ScaleX™ Insider Podcast

Today, I am revisiting my conversation with Cameron Herold. Known by Many Leaders as "The Business Growth Guru" Cameron Herold is a top business consultant, best-selling author, and speaker. He's the mastermind behind hundreds of companies' exponential growth and he's touched thousands of businesses indirectly through his work. At age 21, he had 14 employees. By 35, he'd helped build his first two $100 million companies. By the age of 42, Cameron had engineered 1-800-GOT-JUNK?'s spectacular growth from $2 Million to $106 Million in revenue in just six years. His companies landed over 5,200 media placements in those same six years, including coverage on Oprah. Not simply a theory guy, Cameron teaches what he knows from experience and is passionate about sharing his expertise with today's most dynamic business leaders. He is a best-selling author and has published five books including The Miracle Morning, Double Double, Meetings Suck, Free PR, and Vivid Vision. According to Cameron, vision statements don't work and for those business leaders listening today that think they just need to update or review their vision statement, Cameron Herold would recommend that you flush it down the toilet and start again. Key points we talk about include: How to use the vivid vision concept to help make your dreams happen The importance of creating a vision to inspire people to get involved Why you should focus on the 'Who' and not the 'How' when it comes to executing What characterises Elon Musk's brilliance How can use vision to great effect Key Takeaway "Entrepreneurs need to tell themselves that their role is to share the vision, infuse people with energy and help remove obstacles for people." Contact Cameron LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cameronherold/?originalSubdomain=ca Website: https://cameronherold.com/ Your Vision Statement Sucks | Cameron Herold | TEDxVancouver - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCgK5M3hY8Y Invest in Your Leaders Course - https://investinyourleaders.com/ Buy the book: Vivid Vision: A Remarkable Tool for Aligning Your Business Around a Shared Vision of the Future Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3D1tupp Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3L2HAcV Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Brendan is a global business leader who builds profitable, scalable businesses by delivering on his strong personal belief that anything is possible. Over seventeen years, twelve as CEO of CDE Group, he helped the company achieve 25x revenue growth and become an industry leader. During his time as CEO the company delivered almost £500 million ($750 million) cumulative revenue and £50 million ($75 million) cumulative profit from more than 90 countries. The company also generated considerable cash reserves and became a revered leader in its industry. Driven by his own desire to inspire, connect and enable ambitious leaders of SMEs to scale with purpose, he co-founded Simple Scaling with Claire Colvin with whom he co-authored Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10x your business. Brendan also acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of CDE Group). In 2016, he was awarded the Institute of Directors, UK Young Director of the Year and Overall, Director of the Year. Brendan is also a regular keynote speaker, the host of the popular ScaleX™ Insider Podcast and is also a Wim Hof Instructor. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

In today's episode I'm revisiting the show with Tom Kolditz who shared some fantastic insights on leadership. Tom is the founding Director of the Ann and John Doerr Institute for New Leaders at Rice University. The Doerr Institute was recognised in 2019 as the top university leader development program by the Association of Leadership Educators and named the 4th Leader Development Program in the world by Global Gurus, London. He has been named as a leadership Thought Leader by the Leader to Leader Institute and as a Top Leader Development Professional by Leadership Excellence. In 2020, he has continued to be ranked in the global top 25 coaches and in 2021, the #6 Start-up expert worldwide. He developed the concept of in extremis leadership—an original crisis leadership model—while serving in the oil fields and palace cities in Iraq. His book on that topic, In Extremis Leadership: Leading as if Your Life Depended On It, is used in at least 8 service academies in the US, China, Japan, and Israel. His second book, Leadership Reckoning: Can Higher Education Develop the Leaders We Need, is driving a leader development reform movement in higher education in collaboration with the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. In today's episode, Tom talks about: How leadership is about giving people what they need How to build trust and respect as a leader and make your team want to follow you The importance of emotional intelligence in leadership The mistakes many leaders make when attempting to win the trust of those they serve. How to identify leaders in your organisation The importance of getting to know your people Why every leader needs feedback How actions speak much louder than words. The role that education today has claimed in developing leaders for the future. Key Takeaway "Leadership is about giving people what they need. It's not about the quality of an individual or a style. People don't care about style; they just have needs. You need to see the world through the eyes of your people to influence and motivate them and give them direction and purpose". Contact Tom LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tom-kolditz-7116a3/ Website: https://tomkolditz.com/ Buy Tom's Book In Extremis Leadership: Leading As If Your Life Depended On It https://mybook.to/In-Extremis Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Brendan is a global business leader who builds profitable, scalable businesses by delivering on his strong personal belief that anything is possible. Over seventeen years, twelve as CEO of CDE Group, he helped the company achieve 25x revenue growth and become an industry leader. During his time as CEO the company delivered almost £500 million ($750 million) cumulative revenue and £50 million ($75 million) cumulative profit from more than 90 countries. The company also generated considerable cash reserves and became a revered leader in its industry. Driven by his own desire to inspire, connect and enable ambitious leaders of SMEs to scale with purpose, he co-founded Simple Scaling with Claire Colvin with whom he co-authored Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10x your business. Brendan also acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of CDE Group). In 2016, he was awarded the Institute of Directors, UK Young Director of the Year and Overall, Director of the Year. Brendan is also a regular keynote speaker, the host of the popular ScaleX™ Insider Podcast and is also a Wim Hof Instructor. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

