazy myths we carry about sleep and how short-circuiting this vital human function does far more than just make us tired
- The different kinds of sleep and how many hours we need each night
- Polyphasic sleep, caffeine, alcohol, diet
- What to do when you can’t sleep.
Connecting with Dr Carmel Harrington
You can reach Carmel via her website, sleepforhealth.com.au.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- The Sleep Diet - by Dr Carmel Harrington
- The complete guide to a good night's sleep - by Dr Carmel Harrington
- The 4-Hour Body - by Tim Ferriss
Our topic today is Strategy and Project Reviews with the AAR Method (The After Action Review Method).
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/139
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Ali Terai, Founder & CEO of Future Golf on turning lemons into lemonade, business gestation and value exchange.
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Ali founded Future Golf, a passion-driven business launched with less than $200 and a Facebook post, which is now one of Australia’s fastest growing startups
He also founded The Inspire Project, teaching young people Entrepreneurship, and has authored, crowdfunded and published a children’s book called A Little Penguin’s Guide to Life.
If that’s not enough, Ali has founded and launched a wallet, travel blog, pop-up burger restaurant, pub-crawl company, professional preparation program and number of smaller golf ventures.
He was a winner at the 2019 Telstra Business Awards and has been nominated for various other awards.
In this episode we talk about:
- How an eager young Ali found a loophole in the system of selling The AFL’s matchday program, The Record, and how he “turned lemons into lemonade”;
- How he has built passion-based businesses and loves speaking to young people about transformation;
- Why he spent a long time on the sidelines waiting for the businesses to gestate before jumping in full-time; and
- The value-exchange business models he has devised and how they have evolved.
Connecting with Ali Terai
You can reach Ali on LinkedIn and through his websites, Future Golf and AliTerai.com.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- The Lean Startup - by Eric Ries
- The E-Myth Contractor - by Michael Gerber
- The 4-Hour Workweek - by Tim Ferriss
- A Little Penguin’s Guide to Life - by Ali Terai
In this episode, we meet Liz Nicol, Co-Founder Safetyworks and Board Member on Leading Safety Change, 20 years of business ownership and how to get on a board.
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Liz is Co-owner and Director of SafetyWorks Group, one of Australia’s foremost providers of safety culture change solutions for performance improvement.
She is a non-executive Director of Uniting and committee member of Hunter Region Committee of the AICD.
Liz is an experienced executive and non-executive director, who is determined to improve the lives of others, particularly in the area of safety and wellbeing, and those who are vulnerable in our community.
She is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, previous Chair of Leapfrog Ability, and Board member of St Philips Christian Education Foundation.
In this episode we talk about:
- How she got into the industry and the experience she has gained in 20 years of business ownership;
- Leading Safety Change, developing a chronic sense of unease and where leaders get it wrong;
- Why metrics are not useful if they don’t drive the behaviours that align to your business strategy and vision; and
- How to get on a board and how to make the most of non-executive positions.
Connecting with Liz Nicol
You can reach Liz on LinkedIn and via email.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Safe By Accident - by Aubrey Daniels and Judy Agnew
- Radical Candour - by Kim Scott
- Setting the Tone from the Top - by Melinda Muth and Bob Selden (AICD)
- Deepwater Horizon (movie)
In this episode, we meet Janine Shepherd AM, Resilience and Motivation guru on Cultivating gratitude, the 12 Pillars of Resilience and healing through laughter.
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Janine was an Australian cross country skier, when in 1986, while training for the Winter Olympics on her bike in the Blue Mountains near Sydney, she was hit by a speeding truck. She broke multiple bones in her body, lost 5 litres of blood and spent the next 6 months in the spinal unit of a hospital where she began her long journey from probable death to recovery.
While learning to walk again, she gained her private and commercial pilot’s licences and has gone on to receive an instructor rating, an aerobatics rating and seaplane rating.
Janine has also completed multiple academic qualifications and written 6 books, inspired films and coached and spoken to millions of people.
She has 3 children, and received the Order of Australia (AM) in 2001 and the Outstanding Young Person of the World in 1998.
In this episode we talk about:
- How the power of cultivating gratitude and the gift of acceptance got her through her hospital experience;
- How letting go of her former identity helped her discover a new one beyond her wildest dreams;
- The resilience she developed while going through a marriage breakup, financial disaster and moving countries;
- Finding laughter and rewiring your brain for a different experience of life; and
- How the ketogenic diet helped her become pain-free.
Connecting with Janine Shepherd AM
You can reach Janine on her website and can find her various books on Amazon.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Janine’s TED Talk - A broken body isn't a broken person
- Defiant - by Janine Shepherd AM
- Test Your Resilience
- The Brain that Changes Itself - by Norman Doidge
- The 30-Day Ketogenic Cleanse - by Maria Emmerich
- Articles by Steve Phinney
- Anatomy of an Illness - by Norman Cousins
- Man's Search for Meaning - by Viktor Frankl
- Power of Now - by Eckhart Tolle
- New Earth - by Eckhart Tolle
- The Hero’s Journey - by Joseph Campbell
In this episode, we meet Cameron Schwab, 25 Year CEO of AFL Clubs on Leading in High Stakes Environments, Hard Decisions and Creating High Performance Systems.
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Cameron was appointed CEO of the famous Richmond Football Club at age 24, the youngest in the history of the game.
For the next 25 years, he was CEO of Richmond, Melbourne and Fremantle, when those clubs were at their lowest ebb, both on and off the field. He is the second longest serving CEO in the modern game.
Having taken on some of the sport’s most difficult and daunting challenges, Cameron established a track record of building teams and organisations, unifying groups while navigating periods of genuine adversity and complexity.
In this episode we talk about:
- The question you need to ask yourself to see if you’re ready for a promotion
- The lessons he learned from the hardest decisions you can make - firing a close personal friend
- How to implement systems that drive performance
- What we can learn from sport and what isn’t so transferrable
- What we can all learn from fine art about life and work.
In this episode, we meet Lisa Claes, currently the CEO of CoreLogic International, the world's largest property data and analytics company, accountable for the overall business performance of its operations across Australia, New Zealand and the UK.
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Immediately prior to joining CoreLogic, she served as an Executive Director of ING's Australian banking operations, directly responsible for its retail banking revenue, the financial performance of its commercial banking unit and held global accountabilities for data and digital transformation strategies.
Concurrent to her local Executive accountabilities, Lisa represented the Australian Retail Banking operations on the International Retail Council and chaired ING’s Global Mortgage Forum.
She is a former General Counsel of Mercantile Mutual, a member of Chief Executive Woman and a board member of Loreto Kirribilli.
In this episode we talk about:
- How to exude confidence, even if you don’t feel it to begin with;
- How to get things done - and to make sure they’re the right things;
- How to nurture the right relationships;
- How to be credible by building expertise and a track record; and
- The power of collaboration and partnerships for your career and business.
Connecting with Lisa Claes
You can reach Lisa on LinkedIn.
Thanks to Siobhan Hayden for recommending Lisa.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- The One Thing - by Gary Keller
- Article by Lisa on her company website: Impactful Decision Making to Drive Your Career
In this episode, we meet Mia Feasey, Founder and CEO of Siren Design.
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Mia founded Siren in 2005 as a place for creatives to thrive. With ambition, hard work, and an ability to think differently, Siren has flourished from a disruptive start-up, into Australasia’s leading interior design consultancy.
Led by an all-female management team, Mia's team has created award-winning projects for some of the most innovative companies on the globe. Their values reflect those of an entrepreneurial spirit and a true creative, and their secret lies in finding the compelling sweet spot between innovation and practicality.
In this episode we talk about:
- What she learnt from being a singer in a girl-band that was lining up to be contracted by Sony and take on The Spice Girls;
- The power of being creative but also knowing the practical things;
- The importance of knowing your customer and what she learnt from a customer who took the time to give her accurate feedback;
- The power of mentors and peer groups;
- How her team has taken on the challenge to transform the interior design industry and its impact on the planet to being regenerative.
Connecting with Mia Feasey
You can reach Mia on LinkedIn.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Harvard Business Review (HBR)
Welcome to the fourth and FINAL episode in our 2019 Winter Wisdom Series: a collection of the best of the best from our first 128 episodes of The Inner Chief podcast.
In our first three episodes, we covered Reading Recommendations, How to Get Unstuck and Mentors.
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We’re closing out the Winter Wisdom Series with pure wisdom. The ultimate advice. A collection of answers to my favourite podcast question… If you could offer the next generation one final piece of advice, what would it be?
This question has been asked to more than 50 CEOs and Gurus.
The words of our Chiefs and Gurus is nothing short of inspirational. I’d love to include all of them. But to make this a quick and easy listen, I’ve made a shortlist and I’ve identified 7 Key messages in the process. They are…
- The only constant is change
- Do what you LOVE, and LOVE what you do
- Take risks. It’s OK to fail
- It’s all about people and relationships
- Only YOU can create your future
- BUT… You don’t have to do it on your own
- Look after yourself and HAVE FUN.
Welcome to the third episode in our 2019 Winter Wisdom Series: a collection of the best of the best from our first 128 episodes of The Inner Chief podcast.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/131
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com.au/score-card
So far we’ve covered Reading Recommendations and How to Get Unstuck. And this week we’re talking about Mentors.
In this episode, we’re going to cover the following:
- WHY having a mentor is so important;
- HOW to get a mentor and WHO to approach;
- WHAT to do once you have one;
- The impact of having a mentor on your career and personal development; and
- Networking your way to a mentor.
We asked more than 50 CEOs about the importance of mentors in their career journey. Every single one of them sees them as a critical element. Let’s find out more.
Welcome to the second episode in our 2019 Winter Wisdom Series: a collection of the best of the best from our first 128 episodes of The Inner Chief podcast.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/130
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com.au/score-card
Last week we looked at the Top 5 Reads, as recommended by our Chiefs & Gurus. Hope you’ve all added them to your reading list or your devices!
This week we’ve compiled all of the advice from our Chiefs & Gurus around what to do when you become stuck. So we’re going to cover 3 Steps for Getting Unstuck and 4 Key Considerations when going through the process.
How do you know when you’re stuck? What action should you take? And who should you turn to?
Maybe this is you right now or you can see someone that you care about is in this situation.
You’re unsure about your next career move, feeling stalled, not satisfied or you’re no longer making an impact in your work. Or maybe you’re just unsure about what to do next.
Well, I’ve asked more than 50 CEOs what to do when you get stuck and this episode outlines what they had to say.
Stay epic,
Greg
Welcome to our 2019 Winter Wisdom Series, which is a collection of the best of the best from our first 128 episodes of The Inner Chief podcast.
Today's topic is Top Reads and we explore the 5 most recommended books by our Chiefs and Gurus.
1. Built to Last & Good to Great - by Jim Collins These books are not about visionary products or visionary leaders, they’re about visionary companies and what it is that makes the truly exceptional companies different from the others.
Built to Last
Good to Great
2. Sapiens & Homo Deus - by Yuval Noah Harari While these aren’t business books, they’re a profound study into human history. Drawing insights from biology, anthropology, palaeontology and economics and exploring how history has shaped our societies and our personalities. Life-changing reads, I promise!
Sapiens
Homo Deus
3. The Five Dysfunctions of a Team - by Patrick Lencioni Like all of Patrick's books, this one is a compelling fable with a simple but powerful message. He reveals the 5 dysfunctions that go to the very heart of why teams (even the very best ones) often struggle. If you’re leading a team or trying to build a culture that thrives, this is a must-read.
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team
4. The Power of Now - by Eckhart Tolle This is a spiritual guidebook; a manual for understanding exactly how to ‘live in the now’. It also has the benefit of markers throughout the book that symbolise ‘break time’ ie. when you should close the book, put it down and mull over what you’ve just read. Not in any way a business book, but a guidebook for living a purposeful life and being the best possible version of yourself.
The Power of Now
5. Legacy - James Kerr While I’m forever frustrated when the Wallabies lose to the All Blacks, I’m also forever in awe of what the All Blacks stand for: their culture, passion, teamwork and performance is like no other sporting team in history.
And like Neil Craig said, there’s no need to reinvent the wheel. Success leaves clues and we should learn from these. So if you’re trying to build a high performance team culture, something that lasts the test of time, then this is a great read for you.
Legacy
So Chiefs…what can we learn from these books? I think there are three key themes:
-
- People come first Uniting and aligning your people is the single most important factor in building a successful team and a successful business.
- It's not all fun and games Building a high performance team isn’t easy. It takes focus, energy, commitment and accountability. But while high performance teams might be challenging, they’re ultimately the most rewarding groups to be part of.
- Self-awareness Whether it’s for the benefit of our team, our business or our own personal lives, self-awareness is critical. We must learn about 'us' first. We must debunk our own thinking, bias and beliefs. You can’t live a life of purpose until you unpack yourself.
And that’s it for the first of our Winter Wisdom Series.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Justin McNamara, Psychometrics Guru on improving recruitment selection, performance prediction and acing psychometric tests.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/128
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Justin trained as an Occupational Psychologist.
He has worked with a variety of businesses in most industries to improve the performance of their people in Europe, the Middle East and Australia.
He has a side-business, Advantage Punter which focuses on Machine Learning, with their product correctly predicting the 2018 Melbourne Cup winner!
In this episode we talk about:
- What Psychometrics are and aren’t and which ones are useful in the recruitment process;
- Knowing the markers for success for predicting both performance and leadership;
- The future of Psychometrics and big data; and
- The key factors in ensuring you can ace a psychometric test.
Connecting with Justin McNamara
You can reach Justin on LinkedIn. You can also view the People Excellence Ltd website to see what his business is all about.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Practice psychometric tests:
-
- https://www.shldirect.com/en/practice-tests
- https://www.savilleassessment.com/practice-tests
- https://www.trytalentq.com
- Talent Intelligence - by Nik Kinley
- Mind Over Mood - by Dennis Greenberger
- Advantage Punter - To learn more about how to get accurate tips for your favourite sport
In this episode, we meet Tim Oberg, CEO of parkrun Australia on escaping the rat race, building a community and dealing with anxiety.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/127
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Tim has a background in teaching and travel, having set up his own tour business in London in the early 2000s.
He stumbled upon the parkrun concept in the UK in 2010 and pitched to the owner to be the one to take it to Australia.
parkrun is a free, weekly, timed 5km run at more than 350 locations in Australia and many more globally.
Tim lives in Airlie Beach with his wife and 3 kids.
In this episode we talk about:
- Tim’s epic back story that got him to where he is today - you’ll really love this as it’s one of the most in-depth, interesting and crazy ones we’ve ever had on the Inner Chief podcast;
- The courage he showed in repeatedly escaping the rat race to start his own businesses;
- Growing the parkrun Australia community from nothing to the biggest of its kind in the country; and
- How he has survived and thrived despite having dealt with anxiety.
Connecting with Tim Oberg
You can reach Tim on LinkedIn and Twitter, and you can go to the parkrun website and see what it is all about.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Headspace app
- Beating Anxiety - SBS Insight TV show that Tim appeared on
- parkrun, anxiety and me - article posted by Tim after his recovery
- Dare - by Barry McDonagh
In this episode, we meet Nancy Slessenger, Founder and CEO of Vinehouse Hiring on scientific recruitment, the do’s and don’ts of interviewing, and staff retention.
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Nancy has a Bachelor of Physics degree from the University of Nottingham and her first job was as a Production Manager at Mars Electronics.
Her love of graphs and mathematics gave her the inspiration to solve the biggest challenge in the recruitment industry - hiring and keeping the best staff.
She created a remote recruitment system that has a >90% success rate compared to the industry average of 30%.
Nancy founded Vinehouse in 1995 and works with clients worldwide.
In this episode we talk about:
- Her scientific approach to recruitment and how it has been so successful;
- Why star performers often don’t interview well;
- What most leaders get wrong about recruitment and what that could cost your business; and
- What candidates should do to absolutely nail the job application process.
Connecting with Nancy Slessenger
You can reach Nancy on LinkedIn and via her business website, Vinehouse Hiring.
The Vinehouse shop has a wonderful range of books and booklets that Nancy has written, such as:
- Difficult People Made Easy
- Feedback for the Faint-hearted
- Praise and the Appraisal
- How to deal with Poor Performance
- How to Motivate Yourself and Others
Books and resources mentioned in the episode
- Invisible Women: Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men - by Caroline Criado-Perez
- Factfulness - by Hans Rosling
- Mindset: The New Psychology of Success - by Carol Dweck
- The Luck Factor - by Richard Wiseman
- You can view some lectures from neuroscientist Marian Diamond on YouTube
- Video: Hamish and Andy fake reference check
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Mike Schneider, the current Managing Director of the Bunnings Group on career diversity, genuine empathy, and the 4Hs of authenticity.
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Before being appointed to the top role, Mike was the Managing Director of Bunnings Australia & New Zealand and had also led the store operations teams, having joined Bunnings in 2005.
His career has seen him hold a range of senior operational, commercial and human resource roles, both in retail and financial services, most notably at Target, Westpac and The Warehouse Group.
Mike holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of NSW and has completed the Advanced Management Program at INSEAD, and the Advanced Strategic Management Program at IMD.
In this episode we talk about:
- How having a diverse career path has been to his benefit;
- Why genuine empathy and being a consistent not predictable leader has been the key to his success;
- What he means by an integrated life as opposed to work-life balance; and
- His 4Hs Framework that allows him to lead an authentic life.
Connecting with Mike Schneider You can reach Mike on LinkedIn.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/124
Last week, our High Performance teams series concluded with part 25, namely Communication.
Today, I share the 5 stages that will set up the foundational success of your High Performance Team.
- Philosophy, Frameworks and Analysis
- Form the Team
- Unite and Align the Team
- Strategy and Tactics
- Execute with Precision
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Neil Craig, AFL Coach and England Rugby High Performance Manager on high performance environments, your North Star and decision-making under pressure.
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Neil is best known as being a former Australian rules footballer and as the Head Coach of the Adelaide Crows Football Club.
His other stints in the AFL have included being the fitness adviser at the Crows, and having various coaching roles at the Melbourne Demons, Essendon Bombers and Carlton Blues.
Since 2017, he has been England Rugby’s High Performance Manager under the head coach Eddie Jones.
In this episode we talk about:
- What a high performance environment is and how to create one;
- Why knowing your North Star - your purpose and values - is critical to success;
- How to make complex decisions under pressure; and
- Why leadership is not about you, but all about you.
Connecting with Neil Craig You can reach Neil on LinkedIn.
Thanks to Peter Knight for recommending Neil.
On why he has been successful * I think, firstly it's a passion for me. It's something I really get a lot of enjoyment out of. I don't see it as a job. * Secondly, athletes don't get to that level without being highly motivated, and they have a very clear picture of what they want to do. So as their coach, you have this capacity to enable people, or you help them to be the best they can possibly be. I get great satisfaction out of that and also when someone comes and asks me for help. “Help” is a pretty powerful word…”Can you help me?” * I also appreciate that there is this higher purpose of what sport does for people or can give to people. It is unbelievable.
On what a high performance environment is * A functional high performance environment is really uncomfortable because of the daily feedback that you get as an athlete, coach or staff member. This is because of the high standards set on a daily basis that you have to meet. * A high performance environment is not for everyone. I often say that to athletes that this may not be for them and that's okay. The best high performance environments I've been in are not for everyone and they're very clear in their mind that they don't want to make it for everyone. * Once an athlete knows his or her why, that's really important because once the why's embedded it gives them the energy and the resilience they need to handle the environment. There's a lot of tough times, 'cos you don't win all the time, and you do get injured, and you do miss out on selection and you do get criticised in the public arena, and you do have contractual negotiations and you are away from your family for long periods of time, and it can be lonely, you don't get along with everyone in the environment. If I just painted the picture for you what it looks like, you might say that's not for me. But there are so many good things as well. That's why your why gives you the energy, perseverance and resilience and is so important to know it.
On his role with England Rugby * First and foremost it's to be what I call a critical friend to the head coach, a guy called Eddie Jones, who coached the Wallabies back in the early 2000s. It's a lonely position and because of the nature of the chair that you sit in, it's very rare in actual fact for people to give you feedback because of the power of the chair. * I also do a lot of work with the senior leadership group, which I really enjoy. * The third part of my role is to coach the coaches. We spend all this time and resources in coaching the players when in actual fact, the people who have the biggest influence on players are the coaches. Who's giving them feedback every day? * I do a small bit of technical coaching in terms of the high ball, which is critical in AFL. * And finally, there’s ensuring collaboration between all the different departments of a high performance environment. You've got a coaching department, an analytics department, logistics, sports science, strength and conditioning, medical etc. So you can just imagine the capacity for all those to collaborate, communicate, be on the same page; it doesn't always run smoothly. I, therefore, spend some time trying to maximise the working capacity of all those different environments.
On building a high performance culture * This is done via a series of questions. Firstly, I want people to understand why their company or club existed . This is the higher purpose about why and why it is important. Is an English national rugby team important to England? If the answer is yes, then why is it important? * Then, with the head coach or CEO, I’d ask where they want to take this team or organisation. What does that look like? In reality, they are a provider of hope to create something different and better in the future. * The last question I would ask is when they will know they have achieved success. In sport, you'll know when the scoreboard shows you have won. But what will winning look like internally without the scoreboard? How will you know that you're progressing and when will you know that you've arrived in those areas you’re measuring?
On having mentors * Mentors are really important, if for no other reason that they would ask you questions about why you think that way, what you think about certain things, and why you’ve made that specific decision. In actual fact, rarely do they give me their opinion; it's more about them asking me questions. * I find that mentors just keep you balanced in your thinking and try and keep the emotion out of it because the capacity to be able to lead under adversity is a really important concept.
On decision-making in high performance environments * It’s important to know “what's important now” and also know “what's important in the future” as to where we're going because you've got to weigh that up sometimes. * As a senior coach or as a leader, you have to have calmness in your thinking and maintain stress levels at a good level, because they're complex decisions that you've got to make and think through. You've got to know what the critical information is in order to make what I call “the right decision.” * It's more often than not the most difficult one to make because you get faced with different options. You’ve got the most popular decision, the safe decision, the best political decision. Very rarely are those all associated with what's the right decision, so you need to be very clear as a leader that this gets back to your philosophies and why as a leader.
On having a coaching philosophy aka North Star * You've got to be really clear on your philosophy and you need to know what you value. It’s also your capacity to not be black and white because there's never a perfect answer. There's case studies everywhere. There's the rugby union one at the moment with Israel Folau. It's not a black and white decision; some people think it is, but it's not. * Your values and your philosophy about why you do things do change over time, but they become your guiding principles, your North Star if you like. If you haven't got a well thought-out ingrained philosophy, it will be reflective of your decision-making. You'll be wishy washy. You'll actually make a decision based on the last person you spoke to.
On why leadership is not about you, but it's all about you * It's not about you because there's an understanding that to get a performance, you can't create that performance as you don’t do the hands-on work. * So you need to select good people, train those people, retain and develop those people so they don't want to leave our organisation. And why would you train these people if they want to leave? Well, why would you want to keep them if you don't train them? * But it is all about you because you have to create an environment where these people actually want to do the work, they're enthused to do the work and they share ideas, they collaborate and they bounce out of bed in the morning, and they want to come into this environment.
On other lessons from his coaching journey * Be very careful of the spoken word because once it comes out of your mouth, you can't grab it and bring it back in again. Verbal communication is really the only tool we have as coaches to have an effect, so be very careful or be aware of the words you're using. Words can be so positive and yet in a lot of ways they can be so negative and have an effect on you. * I'm a great believer that success leaves clues. Go and look at the serial successful companies who have stood the test of time, because they have jumped all the hurdles and they've been able to continue to perform for long periods of time.
On a routine that is working for him * I try and get up at about 5.30am and come down to my study and I spend about half an hour preparing for the day. I do some journaling, write down some key things I've got to do today, note down what my overall aims for the day are. One might say that I continually recalibrate my thinking to make it world-class.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode Legacy by James Kerr
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/122
After 25 weeks our Our High Performance teams series now enters the final episode, finishing on Communications.
In this episode we cover:
- The 7 Big Things you need to communicate
-
- Why you do what you do - Purpose
- What you’re going to do - Vision & Goals
- How you’re going to do it - Strategy and Tactics
- Who is going to to do what - Role clarity
- Your style in doing it - Values and Standards
- Updates on progress
- Victories & Loss
-
- Victories = tell the story in great depth, give credit to the team members that nailed it
- Losses = Talk about it, open up, inspire about the comeback
- How often you need to communicate
- What to do in a crisis and when setbacks hit
- Using stories and analogy (themes)
- A philosophy = Repetition, repetition, repetition & listen, listen, listen.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Megan Macedo, writer and marketing entrepreneur on authentic story-telling, knowing yourself and being an artistic entrepreneur.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/121
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com.au/score-card
Megan grew up in Northern Ireland at the tail end of The Troubles, an experience that has shaped her story and career.
She runs a marketing and storytelling consultancy in London and writes and speaks about authenticity in marketing and taking an artistic approach to business.
She created the short film, Becoming Yourself In Your Business, and a video interview series, The Business of Self-Disclosure.
Megan hosts workshops and retreats in the UK, Ireland and the US and has shared the stage with the likes of Jay Abraham and Perry Marshall.
In this episode we talk about:
- Authentic story-telling and actively being yourself in the world;
- Using experimentation to find out who you really are and what you care about;
- Why most of us are artistic entrepreneurs trapped in traditional corporate bodies; and
- The fear of scaling our ambitions.
Connecting with Megan Macedo You can reach Megan on LinkedIn and on her website.
Thanks to Perry Marshall for recommending Megan.
On what growing up during The Troubles taught her * We internalise the environment that we grow up in. People go through traumatic things and it changes how they interact with their family and their loved ones. It changes how children are raised. How it relates to my work is that I have this understanding, or curiosity at least, around this stuff and around Northern Ireland because I grew up in it, and I can see the stuff playing out at a cultural level. I can see it playing out at a family level. I can see it play out at an individual level. * Quite often, there's a whole bunch of stuff that doesn't get spoken and there is a whole side of ourselves that we don't show out in the world, and our work suffers as a result of that.
On having a sense of identity * When people feel unfulfilled in their work, or they feel like something isn't quite right, I think a lot of that is because they are not letting themselves be seen in their work. I think that one of our most primal needs is to be seen and to be known. * Erik Erikson did a lot of the seminal work around identity formation. He talked about something called psychosocial reciprocity, which says that in order for us to have a fully mature, grounded sense of identity, it's not enough for us to know who we are on the inside; we also have to have the world respond to us as that person. * We have to actively be ourselves in the world. And then the world gets to see who we are and respond to that person. * But...most of us are in some degree of kind of misery because we keep that part of ourselves a secret. So we show up as some kind of professional persona in the world and that's who the world thinks we are.
On the value of having an authentic story * If you take a load of vitamin tablets, most of it will just end up down the toilet. Your body will pass it because it doesn't recognise it as food. This is why it's better to eat the whole food. In a way, the story combined with the work that we do, are like the whole food. * Most of us strip our story out of our work and out of our skills, and that's what stops people seeing our value. But if you put your story back in, it's the story that makes your skills and values and talents available to people. That's what makes them connect with you and understand who you are, your context, your perspective, and then they become much more interested in what you're actually doing in your professional life. * And so my clients go through the process of telling their story and usually come away with this much deeper understanding of who they are and where they want to go and why they want to go there.
On knowing yourself * When you're a child, you have parents or authority figures. Essentially, they give you an assigned identity, which is made up of part of their identities. They hand down these values and beliefs to you. * When we come of age, we're supposed to interact with different people who have different worldviews and different identities and value different things. And each experience that we have acts as a mirror and we get a glimpse at a little bit more of ourselves. So we learn what values and beliefs we agree with or disagree with. * Eventually, we get to a point where we have a grounded sense of self. And that identity could be exactly the same as the one you were given as a kid, or you might completely reject it. The important thing is that you have acquired it for yourself. * And some things you will have direct experience of and you can speak from a position of power on those. But other things you don't so you experiment and ask for help. And it's through years and years of living like that that you get to expand your field of genuine expertise and wisdom. * I think one of the things that people should do first is to ask themselves, “What questions do I care about?”
On being artistic in your business and career * I think there are two types of entrepreneurial thinker. You have the traditional businessperson type, and they are really passionate about the game of business and the whole corporate game. And then you have the artist type entrepreneurial thinker. And they are really passionate about the actual work that they do, about building a body of work. * I actually think that more of us are the artist type than we think. We are trained, both in the education system and then how the working world works, to be the traditional business type, but the artist type I think makes up most of the population. * How artists work is that they start with some kind of curiosity or some kind of question they have about a topic that they're interested in. They'll go and research that and then they make a piece at the end of it.
On getting away from it all * I will quite often go to the park for a walk for 20 minutes and then I'll pitch up in a café or a pub, and I'll write for an hour, or until I run out of steam. It's during the walk that I actually process everything and figure out what I'm going to write. * Something else I do is go to the cinema. I find watching films, immersing myself in someone else's work, to be very restorative, and it fires off all kinds of ideas in my head.
On choosing a mentor * I think it's important to lean on mentors for advice on ideas. Get a sense of permission from them if that's what you feel like you need. Or just have a sanity check and bounce it off them. But it's really about getting that confidence to take action. * The reason that I went to my mentor and not some other people is because I looked at his whole life and thought, "That's a guy I could along with." A lot of the other mentors that were around at the time were workaholics.
On the fear of the scale of our ambition * In order to do the things that we really want to do and have the impact that we really want to have through our work, we're going to have to show ourselves, make ourselves vulnerable, and that is terrifying. * Instead, focus on how you are going to take the next step today. Think about the person that you think you're going to be when you get to that goal and how you could be that person today.
Her final message of wisdom and hope * I think that having the courage and willingness to share your story and your wisdom from a place of direct, lived experience is the most important thing.
Books and resources mentioned in the episode * Adult Children: The Secrets of Dysfunctional Families by John and Linda Friel
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/120
Our High Performance teams series now enters the fourth part of the Execution pillar of HP Teams: Business Acumen.
While this is probably the least sexy trait of high performing teams, it might well be that it is the most underrated and hence single biggest indicator of results.
So, in this episode we cover:
- The compound effect of bad acumen and good acumen
- Why this is often overlooked but will forever be relevant
- The four pillars of good acumen in a team
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Ari Galper, the World’s #1 Authority on Trust-Based Selling on trust and influence, eliminating resistance and being a sales magnet not chaser.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/119
Complete your FREE Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com.au/score-card
Ari is the World’s #1 Authority on Trust-Based Selling and is one the most expensive sales growth advisors in the world.
He is the creator of Unlock The Game®, a completely revolutionary sales approach and has clients in over 35 countries.
Ari has a Masters Degree in Instructional Design and is a practitioner of Aikido, a special martial art that diffuses conflict between two parties.
Ari is based in Sydney, Australia with his wife Michelle and their two sons and daughter.
In this episode we talk about:
- Building trust first before anything else, so that you create influence;
- Eliminating resistance in any communication with a prospect;
- Why the language you use is so critical, and some practical examples of phrases to remove from your life; and
- The myth of chasing sales, and instead becoming a sales magnet.
Connecting with Ari You can reach Ari in the following ways:
- If you’re into sales conversion, check out his Unlock The Game® website;
- If you’re a consultant or business coach, then head to Trusted Authority;
- Or if you’re a CEO, check out Ari’s next project, CEO Legacy Books.
Thanks to Perry Marshall for recommending Ari.
On eliminating rejection * What we discovered in our research is that rejection is triggered by certain things you say and do unknowingly that cause the other person to push back on you. * So that comes down to the words you say (languaging), the way you say it (delivery) and how much authority you have (positioning). Those three things are the triggers, and if you don't have one of them, you'll get rejection every single day.
On starting with building trust, not pushing for a sale * Whatever you're offering to them is about a solution to their problem; if you try and sell your project by talking about the benefits of it and not addressing their issue, that is a mismatch there. It will feel like you're trying to put your agenda before theirs. * An example is: "Hi, my name is ... I'm with VRA, we specialise in this." That's kind of a pitch. What you'd say instead is, "I'm hoping you can help me out for a moment. I'm just giving you a call to see if you'd be open to some different ideas around ways to solve the issues you're having related to sales and project management. Would you be open to that?" * That's the mindset shift I talk about in the game - it’s shifting away from the end goal of the sale and focusing only on trust first. If your goal is trust first, you don't talk about yourself, you talk about them. That's the whole mindset shift that I teach.
On doing your research * Nowadays, you can't go fishing for their problems anymore. "Hey, how you doing? How's your business going? What problems do you have?" That used to work five years ago. * You should probably already have a sense of what the top three issues are that your clients deal with, so start with those. * You have to ask yourself what the value is to them to consider your suggestion. Make a list of all the things you offer in which they would see value.
On the biggest lesson in his career * 15 years ago I was a sales manager in a software company and we launched the first online website tracking tools to collect website behaviour - it's now called Google Analytics. In the end, after what I thought was a successful sales call, I overheard them say, "We're not gonna go with him. Keep using him for more information and make sure we shop someplace else cheaper." * It forced me to question what I did wrong, and that became our Unlock The Game mindset premise, where our goal was to remove the pressure from the sales conversation to basically shift away from the end goal of the sale to building trust first, to make sure both you and them were fit to decide whether to proceed.
On a better set of sales KPIs * Most businesses measure the sales people's performance based on certain behaviours. For instance, the numbers game, so that’s how many contacts they make, how many meetings they have, how many presentations they do and how many closes do they make. But none of those issues has to do with trust, meaning there's no measurement on how good they are at building trust in the process. * Most salespeople are being conditioned to hunt, to kill, to bring in the money, but they ought to learn how to stop chasing, stop selling and build trust instead.
On better languaging * We developed what we call Trust-Based Languaging to replace sales languaging. * So, I'll ask you vigorously to remove one key phrase from your vocabulary forever, and that is “follow up”. By saying "follow up" you're asking, “How does this person move closer to a sale for me?” * Instead say, "I'm giving you a call to see if you have any feedback on our previous conversation, our proposal or on us." So, you actually go backwards, not forwards. * The phrase “would you be interested?” is a sales phrase, so get rid of it. Instead try, "Hey, I've got a plan that might be able to help you out, would you be open to hearing this?"
On how to jump to the next level in your career * Don't focus on jumping. Find the person who's at that level and find out what value they could use that they don't have right now, and offer it to them. Just focus on the next person up who's the key player there and ask them what their challenges are and approach them with value-add. * Just keep problem-solving!
On recovering a lost sale - “the magic response” * If you're chasing somebody and you don't hear back from them for a while, you feel like you've lost them. You know you can't chase them anymore otherwise you're going to burn the relationship with them. What you do is call them back or email them and say something to the effect of:
“Hi John. It's Ari I hope you're doing well.
Look, I'm not calling to move things forward at all.
I'm just calling to first of all apologise. I hadn't heard back from you for a few weeks so it's probably me. I may have dropped the ball, I may have missed something, maybe I chased you too hard. I just want to apologise for whatever I may have done that didn't have you call me back.
And look, I'm only calling for one reason, and that is for some feedback to improve myself in the event there are a few opportunities with other people, so I can become a better person. Would you be open to that feedback to me?"
- The above approach helps release the pressure, but by falling on your sword, it's amazing as 95% of the time they say, “No, it’s not you” and then they give you the truthful feedback you’re after, or might give you another look.
On sales myths * One is the whole numbers game concept. That is dead. It's not about how many contacts you make in your networks anymore, it's about how much trust you create with every single person. * Another one is the idea that your job is to overcome objections. But what if what they're telling you is true? So if someone says to you your price is too high, if you try to overcome the objection, you would either bring the price down or defend yourself. Instead, defuse the objection, re-engage again without risking the relationship with the sale and say, "You're absolutely right. It can be perceived as high, no doubt about that. In fact, everyone joins this at first says the exact same thing as you. Look, the last thing I want to do is try and convince you to do something you don't want to do, that's just unethical to even do that in the first place. But would you be open to re-looking at this from a different perspective, based on the topic issue we are trying to solve? Would you be open to that?" * And one final one is that sales messages need to be heard multiple times before a customer acts. Well, the formula is actually not based upon the number of touches, it's based on what the message is in those touches.
On routines * What do you need to be working on that impacts 95% of your business? I spend a lot of time thinking about what I should be doing every day that has the biggest impact on what I do. * Every night I'll think about what the three things are that I need to do today to be successful. As Jeff Bezos says, "If I just make three decisions a day, I can go home."
Final message of wisdom and hope * Always be open to someone else challenging your assumptions, to make sure that you know what you know, but recognise you may not know it all and always strive to be able to say that you’re cutting-edge but others have been there before. So keep seeking out answers for things you may not know yet.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/118
Our High Performance teams series now enters the third part of the Execution pillar of HP Teams: Optimising Risk.
So, in this episode we cover:
- How to optimise risk and make it a more enjoyable and aspirational process;
- How Richard Branson uses Risk to make money; and
- The two opposing models of risk and why it’s important to use both.
For your copy of the two Risk Management templates please email greg@chiefmaker.com.au with the subject line “Risk” and I’ll send you the templates straight away so you can follow along in the podcast. Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Nicolette Rubinsztein, President of the Actuaries Institute and professional board member, on removing guilt, female confidence, and overcoming busyness.
Go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/117
Career Scorecard: www.chiefmaker.com.au/score-card
You can also get hold of her book, Not Guilty. All the author profits go towards her charity, Missionvale Australia.
Nicolette is a qualified actuary and is currently a non-executive director at UniSuper and SuperEd. She has previously held senior positions in the corporate world at Colonial First State, BT Funds Management, and Towers Perrin.
She received two awards for her contribution to superannuation policy: an inaugural FSC Industry Excellence Award and an ASFA Distinguished Service Award.
But her proudest achievement is, without doubt, raising her three gorgeous girls.
In this episode we talk about:
- The resilience learnt from losing her job twice due to overnight industry changes;
- How to balance work with motherhood without feeling guilty or putting your career on hold;
- Why lower confidence in females has led to a lower uptake of STEM careers; and
- Overcoming busyness as parents and the concept of “career mum staff”.
Connecting with Nicolette You can reach Nicolette on LinkedIn or via her website.
Thanks to Jonathan Rubinsztein for recommending Nicolette.
On a story from her childhood that impacted her life * I had come from England and it was an incredibly eye-opening experience to see what was going on in South Africa. It was full-on Apartheid: separate buses, separate beaches, separate schools, separate areas. I still find it almost traumatising. So, part of what we do now is that we've been supporting a charity in a township called Missionvale for about 15 years, and I've taken the kids now a couple of years volunteering there.
On the guilt of raising children * Our generation, we were really taught, the world is your oyster, go off and do whatever you want. And I think many of us did. And then it comes to the having children bit and you realise having a career and being a mother is actually really hard, and no one really told me about how you could do both of these things. And I think the guilt comes from a work point of view because you worry that you're not delivering 100%, and it's guilt from a mother point of view that you feel guilty that you're not being the best mum possible. * I think the most important one is around the childcare and what role each of you is going to play in the childcare: what percentage of that child's time do you want that child to be with a parent as opposed to in some sort of care? Then you’re able to work out how each of you can contribute to that. I think you would want more than half of your child's life to be with a parent. * The ultimate model would be actually both parents working flexibly and part-time. And if you both do the equivalent of that four days a week, it means that your child will only be in three days of care a week. I have seen more and more couples doing it.
On life’s chapters * My mom was a stay-at-home mom until her early 40s. She raised four children, and then she set up her own insurance broking business when she was about 42. She's still running it and she's 75! So she is a great example of focusing on one thing more than another at different phases of your life. * That means really being clear about what your goals are, and what's important to you at each stage of your life. When my children were young they were my number one priority and work was my second priority. A strategy is all about making trade-offs. * And I really think that your values become so much more apparent when you have children. It's about what values you're going to raise your children with. What do you want them to have out of life?
On putting your career on hold * When I look back, I think I've effectively put my career on hold probably for about 10 years while I was having children, and actually, I've been working flexibly for the last 15 years. I feel really good about that decision. It was fantastic. * I talk to mums about taking a long-term perspective; what are your goals in life and what's important to you? Those old-styled goals of achievement and money and success at work are not the be-all and end-all. A lot of our happiness comes from relationships, from our family, and the search for inner peace if you like.
On beating the busyness epidemic * It’s a weird thing that when you say to somebody, "How are you?" "Busy." Busy is a standard response. Isn't that really worrying? * So, how do you counter it? There's a brilliant book called The Rushing Woman's Syndrome by Dr Libby Weaver. Credit to the author for calling it an epidemic, but it is, because she kept seeing lots and lots of people in the same mould. * The only antidote is to work out what's important to you and prioritising based on that. * The other thing that I think is a really good life skill is meditation and mindfulness because I think that really allows you to zoom out a bit and work out what you're doing and why, and just calm your life down a bit. * Also, I’d exercise in the morning, say 5.30am, before the children woke up.
On confidence in women and how to gain it * Women's confidence can be lower than men's confidence because men have more testosterone than women; simply understanding this goes a long way to help. * I've just read another book - Stop Fixing Women by Kathryn Fox - and her point is that a lot of this gender diversity debate focuses too much on fixing women eg. how do you improve confidence? But there’s not enough on how to improve structures within organisations and management to improve diversity. * Also, understand that lots of men lack confidence too; it's not something solely in women. * The study that I've done - qualifying as an actuary and doing an MBA - proved to me that I can do it. Getting older has made me more confident by getting more experience. * I also speak to my husband. I'm often amazed if I go to him and we have a chat about a business issue or whatever it may be, I'm often amazed at how different his approach is to mine. * Some of the common skills that many women bring to the table are empathy and being customer-centric. But another key one is risk management.
On outsourcing your life/career mum staff * The message here about “career mum staff” is about dividing and conquering, and allocating responsibility. * Also, when it comes to outsourcing, Australian career women are very slow to take on the needed domestic help that you really need to thrive. * These very capable women in the workplace are hiring and firing, but when it comes to their own domestic arrangements, they don't seem proactive at setting things up. * I think for many successful career moms, their partner is a very important part of the equation. Not just in terms of the tasks that they do and share, but in terms of being supportive of their partner.
On perfectionism * I think particularly in your early career, perfectionism is a great thing and it's often the reason why many of us are successful. But it comes with a whole load of issues and one of those is sharing the role with your partner and letting them do it their way. I think we have to drop some of those perfectionistic standards and just take a deep breath and share the workload.
On females in STEM careers * This issue starts very early and girls are 25% less confident in maths than boys, despite girls being biologically as good at math as boys. * So why are only 33% of our fellows in the actuarial profession, female? If we look at the percentage of students at University studying actuarial, it's a third female. Then if you go right the way back to the beginning of the pipeline at school, it's also a third. Our key conclusion was that until we increase the percentage of kids doing Advanced Math, we're not going to improve gender diversity in actuaries or probably many other STEM careers. * One of the reasons is confidence; I'm quite optimistic because there's some research that shows that some training around a growth mindset can actually address those confidence issues. * Another is a gender stereotyping issue - we're really not encouraging our girls to do maths at school as a society and as a culture. * There is a strong message for parents of daughters about encouraging them to do those STEM subjects, particularly because the research suggests that 75% of future jobs will require STEM skills.
Final message of wisdom and hope * I would like the next generation to redefine feminine leadership, which I think is a lot more about being yourself in the workplace and bringing some of those traditional female traits to the board tables and management tables. That's some of those traits that I was mentioning earlier around empathy, compassion, customer focus, team-based behaviour. I think we have a lot to offer and we should just have the confidence to be ourselves and bring those skills to the work.
Other books mentioned in the podcast * Homo Deus and Sapiens - Yuval Harari * The Confidence Code - Katty Kay and Claire Shipman
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/116
Our High Performance teams series now enters the second part of the Execution pillar of HP Teams: Stakeholders.
So, in this episode we cover:
- How one conversation saved a client $15M;
- Why not managing stakeholders is the number one cause of project failure;
- How it is the most important point of trust for accelerating your career.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet Mike Michalowicz, serial entrepreneur and multiple best-selling author.
Self-defined as a normal guy with a normal upbringing, by his 35th birthday, Mike had founded and sold two multi-million dollar companies. Confident that he had the formula to success, he became an angel investor…and proceeded to lose his entire fortune.
Then he started all over again, driven to find better ways to grow healthy, strong companies. Among other innovative strategies, Mike created the “Profit First Formula”, a way for businesses to ensure profitability from their very next deposit forward.
Mike is now running his third million dollar venture, alongside keynote speaking and is also the author of Profit First, Surge, The Pumpkin Plan and The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur, which BusinessWeek deemed “the entrepreneur’s cult classic.”
In this episode we talk about:
- How his early success ultimately proved to be a fallacy and led to his downfall;
- Why workaholism is not a badge of honour and must be defeated in our culture;
- How to reframe your value in the marketplace by choosing to become dispensable instead of indispensable; and
- Why having no cash, experience or contacts are your biggest assets when it comes to starting a business.