In today's episode I'm delighted to re-introduce Claire Colvin. Claire has worked as a partner to business leaders and entrepreneurs of high growth businesses helping them to scale through their people. As the former Talent Director on the Board of a rapidly growing global organisation, Claire built the optimum people centred structures and systems to enable the company to significantly scale across 6 continents. Prior to that, she spent almost 15 years with an award-winning, technology SME, which operated in a highly competitive environment. Finding great talent is the #1 reason why businesses are unable to scale. In 2019, Claire became my business partner and we set out on a journey of discovery to extensively research exemplars of scaling to identify the key attributes that made them successful. In today's episode, Brendan and Claire talk about: The importance of a vision and purpose The difference between growing and scaling Removing self-limiting beliefs and the importance of psyche when scaling a business How to turn your fear into energy and excitement How recruitment has changed and how to maximise your social capital to ensure that you attract the best talent The importance of culture and the right Employee Value Proposition (EVP) Contact Claire LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/claire-colvin-586a162b/ Link to Scaling Your Business Templates https://simplescaling.com/scalex-templates Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Brendan is a global business leader who builds profitable, scalable businesses by delivering on his strong personal belief that anything is possible. Over seventeen years, twelve as CEO of CDE Group, he helped the company achieve 25x revenue growth and become an industry leader. During his time as CEO the company delivered almost £500 million ($750 million) cumulative revenue and £50 million ($75 million) cumulative profit from more than 90 countries. The company also generated considerable cash reserves and became a revered leader in its industry. Driven by his own desire to inspire, connect and enable ambitious leaders of SMEs to scale with purpose, he co-founded Simple Scaling with Claire Colvin with whom he co-authored Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10x your business. Brendan also acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of CDE Group). In 2016, he was awarded the Institute of Directors, UK Young Director of the Year and Overall, Director of the Year. Brendan is also a regular keynote speaker, the host of the popular ScaleX™ Insider Podcast and is also a Wim Hof Instructor. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

Joining me today is Sharon Lechter. She is an entrepreneur, international speaker, best-selling author, mentor, philanthropist, licensed CPA for 35 years and a Chartered Global Management Accountant. Sharon is the premier expert for financial literacy and entrepreneurial success. Sharon co-authored the international bestseller Rich Dad Poor Dad and has released 14 other books in the Rich Dad series. Over 10 years as the co-founder and CEO, she built the empire into the world's leading personal finance brand. In 2008, she was asked by the Napoleon Hill Foundation to help re-energize the powerful teachings of Napoleon Hill. Sharon has released four best-selling books in cooperation with the Foundation, including Think and Grow Rich-Three Feet from Gold, Outwitting the Devil, Success and Something Greater, and her latest project, Think and Grow Rich for Women, released in June of 2014. She is also featured in the 2017 movie Think and Grow Rich: The Legacy and has released the book Save Wisely, Spend Happily in cooperation with the American Institute of CPAs. Sharon is a highly sought-after mentor and has worked with major brands like Disney and Time Warner and served two U.S. Presidents as an advisor on the topic of financial literacy. Everything about Sharon's career centers around impacting others to improve their financial IQ, access untapped potential personally and in business, and create their own legacy. Everything changed in 2012 however when Sharon's son unexpectedly died. All of Sharon's successes seemed to fade into the background. She kept working, but on autopilot. She stopped playing at the level she always had and just started coasting. Until now. Now, Sharon is back and playing big again, and she wants you to as well with the Play Big Movement. It's time to shed the limitations that have stopped you in the past. It's time to play big, master your money and time and create maximum impact. In today's conversation we will explore: Managing your fears and managing your energy, The 6ps to scaling and exiting profitably The importance of investing time as opposed to spending time Choose your front row wisely Sharon's personal success equation Quote "You can make money, lose money and make it back. But when your time is gone it's gone. As I sit before you right now, I'm 68 years old so my time is even more precious. We have to guard our time so that we are focused on our mission, because if people keep draining your time you're not moving forward. You really need to be very stingy about your personal time and make sure that you have the systems that allow you to scale but also allow you to concentrate on the areas that will give you the greatest growth." Contact Sharon LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharonlechter/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorSharonLechter Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sharonlechter/ Website: https://sharonlechter.com/ - Find out more about Sharon's Programmes Resources https://atm.sharonlechter.com/ - Access Sharon's ATM which gives you daily deposits of Abundance, Tips & Mentoring https://success.sharonlechter.com/personal-success-equation - Discover your personalized formula for income generation and lasting wealth https://simplescaling-25437777.hubspotpagebuilder.eu/scalex-expander - Use this tool to help you identify 'who' your strategic partners are and how to start connecting with them. Buy Sharon's Books Rich Dad, Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach Their Kids About Money - https://mybook.to/rich-dad-poor-dad Think and Grow Rich-Three Feet from Gold Outwitting the Devil - https://mybook.to/Outwitting-The-devil Think and Grow Rich for Women - https://mybook.to/Grow-Rich-For-Women Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Brendan is a global business leader who builds profitable, scalable businesses by delivering on his strong personal belief that anything is possible. Over seventeen years, twelve as CEO of CDE Group, he helped the company achieve 25x revenue growth and become an industry leader. During his time as CEO the company delivered almost £500 million ($750 million) cumulative revenue and £50 million ($75 million) cumulative profit from more than 90 countries. The company also generated considerable cash reserves and became a revered leader in its industry. Driven by his own desire to inspire, connect and enable ambitious leaders of SMEs to scale with purpose, he co-founded Simple Scaling with Claire Colvin with whom he co-authored Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10x your business. Brendan also acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of CDE Group). In 2016, he was awarded the Institute of Directors, UK Young Director of the Year and Overall, Director of the Year. Brendan is also a regular keynote speaker, the host of the popular ScaleX™ Insider Podcast and is also a Wim Hof Instructor. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/

Oren Klaff is one of the world's leading experts on sales, raising capital and negotiation. With securities markets experience in capital raising advisory leadership, Oren is Director of Capital Markets at investment bank Intersection Capital, where he manages its capital-raising platform. Since 2005, Oren has since grown the firm history to approximately $2 billion in aggregate trade volume across a diversified portfolio of companies and transactions. Oren is the author of two books, Pitch Anything and Flip the Script. In today's conversation we will explore: How venture capital and private equity growth capital can impact the real vision of your scaling company Why understanding the evolutionary flaw in our brain is critical for successfully pitching your ideas The importance of Frame Resets and controlling the frame with investors and partners Why a 'no' is perfectly fine when dealing with negotiations The importance of 5050 relationships Oren's secret to achieving any outcome you want leveraging his strong method of pitching Quote "When you are trying to gain someone's approval, you are putting yourself in a low status position." Contact Oren Website: https://orenklaff.com/ Buy Oren's Books Pitch Anything - https://mybook.to/Pitch-Anything Flip the Script - https://mybook.to/Flip-The-Script Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Brendan is a global business leader who builds profitable, scalable businesses by delivering on his strong personal belief that anything is possible. Over seventeen years, twelve as CEO of CDE Group, he helped the company achieve 25x revenue growth and become an industry leader. During his time as CEO the company delivered almost £500 million ($750 million) cumulative revenue and £50 million ($75 million) cumulative profit from more than 90 countries. The company also generated considerable cash reserves and became a revered leader in its industry. Driven by his own desire to inspire, connect and enable ambitious leaders of SMEs to scale with purpose, he co-founded Simple Scaling with Claire Colvin with whom he co-authored Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10x your business. Brendan also acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of CDE Group). In 2016, he was awarded the Institute of Directors, UK Young Director of the Year and Overall, Director of the Year. Brendan is also a regular keynote speaker, the host of the popular ScaleX™ Insider Podcast and is also a Wim Hof Instructor. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

By his 35th birthday MIKE MICHALOWICZ had founded and sold two multi-million-dollar companies. Confident that he had the formula to success, he became a small business 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. Mike has devoted his life to the research and delivery of innovative, impactful entrepreneurial strategies to you. Mike is the creator of Profit First, which is used by hundreds of thousands of companies across the globe to drive profit. He is the creator of Clockwork, a powerful method to make any business run on automatic. He is the author of Fix This Next, an instant Wall Street Journal Bestseller, The Pumpkin Plan, Surge and The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur. His newest book, Get Different, teaches entrepreneurs how to create marketing that can't be ignored. Over half a million people have read his books. Today, Mike leads two new multi-million-dollar ventures, as he tests his latest business research for his books. He is a former small business columnist for The Wall Street Journal and business makeover specialist on MSNBC. Mike is a popular main stage keynote speaker on innovative entrepreneurial topics; and is the author of Get Different, Fix This Next, Clockwork, Profit First, Surge, The Pumpkin Plan and The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur. Fabled author, Simon Sinek deemed Mike Michalowicz "…the top contender for the patron saint of entrepreneurs." In today's conversation we will explore: The DAD Framework for effective marketing How we need to overcome our fear in order to reach a wider customer base The importance of experimentation and measuring your marketing results Minimum viable marketing and how to authentically be different Quote "Growth is achieving more results through more effort. Scaling is achieving more results through less effort." Contact Michael Website: https://mikemichalowicz.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemichalowicz/ Buy Michael's Book Get Different: Marketing That Can't Be Ignored! Link to book: mybook.to/Get-Different Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Brendan is a global business leader who builds profitable, scalable businesses by delivering on his strong personal belief that anything is possible. Over seventeen years, twelve as CEO of CDE Group, he helped the company achieve 25x revenue growth and become an industry leader. During his time as CEO the company delivered almost £500 million ($750 million) cumulative revenue and £50 million ($75 million) cumulative profit from more than 90 countries. The company also generated considerable cash reserves and became a revered leader in its industry. Driven by his own desire to inspire, connect and enable ambitious leaders of SMEs to scale with purpose, he co-founded Simple Scaling with Claire Colvin with whom he co-authored Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10x your business. Brendan also acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of CDE Group). In 2016, he was awarded the Institute of Directors, UK Young Director of the Year and Overall, Director of the Year. Brendan is also a regular keynote speaker, the host of the popular ScaleX™ Insider Podcast and is also a Wim Hof Instructor. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Mark is an Entrepreneur, Teacher, Writer, Speaker, and Vistage Chair. Mark started his entrepreneurial career early selling bicycles on the street corner of his childhood home at age eight or nine. He is the Founder of two Inc 500/5000 companies – Zweig Group (formerly Zweig White) and Mark Zweig, Inc. He built, sold, and bought back and resold his interest Zweig Group, a management consulting, publishing, media and training company founded in 1988. He built Mark Zweig, a design/ build/ contract/ development company which he founded in 2005. Mark has also been an owner and investor in a number of other ventures and served on the BODs of a dozen or so privately held companies throughout the US. He has written more than a dozen books on management such as Management from A to Zweig, Management ideas that Work and Find the Lost Dollars. He also published the Zweig Letter, the leading management newsletter for the AE (architecture and engineering) industry for more than 28 years. He is also an Executive in-residence teaching entrepreneurship at the Sam M. Walton College of the Business at the University of Arkansas. In today's conversation we will explore: Confessions from an entrepreneur who has led successful scaling businesses The importance of creating a plan aligned to a vision Why marketing is critical for scaling and some ideas to inspire better marketing for your organisation How Mark motivated his colleagues by creating a fun culture The risk of having an organisation that's too formally structured Quote "You better have a purpose, or it will all become meaningless." Contact Mark LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martin-schilling-2b4b5322/ Buy Mark's Books Management From A to Zweig, Revised Edition Link to book: mybook.to/managementfromAtoZweig Look out for Mark's new book 'Confessions of an Entrepreneur' Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Brendan is a global business leader who builds profitable, scalable businesses by delivering on his strong personal belief that anything is possible. Over seventeen years, twelve as CEO of CDE Group, he helped the company achieve 25x revenue growth and become an industry leader. During his time as CEO the company delivered almost £500 million ($750 million) cumulative revenue and £50 million ($75 million) cumulative profit from more than 90 countries. The company also generated considerable cash reserves and became a revered leader in its industry. Driven by his own desire to inspire, connect and enable ambitious leaders of SMEs to scale with purpose, he co-founded Simple Scaling with Claire Colvin with whom he co-authored Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10x your business. Brendan also acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of CDE Group). In 2016, he was awarded the Institute of Directors, UK Young Director of the Year and Overall, Director of the Year. Brendan is also a regular keynote speaker, the host of the popular ScaleX™ Insider Podcast and is also a Wim Hof Instructor. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Shirish Nadkarni – Why finding your value proposition and deep customer empathy is critical to scaling If you are out to change the world, Shirish Nadkarni is your go-to coach to guide you through your entrepreneurial journey to make your startup dream come true. Shirish Nadkarni is a serial entrepreneur with proven success in creating multiple consumer businesses that have scaled to tens of millions of users worldwide. Shirish was the co-founder of Livemocha, the world's largest language learning site with 15+ million registered members from over 200 countries. Livemocha was acquired by RosettaStone in 2013. Prior to Livemocha, Shirish was the founder of TeamOn Systems, a mobile wireless e-mail pioneer that was acquired by BlackBerry in 2002. The TeamOn technology served as the core foundation for Blackberry Internet E-mail which serviced over 50 million BlackBerry users. Shirish started his career at Microsoft where he engineered the acquisition of Hotmail and launched MSN.Com which became a leading web portal in the early days of the internet. Shirish received his MBA from Harvard Business School and a BSE in Electrical Engineering from the University of Michigan. He serves on the board of TiE Seattle where he chairs a number of programs including the GoVertical Startup Creation Workshop, the TiE Entrepreneur Institute, and the Z5 Catalyst funding initiative. In today's conversation we discuss: The importance of maintaining two pizza teams How sales motion undergirds scaling ambition Deploying a strategy of land and expand and creating products which are inherently viral Insights into the leadership characteristics within Microsoft and what they can learn from Apple and what Apple can learn from Microsoft How finding your value proposition and deep customer empathy is critical to scaling fundraising fundamentals to scale your business successfully Quote "There are several things that you need to do to scale your company. First of all, you need to have the appropriate funding. The next step is to hire the right people. You need to hire a marketing team, a VP of marketing, then you need to hire a sales team and customer support team and then you need to invest in articulating the value proposition and establishing a sales motion where you perfect the messaging and the process by which you attract customers. Give them options to try out the product and ultimately sell them. This process is called the sales motion and you need