Connecting with Mike You can find out all about Mike on his website - https://www.mikemichalowicz.com/ (or https://mikemotorbike.com).
Thanks to Jeff Brown for recommending Mike.
On a story from his childhood that impacted his life * I was typically average! It's funny, I hear stories of other people that have gone through extraordinary trauma or had some kind of awakening to their calling in their childhood, and that wasn't me. But one thing I think that was interesting, whenever my parents would talk about work, is that I had to find that one job working for that one big corporation because that's the safest way to navigate through life. And even today, they still are confused by the path of the entrepreneur. So maybe that's the thing that kind of triggered my desire to explore. * I think the greatest lesson I learned in lacrosse was the power of the mind. One of the necessary skills in lacrosse as a middie was to face off. When I did, I realised my thoughts were determining how successful I was on these face-offs. If I thought I could beat the person I was going against and had a plan of where I was gonna move the ball, I was wildly successful. But if I ever felt intimidated or lacked confidence, I would falter. And in business, I realised the power of thought dictates our subsequent actions.
On why early success was his undoing * My first business was in IT Support and my exit was via private equity. The second business was in computer crime investigation and I was in the right place at the right time. First six months I think we did over half a million dollars. The first full year, we did around one and a half or two million. And then in the second year in business, we were on a run for seven million dollars in revenue. In the moment, I thought I was just super smart, but my company got part of the Enron trial. * We were racking up debt, borrowing from the banks, pulling credit lines. I think at one point when we sold the company, we maybe had a half a million dollars of debt. But it was acquired by a Fortune 500 because we were on such a fast growth trajectory, and then it started to instil in my thoughts that, "Oh, you don't need to run a business that's healthy financially. Just go all in on it. And if you do, someone somewhere will buy you." * This concept of grow-at-all-costs is insidious. You see on the cover of every magazine for entrepreneurs and business leaders, "Grow, grow, grow, workaholism, grind it out, push yourself." And we're not considering the health of the organisation or the health of ourselves. And I learned that the hard way, and now I'm on a mission to fix that.
On workaholism * It seems the way to climb up the ladder as a leader is to outperform everyone else, to hustle and to grind out effort. That translates into workaholism. It's become a badge of honour, like "I work x number of hours." Of course the trade-off for workaholism is you've got to sacrifice your family, your interests and passions outside work. * Sam Walton, the founder of Wal-Mart, on his deathbed he was quoted of saying, "I blew it." Why? Well, he was surrounded by his family who didn't know him, who didn't care for him; he barely even knew his own wife. I think that's the definition of what we need to avoid.
On being dispensible * Previously, I would say to my staff, "If you want to make a big salary here, if you want to achieve your vision of employment, your job is to become indispensable; if you're indispensable, I am so dependable upon you, you can dictate your own salary." * And then I changed, and said I want to be dispensable; if we're dispensable it means we have the ability to create the systems and structure around us where systems, technology, maybe other people can carry the workload. And therefore if we go away for a week or two because we're sick or want to take a vacation, the business hums along. I think the greatest leaders understand that. * What small business owners think is that if we can do more of that, it'll bring us to the levels of Amazon and Google. The whole way to get there as leaders is to extract ourselves, to find ways for the technology and for others to carry the business forward. That's the definition of an extraordinary leader.
On rewarding truth * If I want to get the truth from my staff, I have to speak the truth. If I want to get loyalty, I have to give loyalty. I found that as the leader of my organisation, I always have to take the first step in a behaviour that I want. So I will be loyal to them, I will defend and protect my colleagues like they're my family. I will do everything to serve them. That's the first step to getting truth from them. * The second thing is I will put them in a position where they are actually rewarded for speaking the truth. So when someone says, "Mike, you made a mistake," I say, "First of all, let's give you a surprise!" Whatever it is; a bonus or a gift or just a wholehearted thank you. And then they put the truth on the table.
On moments of doubt * I have doubt right now in this interview, but it's just a story in my head. A friend of mine calls it the monkey brain and a great way to navigate it is to vocalise it, wherever you are. Step two is to envision that you're driving a car and so you strap those negative monkey mind thoughts in the back seat. And you say, "Listen, you're staying back there, and I gotta move forward now. But I acknowledge that you exist."
On how to spot the business wave worth catching * Pick a wave to evaluate, and then insert yourself into the community. Go to the conferences, talk with the attendees to see what the chatter is, read the magazines, listen to the podcasts. * Like a surfer, many waves you just let roll by. You don't pick the next wave; you evaluate the next wave and then pick the one that you can ride all the way home. * You can read more about these in my books Profit First and Surge.
On why having nothing is your biggest asset * If you lack cash, lack experience, lack a network of contacts, lack of prospects, those are actually your biggest assets. And sadly, it holds so many people back from starting a business. So in The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur, I explore why lacking each of those is a good thing. * They say necessity is the mother of invention. Well, a lack of money forces innovation, to be creative, which challenges the industry norms, which is a beautiful thing. * The lack of experience means you don't know the rules of the industry. Therefore you become known as the business that breaks the industry norms. * The lack of prospects means you have to learn how to sell. If you go into a business where your friends and colleagues, they'll say, "Oh yeah, I'll buy that," and they help you get started, I know they're doing the socially appropriate thing, but they're not letting you learn early and fast and hard. It's the lack of an ability to sell in the beginning that forces you how to figure out how to sell.
On the similarities between pumpkin farming and growth businesses * Within the community of pumpkin farmers, there's a very tiny faction called colossal pumpkin farmers. They grow these pumpkins that are the size of trucks. What's fascinating about them is they change the growing process only by a small percentage. So I ran the analysis in The Pumpkin Plan and sure enough, when I found colossal growth companies - companies that grow organically ridiculously fast - they have the same kind of process that they do with colossal pumpkin farming. * One was seed selection - colossal farmers match seeds to their soil content and the climate they're in; growth businesses exploit their uniqueness in a community that resonates with it. * Another was discipline - colossal farmers cut away weak pumpkins regularly; what I found in these businesses was the best leaders were phenomenal at removing distraction. The best leaders were disciplined in turning down opportunities, and the weakest people, while the businesses that struggled actually took on the most opportunity. It takes the word “no” to grow. * If we're not willing to immediately stop everything we're doing and abandon everything immediately to take on this new task, it's not important enough and we have to say no to it.
On the routine that makes the most difference * I love two moments about exercise: right before I exercise, I love the idea, there's like a dopamine release of how I'm gonna feel after I'm done. I don't like doing the activity, but I do like the end, the feeling that inspires. Those two moments of excitement sandwich the actual effort.
Final message of wisdom and hope * Every human on our planet is going through a life experience that is not better or worse than anyone else. It's just different. We're all in this brother and sisterhood and all have something to learn from each other.
This episode is sponsored by UnrushedExperiences.com
Unrushed Experiences is: Sydney’s premium degustation of the senses event for overworked professionals to undo the damage of busy. We believe that the world is drowning in speed and starving for stillness. The 7-course degustation menu with wine and beverages, accompanied with live world-class musicians, performers and Q&A with special guest storytellers aims to help attendees unwind and be fully present for a night. It’s on a Saturday evening on the 11th of May at renowned restaurant No.1 Bent Street By Mike in the Sydney CBD. For listeners use the buy one ticket get one free promo offer at checkout. The code is: ONEFREE www.unrushedexperiences.com
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/114
Our High Performance teams series now enters the final HP Teams pillar: Execution. So far the pillars we’ve covered are Mission, People, Culture and Tools, and so now we delve into where it can all go pear-shaped and the wheels can come off.
So, in this episode we cover part 1 of this pillar, Operating Rhythm:
- How to find the drumbeat of your team;
- How it keeps everyone focused and united;
- Why it creates time to do all the right thinking required;
- How an operating rhythm makes everyone highly effective with their time.
This episode is brought to you by: Unrushed Experiences: Sydney’s premium degustation of the senses event for overworked professionals to undo the damage of busy.
It’s on a Saturday evening on the 11th of May at renowned restaurant No.1 Bent Street By Mike in the Sydney CBD.
For listeners of the podcast, use this code to get the buy one ticket get one free promo offer at checkout:
ONEFREE
www.unrushedexperiences.com
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we meet George Hunt, the Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Sydney Water.
George is a recognised technology leader within the global utility sector. He has a successful track record in implementing technology infrastructure to support increasing customer expectations, challenging regulatory outcomes and corporate business goals.
He has held roles as a Global Consulting Partner at Wipro Digital in the UK and CIO for Wessex Water.
George completed a four year technical apprenticeship in a major engineering company, and has a Bachelor of Engineering from Birmingham University, UK and a Master of Information Systems from Kingston University, London, UK.
Connecting with George You can connect with George Hunt on LinkedIn.
On a story from his childhood that impacted his life * My most influential teacher was my maths teacher. He encouraged two or three of us to take our maths O-Level a year early because he had faith in us. We all got A's, which was interesting. That was a defining moment. * Around the age of 10, I joined the local rowing club and I can't begin to tell you how it changed my life. I suddenly found myself in a situation where I was surrounded by professional people, people who had achieved a lot. Doctors, lawyers, accountants, really professional people who were driven. I was mixing with kids who had very high aspirations and who were gearing themselves up to go to university and that couldn't have been further from where I was at that point in time.
On what has made him successful * The first thing is a genuine interest in how applied technology can make a difference. The welding experience I had with the welding robots was a good example of technology aiding manufacturing. * The second thing is that I learned quite quickly the power of learning how to advise and influence, as opposed to tell. People are the secret sauce and if you can get a team to work for you, with you, alongside you and they believe in where you're trying to go, then you can achieve huge things. * I worked for this amazing guy called John Wolf who's sadly passed away now. He was one of two people in my life that has been truly inspiring to me and made me realise the power of working with people and getting things done with people, rather than a more traditional sort of management approach, where you tell people what to do. He taught me a huge amount about the power of goodwill, the power of investing in people so that they believe in what they're doing.
On getting a team to perform * To win your people’s hearts and minds, you have to have a compelling vision or proposition to offer them. If you sell the proposition to them, you can then sell the journey to them. And if you can sell the journey to them, you can grab their heart. I love a good analogy or story in order to help people understand what we're trying to ask them to do. * How do you unlock discretionary effort? Why did you take on the challenges in your life that you took on? Not just because they're there. There must've been something that compelled you to do it. * If you don't win the hearts and minds, it's really difficult to recover as you have no credibility, no goodwill credit that you can trade on when the going gets tough.
Some great analogies to help guide your teams * Everything worth doing in business is like a marathon; all transformations take years. So you have to have the purpose within your blood and you've got to know what the outcome is going to look and feel like. * The one analogy I use is that we're trying to upgrade an aircraft whilst it's in flight. And it's such a significant programme that it's effectively like changing one of the engines whilst it's in flight. This allows people to understand the risk profile of what we're doing. So we better make sure the other engine is sound and not change too much on an aircraft that's in flight as we're introducing risk. And it's really corporate risk or reputational risk if the aircraft doesn't keep flying, so how do you feel about that risk? * There’s a story of JFK walking around NASA in the 1960s and he comes across this guy who's sweeping the corridor, and he asks him, "What's your job?" And he says, "I'm helping to get a man on the moon." Regardless of whatever your role is, whatever your contribution is, there was a clear mission towards achieving an outcome or supporting an outcome. * We had a number of folk that were used to sitting in the grandstand criticising the play on the field. I thought, "That's just too lazy. You've either got a position on the field and you know what your role is, or you're nothing. There's one pitch. One team. One objective and no grandstands."
On being relevant * So the feedback was "Be relevant or get out of my way. Or get out my diary." So the feedback was "Make sure you're relevant and I'll give you time. If you're not relevant, I will not give you time." * You've got to add some value or you've got to make a contribution, so I'm constantly challenging my team to stay relevant otherwise irrelevancy will actually cause them to become extinct.
On the changing landscape of technology * Technology is an interesting arena because it could just be outsourced or switched. So we need to be open-minded about how to change and stay relevant, rather than just saying, "We keep machines going, keep the lights on." * Through the maturity of technology, rather than just being an enabling function, IT has become a partnering function. Digital will actually start to define the strategy of a lot of organisations. * Don't describe what you do, start to describe what impact you have, or what contribution or what difference you could make, or what disruption you could introduce that will change the nature of the organisation. * A CIO is not the technical person in the room anymore, they’re actually at the heart of the future of their organisation. More technical and digital people will be sitting on boards.
On the little things in leadership * Those little things are simple things like knowing somebody's name, saying hello, saying goodbye, saying thank you. At the end of the day on Friday, I always walk around the floors of where I am in the Sydney Water building just telling people to go home or asking why they're staying late, or just saying, "Thanks for doing what you're doing." Simple things like that, they just pay you back in bucket loads. * I have a constant, ongoing dialogue with the people that are going the extra mile for me. We operate a ‘manager once-removed’ process, which allows me to be very connected to my direct report and their direct reports. I go out of my way to understand what makes somebody tick. I know when people are under pressure, so I make sure I go and support them and create an environment that makes them successful.
Final message of wisdom and hope * It's very easy for your moral compass to be messed around with in large corporations; you suddenly realise you're not living up to your values or you're not staying true to what you believe in. So my words of wisdom are really know who you are. Know what you stand for. Know what you believe in, and stay true to them. * Opportunities will come your way and there will be opportunities that are aligned with those values, rather than you seek the opportunity only to realise you have to compromise your values.
Go ahead and listen to George's colleague, Kevin Young, our very first Inner Chief Podcast episode!
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/112
Our High performance teams series now enters part 20 and we enter the final part of our pillar on Tools. So far we’ve covered Scoreboards and Metrics, Hardware and Systems, Processes and Frameworks and IP.
So, in this episode we cover Partnerships:
- How all the best HP Teams and Businesses use partnerships at a whole new level
- How partnerships can lower your risk, vastly grow your business IP, accelerate your growth and improve your culture
- When to partner and when not to
- How to select partners
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode we meet Ram Castillo.
Ram is an award-winning Design Director, Author, Blogger, top-ranking Podcaster and international Speaker.
For 13+ years he’s been working for global agencies including Ogilvy & Mather, DDB, JWT and McCann Worldgroup on clients such as Audi, McDonald’s, Qantas, Coca-Cola, Telstra, Google and The Louis Vuitton Group.
He is the author of two best selling books and has been featured in HOW magazine, Herman Miller, deFrost*, AIGA.org and Apple.
Since 2012, he’s been providing expert advice for emerging designers and creatives to be employed, and those that are established – to reach their next level, via GiantThinkers.com and has recently launched Unrushed Experiences.
- In this episode we talk about:
-
- How creatives are different and what you need to do to motivate them and make them maximally effective
- How to accelerate your career as a creative or not
- Thinking Big
ADVICE FROM HIS MOTHER & ACCELERATING YOUR CAREER AND GROWTH
she just put her hand on my shoulder and said, "Look, whatever you want to do, just remember to dream big. Dream really, really big."
I remember going back from my first USA speaking tour, when I launched my first book, How To Get a Job as a Designer. When I got back, the first thing she said to me ... and I was gone for three months ... And she hadn't seen me. So the folks came and greeted me at the airport. But she said, "how does it feel? How does it feel climbing up that mountain?" And I said, "feels pretty good, Mum." And she said, "Well, make sure you come back down and share to everyone what you found."
This the best way in; to get your foot in the door, and the principle I've really applied is in order to take a forward step sometimes you really need to take a side step. And I've been taking many side steps.
Patience. In a world where it can feel like we're not getting anywhere. I have been embedded, through my parents, that belief that you should really take your time and enjoy what it is you need to learn at this moment. Someone once told me that although it might be a painful experience ... or maybe painful might be a bit extreme of a word ... but you want something so bad. One of my mentor's once told me that maybe you're not moving forward because you've not learnt a lesson you're meant to learn yet. And that's something that's really stuck by me; enjoying what you really need to learn, even if it's uncomfortable, even if it makes you sort of squeamish or gives you anxiety, because ... The way my Mum put it was, look at all the great masterpieces in the world. They were all carved from some block of stone or solid nothingness. And could you imagine if we are that thing. Could you imagine how painful those chips are? Being carved into masterpieces? We're getting chipped away.
And I know that might seem very broad strokes, top-line but it is really these guiding principles that I've been able to really adopt and embrace. On a hyper-practical level, I just work my arse off, mate. I really, really do.
I think when I say work hard, I mean, like, when you feel ... it's the old Schwarzenegger thing, isn't it? It's like Pumping Iron, where he said, when you think you've got nothing left in the tank, it's the extra three reps that actually get you from good to great. Or average to champion.
I also value relationships, and I think that has grown into equity in itself
Education, so it's important because some people are like, "do I need a Bachelor's degree?" Well, from my experience in design specifically ... but again, transferrable principles ... research what is the bare minimum that you need. What is the bare minimum that you need, from an education credibility point of view, that will allow you to work in that trade.
And so many people need to really remove themselves from this whole, "university is the only way," thing because it's not.
ON DESIGN
Now I really push myself to learn social dynamics and social interaction and really through design ... human centred design ... that technology is reverse engineering human behaviour and outcomes whether it's in the commercial space or not. That for me I've also tried to apply to myself.
Ram Castillo: In knowing more about people, which in turn as helped be become, hopefully, a better leader, and a better communicator, and a better creative in that we're not ever meant to assume, we're meant to absorb. We're meant to come up with our hypothesis that is really informed ... not just by data ...but qualitative data as well, not just quantitative data I mean.
HOW TO GET MENTORS AND THE BEST ADVICE HE EVER GOT
I interviewed the likes of Kelly Slater, 11 times world surf champion, exactly that ... I slid into his Instagram DM's. But could you imagine, even if they say no, there's going to be someone who's going to answer on some platform available, where that person's active. And if you're feeling stuck, or you really are stuck, you don't have to go at it alone. You can scope, whether it's locally or globally, someone, or a few people, who can give you a nudge into helping you see the blind spots and kind of the guesswork to succeed faster.
Russell James. He is the main photographer for Victoria's Secret. He is also a fellow Aussie, and one thing he shared with me was ... we spoke at a conference together in Margaret River and we've since been quite good friends ... and he said, "don't let the highs take you too high. And don't let the lows take you too low."
Debbie Millman. She's very iconic in the design world. She actually has had the first ever design podcast in the world, 12 years ago now or more, fifteen maybe. She's based in New York and she runs the Masters of Design Programme at the New York, or is it the Sydney Visual Arts Design School there. And she said the longer it takes, the longer it will last and the more you'll be prepared for the success, when it comes. So I'll say that again. She said that the longer it takes, the longer it will last and the more you'll be prepared for the success, when it comes.
I find that we often dream big and we want so many things for ourself. But then there's this five second window, where logic kicks in, and rationale kicks in. And then it goes, "Nah!" And if you miss that window, and you don't act on that window, so much of what your heart is screaming for, won't ever come into fruition. But the long and the short of it is, we live in a world where you can be whatever the hell you want to be, and you don't need permission from anybody at all. You just need to give things a go and understand, based on these things that I've said, that I've shared from my mentors, it allows you to just a, back yourself. But also, if it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out and that's okay. That's okay.
ON LEADING CREATIVES
I think one of the biggest challenges is balancing creativity with a business mind. Because also, part two, is what kind of creativity are we talking about? Some, and I've quickly had to learn this myself you know, dreaming me big into thinking I would be designing to change the world. Well, the reality is, commercially, much of the time, 90% of the work you'll be doing is probably ... if you're a designer anyway, or in the field of any type of marketing or communications ... is going to likely be for either finance, automotive, insurance, something that you're not entirely passionate about
The main thing, for me, has been understanding ... Starting from the top, where we have to look through the lens of human needs. So, no matter if you're a leader in the creative field or not, everyone ... all your employees, at some version ... would like some recognition, acknowledgement, feeling of community, a sense of belonging.
So understanding that, as a top-line thing, is important because it leads to the next thing, which I strongly advise, and it's the best way to motivates people; and it's to find what already motivates them. Hugely important because finding the right people for the right job ... or the right task ... often, I've seen, doesn't align.
So many leaders in the creative field, they might find that okay, this person is great on paper and then, on the interview, failed to ask the question, "what really lights you up?" What really motivates you and is it okay that you will be doing ... and let's say doesn't. Let's say there's a disconnect with the person's answer; and putting it out there, good old radical candour style ... you won't be doing that here. Like, what else motivates you? Do you ...just say it ... do you just need this for the money? Do you just need this for experience? To get something under your resume?
It's just so important to find the real motivations in people, because if you try to sugarcoat it and say "yeah, yeah, we're highly creative here," and you don't give that person the opportunity, the briefs and the jobs and the projects are actually not that bloody creative. Or worse, you're giving junior work to a senior; doing bloody roll out work that is not stimulating for this creative person, that's a problem.
But I always encourage you to have projects also on the side. Or explore, whether it's going on your own night photography group, or you're building something from wood because you always wanted to and did a woodwork shop class. Or literally pick up your paintbrushes again and paint just like you did when you were a kid. I mean, all of these things I should probably do, to be honest.
But yeah, it is just distinguishing the two, because, we're talking off air a bit, Greg, but you know, the problems that a lot of leadership, certain leaders might have with creatives, is that their brain is actually wired to pushing boundaries and imagining a world that doesn't exist yet.
So, you're conflicting any time that you restrain a creative, they're actually going, "fuck that. I'm not going to do that." Like you're limiting what's possible.
And so it's important to give them the space to express their idea, to listen intently, help them feel that they've been heard. But also influence the outcome, if it's not to their liking, by informing them that here are the circumstances that are not allowing us to proceed with that type of idea. It's a great idea. However, dot, dot, dot.
UNRUSHED EXPERIENCES
Unrushed Experiences. As you said, it's a premium degustation of the senses, for overworked professionals to undo the damage of busy.
Those that feel they may be drowning in speed, and starving for stillness. It is literally a seven-course degustation menu for the next one that's coming up on the 11th of May, here in Sydney, at renowned restaurant Number One Bench Street by Mike. He's crafted the seven-course degustation meal with wine and beverages and live music performers from a violin and cello duo who played for Sydney's Symphony Orchestra and Australian Orchestra to Roshani Priddis, who's been on Idol and X-Factor. James Blunt calls her a deep, dark and soulful songwriter. To Q and A's with special guests
FINAL MESSAGE OF WISDOM AND HOPE
Really simply, I'd say to lead with generosity and to follow with care. That's it.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/110
Our High performance teams series now enters part 19 and we enter part 4 of our pillar on Tools. So far we’ve covered Scoreboards and Metrics, Hardware and Systems and Processes.
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER FRAMEWORKS AND IP
“You don’t need to be a genius or a visionary, or even a college graduate for that matter, to be successful. You just need framework and a dream.” – Michael Dell
- How all HP Teams have a secret recipe for success which drives authority, clarity and unrivalled results
- How to develop that secret recipe by starting with employee / customer or business needs
- How you can overcome some resistance from the people in your team or stakeholders with diagnostics and health checks;
- How this can accelerate your career and ability to lead new teams
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode we meet Perry Marshall.
Perry Marshall is endorsed in FORBES and INC Magazine, and is one of the most expensive business consultants in the world.
He founded the $5 million Evolution 2.0 Prize, with judges from Harvard, Oxford and MIT. The prize aims to solve the biggest mystery in biology.
His reinvention of the Pareto Principle is published in Harvard Business Review. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Labs at the California Institute of Technology uses his 80/20 Curve as a productivity tool.
His Google AdWords book laid the foundations for the $100 billion Pay Per Click industry, and techniques he pioneered are standard best practices. Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords is the world’s best selling book on internet advertising.
He’s consulted in over 300 industries and served as an expert witness for marketing and Google AdWords litigation. Perry has a degree in Electrical Engineering and lives in Chicago.
- In this episode we talk about:
-
- What the 80/20 rule actually is
- How to buy back time by saying no and more efficient meetings
- The 80/20 productivity curve
- Solving tough problems and appearing superhuman
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/108
Our High performance teams series has reached part 18 and today we look at part 3 of our pillar on Tools, namely Systems and Processes.
So far under this section, we've covered Scoreboards and Metrics and how you need to measure what you want to manage if you want to keep pushing the dial on performance. We then moved to Hardware and Collateral that your people have at their disposal to do their jobs.
In this episode, I outline:
- How to use systems and processes to gain a competitive advantage;
- How you can optimise your team’s performance;
- How you can overcome some resistance from the people in your team by creating freedom within a framework;
- Why the use of systems and processes will help you lead any team in any job.
Why do we need systems and processes? If you are in a leadership position and you're finding that maybe growth has stalled or going backwards, or you're having to put out fires all the time and you just can't seem to get to the bottom of what is wrong with what is happening in the team, it's fairly likely that the systems and processes that you've got in your team (if you have any!) can be improved.
The hardest thing about this is that you either don't know the next move or have no confidence in any of your options. So many things are going wrong, you're on the back foot, and as a result, you’re second-guessing yourself frequently.
Edwards Deming, an expert on process excellence, had this to say: "If you can't describe what you're doing as a process, you do not know what you're doing."
It’s a pretty big statement, but it’s so true! Sometimes we get so caught up in the doing that we haven't actually worked out what process we're following. Or there are small parts of the process that you've never really documented and this might be the root cause of some major error or system degradation.
By getting process excellence correct and in place, you can make the work of your people easier and more effective. Furthermore, you will have a lot more clarity on the points of failure, whether they are a systems or people issue, and by refining these, you will naturally improve performance.
Therefore, this pillar of Tools is really about giving you confidence in decision-making and doing so with accuracy.
So how do we go about this? Let’s look at 5 ways.
Step 1: Look at the pain points of your business By doing this, you’ll find that there are certain areas where there are consistent breakdowns of performance (eg. slow turnaround times or delivery quality). Look at the way the team operates, map out the processes, do time and motion studies if you need to.
It doesn’t matter what department you’re in, you will have systems and processes and you’ll, therefore, have performance issues. My advice is to have a read of a great book called The Goal, by Eliyahu Goldratt and Jeff Cox.
The whole global movement of lean six sigma and lean manufacturing is based on process excellence and getting the right systems and processes to work together. It is incredibly powerful and can make an enormous difference. At the very least, go and learn about business process management.
Step 2: Optimise your current systems and processes If you’re looking to do a system replacement or overhaul, you’ll need to get familiar with your current platforms and their effectiveness and efficiency. Firstly, optimise them to the nth degree to a point where you can say, "There's no point optimising any further. We know the system processes, we know all the process maps that go with it and we've done everything we can to improve. This particular part of our business is now optimised."
Once you’ve done that, only then can you make the decision about a new system or process. You’ll then need to perform a cost-benefit analysis to uncover whether it is worth it, especially if you have to pitch to an investment committee.
Step 3: Make a business case for a new system Remember, your goal as a leader is to develop a great track record of making the right calls on these sorts of issues. If you can hand-on-heart say you’ve done all the correct analysis and optimisations, you will then have the credibility to win over the decision-makers.
You’ll be able to confidently say, “We've got to the point where we really can't improve much more unless there's a new system going in. This is going to cost this much and this is the benefit it will give us from a service delivery timing and a cost perspective, and this is what it will mean for the bottom line of the organisation."
As I’ve alluded to in a previous minisode, the organisation you work for will likely be measured against their return on capital expenditure. So don't take systems and processes lightly; it’s a wonderful skill to obtain and develop. And when you get it right, you can lead any team in any industry or profession.
It can also unite the team behind improving and getting things better; the right system or process can release people and give them the freedom to do their job within a framework that helps your team - and therefore the organisation - achieve their strategic objectives.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode we meet Rob Patterson
Rob Patterson is a senior Executive with extensive experience in the leadership and significant growth of national professional service firms.
Rob is the former COO of HWL Ebsworth Rob where he played a key role overseeing the metamorphosis of a small Melbourne Based Legal Practice (40 employees, Turnover $3m) into a National Commercial Law firm of over 600 people and turnover in excess of $150M. Now Australia’s largest firm by partner numbers.
Rob then joined Macpherson Kelley as COO and led a similar transformation there and is now the Managing Director of the Parkins Lane Consulting Group which focuses on creating and executing on strategy, growth and marketing for professional Services firms.
Outside of work he is a keen surfer, grows Sangiovese vines, has an amazing partner Kim and is the proud father of Abbey who is just embarking on her own professional career.
- In this episode we talk about:
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- How he grew their business from $3M to $150M
- The importance of relationships and being a known quantity when going for roles
- Humility and self-regulation
- How to grow your personal brand and business
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/106
Our High performance teams series has reached part 17 and today we look at part 2 of our pillar on Tools, namely Hardware and Collateral.
Last week we spoke about Scoreboards and Metrics and how you need to measure what you want to manage if you want to understand what success looks like in your business, and keep pushing the dial on performance.
But today, we explore the hardware and collateral that your people have at their disposal to do their jobs. This includes their phones, computers, tools, machinery, equipment, sales, brochures, sales decks, business cards, all this kind of equipment.
In this episode, I outline:
- What goes wrong culturally when you have the wrong hardware and collateral;
- How to know how much to invest in this, given it is often a capital expense and requires a return;
- How Scoreboards and Metrics are intrinsically linked to Hardware and Collateral;
- How to use Hardware and Collateral to create a happy workplace.
What goes wrong when you don’t have the right tools? In most organisations, people are often blaming their performance on their hardware or their collateral. The problem comes if you create a situation where their hardware gives them an out, it will allow them to take the victim mentality and puts you in a difficult position.
So take some careful consideration, because the challenge is that you can often find yourself sitting there thinking, “Maybe I need to invest a lot more in hardware because it's a hardware issue; people don't have the right equipment to do their job.”
But in reality, the hardware and equipment is fine; it's the culture or the attitude that your people have. This is when it becomes really hard to work out what the root cause is, because you don't want to under-invest and you certainly don't want to over-invest either!
What happens when your team has the correct equipment? The right equipment can make a person feel 10-foot tall and bulletproof in doing their job. They can really feel supported. They can feel like they're a valuable member of the team. It gives them confidence.
Some equipment can be game-changing for effectiveness: you can reduce long turnaround times or service delivery, or save time on operational processes.
However, it’s not all roses. What can happen is that over time, workers get complacent and having the right tools could lead to social loafing, so you've got to be a little bit careful. You don't want to let them get lazy and make the equipment do all the work. So, it's really about striking the correct balance.
How Metrics and Hardware are aligned I want to tell you a quick story about where this can go wrong when you under-invest. This is a somewhat extreme example, but it’s worth it to make a point. Quite a few years ago, I was working with an organisation that sent teams right out into the desert to do particular jobs. What happened was these teams would go out for about two to three weeks at a time. They’d be in a camp, working on a particular job and they'd move around a bit doing this particular work. These are frontline professionals that did their work, but they were under fairly extreme pressure to hit time and cost targets.
So, in order to achieve the outcome, what one or two of the project leaders ended up doing was, in their costings for the job, they would put in that they were going to have a portaloo and shower facility on site. Perfectly reasonable. But...they never actually bought it, so the project actually would come in under budget and look good! This is a perfect example of when a metric can drive poor behaviour.
The project managers were actually treating their people like animals and in turn, they acted like animals (this wording came directly from someone involved in the organisation). So, if you treat your people poorly by giving them poor or no hardware, what happens is they don't turn up as their contribution or expertise doesn’t feel valued.
Now, let’s turn that on its head and think about professional organisations, particularly sporting organisations; the players turn up with the right equipment, they look sharp in tracksuits, they look like a unit and they're ready to do their job like a pro.
Happy workplace environment, happy life! The fact is, hardware and collateral can have a huge psychological effect on your people, and when they have good equipment, they even start to do things like making sure their working environment looks better and cleaner. And then they start to take care of their work, and this attitude of quality starts to come through in your people.
I worked for an organisation where they had shift turnovers where one mechanic would come in and replace another mechanic who was working on aeroplanes. At the end of each shift, the outgoing mechanic was given 10 minutes to clean up the area, put all the tools in the right place and make everything absolutely perfect and sparkling clean for the next mechanic.
It really played such an important role in the respect amongst the staff, in the quality of work and in the workmanship. This is the effect that a really good quality set of tools and equipment can have on your people.
How do I get the correct balance of hardware and collateral, and investment? This is the real trick. First and foremost, you have to go back to the work we did in the first five sessions on high performance teams around your mission; this was your vision, your values, and your strategy.
If within that you have identified that you need to invest more in equipment and the hardware and collateral for your people, then now is the time to do so. If you're getting a lot of complaints about the quality of equipment, if you're seeing people disregard or disrespect their equipment, you might sense it is the time to make a move.
You need to do a real cost-benefit analysis here. Any listed company is measured in the market on their return on capital expenditure. It is a key metric of whether or not shareholders or major investors will invest within that organisation.
So as a leader, your job is to make sure that any capital you expend has a very good return and you need to do that analysis carefully. If you're not sure how to do it, go and work with the Finance team and make sure that you are providing really solid evidence for the case for more expenditure.
But don't spend it wildly. Spend it first on the one or two things that will move the dial the most on achieving your vision and your strategy. Remember, as a Chief, you're after a good Track Record here that supports the organisation you work for; if you end up investing a load of capital that gets no return, it doesn’t do you nor the organisation any favours.
What if we can’t spend more money? If the decision - based on your analysis and business cash flow - is not to invest more, then go back to the team and explain why. Get them involved in a process whereby they start to take greater care for the tools they have. Give them that extra time to clean things up, give them time to improve the quality of their hardware.
If they've got an old laptop that's rubbish, try just get it cleaned up. Maybe get it slightly upgraded, rather than a full replacement. Get some software that can make them run faster and be less cluttered.
Make the new equipment a special moment in time A common pitfall is when an organisation or a leader invests a stack of money on new equipment and then they hold it over the employees by saying, “Here's new equipment. Now you have to improve your performance to justify the expense!”
Well, that's just a condescending bribe and all that results in is people thinking that the leader has just given them what they've always needed to do the work being demanded of them properly, but never gotten. And to make it worse, now they’re being told to improve?!
The key takeaway here is that as a Chief, the reason you're investing in hardware and collateral is to lift the spirit of your people; if they haven't had the tools and collateral to do the job before and it's made their life harder, tell them you're sorry, but now you're really happy that you can give them new equipment to do their job. Tell them they deserve to have it; make them feel special.
Think of when a parent gives their child their first-ever boots to play football, or their favourite tennis shoes for their first game of tennis. How much excitement does the kid have?! Well, I know we're not all going to feel the excitement a 10-year old kid feels when they get their first bit of sporting equipment, but that's okay. The principle here is to make people feel special. Recognise them when you are investing in hardware and collateral for them. If you're investing to increase performance, the tools alone should provide most of that uplift.
After the new collateral comes in and all the new hardware is rolled out or the new equipment is handed out, engage the team to buy into the numbers by going back to the previous episode on scoreboards and metrics. Once these two are aligned, so will the cultural transformation of the team be.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode we meet Laura Gasner Otting. Laura has empowered thousands through her speaking engagements and inspirational writing, including her newest book, Limitless: How to Ignore Everybody, Carve your Own Path, and Live Your Best Life.
Laura’s 25-year resume is defined by her entrepreneurial edge. She served as a Presidential Appointee in Bill Clinton’s White House, helping shape AmeriCorps; Was founder and President of the highly successful Nonprofit Professionals Advisory Group, which placed nonprofit executives around the world.
Through her own commitment to give back, Laura has helped build a local Montessori school, co-founded a women’s philanthropic initiative, advised a start-up national women’s PAC, grew a citizen-leadership development program, and completed three charity-inspired marathons—projects emblematic of her passions and values.
Laura is both an experience CEO and Guru and her advice around success and reaching your limitless potential is practical and inspiring.
In this episode we talk about:
- What Laura learnt from working in Bill Clinton’s White House on a national program
- How to live with purpose
- Defining your own success rather than living someone else’s life
- How find your Leadership Voice
- The four words you need to never repeat ever again
Key Quotes from Natalie Speers
Why she does what she does:
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I went from the White House to going into executive search, really, was the best and the brightest, the smartest people, the shiniest brand, who was doing this work. And I was interviewing people, and about four years into it, I was struck by this idea that even though I was interviewing people who were at the top of their game, these were leaders, they were people coming out of ... there were people coming out of the White House, there were people coming out of massively impressive, bold-faced jobs. And I was fascinated by the fact that even though they were successful, on paper, they were successful, they weren't all that happy.
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When you do search for non-profits, you get to talk about what people have accomplished and how they've accomplished it. But you also get to spend a lot of time talking about why they accomplished it. What's their purpose? Who are they? What's their calling? What do they care about? And I was so struck that there were not that many people where the what they did, matched the who they were.
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And then I started thinking about my own life also, and realising that it wasn't that way for me too. And that's sort of when I had this moment of rage in this big firm and I said, "I can do this differently, better, smarter, faster. And with more authenticity, integrity and profit than this big firm." I went on and launched my own firm. And I ran that for 15 years. During that time, I had to keep coming back as an entrepreneur, to why am I doing this? Why am I here? What's the point? And in each of those moments, I would realise that I had to continue to be honest with the plan. What's my plan? Who am I? Is there a plan at all? Because when you're running your own business, you really have to be conscious of those decisions of the expenditures you make and the time that you take to do things.
On Living with Purpose and Consonance:
If you want to live a life of consequence, no matter how you define it, you have to live a life of consonance, where everything is aligned, where it's in flow, where as I mentioned, the what you do match the who you are. So this book really came out of the 20 years of interviewing thousands of people, and my own story of making specific changes, so that I could live a life that really felt like it mattered to me.
And I think that that's this purpose fallacy that we have, that purpose is for someone else, it's some other time after you've made your money. It's for the people who wear the white hats or who are okay living in poverty
I looked up the word purpose in an actual dictionary. And the word purpose means the reason for which something exists. And that's it. There's no picture of Mother Teresa. There's no friend wagging their judgmental finger at you. Your purpose is just the reason why you're here, and your purpose may be curing cancer. Your purpose may be feeding the poor. Your purpose may be administering alms to the unwashed masses. But your purpose might also be getting yourself out of debt, or building a business, or buying a Maserati and a beach house. Your purpose is just your purpose.
The first thing I do in the book, is I want to get rid of this idea that calling and purpose has to be writ large and lofty, and that it can only belong to people in the non-profit sector, because frankly, most of them are feeling just as untethered and unmoored as the rest of us.
And I think we also have this idea that ambition is a bad thing. Just like we get purpose wrong. I think we get ambition wrong too. We sort of hide it under this guise of faux humility, because that's, of course, more socially acceptable, right? Quote unquote, hashtag humble brag and all of that. And I do think that if there is a cause that you care about or there are people who you love, and if making the most amount of money or giving yourself a bigger megaphone or putting yourself on a bigger platform will help to advance that cause or help those people, I think it's not ambition. I think it's your responsibility.
How to find your purpose
think about a time when you were at your very best. You were firing on all cylinders. You were making it rain. You were closing a deal. You were getting a standing ovation, or maybe you were having a small, quiet moment with a loved one. Maybe you were ... difficult situation in private. There are moments where you know, you're just, everything that's in you, everything that you bring to the world, has been called upon in that moment. And then those are really your fundamental states of leadership.
Think about those moments and to write down the energy that they're using, the muscles that they're using, whether they're in public or in private. How are they moving their body? How are they using their mind? And to write down some of the adjectives that describe that. Pin them to a lock screen on your phone or on your rear view mirror or on your new bathroom or something. And to spend as much time as you can living into that person
Some Pitfalls to Finding Purpose
as long as we don't fall into hustle porn. The whole hustle, hustle, hustle. When I was interviewing people, I would get candidates. They would say things like, "Well, I sent out 800 press releases." And they'd be really proud of that. And I'd be like, "All right, great. Did any of the press releases result in an article in the paper of the guy who runs the committee in Congress who determines whether or not this issue comes up for a vote?" Hmm. And if they did, then that press release matters. And the other 799 were useless, right? But if none of them did, well, then it doesn't matter. There's busy and there's impact.
On Defining Your Own Success
I turned around one day and I went, "Well, okay, I made it to the top. But the top of what? Is this actually where I want to be?" And so I filled in all those checkboxes along the path and I got to where I was supposed to. I collected all the gold stars. I ran on the treadmill. And then I looked around one day and I'm like, "All right, well, success just means running faster?" If I have more clients and I have more revenue and I have more projects, that just means I have more. But am I actually making more profit? Am I actually maximising impact in the world? Am I actually maximising the flexibility I have in my life? Or do I just have more of the stress? Am I just running faster to keep the treadmill going? I got to the top, the top of what?
all along our path, there are people who insert their own definitions into our world. And if we don't fall for that, frankly, we fall for Instagram and Facebook and social media, where we've got these beautiful, flaxen-haired, beach-waved beauties looking out over the sand dunes telling us to, "Follow our passion." And that, "You'll be happy when." "Live life perfectly in balance." And I think that's all nonsense
So it's not until we stop and we say, "Well, what do I actually care about? What would make me happy?" That we get rid of everyone else and we say, "Screw the Joneses and their happy little shiny, beautiful, Facebook families." And we say, "What's my own definition?" And rather than leaning in to everyone else's, we figure out our own and we lean into that
On Finding Your Leadership Voice and Defining Your Own Success:
We have to figure out who we are when we're at our very best. And stop trying to emulate other people's voices. And it wasn't until those staff members became confident in who they were and the voice that they had, that they could live into that voice.
Because I believe that confidence doesn't come from having big dreams. I think that we have this idea that if we can dream it, we can do it. That's just not true. I could dream that I could be the Queen of England all day long, but nobody's bringing me tea and crumpets at 3:00 PM.
I didn't run those marathons eventually, because I dreamed it in the beginning and because I could dream that I could do it. I just started doing. And I put one foot in front of the other. When I put one foot in front of the other and my pants didn't light on fire, I started demonstrating competence. And when I started demonstrating competence, I began to have confidence that I could dream bigger and bigger.
And I think finding our personal voice of leadership comes from stepping into those moments where we try to do things that are hard, and we figure out what we're made of. And I think that it's so key to how we grow as individuals
Now, life is really short. We don't have a lot of time on earth, and frankly, we're going to spend 80,000 of those hours of our lives working. So it's time to not be, I'll be happy when, but to figure out how to be happy now.
I'm on this all-out crusade to get people to stop asking, "How can I help?" And create these band aids, and ask the question, "What needs to happen?" Because when somebody comes to you with a problem and they tell you all about it and you say, "How can I help?" They give you busy work. But if they tell you all about it and you say, "What needs to happen for you to feel successful?" Then suddenly they go, "Oh, well, actually I need to do this. I need to do that. Maybe if you could help me think through this problem, then I'm all set." And suddenly, their lack of planning, their anxiety, their emergency, doesn't become your problem. You just help facilitate for them the solution, the pathway that they need to take
At every age and every life stage, we're going to be sitting on different seats on the bus. But we want to pick them. I think that's something that's part of who we are. We've climbed out of the primordial sludge because we had agency. We had plans. We had ambition. I think if you don't allow people to find their own solutions, then they're not going to be of solution to you. You can't be insatiably hungry for someone else's goal. It's got to be your goal. Because you're not going to do the work, you're not going to grind, you're going to do what needs to be done in the dark hours where no one sees, where it's exhausting, where you'd much rather just be sitting on the couch and watching TV. But if it's not your goal, then you're not incentivized to get there
And so, the whole idea around the book Limitless, is that we are so limited by everyone else's definitions of success and everyone else's expectations that we've lost ourselves in those limits. The reason I want people to define their own success and define their own goals is because they will be so hungry and so driven for those, that they will, in fact, be limitless
A final message of wisdom and hope:
My final message of wisdom and hope is to ask people to live on the edge of their incompetence. I think that we spend so much time being paid and praised and promoted for doing the things that we do well, for living in the centres of our excellence, that we don't spend enough time taking risks and putting one toe over that edge of incompetence and doing things we haven't yet done to figure out what else we're made of.
LINKS:
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Do your limitless assessment here:
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limitlessassessment.com/chief
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Laura’s Book
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https://www.amazon.com/Limitless-Ignore-Everybody-Carve-your/dp/1940858763/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=limitless&qid=1552363715&rnid=2941120011&s=books&sr=1-1
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/104
Our High performance teams series now enters part 16 and we enter the 5 key Tools that drive a high performance culture, the first of which is Scoreboard and Metrics.
We’ve spoken about the Mission - all about the vision, your purpose and your why. And then we went into getting the right people on the bus, followed by building a high performance Culture. Now, for the next 5 episodes, we’re going to talk all about Tools; the equipment that let your people do their job well.
But today, we explore how to gamify your team's performance and increase engagement and results through the regular use of metrics and scoreboards.
In this episode, I outline:
- Why measuring performance is important and what happens when results are not measured correctly;
- Scoreboards and metrics in a business context and how they can be used to your advantage both internally and externally;
- How you can make numbers and data more interesting, meaningful and inspiring.