to perfect that sales motion so that we can just simply eventually pull money into that and drive revenues and sales for your company." Contact Shirish LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/shirishn/ Twitter - https://twitter.com/search?q=shirish%20Nadkani%20&src=typed_query Buy Shirish's Book From Startup to Exit: An Insider's Guide to Launching and Scaling Your Tech Business Amazon - mybook.to/fromstartuptoexit Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Dr. Margaret Heffernan produced programmes for the BBC for 13 years. She then moved to the US where she spearheaded multimedia productions for Intuit, The Learning Company and Standard & Poors. She was Chief Executive of InfoMation Corporation, ZineZone Corporation and then iCast Corporation, was named one of the "Top 25" by Streaming Media magazine and one of the "Top 100 Media Executives" by The Hollywood Reporter. The author of six books, Margaret's third book, Wilful Blindness: Why We Ignore the Obvious at our Peril was named one of the most important business books of the decade by the Financial Times. In 2015, she was awarded the Transmission Prize for A Bigger Prize: Why Competition isn't Everything and How We Do Better, described as "meticulously researched... engagingly written... universally relevant and hard to fault." Her TED talks have been seen by over twelve million people and in 2015 TED published Beyond Measure: The Big Impact of Small Changes. Her most recent book, Uncharted: How to map the future was published in 2020. She is a Professor of Practice at the University of Bath, Lead Faculty for the Forward Institute's Responsible Leadership Programme and, through Merryck & Co., mentors CEOs and senior executives of major global organizations. She holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Bath and continues to write for the Financial Times and the Huffington Post. In today's conversation we will explore: The importance of creating social capital to foster a strong scaling culture How to spot emerging leaders creating a foundation for scaling How we should give people hard problems to solve The need for leaders to be able to deal with ambiguity Why we should lean into experimentation Why we should cultivate diversity in our organisations and in all aspects of life Quote "Having a coach means you schedule thinking time. Thinking is pretty much what you are paid to do but it generally seems to be the one thing nobody ever has time for. Coaching simply brings a discipline to your thinking that I think is really important. It's very difficult to think alone and most people can't do it for more than a few minutes. Therefore, thinking with a coach helps solve some challenges and provides prompts which creates a deeper, richer experience which most people can't create in isolation". Contact Margaret Website: https://www.mheffernan.com/ Buy Margaret's Books Uncharted - How to Map the Future Together - mybook.to/Howtomapthefuture The Naked Truth - A Working Woman's Manifesto on Business and What Really Matters - mybook.to/Nakedtruth Wilful Blindness - Why We Ignore the Obvious at our Peril - mybook.to/Wilfulblindness A Bigger Prize - Why Competition Isn't Everything and How We Do Better - mybook.to/Abiggerprize Beyond Measure - The Big Impact of Small Changes - mybook.to/Beyondmeasure Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Martin is the Managing Director of the Techstars Accelerator in Berlin, angel investor and entrepreneur. He believes that we need to build 750 more unicorn companies within the next 10 years in Europe to create millions of future jobs, make Europe more independent when it comes to technology and give many the opportunity to realize their full potential. Martin believes that 'builders' are the inventors of the 21st century and is doing everything in his power to support entrepreneurs working towards that mission. He is passionate about accelerating companies that make the planet a better place for humanity and connecting growth and purpose. In the past 15 years, Martin has co-created and scaled up five ventures, including Orphoz, a subsidiary for McKinsey & Company, a public company in Saudi-Arabia, the foundation MARA in Argentina and the FinTech N26. To support startup teams on their journey to build category-leading technology companies, Martin has written the book "The Builder's Guide to the Tech Galaxy – 99 Practices to Scale Startups into Unicorns Companies" (Haufe, Wiley). He speaks regularly on topics such as: Startup Mindset, Scaling Technology Companies, Customer Experience, B2B Negotiations, Entrepreneurship. In today's conversation we will explore: The four pillars which are fundamental to scaling The critical importance of setting a clear direction by virtue of your north star The Radar and Granny tests for purpose The secret to being number one in your category Some guidance on establishing optimal sales commission plans The importance of mindset for scaling Guidance on raising growth capital and creating FOMO to help secure investment for scale Quote "Having a crystal-clear purpose brings you three key advantages. First, it attracts customers and ensures growth and profitability. Studies show that companies that score higher on purpose have a much higher likelihood to be amongst the top performers in shareholder return. Two, it's attracts investments. Three, AAA talent decides for or against the company if you match their values." Contact Martin LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martin-schilling-2b4b5322/ Buy Martin's Book The Builder′s Guide to the Tech Galaxy – 99 Practices to Scale Startups into Unicorn Companies Link to book: Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3zMDEe6 Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3N1thpp Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Joining me today is Mithu Storoni a physician, a researcher, and the author of Stress Proof: The Scientific Solution to Protect Your Brain and Body—and Be More Resilient Every Day. The book is full of practical evidence-based steps for protecting yourself against stress and its effects. Mithu spent years combing through over 1,000 research papers and clinical studies before condensing her findings into a manual which then became her book 'Stress Proof'. Some of its contents are surprising for example smelling the scent of a lemon can help you relax. Mithu received her medical degree from the University of Cambridge, is certified in ophthalmology, and holds a PhD in neuro-ophthalmology. In today's conversation we will explore how to mitigate stress and overcome fear as you progress your scaling ambition. In today's conversation we will explore: The 7 pathways to stress proving an exploration of the unknown universe in our brains How controlling inflammation can aid better health How to develop a sense of self efficacy, agency, and confidence to support your scaling ambition The benefits of cold therapy How having a sense of purpose can support you eating well and living longer The counterintuitive recommendation for dealing with a highly stressful event The adaptation gap and the importance of getting comfortable with being uncomfortable Quote "You develop emotional reactivity so your rational way of thinking about the world is momentarily suppressed, and you become very emotionally responsive, and this has an advantage or had an advantage because this allowed us to predict danger before it happens by emotional instinct. Navigating a room full of people or a company full of employees, you cannot predict what another human being is saying or doing, and you also cannot predict other people's behaviour and control it. So, this now serves us in a poor way. In a state of acute stress people make high risk decisions. Decision making is skewed because the perception of reality is skewed. The negativity bias that happens during acute stress can sway your business decisions so always avoiding any kind of important decisions while you're acutely stressed is very important for this reason." Contact Mithu LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mithu-storoni/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/MithuStoroni Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mithustoroni/ Website: https://www.mithustoroni.com/ Buy Mithu's Book Stress-Proof: The ultimate guide to living a stress-free life for Individuals, Organisations and Life Link to book: mybook.to/stress-proof Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Jamil Qureshi is one of today's foremost practitioners of performance enhancing psychology and is an expert in high performing teams. Jamil has enjoyed working with a rich diversity of the most talented business and sports people and teams in the world, helping six individuals get to World Number 1. He has worked with 22 golfers inside the top 50 in the world, including the likes of Paul McGinley, Sergio Garcia, Darren Clarke as well as two world number one's. Ranked among the most influential figures in British sport in 2009, Jamil was voted in the top 100 most powerful men in golf 2008 by his international peers. He has worked successfully with 3 English Premiership football clubs, as well as 2 Formula 1 racing drivers, David Coulthard, and Eddie Irvine and the 2009 England Ashes winning cricketers. In business and industry, Jamil has worked from CEO and board level to middle management in a variety of sectors in over 24 different countries, helping teams to fulfil their potential by orchestrating change and performance programmes. He has developed and delivered management and leadership programmes at board level for Coca Cola, Hewlett Packard, Emirates Airlines, Serco, Marks and Spencer, and Royal Bank of Scotland. He has worked across Lloyds Banking Group on their 'Journey to World Class'. He has led teams responsible for change management in several high-profile areas, such as Lloyds Banking Group's substantial integration strategy, and with The Post Office to create The Post Office Way as they separated from Royal Mail. Jamil is also a world recognised speaker on all aspects of the psychology of performance, psychology of leadership, leadership attitudes, improving people, cultural change techniques, and team performance. Today we discuss: The importance of purpose and vision when scaling a business The importance of self-belief Why we need to be more curious What ambitious leaders should do to question the belief system The importance of gamification Why a lack of ambition from leaders is a mindset Quote "The reason why most people are limited in their ability to expand, progress and become more ambitious is their Belief System, it's what they believe to be true. The Belief System is probably the greatest inhibitor of human performance and holds us back more than anything else. Whatever we believe in regard to our stakeholders, our customers, our pricing points, our competition, globalisation, legislation, compliance, governance, all the things that affect business inside and out and whatever we believe holds us in place. For us to create bigger and better outcomes, we need to challenge our perspectives." Contact Jamil LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamil-qureshi-494661a/ Twitter - https://twitter.com/Jamil_Qureshi Buy Jamil's Book The Mind Coach: Be the person you really want to be Amazon - mybook.to/JamilQureshi Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Aidan McCullen is the host and founder of the Innovation Show, broadcast globally and on Ireland's national broadcaster, RTE. It's also the only English-speaking show on Finland's Business FM! It boasts such guests as Seth Godin, Rita McGrath and Charles Handy, and boasts Visa founder, Dee Hock, and Bill Gates amongst its listeners. Aidan is the author of the recently published book "Undisruptable: A Mindset of Permanent Reinvention for Individuals, Organisations and Life" with Wiley. Aidan's work as a change consultant, speaker, facilitator, and workshop leader is based on his direct experience of reinvention in his own life and career. During his time as a professional rugby player, he won over 100 caps playing for Leinster, Toulouse and London Irish, as well as becoming a full Ireland Rugby International. In his business life he developed the digital eco-system for Communicorp Radio Group, served as Head of Innovation for RTE (Ireland's National broadcaster), worked as an innovation consultant for Global company Katawave, and sits on the board of National Broadband Ireland. He has also created and delivers a module on Emerging Technology Trends in Dublin's Trinity College Business School, which is ranked 1st in Ireland and in the top 100 globally. Aidan's mastery of transformation in his own career from professional athlete to becoming one of Ireland's most recognized innovators in digital media has led to him being recognised as a thought leader in business transformation. Aidan believes that you cannot change business models until you change mental models. You cannot