What gets measured gets managed If there is one thing that sport and business have in common is that they both love to measure performance. However, it’s safe to acknowledge that sport does it better, in a way that encourages people and indeed makes metrics interesting.
Some individuals and professions absolutely need to focus on numbers; while how we do them is important, it’s how we bring them into the culture of the team that is doubly important, especially if done wrong. Patrick Lencioni, who wrote that wonderful book, Five Dysfunctions of a Team, says that one of the critical dysfunctions is not paying attention to results. Ultimately, presenting numbers in a way that makes it clear and understandable for every member of our team as to what we can do to improve, then we can suffer.
Pitfalls of measuring results Firstly, we measure to prove our theory or belief - this is when we just keep paying attention to key numbers that we think prove what we want to do, or when we have metrics that don’t represent all situations.
Secondly, you could have a range of metrics that aren’t aligned to your style of play or team values, and what could happen is that you end up sacrificing team or organisational culture. A really good example of this is when you have two teams that actually have metrics that are in conflict with one another, for example, a manufacturing unit whose goal it is to increase the rate of production, and a supply team whose job is to cut costs.
And finally, a huge pitfall of measuring data is perhaps at the crux - inaccurate data. This is when the data is late, inaccurate, or just too difficult to obtain.
What goes in, must go out! Good metrics are absolutely vital because they allow accurate data-driven decisions so that your team can act in alignment with the company’s strategy or operational excellence. They can break down old paradigms and dispel myths and clarify a problem.
However, you have to get your numbers right because people can see through them really quickly; I’m sure you’ve been in that situation before looking at other peoples’ dodgy numbers! In fact, I’d go as far as saying how you present your numbers is vital to getting your point across. Tell people how they were collected and how accurate they are.
Metrics can also clarify the relationship between inputs and outputs, statistics and scoreboards, statistics and results. In other words, the more you do of a particular input activity, the more of a chance you will get an output. For example, in rugby, they talk about the speed of turnover and a tackle being an input metric to the number of tries scored. In netball, they talk about the number of seconds an individual holds a ball versus the number of goals scored.
7 ways to bring life to your scoreboards 1. Review your vision, strategy and values by breaking those goals down into what to measure and how it will be presented, with a focus on the person that’s going to be taking action. 2. Next, develop clear definitions of what is being measured and a precise target score. 3. Identify the sources of data, the quality, the timing required, the ease of collection, the owner of that data. 4. Develop your data collection plan. 5. Implement and refine the measurement process so that data gets clearer and clearer for your people. 6. Create scoreboards and reports that are striking, easy to interpret and valuable. Bring your scoreboards and metrics to life. Don’t make them a boring spreadsheet that just sits there. At many sports matches, the players can see the scoreboard plus the countdown timer; they know how much time there is to go to perform their job. Your people, therefore, need to be able to see your scoreboard. 7. And then, celebrate when someone makes a change or improves a number.
In summary, scoreboards and metrics are critical to all high performance teams. They can be a wonderful way of engaging the team, of creating a spirit around the numbers, of giving individuals the real information and data, so they can improve in their work and the team as a whole.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, our guest is Natalie Speers, the Founder & CEO of Social Ally, an agency in the digital marketing and social media space.
It was a great chat, in which we talk about how being an early adopter has pushed her out of her comfort zones, particularly in the social media space in the last decade. Natalie also shares some incredible social media stats that prove that everyone needs to use social media, regardless of your industry.
We then go through her list of common mistakes business owners and leaders make on social media and what they should be doing instead, and then we round up with her explaining what visual disruption - a term she coined - is and how to introduce it into your social posting strategy.
You can connect with Natalie Speers on LinkedIn or by email: natalie@socialallyusa.com.
Key Quotes from Natalie Speers
Keeping up with the ever-changing social media landscape
- I visit various websites, such as Social Media Examiner and Social Media Today. I'll visit those three times a week to read the articles of anything up and coming that's new, and I'll be sure and relay that to my entire staff. And if it's something of extreme interest that directly impacts us and how we service our clients, then I'll do training on it with all of my staff.
- My best ideas come to me when I'm laying in bed and it's the middle of the night and I wake up and I have some sort of great idea, so I go and write it down in my phone and then I'll go research accordingly the following day.
Misconceptions of social media and some incredible stats
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The most common misconception of social media is that often times people think it's just for young people or a social media marketing strategy won't work for their industry.
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So, you have Facebook. Obviously it's still the reigning champion. It has 2.27 billion monthly active users. That's a quarter of the entire world population, which is really crazy. The fastest-growing demographic on Facebook is ages 50 to 56 years old. So, again, it's not just about young people. All ages are on social media.
- Then, take a look at YouTube. YouTube is the second largest search engine below Google - 5 billion videos are watched per day and 300 hours of video are uploaded per minute!
- Instagram is more of a millennial-driven crowd; the 18 to 34-year olds are primarily using it.
- Twitter has 66 million monthly active users, and, interestingly, 34% of Twitter users are ages 25 to 34, favouring the side of females.
- A ton of millennials use Pinterest - as much as Instagram. The median age is 40, typically female and highly-educated.
- I like to refer to LinkedIn as a professional goldmine. It's a database for professionals by professionals. There is a lot of opportunity to be had on LinkedIn. Any business should define a LinkedIn prospecting strategy because I have seen a lot of success and lead generation come from LinkedIn.
Why you can’t afford not to use social media
- A lot of people come to me and for whatever reason, they don't think social media applies to their industry. So, to these people, I ask, “Do you not want your business to show up on a Google search when a user is searching for whatever service or product you're providing?!”
- Every minute there are 40,000 Google search queries happening. This equates to 3.5 billion searches a day!
- People are literally searching for answers to solve problems in their everyday lives by typing it into Google - they’re seeking authoritative content via social media channels, blogs, podcasts, YouTube videos. How you show up on a Google ranking is 85% based on your authoritative content, so if you're not doing social media and blogging etc. for your business, you're doing yourself a huge disservice. I can confidently say to you that if you don't implement a digital strategy, your business will eventually get left behind.
Some LinkedIn tips
- A LinkedIn search has a couple different components to it. Most importantly, it's to do with how your profile is optimised.
- As an example, when someone searches on LinkedIn, obviously I want to rank for the keywords “social media” or “social media marketing.” And so, as many times - within reason - as I can incorporate that phrase or keyword throughout my profile, the better.
- Secondly, a lot of people don't use the Headline properly, in my opinion. If you go to my profile, you will see that it has all my keywords in my headline: “entrepreneur”, “social media marketing”, “lead generation”, “speaker”, “consultant”. So, eloquently insert your relative keywords throughout your headline and throughout your profile.
- L.I.O.N. means LinkedIn Open Networker and it signifies to people that you are open to network with whomever and not sifting who I'm going to accept as a connection.
The future of social media
- The reality of today's world is that our mobile phone is literally an extension of us. We've come to expect instant gratification, meaning that we have the ability to pick up our phone, shop online and have something delivered to us the same day. We have the ability to communicate with small brands, large brands on social and be provided with an instant response to a question we may have, or feedback we may provide. With that in mind, that means our customer is getting increasingly smarter, more tech-savvy and less patient.
- 92% of consumers trust peer recommendations, so people are literally turning to social media, online forums, blogs in order to make their purchasing decisions.
Engaging your audience
- Social media is becoming the easiest, most powerful tool you have available to you as a business owner and I love to refer to it as “world-of-mouth”; you have the world ready to listen, at your fingertips, and it's really just a matter of figuring out how to engage those people in something they love.
- There are so many people leaving different comments or writing direct messages or a public wall post. My advice is to respond, engage and provide something of value. Build rapport, as that is when people make an emotional decision to buy from your business.
- One of the most detrimental things you can do to your business is leaving negative feedback or comments un-responded to. Now often, from the business owner's standpoint, the consumer is probably far exaggerating what really happens. But it can literally ruin a small business because the owner didn't step up and provide a valid explanation. People want to be heard, so listen, as that's the essence of social media.
- People are just haphazardly posting things that they find interesting themselves, not what their audience finds interesting and that's key. If you really want your social media to start working for you, you really need to have a clear understanding of who your audience is, how old are they, what interests do they have, what hobbies do they have, who do they engage with online. So, knowing this information is going to allow you to create a real consistent posting strategy that resonates with your potential customer and what they care about. It's not what you care about. It's what they care about.
Leading a group of millennials
- So, I have a team of just under 20 people, mostly comprised of millennials and I myself am a millennial.
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I am a very, non-confrontational person; I like to avoid conflict and it makes me very uncomfortable. So I actually joined a peer-to-peer group called EO (Entrepreneurs Organisation) and it's a worldwide organisation of entrepreneurs. Business ownership comes with so many challenges and you always think you're the only one going through this, but the fact of the matter is that's not true.
-
Greg: “I can say almost with certainty, that just about every CEO I've interviewed on this podcast has been in a mastermind or peer-to-peer group of some sort.”
Biggest mistake #1: Unrealistic Expectations
- Clients want social media, but sometimes they don't fully understand what that means. They just know it's a hot buzz word and they need it because their peers are doing it. They don’t fully understand what it takes to get from point A to point B. They think they can just post a video and all these leads come flooding in. If that was the case, everyone would be doing it themselves and there would be no need for agencies like Social Ally!
- So, use organic social media, meaning using unpaid social media, which is a long-term brand play. It takes time to build a community and it takes time to build rapport with your community, and this is done through really great content, providing value to your audience, engaging your users in something that they love, addressing pain points and solving their problems.
- Then, there’s paid social media. So that’s Facebook, Instagram, Google Ads. This is a shorter-term play, but it consists of a few components
-
- You must know what you are doing, otherwise, you will waste money. It's all about data-driven testing and making very strategic decisions. You have to figure out what your audience demographics are and what is going to entice them to click. It really just comes down to internet behavioural psychology
- You must have a consistent, organic social strategy.
- You must have a budget and be willing to lose it.
Biggest mistake #2: Not Visually Disrupting
- So, I want to put this into perspective for you. The average social media user scrolls through 300 feet of content per day. That is the height of the Statue of Liberty!
- Your job as a business owner is to visually disrupt people's newsfeed. Your job is to stand out, to make them stop and read your post or watch your video or whatever it is. Every day we're bombarded with advertisements and brands all around us. Visual disruption!
Biggest mistake #3: No KPIs or Data Analytics Monitoring
- People often put so much time and resource into their social media and then they love to complain about how it's not working for them. And they just write it off: “Oh, social media doesn't work for me. I tried it.”
- You should be monitoring cost per click. Cost per acquisition. If you’re not, you’re wasting your time and you should just stop and invest your time into areas of your business until you are ready to get serious and understand the power of digital marketing and really making data-driven decisions.
- Clients don't care about the pretty graphics that we are going to put out on their social media. They care about selling their product or service.
What is the final message of wisdom and hope for the next generation of executives?
- To all of you talented and amazing future executives, get ready for a wild ride. Owning and operating a business is the most difficult and challenging experience of your life. However, it's also the most rewarding and gratifying experience.
- You have to be willing to stick it out and fight through the day and never give up. I can tell you that there have been about 3 times I have come extremely close to shutting Social Ally because I couldn't handle the pressure and the stress, but I'm super lucky to have a support circle of friends and family and mentors who really kept me going with different encouragements and mentorship.
- One of the most gratifying things about being a business owner is having the ability to employ people and be a leader and mentor that your team looks up to.
Resources mentioned in the episode:
- Facebook Attribution Tool: this allows you to access the full conversion path, explaining to you what ads made people convert.
- LinkedIn Social Selling Index (you need to be logged into LinkedIn)
- Book recommendation: Scaling Up by Verne Harnish
- Book recommendation: Traction by Gino Wickman
Book recommendation: Expectation Therapy by Art Costello
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/102
Our High Performance Teams series now enters part 15, where we finalise the 5 key elements that drive a High Performance Culture, namely the rituals & traditions of the team.
We cover how to overcome those periods in work or business life when it has become a bit soulless, a bit toxic and is all work, and no play. One of the best ways is to use rituals and traditions to create meaning and a sense of belonging to your team and get the trust back on track.
In this episode, I outline:
- The history of rituals and traditions and why they are so important, no matter the context;
- When rituals and traditions take on a negative form and what good ones should look like;
- 6 topics that will guide you around rituals and traditions and some really great, specific examples;
- How it's important to remember that you are the chief story-teller and your team will look to you to create rituals and traditions that energise them and ultimately will drive high performance.
Stay epic,
Greg
This week’s episode takes a totally different format as it’s a discussion rather than an interview.
I recorded this episode with our spiritual guru, Damien Price, for another podcast called The Universal Man, a Not-For-Profit organisation dedicated to helping men operating at their best in the modern world.
You can connect with Damien on LinkedIn.
He’s also been on the podcast before; check out episode 31.
Key Quotes from discussion with Damien Price
What is balance?
- When we are out of balance, there's a sense that you're just going around, you're spinning, you're on a treadmill. You feel a sense that you've got no particular power, and you’re just rushing, rushing, rushing, go, go, go. You’re out of balance.
Aligning balance to your life vision and life chapters
- We've got to look at the particular context of where we are in life; it's our vision, it's where we are at this point in time. What chapter of our lives we’re in.
- There is a famous story where a university professor gets out a large jar. He puts in three or four relatively large rocks and says to the class, "Is the jar full?" And the class says, "Yes." Then from under the bench, he pulls out a container of fairly large pebbles. He pours that in, shakes it up, pours more in, and again, "Is it full?" They all say, "Yes." Then he goes under the counter, pulls out a container of very fine sand, pours it in, shakes it, pours more in. "Is it full?" And they're all very, very quiet. Then finally, he goes under the bench and pulls out a pitcher of water, pours that in and it fills the gaps.
- Therefore, balance is about the different stages of your life ie. the chapter of your life. What are your particular rocks and the pebbles at that point?
The role of core values
- You don't want to be so busy in life, that it's impossible to have any flexibility.
- So balance comes when you become aware of the particular chapter you’re in, and then you work out your rocks, your core values, your core tasks, who you want to be, or what you want to do. You’re deliberate, and you name them all and you plan around them.
Building your life scoreboard and defining achievable success
- A life scoreboard has a list of all the most important things to you in life. This might be a partner, your family, your wider family, mates, your career, any volunteering contribution to the greater good, health, fitness, finances, hobbies, travel, whatever's most important to you.
- Give yourself a bit of a score on each and every one of those, to tell you how you're currently going in each of them. And that gives you a sense of whether you’re spending your time right, given what's most important to you right now.
- When you are clear in your planning and you know your achievable outcomes, you deliberately plan them, and they get energy. All of a sudden, you're getting up at 5am for that run or for the gym session or for the work, you've got into a pattern of it, you've got a discipline wrapped around it. You are ticking off a rock within your life. You've got a particular sense of balance then.
Beating guilt of not doing certain things
- If you're in one place and feeling like you need to be somewhere else, that's when the guilt comes in.
- If you have a partner, it has to be negotiated and agreed with them. You say, "I'm going to go away for a few days. I know it's a bit of an extra pressure on you. Why don't you do this? Is that okay?” And when they go away, make sure that there's that same discussion. What it means is that when you're away, you're free to be present.
- It’s the same with work as well. There's absolutely nothing wrong with saying to your boss you need to be at an event or that you’re picking your kids up from swimming twice a week at 4pm. But then you say what you’re going to do in exchange.
- Bill Gates said, "People vastly overestimate what they can do in one year, and hugely underestimate what they can do in ten years." Let alone a week. Sometimes you get to the end of the week and you feel like you've done nothing. You need to cut yourselves some slack. And one thing that I do, is on a Friday afternoon, I sit down and I say to myself, "What are all the things that I have done this week?”
- You may have periods when you'll be lacking a tiny bit of balance, like a business trip. But in the bigger picture, you can claim that back.
Creating your rhythm and optimising time
- Either on a Sunday afternoon or a Monday morning, spend a bit of time, either on your own or with your partner, to plan the week ahead.
- Rituals and traditions over a year are vital: my wife and I go to this local café every Saturday morning. We know we get that moment every week to reconnect with the family.
- Make a list of all the activities in your life that you have to do every day. Go to work, your commute to work, pick up/drop off kids, etc. And then list all the things you want to do on top of those, such as going to the gym, doing a hobby, whatever. Then write how many hours per week you have to (or want to) do them. Every single time I've done that with someone, the number of hours in a week that they want to spend on things is far more than the numbers of hours in a week. Which means their unconscious criteria for balance is impossible to achieve.
Simplifying life and buying back time
- Look at the number of rocks and pebbles you have got. A little process of simplification doesn't have to be a lot. But the art of saying no is so important in being able to achieve your life vision and your career goals.
- You cannot do it all. You have to make some hard decisions. Instead of doing that thing every week or month, go back to doing it once a quarter or year. Ritualize it; make it a tradition.
- We also create rocks over stuff which actually isn't. Step back and ask, “Do I really, really have to do that thing?”
- You might be sitting there thinking, "I just wish there were more hours in the day.” How about getting rid of social media? It's costing people hours and hours a day. How many hours were you on Facebook or Instagram today? Yet you’re so busy. Same with TV.
- Sleep is important, and you've got to have recovery. But if you go to sleep a little bit earlier, you can have very early mornings and therefore you've bought yourself time to work when everyone is asleep.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/100
We’ve made it to Episode 100!!! What a cracking topic we have in store for you today.
Our High Performance Teams series now enters part 14, and we’re into the penultimate element of what drives a high performance Culture, where today we look at the power of high standards and how this drives feedback, accountability and unity across a team.
In this episode, we cover the one topic that my clients ask me about more than anything. And that is how to increase accountability in their teams and how to get people to take ownership of their work, and stop them becoming victims.
“Feedback is the breakfast of champions”. This is more than just a brilliant quote by Ken Blanchard; this is instrumental and at the core of high-performing, accountable teams. But it’s easy to get wrong when giving it out, especially if you have no leadership currency, and it can become a really draining process.
In this episode, I outline:
- Why living and breathing your organisation’s values is where you need to start;
- How you can turn the values into specific behavioural high standards across your team and how to get them to be accountable to these standards;
- How your team can enjoy continuous feedback in such a way that they serve the higher standards you seek to attain;
- How all of the above starts with you - you raising the bar, you being accountable, you improving continuously based on feedback.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode, we have a great chat with Marty Vids, an entrepreneur, mentor and podcast host, about building rapport, empowering customers and owning your job.
Marty has had quite the eclectic career and life, having started out in his parent’s milk bar as a kid, and then moving into the comedy scene as an MC. He has a few great stories from that past life, that’s for sure!
A career change beckoned and he landed up at Westpac as a mortgage broker, before leaving that to co-found Mortgage First, which he sold in his mid-30s. But the itch to build another business didn’t go away, and he started Mortgage 500, a company he eventually sold in 2016.
These days, Marty is also a mentor, life coach, MC, and hosts his own podcast, The Marty Vids Show.
You can connect with Marty Vids on LinkedIn.
Key Quotes from Marty
On his Formative Years...
- My early days really were a place of work. I would go in with my dad even on a Sunday and help him collect the newspapers and I'd be serving clients probably from the age of around six or seven. From a very young age, I was developing social skills, emotional intelligence skills, but also financial skills.
On what comedy taught him about building rapport...
- One of the projects I did was run a comedy night because I always loved stand-up comedy. I brought that to my country town and I brought in the audience; I'd go to all the shops and say I was running it, I went on local radio. I really went into that promotion phase but I was doing too much, I didn't delegate. I was MC-ing the night, I arranged the comedians, got all the audience in, and I had my mates helping me.
- This guy comes on a bucks night and I was last on stage as the main act and he was just ... Their party was giving each comedian hell and I'm thinking, "What am I gonna do? I can't get on this guy's bad side because they're just gonna come up on stage and actually kill me.” I had to think on my feet, but I got him on stage, we skulled a beer together and I said, “Congratulations mate, your life is officially over as of this moment,” and I got them onside and they were the best audience after that. It didn't matter what I said.
- I think that's the sort of thing you go, "How do I build rapport in a situation that's very challenging?" You think about that in business negotiation, I mean that's an extreme story there, but it's like how do you build rapport when something's not going well and be able to shift direction?
- There's a big difference between agreement and unconscious rapport. How you can tell - and why this is important - is you can pick the body language. If they're in a similar body stance to you, like let's say you have your arms crossed and they have their arms crossed, people might misinterpret that as just two people that are cold. But what you're looking for is to get physical rapport and that will show up in the body. If someone makes a move like let's say someone moves their right hand and puts it up to their chin, you don't do it simultaneously, but you give it about 15 seconds and then you manoeuvre into that same position while you're having the discussion. What you're looking for on an unconscious and physical level is whether they break that rapport.
- If someone is very auditory rather than visual, you can speak to them with your body posture to the side, not facing them, because that's too impactful for them when you're right in their face. Other people are very kinesthetic where they like to be in each other's face and are more sensitive. It's not a fake thing, it's good communication and really allowing them to converse with you in a way that's comfortable for them.
On effective leadership...
- I found that the managers that were more light-hearted and you could engage with, you could really learn from. So you'd have the dictatorial types that you're more fearful of, but they were never as engaging and never got as good a result as the people that were structured but also had this light-heartedness, and were able to mentor and engage you beyond the transaction they wanted you to get for them and the bank.
- They would think through a problem and then come to me with their thoughts around it, so I could then provide additions to it or steer them in a direction that was more beneficial.
On career drifting to having an ownership mentality...
- Andy Meikle, who's an ironman who competed against Trevor Hendy, came in and gave a speech at Westpac. I'm not sure if I was the only one listening, but he was saying about people finishing seventh in life and floating through the corporate system, and really looking at taking your role, taking responsibility for your role as a business owner and as an owner of that role. That shifted my whole perspective on just having a job, as opposed to going, "Well, how can I be a leader within my job?"
- I started to come in early. I started to realise the top performers would come in early, they'd go and see clients, and in the afternoon they would leave fairly early to go and see more clients. I started to really tap into the people that were doing well and started modelling what they were doing and I was fortunate I had three job promotions within a six month period and pretty much doubled my salary in that time from someone that was floating.
On how to make the leap from employee to business owner...
- We kept getting pulled towards the move. We had good jobs, we were earning good incomes, we were 29 years old, going places within the bank. But this just kept calling out to us.
- One of the things I'd say that we did that helped us a lot, was we gave ourselves six months of income in order to make sure that when we started the business, we weren't in financial distress from day one. This was really important. Some people say, "Look you gotta jump off the cliff." And yes, that's right, you gotta jump off the cliff in your mind, but I think it's more savvy to have a parachute on the way down, because it's not going to end as badly.
On the lessons of his first business, Mortgage First...
- We saw an opportunity in the broking market where we could empower clients to really take control of their financial circumstances and save them money on their mortgages. When we were in the bank, we were always encouraged to really get the most profit in regards to the products we were selling.
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Philosophically, I struggled with that a little bit because I go, "Yes, it might have created great revenue, but here was a better product given how we could serve the client." And what I recognised by giving that better product was I would get more and more clients.
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Did I stuff up? Of course, but I was always honest and said I think I've done something wrong here, wasn't intentional, how can I rectify, because I was hungry to keep learning. It's really important to have that authenticity and be humble when you don't know something and ask the question.
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The rest of the market saw a broker as somewhere you go where you can't get money from the banks. We saw this as a relationship management role. We saw this as encouraging the clients to understand the system, keep it simple, empower them with choice.
- We came from an education-based marketing platform of giving up our time, because we could never compete with the banks on marketing. What we did was a momentum build. When we did the accountant’s loan, then guess what? He got so much benefit out of it, he would tell his clients. When we did the real estate agent's loan, they would tell anyone they dealt with.
- We really got ourselves out there, talking to people. We'd hand out three business cards a day. We said we never wanted to do that from a point of view of just handing out free business cards; we wanted to have conversations so people would ask us for our business card. That was always our theory. How can we provide value and connect with people so they asked us what we do. And that's how we started and we built momentum and that turned into something that we were even surprised it turned into!
On wellbeing as a business owner...
- What we didn't do is look after ourselves well enough. We were running so hard for so long and even in the bank, we were running really, really hard to get our careers going. We got really tired and we really should've delegated roles and done that more effectively.
On the pitfalls of selling a business...
- We thought we got offered the cheque of a lifetime. We had a team of about 14 people and we really developed a fantastic culture and we thought when that opportunity arrived to get that cheque, Craig and I looked at each other and went, "Well, we might never see this again in our lives."
- For two country boys, this was a big moment and we decided to take it because we thought it would have a real impact in our lives. But you know what? At the end of the day, money is an interesting thing, because what I love was the people in the business. I loved the clients, I loved the culture, I loved the innovation. We got the money and I went, but it felt so numb afterwards because this was our baby.
- Because I wasn't feeling as well as I had been and I missed the business, I made some financial decisions and invested in things I would never have invested in because of my usual structures.
On taking these lessons into a new business...
- The second business was a lot better because I really knew who I was within that business and the circumstances around that was all different. But it came from a place of real joy, where I think the first business still was me needing to prove my value, which comes back to not being very good at school!
- Our clients were our best sales force. They loved what we did and they just kept driving opportunities to us because we were looking after them.
On how to get a pay rise the right way...
- I would never go to my manager and say, "I want a pay rise." I would go to my manager and say, "Here's the ideas I have for my role. Here's how I'm going to generate more business. This is the value I'm going to add to the client base. This what I think I could bring to the team."
- I always instigated this within our own businesses. When people came in and said, "I want a pay rise." I was very quick to ask, “Why do you want a pay rise, because you're 70% of target at the moment!” “Oh, we want to start a family.” “Alright. Fantastic. Let's now work on a plan in order to enable you to achieve the results, so I can give you this pay rise.”
- I wanted to work with them to really instil this sense of confidence and leadership and a call to action in order to then really feel great about their pay rise. In doing that, I said, "Alright we'll increase your pay by $10,000 and work on this vision in the next six months and achieve it."
Marty’s final message of wisdom and hope...
- I think sometimes it's just important to listen. I think very much we want to jump in with what we know a lot of the times, but sometimes when someone says something to you when they're under challenge, just listen and when they're finished say, “Thank you,” and then you can work on a response and a solution to it. I would say as managers, that's something I've learnt over time; just being really appreciative of when people are being vulnerable.
Resources mentioned in the episode:
- Book recommendation: Simplified: Leadership is Simple. You Lead People, by Dave Clare.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/98
Our High performance teams series now enters part 13, and we’re right into the High Performance Culture pillar, where today we look at how to get your team focussed on winning, and collaborating intensively.
In this episode, we cover how to get your team members to come along on the journey in pursuing excellence, but also how to simultaneously avoid becoming too internally focussed and operational.
One of the ways true chiefs get the best out of their troops is to compete externally, that is, changing the game of the industry, giving the team the energy and the tools to be the best. Sometimes the converse is true, where a bunch of individuals end up competing against one another; the result being low energy, a team that’s defensively-minded and you as the leader can’t drive your own track record and career momentum.
So how does one set up and lead a high-performing, industry-leading, best-of-the-best team that hunts and isn’t the hunted?
In this episode, I outline:
- How continuous learning can shift your mindset from being operational and technical to changing the game;
- How getting out of your own work environment will help you look at your challenges and problems with a different perspective;
- How to create an environment where failure and trying new things is normal, either internally or through external partnerships; and
- Why even the top performers have mentors and coaches as they have a hunting mindset.
Stay epic,
Greg
In this episode we meet Ted Prodromou, America’s #1 LinkedIn Coach, and talk about perception, connecting properly with purpose, and standing out online.
As you will pick up from this episode, Ted has bounced back from many setbacks, and offers up a number of immediately actionable tips for super-charging both your LinkedIn profile, but also your online presence and online etiquette in general. So get that pen and paper handy, log into your LinkedIn profile and be prepared to put your best foot forward!
A special thanks to Alex Mandossian for recommending Ted.
You can connect with Ted Prodromou on LinkedIn.
You can find Ted's books on Amazon.
Key Quotes from Ted
On the LinkedIn platform as a whole:
- The last three to six months, LinkedIn has been rolling out updates like crazy. And they really are pushing it as a content management platform, content distribution. So you post a video on there now, and it goes out to first, second and third-level networks. First-level is people who have accepted invitations with each other; so when we connected, your network became my second-level network. And then there’s the third-level network behind that. So now, content you post isn’t only seen by people you’re directly connected with. It’s seen by everybody, and it’s pushed out to Google and Bing now, and all the different other search engines.
- 83% of people will look at your LinkedIn profile now before they take a meeting with you. I’m always harping on telling people, “You need to complete your profile to make a great first impression!” What impression does that make of your company if somebody comes to your website and it's like, horrible looking? Or like a third-grader put it together or something like that? Same with your LinkedIn profile.
Profile improvements: Profile picture:
- They've made the images fit better, but with your cameras today, you can take a great picture. Stand in front of a blank wall and have somebody take your picture. Don't crop out a photo of you at a wedding or something or with a busy background. This is your professional image, people are out there looking at you.
- Say you're going to a meeting, you're trying to sell a $20,000 coaching package to a client. And they just looked at your profile and it's you half-drunk in a wedding somewhere and you got somebody cropped out and it's all blurry. And then you come in and say, "My charge is $20,000." And they go think, “Who is this guy?”
Profile improvements: Professional Headline
- One of the things, the professional headline they call it, is right under your name. And by default, LinkedIn takes your current job title and sticks it in there, but you can edit it to make you stand out.
- If you search for an executive coach on LinkedIn, there are literally millions of people with executive coach in their title. And almost all of them will have their job title, like executive coach at XYZ Company. That doesn't make you stand out. People are scrolling on their phones now, most of the time, so you have one second to get their attention.
- So I always use the USP, unique selling proposition. What problem do you solve and who do you solve it for? Get that into your headline and they'll click on it and learn more about you. I have the keyword phrases in there.
- One of my clients was a financial advisor, so I helped her create it. It said, "Would you like to retire with the same standard of living you have now or better?" That just got people's attention.
- Treat it like a sales letter, or an article. The headline of the article or a book. What's going make you pick up a book at the library and read it? The title. We're all in sales, whether we're working for a company or not. To get the job, you got to go in and sell yourself.
Profile improvements: Summary
- Tell your story. Don't put it in the third person. It's more conversational and people really get to know you and like you faster. If you're writing in the third person, it’s pretty stuffy.
Company Pages
- They revamped the company pages recently, they've been evolving over a year. Now they have places you can post your products. They're called showcase pages so a company like Adobe has lots of different product lines, so you can create a showcase page for each major product line and then people can go there and have conversations about what's going on with that product, like Photoshop. But the company pages show up in Google search results, so it's a good way to get your name out there.
Posting Content on LinkedIn
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My strategy is to post a lot of other people's content, such as other LinkedIn experts’ from their blogs. And people ask, "Why are you sharing your competitor's information?" And I reply, "Because I thought it was a good article and a great tip." I learned this from Dan Kennedy years and years ago when I was learning marketing, when I was failing as a coach, he always said, "The pie is big enough for all of us. You don't need to go after your competitors and destroy them."
-
And one of my wife's co-workers, her husband came up to her and said, "Wow, Ted is all over the internet, man, he is just crushing it." And I'm just laughing because I wrote 20% of the content I'm sharing and 80% I'm sharing other people's. I've got it all automated through a programme called Sendible. Just pumping content out there with my name associated with it. So even if I share an article from Forbes magazine, people perceive me with Forbes magazine because they see my name with Forbes. It's all perception. But consciously, they're thinking, “Oh wow. Ted's really, he's posting 10 or 12 times a day on social media. He must be really famous and really know what he's doing.”
- Post as much as you can, but don't sit there and blast. Sometimes I'll connect with someone on LinkedIn and I'll see them all of a sudden, they're posting six or seven times an hour. That's too much. I do six to ten posts a day on LinkedIn throughout the day. I wrote four books now so I hired someone to go through the manuscripts and they created social media posts from excerpts from the books. And then I have those in these queues in Sendible so that they're just always going and recycling. Each post comes back about every three or four months, because I've got so many posts queued up now. But otherwise, I actually blocked out time to start writing one article a week.
Writing an engaging LinkedIn Article
- One really good trick, there's a site called quora.com, and people are asking questions about everything there. And I have a friend, he gets all of his LinkedIn consulting from answering questions on Quora and speaking engagements. And the articles only need to be about 500 words anyway.
- And don't make it all like you're perfect. I share a lot of vulnerabilities, things that have happened to me, big failures in my life. I share all that, and I send out to my email list, you wouldn't believe how many people reach out.
Accepting LinkedIn connection requests
- Everyone has all sorts of philosophies about accepting certain people or should they try to reach out to certain people. I kind of filter out people if their profile looks not great or they didn't even put a job title in. I won't accept them if they don't have a picture. And not to pick on certain people, but a lot are SEO experts and marketing experts, I don't accept theirs, because they're just going to try to pitch me something. I know they're trying to grow a business and stuff but they're not going to add value to my network. Just think about that. Who are all these people connected with, would their connections be valuable to my network?
- If it's the CEO-level or C-level, a lot of times, they don't really log into LinkedIn very often. Only 24% of LinkedIn members log in more than once a month. Now they're almost at 600 million, so that's still a lot of people that are active on LinkedIn. But with LinkedIn, if it's the CEO that you're trying to get to, you can send an InMail to them, but don't just say, "Hey, I want to connect because I want to work for you." You have to compliment them and get creative of what's going to get them to accept your invitation. Open the conversation on other social networks.
- I've seen a new trend on LinkedIn. I don't know if you're getting this too. We all have that experience where you connect with people and say, "Hey, thanks for connecting." And then they try to sell you something, a long sales pitch. Now they're starting to do that in the invitation to connect. Like, they're not even waiting to connect, they're already trying to sell me before I say, "Sure, I'll be your friend." I can't tell you how many times people ... at least three times a week, people send me a message. "Hey, do you need help with your LinkedIn? We are a LinkedIn lead generation firm." I'll reply and say, "Did you read my profile?" They'll say, "Yeah, I read my profile." I'll say, "What do I do for a living?"
Resources mentioned in the episode:
- Contribution to an article on predicted LinkedIn trends for 2019 on Digital Marketer (Ted’s piece is two-thirds down the article)
- Snappr, a great resource for taking a high-quality LinkedIn professional photo
- Book recommendation: How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Dale Carnegie
- Book recommendation: Leadership and Self-Deception
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/96
Our High performance teams series now enters part 12, and the second episode of the Culture pillar, where I talk you through how to tighten the bonds between the people in the team, and in you and the team.
IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER BUILDING TRUST WITHIN THE TEAM MEMBERS AND HOW THIS CREATES NOT ONLY A SENSE OF BELONGING, BUT RESULTS IN HIGH PERFORMANCE.
There is a lot of research now that shows that the best high performance teams know each other really well. Not just the quality of skill and the individuals’ abilities, but they all say they know each other really well away from the office.
To form a team that’s really going to make an enormous difference in the world, you’ve got to have people
you can trust, and so you’ve got to tighten the bonds and get to know them deeply.
In this episode, I outline:
– How a personality modelling activity will help you understand others and communicate better with them;
– Other fun games to find out more about colleagues’ backgrounds;
– The 5 why’s method so as to peel back the onion layers and find out what makes them tick.
Stay epic
In this episode we meet Cliff Gale former Managing Director of Lite n’ Easy for over 20 years and talk about passion, respect for your people and keeping the soul alive in your business.
Cliff bought into Lite n’ Easy after he saw a two line ad in a paper in its very early days. He then led the business for over two decades and grew it into one of the most successful businesses of its type.
Key Points from Cliff:
- Know your business inside out
- Treat your people and customer with respect and recognise their efforts
- Keep the business emotive and build its soul
- Focus on the things that count and profit will come
- The difference between givers and takers
A special thanks to Sarah Chamberlain from The Real Estate Stylist for recommending Cliff.
Key Quotes and Points from Cliff:
"You know, because we don't see it all the time, it's great when also when we see you like that, it makes you feel like you care. You care about the business, and you care about us." I said, "Well, I'm glad you said that because I do. That's it." I was so, yeah, passionate about the business. I was so focused on making the business successful. I was never focused on the profit of the business. The business was a very profitable business, but I knew that if we got all the blocks in place, that the outcome would be profit. So I never had to worry about that at all, and it was much more fun running the business by just being able to do things properly and for me to be myself there.
I prided myself on the fact that I really carried myself very similarly in my workplace as I did out of my workplace. I didn't have a suit. I never wore a suit at work anyway, but I never felt like I put a suit on when I walked in the door. I never wanted to be seen like that, and I don't believe I was ever seen by that either. I was just Cliff in there. I was seen to be the driver of the business. Yeah.
Look, we had to pay people the right amount of money. That was a core ... I learned that as well. You had to make sure you're paying people a fair and reasonable amount for the role they did, but I learned, and I'd learned this emphatically, that a lot of why people continue to work for you and wanted to do the right thing by you, and I guess that was something that I always felt a lot of people really wanted to do the right thing by I me, was because I treated them with respect in the business. I ran the business morally correct. We were generous in the way we ran the business
I looked at my business very simply. If we traded people right, they would basically give it back to you. In this world, that might sound very, very simplistic but I think it's very, very underrated. I think the value of just doing the right thing by people, and of course, look, there's mentoring on the way of your staff and all that sort of thing. Yeah, there was all that stuff that was involved in the business as it kept growing. We had logistical issues. We had all sorts of production issues, but I reflected on the sense of why the business was successful, because people basically wanted to do the right thing.
We then found by just focusing on what we did and doing it very, very well ... and that was a very important part of I guess why the business was so successful. We didn't try to be all things to everybody, but we tried to do everything very, very, very well. I reflect one time and thinking about you one time, we might even get as big as Jenny Craig or one of those sorts of business. I think in the end, we're probably 10, 15 times bigger than Jenny Craig as a business. I guess that's one of the nice things I reflect on. I reflect on the success of the business. And, yeah, look, as I said earlier, success generates profit, of course, but my feeling is not about the profit. The profit was always considered to me to be an outcome.
People wanted to be ... wanted to work at Lite n' Easy. I wanted to employ what I referred to as givers rather than takers.
Givers are the ones that were prepared to just hang around the end of the day till everything think was all finished and all done, and the takers were the ones that, in the interview, they started talking about their wages and when they'll be getting ... when their first review was and things like that. We're able to identify very early in our recruitment process to try to identify people that were, what I called givers.
Because I was so passionate about the business, at times, I would really micromanage into an issue, but I was really, really conscious that if I micromanage something, I only did that because it was either a serious problem or it was one that ... but I didn't want to skirt around the issue. If it was serious enough for me to get involved in, I wanted to find out all the ingredients of what created that problem for us.
We would then come to ... by getting to the root of the problem, and that was really important to me, we would then come to an agreement that this ... moving forward would be done differently. That's, I guess, what it was all about for me. But I guess reflecting on what you were getting at there, Greg, micromanaging the business was in some ways a bit of a call for me, but I was very focused on not doing it unless it was really, really important. I found it was sometimes when it was extremely important, but I got out really quick.
I mean, one time, we had a particular problem. This is, I guess, with an idea of the size of the business and giving an insight into me personally. The business, this was probably in about the 12th, 15th year. The business was probably turning over 50 or $60 million a year and I had an issue. It couldn't get resolved so I spent eight hours one day in the freezer just helping manage something that I wasn't happy with.
Now, that's an absolute extension of micromanaging, but it was ... it reflected the passion that I had at the time. Did I do that regularly? No, I didn't do that regularly. Did I walk home at the end of that day with frostbite, genuine frostbite on my feet? Yes, I did. Did it take me six months to get over it? Yes, it did. And was that intentional? It certainly wasn't, but it was just a ... it was really, really important to me to show everybody that this thing could be resolved. Now, that might sound a screwy story, but that was just part of my psyche to do stuff like that.
Do not underestimate the core things that ... core needs that people have in life, people being ultimately employees, people that work for you, the core needs of wanting to be appreciated in their roles, wanting to be shown respect in their roles. There's lots of media in the last year or two that's really highlighting the problems of harassments and all sorts of things like that. I was very, very, very conscious of ... as I said, I ran the business ethically correct and all that sort of thing, but I believe we've probably gone a little bit too far in the other way. There's been too much focus on profit outcomes in business rather than maybe building the process along the way through empowering people, through effective delegation.
Just, I guess getting back to basics, getting back to what made you feel good with an early boss that you dealt with? What were the things that ... What was a boss that you respected, and what did they do? What did they do themselves when you were working for them?
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/94
So , IN THIS EPISODE WE COVER THE POWER OF HIGH PERFORMANCE LIFECYCLES AND HOW TO USE THEM TO AUTOMATE THE PURSUIT OF EXCELLENCE.
The pursuit of excellence lies at the heart of all great performers. It means mastering your craft and continually working to improve yourself. It also means leading your team to work collectively to improve itself. The long term benefits have an incredible compound effect on your ability to get results and rise above the pack.
Executive Performance Lifecycle: (P2R2) Prepare, Perform, Recover, Review
I outline:
– the Prepare, Perform, Recover, Review (P2R2) Lifecycle and how to use it as an executive performance tool
– How to lock this into as a system that drives performance
– How to optimise each step
– Some tricks to stay focused and embed the system in the real world
Stay epic
In this episode we hear from Geoff Lloyd, CEO and MD of Perpetual Limited.
ABOUT GEOFF
Geoff joined Perpetual in August 2010 as Group Executive of Perpetual Private and led the development and implementation of the growth strategy for this business. He took on the additional responsibility of Head of Retail Distribution in September 2011 and was appointed Managing Director and CEO in February 2012.
Geoff was previously General Manager of Advice and Private Banking at BT Financial Group following the Westpac Group merger with St.George Bank. Before the merger, he led St.George’s wealth management portfolio. He held many senior positions at BT Financial Group, including Chief Legal Counsel and Head of the Customer and Business Services Division.
Geoff is the Chairman of the Financial Services Council, an Advisory board member of The Big Issue and the Patron of the Financial Industry Community Aid Program. He is a Patron of Emerge Foundation and is also Chairman of the University of Technology Sydney Law Advisory board.
Key Questions and Answers from Geoff (curated for clarification and brevity):
What did you learn from the police force?
In the police force, I got to learn a lot about people and what I still take with me is that you don’t judge too quickly. Take the time to step back and see what else might be going on, what’s driving an outcome, because what you see is normally just the surface of a thing. When it involves people in complex environments, there’s always emotion. So that’s something I’ve tried to take with me where I don’t judge too quickly, stand back, ask questions and observe.
What did you learn from your first move interstate to Sydney with ASIC?
It was the first time I learned about stretching myself out of what you might call a comfort zone, and how it can lead to just so many unforeseen, unplanned, unexpected outcomes. And so for me, that was probably the first time I’ve learned that as you actually stretch yourself and take real risk, it is not just a little bit that comes from that. It is quite amazing and you really don’t know what you can achieve until you’ve tried.
What drives you internally? You’re this,very aspirational man, you want to grow again and take your game to another level. What drives that?
I’ve learned for a long time that there’s always evidence of how you can keep getting better and you just don’t know what you can achieve. And so having that mindset, of being curious…if you aren’t finding evidence and keep getting better, then you’re going to plateau. And so for me it’s about that looking forward, being curious. If I don’t have a 110 percent passion and energy for something, it becomes 50 percent and so I need to be operating at that level to truly find rewarding outcomes, whether it’s philanthropic, social, business or family.
Do you have in moments when you doubt your abilities? What do you in do in those moments to keep going?
Yeah, I do. You know, if you don’t, if you can’t look in the mirror and get a bit paranoid, then you’re probably not able to really find evidence of how to keep getting better. I’ve tried to find different times in my career where I’ve hit inflection points and probably the most successful times the more paranoid I get.
You’ve got to have enough confidence to know you’re going to be able to follow on to what the next challenge is… I get energy from others. So, getting access to and making sure I’ve got the right network, that’s really important. But equally I’ve always had this philosophy that you’ve got to hire the best people you can listen to them, trust them, invest in them and then make sure you’re having some fun along the way, you know, because it’s, it’s a very serious game that we play.
If you can get that sort of talent around you then your job as a leader is really about being their guide and helping guide them rather than do or carry out the activity. Great leaders are able to step back and be able to motivate people through how they give them that guidance and help set direction and boundaries.
Why did you switch from General Counsel into other more broader roles and how did that lead to CEO level roles?
I actually started to think differently about my career and stretch myself beyond being tall and skinny in a career or a profession to being broad. Think about it as the goal is to grow skills and experience over the next three to five years rather than, I want this job or that job. I think if you just go off the job titles, you might never know how good you can be and how different the work that you can do will be
Did anyone give you any feedback to you personally that, that really rang true for you? That was important for the young Geoff Lloyd to hear?
BT was a very driven meritocracy, with enormous amount of opportunity. So running too fast can happen and it happened for me. And so learning about not stepping on others around you, but picking others up around you is what you’re going to be judged for.
And, that it takes time. Actually there’s no shortcuts to hard work. I’ve tried lots of them. it’s just about hard work. It’s actually about focus and it’s about making sure that you’re true to yourself. Don’t try to be somebody else. I’ve worked for some great leaders and I’ve picked up their characteristics and often said, ‘oh, well, if I can be like that’. And you can’t be, you can pick up those characteristics and learn from them. But then you have got to be you again. Today we would talk about authentic leadership. You just have to be, you.
How was the final step to CEO different?
The step was quite different because as much as I’ve worked in large organizations, ran much bigger teams in the past than at perpetual, when you become the CEO, there’s nobody else that’s coming. It’s words that we’ve used around the executive team that ‘nobody’s coming’. It’s us. You know, you run two and a half thousand people in a bank, there’s always somebody else who can ask or the decision can go to. So the big gap is…Nobody’s coming.
Does ‘Ownership Precedes Victory’ resonate with you?
I think you’ve got to have courage or otherwise you’re not going to keep challenging yourself. If you don’t you’re not going to keep challenging your team, you’re not going to take the right amount of risk and you won’t see the other sides of the benefit that can come with that risk. So make sure you’ve got the courage is the key, that conviction of something you’ve started to create change. Maybe that’s the words that gravitate more with me.
How do you stay focused?
I suspect that at perpetual I will be remembered for at least two words. Hopefully it’s clarity and focus. I think complexity kills businesses. I’m a big believer in that a quality businesses can’t do lots of things. What are the few things that you can do incredibly well and be the leader at.
And then once you become a leader at anything, it’s very hard to stay there. Everyone’s coming after you. For us at perpetual and for me it’s about clarity on a few things. Do them really well and then move to the next few things. Try not to be distracted by a long list, we try to prioritise on what we can do and then draw a line under number three. And you know, often the team will hear me say, just tell me the top two. Actually, I’m not interested in the top three.
We also had to try to focus on what we’re not going to do and write that down because a lot of businesses are good at telling you what they do, but if you can articulate what you’re not going to do, it brings more clarity to that focus around what you’re going to do
Where do leaders in the middle and senior management waste their time and effort?
I think often getting too much into the detail because if you’re a leader, you’ve got to have sort of three hats. You’ve got to do work, improve your work and lead your team. And you’ve got to have, at least a third of each of those….So you’ve got to dedicate time and focus to leadership, not just doing. And I think it’s easy to go back to the doing. You know, I had somebody put it in my mind a long time ago, a phrase called ‘being a guide, not a guru’.
I think as you become more of a leader and your sole job, which is mine, is leading, not doing. So the job is to guide people not to be the technical guru. It took me a long time to learn that. As a lawyer, you want to be the smartest person in the room when it comes to the topic on ‘x of the law’. And that’s not your job as even the general counsel, because my job was to hire the smartest people in the room, trust them, invest them, listen to them, guide them because it was their job to be that smart. It’s not mine. And so that stuck with me for a long time. So maybe they should be more of a guide than a guru because your job is to hire the gurus as a leader.
How important is it for young people coming through and in middle management and senior executives to have a network?
I think it’s vital. You know, I also chair the Financial Services Council now, a leading industry body and one of the things we’ve reintroduced is a group called ‘the circuit’. I call it the 30 somethings and it’s actually about bringing interesting topics to a forum of 40 to 100 of all of our members staff.
What was the most important thing you learned in Harvard?
How bad Australians are at negotiation. I think that was a really big part of that program and you know, just seeing our cultural norms. We are ranked in the bottom five countries in the world in negotiation!
You’ve been CEO here for six years now, and the share price has gone from $19 to just shy of 50 which is a remarkable period of growth for the company. How important is it for individuals to build a track record, perhaps not as spectacular as that, but to keep thinking about change and transformation?
I’ve worked with a gentlemen named Andy Meikle who has left a couple of thoughts with me over the years and one was, you know, high performers create a track record that you can leave on the table and they can leave the room and it speaks for itself. It is important to be able to think about not the way you would tell the story, how the story would tell itself. And that doesn’t have to be about share price growth.
What is the difference between Change and Transformation?
I had this view that change is what happens to you. Transformation is what you do to yourself. So with change, you react to your competitor, you’re reacting to, it puts out a new product, you react. Transformations are where you have that honest, courageous look and say we’re going to go from x to y and it’s going to be tough and we’re going to have to have clarity, courage, and control which are three woods, we used a lot. Clarity of what we would or wouldn’t do, control because the market is going to tell us what’s wrong and we also needed to keep the courage to hold the course because we couldn’t possibly plan for everything to that level of detail.
How would you define a GREAT Chief?
I think it’s someone who is able to bring passion and energy to the way they communicate to people and the way they support and develop and grow everyone around them. It means you’ve able to motivate, support and nourish people in your community.
What is the final message of wisdom and hope you think is vital for the next generation of executives?
I still believe that there’s no shortcuts, it’s all about hard work. But remaining really very curious, have curiosity in your life and you can define what that means and make sure you’ve got the courage.
Recommended Books by Geoff Lloyd.
Repeatability :
https://www.amazon.com/Repeatability-Enduring-Businesses-Constant-Change-ebook/dp/B0070YQQI4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1520487587&sr=8-1&keywords=repeatability
Founders Mentality:
https://www.amazon.com/Founders-Mentality-Overcome-Predictable-Crises-ebook/dp/B01BO6QMC8/ref=pd_sim_351_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=WSXZ3BEMWMND0FWN22E7
Most of us at one time or another have had a boss who seems totally disinterested in our work. They’re the opposite of micro-managers, leaving us completely to our own devices and at times in more senior regional roles can go missing for weeks at a time. Here is what you can do.
In this episode I catch up with Nicky Sparshott, Global Chief Executive of T2 Tea - a global luxury retailer offering the broadest and most imaginative range of teas and teawares from around the world.
Nicky also serves as Vice President on the Global Leadership Team for Unilever's Refreshment Category, playing a lead role in M&A & E-Commerce.
She also has experience on the agency side as a Partner at Y&R George Patterson (WPP Group).
www.t2tea.com
Key Points:
“Be brave, because I think the world is changing quickly. What got us here won't get us there, and the best advice I would give to people is go after the dream, but perhaps also be prepared to take the path less trodden to get there, because I think it will hold you in good stead.”
Nicky’s top messages include:
- On what Nicky learnt from a major setback from a failed product launch:
A couple of really small choices that we thought were small choices, had not been clever and we did not deep dive. These proved to be those chinks in the armour that really let us down, and it was an unmitigated disaster. Be sure to build the right stakeholder relationships outside of the business and leave no stone unturned. When someone asks, "Have you thought about X?" It might feel like an inconvenient truth, three days before you launch, but actually take the time to investigate.
- The importance of mentors is that you need to have a safe place where you can have those unfiltered sounding board conversations, where you can shoot the breeze, you can explore scenarios, where you're not personally judged for it. And you've got a relationship where someone can say, "Actually, that's not going work," or, "You need to hold yourself to account to a higher order". The value of those mentorships have been really, really important to me and I play a mentorship for many others, because I think you've got to pay it forward.
- My mindset is to aim for the moon and you might get the stars. I aim high and kind of go big or go home. You sort of play to do something extraordinary.
- It’s important to practice service leadership, which is really paying it forward and recognising that there is no time better spent than in nurturing capability. Especially today, technology is such that things can be replicated with such pace that you need to have an amazing group of people and a culture that is sticky.
- Bryce Courtenay once said to me, “if you're skating on thin ice, you may as well tap dance." That really appealed to me. To push the boundaries, be courageous and go create some magic. Sometimes you'll get it wrong, but more often than not, you won't.
- I've taken the path less travelled at times in my career, much to the horror of some of my mentors and some of the people around me, but it's always felt right.
- Ask yourself, how do you differentiate yourself against a myriad of other people in the market? Because there's some great talent out there, some exceptionally good people. How are you going craft or curate a skillset and an experience list that is different?
- I write myself for the month, what are the big bets. If I do nothing but what's on this list for the next 30 days, will that create the impact that I want to create in the next 30 days? If it's not on that list, will I spend my time on it?
- At the end of every week I do a pulse check, "Is there something that has changed that would require me to change my focus?"
- Every month as a leadership team, we get together and not only measure performance to date and performance to go, but that performance in the context of our three-year plan. What are the risks? Are we investing in the right areas? If we have to dynamically allocate resources, where are we prioritising?
- Problem shared is a problem halved. There's so many things that we work on that feel hugely challenging and sometimes insurmountable, but the reality is somebody, or a number of people, are probably experiencing exactly the same thing, or have done so before. There are some brilliant people out there, so just getting around the table with other thought leaders, or people from different industries and taking the best practise that's happening in one industry, and being able to adapt it to your own.
- For me right now, mindset trumps capability quite often. You can have all the best capability in the world, you can be an amazing rock-star, but if you can't bring others on that journey with you, if you can't elevate the performance of the whole team, if you can't get past your own ego to deliver the results, then it'll just be really short lived.
- My council to anybody that's in a senior management role and aspiring to be in a CEO role, is to get that commercial understanding solid. If it doesn't come intuitively to you, get some mentors and some support in that space and certainly recruit a team that is incredibly capable in that area, and marry that with creativity and intuition, because you need both today to be successful.
- On the importance of developing a track record - Success breeds success and confidence. It's having done it and experienced it and lived it, warts and all. Because when someone talks about their track record and having delivered something great at the end of it, it's very rarely been smooth sailing to get to that. It's the lessons learned that are as valuable as the success delivered. It is really important to be able to talk from a place of confidence about what you've done, and how you've done it, and how you would do it differently based on the experience that you've had. You've got to get dirty. You really got to roll up your sleeves and do it. I mean one bit of advice that I would give to anybody listening to this is, take opportunities that come up that sit outside of your natural job.
Recommended Reading:
Elon Musk's biography, that sort of Tesla, SpaceX ec cetera.
https://www.amazon.com/Elon-Musk-SpaceX-Fantastic-Future/dp/0062301233
Why leaders micromanage and how you can adjust your approach to improve the working relationship so that it is a. more effective and b. less soul destroying.
Before you dive in and start trash talking your overbearing boss - it is wise to seek some understanding as to why they might be micromanaging you. Take a few minutes to think deeply and through their eyes about what might be causing them to dip down.
In this episode you’ll hear from Daniel Herbert, CEO of SSKB.
We are going to be covering some powerful strategies that he learnt through 67 tests for the Wallabies. He was apart of the glory era of Australian Rugby, won the RWC in 1999, the Bledisloe Cup and beat the British and Irish Lions in 2001. He Captained the QLD Reds and was world player of the year in 1999.
Critically he has now gone to a successful corporate career with the commercial side of the QLD Reds and is now CEO of SSKB.
We cover what executives can learn from elite sport (and what doesn’t translate), about what made him stand out from the pack and how to be indispensible to an organisation. The lessons here are vital.
Subscribe on iTunes here:
https://itun.es/au/87Pqkb.c
Subscribe on Android:
http://tunein.com/radio/The-Inner-Chief-p1004701/
http://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=141429
Key Points:
“My only message to the next generation is, you have to impress. You have to still do the work, you have to still stand out from the crowd because there is a lot more people coming around, there is lots of competition, don't rest on your laurels. By in large, I think they are smarter than what we were at that age.”
Daniel’s top messages include:
- I think you have to go through some lows to get the highs
- What people forget is the great era of Australian rugby came from something that wasn't so great.
- I think I made the most of what I had. I look back and I think, I played with numerous people who were more talented than me. I got to where I got from graft and I had to look for opportunities, take the opportunities and I had to work harder than others did to get there. So that became part of my mantra, I would work when I knew people weren't working. I would deliberately go running at midnight when I knew everyone else would be in bed. I would go on Christmas and kick some goals down the local park because I knew everyone else was sitting at the dinner table and that gave me this confidence that I know no one else is out there working today, I'm out here working, that's going to put me in a good place.
- Hard work will beat talent when talent doesn't work hard.
- I've seen a lot of people who were far better, were more talented, had natural abilities that I didn't have. And the only way I could convince myself that I had the right to actually be on the field or in the team ahead of these people was by working harder than them.
- There will always be weaknesses and yes, you try to improve your weaknesses but I tend to spend more time on my strengths than I do on fixing up the weaknesses, because what I would take into the business environment now is I can get people to fill in my weaknesses but, I can't necessarily get people who have better strengths than me where I think I'm particularly good.
- Don't be threatened by people who are really good, you've just got to get the best people around you and as long as they are not a real cultural risk to it
- As a CEO or a senior manager, you have to be a generalist, so you have to be across a lot of different things, but you still have to have something that you focus on, that's my unique point.
- I worked on the fact that, what I did as a rugby player, I love contact, I love the aggression, I love breaking a line and I love the physical side of it and that was going into the way that Rod MacQueen wanted to play the game when he came in. I knew that he wanted a line-breaking centre, somewhere and he needed someone who could bend the line, break the line. So I got in the gym, I got bigger, I worked on my footwork to get through a tackle and I thought, if I can be that guy, where he builds his game around me, or builds a certain element of his game around me, then that's a little bit unique, because I don't think anyone else necessarily has, in Australia right now, has that skill set.
- The chairman of the Australian Rugby Union at the time, a guy called Dick McGruther, to John O'Neil the CEO, to Rod McQueen the coach, to John Eales the captain, all four of those guys always seemed to be aligned. They got on well, you knew they got on well, they always seemed to be on the same page and in the team environment, same thing, the leadership group, which I was part of for most of the time there, were always on the same page, and when you walk out of the room, no matter whether you lost your debate or not, you lost your way, you're on the same page. And that was always, and I think, is a really important thing I see in business places where you see general mangers undermining the CEOs or general managers undermining each other because I didn't vote for that and it's always just to win a bit of favour but it's dangerous and that was something, that is one of those analogies that I would take from the sporting world into the business world.
- So that was probably for me, the most important and harrowing experience that I had because I now am a different person because not only do I know that you're never in control, it's just an illusion but I don't fear things. Even in this job, in my previous job, people threaten you with legal action all of the time, it's used as a bullying tactic. I now don't fear, I've been through it personally where it was a really tough thing for me to go through and for my family to go through, but I don't fear it anymore.
- What I enjoyed was the business of sport. And it's changing very quickly with all of the things we are seeing, tech and media and sport was starting to become a very professionalised industry and in my job, the teams job was to maximise the commerciality of that
- You need an opportunity but you've also got to make your opportunity. I don't think you can just sit there and wait and someone is going to come and tap you on the shoulder one day. You've got to make your own opportunity or seize it when you see it. Then you just have to make every post a winner if you can, you've got to work hard. People have to see that you're going to put the shoulder to the wheel and you're not one of these clock in, clock out people.
- You need to influence the right people. You're never going to please everyone and wherever I have been, I've never pleased all ends of the spectrum and I don't lose sleep about that. But the ones that I need to influence, the ones that I need to be on page with, I need to make sure I spend the time with them. I don't worry about people who are critical or small-minded who aren't going to influence anything anyway. I spend my time on those who are positive and can influence and shape the direction that we are going so they are probably the three things that come to mind immediately.
- They have got to have skills, but you can teach skills as long as they have got the right make up, they are honest and they are hard working and they are loyal, then that would be how I would like to be perceived by people who have been my leaders.
- What drives me and why I think I am here on this earth is to be a father and to provide
- I used to make the mistake of putting 20 things down a day, this is what I am going to get through today. And you would get to the end of the day and you've got two of them done and then you work through the night trying to get the others and it's just not sustainable because the work never goes away, it's always there, it's not going to go anywhere. So I have come to the point now where it's two or three things. And even yesterday, I wrote down two things, I didn't do either of them
- I also have thinking time, I need to think. I think that's one of the other things where you just become so busy that you're not actually thinking about, should we be doing this at all?
- I think that is the value of networking, is you have got to make sure you offer them something, there has got to be a value, there is a trade there. You bring people into your network, what are you going to give them and what are they going to give you?
- When it comes to hiring people, it's not always the most talented, it's not always the most educated, it might be someone who just demonstrates resilience and perseverance and grit.
Recommended Books
Good to Great – Jim Collins
Sapiens - Yuval Noah Harari
Grit – Angela-Lee Duckworth
In this episode I talk about why you should run across a desert (and love it). Huh? What I really mean is why you should do something epic. In 2007/8 I conducted a personal growth experiment by tackling the Gobi March a 250km ultra marathon across the toughest terrain in the world. This is a bit of that story and what I discovered on…and didn’t expect.
In this episode you’ll hear from Vivek Bhatia. At age 26, Vivek was a Indian migrant watching the big businessmen in their expensive suits walk around Sydney. This inspiring story is how he rose above the pack to become a CEO in just 10 years. Vivek is now CEO and MD of iCare which delivers insurance and care services to the people of New South Wales. Whether a person is severely injured in the workplace or on the road, iCare supports their long-term care needs to improve quality of life outcomes, including helping people return to work.
In 2008, Vivek was appointed CEO of Wesfarmers Insurance in Australia, where he was responsible for leading the multi-brand, multi-channel insurer through a significant transformation journey. He was also co-lead of McKinsey & Company’s Asia Pacific Restructuring & Transformation practice and has been the Chair of the former NSW Dust Diseases Board and been the NSW representative on the Board of SafeWork Australia.
Key Points:
Vivek outlines that “the day you stop learning is the day you stop living” and how important it is to have a commercial mind and social heart.
Vivek’s top quotes throughout the podcast are:
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“Your boss is your customer. Work with them to determine the right priorities across the business.”
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“Get the right people reporting to you and delegate more so you have more time to work on the business. If you find yourself doing things that you would expect your team to do then that is an alarm bell.”
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“If people haven't had set backs, my personal belief is that they haven't challenged themselves or challenged the status quo which is even worse.”
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“If you haven't clearly articuled what you expect and then confirmed that the other person hasn't understood it in the same way then you aren't doing your job as a leader.”
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“What I'm not looking for is someone who has been successful but there is collateral damage”
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“People talk about networking as a means to an end, instead of an end unto itself. I believe in networking because I get to learn.” 7. “The biggest challenge that good leaders overcome is effective use of time.”
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“Always look for what more you can do for your company (above your role description).”
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“One thing I make sure I never do is to go into victim mentality mode”
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“I strongly believe that individuals need to take ownership of their situation”
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“Good leaders are very aware, they always have their antenna on. They always look for signals that are being passed overtly or covertly.”
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“Networks don't happen by themselves”
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“If I am not investing in myself, why would anyone else invest in me.”
Nominated Charity: Vivek’s nominated charity is The Starlight Foundation and I’ve made a donation of $250 in Vivek’s name for coming on the show. https://starlight.org.au
Recommended Books, Influencers and Learning: • Anything by Peter Drucker and Malcolm Gladwell • The Road to Character, David Brooks
In this episode we talk about executing your Life Vision as part 2. If you haven’t listened to Episode 57 of building your Life Vision I’d recommend doing that first.
There is an old saying, “Vision without execution is just a dream”.
And, chief, I’ve got a confession so make this was me. I was a dreamer with all sorts of grand ideas about who or what I’d become. I always had new ideas and goals that all seemed to flow from my creative mind.
I was the line from poem “George Gray” by Edgar Lee Masters that I read in Ep 57 on building your life vision...“a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.” I was stuck in my own sheltered harbour. Not willing to do the hard work break the boundaries, to look inside myself at the things I liked about myself the least or the limiting beliefs I held and grow beyond them.
It was only when I realised that all greatness requires challenge. It will requires a thousand steps one after the other to change my game. One must have a vision and one must execute. I’ve seen too many people with only one part of the pie.
In Life Vision Part 1 we did some dreaming and created your life vision. Now we focus on execution. We take specific planned action towards our goals.
In this episode you’ll hear from Jennifer Holland, Founder and CEO of Throat Scope.
Jennifer’s passion lies in inventing, designing and developing medical products that will revolutionise the healthcare industry. Her first invention was Throat Scope, which has had outstanding success across the globe and began as the foundation of Holland Healthcare.
Throat Scope was the recipient of ‘What’s Your Big Idea Queensland?’ in 2011, which included a $50,000 prize money from the Queensland government. This allowed Jennifer to develop and patent Throat Scope and have several working prototypes made.
In 2015, Jennifer and Throat Scope were featured on Shark Tank Australia. Jennifer secured investment from Steve Baxter and this exposure propelled the business. In October 2015, Throat Scope was launched into the Australian retail and healthcare markets. Throat Scope broke a retail record with a company, which saw the product signed in seven days. Jennifer has since negotiated several lucrative distribution deals with both domestic and international companies.
Jennifer has been awarded several awards for her hard work and determination which include, gold product innovation winner at the Ausmumprenuer Awards 2017, Best Presenter Award at the New York Venture Summit 2017, Edison Award Winner 2017, Lake Macquarie Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2016, Sydney Design Award Winner 2015 and QLD ‘What’s the big idea’ Winner of $50,000. Jennifer also actively participates in speaking and networking events internationally.
Key Points:
Jennifer outlines her incredible story of the invention of Throat Scope and the struggle to get it funded and into the market. Her mantra – Believe, Act, Persist has been at the core of her undying enthusiasm to make a difference. And her advice for the next generation of leaders is Don’t Settle, get out there with enthusiasm and persistence and try a different way if the first way doesn’t work.
Jennifer’s top messages include:
- Prepare meticulously for big opportunities - I watched 108 episodes of Shark Tank US to prepare for it.
- When going for a big role you have to show your passion, purpose, excitement for wanting to be apart of their business
- Enthusiasm is everything
- When hiring someone for my team experience isn't all that necessary. It’s the passion and seeing someone who is persistent. And that wins every time over education and experience in an industry
- It took a long time to find the right mentors and advisors
- My business mantra is believe, act, persist
- Whatever I do I know there is another way to do it. So if one doesn't work I'll walk through another door.
- Free yourself of the worries that aren’t real - In life you always regret the things you don't do
- If you're open to finding opportunities they will come
- Opportunities are everywhere its just a matter of whether you're open to finding them
- Having mentors or advisors that give you confidence will give you more passion, excitement
- When people say to me, “no, you can't do that”, for me that is the biggest driver.
- I love the saying ‘Today's no is tomorrow's yes….You tell me no, and I'll turn it into a yes
- Don't settle
Web: www.throatscope.com
In this episode we build your own Life & Career Vision.
"George Gray"
I have studied many times
The marble which was chiseled for me--
A boat with a furled sail at rest in a harbor.
In truth it pictures not my destination
But my life.
For love was offered me and I shrank from its disillusionment;
Sorrow knocked at my door, but I was afraid;
Ambition called to me, but I dreaded the chances.
Yet all the while I hungered for meaning in my life.
And now I know that we must lift the sail
And catch the winds of destiny
Wherever they drive the boat.
To put meaning in one's life may end in madness,
But life without meaning is the torture
Of restlessness and vague desire--
It is a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.
- Edgar Lee Masters, 1868 - 1950
To leave the harbour chief we must start with a destination. One that inspires us and drives us to personal greatness. In this episode we will talk through creating your own Life Vision. The very first time I did a vision board was in 2007. It was a transformative period of my life and I was reading self-help books by the dozen. They ALL said you need a vision. Without it you simply don’t know what direction you’re going. They said it’s like when you decide you want to go away for a weekend and what you do first is imagine what the perfect weekend would be like you create a vision in your head. Then you go about finding the right region, accommodation and activities that’ll help you achieve your vision. It all starts with vision. Without the vision you don’t even leave your home in the first place.
In this episode we take an entirely new angle. I’ve been wanting to bring in some gurus on particular topics and it brings me great pleasure to start with our spiritual guru Damien Price on Spiritualism and how it fits in the corporate world. Damien Price is a Christian Brother and has taught for over thirty years in schools throughout Australia and New Zealand. Over the past twenty years Damien has been involved in working with disadvantaged youth, homeless men and women, refugees and Asylum Seekers. Damien has Masters Degrees in Counselling and Pastoral Guidance. Damien’s Doctor of Philosophy degree focused on the sense of self that youth grew into as they engaged with homeless people over an extended period of time.
He is now Regional Ministry Coordinator for PNG, Philippines and Timor Leste in a role that has him travelling and organising all over SE Asia. Some of the questions I ask Damien include:
• What is God and/or who was God and where do people get it wrong? • What is Religion and where do people get it wrong? • What is the ultimate purpose of life? • Your often describe yourself as a monk. Why is that the most fitting description of you? • What are the vows you take a Christian Brother? Why do you cherish them and what role do they play for you? • You took a break from the Brothers. What drew you away and ultimately what brought you back? • What is the most stinging feedback you’ve ever received and how did it shape you? • What have you learned about yourself over the past five years? • What mistakes do busy professionals make that is costing them their spirituality? • On a day to day basis what's the most powerful action someone can take to keep and develop a strong spiritual connection? • Does spirituality fit in the boardroom?
In this episode we build your own Life Scoreboard.
Like most successful professionals, you probably started your career with clear ideas about what you wanted to do and who you wanted to become. Then, as time progressed, you got caught up in the corporate life. Before you knew it, you were running from one meeting to the next, and what you expected of yourself started to come second to what others expected of you. Add to the equation the responsibilities that come with a family and a mortgage and it’s easy to see why so many of us fall into this trap. We look forward to time away from work, but the four weeks of leave most of us take a year don’t ever seem enough.
It just doesn’t feel like living.
Years fly by, seemingly at the speed of light, and no matter how hard you try you can’t seem to slow it down. You may even have started to feel a little lost, disconnected from our soul, and of control as the year has progressed you don’t feel as comfortable in your own skin. You’re not coming from a place of personal strength and centredness. And worst of all you know you’re not reaching your potential in any area of your life.
One of the many great lessons I’ve learnt from elite sport is their infatuation with analysis and then how they present data as useful information to athletes and coaches. One particular scoreboard really resonated with me. This was the elite athlete scoreboard at the QLD Reds for their academy players. Every player had a set of measures they needed to reach in every part of their game. It was the technical, tactical, mental, physical, social elements of their development. They had benchmarks they had to achieve every year and this was updated regularly in red, amber, green when a particular element was out of sync. Essentially they could identify when players were out of balance and how that was affecting other parts of their game. They wanted well-rounded and growing young men and women in their programs.
This gave them a baseline for taking intentional action to stay in balance. As Michael E Gerber said:
"The difference between great people and everyone else is that great people create their lives actively, while everyone else is created by their lives, passively waiting to see where life takes them next. The difference between the two is the difference between living fully and just existing." —Michael E. Gerber
About 10 years ago I developed my first vision board for my life and then I added to it a Life Scoreboard. This Life Scoreboard is a pictorial representation of how I’m performing in all the most important elements of my life. Things like my relationship with my wife and kids, wider family, best friends, my career and legacy, finances, health, mastery, travel, spirit and dreams.
I use this scoreboard religiously. It gives me immediate insight into how I can improve an element or two to improve my overall life. And whenever I’m feeling down, out of whack I return to this. It normally takes about 5 mins and I’m back on track at least with some actions to take.
The thing is we’ve all met the guy or gal that is all about their fitness. They spend all their time thinking that the fitter they get the happier they’ll be while so many other elements are suffering. The same of the social butterfly who has a fear of missing out syndrome out of control but as a result never re-centres, loses their fitness or the spiritual guru who spends all their time in meditation but becomes disconnected from the world. In the end, your Life Scoreboard is about YOUR journey and what is RIGHT FOR YOU. No one else’s scoreboard is yours. We are all so beautifully unique. So treat it as a process of reconnection to WHO YOU TRULY ARE.
I want to talk you through a Four Step Process now for you to develop your own Life Scoreboard:
- Define each of categories
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- The elements of your scoreboard are totally up to you. We’ve provided an example but you need to work out what is most important to you.
- On each element give yourself a gut-feel score out of 10
- Score yourself out of 10
- On any item that you scored lower than 7 define anything you can do in the next 48 hours to boost that score
- Pick low hanging fruit
- Identify ways you can boost scores by combining pursuits and any other longer activities to get your score higher
- Kill two birds with one stone
Remember, this is about YOU. Think deeply as to why you’re giving certain scores. What is the root cause? How can you bring your greatest self to the table.
The Life Scoreboard is a vital tool in becoming the CHIEF of your Career and Life. Use it wisely, use it often and I guarantee you’ll find yourself coming from a play of personal centredness and power. Then and only then are you a true CHIEF.
For a detailed example and steps I’ve created a page with all those resources at www.chiefmaker.com.au/55.
In this episode you'll hear from Mike Pratt.
Mike is the Commissioner for Service, NSW Government, leading major service reform across the NSW Government. He is also Deputy Chancellor of Western Sydney University, Chairman of Bennelong Funds Management and a Non-Executive Director of Credit Union Australia. Mike was CEO of Consumer and SME Banking, North East Asia, with Standard Chartered Bank. He is a former President of the Australian Institute of Banking & Finance.He was also Group Executive of Westpac Business & Consumer Banking, CEO of National Australia Bank in Australia and CEO of Bank of New Zealand. He was also CEO of Bank of Melbourne.
Previous directorships include Non-Executive Director of MasterCard International Inc, New York, Non-Executive Director of MasterCard, Asia Pacific, Non-Executive Director of BT Financial Services, Chairman of Shenzen Credit.
Mike outlines how important it is to be well prepared, build out your network, incorporate lifelong learning, be disciplined, maintain transparency and integrity in all you do. And to never forget - its all about relationships, what matters more than anything is relationships
Mike also has some great tips on getting great mentors and what you need to be on top of in the future of business.
Nominated Charity:
I have made a $250 donation in Mike's name to Plan International - www.plan.org.au
Recommended Books:
Leading Change, John Kotter
The Long Walk to Freedom, Nelson Mandela
The Service Profit Chain, Heskett and Sasser
Copyright: (c) 2017 Greg Layton, Chief Maker
URL: chiefmaker.com.au
In this episode we will be talking about another pattern that has emerged through many of the CEOs on the show and that is “Taking the Path Less Travelled”.
Have you ever found yourself boxed in to a role or industry?
Ever felt stuck in your growth or feel like your network and knowledge set is limited to your profession and industry?
Ever had the nagging gut feeling that you need to do something drastic to change things up but you find any number of reasons why you shouldn’t?
Feel like the dream of rising to the top of just having a more meaningful career is slipping away?
One pattern that has come up time and again is one where they have come to a sort of cross-roads where they feel they are potentially going to be stalled.
WHAT IS TAKING THE PATH LESS TRAVELLED?
It can mean shifting industries, roles, organisations or something that expands your horizons.
The key here is to aim to build wide ranging experience and knowledge that you can use to become better, smarter and more connected.
Normally these kinds of shifts only happen a few times in your life. Make no mistake though, they are life and career defining and therefore should not be taken lightly.
This is making a move that is often against most other people’s advice but you know in your heart, in your gut that it is the right move.
WHEN SHOUD YOU TAKE IT?
There are a number of situations when taking the path less travelled could be a good move:
- You’re stuck or boxed in your career progression
- Internally your real chances of going forward are low and getting lower as more competition rises up
- You’ve stopped learning and growing
- You feel like you’ve now gone down one path of professional skill almost as far as it can go. Going further won’t add to your wisdom or experience significantly. The well so to speak is drying up and you need to fresh taste of new water to expand your mind
- Industry is taking a seismic shift in direction and you want to get on the front foot
- The profession or industry your in is wrong for you
- The business you’re in is wrong for you
- An opportunity arises that must be taken
- You’ve lost the energy and spark that makes work fun and is critical to leading big transformations
THE BENEFITS?
- This is what Chiefs are looking for. Someone that is willing to do something different, take a calculated risk to get ahead. Someone that is bold and tried something.
- Expansion of your knowledge set, growth and wisdom
- Momentum in your career again
- New networks
- New opportunities
- Fun and renewed energy for life
HOW DO YOU DO IT?
For all those that have taken the path less travelled successfully there are a thousand who took it and failed. They jumped too fast without being considered or didn’t listen to their intuition.
- Assess the root cause of the current situation
- Review your life and career vision / plans
- Listen to your gut, what does it say?
- Talk to a trusted friend who brings out the best in you
- Assess the risk and increase the upside and decrease the downside
- Stay focused and go with 100% commitment
For full show notes go here: www.chiefmaker.com.au/93
This week we are joined by Isabelle Nussli. She is the former US CFO and chairperson of the NUSSLI Group, a leading international provider of portable and permanent infrastructures for sport and cultural events at exhibitions just like the Olympics. They built the iconic Bondi Beach Volleyball Stadium at the Sydney 2000 Olympics, and have been involved in FIFA World Cups.
Isabelle is the author of the Amazon bestselling book "Cockfighting: Solving the Mystery of Unconscious Sabotage at the Top of the Corporate Pyramid". Drawing on the latest research and interviews with more than 70 chairpersons and CEOs, Cockfighting presents Isabelle's findings on the conscious and unconscious drivers of conflict, and provides invaluable tools for increasing self awareness, overcoming differences, and facilitating collaboration for those at the very top of the corporate world.
Isabelle has an MBA from Kellogg School of Management and is currently the Chief Energising Officer for Leverage-Your-self.com, where she leads a team of experts in business, behavioural economics, and applied psychology that support business in navigating change and capitalising on their organisations' full potential.
KEY POINTS & QUOTES * I conducted interviews with 70 chairpersons and CEOs, which produced novel insights and led me to the writing of the book Cockfighting. What was really, really interesting was that I got a glimpse of something more profound behind the machinations of leadership that neither law nor corporate governance could explain, and this something was the human element, a part that I've always been fascinated by.
* So we had a strong value system in place, that I mentioned the handshake, which is something beautiful. Of course we all need contract, but it's still beautiful, still today, if you can go with a handshake. But I also learned where money came from. So while I was still in school I started to work, because I earned my bike, I was folding cardboard boxes for a potato chips producer and I was so proud that I had my first bike.
* During business school when my, at that time partner, now husband, asked me to follow in his footsteps. And I thought wow, quite big footsteps! So I approached the dean of my business school, former dean, and I laid out my options, and things I could have like, I thought ... It was not my plan to go back to Switzerland anytime soon. I thought maybe China or India or US.
So he looked at me and said one word: "Jump." So asked him why, and he said look, you'll never be really, how much you hone your skill, whatever you do. Join the company now and then you can grow with it. That was very good advice.
* First of all I realise that doubts are absolutely normal. So human. So I'm not harsh at myself and you're not supposed to. So when they come up I grab them, I sit with them for a minute, but then I try to make an empowered decision. So I take these doubts, I take them seriously. But then I often realise that they have to do with patterns that are no longer productive. Or shaped in childhood or a bit later, but as an adult they are no longer productive.
* We all have patterns, and they're neither good nor bad, but it's a matter of getting to know them, and working with them. And the ones that are no longer productive try to overcome them.
* When I look back, that early in my career I did not always fill my footsteps. So I was somehow almost afraid of success, or of power, because I learned that, and again that's an unproductive pattern looking back. But something these patterns aren't conscious. So learned that I thought whoever is in power tends to misuse or abuse power, and then I realised that of course that's not the case, and that I can very well take on leadership positions that come naturally to me, often. And I realised to fill footsteps and live up to the position and to the function. So that's, for example, a pattern that I have discovered, and that I largely managed to overcome.
* When I asked about the meaning of power, many interviewees said oh I'm not in favour of power for the sake of power, but in order to achieve goals. And some contradicted themselves a bit later, saying I don't like to play number two, it's nice to receive applause and get the laurels. But I also realised that the level, or amount of self-reflection, level of self-awareness was also quite different when it came to the answering of that question. But again, I think in general, the relationship around power has an ambivalent tone to it
* Corporate governance of course is mechanisms about the processes. It's about the what of the role, what is the role? And that's what I call the rational part. But what's not talked about, or hardly ever, is how are these roles filled?
* What makes this a bit more tricky is that there are unconscious drivers. For example, how much our upbringing has shaped us, the worldview we have, the value system we believe in. Or for example, the definition of and relationship to power.
Or, the amount of time these two spend together. And it's not just, for example, the chairperson is hardly ever full time. That's by nature, they spend less time together. But very often if they don't get along that well, or if there's a slight mistrust, they tend to spend less time together. But if you spend less time, it also means inferior quality of communication, which is likely to harm a relationship. So, time spent is also an unconscious driver.
* So intensifiers are just, let's say birth order. Let's say functional firstborns. So when you occupy a niche within your family, you tend to acquire certain characteristics and traits.
* So when you look at the unconscious intensifiers such as power, and you learn that firstborn and firstborns tend to engage in power struggles. So I think that's interesting, it almost explains part of why, and too, functional firstborn, at the very top of the corporate pyramids when exposure is there and power is involved. Why they might engage into conflicts.
* I call it the second part of the leadership equation, the workforce, because it cascades down. Power yes lies at the top of the corporate pyramids, but as we heard from the relationships and as we probably all know, the relationships at the top are important in the way of how the tone is set, and how, positive too by the way. Positive and less positive behaviour gets cascaded down the pyramid.
* So I developed this CCCC, Chairperson-CEO Collaboration Contract, which is a type of psychological contract, meaning it's not written. So, the two of them sit at the table and talk through different topics such as trust, what does trust mean to you and me? How are we going to increase our trust level? How do we go about it? Or another topic is power, what does power mean to you? How are we going to treat a division or power? For example, at the press conference who takes how much airtime? What if, what if? And all the role clarity, what does it mean, to fill the roles?
So I developed this, it's the idea in it is really for the two of them to talk through, and it's important that they get to communicate. So that they spend time together, get to know each other, but also work through these topics. And ideally, this process is facilitated by an independent moderator, because if not, either one person is superior, so it's important that that person does not exercise power
* For me it's a balance between action and reflection. So I always, I try to find time or make time for reflection. And I'm not talking about hours. Sometimes it can be like seconds while waiting for a train or a bus. Sometimes it can be minutes, just between meetings you know? No athlete works out 12 hours, but in business you see often that meetings are scheduled back to back without time for reflection.
* And what I also believe, when you have an experience, maybe a not so good one, it's still on you on which part of the balance sheets do you want to place it, you know? Was it a good experience or a less good experience. And I think that's quite powerful. Because it stays with us, and we have that choice. In business you cannot play around the balance sheet. But in personal life you can. And that's great.
* Become aware that one day your life will flash before your eyes. So make sure it's worth watching. Which means build self awareness, and a lot will follow. We talk about qualities of future leaders, curiosity and humility, listening, but I think a lot will follow automatically if you become aware of your situation, of your environment, at work, at home. And if you increase self-awareness, it'll be very likely for you to take the right decisions coming out of it. And building the right capacity and qualities.
For full show notes go here: www.chiefmaker.com.au/93
www.chiefmaker.com.au/92 Today we dive into High Performance Teams, Part 10. This is the final episode in the people pillar and so far we have discussed the right people, the right role, the right strategic development plans for them and the right coaching and one-to-ones.
So now you've got the right people on the bus, got them all sitting in the right seats, you're developing them all in the right way over their entire career, looking to develop them and make them into the best people they can be.
You're also actively coaching and giving them one-to-ones. Today wet finish the people pillar with a focus on the execution part of the job through situational delegation. As new initiatives and tasks come up on a day-to-day basis, this is different to our coaching and one-to-ones. This is when something pops up that is above and beyond business as usual like a special report, a new project and the quality of your delegation will directly impact the quality of performance of your people.
Back in about 2006 I was a Project Manager leading a major programme at work across the state government, and I had a fantastic, very high performing Business Analyst that worked for me. And on a Friday afternoon I got a call from the project board chair saying that on the Monday during my project board meeting, I was going to have to present an update on a particular part of this project and my Business Analyst was leading that. So I called him and said "Hey mate, can you put together a quick report for me on how that particular part of the project is going?" It was all about the requirements we're developing and the solution he was gonna propose.
And you know what happened, I had the weekend off. I had a wonderful time, came in Monday morning, and there was about a 15 page report in my inbox waiting for me and I thought "Oh my God, this is ... I just wanted one page." I went over to him and said "Hey mate, what's this? This is too big. I needed one page." And he goes "Oh man, you said you wanted a report."
And you know what? It dawned on me, my delegation or the way that I described this task to him was just terrible. It was just off the cuff, I didn't put any thought into it. I thought he would just understand. But you know what? He spent most of his weekend putting this together, he was so worried about it. And it was just such poor delegation on my part, it's really, really stuck with me.
Something
important for all of us to remember is that if you're getting work coming back to you that isn't what you expect, the very first person you should look at is you. Just get a sense and try and recall the quality of your delegation. Because if you just put an extra 10% effort into your delegation, I guarantee, you're likely to get about a 50% return on that.
Delegation is where a lot of leaders fall victim to their natural preferences. You might remember very early on in the Inner Chief we spoke about micromanagers and even the opposite, when your boss is in the clouds or a macromanager for wont of a better term. The thing is, delegation is very situational, and the biggest pitfall here is that if you have one approach to delegating in all situations, that becomes your MO or when your task comes through, you've got a way of just flicking it on to someone or just handing it over to someone without any framework or any thought into how you're going to communicate that.
From time to time you will succeed, but a lot of the time, you'll get sub-par results. As an example, let's just say you had a high performer in your team, and you have a very low risk task, and you're naturally someone that is a bit of a micromanager. You're a bit stressed about the quality of work people put in, and you really want to have your finger closely on the pulse. Now if you do that with a low risk task, and you've got a high performer, you're just going to annoy the hell out of them, you really are. You're going to dip down, guide them too much, you'll have your hands on the reins the whole time and they will just be over it, and you'll wear them out. It'll be soul destroying for them. They won't feel like they've got any level of empowerment.
Or let's turn that around for a minute. Imagine you've got a low performer on a high risk task... Sometimes a low performer is just a new recruit. They're not quite up to speed yet. It doesn't mean they're not good people. Sometimes they are really struggling in their role. But if you've got a mission critical task or mission critical project and someone who is new or a low performer, and then you take your hands completely off the reins and let them go to their work, then you are very likely to have failure and... you deserve it.
So what we have here is an opportunity to understand and refine a solid way to delegate accurately, because when you think about this people pillar, this is the final step. If you've got the people in the right, if you have already got great developed plans, and you're coaching with good one-to-ones, this is the bit where the work gets done. And if you don't get the work done properly, then you're never gonna get that track record. You know that team is never gonna go to a new level of performance.
I've develop a Situational Delegation framework called COGS. You can always remember COGS, because cog is what actually makes wheels go around, and so does delegation. The more you delegate effectively , the more the wheels turn, so that's a way of remembering COGS.
COGS stands for Context, Outcome, Guidance and Support.
So Context is all about starting with why. You know that's what Simon Sinek made famous, and it's about helping people understand why a particular task or project is so important, the broader context to understand the parameters, what's going on around in the other projects and things that are leading up to it and things that will suit it afterwards.
And once they understand the why of what they're doing, tell them what it is you need them to do. This is the O, the Outcome. This is the outcome you want when the task is completed. Don't tell them exactly what the task is. I always start with what the outcome is. Here we want to really WOW people. We want people to think, feel and do something at the end of that particular task. So maybe if it was something related to implementing a new IT system, we would say, instead of saying "Implement an IT system," we would say "At this point, we want to make the customer experience so incredible for our new users that they'll rave about us and tell all of the other people." That's the outcome, right? If they don't know what the outcome is you want, how can they possibly deliver exactly what it is you're after. So we go straight to, the very first thing is the size of the outcome, right? How amazing will things be when you've completed. This is truly beginning with the ending line.
Then we go to G, and this is Guidance, and where we get very situational. Because this is where we say "What exactly do you need someone to complete?" E.g. I need you to implement an IT system or something like that, and I need to know the quality components. I need to know if there's any key metrics or anything like that that I need to have done, and this is where we get really clear on a little system that I use to determine how much micromanagement or how much full empowerment I can give.
So I want you to imagine a quick matrix, right, on the Y axis is risk, and on the X axis is skill. So up in the top left, what you're gonna have is something that is high risk and low skill. That's what we call Quadrant 1 and a high risk task with a low skilled team member and the response to someone who's in this situation is a form of micromanagement. And you might be thinking "Hold on a minute, micromanagement is out." But think carefully about this for a minute. You've got someone who's in a role, and they're really struggling and they know it. And you've just thrown them in the deep end with a really, really difficult task. What you now need to do is get on board with them and help them. Show them every step of the way. Be there to support them. Micromanagement is such a negative term, but there are moments when you can really help someone nail a big task by being right there for them all the time. Sometimes you can tell them exactly what to do next. Help them write their emails or help them write reports. You can be there for them. Don't be too over bearing on them, just remember at this point, if you take the reins off too much and get too far in the Clouds, they're going to really struggle, and they'll be looking for help, and you'll be nowhere to be seen. So top left quadrant means micromanagement but do it nicely.