change what people do until you change how people think. Today we discuss: The wonderful Japanese Art of Kintsugi and how it can be applied to our thinking The importance of developing a psyche for scaling and knowing thyself How to exploit assets from the ashes Lessons in innovation from Amazon A word of caution for leaders to avoid the coconut trap as they scale Quote "Mistakes as the source of learning as long as they're not repeat mistakes are absolutely essential because when it comes to invention and innovation mistakes are symbiotic with those processes of invention and innovation. You have to make mistakes when you're trying something new. Celebrate them and if you can, I encourage you to create a Kintsugi Wall which is a wall which highlights the things you have tried and didn't work. It might have been timing, you might have been too early to the marketplace, you may have articulated it in the wrong way but if you harness and keep that idea, someone may come along and say, "Do you remember that idea…What if?' And that's Kintsugi thinking." Contact Aidan LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/aidanmccullen/ Useful Resources theinnovationshow.io Buy Aidan's Book "Undisruptable: A Mindset of Permanent Reinvention for Individuals, Organisations and Life" Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3N0s9Df Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3a5nVf9 Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

When scaling a business, what does it mean to become a liquid thinker? In this episode of the ScaleX™ Insider podcast, I'm speaking with international speaker and best-selling author, Damian Hughes. Damian combines his practical and academic background within sport, organisational development and change psychology, to help organisations and teams to create a high performing culture. He is the author of eight best-selling business books which have been translated into ten languages. He was appointed as a Professor of Organisational Psychology and Change for Manchester Metropolitan University in September 2010. He is the co-host of The High Performance Podcast, an acclaimed series of interviews with elite performers from business, sport and the arts, exploring the psychology behind sustained high performance. He has served as a member of the coaching team for England Rugby League, Scotland Rugby Union and a wide range of international and national sporting teams. His innovative and exciting approach has been praised by Sir Richard Branson, Muhammad Ali, Sir Terry Leahy, Sir Roger Bannister, Tiger Woods, Jonny Wilkinson and Sir Alex Ferguson. We cover many insights and topics in this episode including: What Damian has learned from working with elite sports professionals 5 different types of culture and what defines a high performing culture How success leaves clues Why not to leave the conversation at values What to do when fear and anxiety grips you Contact Damian LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/damian-hughes-a376121/ Website: https://liquidthinker.com/about-damian Get the book Liquid Thinking: Inspirational Lessons from the World′s Great Achievers mybook.to/Liquid-thinker High Performance: Lessons from the Best on Becoming the Best mybook.to/high-performance Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to re-introduce Claire Colvin. Claire has worked as a partner to business leaders and entrepreneurs of high growth businesses helping them to scale through their people. As the former Talent Director on the Board of a rapidly growing global organisation, Claire built the optimum people centred structures and systems to enable the company to significantly scale across 6 continents. Prior to that, she spent almost 15 years with an award winning, technology SME, which operated in a highly competitive environment. Finding great talent is the #1 reason why businesses are unable to scale. In 2019, Claire became my business partner and we set out on a journey of discovery to extensively research exemplars of scaling to identifying the key attributes that made them successful. In today's episode, Brendan and Claire talk about: The importance of future thinking The importance of belonging and culture Why it is important to expand internationally How to build value within your business Contact Claire LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/claire-colvin-586a162b/ Link to templates https://simplescaling.com/scalex-templates Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Andrew Sillitoe is a business psychologist, author, and speaker. His innovative approach to leadership and work-life balance has earned him invitations to work with a range of global companies, including Pfizer, Nationwide, Virgin, and the BBC. Today Andrew is the CEO at Team Head Coach which runs the UK's number- one training company for entrepreneurs and business owners who want to succeed in business, health, relationships, and mindset. Andrew has authored two books including, 'The Four Keys: How to Win in Your Business, Body, Relationships, and Mindset' and 'Manage The Mist: How to develop winning mindset and create high performing teams.' Throughout Andrew's life sport and business have always been intertwined. He was the first British player to play professional roller hockey in North America, competing for his country and was fortunate enough to pull on the jersey in 11 world championships. When he wasn't competing, he was managing teams, consulting with CEOs, and working as a performance coach with business leaders and teams throughout Europe, the Middle East, and the U.S. It was here in 2012 that he first identified the role of a 'player-coach' in business and where he saw high-performance contributors who were skilled at what they did become overwhelmed, stressed, and anxious because of what was happening in their business. He identified some glaring problems including lack of formal leadership training, poor time management skills, poor communication, an inability to delegate, but even with all this they were still performing well. Key points we talk about include: The four keys to support sustainable scaling The importance of personal transformation through inner work to affect your business scaling ambition Setting a personal and professional vision of how you will look, act, and feel in the future The importance of letting go and focusing on the things you can control Some personal practises and disciplines which help seed scaling mindset Key Takeaway 'Think about life