Top right where it's a high risk task, but they have high skill, this is where I call what we do is we partner with them. We get close to them and say "Hey this is what we're gonna do, how we're gonna do it, how can I help you, what role can I play." You don't take your hands completely off the reins, because this is a mission critical project, and you need to know what's happening along the way. And you know what? They'llg want partnerin, even when they're high performing, to have someone right beside them along the way. Not micromanaging, but just being there as a partner, as a good person who can keep them accountable along the way.
In the bottom left quadrant is where we have a very low risk task and low skill. So it's a simple task but it's someone who's not really doing that well. In this case, it's just coaching them. Just giving them some guidance along the way. It doesn't matter too much if they fail anyway, it's an opportunity to learn and to grow.
In the bottom right, which is quadrant four, this is something where it's a very low risk task and they have very high skill. In that case, it's complete empowerment. Now you're saying to them, "Look, you're amazing at this. All I need you to do is this particular task. Get this outcome, go for it, I don't even need to know how you're going to go about it."
This framework allows you to know, at what point and what situation should you give more or less guidance.
And then the last step then is now that you know, you've given the context, you've told them why, you've told them the outcome you need, you've given them the guidance on the quality and the quantity of things you want, the key targets, you've decided exactly how much guidance you'll give them, now you tell them how much support they're going to get. What, if any, budget, any resources, how often you're going to meet so you can keep track of what's going on. This is about bringing the company's and your own resources to bear t help that person do the job. It is also the point you confirm there is clear understanding of what you've said. You might even get them to paraphrase back to you, what it is you've said and so you can get really clear, particularly with someone who's maybe a little bit low of a performer and it's a higher risk task.
Let me just give you a very quick example of how this would play out with the Business Analyst I was leading way back in 2006. So let's just talk through context, outcome, my guidance and any support. And remember, what I really wanted him to do was to develop a one page report for my project board which was due to meet on the Monday. So this is what I should have said to him.
Context: "Now, mate, next Monday, I'm meeting with our project board. We meet every single month to discuss the progress of this project. They're a very supportive board. We've got a lot of trust from them. We have been delivering pretty well, so they're not real hard arses. They're going to be nice to us. They do have a bit of a query about some of the analysis we're doing that's in your particular area. They've got no question over your ability or anything, but they just want to know a lot more detail about it if that's all right." So that's the end of Context.
Now we go to Outcome. "What I'd like to do is put their minds at ease. I want them to understand that you've absolutely got this, right? Because I know you do. They're just not 100% across that." So that's the Outcome. Really short and sharp.
Now Guidance, remember this is a high performer, and this was not a low risk task, but it was medium risk. So all I needed to do was paint a pretty clear picture of the thing that I needed him to produce at this point, So this is what I should have said to him. "What I need you to produce is a one to two page report that outlines the key risks, issues, what you're currently working on, what is in the pipeline and what's going on with timeline and budget. Make it short, sharp, to the point and just make sure we demonstrate that you've absolutely got this covered." Right? That's the guidance. That's what I should have said to him, which takes us to the Support I'm able to give him.
So this is what I should have said in the end. "I'm here for you whenever you need to talk. We have the rest of today which is Friday and Monday morning to produce this document. I'd like you to spend no more than two hours on it, and as soon as you've spent around 90 minutes or you feel like it's in a good first draught, let's sit down and quickly go through it. Please don't work over the weekend. If you don't get back to me this afternoon, we'll meet over a coffee at 8:00 Monday morning."
So that's what I should have said to him, and if I had said that to him, he would have absolutely now that, not spent too much time, and we would have had a better outcome for me, for him and the project board.
So Chief, that's a simple situational delegation model for you: Context, Outcome, Guidance and Support.
www.chiefmaker.com.au/92
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/91
This week we are joined by Roland Frasier, CEO, War Room Mastermindand the Principal/Founder at Traffic & Conversion Summit, DigitalMarketer, Praxio, Rival Media, Plattr.
He is the co-founder and/or principal of multiple Inc. Magazine fastest growing companies (e-commerce, e-learning and SaaS). Serial entrepreneur who founded, scaled or sold almost two dozen different businesses ranging from consumer products to industrial machine manufacturing companies with adjusted sales ranging from $3 million to $337 million.
Through War Room Roland advises over 100 major companies on digitally centric customer acquisition, activation, referral, retention, revenue and growth strategies and plan implementation.
He is a guru in the art of the deal and one of the most humble and generous chiefs you’ll ever meet.
Books and Resources Recommended Nothing Down by Robert Allan
The Psychology of Winning by Denis Waitley
Unlimited Power by Tony Robbins
The works of Milton H Erickson
Measure What Matters by John Doerr
High Output Management by Andy Grove
The 4 Disciplines of Execution
CONNECT WITH ROLAND FRASIER DigitalMarketer.com
RolandFrasier.com
LUNCH TIMES WITH ROLAND FRASIER PODCAST Check it our here...just launched.
QUOTES AND KEY POINTS BY ROLAND FRASIER When I read Robert Allen's book on real estate, it was just amazing to me that you could buy real estate with no money down, and the first time that you do that, I always, when I talk about buying companies with no money down, so the impact for me was to ultimately I took those principles and so what if I just did that with companies, and it turns out you can.
The Denis Waitley (Psychology of Winning) one for me was that I had never really, no one had before that exposed me to the thought of setting goals. And, so the biggest thing that I got out of Dennis's thing was that the people who set goals achieve them and people who don't, don't typically. That you have to have some thing that you're working towards or you're just kind of floating, and then he talked in that about visualisation and how athletes who he trained, and he sort of trained Olympic athletes and astronauts and all these amazing people and actually did studies where they would visualise themselves on the bench pushing the weight up and that, that enabled them in their minds to go and actually lift the weights that they hadn't lifted before.
Roy H. Williams, who I just recently was exposed to, he's called the wizard of ads in Austin. And, he says that for ads, you have to take the mind first to the place that the body will then go. So, in your advertisements, you need to take people in their minds to the place that you want their fingers on the keyboard or their bodies or their dollars to go in the future, because if you don't paint that story and take them there, then they don't ever go. So, that was the big thing I think from Dennis. And, then Tony did a fantastic job of synthesising the work of Milton Erickson, and Richard Bandler, and John Grinder from neuro linguistic programming and hypnosis into a, especially in unlimited power into a very digestible, understandable, nonscientific layman's kind of approach or laypersons approach to that science of NLP.
"Everything that you want to accomplish can be accomplished with mentoring, modelling and masterminding"
HOW TO BUY FOR NO MONEY DOWN - AN EXAMPLE And, it was a gentleman who was interested in buying an eCommerce, not an eCommerce, it was actually a wholesale, I'm trying to think of how to do it without giving it away. It was a wholesale concrete business and this was the manufacturer of this kind of cool type of concrete. And, so my friend was interested in acquiring that company but didn't have the money to do it. It was doing about two and a half, $3,000,000 a year. It was profitable at about a 150 to $200,000 a year profit.
So, in the neighbourhood of eight to 10% profit. And, he didn't have any money or know anything other than he'd been talking to the owner and the owner was interested in selling, and he was interested in buying, and the owner was only selling through print ads in magazines. So, like old school, old school, right? Print ads in magazines had never, and was selling direct to customers. So, had never sold directly to wholesalers and had never sold online. So, it was really kind of an interesting opportunity and had had inquiries before, but it was like, nah, I don't know how all that internet stuff works and I don't want to hassle with other people who are reselling. So, I just want to sell to the customers, and he said, "But I'm thinking I've got this other thing that I want to do. I've invented something else that I'm really interested in", now so one of the biggest, coolest things is when you find someone who's already in their mind, sold their business, like they're done, even if it's a good business, a truly creative entrepreneur frequently is tired of the business they're in, and looking to the next business that they can be in. So, that's a really positive sign.
And, I said, "Well, the first thing that I always like to ask people, what are you going to do with the money?", and, he's like, why? And, he's like, "He's gonna tell me it's none of my business", I said, "No, it's actually a 100% about your business because if you can figure out what he or she is going to do with the money, then you'll find out exactly how much they actually need right now". And, he's like, okay. So, he went and asked him and the guy said, "Well, it's going to cost me about $200,000 to do the mouldings for this new thing that I've invented". I was like, great. I said, "And what are you going to do with the rest of the money?". He said, "I'll have it for working capital or investments or whatever", and I said, "Great". I said, "So, you should be able to buy that company for $200,000 down", and he said, "Okay, well how?", I said, "Because that's all the guy needs to do that. And, if you can find out what the deal is on the mouldings that he needs for this invention that he's got and you can get him those without you having to come out of pocket $200,000, you can buy that business for no money down".
So, the thing that I always look for is what are they going to do with the money and then how much is it going to actually cost to do the next thing that they want to do. And, if they just want to have money for investments, chances are really good they'll carry back. So, they will finance the acquisition for you. So, great. So, now he's down to $200,000. And I said "Okay, so you need $200,000 to do this", I said, "He probably doesn't need $200,000 right now to do that". I said, "Ask him what is the process with the people that he's talking about doing the mouldings", and it turned out that he only needed like about 80 grand. I was like, great, you only need $80,000 now, because the way that you pay for the mouldings is this, and the business is actually making money. So, let's let the business pay for everything except the actual cash dollars that he needs right now today. And, he was like, great. So, we went back and talked to the guy and the guy was like, yeah, okay, I could do that.
And, it's like, so you know that the money's going to come, so you transfer the business to me, I will assign you the money that the business is making until you get that $200,000 that you need and I'll secure the rest of the business with the stock and the business that I'm buying. Fantastic. Well, what we knew was that if we could get a small deferral period, then my friend could go out and go to all of the wholesalers who had already inquired about making wholesale purchases for the company and do deals with them to raise the $80,000 that he needed to put down. So, all they needed to do was have a period of time where he could do that. So, we negotiated a 60 day period where he would get to do that during the due diligence period for looking at the company. Right? And, so then he was able to raise the money, cut the deal to get advanced purchase orders from the people who were the wholesalers who had already asked and inquired, and then he went out and he did the deal with no money down. So, and that's a very abbreviated process of that, right?
It's just being creative enough to find out what do they actually want, what are they going to do the money with and what are all of the pieces that are available to you right now to generate the money without having to come out of pocket? And, to me it's a game, right? I just don't, like when I have the money to buy a business, I don't want to pay anything down for it because I want the business to pay for itself. That's a fun game to play, right?
ON BEING CREATIVE IN YOUR BUSINESS DEALS So, if a business deal, a marketing problem, a business problem comes to me, I'm thinking about everything that I know that I've encountered before in every situation that is not business, as much as I am business. And then it's somehow identifying not being constrained, I guess, to a formula that let's say, I'll use business acquisitions as an example because I think it's a good one, is the way you buy businesses, you pay money for it. I don't accept that, right? I don't accept that as a fact of how you buy businesses.
And, so if somebody says, well, you buy a business, then you pay money for it or you trade something for it, and the way that you get money as you get money from a bank or you get money from an investment banker or you get a loan. None of that right is completely acceptable to me. And, so if you go through, the Toyota's system of the 'five why's' of if you want to get to the root of any problem in manufacturing, the machine failed. Why did the machine fail? The machine failed because the ball bearings failed. Why did the ball bearings fail? Because, they were not properly oiled and maintained. Why were they not properly hold and maintains? Because, there's no system for doing that. And, if you keep asking those questions, usually within five times of asking it deep, you get to an answer that is the true answer. And, so I like to do that with buying a business, I'll call it the 'five buys', so I can buy it for cash. Great, what if I can't buy it for cash? Oh, well then you're going to get a loan. What if I can't get a loan? Well, then you're going to need to find another way, right? And, you go through all of that and at the end, if you do that exercise with pretty much any problem that you're trying to solve, and instead of accepting the traditional ways or the ways that you could do it easily, think about what if I didn't have that? What if that wasn't possible? And, then it just really makes you think about all of the other things that you could do and you come up with a creative solution that can get you buying houses, or companies, or solving huge problems that you might not have otherwise been able to because it was too easy to do that. It's too easy to say, well, I need money to buy a business. Okay, well I can't get it, therefore I can't buy the business. No, what if you couldn't buy businesses for money? Right. Does that make sense?
Somebody explained to me the other day, a medical doctor who was trying to explain how a stroke affects people, and he said, "Look, a stroke is pathways to the brain, and imagine that you always go down the interstates and you, let's say that you now you can't go down the interstate and you have to take the side streets. Could you get to that place by doing that?", and the answer is yes. And I was like, okay, well now what if I said you can't, you can go that side street way but you can't take any of the main streets on the side streets that you're used to, and that's what happens in a stroke situation with thought, that our thoughts are not allowed to go down the main way and they're not allowed to go down the side streets, but they start down the side streets and several of the main side streets that they know are missing. And, now what are you going to do? And, that's why it's so hard to form speech or things like that when you go through something like that. And, I think that if you can simulate that a bit by removing all of the normal, easy, well travelled roads to solve a problem that you're trying to solve, then you're forcing yourself to be truly creative in how can I get to the end result? And, it might be harder, but it might be that in fact the main roads in that situation like bank financing is a perfect example, isn't available, that it's not an option because you don't have the assets, or the wherewithal or whatever to make that happen, or the business doesn't have the fundamentals or you don't want to personally guarantee it because you don't want to risk your own capital. And, so I like the creativity of challenging yourself to remove the easy ways to do things, and think about how can I accomplish this a different way?
ON THE WAR ROOM MASTERMIND It's eight years old now and we have 165 people in it. We had limited it to 100 for several years and just in 2018 decided that we were going to expand it, but it's a collection of people who are, you have to be doing a minimum of a million dollars a year to be in it, but really the average is probably between five and 85 and 60 million. We have several people that are in the hundreds of millions of dollars in sales, and two members now that are over a billion dollars. Which is really cool because in that group, the goal I think of a group like that is that you have people who have been where you want to be, or are where you want to be and can reach a hand down and pull you up and tell you the things that you need, the things that are different. The things that won't work, that are working now. That kind of stuff, and so I think that's really valuable all along the spectrum of revenue. And, then the people who are at the higher levels get to see the agility of the people who are, and the scrappiness of the people who are at the lower levels so that they can say, well we shouldn't take two years to bring this thing to market.
We should be able to do, so it's a really cool mix of people who have really big companies and people who have smaller companies, but all of them are taking action and doing things and sharing in a very open, giving, vulnerable, atmosphere and everyone's goal is to double their business each year that they're in the programme. And, you end up making really great friends and that leads to all these ridiculously good contacts. So, it's very exciting for me. I have a really unique perspective because I was a member for three years before I became a partner in digital marketer. I've bought into the business with Ryan and Perry. I did that with also no money down, by the way. So, hopefully they're not listening to this, because, you know? But, that perspective of being in there three years and seeing the tremendous value of the relationships that I had, but also seeing as a customer, the things that I thought were limitations of it was really helpful.
So, when I became a partner and ultimately that became a business unit that I'm running, to responsible for anyway. I don't really run anything, but I was able to bring that in and say, here's some changes we should make that I think we can serve people better, and every year it changes. It's always evolving. And, so we're in our eighth year of evolution and probably still 20 years away from the perfection that we seek, if we ever can achieve that, but we learn more, I mean, I can literally say that I would pay to be in there if I didn't get to be in there because I run it. I would pay to be in there because I did pay to be in there and I did experience the growth and I did see the magic of that group. And, there aren't many, there's no group that's like that, but there are several, like the genius network from a networking standpoint, and meeting a different group of people is fantastic. And, so I belong to about five or six different groups because they radically expand my network, and the money that I pay to be in them is dwarfed constantly by the deal flow, and the learnings that I get from the folks that I would not have otherwise encountered.
This is episode 9 on our 25 part series on High Performing Teams. The first 5 episodes were about your MISSION which includes your vision, purpose, strategy, values and goals of your team. And then for the last three weeks we've been talking all about your PEOPLE. We have already covered getting the right people on the bus, putting them in the right role, and then getting a strategic development plan together for that individual. Today we talk all about the coaching and one-to-ones. We’ll cover four important steps in coaching: 1. Understanding what motivates your people 2. Understanding their psychology in greater depth 3. Get into a regular coaching rhythm (see Ep 33 and 88 on Strategic Development Plans) 4. Coach each person in their own right and maintaining growth mindset
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/90
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/89
This week you and I are joined by Jonathan Rubinsztein, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) & Managing Director of Infomedia.
Infomedia (ASX:IFM) is a leading global provider of SaaS solutions to the parts and service sector of the automotive industry. Founded in 1987, Infomedia supplies online parts selling systems, sophisticated service selling systems, a range of publications, as well as data analysis and information research for automotive and lubricant industries.
Previously, Jonathan was the CEO and founding Shareholder at UXC Red Rock Consulting, the largest Oracle Consulting business in ANZ with 8 offices and 600 staff.
He also served as a founding Director of RockSolid SQL is on the Advisory board of the Missionvale charity based in Port Elizabeth, South Africa and on the Board at Humanitix, the first not-to-profit ticketing platform that redistributes profits from booking fees to fund domestic violence shelters, meals to homeless, and indigenous education
He has been a guest lecturer at the University of Sydney Business School and a regular participant at TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) conferences. And was awarded the IT Professional of the Year 2013 (AIIA award NSW).
For more information go to www.chiefmaker.com.au/88 In this episode we are going to continue our focus on the People pillar of High Performance Teams. In particular, building strategic development plans for each of your team members. One of my great mentors, all through his books, obviously never met the man, was basketball coaching legend, John Wooden. He said, "I worry that business leaders are more interested in material gain than they are in having the patience to build up a strong organisation, and a strong organisation starts with caring for their people." When I refer to strategic development plans, I mean now that you've got the right people in the right role, you need to strategically develop them so they can be their absolute best. To do that, you must have to genuinely, authentically care about each and every one of them. Remember, Napoleon said, "Leaders are dealers in hope." So often we get caught up with the business commercials and the targets and the things we've got to do, and we forget that the greatest legacy we can potentially leave on the planet is the growth of the people in our team. Don't shortcut on this. It's a simple process but pays big dividends in performance, trust and legacy. When I was working at the Queensland Reds, Super Rugby team as high performance coach in 2015 every single player in every single position had a development plan which outlined the physical, technical and tactical capabilities the needed to be successful in their role. The coaching staff worked tirelessly to improve their skills throughout the year to build those new capabilities. What are the skills, education and experience that each of your people need to perform their job to the absolute limit of their potential? Not just what they should be capable of, but what's the potential for them? Remember, if you get all of your team all growing every single week, every single month, improving in their own skills the entire team performance is going to grow. What's more than that, if you're facing some internal resistance it might be because people are stalled in their development. They've got a fixed rather than a growth mindset. One of the best ways to shift a fixed mindset is to pour add some new skill and knowledge into the minds of your people which starts to broaden their mind and perspective. This brings new thoughts and ideas to a problem or a particular piece of their work, and the whole game changes. Leaders are dealers in hope and key role of all leaders is coaching. All coaches develop their people and they do it with a clear strategy. This is not HR's job. HR will support you with the things they need to do, but developing your people, working out the plan is your job. It's also not the people that report to you. It's not their job either. You've employed them. You've brought them in to do a great job, now develop them. Make them amazing. Really invest the time, the effort, the energy into developing them. A strategic development plan has only a few steps. The first thing is, you need to understand their personal dreams and goals. What are they here for? What do they want in life and in their career? This won’t be their only job in their career. They'll be here for a while working for the company, and eventually they'll move on. Don't bracket them and think, "I've just got to get the ounce of sweat over them over the next few years, and then we're done." No, think about what you can do for that person for their entire life and career. Start with learning what their big dreams and goals are, then clarify what the current role is meant to do. What it would look like if they were absolutely knocking it out of the park? What is expected of them every single day? This is being crystal clear about that role, which we covered in the last episode. Then do a gap analysis on where they are now, compared to where they need to be on skills, education and experience. Then plan how they’re going to accumulate those new capabilities and regularly check in on them. That's it. When you think about it, when we go back through the last three episodes, where you got the right person in the right role. That was absolutely vital because now everybody knows or is doing something that makes sense for them, that plays to their strengths, that's work they value, and now you're improving their performance every single week. Well, as soon as you've got those three things lined up, they are going to fly. Chief, this might not seem like a lot, but whenever I walk into a team that wants to become high performing, this is one of the first things I look for. I look for how much they're developing their people. If there's no plan to develop each of their people, I know this is one of the very first things we need to do. You don't have to invest a lot of money. You can create all sorts of ways and means of sharing information, podcasting, doing group book reviews in your team. You can cut corners on this develop or save money on this development at every opportunity. So, Chief, that process again. Start with dreams and goals, then go with role definition, what is required of them. Then, do the gap analysis on their skills from where they are now to what is required to perform the job to their utmost ability. Then, work out the skills, the experience, and the knowledge, and the education you're going to give them over the next 12 months. And then, execute and get that done so every single week they're improving and growing as an individual. If you think for a minute about maybe someone in your career who's really taken you under their wing and given you the right development and gone the extra mile, you never forget that person. That someone becomes special in your heart. We often talk about them as being mentors. Imagine the difference you can make in the world if you do this for everyone in your team. In fact, imagine if you didn't. Imagine for a minute you didn't have any development plans for any of the people in your team. What would that be doing to your performance? How much would you be leaving on the table? It's just a fantastic opportunity to get quick wins. Spend some time and get a strategic development plan for each of your people. That sums it up for this week. As always, remember to stay epic.
Part 7 of our series on building High Performance Teams continues to look at the second pillar - People. And in this case The Right Role for your people. Once you’ve formed the right group of people, which we covered in Ep 86, now its about taking a step back and analysing if you have the right role for each of those people. A role that will bring out their best and get the job done for the team. The best people can crash and burn in the wrong role and a low performer can start thriving in a role that plays to their strengths and focuses on work that they value. Remember, an individual can outgrow a role and when that happens every day they turn up can feel like a step back. It can be soul destroying and in situations like that it’s a significant move if you can help them feel appreciated for their real potential. And sometimes a role can be too big or the wrong shape for someone. E.g. If they’ve been in an operational line management role which plays to their technical expertise and they’ve shifted into an internal support role which is all about influencing it can be a huge leap. Particularly if they have to lead transformation on a topic or through a process that is new to them. Of course, every role has suck factor. And mostly people understand that and can handle it to a certain point. As the leader it’s your job to make sure that the suck factor doesn’t get too much or get them down. Here are three steps to optimising the roles of your people: 1. Start with a blank canvas and considering the targets and challenge the organisation needs of you draw up the roles that you need to do the job (without the people’s names). 2. Once you’ve worked out the roles and tasks that need doing add in your people to each of the roles. 3. Be creative about how you can make that role more interesting and challenging in a way that brings out their very best. Consider their strengths, their goals and the kind of work that they value. Remember, a basketball coach would never put a 7-foot tall centre at point-guard and netball coach wouldn’t put a wing-defence at goal attack. They’d be doomed to failure. Think like a coach. How can you make the lives of your people better through role adjustment alone. Now you’ve got the right people, get creative and smart so that they’re also in the right roles. Once you’ve done that, you’ll find an immediate boost to performance and energy across the team. For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/87
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/86
In our first five minisodes on leading high performance teams we built your mission and this was the vision, purpose, strategy, values and goals of your team. We’ll spend the next 5 weeks focusing on what makes it all happen - PEOPLE.
And to start off we’ll look at getting the RIGHT PEOPLE on your team. As Jim Collins said, “Get the right people on the bus and wrong people off the bus.”
In many ways, this is actually the first step. But in reality you need to keep checking in to see if you’ve got the right people. And so that is first question, if you think about your mission and the aspirational goals you’ve got, then straight up, do you have the team that can do that?
If your answer isn’t a confident yes, if there is someone who you’re unsure of that is nagging away at you then let’s look at it. Review your team and ask yourself, are we a title winning team. Who am I unsure about and is it their skill or their character?
This is something where you really have to follow your intuition. If they’re unhappy and causing trouble it’s likely their spreading their unhappiness throughout the team and everyone will be more than comfortable if you move them on. In fact, sometimes you’re doing them a huge favour…even if they don’t realise it in the moment. In the end, some people have gotten too toxic and it’s too hard for them to rescue their reputation in the time required. This takes courage and humility and resilience but all great chiefs ensure they have the right people on the bus at the beginning.
For a detailed review checkout www.chiefmaker.com.au/86
In our first four minisodes on leading high performance teams we built your vision, purpose, strategy and values. The final element in building the first major pillar of High Performance Teams is Goals. These are the goals or metrics that will inform you on your progress and success.
Goals must be: - Clearly defined and linked to other goals with a measure, target performance on a particular date - Must be aspirational targets with timeframes that result in a paradigm shift or significant change in performance - Relevant for those who will be working towards it...so people have a line of site from their work to the end target - You need to check for ecology to ensure that one goal isn’t likely to be sacrificed in the pursuit of another because of systems in the backend around remuneration and reward. E.g. you might talk all about measuring values but if bonuses or annual reviews don’t include a % around how they live the values then people won’t follow it. You also need to check for ecology across departments and ensure that different department goals aren’t going to cause them to battle against each other. - Goals must be multi-dimensional and including Commercial, Operational, Business Improvement Projects Success, Customer Satisfaction, Marketing / Sales, Values & Culture
Goals really do round out your Mission. It is time now to do something epic. Lead a turnaround boldly like a great chief and create an atmosphere people want to be apart of.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/85
Our guest this week Golf Master Coach, Steve Bann on Coaching the world’s best golfers, confidence and the improvement lifecycle.
Here is what Stuart Appleby had to say about our guest. "I have worked with Steve Bann since I was 18 years old and he is my coach to this day. Steve has helped me shape my game in every aspect from the start and helped me win on the nationwide PGA tour and internationally. Steve is the most knowledgeable coach in the world and can help any golfer of any skill level achieve their goals."
Steve is a partner in BannLynchMcDade, and the team have coached their students to 29 USPGA Tour wins and multiple international amateur and professional titles. After turning professional in 1979, Steven played on the Australian PGA Tour from 1981 to 1996. Since 1996, Steve has travelled the world, coaching at over 40 Majors and five Presidents' Cups. His students, who have included, Stuart Appleby, K J Choi, Robert Allenby, and he has given lessons to many notables, including Ian Baker-Finch, Greg Norman, Vijay Singh, and Adam Scott. He is the author of Simply Golf: Back to Basics. Steve Bann, welcome to the show.
Quotes and Key Points Made by Steve Bann
- The one thing that we all had in common was we all loved to compete. We loved to play the game and loved to compete. We didn't have any technology. There was no high speed video cameras, and force plates, and launch monitors, and ... but we all found a way to play. The conditions of the golf courses were terrible. Some of them were dry, some of them were sloppy, so the grain on the grass ... Gravity's supposed to make the ball go that way, but the grain was so strong that it would actually go against the gravity. You just had to figure out your way of being able to score. Along the way, we learnt to deal with adversity. We learnt to find ways to get on with doing what we were trying to do, trying to do better, and were all pushing at each other, at a competitive level, and yet, we were all supporting each other. It was like a team.
- I think people focus on technique so much, because it's tangible. You can see it. Somebody hits a bad shot, you can say, "Oh, I hit that bad shot, because I did this. If I then work on fixing that, then I won't hit bad shots anymore." There's always something to work on. I'm too flat, I'm too upright, I'm swaying, I'm sliding, I'm spinning out. There's always something. An interesting stat is that there's more books written on golf technique than every other sport in the world combined, and yet, golfers still aren't improving.
- Focusing on technique, and I think you fall into that trap, which we call a reactive cycle. When something goes wrong, you're always trying to fix it. The reactive cycle is always trying not to do something, and that's not a good cycle to get on. In golfing terms, I hit a slice, I'm trying not to hit a slice.
- How do you fix a slice? You teach somebody to hook the ball.
- I was asked by the ESPN interview a few years ago, who I thought some of the great coaches in the world were, and I said I'd have to put Mike Furyk, Jim Furyk's dad, right up there, 'cause he's actually a golf coach. They said, "How could you say that?" I said, "'Cause Jim Furyk swings ... as David [inaudible 00:19:42] said, he swings like an octopus falling out of a tree." No one ever asks why the octopus was up there, but that's what it looks like. But he gets the job done.
- I've heard Mike Furyk say that, "Jim used to come down after school, hit some balls, I'd get him to hit some draws and fades, and highs and lows." He said, "I knew it didn't look right, but I didn't know enough about technique to try and fix anything, so I just let him go." To me, he's a great coach. He had him hitting shots, learning to play, didn't interfere and say, "You won't be able to play well until you do these things right." There's another world champion golfer for a long period of time who's done it his own way.
- I couldn't agree more. In golf, we bring it down to the technical, physical, tactical, and mental side, and if we use the improvement cycle model, the idea is ... Let's just say we can run one month improvement cycles. If you've got an improvement cycle going technically, physically, mentally, and strategically every month, times 12 every year, you have to be making progress.
- Make an assessment and ... The assessment's the important part to get right, because if we make an assessment and we come up with the incorrect conclusion, then we set ourselves on a pathway, which is going to be potentially a waste of time. But at least, at the end of that, if we reassess, we can then go, "Okay, that wasn't the right step forward." Make an assessment, set a goal, which has to be realistic, based on time and capability to be fair. There's no point setting goals that somebody probably isn't ready for and not capable of doing. Put activities in place to achieve that goal, come back and reassess. It's standard golf setting, but if you do it across one physical, one mental, one tactical …
- Just on that coffee and the diet, I've worked out very early on, that if I have a coffee before I play, I've got the yips on the first green. 'Cause you add the caffeine to the nervous anticipation of playing a sport, and then it's just, the whole thing is compounded. The big three in golf are hydration, caffeine, and sugar.
- We have to talk about confidence in a language that people understand and they get. We like to call it, knowing
- I like to say that negative confidence works 100% of the time, and the unfairness of golfers' positive confidence, works between 50 and 70%.
- But negative works every time. Every time. The confidence is knowing, so we try to prepare to know, and the only way you can prepare to know, the difference between optimism and faith. They're closely linked. Self advocacy. All those things we need, self belief, we need all of those things to drive the confidence, but confidence is knowing, so you can't know something until you've actually experienced it, so how do we rehearse to experience it? In golf, technique. I say that technique is only 30% of confidence. You get your technique perfect and at best, you'll only be 30%.
- The next 30% is skills. In golf, there's 11 shot categories; driver, fairway, woods, long irons, mid irons, short irons, chipping, pitching, bunkers, and short, middle, long putts. There's 11 categories. There's about nine skills in each of those categories; high, low, normal, draw, fade, and straight. There's about eight [inaudible 00:33:58], and there's about eight different wins. There's about 6500 skills
- That's why getting back to the WAFWOM tour, that was ... we didn't realise what we were learning along the way, was to deal with all of these different skills and ways of, "Okay, when that happens, I do this, because last time it happened, I learnt from it," and that's what knowing is. By practising all of the skills, so turning the technique into the skills gives us 60% of confidence. Well, hang on. Where's the next? Well, that's ... in golf, we call it testing. You've got to test something, you've got to put it into a test situation where you challenge it, and you test it, and you see whether it actually works.
- The biggest intimidation in golf is the boundaries. It's never the target. It's what's around the target is the intimidation,
- The four step routine is actually five, but the four steps is, number one, decide on the shot. You do an analysis of distance, wind, and all that sort of stuff. Number two, is prepare for the shot. When you're preparing for the shot, you're having your practise swings or you're visualising, theorising, you're preparing for the shot. Hopefully, you're repeating a swing that you know has succeeded in the past. This is just like that shot.
- Drawing on your memory bank. Number three, is the set up routine; grip, stance, ball, position, posture, and aim. Now you're setting up for that shot that you've decided on playing, prepared to play, set up to play. Step four in the routine, is the easiest thing to do and the hardest thing to do at the same time. The reason it is the easiest thing to do is 'cause there is no further thought required. The reason it is the hardest thing to do, is because there is no further thought required. You've got to get out of your way and trust and commit, and only you know, on every individual shot, whether you actually do that.
- Step four is hit it without rethinking it. I've heard Tiger Woods say in interviews after shooting over par, "Tiger, what went wrong today? You shot three over." "I was happy with my execution on every shot today." What he's talking about is he decided, he saw it, felt it, set up for it, and executed it ... it just didn't happen.
- It's knowing. Knowing. How do we create situations? First of all we have to imagine it and decide what we're going to do when it happens, but then prepare for it as much as possible, and have all of our contingencies in place. Then we just keep growing with that, but I think the most vital step, which these days most people understand the principles behind
- Everything that stays in our longterm memory is, because there was an emotional shift attached to it. We might remember a first bike, and our 12 year old birthday party, and all of those type of things. We don't know what we were doing the day before or the day after. Sometimes, we're too hard on ourselves and there's more emotion attached to our failures, negative emotions then, than there is to our successes. Eventually, in our memory bank, in that longterm memory bank, there's an imbalance. There's way more successes, but because we were prepared for that, that was going to happen anyway, we don't actually acknowledge it and anchor it as much as we
- I think Tiger Woods is brilliant at this. We see Tiger get angry and throw clubs, and curse, do all of those things, but we've seen, when he does something that only Tiger Woods does, gets super excited, and pumped up, and dance across the green pumping his fist. I said, "Tiger, you just holed a six foot putt. You've done that a million times." What's he doing? He's making sure that the emotional anchoring of that success outweighs the human anchor.
- I call it human, because we're human beings. Of course, you've got to get angry. You've got to get frustrated, because that's what drives you to get better, but if that's all we can remember, 'cause that's the only thing we have emotional shifts attached to, eventually, you just can't see yourself succeeding at anything.
- Learn to find out ... to simplify, to find out what works and stop doing all the stuff, all the filler around it that we think we have to do, because that's what's been done in the past. Why are we doing this stuff? How is it actually helping? So just filter out all the stuff that doesn't really help us get where we want to go. But a final message is, reframe learning to love what you do. The moment you stop loving what you do, I think that's when things start to unravel, and then we do start to react, and then motivation for doing things becomes, probably not the right motivation. If we love what we do and then we can analyse what we do and realise that so much of this stuff is just wasted time, and effort, and energy, I think they'll have a lot more fun.
In our first three minisodes on leading high performance teams we built your vision and purpose and then turned that into a strategy.
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/83
So your team now knows where they should be in two to three years and also why (your purpose) and how you’re getting there. Now the next question is “Who are we and what do we stand for? How will we be remembered?”
And this starts with shared values.
What are values?
Values are principles or standards of behaviour; one's judgement of what is important in life.In a team sense they grow from your shared spirit...the aspiration or shared principles you have for life and work. Often we forget that there are unwritten standards of behaviour that already exist. You have a culture based on the values already at work in your team. It can be seen the behaviours and actions of people everyday. It can be seen in the stories they tell, the rituals and traditions, the way they greet each other, how they respond when things go wrong and how they celebrate.
We cover:
- Where leaders get them wrong - What can happen if you get them right - How to bring them to life in your team in a simple 3 step process - Some examples of incredible values based leadership
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/8
In a moment you and I will be joined by Peter Finn. Peter is the CEO and founder of Face Contracting who provide a range of quality, cost-effective solutions in mining, construction & manufacturing.
After starting out in mining, he has spent time as publican in regional Australia,
Now Finny is a true Aussie larrikin. A top bloke that I met at a podcasting conference last year. He also hosts ‘Full Production’ THE podcast for the mining industry.
We are going to cover everything from self-development to leading a growing company with presence around the world.
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/82
In our first two minisodes on leading high performance teams we built your vision and purpose.
So your team now knows where they should be in two to three years and also why (your purpose).
The next logical question is how? And this means pulling the right levers to make the biggest and most effective impact in your area.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/81
Many executives make a critical error at the outset of leading a transformation. They don’t stand back and clearly assess the current situation, relying instead on a partial understanding of the environment in which they’re operating. This error costs them time and money, and it raises stress and resistance throughout the process.
Chiefs spend significant time precisely mapping the territory before they start. Rather than launching projects randomly, they apply deep understanding to the problem.
This mapping gives them an in-depth understanding of the economics, culture, and their team’s capabilities. They understand how the departments work together, the legal and market conditions, the technology in play, the finances, the service, and the operational numbers. They understand that they operate in a living and breathing system. Changes within this system have ripple effects that spread throughout the business. Thanks to broad and deep understanding of the operating environment, it is substantially more likely that, at the end of the transformation process, they end up with a smoothly operating system.
Remember, most of the time you’re not setting the whole company strategy. The CEO, executive team and board will most often lead that process which focuses heavily on how your organisation differentiates itself from competitors, which parts of the value chain you will optimise over others to maximise profit and how the organisation will leverage branding, pricing, market entry and exit etc.
What you’re leading is a critical department transformation that will ensure the success of the company and department vision. And there are generally four big levers to pull that will transform your department’s performance:
- Talent – The right people with the right skills in the right jobs doing the right work (Refer back to the Entourage Chapter for more details)
- Culture – The operating rhythm, team work and trust, behavioural standards, quality of feedback, mindset for innovation, commitment to stakeholders and customers that drives flow and performance in the team
- Tools and Systems – The technology, processes, data and other tools that your people have which let’s them do their job to their full potential.
- Service / Operational Improvements – The list and design of services your department provides or operations it delivers and the economics (including pricing or cost), efficiency and quality control of those services or operations.
Stand back and assess your current department and ask yourself, “which of these is currently my biggest problem to achieve the department and organisational vision?”
Now that you have a clear understanding of the levers you want to pull they need to be turned into initiatives that will drive change. This should be fairly logical with a clear line of sight between a project and a performance lift. The most common pitfall here for leaders is not getting the sub-projects right, it’s doing too many.
This is the crux of the issue. This is why so many attempts to lead transformation fail right at the beginning. Overload. They create so much busy-ness and activity that its impossible to do it all and none of them succeed.
Chiefs courageously cut through conflicting interests to set clear priorities. Those destined to spend their entire careers struggling ineffectually in management positions let everything happen at once. It’s a recipe for certain failure.
Laser focus is necessary to make change powerful and lasting. Tackle one issue at a time. This doesn’t mean combining a number of projects so that it feels or looks like you’re only pulling one lever when, in fact, you’re pulling many of them. When you’re trying to spin too many plates, there are consequences. Everything comes crashing down. Quality suffers, innovation dries up, there’s poor stakeholder management, stress, missed deadlines and budget blowouts. Projects get cancelled each time you switch strategic direction, and those in your department are left weary and wary of more change.
Have patience and sequence different levers after each other. This way, each new initiative leverages off the improvements of the previous ones. There are often unexpected consequences (some good, some bad) that come in change’s wake. These developments might make the next change in line inappropriate or ineffective. At the end of each change initiative, reset as a team and (when necessary) reprioritise. New benefits might be leveraged in powerful ways. There might be quick and easy wins that you’re leaving on the table if you move too quickly from one initiative to the next.
Remember as well to underpin the whole change process with sound project management and a governance rhythm to ensure everyone maintains alignment and the focus on driving the results continues.
It says a lot about a person if they can focus on driving highly complex change processes (and stay focused in the midst of them). It tells those above you that you’re smart, that you’re willing to make tough calls when necessary, and that you understand how to turn theory into practice. It is one of the skills that Chiefs possess.
Time to weave it all together. The All Blacks and Football Federation Australia have both created beautiful examples of vision, purpose and strategy all integrated and working brilliantly in the real world.
For more info check out www.chiefmaker.com.au/81
In today’s episode we meet Ronsley Vaz.
Ronsley is a speaker, author and marketer. He is the author of the book AMPLIFY – How to raise your voice, boost your brand and grow your business. His podcast, ‘Bond Appetit’, is Australia’s #1 food podcast on iTunes and receives between eight and twelve thousand listeners a day. Ronsley is also the founder of content marketing agency Amplify, which has grown from zero to twelve staff in just ten months.
Ronsley sits on the board for freetoshine.org, an organisation that prevents sex trafficking. He has an MBA in Psychology and Leadership and a Master's in Software Engineering as well as a Diploma in Financial Services. Ronsley’s journey has seen him specialise in a variety of different industries. Before killing it as an entrepreneur, he worked as a DJ, software engineer, financial adviser, restaurateur and chef.
His newest venture, Amplify, is all about converting audio into a content-marketing echo chamber. He and his team help clients create content and turn it into genuine assets that allow their businesses to grow.
We cover:
- The labels we carry and boxes we put ourselves in that stop us growing
- How to find your inner voice and execute
- The future of the audio world
- Knowing your impact on your team maintain empathy
- Dropping entitlement syndrome
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/80
Last minisode we spoke about Vision which is the what you’re going to achieve. The destination. Purpose is all about your why, your spirit, serving the greater good.
Simon Sinek, author of “Start with Why” says, “People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.”
And that goes for people buying your products and people buying into your business or team plans.
If you don’t put purpose at the heart of what you do you’ll never know what it’s like to have someone in your team go the extra mile for the team.
You can find our more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/79
How Does purpose give us energy and make us kick out of bed in the morning?
Purpose unleashes oxytocin, serotonin and dopamine because when we do something significant that is for the benefit of others and the world these so called Happy Chemicals release into the body making us feel great and improve our bodies immune system and flow.
Every time I’ve had a huge week and it gets to Friday and I need to record a minisode I picture someone listening in their car and on the train and that they get just one thing from it that changes their approach and then it ripples. This get my juices flowing...and sparks me with energy.
No purpose and all business leads to a stail existence. One where stress and overwhelm thrive. This is the land of Cortisol a stress hormone that is more like the unhappy drug.
When we live with purpose everyone around us starts to the thrive and feel happy. You see when we see other people doing good things for others it triggers the happy chemicals too. Not only that but when we do it as a team the ripple effect of our work can change the world.
Get your team together and ask:
- How can we make the world a better place because of our work?
- What are all the things we do or can be doing to?
- What are the causes we are passionate about?
- Who can we serve and make their life better?
- Sometimes it can help to flip it on its head and ask yourselves what annoys you? What articles do you read that fire you up?
The next step is then connect this with your Vision. If you can align your Vision and Purpose then mountains can be moved.
Let’s remember the NASA Story, President John F Kennedy set the vision and goals, “We chose to the go to the moon. To send mankind to the moon and bring them safely back to earth again within the decade.”
Then he incorporated the purpose. “We mean to be a part of it--we mean to lead it. For the eyes of the world now look into space, to the moon and to the planets beyond, and we have vowed that we shall not see it governed by a hostile flag of conquest, but by a banner of freedom and peace. We have vowed that we shall not see space filled with weapons of mass destruction, but with instruments of knowledge and understanding.”
Without purpose your life and work will feel heartless, soulless and all business. The running around will not make sense. You’ll constantly feel like your just in the rat-race and search for an out. But put it in your life and it’ll all feel worthwhile. You’ll be more resilient, more focused and just more happy and everyone will see it. They’ll always remember that you had values and character and cared more about the planet and others than yourself and profit.
This is the way of GREAT chiefs.
You can find our more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/79
This week you and I are joined by Siobhan Hayden, the COO and Board Advisor of HashChing a progressive and innovative fintech start-up. HashChing is Australia’s first online marketplace for customers to access verified mortgage brokers.
Siobhan is also a Director of Running for Premature Babies and former CEO of The Mortgage & Finance Association of Australia (MFAA) the peak industry body providing service and representation to more than 12,500 Professional Finance Brokers.
We cover:
- How she rose from bluecollar roots to lead one of the most exciting fin-tech businesses
- What she learnt from becoming a black belt in multiple martial arts forms
- How to stop being a victim and accelerate your career
- How to look at the person in the mirror and like what you see
Full show notes at chiefmaker.com.au/78
Leading HP Teams - Part 1 - Vision www.chiefmaker.com.au/77
Over the next 25 weeks I’m going to share the 25 elements that form the Chief Maker HP Teams - Tx Model. The aim is that every Monday we’ll introduce one element so you can spend the week focusing on improving it even just 5 or 10%. After 25 weeks you should have made real world progress and have a measurably higher performing team.
These 25 elements fall under the 5 pillars of the Chief Maker HP Teams model are: 1. Mission
2. People
3. Culture
4. Tools
5. Execution
A MISSION A clear vision and goals steeped in a bigger purpose with a clear strategy & metrics to align the group PEOPLE We have the right people with the right capability in the right roles CULTURE Our team is united,constantly improving in a challenging and enjoyable environment. TOOLS My people have the systems, processes and hardware to perform their role with excellence EXECUTION We have strong governance of our transformation to keep the clock ticking
To kick things off over the next 5 weeks we’ll focus on your team Mission which has 5 critical elements. 1. Vision (What)
2. Purpose (Why)
3. Strategy & Tactical Plan (How)
4. Values & Identity (Who)
5. Goals (Proof)
CRAFTING YOUR VISION All teams must have a vision. It must be crystal clear. Imagine for a minute you’re building a house and you have some workers turn up. You wouldn’t just say, "we are build a art-deco modern house, now let’s go to it.” No, you’d givem them a detailed set of drawings, with descriptions of fittings and everything so they know exactly what they have to do with their time.
A vision isn’t just a strap line. It should be co-developed into a colourful picture of the future, full of symbols and written stories of where you will be when the vision is achieved. It is proudly shared and hung on the walls throughout the work spaces and anyone can describe what you aim to achieve over the next 2 - 5 years.
It captures your true spirit and aspirations as a team and leaves a legacy that everyone is proud of
Cameron Herold, COO Alliance, NY Times Bestselling Author advocatess developing a Vivid Vision. It’s a detailed, three to four page document that lays out a clear, logical vision of what your company will look like in three years.
When completed, it’s meant to be woven into your company’s or team’s culture, guiding your employees decision making and giving all involved clear goals to strive for.
Usually, creating a Vivid Vision is a very involved process that can take quite some time to get right. For a large business that should be as long as six months to get right for smaller teams with less complex challenges it can be shorter. He offers these tips when developing your vision:
* It’s important not to get caught up in the ‘how’ of things. Instead, dream big and worry about the ‘how’ later
* You’ll need to be free of the day-to-day worries of running your business. You need freedom to visualize your future
* Get out of your office and go somewhere inspiring where you can let your mind wander
* Turn off your computer. No matter how much willpower you have, the temptation of email or web surfing will be a distraction
* Get out of your comfort zone, think out side the box—choose whatever cliché works for you. Just be creative, even outlandish. You’ll be amazed at what you can come up with. It’s a sure fire way to create a fun, dynamic vision you and your team will love to strive for.
Your focus for this week is as step one in building a high performance team is look at your teams vision. - How crystal clear is it? - Is it aspirational enough that is challenges the group to be better? - Has everyone bought into it and is across it? - Does is it align to the wider business?
Your vision becomes a vital filter for all decision-making and strategy development. So give it the time, energy and investment required. All GREAT chiefs spend a lot of time here and get very good at vision development.
In this week’s Chief interview we meet CEO of WTRI, Dr. Lia DiBello.
Lia is a global leader in accelerated learning and business expertise. She leads her team to build cutting edge cognitive science into products that can improve performance in business while at the same time advancing research.
We cover:
- What is accelerated learning
- How can we cut the 10,000 hour rule to 16 hours
- The number one mistake most leaders make in their learning that is costing them
- How anyone can rapidly increase their rate of learning and improve business outcomes
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/76
More about Dr Lia DiBello
Lia is best known for the development of a particular kind of activity-based “strategic rehearsal” approach that has been shown to greatly accelerate learning through cognitive reorganization. Studies of over 7000 people at all levels exposed to DiBello’s methods indicate that learning was accelerated by several months in all cases. Other studies indicate that unprecedented performance improvements and significant competitive advantages were achieved by companies using DiBello’s methods. The method is now used globally in four continents in industries as diverse as mining, transportation, financial services, IT implementation, manufacturing, pharmaceuticals as well as others. Numerous articles and books have been published on its business benefits and theoretical significance in cognitive science.
She is also the innovator behind the FutureView™ Profiler, which has been recognized as a theoretical and methodological breakthrough in knowledge elicitation and executive intelligence.
Since she started directing the research at WTRI, she has been the recipient of 17 basic research funding awards from the National Science Foundation, NASA, and The Russell Sage Foundation.
Today, we will cover 7 vital steps that leaders often get wrong in leading transformation but when they get them right it accelerates change and makes it far less stressful. For full summary go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/75 A very trusted friend of our family is the COO of a national law firm. In the first paragraph of his profile he outlines his expertise in professional services firm leadership. He details how, as COO, he led a company from $3M turnover to over $100M in 8 years. Those are some seriously impressive numbers. They demand attention and they give him immediate credibility when he walks in the room.
Few executives ever rise to the top without leaving behind them a clear record of transformation. CEOs are looking for leaders who can demonstrate how they’ve innovated, led significant change and succeeded without leaving a trail of destruction.
Everything up to this point has been preparing you to make a standout impression when your target CEO is reviewing candidates for an executive position. A track record of transformation makes you pop off the page at the resume stage and gives you the real-world stories of transformation you can describe in interviews—ones you can back up with hard numbers.
A track record of success is the rocket fuel of any upward career trajectory. It builds unrivalled credibility and magnetically attracts exciting new opportunities. It shows you can unite people to a cause and smash politicking and bureaucracy. It does much more than make a jump to the executive team achievable—it makes it inevitable.
But in reality if you’re doing it just for your career you’re in it for the wrong reasons. In the words of Jack London,
““I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot.” —Jack London
All great Chiefs are dissatisfied with the status quo. They want to be one turn ahead of their competitors, so they apply a critical lens to everything, even what is currently working tolerably well. They know that present success guarantees nothing. There’s no such thing as a future-proof strategy. Standing still is the same thing as lying down and waiting to be buried.
Most managers know that they have to lead transformation to make that next big leap in their careers, but making the change happen in the real world is a complex task riddled with pitfalls.
Whole books have been written on Leading and navigating change and the work of John Kotter and others is a solid base that all leaders should know. Today, we will cover 7 vital steps that leaders often get wrong in leading transformation but when they get them right it accelerates change and makes it far less stressful. I’ve been in the trenches and coached teams from losing to making millions. I’ve done it in multiple industries and continents. I’ve seen first hand where it goes wrong...and how the incredible strain on those leading the change. The teams and chiefs I’ve worked with that got it right are some of the most inspiring people I’ve met. It has been truly a privilege to play a support role to their enormous efforts.
The reason I have picked these is because in the trenches of significant change this is where most leaders really struggle or make a critical mistake that costs them victory or delays it for long periods. They are: * Assess the current situation first
* Set a vision and strategy that unites the leadership team the keep checking in
* Be courageous and bold
* Deeply engage stakeholders
* Raise the bar on standards
* Set a clear and right sized tactical plan
* Make it fun and a rich human experience
For full summary go to: www.chiefmaker.com.au/75
Out guest this week is Sara Chamberlain, who along with her sister Amy created Australia’s premier property styling company, The Real Estate Stylist, in under 4 years. The business has grown from effectively a one sofa enterprise to now employing 15 staff with a multi million dollar turnover and a list of discerning property owners and A-listers including Rebecca Judd, Zoe Foster Blake and the Australia’s elite. Launching yet another two businesses under this umbrella since 2013 the group now includes The Artwork Stylist and The Apartment Stylist.
The Real Estate Stylist is considered the property styling experts in Australia regularly called upon for collaborations and comment with Real Estate.com, Domain, and The Collective.
A serial entrepreneur, Sara has being in business for 15 years, launching her first internationally stocked homewares range at just 21. Sara has bought and sold businesses, worked on the world’s largest advertising accounts in London, (including Coke-a-Cola, Cadbury and Pizza Hut) doubled the turnover of a retail store in under 18 months, launched a business coaching seminar series, published a small business strategy guide and trained as an executive coach.
Full details at www.chiefmaker.com.au/74
We cover:
- How the stories we tell us reflect the life we live
- How she built resilience through brutally tough health issues as a child
- The importance of knowing your business and not making your hobby your business
- Knowing your customer and ensuring it is a human to human experience
- Being curious and not knowing it all
- Being a thoroughbred and unemployable
- How she grew her business by knowing the numbers and strategy
Key Quotes and Points by Sara
We are always in our own mind, and what we tell ourselves is what we believe, and what we believe is what we manifest
My entire mindset was driven by my mother's resounding, compelling belief that her daughter was absolutely fine, and I'll pick her up and I'll take her back to Wagga, and she will be 100% normal and she will miss all of year three at primary school, and she'll just pick up and walk into year four again. That's exactly what happened.
I've never ever really wanted to follow the doctor's orders anyway. I'm a complete rebel by definition. Doctor's would say come and see us again in 12 months, and I would just delete their number.
Look, I just don't like playing by the rules. I think you really have to be able to listen to your body, listen to your intuition, listen to your instinct, and then go and show them what you're made of. Do whatever you want to do.
Look, I've always felt like I was in a rush to run the world. That's been like a fire within me for a very long time.
I always set it up with the intention of not needing me to run it, that an investor couple could've just come in and sweep it up no matter what the writing on the wall was around the financial economy.
It's not in my makeup, and you can't do that. I mean I think that comes back to that inner child rebel in me that was like if you told me that I couldn't do something, or I wasn't capable of doing something, then it was like a double dare
I am pretty adamant about the fact that I'm a business person first and a stylist at the moment, second.
"Don't go outside of your area of expertise, and don't make your business your hobby." Sorry, "Don't make your hobby your business." Apologies.
"It would be remiss of us to encourage you in any way, shape or form, to consider a career change or an opportunity if we didn't understand what ... and if you didn't understand what your personal definition of happiness and success looks like, what your goals are, what your risk assessment is, how your family will support you, what skills you can draw upon to bring this into fruition. This is not a game guys. This is your actual life. This is your family, this is your mortgage, this is your children's future and your financial security. This is probably one of the most serious conversations you're going to have. If you think you're here to learn about cushion, you've got another thing coming."
"It's not about starting up, it's about staying up."
From a strategy perspective, I think that any business is really only as good as its data. I think you really need to have an understanding of your numbers and what is your important points. So for us we've spent a long time getting a handle on what the figures look like for us. I'm not talking figures in P&L sense. I'm talking figures in if you pull this lever, how does that impact on our overall ability to deliver a product?
I don't think there's really a bum on seat in any job that doesn't necessarily think that technology could maybe come along in some way, shape or form, and improve how they operate.
We spend too much time comparing ourself to others. So the questions that they need to ask themselves is, who are they and what is it that make them happy in their life already?
The way that you overcome boredom is start setting yourself some goals again. Start looking at some of the things that you actually enjoy. When you're not at work, what are some things that get you interested? Are you listening to podcasts around a particular subject? Is there something in a meeting at work that comes up that makes you think, "I'd like to know a little bit more about that?" Is there somebody in another sector in your business that is doing something that you actually end up talking about in the pub?
I think we become complacent that technology is a tool that will replace the human relationships in the sales space, and by sending something through to somebody and making the assumption that that has been received, read and understood, you're doing yourself a really big disservice.
The only way you're really going to make cut through, is committing yourself to an ongoing personal relationship, and driving a sense of understanding around what that consumer needs. So we say in your team often, "People don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care."
The first time you ask them, "What's in this for you? How can we help you meet your target?" Because everyone else has got somebody else on their back, and every single person has a deadline to meet and a budget to hit and a criteria that they have to do, in order for their performance to be what it needs to be for them within their company structure.
So I say to my team, if somebody can't hit that budget, it's not because they don't want to spend the money, it's because they don't have either the authority or we haven't hit the criteria in that proposal. So you need to understand what that is.
Well, when did we foster a culture where everybody believe that they have to pretend they know everything? What happened to asking the question of, "I don't know?" And if you can sit there in a meeting and you can drop that guard and say, "I actually don't know that. Can you explain that to me? Can you give me some more insight, how does that work? I'm curious about that."
Am I looking forward to coming into work, and am I looking forward to going home?
I think we have to appreciate that what you're doing with your time and how many hours you are committing to your work environment, you really want to be enjoying that. You really want to be able to say that you didn't just go through the motions for 40 years. I think we're moving away from the early days where everyone just had to get a job and they stuck to that job.
I mean my poor father would be an example of that, he hates being a liquidator, but he had graciously done that to support his family in the way that he has. There are opportunities these days to create your own journey, and to ask a lot more questions around what makes you happy in order for you to have some fulfilment at work, because it's going to be important in your overall healthiness and health. I think that's really important.
Life in the chaos of the modern business world can be crushingly difficult. Many of those caught in the machine describe the daily grind as “soul destroying”. They work hard all day, every day on an endless list of tasks at work and home. It might be politics, red tape and antiquated systems frustrating them, or they might just sense that there has to be more to life than this.
Many of them feel like they need to escape, but escape isn’t the answer. They know the solution is a purposeful and impactful career and a life of significance that doesn’t come at the cost of one’s soul.
Many of them see Chiefs who are living this life. They want the same thing, so they strive to be Chiefs themselves (or at least their dream role). They drive for that title which will give them the authority to make big change. The life of a Chief can look glamorous. Not only do they have the powerful roles, they are also honoured guests at the best events, they are connected to powerful and influential people, and they have the power to make wide-ranging changes with the stroke of a pen.
Great Chiefs haven’t just walked into these roles, though. Their lives have been anything but a walk in the park. The best have embraced a tough journey that has pushed their mental toughness and adaptability to their limits. The best have been forged in the fires of hard-won, tough-fought lessons.
And this is what strikes you when you spend time with the great Chiefs: there is a different essence at their core. They aren’t interested in playing political games. Instead, they take a scalpel to bureaucracy and generate profits through purpose. Their ability to get results combines with dignity and humility, which gives them a calming presence. When this presence is united with their vision, well…that is when the magic happens.
It’s so easy to think that Chiefs are smarter, better connected or more engaging than you, but their intelligence and relationships, while undeniably important, are only a part of their success. Chiefs become Chiefs not because they are lucky with intelligence or networks, but because they have taken to heart a powerful philosophy: ownership precedes victory. They own the outcomes of every challenge they face, relationship they enter, and business they lead. Whether the outcome is success or failure, they are accountable. They demand responsibility for it and they will not share the blame with others.
The qualities and habits that make one a Chief are not innate. They are learned. The method I’ll share today is a what I covered in my book which is now an Amazon bestseller in careers. It teaches you how to become a Chief. It contains a blueprint for personal and professional mastery in the corporate world. By following the blueprint, you’ll learn to make a noticeable impact, and this will help you rise above your competition and earn a seat on the executive team. You’ll rise above the politics and overload rampant in the corporate world. You’ll learn how to become a master of yourself and your profession. It isn’t a quick fix, it will take serious hard work and lots of soul searching. But this will make your victory all the sweeter.
The 5-Step Chief Maker GREAT Method drills down on the issues that so many of those in senior management roles are dealing with. These are the issues your peers talk about time and again:
• You have no time. You’re overloaded with commitments at work and home. You don’t feel as though you’re controlling your destiny. • You’re tired of fighting for respect, tired of trying to prove your point. • You don’t feel connected. You don’t have friends in high places. • Your team is predominantly made up of average performers. You and a small handful of strong performers on your team carry the load and fix others’ mistakes. • You can’t escape the bureaucracy and career-killing politics. • You can’t find the time for personal growth. Since you’re not mastering your craft, career growth has stalled. • Your personal and professional lives are out of balance, which is impacting your family and your physical and mental health. • You feel like you’re drifting, as though your career trajectory is entirely out of your hands. • You’re no longer sure if you even want a C-Level role. It looks like it requires more sacrifice than you can afford. Deep down, you’re only half-heartedly committed to becoming a Chief. If any of these issues resonate with you, this framework is for you.
Over the past 15 years I’ve searched the planet for the most powerful, results-driving performance strategies. I’ve coached CEOs of multi-billion dollar listed companies around the globe. I’ve helped sporting legends like Martina Natratilova to coach top tennis players and Super Rugby teams reach peak performance levels. I’ve taught the world’s best coaches how to get the absolute best out of their athletes, and I’ve helped doctors and emergency response teams become better lifesavers.
After a decade of coaching at all levels of business and at the top of elite sport, I was able to distil the most effective peak-performance strategies into a small set of repeatable behaviours. These are the behaviours that separate the career middle managers from the Chiefs. In business, in sport and in life, Chiefs do something different, and these behaviours can be learned. That observation is what drove me to write my book and share a 5 step process that I call the GREAT method to help anyone accelerate their career.
I’ve tested these five steps over more than a decade at the top of business and elite sport, and they get the desired results time and again. Whether it was in the world of business or in sport, whenever an elite performer came to me wanting a competitive edge, these were the five steps we went back to just about every time. This is a system that produces game-changing results:
- Game Plan
- Routine
- Entourage
- Assets
- Track Record www.chiefmaker.com.au/73
In this episode we talk with CEO of SalesITV Dean Mannix on overcoming your limitations to live a bigger life and selling like the best in the world
Full details at www.chiefmaker.com.au/72
ABOUT DEAN
He is the author of Australia’s largest library of video sales and service training and has delivered sales performance projects in over 25 countries. Dean is recognised as one of Australia’s leading sales performance coaches with 30 years of legal, finance, sales and management experience. He advises, coaches and trains senior executives from many of the world’s leading corporations.
He has also been the CEO of a leading property development and childcare management company which he built to a team of 140 employees. He then developed and led a highly successful sales team in the technology space and simultaneously grew his consulting business.
Dean has an Executive MBA from the AGSM and he is also a qualified Yoga teacher.
He is now the CEO of SalesITV.
We cover:
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How we coped with the murder of his father at 15
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How we built a multi-million dollar childcare business and then lost it all by 26
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How we has become the trusted sales coach of the world's biggest companies
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Resilience and living a better life
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The most important steps to sell like the best in the world
Full details at www.chiefmaker.com.au/72
In this episode we talk about :
• why your boss is your #1 customer • What happens when they’re not • How to make them your biggest ambassador
www.chiefmaker.com.au/71
This starts with a simple question:
Who is your customer?
When I asked one of my clients this question, he said, “My team. My job is to make their jobs as easy as possible.”
“Do they approve your salary and bonuses?” I asked.
“Well, no”, he said, hesitating. “My boss approves that.”
“Who is your true customer then?”
The revelation stopped him in his tracks because it runs counter to contemporary management fads to think of your boss as your true customer. We’ve been taught that we should think of our team members as our customers, but this is looking at it the wrong way around. Your team is the vendor. Your boss is your customer.
Turning your thinking around like this will help you see who you need to serve better (i.e., your boss) and who you can expect more from (i.e., your vendors). When we look at our team as though they were our customers (rather than service providers to both you and the company), we accept poor performance from them far too readily. Of course, this doesn’t mean you should stop developing them and providing them with a high-performance work environment, but by serving them instead of your boss as your customers, you are doing yourself (and your career) a disservice.
Start viewing your boss as your customer and you’ll do everything you can to make sure they are a raving fan. This is what will move you to the top of the list when you are being considered for promotion.
In a career sense, it pays to start approaching your boss as though they were your customer for three main reasons:
• You’ll grow with them. In other words, if they’re successful in their role and future roles, not only are they going demand more of you, but when they get a promotion they’re going to lift you up the corporate ladder with them. • The better you make your boss look, the more likely it is that those in the position to promote you will want to see you in positions that can make them look good. • A happy boss can make the daily grind feel downright pleasant. • If you’re effectively serving your boss and effectively serving the company in perfect alignment
Let’s be honest, if your customer isn’t happy, how much of an impact are you going to have? If your customer isn’t happy, how happy can you possibly be?
One my clients, Rob, was having credibility issues with his boss, the COO. “She is difficult to connect with”, he told me one day. “I never know where I stand. I just don’t think she sees the value in me.”
The deeper truth that Rob was missing was that he was solving the wrong problems. He was focused on his problems which he thought the COO should be focusing on rather than listening and gaining deeper understanding of what the COO felt the biggest problems in the business were.
The moment he started to look at the COO as though she were his customer, his whole approach to messaging changed. He wrote a detailed profile on the COO. What were her real problems? What was keeping her up at night? What were the CEO, shareholders and the market demanding of her?
Rob worked out that the three biggest pain points for the COO were safety, unstable operations, and difficulty in keeping other team members on track. The last of these was a major issue. Team members were constantly drifting off into non-mission critical activities and not working together.
Rob immediately started framing his messages around solving these problems. Whereas before he would say,
“We’re implementing a new governance system for our projects to ensure they are kept to scope, time and budget and our new operational standards are being rolled out”,
now he would say,
“Our new operational standards are being implemented with a focus on their relationship to safety and stabilising production. We have initiated a fortnightly managers meeting to keep everyone focused on the most valuable work. We have also announced that we are pausing or cancelling several non-critical projects.”
Rob’s work focus changed only marginally, but by turning his messaging on its head, he was demonstrating to his customer that he understood her problems.
At an executive team meeting less than three weeks later, the COO told Rob (and everybody else in the room) that he was doing a brilliant job and that there were other opportunities they were going to send his way. This was a big change for Rob. He was definitely not being positioned like this previously.
Best of all, by solving his boss’s problems, Rob solved the company’s problems at an even higher level. The COO and the executive team had their own set of daily challenges, and by addressing one of them, Rob’s changes had company-wide impact.
By thinking about the role above his, Rob was able to connect with her boss and solve his problems, and as these positive effects rippled outward, word quickly spread among the executive team. Rob had developed a reputation as a leader worth considering for promotion.
The most effective way to do this is to develop an in-depth understanding of the problems that your boss faces daily.
• What are their biggest day-to-day issues at work and home? • What are their biggest fears about their work and career? • What are the consequences if they don't get the results they're after? • What do you need to change to really get on track in serving them?
The more clarity you have in terms of your customers’ wants and needs, the more likely it will become that you’ll be able to address these issues. They key elements of this customer profile are as follow:
You don’t need to be a psychic to get accurate answers to these questions. You just need to talk to your customer. Buy them lunch, take them for a drink after work, or take them for a coffee early in the day. The more you know about them, the more likely it is that you’ll be able to get inside their head (and this is where you have to be if you are going to make the most of this exercise). Ask them about their work, and listen carefully to their answers. What is the subtext of what they’re saying? Pay particularly close attention to complaints or other signs of frustration.
If your first profile doesn’t work, you might have missed a core customer problem, or you might not be making it obvious to them that you are solving or have solved their problem. Like we learned from Rob, a change in messaging can have powerful knock on effects.
The final step here is that once you know what your boss’ biggest challenges are then go the extra mile and exceed their expectations. I mean make them your biggest ambassador. This doesn’t mean being a suck-up. No one likes that. It is easy to see. Just do such an incredibly good job they can’t help but be impressed by you.
Recently I helped two leaders land their first ever executive team roles. They both came to me with similar problems...they weren't in the hunt for the role. But we turned the tide around by immediately getting inside identifying the key members of the interview panel and then getting inside their heads. We did a detailed profile on the CEO and looked at the way they could pitch for the role. And now they are both in the C-Suite. Huge moves. Talk about fist pumping moments for them.
The most beautiful thing i’ve found about this process is that it shifts your whole emotional experience from back foot to front foot. It goes from negative to positive. Now you’re focused on delivering, being great and you get your head in the game. That’ll flow with a better vitality and energy in your work.
I know that this shift has been huge game changer for countless people I’ve coached.
In this episode we talk with Know How Group Founder and CEO Bushy Martin on success, playing the long game and living like every day will be your last.
Full details at www.chiefmaker.com.au/70
SPONSOR:
This episode is brought to you by The Build a Better Agency Podcast with Drew McLellan. The podcast has a new episode every week that helps small to mid-sized agency owners and leaders ensure that their agency is future proofed, scalable and more profitable than ever before. Search Build a Better Agency podcast on your podcast player or google
ABOUT BUSHY
Bushy is the founder of the Know How Group. His team helps time poor professionals that don't know who to trust or where to start to replace their income through property. But, much more than that, Bushy is the author of Freedom Formula, a killer book I read cover to cover, the host of Get Invested Podcast, and avid property investor, and just an all around top bloke. In this episode we'll talk about his journey from being completely broke to being financially free in 15 years, how he wrestled crocodiles in Papua New Guinea, how he started and built a successful business, and a life full of interesting stories.
QUESTIONS I ASK BUSHY MARTIN:
- Tell us about your time in Papua New Guinea working with crocodile farmers and living wild
- What did you learn about yourself when your marriage broke up and your father died?
- What is the freedom formula?
- How can people build additional wealth without investing or creating new revenue streams?
CONNECT WITH BUSHY MARTIN:
www.khgroup.com.au
Call Bushy and his on on +61-8-8383-6990
Email bushy@khgroup.com.au
Listen to the Get Invested Podcast here.
Buy Bushy’s book here.
Connect with the KH Group
In this episode we talk about how to create clarity everyday and how that will help you with confidence, beating imposter syndrome and making smart decisions.
www.chiefmaker.com.au/69 The speed and complexity of the modern world is not a natural environment for our brains. It can too easily lead to overwhelm and feeling like you’re a little lost at sea. Our brains are designed for singular focus and by pouring a constant stream of emails, social media, news onto our normal busy lives it is a recipe for confusion and a scattergun approach to our work. We simply lose focus. There are three important methods for creating clarity in your life and career. Having this clarity in your mind is comforting. Is helps keep you composed and when key decisions or events come along your response is more effective and inspiring. The three methods are: 1. Diagnostics
The world is full of diagnostics that help people and teams analyse complex systems. The medical profession, personality models, culture surveys and manufacturing plant diagnostics help us rise above the detail and see how things are performing in relation to each other and a benchmark. It’s the higher level view this creates which is so important. It helps us understand, have clarity and know what to do next. In every coaching engagement I enter into we start with a diagnostic be it a High Performance Team survey, 360 feedback or Chief Maker Scorecard. All these provide immediate information to help with a better coaching outcome and rapidly reduces the time to understand a situation. It also gives everyone something to talk too, get on the same page and benchmark performance so you can see how the action you take improves the overall outcome. 2. Frameworks and Mental Models
The second key elements are the analytical frameworks or mental models you use to understand and respond to the world. When tricky or complex scenarios at work arise having these frameworks at your disposal allows you to quickly and effectively respond using a proven pathway. They foster calm and ask people to consider all the angles of a given issue or initiative. This might be simple models like SWOT or a PESTLE analysis or more details approach like a full Project Management Lifecycle or Six Sigma Analysis. The more of these you have stored away in your mental arsenal the better you are able to respond in the real world. Of course, as you rise up the corporate ladder the types of models you need to apply shift more towards strategy development, vision, values, culture change models, coaching models and financial analysis. The whole game shifts from the technical models that you used early in your career. So you need to re-educate yourself to thrive at the higher levels. 3. Mindmaps & Systems Diagrams
The final tool I use religiously are mindmaps and system diagrams. In the words of business guru Edwards Deming, “If you can’t describe what you’re doing as a process, you don’t know what you’re doing.” Mindmaps, process maps and more detailed system diagrams allow you to accurately represent a complex system visually so you can stand back and look at the bottlenecks or pain points. Any personal mindmap, business plan-on-a-page or system diagram will immediately allow everyone to have greater clarity and to focus in on the most important pain points for them and the business as a whole. When these three key methods are combined you’ll grow in comfort in your own ability and that you’re leading a team along the right path. Without these tools you’ll spend valuable time and energy guessing your next move and that can cost you confidence and bring imposter syndrome back to the table. Stay epic Greg
In this episode, we explore the three powerful techniques to recenter the soul and mind. It is also part 2 of how to overcome imposter syndrome which we discussed in Ep 65 Imposter Syndrome. Full notes here: www.chiefmaker.com.au/67 The soul can easily get lost as sea in the modern business world. With the incredible pace of business and life it is easy to lose connection to yourself. When you lose this it rattles your confidence and belief that you should be in the position you’re in. So it plays a key role in beating imposter syndrome. It is also vital to get right if you want to feel composed, present and have that sense of gravitas so many of us find elusive. There are three major ways to recenter the soul and mind: 1. Regular Focus Session
Once or twice per week set aside an hour and give yourself the opportunity to deeply reconnect to your soul, purpose, vision and strategy. This is best done in a few key steps: 1. 20 mins of meditating and calming the mind 2. 20 mins of reviewing your purpose, vision and strategy 3. 20 mins of planning and rehearsing for the week ahead
This is much like a ship’s Captain who regulularly takes their bearings, heads down to their quarters and plots their progress. They take time to take stock, review the impact of the weather, tides and performance of their crew. At the end of this session, you’re seeking absolutely clarity on the week ahead and also a sense that you’re reconnected to your purpose and soul. 2. Mini Resets
Throughout the day when things get really busy use these three powerful and simle tools to reset the mind. 1. Rhythm
Using the speed of your footsteps, slow down and speed up your rhythm as required. Perhaps as you are walking towards a key meeting slow the steps down, demonstrate composure and calmness. 2. Breathing
Going hand-in-hand with rhythm is your rate of breathing. Taking small moments throughout the day to reset your breathing resets the mind and your state. Try a perfectly even breathing rate of 2 seconds in, 1 second pause, 2 seconds out, 1 second pause and repeat just 5 ties. You’ll find that in 30 seconds you’re entire state has shifted. 3. Posture
The final link in this chain is your posture. You’ll find that by adopting a very well grounded and centred posture you’ll experience and associated shift in state. 3. Mindsets and Mantras
Put a few of your favourite quotes and mantras into your back pocket so that you can whip them out when appropriate. Some that I love are: * Slow is smooth, smooth is fast * I keep putting money into the global bank and it keeps paying me back with interest * A problem shared is a problem halved * Start with why
In truth, I have dozens that I use. Would love to hear yours. The key here is to create a regular rhythm. Without the rhythm you lose the fitness and like a captain not checking their bearings will drift right off course far from your destination and purpose.
In this episode we talk with Ausenco CEO Zimi Meka on resilience, honesty and the importance of good people.
Full details at www.chiefmaker.com.au/66
Zimi Meka is one of the founding directors of Ausenco Limited and was appointed as Chief Executive Officer / Managing Director in 1999. Zimi’s background includes senior roles in engineering and operations companies prior to the formation of Ausenco in 1991.
He has over 25 years' experience in the design, construction and operation of a wide range of processing plants and infrastructure in the minerals industry in Australia and internationally. He is the Queensland University of Technology’s 2008 Alumnus of the Year, was awarded the Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy’s 2009 Institute Medal and is one of Australia’s top 100 most influential engineers as awarded by Engineers Australia. He is a Fellow of Engineers Australia, a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy and a Member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
Other career highlights include:
- Listed by Engineers Australia as one of the country’s Top 100 most influential engineers in 2010, 2011, 2014 and 2015
- Awarded Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy’s Institute Medal 2009
- Queensland University of Technology Alumnus of the Year 2008
- Fellow of Engineers Australia
- Fellow of the Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy
- Director, Carube Copper Corp. (May 2018 - )
QUESTIONS I ASK ZIMI MEKA:
- In the early years of Ausenco, how did you develop resilience?
- What was the most important thing that you did as a business early to ensure growth?
- How do you attract good people?
- How do you keep learning?
- How do you lead thoroughbreds?
- What is the most important skill leaders need but don’t tend to develop?
- What advice would you give someone who is stuck in their career?
CONNECT WITH ZIMI:
www.ausenco.com
In this episode, I answer a question from a subscriber. How do I overcome imposter syndrome?
Over the next three minisodes we’ll explore some powerful ways to beat imposter syndrome so you feel comfortable in your own skin and clear in your mind.
Assuming you do have most of the skills necessary for the job the three main causes of imposter syndrome are:
• Unrealistic or incongruent vision of the role • No set process of recentering • Lack of clarity
In Part 1 today we cover:
• Develop a congruent vision of you in the role • Dealing with hidden assumptions
In Episode 67 I’ll cover processes for recentering and in episode 69 we’ll talk about creating clarity.
The single biggest assumption that people make is that the day their role changes is the day their whole mindset and outlook will change. The two aren’t related. To feel like a boss, like a chief, you have to cultivate that feeling. This means you need to be rock solid in your belief in the path you’re on.
I remember the first time I entered a board room for a big meeting with an executive team back when I was a project manager. I was pretty nervous and had put all these people on a pedestal. Over the next few months of reporting to them I realised it was often a facade. Every single person in that room was just trying their best and were far from perfect.
Imposter Syndrome strikes when you’re trying on something that doesn’t fit yet. It doesn’t fit for a few reasons: 1. What you’re trying to be isn’t you. You’re trying to be like a CEO you’ve seen or met. But that is there style. Not yours. It’ll never feel right. You’ll always feel like you’re being someone else. 2. You’ve got unrealistic expectations or beliefs about what it’s like for others in the role For full summary go to www.chiefmaker.com.au/65
Today we joined by founder and CEO of the McLellan Marketing Group, Drew McLellan.
He also owns and runs the Agency Management Institute (AMI), which is a consultancy for small to medium sized agencies that has been helping agency owners grow their agencies since the early 90s.
We talk about:
- What he learnt about understanding people by creating ads
- To grow and get promoted you need to let of the reins
- Being curious
- Joining masterminds
Drew launched his agency’s blog in 2006 and it has been on the AdAge Top 150 from the list’s inception. His first book, 99.3 Random Acts of Marketing, was published in 2003 and Drew and Australian marketer Gavin Heaton created the Age of Conversation series of crowdsourced books in 2007. To date, the AOC series has raised over $50,000 for charity. Drew launched the AMI blog in 2012 and hopes it will be a great resource to agency leaders.
Drew’s often interviewed/quoted in Entrepreneur Magazine, New York Times, CNN, BusinessWeek, and many others. The Wall Street Journal calls him “one of 10 bloggers every entrepreneur should read.”
When he’s not hanging out with agency owners/staff or MMG clients, Drew spends time with his family and pondering why the Dodgers can’t seem to get back to the World Series.
Drew has a Master’s Degree from the University of Minnesota but alas, he cannot remember their fight song.
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/64
In this episode I outline a method of turning risk completely on its head that I developed which gets killer outcomes for everyone involved.
When most of us here the word Risk Management Plan we start thinking red tape, no more freedom and a group of expensive auditors at your door to analyse your business inside out.
If you’ve ever had the risk auditors turn up and trawl through your business telling you all the things you need to write a report on about you’ll stop major events happening you’ll know the meaning of paperwork.
Richard Branson. Never made a deal he could lose on.
“As an adventurer...I try to protect against the downside. I make sure I have covered as many eventualities as I can. In the end, you have to take calculated risks; otherwise you're going to sit in mothballs all day and do nothing.”
Throughout my business life I have always tried to keep on top of costs and protect the downside risk as much possible. The Virgin Group has survived only because we have always kept tight control of our cash. But, likewise, I also know that sometimes it is essential to break these rules and spend lavishly.
Richard Branson
Don’t get me wrong, there is always a time and place for risk management plans. But they have a serious problem. Ask yourself a questions, when was the last time you got out your Risk Management Plan and assessed every aspect in detail?
The major problem with risk management plans is that they don’t get big buy-in.
In a business sense risk has a bad wrap. It defensive and often negative. And here is the MAJOR reason why.
It is all about stopping things happening. Stopping sucks the energy out of a room. It’s not motivating. It doesn’t draw people up to their best performance.
What I do with clients is flip it on it’s head.
How does risk assessment traditionally work:
Risk is generally assessed against the impact and likelihood of bad event happening. It is at this point that it gets put into a matrix, given a code and then managed through a risk management plan.
This is where the psychology of high performance disagrees with this approach. The process loses focus on the outcome. Instead it sends people into the minute details of defence rather than that key steps to a positive and bigger outcome.
To spin it on it’s head what we do is put a new event up. E.g.
- Zero Safety Incidents
- Successful $100M Business Deal Announced to Market
- Perfect Implementation of new business system
At this point we plot, the outcome on the traditional risk matrix. I.e. What is the current likelihood of the outcome happening and what is the size of the impact?
Now we optimise the hell out of it. Drive it up by increasing the likelihood and increasing the impact. What you’ll find is that people now are shoring up their plans with positive actions that are energising. What’s more you’ll note that the likelihood of failure also plummets.
What this means is you start to take calculated risks and have done everything you can to increase the likelihood of success.
YOUR PROCESS OF OPTIMISING RISK
- Define the outcome
- Plot it on a matrix with the likelihood of success and positive impact on the business
- Record all your assumptions
- Partnerships
- Resourcing
- Budget
- Relationships with key stakeholders
- Plan how you can increase likelihood and impact through:
Chief, what I recommend you do then is flip it back on its head and do the traditional method to give it a different lens. And then return this method.
Stay epic
I’ve put all the show notes on the website at www.chiefmaker.com.au/63
In this episode we hear from Super Rugby Club, the Melbourne Rebels CEO, Baden Stephenson.
Baden's path to CEO has been different to most as he transitions from coaching and operations and finally getting his first CEO role in 2017. He was heavily involved as a GM of rugby in the drama of 2017 when the Melbourne Rebels battled to keep their super rugby licence. At the conclusion of, he was selected to lead the club into the future.
Questions I ask Baden:
- What did you learn from the elite sport side of rugby that has translated to the business and administration side?
- What was the most brutal feedback you ever received that you knew to be true?
- What do people misunderstand about professional sporting clubs?
- What are the major setbacks you’ve had?
- How do you lead high performers?
Key Points from Baden:
On what he learnt from his wife’s battle with cancer:
I think now when I'm dealing with people, I think it has certainly improved my emotional empathy for players and stuff, when they've got family issues, having gone through that experience myself.
On the Rebels almost being cut and what it was like being in the inner sanctum:
It was really tough. There's no way to sugarcoat it. It was highly emotional and highly stressful, and when you also throw in uncertainty ... It's just a character or a feeling that no one likes, and I found that you had from players, the staff to management ... that everyone deals with uncertainty in different ways, but it's not a nice thing to go through. And sometimes uncertainty might last a day or week, but this was odd going for months. I had players in tears in my office. I had wives and kids of players and staff that they're unstable relationships, and you know, do I enrol in school, do I take out a lease, what are we doing? What's the future hold?
On what he learned from elite sport:
I think what I have learned as a player, as a coach, administrator or management, is that it's not always gonna be a straight line, and you've gotta be flexible, and you're just gonna have to deal with the challenges and get back on the horse, and sometimes you get bucked off real hard, and ... in a position that I'm in, if I don't show resilience, I can't expect everyone else to show resilience
That was something that I really learned and liked about Sydney University ... that it didn't matter what year it was or who was in the team or how the club was going ... but the expectations were very clear and high.
What he learnt from mentors:
when there was issues, he addressed them really quickly. He didn't let them manifest ... He dealt with them, and he did it in a personal way.
On mindsets:
Your emotions are contagious, and it's important that ... if people are up, often people will follow, and likewise if they're down, and I think that we had just gone through such a long period of sort of dark clouds hanging over the club that you almost forget ... And I would've been as guilty as anyone ... you almost forget that you're in a privileged position. You're working in sport. You've got a huge opportunity, and you're around like-minded people, so ...
I think that understanding your mindset and what sort of attitude you bring into the workplace every day is something that, I think we're all working on.
On the importance of making people feel valued:
make sure that people feel valued in your organisation, and I think that, as we talked about before, sporting organisations can be quite brutal, but I think if you're going to get the best of them ... if people feel valued, they'll go over and above for you, and be passionate and be really driven ... if they're feeling valued
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/62
In this episode we explore the incredible power of ritual and tradition in building your tribe and I share 3 magic traditions that will boost any team spirit and most importantly the role of the chief in leading them. Traditions and rituals in a business sense are the stories, language, gatherings, symbols that give a team deeper meaning and a sense of belonging. They reinforce what you stand for, what you believe in, what you have in common and that you share something. Tradition comes from an inner space that is seeking meaning, deep human connection and understanding. All of us long for traditions, they nourish our spirits and when at their best, they ennoble us and those around us. When work feels soulless, like it crushing your spirit, people are sacrificing, people aren’t committed to the team or their work. Won’t go the extra mile for each. Bicker and fight. Good people are leaving and average people are staying. Then there is a good chance you haven’t got the right rituals and traditions.
In a classic sense think anthems before a big sporting fixture, the All Blacks haka and traditional Australian response of uniting arm and arm and accepting the challenge, think huddles, think catchphrases, stories being told and annual trips, awards and celebrations. These all have an inordinate effect on culture and spirit of a group whatever the size. Team spirit flourishes with positive rituals and traditions and is toxic when they’re lacking or negative. In the words of The Inner Chief’s spiritual mentor, Damien Price: “They express - beyond words, our common bonds, our core values, our reason for wanting to belong and our shared purpose. So often the best traditions are small and simple but speak straight to the heart of the matter.” See more at Chiefmaker.com.au/61
In this episodes we hear from CEO and authority guru Steve Brossman on Making on Sales Easy and and Being and Enterprise of One.
Steve is a former National Professional Track Champion and is the Author of two Amazon No.1 Best Sellers ‘Stand Up, Stand Out or Stand Aside’ and ‘The Authority Client Attraction System”.
He has created several 6 and 7 figure businesses of his own, including inventing and marketing an environmental product selling 4 million units into 26 Countries.
With over 20 years TV and video experience including hosting and producing his own TV Show on Ch 9 and appearing on TV in 5 Continents he is one of Australia’s most experienced Video presenter trainers.
Steve has spoken in 15 countries and trained over 32,000 Speakers, Coaches and Business Owners to Stand out in their market.
Recognised as real influencers Pam and Steve were invited to a high-level mastermind with Richard Branson on his own Necker Island.
With a desire to help professionals overcome their fear of selling Steve has created the Blueprint Conversion System. This breakthrough program is changing the way professionals market and sell their services.
Questions I ask Steve:
Why do people fear sales so much?
How do people build authority within their organisation or as a small business?
What is it like working Sir Richard Branson on Necker Island?
What is the difference between an expert and someone with authority
What is the biggest mistake people make in sales?
What separates the top 1% of sales people from every other person?
Key Points from Steve:
- One of my mentors once said, "You're not in the job of your profession, your profession is marketing what you do."
- An expert knows something, an authority is known for something.Now in corporate world, you could be an authority within the corporate world. What most people don't do is go and look at what their strengths are. Not only what their strengths are, but what that means to other people. I do work in the corporate world, and with individuals as well. I try and teach them to be their own what I call a personal enterprise. That they've got to run their own business within the corporate. They've got to be seen as a leader and authority to stand out in that business. That person is the go-to person for something.
- Work out what is your own uniqueness, what you want to be known for. What are the outcomes that you deliver for the people in your own organisation, or for your clients and customers, if you're a business owner.
- I love bringing sporting analogies, and you'll appreciate this one, is that once they're known for that, and they're delivering and exceeding the delivery, exceeding the values that they're providing for other people, they need to do it in two ways. They need to do it in their playing field, and that's with and for people that they're interacting on a daily basis. That's providing great service, and it's other people seeing that they're providing great service. So that's down on the playing field, but what they also should be looking at is the perception from the stands. The people that may or may not be interacting, but potentially are going to be responsible for, or actually reporting to those responsible for that person getting a promotion, or getting up the corporate ladder.
- That's the thing, it's not the fear of selling. If you're selling yourself, if you're a professional, it's the fear of personal rejection.
- The philosophy is sell the system, not yourself. When you take it away from selling yourself, and I get them to pictorialize their system in a way that it is a graphic blueprint. Because we absorb images, verbal is linear.
- "This is the system. This is my blueprint for success for you." Then they start saying, "Well, this is the different ways that we could help. This is the different value that we could have." They're collecting value as they're going along, and at the end of it, the perceived value was greater than the investment. Does it make sense we implement this sooner rather than later? So it's a collaboration, people like collaborating. As you're going through, you're collaborating, you're working with that person. They're coming in with some ideas, so you're co-creating a solution. By the time you get to end of it, they've co-created the solution, so the objections are not there.
- My definition of sales, and I heard it from a mentor many, many years ago, was professionally servicing other people's needs for a mutually beneficial gain.
- The people that just jump in, and just solve a need, are going to be just solving those needs. They're just order takers, and they're going to make much less sales. So the real good salesmen, elite salespeople, really understand more than just what the problem is. What is that problem causing? What are the emotional effects that that problem is going to cause? How can we solve all of those? They're the elite sales people. They take the time to understand more than just what they need to sell.
- The purpose is to take the viewer or the prospect along an emotional journey, where in the end, in their mind, they're making a logical decision to do whatever the next step is. If you've done it right, you've given them enough emotion. You've taken them on that emotional journey, but you still have enough facts in there, that in their mind they're making a logical decision. "I've got to do that. I've just got to have that," and that's what it's all about.
- I love LinkedIn, so they can connect with me directly on LinkedIn. I make it very hard for people to find me on the web. It's stevebrossman.com. If they do actually want to email me personally, I do respond personally. It's even harder, steve@stevebrossman.com.
- One of the biggest things that most people don't know is the way Richard actually operates. He works in two hour shifts, and the way he works is he just gets paid to think. You access his brain, he has got two assistants beside him. They'll ask a question or outline something, and he will answer and go into that. They'll start reporting that while the other person asks a question, and he just gets paid to think. The other thing that's interesting about him, it's almost embarrassing. When he's talking to you, and particularly when you're just sitting there having breakfast one-on-one, you feel embarrassed, because you feel as if he's trying to pick your brain. You feel as if he's trying to learn from you, and he remembers. That's the big thing, is you learn to be present. That's why he is very successful. He is present, he listens, but all he does is he gets paid to think, not do.
In this episode we talk about executing your Life Vision as part 2. If you haven’t listened to Episode 57 of building your Life Vision I’d recommend doing that first.
There is an old saying, “Vision without execution is just a dream”.
And, chief, I’ve got a confession so make this was me. I was a dreamer with all sorts of grand ideas about who or what I’d become. I always had new ideas and goals that all seemed to flow from my creative mind.
I was the line from poem “George Gray” by Edgar Lee Masters that I read in Ep 57 on building your life vision...“a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.” I was stuck in my own sheltered harbour. Not willing to do the hard work break the boundaries, to look inside myself at the things I liked about myself the least or the limiting beliefs I held and grow beyond them.
It was only when I realised that all greatness requires challenge. It will requires a thousand steps one after the other to change my game. One must have a vision and one must execute. I’ve seen too many people with only one part of the pie.
In Life Vision Part 1 we did some dreaming and created your life vision. Now we focus on execution. We take specific planned action towards our goals.
In this week’s episode we meet Katrina McCarter the Founder and CEO of Marketing to Mums. She is a Marketing Strategist, Best-selling Author, Speaker and Advisor, who specialises in helping businesses sell more to world’s most powerful consumer, Mums.
An award-winning businesswoman and mother of three, Katrina founded an award winning online shopping website for mums called Bubbler.com.au which she grew to a community of 150,000.
Katrina is the author of bestselling business book, Marketing to Mums, and is a regular contributor to business media.
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/58
QUESTIONS I ASK KATRINA
- What is the biggest mistake organisations make in marketing to mums?
- What are the steps people should follow if they’re thinking about starting out on their own?
- How can people be more influential through their own work in large organisations?
- What is an intrapreneur and how can professionals be one?
- How have you planned the future of your life?
- How can people build more confidence in their work and in the early stages of starting their own business?
- What kind of structures should they put in place to be more effective?
In this episode we build your own Life & Career Vision.
"George Gray"
I have studied many times
The marble which was chiseled for me--
A boat with a furled sail at rest in a harbor.
In truth it pictures not my destination
But my life.
For love was offered me and I shrank from its disillusionment;
Sorrow knocked at my door, but I was afraid;
Ambition called to me, but I dreaded the chances.
Yet all the while I hungered for meaning in my life.
And now I know that we must lift the sail
And catch the winds of destiny
Wherever they drive the boat.
To put meaning in one's life may end in madness,
But life without meaning is the torture
Of restlessness and vague desire--
It is a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.
- Edgar Lee Masters, 1868 - 1950
To leave the harbour chief we must start with a destination. One that inspires us and drives us to personal greatness. In this episode we will talk through creating your own Life Vision. The very first time I did a vision board was in 2007. It was a transformative period of my life and I was reading self-help books by the dozen. They ALL said you need a vision. Without it you simply don’t know what direction you’re going. They said it’s like when you decide you want to go away for a weekend and what you do first is imagine what the perfect weekend would be like you create a vision in your head. Then you go about finding the right region, accommodation and activities that’ll help you achieve your vision. It all starts with vision. Without the vision you don’t even leave your home in the first place.
In this week’s episode we meet Mastery of Money Guru Adam Carroll.
Adam is an internationally recognized financial literacy expert, author and speaker. He is a two-time TED talk speaker, with one of his talks surpassing 2 million views. Adam is the founder and curator of www.MasteryOfMoney.com, and creator of the documentary film, Broke Busted & Disgusted.
His passion is helping people build a bigger life, not a bigger lifestyle.
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/56
QUESTIONS I ASK ADAM
What did you learn from your $10,000 experiment on your kids?
How do we cultivate Owners Mentality in ourselves and our people?
What is the biggest mindset shift you think we as individuals need to make?
What do you mean by building a bigger life not a bigger lifestyle?
KEY POINTS BY ADAM CARROLL
- I think the biggest mistake is we wait. We wait for other people to recognise our greatness instead of claiming our greatness and helping other people see it.
- I've always in my life held high intention but low attachment. I have really high intention that things are going to happen, but I'm not directly attached to the outcome always.
- A good friend of mine one time told me he said when something is placed on your heart, that idea that burning desire, that thing that you absolutely must go do, your head will attempt to justify. It will say no Greg you can't do that, you’re not old enough, wise enough, rich enough, famous enough, et cetera. But your heart will never justify. Your heart will always want what the heart wants because that’s what God put in your heart for you to go do or the universe or whatever being you believe in. So, if there's something on your heart that continues to come up pursue it, go after it, it’s there for a reason and that is your service freedom. If you have re-orient your life to go do it by all means go do it.
- You said in chief maker be bold and make a difference. Bold is not just offering help but it’s asking for help. Because when we don’t ask for help we deny someone the ability to offer help or to give help
- See yourself as the architect of your own life
- If you’re going to build a big life, you have to ask yourself really big questions. The questions that people would ask themselves were around, I don’t know how to do this but if I did, what would I do first? Or they would say, I really want to live a vacation lifestyle, what would I need to do to live a vacation lifestyle? Then they let those questions simmer in their subconscious. You know as well as I do that your subconscious mind is the most powerful super computer ever designed. Its goal is to answer the question that are posed to it.
- There are three things required for shared ownership and I think that’s what you’re talking about is shared ownership. Not just one person owns it but everybody owns it, right. The three things required for shared ownership are information, so telling people all the information necessary to be informed of decisions that are being made. So information, decision making, meaning how many people are involved in the decision of do we do this, do we not, do we spend this money do we not, do we invest this do we not. The last thing is consequences. If there is information and there's decision making and there are consequences understood then we have shared ownership.
- Zig Ziglar says, money is not everything, it’s not the most important thing, but it certainly ranks right up there with Oxygen on the got to have it scale
- We will say and I have heard parents say I love my kids, I don’t want them to struggle. So as a result I take care of everything for them, I buy them what they need, I pay for their meals. When we go to the store and they want a toy I pay for it. So, what we started doing was saying I love my kids and I want them to struggle. Because people who struggle financially especially when they’re young and they make solid decisions with small amounts of money they become really successful adults who make solid decisions around large amounts of money. So that’s the goal is we try and give our kids the ability to make mistakes around money at a very early age so we can correct and change their behaviour down the road.
- The way I define love, I will greet each day with love in my heart. The whole idea was that love is the greatest weapon and the greatest shield because no one that I encounter when I use love can defend against it differently than lifestyle, is life for me is about financial freedom, it’s about time freedom, it’s about relationship freedom and it’s about service freedom, those four things, money, time, relationships and service. If I have the freedom to do all those four things I have a real big life.
- Behaviour is multi causal, it’s multi functional and it’s multi dimensional. So, we don’t know why people behave the way they behave, nor can we assume to know because there are so many different things that can impact behaviour.
In this episode we build your own Life Scoreboard.
Like most successful professionals, you probably started your career with clear ideas about what you wanted to do and who you wanted to become. Then, as time progressed, you got caught up in the corporate life. Before you knew it, you were running from one meeting to the next, and what you expected of yourself started to come second to what others expected of you. Add to the equation the responsibilities that come with a family and a mortgage and it’s easy to see why so many of us fall into this trap. We look forward to time away from work, but the four weeks of leave most of us take a year don’t ever seem enough.
It just doesn’t feel like living.
Years fly by, seemingly at the speed of light, and no matter how hard you try you can’t seem to slow it down. You may even have started to feel a little lost, disconnected from our soul, and of control as the year has progressed you don’t feel as comfortable in your own skin. You’re not coming from a place of personal strength and centredness. And worst of all you know you’re not reaching your potential in any area of your life.
One of the many great lessons I’ve learnt from elite sport is their infatuation with analysis and then how they present data as useful information to athletes and coaches. One particular scoreboard really resonated with me. This was the elite athlete scoreboard at the QLD Reds for their academy players. Every player had a set of measures they needed to reach in every part of their game. It was the technical, tactical, mental, physical, social elements of their development. They had benchmarks they had to achieve every year and this was updated regularly in red, amber, green when a particular element was out of sync. Essentially they could identify when players were out of balance and how that was affecting other parts of their game. They wanted well-rounded and growing young men and women in their programs.
This gave them a baseline for taking intentional action to stay in balance. As Michael E Gerber said:
"The difference between great people and everyone else is that great people create their lives actively, while everyone else is created by their lives, passively waiting to see where life takes them next. The difference between the two is the difference between living fully and just existing." —Michael E. Gerber
About 10 years ago I developed my first vision board for my life and then I added to it a Life Scoreboard. This Life Scoreboard is a pictorial representation of how I’m performing in all the most important elements of my life. Things like my relationship with my wife and kids, wider family, best friends, my career and legacy, finances, health, mastery, travel, spirit and dreams.
I use this scoreboard religiously. It gives me immediate insight into how I can improve an element or two to improve my overall life. And whenever I’m feeling down, out of whack I return to this. It normally takes about 5 mins and I’m back on track at least with some actions to take.
The thing is we’ve all met the guy or gal that is all about their fitness. They spend all their time thinking that the fitter they get the happier they’ll be while so many other elements are suffering. The same of the social butterfly who has a fear of missing out syndrome out of control but as a result never re-centres, loses their fitness or the spiritual guru who spends all their time in meditation but becomes disconnected from the world. In the end, your Life Scoreboard is about YOUR journey and what is RIGHT FOR YOU. No one else’s scoreboard is yours. We are all so beautifully unique. So treat it as a process of reconnection to WHO YOU TRULY ARE.
I want to talk you through a Four Step Process now for you to develop your own Life Scoreboard:
- Define each of categories
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- The elements of your scoreboard are totally up to you. We’ve provided an example but you need to work out what is most important to you.
- On each element give yourself a gut-feel score out of 10
- Score yourself out of 10
- On any item that you scored lower than 7 define anything you can do in the next 48 hours to boost that score
- Pick low hanging fruit
- Identify ways you can boost scores by combining pursuits and any other longer activities to get your score higher
- Kill two birds with one stone
Remember, this is about YOU. Think deeply as to why you’re giving certain scores. What is the root cause? How can you bring your greatest self to the table.
The Life Scoreboard is a vital tool in becoming the CHIEF of your Career and Life. Use it wisely, use it often and I guarantee you’ll find yourself coming from a play of personal centredness and power. Then and only then are you a true CHIEF.
For a detailed example and steps I’ve created a page with all those resources at www.chiefmaker.com.au/55.
In this episode we meet Alex Mandossian.
Alex has helped his clients generate over $203 million in sales from TV spots, infomercials, national retail catalogs, direct mail, web marketing and postcards.
Here is what Mark Victor Hansen, public speaker and best-selling author of Chicken Soup For The Soul and One Minute Millionaire series, has to say about Alex: “The first time I watched and heard Alex Mandossian give a marketing presentation, my pen ran out of ink because I took so many notes! Alex’s greatest gift is the way he uses the power of stories to make his marketing strategies stick in your mind.”
He has coached George Foreman, Larry King, Russell Brunson, Jay Abraham, Brian Tracy, Jack Canfield, Brendon Buchard, Alexandria Brown, Barbara DeAngelis to name a few.
He is the also the subject of many books on marketing and selling, the author of Alexisms, host of the iTunes top podcast All Selling Aside and just an all round good bloke.
In this episode I countdown the top 5 lessons from the first year. When I chat to listeners they all tell me they’ve got a favourite guest from the show and every chief has been mentioned. It just goes to show that there is NO single way to be a chief. In putting this list together I studied the transcripts of 28 episodes and found the most common themes and I’ve included one quote from each of our chiefs and gurus. Righto Chiefs counting down from 5 to 1 here are the Top 5 lessons from the last year. Go to www.chiefmaker.com.au/53 for full summary.
This week’s episode welcomes Jame Whittaker. James has interviewed more than 100 of the world’s most revered business leaders, cultural icons and athletes to unlock their secrets to success. People like Oprah Winfrey, Lewis Howes, Bob Proctor, Barbara Corcoran...in all 100 legends of our time.
Today, the bestselling author, speaker, entrepreneur and film producer draws on his unique experience to give people the tools to take ownership of their financial, physical and mental health.
His book and new movie are “Think & Grow Rich: the Legacy”.
More at www.chiefmaker.com.au/52
In this episode we dive deep into Meticulous Preparation.
Most of you have heard me wax lyrical about systemising high performance by using a High Performance Lifecycle like Prepare, Perform, Recover, Review. This is a powerful model and really comes to live when every step is respected and completed like a pro.
10 years ago I went off the grid and spent 3 months living in the remove mountains of China with the Shaolin Kung Fu Monks.
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/51
In this episode we here from Mitch Matthews, keynote speaker, success coach, and best selling author.
He speaks to student, corporate, non-profit, and association audiences around the world on the power of dream, think, do.
In 2006, Mitch started the big dream gathering. Originally it was supposed to be something his friends and family could do for a few hours to get clear on their dreams. But this simple concept became a movement that hasn't stopped since. Thousands of dreams have been launched as a result.
He's become a world-respected thought leader on coaching and workplace mentoring, plus he's created a coach training programme that has been utilised around the globe.
Presence and gravitas. Such a holy grail. When I think of people that have truly had presence they are have such charisma, they’re enigmatic...there is something in the ether, their spirit seems different to everyone else...like it expands to fill the room.
People that master true presence are magnetic and in demand...others line up to spend time with them and their cut-through to find key insights and get the job done is revered by those around around them.
In this episode, I’ll share 3 common pitfalls and 5 challenging steps to mastering true executive presence.
In this episode we hear from Keith Wootton, founder and CEO of AV1.
Keith tells his remarkable story from growing up in Ireland, moving to Australia and how he almost accidentally became the CEO of a business that produces over 1,000 events per year.
We talk about how he finds inspiration from unusual and different fields and how he crafts the culture that attracts the best people to his team.
It’s time for a heart to heart. Chief to chief. About YOUR FEARS.
Fears can be big. They can be small. But they are insidious. Subtle creatures that sabotage our success. And they will eat away at your performance. And while they are powerful motivators, as Yoda so eloquently put it, “fear leads to the darkside”.
Do not be sweet-talked by the power of fear. It only breeds negative attitudes and behaviours and they stop us becoming our greatest selves.
In this episode we talk about the vital skill of written communications. Leaders spend from 2 to 6 hours per day writing and yet very few have had any formal training in writing skills outside of university. Most top executives receive 100 - 300 emails per day so if you want your message to get through you'd better have a system and a method for getting cut through.
The way to get cut-through is simpler than most expect a clear structure, simplified message and know your audience! We've all heard that before...so why don't we do it? Perhaps its because we love to prove how smart we are though our writing? Well research now shows that this actually has the opposite effect. Complex messages decrease trust.
To explain this in more detail I've invited Paul Jones to share his wisdom and strategies. He is the co-founder of corporate training company, Magneto Communications, and business-writing software, Credosity. He's a corporate communications expert hell-bent on helping business people communicate clearly.
In this episode I cover a strategy for assessing and building your own powerful senior executive network both inside and outside your current business.
In the busy-ness of modern corporate life it can be so easy to let yourself get isolated from not only external trusted advisors but also high quality senior executives within your own organisation. The truth is most of us underestimate just how powerful an ambassador in your corner can be for pushing through key projects, cutting through red-tape and attracting new career opportunities. At the same time we discount the power of detractors that end up closing doors and resisting everything we do.
Here is a simple strategy to define your networks current state so you can take precise action:
- Draw a map of your current network internally
- Rate them as Critical, Important or Neutral for your projects and career
- Rate their level of support for you as an Ambassador, Neutral or Detractor (and colour code them Green for Ambassador, Amber for Neutral, Red for Detractor)
- Take action on the most important people
- Repeat the process for your external network
[SECRET TIP: Put on the executives that don’t currently have a relationship but you should or would like to have a relationship with]
Now that you have a heat-map of your network it can help to assess why some of the key people are red, why others are amber and others green. Think about these five factors for each relationship:
Know: Do they know you well, can they put a face to a name and do they know your story
Like: Are you a likeable person around the office, are you interested in other people's stories (including theirs), are you trying to help them and others so business isn't always about your agenda
Trust: Are you authentic and do you overtly demonstrate integrity
Capable: Can you get the job done and lead change
Reliable: Do you turn up all the time not just some of the time
Some tips on how to get access to key executives that you don't know yet:
- Hint - find ways to cross paths at conferences / meetings
- Ask if they are open to meeting to discuss your career (how to get and keep a CEO mentor)
- Like and share their content on social media
- If they are doing small workshops / 1:1s at conferences then buy-it
- Get into a mastermind of other senior professionals
Remember, building a powerful executive network takes a long-term consistent effort. You have to keep giving without counting the cost and help others achieve their dreams and goals. Once your network is activated you'll come to realise the amazing benefits of the world paying you back for all you've done. It's a magnificent way to do business.
Stay epic
In this episode we hear from Mal Bundey, CEO & MD of Pact Group Holdings Limited.
Malcolm Bundey is the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Pact. Prior to joining Pact, Malcolm held several senior executive leadership positions for the Graeme Hart owned Rank Group. He relocated to the United States with Rank in 2007 where he was President & CEO of Evergreen Packaging a US$1.6bn paper packaging company. He was most recently President & CEO of both Graham Packaging and Closure Systems International (CSI), a combined US$4.8bn global rigid packaging, closures & equipment company owned by The Rank Group. Mr Bundey was previously a Partner at Deloitte in Corporate Restructuring and Management Consulting, spanning over 16 years from 1987 to 2003.
See more at www.chiefmaker.com.au/44
In this episode we talk about one of my favourite Albert Einstein quotes: "Try not to become a person of success, but rather try to become a person of value."
This quote has now been mentioned by so many countless successful business people that I’ve lost count. When you’re focusing on your own success and climbing the ladder it repels other people.
They see you as a competitor and resist and so it’s tiring, hard work and strains relationships. Why? Because they can sense your hidden agenda, you don’t listen quite as well as you should, you don’t allow wisdom to enter the conversation and your presence / gravitas goes out the window.
For full summary go to www.chiefmaker.com.au/43
In this episode we meet international bestselling author, finance and investment expert, radio broadcaster, newspaper columnist and public speaker, Noel Whittaker, one of the world’s foremost authorities on personal finance.
Noel reaches over seven million readers each week through his columns and broadcasts on over 50 radio stations. He is one of Australia’s most successful authors, with 20 bestselling booksachieving total worldwide sales of more than two million copies. His first book, Making Money Made Simple, set sales records and was named in The 100 Most Influential Books of the Twentieth Century.
For 30 years, Noel was the Director of Whittaker Macnaught, one of Australia’s leading financial advisory companies, with more than two billion dollars under management.
In 2003, he was awarded the Australian Centenary Medal in recognition of his services to the financial services industry. In 2011 he was made a Member of the Order of Australia for service to the community in raising awareness of personal finance.
Noel shares a lifetime of wisdom and lessons learnt on personal finance, excellence and success. We focus on:
• His incredible career journey • The powerful messages he received from mentors and most influential books that shaped his career • The role of money, honesty and passion in a great career • ...and much more! Ways you can support Noel's legacy:
• Book - Pickup a copy of Think and Grow Rich - The Legacyby James Whittaker • Movie - Watch Think and Grow Rich- The Legacy
In this episode we talk about the importance of reputation. Every single action you take, every single day or the weeks adds or subtracts to your reputation and it is perhaps the most important element to rapidly accelerating up the corporate ladder and for attracting opportunities. It is made up of stories and labels people carry for you and in essence is, “what people say about you when you’re not in the room.” People naturally assess you against three factors: 1. Are you likeable and do you care about others and the greater good or just yourself 2. Are you good at your job and reliable 3. Do you have integrity and honesty All these shape what people say and think about you. It’s important to remember that you also carry these labels for the people around you as well and they might be affecting your relationship with them. You can improve your reputation by: a. Being intentional and values centred in how you live everyday b. Caring for others and giving to the greater good / cause c. Being good at your job d. Being well rounded and not one-dimensional Check out more www.chiefmaker.com.au/41
In this episode we meet Read to Lead CHIEF Jeff Brown. He is the founder of the Read to Lead podcast and community
Before beginning Read to Lead, he spent 26-years in radio and co-hosted an award-winning and nationally syndicated morning show from 2002 to 2008 with over a million daily listeners.
The Read to Lead Podcast began in 2013. Since then he's been fortunate to interview a number of New York Times bestselling authors including John Maxwell, Seth Godin, Dan Miller, Daniel Pink, Simon Sinek, Chris Brogan (not once but twice), Gary Vaynerchuk and Liz Wiseman among others.
It has been a top #10 Business and top #3 Career podcast in iTunes, is an iTunes Essentials podcast (Book Lovers), and has been nominated Best Business Podcast no fewer than three times.
I’ll ask Jeff to share about:
- His 26 year career on US Radio and what led him to being on main morning drive show with over a million listeners
- What is the most important lesson he learned from going out on his own that is so important for leaders still in the corporate world
- Which of his over 200 guests has stood out the most
- The importance of learning, taking action and relationships.
- ...and much more
You can connect with Jeff on Twitter or Instagram @THEjeffbrown and to learn more about read to lead just visit here: http://readtoleadpodcast.com
In this episode, Part 2 on confidence, I talk about confidence ‘boosters’ and how they can help take your game to a whole new level. The 7 boosters we focus on are:
- Mindset
- Reframing Fear
- Getting in flow
- Putting on your game face
- Rehearsal and scenario modelling
- Building a game plan
- Decision making frameworks
If you've got a confidence issue or just want to lift your game then this will definitely serve up some new ideas.
In this episode we hear from Golf Coaching legend Peter Knight on mastering your craft.
Peter Knight is one of only four master golf professionals in Australia. He is the author of Iron Golf Mind and has over 25 of years successfully coaching at State and National level as well as driving golf programmes for the Australian Institute of Sport, Golf Australia, Taiwan Golf, Golf Victoria, NSW Golf and NSW Institute of Sport.
In 2012 he was one of three coaches in Victoria recognised for his contribution to coaching in Australia over the past 100 years.
His book is called Iron Golf Mind: Five lessons to achieve an amazingly strong mindset for golf. And might I add - your career and life in general.
During this far reaching interview we explore:
- His 5 C's of Optimal Performance - Confidence, Concentration, Commitment, Composure and Competitiveness
- What is mastery and how you can apply it in your work
- How do you build the right routines around your performances
- The most important question you should ask yourself everyday if you want to master your profession
You can connect with Peter on Facebook here @MelbourneGolfCoach.
In this episode I talk about confidence and the critical role it plays in performance and career progression. The topics is huge and I’ve split it out of over two minisodes. In this episode we’ll focus on 7 big blockers that most of us can take practical action to turnaround if pay close attention to our performance.
In this episode we hear from Kate Erickson, chief implementer at Entrepreneurs on Fire. I met Kate about a year ago and hear her speak on systems, efficiency and automation and she honestly stopped me in my tracks. The energy and focus was mesmerising. Kate is an absolute GURU in personal effectiveness. Everything is personally tested on a daily basis and while they focus on entrepreneurs the lessons are just as applicable for the corporate world - which by the way is where she started.
Take 3 deep breaths before you listen to this episode. Centre the soul. The 'busy-ness' syndrome is in plague proportions and is driving so many managers towards burn-out, low quality work, strained relationships and disconnecting from their purpose and meaning. Recovery is our great weapon in bringing our true spirit and greatest performances to the table. Without effective recovery we can not perform at our best and we look like we need development rather than a promotion. In this episode I cover the importance of recovery and a range of 'active' and 'passive' recovery techniques that work in the corporate world.
Marcus Aurelius said that he was indebted to his grandfather for teaching him that “on an education one should spend liberally”.
In this episode we cover the importance of learning from the gurus in your field and I give you two challenges.
To reach the top, we stand on the shoulders of giants—the undisputed masters of their fields. The powerful and influential may appear to be entirely self-made, but ask them about their teachers and influencers. The length of their list might just surprise you.
A lot of leaders do not make use of 1:1s and yet they are one of the greatest opportunities to inspire your people and lift their performance. In addition, your people's careers and lives are in your hands and you have a responsibility as a leader to coach, develop and support your people. Many people complain about the performance of some of their team members and yet they either don’t do 1:1s or do them very poorly. And this often means that individuals lose interest, they don’t feel valued and they certainly don’t bring the extra effort that is sitting stored away inside of them. I cover a 4 step process for running inspirational and effective 1:1s - Check-in, Operations, People, Strategy (COPS).
Every now and then you’ll get a serial low performer that is a toxic presence in your team. They can be incredibly stubborn and many leaders find dealing with these people the hardest part of their work. In these cases it is unhealthy for both them, yourself and likely several other people in the team if they don’t seriously change their ways or move on. I cover a three step process for removing them from your team Coach, Counsel, Shoot. This is sounds tough and brutal but it really just a framework for either improving or removing low performers. Great Chiefs are brilliant at shifting low performers into better performance or moving them on. They understand the importance of getting the right people on the bus and letting the wrong people off at the next stop. Shifting this individual can be a huge relief for everyone involved. Many time I’ve seen whole teams take a collective sigh of relief. They didn’t realise how much of an impact the person was having. They spread their wings and really fly. And when it this process is done with respect for the low performer at every single point it removes much fo angst. Every leader I’ve ever helped through this process comes out the other side really proud of their courage and effort. They grow as people and as leaders.
In this episode we take an entirely new angle. I’ve been wanting to bring in some gurus on particular topics and it brings me great pleasure to start with our spiritual guru Damien Price on Spiritualism and how it fits in the corporate world. Damien Price is a Christian Brother and has taught for over thirty years in schools throughout Australia and New Zealand. Over the past twenty years Damien has been involved in working with disadvantaged youth, homeless men and women, refugees and Asylum Seekers. Damien has Masters Degrees in Counselling and Pastoral Guidance. Damien’s Doctor of Philosophy degree focused on the sense of self that youth grew into as they engaged with homeless people over an extended period of time.
He is now Regional Ministry Coordinator for PNG, Philippines and Timor Leste in a role that has him travelling and organising all over SE Asia. Some of the questions I ask Damien include:
• What is God and/or who was God and where do people get it wrong? • What is Religion and where do people get it wrong? • What is the ultimate purpose of life? • Your often describe yourself as a monk. Why is that the most fitting description of you? • What are the vows you take a Christian Brother? Why do you cherish them and what role do they play for you? • You took a break from the Brothers. What drew you away and ultimately what brought you back? • What is the most stinging feedback you’ve ever received and how did it shape you? • What have you learned about yourself over the past five years? • What mistakes do busy professionals make that is costing them their spirituality? • On a day to day basis what's the most powerful action someone can take to keep and develop a strong spiritual connection? • Does spirituality fit in the boardroom?
In this episode we cover the power of high performance lifecycles and how to use them to automate the pursuit of excellence. The pursuit of excellence lies at the heart of all great performers. It means mastering your craft and continually working to improve yourself. It also means leading your team to work collectively to improve itself. The long term benefits have an incredible compound effect on your ability to get results and rise above the pack. I outline: - the Prepare, Perform, Recover, Review (P2R2) Lifecycle - How to lock this into as a system that drives performance - How to optimise each step - Some tricks to stay focused and embed the system
In this episode we hear from John Lee Dumas, Founder of Entrepreneurs on Fire.
John is the founder and host of Entrepreneurs ON FIRE, an award winning Podcast where he interviews today’s most successful Entrepreneurs 7-days a week. JLD has grown EOFire.com into a 7-figure business with over 2000 interviews and 1.5 million monthly listens.
Some of the questions I ask John:
• What was the most important lesson you learnt from your time as a soldier in Iraq that shaped you the most? • You spent time in law firms, real estate and a number of other industries early in your career. Eventually you took a different path to be start podcasts and be an entrepreneur. What were you really looking for that you found in podcasting and EOFire? • What advice would you give to a middle / snr manager of a large organisation that is stuck in their career, fighting politics and can’t seem to find a way forward? • If someone, is thinking that they might like to start their own business. Can you explain what a side-hustle is and the most important principles to get it right? • What is a final message of wisdom and hope you think is vital for the next generation of executives?
Most of us at one time or another have had a boss who seems totally disinterested in our work. They’re the opposite of micro-managers, leaving us completely to our own devices and at times in more senior regional roles can go missing for weeks at a time. Here is what you can do.
In this episode we hear from Hetty Johnston, AM, Founder and Chair of Bravehearts.
You can support Hetty’s work through Bravehearts at www.bravehearts.org.au
CHANGE OF PLAN
Normally I put a detailed set of show notes. In this case, I’m electing not to. This will make sense when you’ve heard this episode. Hetty is someone you have to listen to. She is one of the most influential leaders of modern Australia and summary notes just won’t do her justice.
So find an hour to really focus on this session. Hetty tells the FULL story of her life and the horrific circumstances that led to the beginnings of Bravehearts after her daughter disclosed she was being assaulted. She also shares some of her techniques for negotiating with Prime Ministers, staying resilient and gives the ultimate career advice if you want to be a GREAT chief.
ABOUT HETTY JOHNSTON AM
Hetty is the Founder and Chair of Bravehearts & Australia’s leading child protection advocate.
https://bravehearts.org.au/who-we-are/founder-chairman/
For over 20 years Hetty has been leading the charge in child protection and has built Bravehearts into powerful not-for-profit with global reach. She and her team are regularly asked to speak and advice on their most important work all over the world.
Hetty’s most recent accolades include:
- Australian Businesswomen’s 2016 Hall of Fame Inductee
- Queensland Australian of the Year 2015
- Logan’s Wall of Acclaim 2015 Inductee
- Member of the Order of Australia (AM) 2014
- Author of national awareness campaign, ‘White Balloon Day’, ‘Sexual Assault Disclosure Scheme (SADS)’, ‘Ditto’s Keep Safe Adventure’ child protection CD-Rom and her autobiography, ‘In the Best Interests of the Child’ (2004)
Just some of her responsibilities include:
- Chaired the Queensland Child Protection Week Committee for three years;
- Held a position on the Board of NAPCAN (National Association for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect);
- Was a participant on the Federal Government’s Working Party on a ‘National Approach to Child Protection’;
- Currently sits on the Federal Governments working party on Cyber-Safety;
- Working with the Federal Government’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.
She is consistently sought after by media for commentary on issues pertaining to child protection and has been the subject of personal profile in many print media, talk back radio and television documentaries such as Australian Story.
Hetty is a truly GREAT chief. She has battled resistance to change for 20 years from every angle imaginable and from some of the powerful groups in our community. And through it all she has stayed, strong, focused, warm and immovable. I’ve know Hetty personally for over a decade. She is a force of nature when it comes to leading change across our society and through all this has maintained a warmth and kindness, never forgetting that this is ABOUT THE KIDS.
Recommended Books by Hetty Johnston
The Gift of Fear - https://www.amazon.com/Other-Survival-Signals-Protect-Violence/dp/0440508835/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1522021749&sr=8-1&keywords=the+gift+of+fear
In this episode I talk about why you should run across a desert (and love it). Huh? What I really mean is why you should do something epic. In 2007/8 I conducted a personal growth experiment by tackling the Gobi March a 250km ultra marathon across the toughest terrain in the world. This is a bit of that story and what I discovered on…and didn’t expect.
In this episode we hear from Brad Gordon, former CEO of Acacia Mining Limited. We cover the importance of getting out from behind your desk, how to create a game that inspires your people and attracts the best talent.
ABOUT BRAD
Until recently, Brad Gordon was the CEO of Acacia Mining Limited. Prior to that he has also been the CEO of Entrepid Mines Limited, Emperor Mines Limited and was Managing Director of Placer Dome, New Guinea.
Key Questions I ask Brad Gordon:
• What you do love about mining and being underground? • Were there any setbacks along the way? • What is your secret sauce? The thing you can do better than almost anyone else? • So what advice would you give to someone who's in that middle level of their career and all of a sudden they're stuck, they're not going up any further? • Do you have any moments when you doubt your abilities? What do you do in those moments to keep going? • Did anyone give you any feedback to you personally that really rang true for you? That was important for the young Brad Gordon to hear? • What you have learned about yourself over the past 10 years? • How do you stay focused? • Where do leaders in the middle and senior management waste their time and effort? • How do you get the right people on your team? • Where do people get transformations right and where do they go wrong? • What is the final message of wisdom and hope you think is vital for the next generation of executives?
In this episode we are going to cover How to get and keep a CEO mentor.
Every CEO I’ve met has had a mentor of some sort in their career. Interestingly, in most cases, these were through a reporting structure and weren’t formal mentoring relationships.
How to convince a CEO to mentor you CEOs are insanely busy people in very high demand. And yet, every one of them I have met finds time to mentor several of the next generation. The fact is they want to help and give back, but they don’t want to waste their time.
It is unlikely that you can offer them much from spending time with you except for giving back. So that is the lever to pull. Here are a few steps that have worked time and again when I’m connecting with big chiefs.
In this episode I cover one my personal mottos “Ownership Precedes Victory” and how to use it to really take control of your career and become a great Chief
Life in the chaos of the modern business world can be crushingly difficult. The rapid pace of change in technology, as well as new customer and employee expectations is now amplified by a hyper-competitive global landscape. Executive teams now have to navigate their companies through transformational change just to survive.
For those reporting to the executive team, and leading the operational charge towards big targets and new cultures, it can be incredibly complex and difficult to stay in front of the game. They work hard all day, every day, on an endless list of tasks at work and home. The politics, red tape and antiquated systems suck their energy and many begin to wonder if there is more to life than this.
It feels like the world is happening to them, rather than they’re happening to the world.
After spending the last decade with some of the best in business and sport, it is now crystal clear that their intelligence and relationships, while undeniably important, are only a part of their success. They became great Chiefs not because they are lucky with intelligence or networks, but because they have taken to heart a powerful philosophy: ownership precedes victory. They take personal accountability for the outcome of every challenge they face, relationship they enter, and business they lead. They demand ownership of it and they will not share the blame with others
It is this hunger to accept the mantle of responsibility that separates the good from the great.
But in practice ownership can be brutally difficult because it is between you and you. And the best are their own hardest markers.
As one CEO said to me recently, “You can’t lie to the person looking back at you in the mirror.” This is what ownership is all about. Can you be truly honest with yourself?
Using this little philosophy can be like an internal call to arms when challenges arise. Instead of shrinking in the face of a challenge or a difficult person, ownership is about rising up to your full height and using every resource, connection and strategy at your disposal to get a new outcome.
In a work context take stock for a minute and ask yourself whether you have taken true ownership of the outcomes in the following:
Your relationship with my boss (hint – your boss is your customer, how would they rate you as a customer?)
Key stakeholders and peer relationships
Low performers in your team
Your company targets and results
Your personal development and the development of your team?
Sometimes we just need a little reminder that the qualities and habits that make one great are not natural. They are learned and earned and 100% in our own control. It isn’t a quick fix – it takes lots of soul searching and all of your personal power. But when you rise above the challenge by taking the harder road and knock it out the park, your victory is so much sweeter.
Remember – OWNERSHIP PRECEDES VICTORY.
Stay epic
Greg
In this episode we hear from Geoff Lloyd, CEO and MD of Perpetual Limited.
SUPPORT GEOFF IN THE CEO COOK OFF FOR OZ HARVEST HERE
ABOUT GEOFF
Geoff joined Perpetual in August 2010 as Group Executive of Perpetual Private and led the development and implementation of the growth strategy for this business. He took on the additional responsibility of Head of Retail Distribution in September 2011 and was appointed Managing Director and CEO in February 2012.
Geoff was previously General Manager of Advice and Private Banking at BT Financial Group following the Westpac Group merger with St.George Bank. Before the merger, he led St.George’s wealth management portfolio. He held many senior positions at BT Financial Group, including Chief Legal Counsel and Head of the Customer and Business Services Division.
Geoff is the Chairman of the Financial Services Council, an Advisory board member of The Big Issue and the Patron of the Financial Industry Community Aid Program. He is a Patron of Emerge Foundation and is also Chairman of the University of Technology Sydney Law Advisory board.
Key Questions and Answers from Geoff (curated for clarification and brevity):
What did you learn from the police force?
In the police force, I got to learn a lot about people and what I still take with me is that you don’t judge too quickly. Take the time to step back and see what else might be going on, what’s driving an outcome, because what you see is normally just the surface of a thing. When it involves people in complex environments, there’s always emotion. So that’s something I’ve tried to take with me where I don’t judge too quickly, stand back, ask questions and observe.
What did you learn from your first move interstate to Sydney with ASIC?
It was the first time I learned about stretching myself out of what you might call a comfort zone, and how it can lead to just so many unforeseen, unplanned, unexpected outcomes. And so for me, that was probably the first time I’ve learned that as you actually stretch yourself and take real risk, it is not just a little bit that comes from that. It is quite amazing and you really don’t know what you can achieve until you’ve tried.
What drives you internally? You’re this,very aspirational man, you want to grow again and take your game to another level. What drives that?
I’ve learned for a long time that there’s always evidence of how you can keep getting better and you just don’t know what you can achieve. And so having that mindset, of being curious…if you aren’t finding evidence and keep getting better, then you’re going to plateau. And so for me it’s about that looking forward, being curious. If I don’t have a 110 percent passion and energy for something, it becomes 50 percent and so I need to be operating at that level to truly find rewarding outcomes, whether it’s philanthropic, social, business or family.
Do you have in moments when you doubt your abilities? What do you in do in those moments to keep going?
Yeah, I do. You know, if you don’t, if you can’t look in the mirror and get a bit paranoid, then you’re probably not able to really find evidence of how to keep getting better. I’ve tried to find different times in my career where I’ve hit inflection points and probably the most successful times the more paranoid I get.
You’ve got to have enough confidence to know you’re going to be able to follow on to what the next challenge is… I get energy from others. So, getting access to and making sure I’ve got the right network, that’s really important. But equally I’ve always had this philosophy that you’ve got to hire the best people you can listen to them, trust them, invest in them and then make sure you’re having some fun along the way, you know, because it’s, it’s a very serious game that we play.
If you can get that sort of talent around you then your job as a leader is really about being their guide and helping guide them rather than do or carry out the activity. Great leaders are able to step back and be able to motivate people through how they give them that guidance and help set direction and boundaries.
Why did you switch from General Counsel into other more broader roles and how did that lead to CEO level roles?
I actually started to think differently about my career and stretch myself beyond being tall and skinny in a career or a profession to being broad. Think about it as the goal is to grow skills and experience over the next three to five years rather than, I want this job or that job. I think if you just go off the job titles, you might never know how good you can be and how different the work that you can do will be
Did anyone give you any feedback to you personally that, that really rang true for you? That was important for the young Geoff Lloyd to hear?
BT was a very driven meritocracy, with enormous amount of opportunity. So running too fast can happen and it happened for me. And so learning about not stepping on others around you, but picking others up around you is what you’re going to be judged for.
And, that it takes time. Actually there’s no shortcuts to hard work. I’ve tried lots of them. it’s just about hard work. It’s actually about focus and it’s about making sure that you’re true to yourself. Don’t try to be somebody else. I’ve worked for some great leaders and I’ve picked up their characteristics and often said, ‘oh, well, if I can be like that’. And you can’t be, you can pick up those characteristics and learn from them. But then you have got to be you again. Today we would talk about authentic leadership. You just have to be, you.
How was the final step to CEO different?
The step was quite different because as much as I’ve worked in large organizations, ran much bigger teams in the past than at perpetual, when you become the CEO, there’s nobody else that’s coming. It’s words that we’ve used around the executive team that ‘nobody’s coming’. It’s us. You know, you run two and a half thousand people in a bank, there’s always somebody else who can ask or the decision can go to. So the big gap is…Nobody’s coming.
Does ‘Ownership Precedes Victory’ resonate with you?
I think you’ve got to have courage or otherwise you’re not going to keep challenging yourself. If you don’t you’re not going to keep challenging your team, you’re not going to take the right amount of risk and you won’t see the other sides of the benefit that can come with that risk. So make sure you’ve got the courage is the key, that conviction of something you’ve started to create change. Maybe that’s the words that gravitate more with me.
How do you stay focused?
I suspect that at perpetual I will be remembered for at least two words. Hopefully it’s clarity and focus. I think complexity kills businesses. I’m a big believer in that a quality businesses can’t do lots of things. What are the few things that you can do incredibly well and be the leader at.
And then once you become a leader at anything, it’s very hard to stay there. Everyone’s coming after you. For us at perpetual and for me it’s about clarity on a few things. Do them really well and then move to the next few things. Try not to be distracted by a long list, we try to prioritise on what we can do and then draw a line under number three. And you know, often the team will hear me say, just tell me the top two. Actually, I’m not interested in the top three.
We also had to try to focus on what we’re not going to do and write that down because a lot of businesses are good at telling you what they do, but if you can articulate what you’re not going to do, it brings more clarity to that focus around what you’re going to do
Where do leaders in the middle and senior management waste their time and effort?
I think often getting too much into the detail because if you’re a leader, you’ve got to have sort of three hats. You’ve got to do work, improve your work and lead your team. And you’ve got to have, at least a third of each of those….So you’ve got to dedicate time and focus to leadership, not just doing. And I think it’s easy to go back to the doing. You know, I had somebody put it in my mind a long time ago, a phrase called ‘being a guide, not a guru’.
I think as you become more of a leader and your sole job, which is mine, is leading, not doing. So the job is to guide people not to be the technical guru. It took me a long time to learn that. As a lawyer, you want to be the smartest person in the room when it comes to the topic on ‘x of the law’. And that’s not your job as even the general counsel, because my job was to hire the smartest people in the room, trust them, invest them, listen to them, guide them because it was their job to be that smart. It’s not mine. And so that stuck with me for a long time. So maybe they should be more of a guide than a guru because your job is to hire the gurus as a leader.
How important is it for young people coming through and in middle management and senior executives to have a network?
I think it’s vital. You know, I also chair the Financial Services Council now, a leading industry body and one of the things we’ve reintroduced is a group called ‘the circuit’. I call it the 30 somethings and it’s actually about bringing interesting topics to a forum of 40 to 100 of all of our members staff.
What was the most important thing you learned in Harvard?
How bad Australians are at negotiation. I think that was a really big part of that program and you know, just seeing our cultural norms. We are ranked in the bottom five countries in the world in negotiation!
You’ve been CEO here for six years now, and the share price has gone from $19 to just shy of 50 which is a remarkable period of growth for the company. How important is it for individuals to build a track record, perhaps not as spectacular as that, but to keep thinking about change and transformation?
I’ve worked with a gentlemen named Andy Meikle who has left a couple of thoughts with me over the years and one was, you know, high performers create a track record that you can leave on the table and they can leave the room and it speaks for itself. It is important to be able to think about not the way you would tell the story, how the story would tell itself. And that doesn’t have to be about share price growth.
What is the difference between Change and Transformation?
I had this view that change is what happens to you. Transformation is what you do to yourself. So with change, you react to your competitor, you’re reacting to, it puts out a new product, you react. Transformations are where you have that honest, courageous look and say we’re going to go from x to y and it’s going to be tough and we’re going to have to have clarity, courage, and control which are three woods, we used a lot. Clarity of what we would or wouldn’t do, control because the market is going to tell us what’s wrong and we also needed to keep the courage to hold the course because we couldn’t possibly plan for everything to that level of detail.
How would you define a GREAT Chief?
I think it’s someone who is able to bring passion and energy to the way they communicate to people and the way they support and develop and grow everyone around them. It means you’ve able to motivate, support and nourish people in your community.
What is the final message of wisdom and hope you think is vital for the next generation of executives?
I still believe that there’s no shortcuts, it’s all about hard work. But remaining really very curious, have curiosity in your life and you can define what that means and make sure you’ve got the courage.
SUPPORT GEOFF IN THE CEO COOK OFF HERE
Recommended Books by Geoff Lloyd.
Repeatability :
https://www.amazon.com/Repeatability-Enduring-Businesses-Constant-Change-ebook/dp/B0070YQQI4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1520487587&sr=8-1&keywords=repeatability
Founders Mentality:
https://www.amazon.com/Founders-Mentality-Overcome-Predictable-Crises-ebook/dp/B01BO6QMC8/ref=pd_sim_351_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=WSXZ3BEMWMND0FWN22E7
In this episode I want to talk about a deep mindset shift that can lead to meteoric improvement in performance. And that is different between viewing yourself as a Professional or an Amateur.
In general terms, an Amateur is someone who turns up and has a crack. They go through spurts of increased interest and their performance spikes and troughs. They don’t take the pursuit as as an artform they are looking to master. And that is where the big line is drawn. Mastery.
Being a professional executive means learning to love the fact that this is YOUR artform and you want to build yourself over a lifetime into the sharpest professional you possibly can be. They want to be the best as leading an organisation or whatever their ‘profession’ is.
This isn’t something they start doing once their in a big role. No, they do this from the outset. Before they earn the big bucks and have the big job because in essence that is why they end up getting the big job over others.
Full summary can be found at www.chiefmaker.com.au/podcast
Why leaders micromanage and how you can adjust your approach to improve the working relationship so that it is a. more effective and b. less soul destroying.
Before you dive in and start trash talking your overbearing boss - it is wise to seek some understanding as to why they might be micromanaging you. Take a few minutes to think deeply and through their eyes about what might be causing them to dip down.
Full summary can be found at www.chiefmaker.com.au/podcast
Our CEO this week is Angela Buglass, who has recently returned from 15 years in the UK where she held the role of VP Marketing for LF Beauty, part of the global sourcing giant Li & Fung.
Her experience includes roles with leading players Procter & Gamble, L'Oreal and Estée Lauder (working on the AVEDA brand).
Angela is now the CEO of Trilogy International Limited which you may know through beauty products like Trilogy, Ecoya, Goodness and CS&Co. Her work has taken her from NZ all around the world and back again and her stories are inspirational, insightful and so wonderfully down to earth.
Full summary can be found at www.chiefmaker.com.au/podcast
Kung Fu the most difficult situations with SARS (Smart Automated Response Systems)
- Have you ever found yourself in a situation and not known what to do?
- Ever tried to stop a certain scenario at work from happening but it always seems to repeat itself?
- Ever lose confidence at key moments?
In this episode we will be talking a technique that emerged through my work in elite sport and an in particular in martial arts and how you can translate this to the business world.
Full summary can be found at www.chiefmaker.com.au/podcast
In this episode you’ll hear from Greg Steele, CEO Arcadis Asia Pacific.
He is also the Chairman of Engineering Aid Australia and on the board of Roads Australia. He was the Managing Director of Hyder Consulting before the Arcadis takeover.
I came across this special man at a mindfulness conference where his authenticity and honesty about the challenge of keeping balance in the corporate world blew the audience away. I couldn’t wait to get him on the show.
We cover the importance of making sense of things, making choices and making things happen. And how to drive change, using diversity as a strength and mindfulness to keep you focused.
Subscribe on iTunes here:
https://itun.es/au/87Pqkb.c
Subscribe on Android:
http://tunein.com/radio/The-Inner-Chief-p1004701/
http://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=141429
Key Points:
Greg’s top quotes from this episode include:
1) Back yourself but be prepared and don't be afraid to speak your piece. I think one of my early lessons in my career that was very formative.
2) I liked the notion of strategy. I think I was born with a competitive streak. I liked the notion of out-competing, outperforming and other companies. The whole notion of financial performance, HR, really having a broader view of an organisation. Strategy is the thing I guess I fell in love with. Trying to find a way to outperform and win. That's what I liked more than anything and I guess that's where my ambition started to grow.
3) Some of the biggest lessons learned for me was listening to bosses in team meetings and then walking out saying I will never do that. This guy or girl has just totally demotivated the whole staff with that speech. Yeah, funny enough a lot of my lessons learned and maturity came through what not to do.
4) I wasn't a strong candidate for my first attempt at a CEO role. I reflected on that, and I said, things are not going to change, people have got me pigeon-holed as a business development, strategy, marketing type person. I had to change. For the second time in my career, I changed jobs, went back to Hyder. A company I thought was a huge opportunity. Really, not a pay cut but really a backward step. A backward step because I had to do some things to change people's perception. I was never going any further in my current role unfortunately. At Hyder I took on the strategy of the clients but also all the corporate services. Legal, HR, all those things that I needed to help broaden my career. Not quite a P&L but nevertheless getting some real experience in lots of different areas. I did that and there was some changes in leadership both nationally and globally. Out of that within two years, I was the CEO.5
5) I made some mistakes, of course. Some mistakes early on and then I realised, I have to think about this, I just can't make off the cuff decisions here. There's a lot more depth I needed in a couple of areas. I was a little bit concerned about the financial aspect in the matrix but in the end having a very good CFO and I still currently do, is we really play a good team.
6) A big mistake leaders make I think is there's a propensity of people in leadership roles to try and do too many things. I think focus is key to leadership and a successful organisation. Making choices, is you just would love to do some things and you just can't.
7) Three keys to leadership
a) Making sense of things - Where is the marketing heading, what's happening here, what are our competitors up to? Okay, where do we need to go? Differentiate
b) Making choices – Choices need preparation, understanding, thinking through, having data, some factual evidence as to the decision you're making. It might originally be led from a gut feel, which most of my big decisions are. Gut feel is telling me this, now let me do some research on this. How do I convince others and give the business case for what I'm doing is.
c) Making things happen - In the end, I always have a saying, strategy is easy, implementing strategy is the hard thing. Making things happen. This is where understanding people, the Lencioni work of teamwork and having an open, collaborative organisation but still being tough on accountability.
I think it is really important that you bring people on the journey and try to seek ownership of big decisions. Once again, little saying I have, “participation leads to ownership, leads to commitment”. Often in a strategy, I'll get about 70% there themself, and I'll stop short of that. I never try to perfect it.
Then I'll get others involved to genuinely help polish it up, finish it up. Even other big ideas to help shift it and to get them on-board. Then once the decision is made, you've got some ownership and therefore their commitment to make things happen. I guess that's the key element for me.
8) I think being mindful and I practise coming to work. I now shut off when I get home. That's home, I really don't like text or emails and I avoid those. I've gotten much much better at that, much better. Then in a presence sense, making sure when you're with a person that you're really present. I can look back now and see me thinking about three or four things whilst I was talking about to a person as opposed to giving that person full attention. Meditation, once again not enough but a couple of sessions a week. Half an hour, that ideally should be done daily.
9) A big mistake a lot of organisations make - I think trying to do too much. It's getting back on that focus and try to achieve too much. The one time it hit very hard, the organisations nowadays not too much fat in them. They're really running close to the wire. Once you keep adding initiatives and things like that, that might be a right thing to do but not the right time. I'm very mindful now. If I ask someone to do something, what's the ripple effect? I always think through. If I ask that person to do that, they're going to go to that person who is going to go to that person, who is going to get them to do something and suddenly, you've got half a dozen people working on something. That might be only just a win.
10) You got to be very mindful of the impact of your thinking and getting people to do stuff for you. I think most of the time wastage is trying to do too much and really getting to that “making choices”, getting back to that. Having some clear choices and then driving that through. Our strategy at Arcadis has barely changed. Little tweaks around the edges as the market moved but people come up to me and go, "Strategy is the same as it has been for the last three, four years, Greg." That's great; we know where we're headed. It's really consistent, we know where we're aiming for, it's quiet, it's this sector, it's this market.
Where the guy before me apparently every management course he went to, he'd came back with a new strategy. Flavour of the month type of stuff and that can really stress an organisation out because they never know where they're headed. Just have that consistency.
11) On making culture change: I have a saying; sometimes you just got to put a head on a stake in the foyer of the office and let people walk past it and say, "He is serious about this." We let some people go who weren't serious about global excellence centres. You're not driving this, this is in our culture, you're removed from a performance perspective. This is our strategy; you're not doing it. People just see that you're serious about it.
In an intervention sense, my exec team was Ten people. I said 10% women in that, not good enough I'm leading this. We're not making enough in roads. Whilst we've moved from 22% to 28% women in the organisation over three-year period, and we're doing lots of fabulous things though not moving quick enough. I need to show people I'm serious plus I am a huge believer in diverse teams make better decisions.
We had our city executives of Brisbane City, Melbourne, two of those females. I added them to the regional executive team. Much to the cries of ‘don't do it’, the team's too big from the people in the existing exec team. I did it, so 25% of the exec team are now women. After the first meeting, you can see the change dynamics and a few people came up to me, the naysayers afterwards, and said, "I can see why you did it, I understand." Some things you just got to go against whatever everyone is advising you and just go with your gut.
12) On what Greg looks for in new executive team members: I look for potential and their learning agility. They are probably the two key things.
You see often people get promoted to positions, and they weren't necessarily the best performance on paper, but they've had a go at some things. You can see there's that curiosity, there's that drive to try some things. I want people to challenge me. I want them to come with ideas and say I want to try this and do that. I far prefer a direct report who will do that as opposed to do what they're told.
13) On learning: Yeah, I think you just got to test and try some things. You got to fix an issue or a problem. I remember the chairman of Hyder, Sir Allan Thomas was in his 70s, would come and spend a week here in Australia with me. He was just legendary with clients. He'd point to me a few times, he says, "You've got an issue here, and you're walking around and admiring it." He says, "You don't walk around issues and admire them. You go up and grab it by the neck, and you grapple with it, and you deal with it." I often reflect very warmly on my time with Sir Allan, and as soon as I do see an issue or an opportunity, I think I'm a lot quicker to get in there and try some things.
I think in today's time it's difficult to let people learn by mistakes, but it's still the best way of learning.
14) Final message of wisdom and hope: I think moving forward with such a dynamic pace of change nowadays in technology. I think some of the fundamentals still need to be there in a leadership sense. Teamwork, bringing people along for the journey. To be very agile, you always think that agility. You got to be more agile than we have in the past because the disruption is occurring. Really building agile organisations so limited bureaucracy, empowering people is very important in this regard. There can't be an empowerment without accountability. Driving empowerment but ensuring that accountability is there. You got to build that culture that can move quickly. Then some of the things into the future, I think sustainability is going to be core as we keep moving into the problems we're having in the world.
Recommended Books & Articles
Patrick Lencioni – 5 Dysfunctions of a Team
The Discipline of Market Leaders, Michael Treacy and Fred Wiersema
https://www.amazon.com/Discipline-Market-Leaders-Customers-Dominate/dp/0201407191/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1512688374&sr=8-1&keywords=discipline+of+market+leaders
The Kaleidoscope:
https://hbr.org/2004/02/success-that-lasts
In this episode we will be talking about another pattern that has emerged through many of the CEOs on the show and that is “Taking the Path Less Travelled”.
Have you ever found yourself boxed in to a role or industry?
Ever felt stuck in your growth or feel like your network and knowledge set is limited to your profession and industry?
Ever had the nagging gut feeling that you need to do something drastic to change things up but you find any number of reasons why you shouldn’t?
Feel like the dream of rising to the top of just having a more meaningful career is slipping away?
One pattern that has come up time and again is one where they have come to a sort of cross-roads where they feel they are potentially going to be stalled.
WHAT IS TAKING THE PATH LESS TRAVELLED?
It can mean shifting industries, roles, organisations or something that expands your horizons.
The key here is to aim to build wide ranging experience and knowledge that you can use to become better, smarter and more connected.
Normally these kinds of shifts only happen a few times in your life. Make no mistake though, they are life and career defining and therefore should not be taken lightly.
This is making a move that is often against most other people’s advice but you know in your heart, in your gut that it is the right move.
WHEN SHOUD YOU TAKE IT?
There are a number of situations when taking the path less travelled could be a good move:
- You’re stuck or boxed in your career progression
- Internally your real chances of going forward are low and getting lower as more competition rises up
- You’ve stopped learning and growing
- You feel like you’ve now gone down one path of professional skill almost as far as it can go. Going further won’t add to your wisdom or experience significantly. The well so to speak is drying up and you need to fresh taste of new water to expand your mind
- Industry is taking a seismic shift in direction and you want to get on the front foot
- The profession or industry your in is wrong for you
- The business you’re in is wrong for you
- An opportunity arises that must be taken
- You’ve lost the energy and spark that makes work fun and is critical to leading big transformations
THE BENEFITS?
- This is what Chiefs are looking for. Someone that is willing to do something different, take a calculated risk to get ahead. Someone that is bold and tried something.
- Expansion of your knowledge set, growth and wisdom
- Momentum in your career again
- New networks
- New opportunities
- Fun and renewed energy for life
HOW DO YOU DO IT?
For all those that have taken the path less travelled successfully there are a thousand who took it and failed. They jumped too fast without being considered or didn’t listen to their intuition.
- Assess the root cause of the current situation
- Review your life and career vision / plans
- Listen to your gut, what does it say?
- Talk to a trusted friend who brings out the best in you
- Assess the risk and increase the upside and decrease the downside
- Stay focused and go with 100% commitment
In this episode you’ll hear from Sue Murphy, CEO of Water Corp.
Sue spent 25 years at Clough engineering after completing an engineering degree where she was one of only two women out of 300 students. She has been the Water Corporation CEO since 2008 and on the board at the Fremantle Dockers for 12 months. She is also a director at Water Services Association of Australia (WSAA).
We cover how to be honest, fun and make a difference in your work.
Key Points:
Sue’s top quotes from this episode include:
- I learnt that it's not what your background is that matters, it's how well you can relate to the people around you. You don't come in and enforce your own self on everybody around you, you learn about the people around you and you learn what matters to them
- Harold (Clough) was very strong on giving people empowerment. He's philosophy was employ the smartest, most sociable kids you can find straight out of university and let them loose and see what can happen
- Harold always argued you can fake it for a few hours when you work with someone and make them think you're clever, but when you work side by side with someone in a joint venture on a construction project for months and months at a time, real talent shines through. His motto was plagiarise shamelessly. We learned procedures and policies and design skills and all kind of things from our partners, but over the years we also taught a lot back
In this episode we explore the terrible consequence of Overwhelm, the high level neuroscience of the brain, the triggers and a rock solid solution for removing it from your life,
Subscribe on iTunes here:
https://itun.es/au/87Pqkb.c
Subscribe on Android:
http://tunein.com/radio/The-Inner-Chief-p1004701/
http://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=141429
Key Points:
The top quotes and messages from this episode include:
The Triune Brain
- Lizard – Flight for fight
- Monkey – Emotional monkey
- Mammalian – High order thinking
The consequences of overhwlem:
- relationships
- health and fitness
- work performance, quality, lack of creativity and insight
- stuck
- no career opportunityies
- drags into home
- not being a dealer in hope
What triggers overwhelm:
- doing too many things at once
- bouncing around from one task to the next
- not having an automated response system
- evil sin of not recovering and doing things like turning your phone on
Three steps to managing overwhelm:
- Mindmap
- Daily Focus Session Focus
- Reset Focus
- Review meetings and how you’re spending time
- Plan and rehearse day ahead
- Work Practices
Recommended Books
https://hbr.org/2000/09/why-should-anyone-be-led-by-you
In this episode you’ll hear from Daniel Herbert, CEO of SSKB.
We are going to be covering some powerful strategies that he learnt through 67 tests for the Wallabies. He was apart of the glory era of Australian Rugby, won the RWC in 1999, the Bledisloe Cup and beat the British and Irish Lions in 2001. He Captained the QLD Reds and was world player of the year in 1999.
Critically he has now gone to a successful corporate career with the commercial side of the QLD Reds and is now CEO of SSKB.
We cover what executives can learn from elite sport (and what doesn’t translate), about what made him stand out from the pack and how to be indispensible to an organisation. The lessons here are vital.
Subscribe on iTunes here:
https://itun.es/au/87Pqkb.c
Subscribe on Android:
http://tunein.com/radio/The-Inner-Chief-p1004701/
http://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=141429
Key Points:
“My only message to the next generation is, you have to impress. You have to still do the work, you have to still stand out from the crowd because there is a lot more people coming around, there is lots of competition, don't rest on your laurels. By in large, I think they are smarter than what we were at that age.”
Daniel’s top messages include:
- I think you have to go through some lows to get the highs
- What people forget is the great era of Australian rugby came from something that wasn't so great.
- I think I made the most of what I had. I look back and I think, I played with numerous people who were more talented than me. I got to where I got from graft and I had to look for opportunities, take the opportunities and I had to work harder than others did to get there. So that became part of my mantra, I would work when I knew people weren't working. I would deliberately go running at midnight when I knew everyone else would be in bed. I would go on Christmas and kick some goals down the local park because I knew everyone else was sitting at the dinner table and that gave me this confidence that I know no one else is out there working today, I'm out here working, that's going to put me in a good place.
- Hard work will beat talent when talent doesn't work hard.
- I've seen a lot of people who were far better, were more talented, had natural abilities that I didn't have. And the only way I could convince myself that I had the right to actually be on the field or in the team ahead of these people was by working harder than them.
- There will always be weaknesses and yes, you try to improve your weaknesses but I tend to spend more time on my strengths than I do on fixing up the weaknesses, because what I would take into the business environment now is I can get people to fill in my weaknesses but, I can't necessarily get people who have better strengths than me where I think I'm particularly good.
- Don't be threatened by people who are really good, you've just got to get the best people around you and as long as they are not a real cultural risk to it
- As a CEO or a senior manager, you have to be a generalist, so you have to be across a lot of different things, but you still have to have something that you focus on, that's my unique point.
- I worked on the fact that, what I did as a rugby player, I love contact, I love the aggression, I love breaking a line and I love the physical side of it and that was going into the way that Rod MacQueen wanted to play the game when he came in. I knew that he wanted a line-breaking centre, somewhere and he needed someone who could bend the line, break the line. So I got in the gym, I got bigger, I worked on my footwork to get through a tackle and I thought, if I can be that guy, where he builds his game around me, or builds a certain element of his game around me, then that's a little bit unique, because I don't think anyone else necessarily has, in Australia right now, has that skill set.
- The chairman of the Australian Rugby Union at the time, a guy called Dick McGruther, to John O'Neil the CEO, to Rod McQueen the coach, to John Eales the captain, all four of those guys always seemed to be aligned. They got on well, you knew they got on well, they always seemed to be on the same page and in the team environment, same thing, the leadership group, which I was part of for most of the time there, were always on the same page, and when you walk out of the room, no matter whether you lost your debate or not, you lost your way, you're on the same page. And that was always, and I think, is a really important thing I see in business places where you see general mangers undermining the CEOs or general managers undermining each other because I didn't vote for that and it's always just to win a bit of favour but it's dangerous and that was something, that is one of those analogies that I would take from the sporting world into the business world.
- So that was probably for me, the most important and harrowing experience that I had because I now am a different person because not only do I know that you're never in control, it's just an illusion but I don't fear things. Even in this job, in my previous job, people threaten you with legal action all of the time, it's used as a bullying tactic. I now don't fear, I've been through it personally where it was a really tough thing for me to go through and for my family to go through, but I don't fear it anymore.
- What I enjoyed was the business of sport. And it's changing very quickly with all of the things we are seeing, tech and media and sport was starting to become a very professionalised industry and in my job, the teams job was to maximise the commerciality of that
- You need an opportunity but you've also got to make your opportunity. I don't think you can just sit there and wait and someone is going to come and tap you on the shoulder one day. You've got to make your own opportunity or seize it when you see it. Then you just have to make every post a winner if you can, you've got to work hard. People have to see that you're going to put the shoulder to the wheel and you're not one of these clock in, clock out people.
- You need to influence the right people. You're never going to please everyone and wherever I have been, I've never pleased all ends of the spectrum and I don't lose sleep about that. But the ones that I need to influence, the ones that I need to be on page with, I need to make sure I spend the time with them. I don't worry about people who are critical or small-minded who aren't going to influence anything anyway. I spend my time on those who are positive and can influence and shape the direction that we are going so they are probably the three things that come to mind immediately.
- They have got to have skills, but you can teach skills as long as they have got the right make up, they are honest and they are hard working and they are loyal, then that would be how I would like to be perceived by people who have been my leaders.
- What drives me and why I think I am here on this earth is to be a father and to provide
- I used to make the mistake of putting 20 things down a day, this is what I am going to get through today. And you would get to the end of the day and you've got two of them done and then you work through the night trying to get the others and it's just not sustainable because the work never goes away, it's always there, it's not going to go anywhere. So I have come to the point now where it's two or three things. And even yesterday, I wrote down two things, I didn't do either of them
- I also have thinking time, I need to think. I think that's one of the other things where you just become so busy that you're not actually thinking about, should we be doing this at all?
- I think that is the value of networking, is you have got to make sure you offer them something, there has got to be a value, there is a trade there. You bring people into your network, what are you going to give them and what are they going to give you?
- When it comes to hiring people, it's not always the most talented, it's not always the most educated, it might be someone who just demonstrates resilience and perseverance and grit.
Recommended Books
Good to Great – Jim Collins
Sapiens - Yuval Noah Harari
Grit – Angela-Lee Duckworth
In this episode I cover a key point that all of the CEOs have made on the show, ‘How to Create and Seize Opportunities’.
“You have to create opportunities, they are the lifeblood of your track record”
The top of the business world is fiercely competitive. Getting the chance at new opportunities can be rare and when they do come you have to make the most of it.
Often you’ll see other executives getting golden opportunities that you thought should go to you and not understand why. This is often because you’re too busy, caught up in daily operations that you miss the chance to stand out.
Don’t be limited by your role description. (Ep 5 – Vivek Bhatia also talks about this)
Work on the business with your boss (Ep 3 – Daniel Hunter refers to this)
A mistake that many leaders make is that they don’t seize the current opportunity in front of them and transform their current business. They keep waiting for bigger opportunities to come without looking at what is right in front of them. If you don’t make a big impact in your current area the leadership of a company will often think you’ve gone as far as you can in the business.
Three Big Points:
Create Space – so that you can work on the bigger opportunities. The most powerful ways to create space initially are through better delegation, building capability in your team and collaborating with others that have been through similar turn arounds before.
Ask for more – work with your boss to ask for more and show a real passion and energy for the business.
Double-down – when new opportunities present themselves double-down your effort and knock it our of the park. You have to exceed expectations.
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In this episode I catch up with Nicky Sparshott, Global Chief Executive of T2 Tea - a global luxury retailer offering the broadest and most imaginative range of teas and teawares from around the world.
Nicky also serves as Vice President on the Global Leadership Team for Unilever's Refreshment Category, playing a lead role in M&A & E-Commerce.
She also has experience on the agency side as a Partner at Y&R George Patterson (WPP Group).
www.t2tea.com
Key Points:
“Be brave, because I think the world is changing quickly. What got us here won't get us there, and the best advice I would give to people is go after the dream, but perhaps also be prepared to take the path less trodden to get there, because I think it will hold you in good stead.”
Nicky’s top messages include:
- On what Nicky learnt from a major setback from a failed product launch:
A couple of really small choices that we thought were small choices, had not been clever and we did not deep dive. These proved to be those chinks in the armour that really let us down, and it was an unmitigated disaster. Be sure to build the right stakeholder relationships outside of the business and leave no stone unturned. When someone asks, "Have you thought about X?" It might feel like an inconvenient truth, three days before you launch, but actually take the time to investigate.
- The importance of mentors is that you need to have a safe place where you can have those unfiltered sounding board conversations, where you can shoot the breeze, you can explore scenarios, where you're not personally judged for it. And you've got a relationship where someone can say, "Actually, that's not going work," or, "You need to hold yourself to account to a higher order". The value of those mentorships have been really, really important to me and I play a mentorship for many others, because I think you've got to pay it forward.
- My mindset is to aim for the moon and you might get the stars. I aim high and kind of go big or go home. You sort of play to do something extraordinary.
- It’s important to practice service leadership, which is really paying it forward and recognising that there is no time better spent than in nurturing capability. Especially today, technology is such that things can be replicated with such pace that you need to have an amazing group of people and a culture that is sticky.
- Bryce Courtenay once said to me, “if you're skating on thin ice, you may as well tap dance." That really appealed to me. To push the boundaries, be courageous and go create some magic. Sometimes you'll get it wrong, but more often than not, you won't.
- I've taken the path less travelled at times in my career, much to the horror of some of my mentors and some of the people around me, but it's always felt right.
- Ask yourself, how do you differentiate yourself against a myriad of other people in the market? Because there's some great talent out there, some exceptionally good people. How are you going craft or curate a skillset and an experience list that is different?
- I write myself for the month, what are the big bets. If I do nothing but what's on this list for the next 30 days, will that create the impact that I want to create in the next 30 days? If it's not on that list, will I spend my time on it?
- At the end of every week I do a pulse check, "Is there something that has changed that would require me to change my focus?"
- Every month as a leadership team, we get together and not only measure performance to date and performance to go, but that performance in the context of our three-year plan. What are the risks? Are we investing in the right areas? If we have to dynamically allocate resources, where are we prioritising?
- Problem shared is a problem halved. There's so many things that we work on that feel hugely challenging and sometimes insurmountable, but the reality is somebody, or a number of people, are probably experiencing exactly the same thing, or have done so before. There are some brilliant people out there, so just getting around the table with other thought leaders, or people from different industries and taking the best practise that's happening in one industry, and being able to adapt it to your own.
- For me right now, mindset trumps capability quite often. You can have all the best capability in the world, you can be an amazing rock-star, but if you can't bring others on that journey with you, if you can't elevate the performance of the whole team, if you can't get past your own ego to deliver the results, then it'll just be really short lived.
- My council to anybody that's in a senior management role and aspiring to be in a CEO role, is to get that commercial understanding solid. If it doesn't come intuitively to you, get some mentors and some support in that space and certainly recruit a team that is incredibly capable in that area, and marry that with creativity and intuition, because you need both today to be successful.
- On the importance of developing a track record - Success breeds success and confidence. It's having done it and experienced it and lived it, warts and all. Because when someone talks about their track record and having delivered something great at the end of it, it's very rarely been smooth sailing to get to that. It's the lessons learned that are as valuable as the success delivered. It is really important to be able to talk from a place of confidence about what you've done, and how you've done it, and how you would do it differently based on the experience that you've had. You've got to get dirty. You really got to roll up your sleeves and do it. I mean one bit of advice that I would give to anybody listening to this is, take opportunities that come up that sit outside of your natural job.
Recommended Reading:
Elon Musk's biography, that sort of Tesla, SpaceX ec cetera.
https://www.amazon.com/Elon-Musk-SpaceX-Fantastic-Future/dp/0062301233
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In this episode you’ll hear from Jim Soorley, Former Mayor of Brisbane and Chairman of CS energy and Unity Water.
Jim has left an almost unrivalled legacy in Brisbane through his tireless work at Lord Mayor. He led the introduction of CityCats, A/C on buses, RiverFire, RiverWalk and brought a business and commercial approach to the running of the council.
Key Points:
Jim outlines the importance of energy, getting connected to the people on the ground and role modelling the behaviour you want to see.
Jim’s top messages include:
- Life is about sales. You’re always selling something. An idea, concept, product or service.
- For people who are working in management roles, they've got to see it is the system that determines outcomes. I guess the lessons out of that are that, if you're going to engage in training, restructure, reorganisation, you, A, must take a systems approach and B, let the people on the ground have a say. The worst thing in the world you can do is impose new structures, new disciplines, new ideas without consulting people
- I think it's important to get good people around you. You've got to let them do their job and you've got to give them confidence and puff them up so that they feel like they're safe and secure and are delivering.
- I came to the conclusion that the decision to employ is often made in the first 30 seconds. Initial impressions are critical. For people who are going for an interview in a job process, I still believe it's that first 30 seconds. You don't get a second chance at a first impression.
- I think there's a few of things people need to do in the first 30 seconds; show energy, good presentation and rapport. Initially they are the critical things. If they come into an interview, can they really connect with you, because if they connect with you, you can't not connect with them, so to speak. So, that's your way to take charge of the interview process.
- If you're in an organisation, emails is often an avenue to cover my arse. If you're working with people and it's important, make it personal. Get out of your chair and take the five steps or even 20 steps and say, "Hey, we need to fix this up. How about this?"
- Management is not about control, "I've sent you an email. Do this. I've got it off my desk and it's now on your desk." Sometimes we must do that, but management is about getting people to understand, engage and lead and that's important.
- Stop tapping away at the keyboards and go and talk to people. Know your customer, know your people, that way you can inspire them and give them the tools they need to do their job.
- There's a guy I studied with in America, Gerard Egan. He's written about 14 books on organisational culture and his last one's on the dark side. That's the unknown stuff that's going on. What are the real values, the non-espoused values?
- You've got to take a risk. If you're running a department you've got to say, "What do I really want to achieve here? How do I do it? What resources do I need? What resources don't I need?"
- You've got to be able to show, you build a team, the team has delivered outcomes, and in many environments delivered them safely, and you know, “I deserve the next gig”.
- To be really be a successful manager, you've got to bring the last person with you or get rid of them. They'll either come the journey or they go. Sometimes, the ones who are slow can be your best outcome and deliver best results.
- In job interviews a reference is basically non-sense in most cases, particularly if they're not known.
- To have a network of people who you can bounce ideas off and have a beer with or whatever is important. But to have that network who can then, if you're looking for the next move up, can be referees and support for you. That’s very important.
- So when you're recruiting, you've got to get the person with the energy, the vitality, the difference.
- A question I always ask is in recruiting is, "Why are you not the best person for this job?"
- A successful leader generates by their presence and by their disposition and by their action a sense of urgency and a sense of energy, and a sense of the outcome.
- I think a successful manager has got to generate energy and insight and cooperation.
- You have to build up your own confidence. That, "This is my opportunity. I am a unique individual, and what I want to do I can do."
- Believe in yourself. If you believe in yourself, you can do anything. Then, clearly define what you want to do and go to it. The thing that I think holds a lot of people back is
- they don't know what they want to do, and
- they don't believe they can do it.
Put those two things together and you can conquer the world.
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In this episode you’ll hear from Trevor Matthews former MD/CEO of Legal & General Australia, ManuLife, Friends Provident PLC, Aviva UK and Standard Life UK. He is currently a non-executive director of AMP, Tokio Marine, FNZ and BUPA. He is also Chair of the State Industry Regulatory Authority and 1stAvailable Ltd.
Key Points:
Trevor tells the story of his remarkable career from actuary to CEO and President of some of the world’s biggest insurance companies. He outlines that a leaders is a dealer in hope, you have to build a track record and importantly you need to be respectful about the past, realistic about the present and optimistic about the future.
Trevor’s top messages include:
- Travel was great in that it gave me a global perspective
- It’s the execution of the strategy that makes the difference on a sustainable basis
- Compete aggressively on the outside and collaborate superbly on the inside
- You've got to line your people up shoulder to shoulder and get them out in the market aggressively going for business
- The more you know about more parts of the organisation the more chance you have of getting collaboration happening and that is when the magic happens. That’s when companies really move ahead I believe, when you have superb collaboration on the inside.
- You've got to have a lofty purpose in whatever you're doing
- Look for ways to move ideas from one geography to another
- To get up a level - learn the other parts of the business, ask for more work, show good teamwork, and never lose sight of the end customer
- Don't take it too seriously
- Don’t get too hung up if things don’t happen as rapidly as you thought
- I didn't understand the CEO role until I became the CEO there were so many more stakeholders than I thought
- People always say you hire too fast and fire too slow
- If you’re so busy that don’t have time to work on bigger projects then getting good people around you is the secret. It releases you to work more across the business.
- When hiring for my executive team I look for people that know their business, expertise, somebody that will fit into the team, like me but not like me, people of the same mind that are willing to share
- Every time you add a new person you have a new team
- If you have a star that is causing trouble remember that no one is indispensible
- I've had a lot of success promoting people that others say is not quite ready and watching them blossom and grow
- One of the most important secrets is stamina and resilience. That is the only way you will succeed in the long run.
- Getting external advice is incredibly valuable
- Be respectful about the past, realistic about the present and optimistic about the future
- You have to work hard to develop a track record
- If you haven't got a track record you should be working on getting one. And you don't have to do it alone.
- Build confidence by doing things one step at a time. Tackle things in bite sized pieces. Don't look for the big massive solution.
- It's normal to be overawed to start with, I was nervous in my first executive meetings
- What should every leader should ask themselves everyday - What can I learn today? How can I do it better?
- A final message of wisdom for the next generation is from a Napoleon quote - A leader is a dealer in hope.
Recommended Books:
https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Sweat-Small-Stuff-Its/dp/0786881852
Other Key Links:
Young Presidents Organisations: www.ypo.org
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In this episode you’ll hear from Jennifer Holland, Founder and CEO of Throat Scope.
Jennifer’s passion lies in inventing, designing and developing medical products that will revolutionise the healthcare industry. Her first invention was Throat Scope, which has had outstanding success across the globe and began as the foundation of Holland Healthcare.
Throat Scope was the recipient of ‘What’s Your Big Idea Queensland?’ in 2011, which included a $50,000 prize money from the Queensland government. This allowed Jennifer to develop and patent Throat Scope and have several working prototypes made.
In 2015, Jennifer and Throat Scope were featured on Shark Tank Australia. Jennifer secured investment from Steve Baxter and this exposure propelled the business. In October 2015, Throat Scope was launched into the Australian retail and healthcare markets. Throat Scope broke a retail record with a company, which saw the product signed in seven days. Jennifer has since negotiated several lucrative distribution deals with both domestic and international companies.
Jennifer has been awarded several awards for her hard work and determination which include, gold product innovation winner at the Ausmumprenuer Awards 2017, Best Presenter Award at the New York Venture Summit 2017, Edison Award Winner 2017, Lake Macquarie Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2016, Sydney Design Award Winner 2015 and QLD ‘What’s the big idea’ Winner of $50,000. Jennifer also actively participates in speaking and networking events internationally.
Key Points:
Jennifer outlines her incredible story of the invention of Throat Scope and the struggle to get it funded and into the market. Her mantra – Believe, Act, Persist has been at the core of her undying enthusiasm to make a difference. And her advice for the next generation of leaders is Don’t Settle, get out there with enthusiasm and persistence and try a different way if the first way doesn’t work.
Jennifer’s top messages include:
- Prepare meticulously for big opportunities - I watched 108 episodes of Shark Tank US to prepare for it.
- When going for a big role you have to show your passion, purpose, excitement for wanting to be apart of their business
- Enthusiasm is everything
- When hiring someone for my team experience isn't all that necessary. It’s the passion and seeing someone who is persistent. And that wins every time over education and experience in an industry
- It took a long time to find the right mentors and advisors
- My business mantra is believe, act, persist
- Whatever I do I know there is another way to do it. So if one doesn't work I'll walk through another door.
- Free yourself of the worries that aren’t real - In life you always regret the things you don't do
- If you're open to finding opportunities they will come
- Opportunities are everywhere its just a matter of whether you're open to finding them
- Having mentors or advisors that give you confidence will give you more passion, excitement
- When people say to me, “no, you can't do that”, for me that is the biggest driver.
- I love the saying ‘Today's no is tomorrow's yes….You tell me no, and I'll turn it into a yes
- Don't settle
Web: www.throatscope.com
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The Inner Chief Podcast
- Episode 7: Todd Hunter – CEO Turners Automotive Group
In this episode you’ll hear from Todd Hunter, CEO Turners Automotive Group
Key Points:
Todd outlines that there will be times that you are scared about what you're being asked to do but - pressure is a privilege - and someone believes you can do this.
Todd’s top messages include:
- When assessing an opportunity or role always ask yourself what can I learn from the people that I will be around?
- When you're faced with someone hostile - You listen more than you talk, you put yourself in their shoes, you try and understand where they're coming from.
- When you disagree with the direction of a business you have three options - you can win the person over, you can go around them or you can leave.
In this episode you’ll hear from Jonathan Ling, CEO and MD of GUD Holdings
Limited.
Jonathan is also the former CEO of Fletcher Building and Visy Recycling. He is the
Chairman of Melbourne Rebels Advisory Board and has previously held a number of
other board roles including ASB bank and Pacific Brands.
During his time as CEO of GUD the market capitalisation has grown from $360
million to $1.2 billion and the share price from around $5 to in excess of $13. And
during his time as CEO at Fletcher Building market capitalisation grew from around
NZ$2.5 billion to NZ$4.8 billion.
Jonathan is a fantastic story of a little Chinese boy that rose from the frontline all the
way through the ranks to becoming CEO. He has taken on some of the biggest
challenges in business and succeeded both commercially and through the culture he
has created.
Key Points:
Jonathan outlines that “to get ahead you must tell wow stories” and that you must
have three key skills to be CEO; 1. The ability to innovate, 2. The ability to lead a
group of people to something beyond what even they though possible, 3. Know how
to truly make money.
Jonathan’s top messages include:
1. 1/3 of MBA graduates are better for it, 1/3 makes no difference, 1/3 come out
worse because they’re expectations of what will immediately happen as a
result of having the qualification exceed reality
2. Running your own business gives you a very different perspective on:
a. risk and what you're willing to take
b. how to stand out from the crowd; and
c. that you have to have to courage to take risks, calculated risks.
3. Some people more successful than others because the tell 'wow stories'. How
many people have you met in meetings that you just don't remember? People
have done something that is ‘wow’, or said something is ‘wow’, that is who
you remember
4. In telling stories the key is that you've got to want to stand out. The first thing
is the desire and the courage to take the risk to be different. If you're doing
what everyone else does you don't stand out. You have to be willing to put
your head above the parapet and take a shot at it.
5. One of the skills that you don't see that often, is the ability to make money.
I've never had a shareholder say, you're making too much money, slow down
- The only three things I'm looking for is - are you innovative, can you make
money, can you inspire people - Leadership is the ability to inspire people to achieve something far greater
than even they thought possible. And when you do that the feeling is just
magical. - For those that have hit a glass ceiling, are you pulling the right levers? Are
you pulling the levers that will make a big difference. There are three key
levers
a. Do I have the right people in my team? The talent, intellect and drive
b. Do I have the right culture? The collegiateness, work ethic, risk
appetite and how they manage conflict
c. Does my team have the right tools? - Once I change my beliefs, when I come back to a problem you'll see it in a
different way. Its actually the notion of learning. You can do this by creating
emotional intensity in the team, both positive and negative that is good for the
team. And how do you manage it so it doesn't get personal. - Three big levers - the right people, the right culture, the right tools. You get
those three things together and it is amazing what a group of people can do. - You've got find out what drives you, then you find out how you can harness it
and then you have to figure out how to harness that for others - Political correctness is at the other end of the spectrum to authenticity
- Hold a whole conversation with only open questions. E.g. What do you think
about? how do you feel about? how did you come to this conclusion? - If you want to get really good at something, find someone who is really good
or world class at it and go and work for them and learn from them. If you’re
going to be a CEO you have to learn how to make money. Go and find
someone that you think is probably the best moneymakers available and go
and work from them. I am against generalist mentors. Find specific mentors
for specific purposes. - Most successful people I've met have an inquiring mind. To get the most of
your mind there needs to be lots of stimulus - My leadership style has always been about working through others to get
outcomes. - If you're the boss and you’re running flat-out and then someone wants
something more from you, you've got nothing to give - Distraction is the source of all waste (for middle managers). Learn to
differentiate between what the urgency and importance in prioritising your
work. (See Covey’s Quadrants below) - If you find your meetings are going too long make everyone stand up. They'll
go for half the time. - One question you should ask yourself everyday: “Am I creating the right
stimulus to get me to the next place I want to be?”
Nominated Charity:
Jonathan’s nominated charity is Team Rubicon Australia and I’ve made a donation of
$250 in Jonathan’s name for coming on the show. http://teamrubiconaus.org
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In this episode you’ll hear from Vivek Bhatia. At age 26, Vivek was a Indian migrant watching the big businessmen in their expensive suits walk around Sydney. This inspiring story is how he rose above the pack to become a CEO in just 10 years. Vivek is now CEO and MD of iCare which delivers insurance and care services to the people of New South Wales. Whether a person is severely injured in the workplace or on the road, iCare supports their long-term care needs to improve quality of life outcomes, including helping people return to work. In 2008, Vivek was appointed CEO of Wesfarmers Insurance in Australia, where he was responsible for leading the multi-brand, multi-channel insurer through a significant transformation journey. He was also co-lead of McKinsey & Company’s Asia Pacific Restructuring & Transformation practice and has been the Chair of the former NSW Dust Diseases Board and been the NSW representative on the Board of SafeWork Australia. Key Points: Vivek outlines that “the day you stop learning is the day you stop living” and how important it is to have a commercial mind and social heart. Vivek’s top quotes throughout the podcast are: 1. “Your boss is your customer. Work with them to determine the right priorities across the business.” 2. “Get the right people reporting to you and delegate more so you have more time to work on the business. If you find yourself doing things that you would expect your team to do then that is an alarm bell.” 3. “If people haven't had set backs, my personal belief is that they haven't challenged themselves or challenged the status quo which is even worse.” 4. “If you haven't clearly articuled what you expect and then confirmed that the other person hasn't understood it in the same way then you aren't doing your job as a leader.” 5. “What I'm not looking for is someone who has been successful but there is collateral damage” 6. “People talk about networking as a means to an end, instead of an end unto itself. I believe in networking because I get to learn.” 7. “The biggest challenge that good leaders overcome is effective use of time.” 8. “Always look for what more you can do for your company (above your role description).” 9. “One thing I make sure I never do is to go into victim mentality mode” 10. “I strongly believe that individuals need to take ownership of their situation” 11. “Good leaders are very aware, they always have their antenna on. They always look for signals that are being passed overtly or covertly.” 12. “Networks don't happen by themselves” 13. “If I am not investing in myself, why would anyone else invest in me.” Nominated Charity: Vivek’s nominated charity is The Starlight Foundation and I’ve made a donation of $250 in Vivek’s name for coming on the show. https://starlight.org.au Recommended Books, Influencers and Learning: • Anything by Peter Drucker and Malcolm Gladwell • The Road to Character, David Brooks Listen on iTunes here: https://itun.es/au/87Pqkb.c Listen on Android: http://tunein.com/radio/The-Inner- Chief-p1004701/ http://www.stitcher.com/s?fid=141429
In this episode you'll hear from Paul Broad. Paul is one of the great reformers of modern Australian business. He has been a CEO for 28 years leading major reform in Hunter Water, Sydney Water, Powertel, AAPT, Infrastructure NSW and Snowy Hydro. He has led many of these companies through corporatization and user pays representing the biggest change in their organisational history. Key Points: Paul outlines how important it is to dream and believe in yourself, how as leader sometimes you have to break the rules to succeed and that success comes through personal power.
Dan outlines how important it is to stay the course, keep at it, leverage your networks and be grateful for what is around you. Dan covers 10 key topics throughout the podcast: 1.Stop spending all your time just working on your division and work on the organisation with the CEO 2.You have to demonstrate that you work for the betterment of the entire organisation 3.If you get down into the detail, you'll just annoy your people and hold them back 4.The role of the leader is to get a good team around you, set some good parameters, ask them how their going to achieve the goal, then give them some space. 5.We often waste time on developing the wrong people, when we should be cutting them. If after a month or two if you have a bad feeling about someone, its rare that they will come good. Look at how they manage people. A lot people are great atmanaging up, but kick down. 6.If you tolerate poor behaviour from one of your leaders then you're complicit in it. Let someone tell his or her story first. Be respectful. 7.We have a system that we stick to for family balance 8.Both times he got knocked back for exec team roles, something good came of it. Make sure you respond well to disappointments. 9.You've got to get comfortable with uncomfortable conversations. You do have to steel yourself for them. You've got tobe prepared and have examples. 10.Very rarely will people say no when you ask them to be a mentor. Dan’s nominated charity is Running for Premature Babies and I’ve made a donation of $250 in Dan’s name for coming on the show. http://www.runningforprematurebabies.com Recommended Books: Good to Great - Jim Collins Copyright: (c) 2017 Greg Layton, Chief Maker URL: chiefmaker.com.au
In this episode you'll hear from Mike Pratt.
Mike is the Commissioner for Service, NSW Government, leading major service reform across the NSW Government. He is also Deputy Chancellor of Western Sydney University, Chairman of Bennelong Funds Management and a Non-Executive Director of Credit Union Australia. Mike was CEO of Consumer and SME Banking, North East Asia, with Standard Chartered Bank. He is a former President of the Australian Institute of Banking & Finance.He was also Group Executive of Westpac Business & Consumer Banking, CEO of National Australia Bank in Australia and CEO of Bank of New Zealand. He was also CEO of Bank of Melbourne.
Previous directorships include Non-Executive Director of MasterCard International Inc, New York, Non-Executive Director of MasterCard, Asia Pacific, Non-Executive Director of BT Financial Services, Chairman of Shenzen Credit.
Mike outlines how important it is to be well prepared, build out your network, incorporate lifelong learning, be disciplined, maintain transparency and integrity in all you do. And to never forget - its all about relationships, what matters more than anything is relationships
Mike also has some great tips on getting great mentors and what you need to be on top of in the future of business.
Nominated Charity:
I have made a $250 donation in Mike's name to Plan International - www.plan.org.au
Recommended Books:
Leading Change, John Kotter
The Long Walk to Freedom, Nelson Mandela
The Service Profit Chain, Heskett and Sasser
Copyright: (c) 2017 Greg Layton, Chief Maker
URL: chiefmaker.com.au
In this episode Kevin outlines how to seize the future, be proactive and take risks and will help you be successful in the modern business world.
We discuss many topics like:
- A manager is someone who achieves things through others.
- Be humble and maintain fierce resolve
- Deciding who is on the bus. And you've got to decide before you know where the bus is - going. To pick the people that are going to be with you on the journey. And decide where you're going together.
- When you're acting up in a role don't make this mistake that this is part time. Act as if you have the full authority of the role. It is full commitment.
- Unlocking human potential is what will keep you excited everyday.
- Have a reptuation of working well in teams and getting things done.
- No triangles. If two people keep coming to you with their problems with each other get them together in a room to talk and remove yourself from the conversation.
- It's not about the technical. It is always about the people.
- Whenever you get a chance to relieve, you double down your effort and exceed expectations
- I always believe that even in the worst problem there is always a solution there waiting for you.
Kevin nominated www.wateraid.org for his charity and I have donated $250 in his name.
Book Recommendations:
The Avantage, Patrick Lencioni.
OPEN ON ITUNES
https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/kevin-young-md-sydney-water/id1245880060?i=1000386277633&mt=2
Copyright: (c) 2017 Greg Layton, Chief Maker
URL: chiefmaker.com.au