in four keys - your business, your body, your relationship and your mindset. Some people think that they have got to be 100% at all of them. Like an equaliser, sometimes when you're scaling a business you think you need to be all in on the business putting in 12 to 13-hour days and 50-hour weeks, but it doesn't mean we switch the other three off which is sometimes what happens. We can become blind to the fact that it's more than that and business leaders need to ask themselves that if they only focus on work how will that show up in my relationships, what can I do for my body and my mind?' Contact Andrew Website: https://andrewsillitoe.com/ Buy the books: The 4 Keys: How to Win in Your Business, Body, Relationships, and Mindset: mybook.to/The-4-Keys Managing the Mist: How to Develop Winning Mind-Sets and Create High Performing Teams: mybook.to/managing-the-mist Get the Simple Scaling book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in six continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Norman is an inspirational international entrepreneur who founded multiple successful businesses including The Cloud - Europe's largest WIFI operator, Inspired Gaming Group - the world's largest company in the server-based gaming domain, Trinity Commerce - one of the first eCommerce services companies in the world and Crowley Carbon. Today, Norman Crowley is the Founder of Coolplanet, a family of revolutionary companies working in collaboration to cool the planet as fast as possible. He has successfully grown numerous businesses from start-ups to millions in annual sales through effective business planning, creative sales techniques, and innovative marketing. Listed as one of Ireland's top entrepreneurs, he was nominated for the 2011 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year and is known for his contagious passion for excellence, his talent for resourceful business solutions, and a capacity for motivational leadership. He is currently a Board member of i2e2 Research Centre which focuses on researching energy efficiency improvements and is on the board of First Step Georgia (FSG) – a not-profit organization dedicated to enhancing the quality of life for children with special needs. Today we discuss: Why developing a psyche for scaling by doing the inner work as a leader is absolutely critical. Why your proposition should focus on helping your customers with their bottom line as a Trojan horse for your own. Creating a structure to support your team and developing their tactical mental and spiritual capabilities. How to support high performers by addressing underperformance of other team members. How to generate the courage to communicate candidly. The importance of having big goals focused on making a greater global impact. The importance of hiring great people and those who are energy radiators aligned to your values. Quote "When you get up in the morning whether it's minding your children, or creating a startup or whatever you are doing, that is what defines you. The money is just points in the game. Don't confuse money being important with the reason why you're doing it. Money is just the speedometer that's telling you how fast you're going. It's really about what are you doing and the way you work. What I have learned by not retiring at 28 is that it's about the work which is why we were probably doing 6½ days a week and very long days and I haven't needed to work in 25 years." Contact Norman Twitter: @Normancrowley1 Website: www.coolplanet.ie Website: (cool electric cars): www.studioava.com/ Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Holger Seim is the Co-founder and CEO of Blinkist - One of Europe's most exciting startups that almost never existed. Founded in Berlin in 2012, Blinkist provides a selection of non-fiction knowledge in an app that makes it easy to fit learning into your everyday life. Highlighting key insights through audio and text explainers, called Blinks, original podcasts, and author-driven content, Blinkist is on a mission to help people turn ordinary moments into learning opportunities – it takes just 15 minutes to learn something new! Today, the app is already used by over 20 million people worldwide and at the start of this year the fast-growing company raised an additional €35 million to transform the way we learn and develop. In today's episode we talk about: The importance of coaching to help preserve Founder relationships and support scaling ambitions How scaling companies should focus on hiring a great people person early in their journey How Blinkist's purpose is helping provide a catalyst for growth by creating a competitive advantage The fundamentals of their scaling success including creating great cultures which encourage open communication, direct feedback in the moment The importance of the journey not necessarily the goal Quote: "You need to have trust because if there is no trust there is no psychological safety. On top of that you need to have the ability to have courageous conversations, hold each other accountable, have clarity of one goal and speak with one voice. We also need to build the muscle to have courageous conversations to be able to give critical feedback without diminishing trust. None of this comes for free as it doesn't just happen. Sometimes it happens because you get along perfectly but as your leadership team grows statistically it's very unlikely that everything will be smooth and there will be people that do not have the same preferences as you. All of us have shortcomings that we need to work on together and individually." Recommended Reading Marshall B. Rosenberg - Nonviolent Communication - A Language of Life: Life-Changing Tools for Healthy Relationships Buy on Amazon: mybook.to/MichaelBRosenberg Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Owen Eastwood is one of the most sought-after performance coaches in the world and has been engaged by high profile teams across the globe who are searching for competitive advantage through their culture. He currently works with the British Olympic Team and the English Football Team in their World Cup year and is serving on the board of Harlequins Rugby. He has previously worked with diverse teams such as the Command Group of NATO, the South African Cricket Team, corporate leadership teams and in elite ballet. Owen is a New Zealander with an Irish heritage and has a unique approach based on an evolutionary understanding of what makes a team of humans strong and weak. There are some incredible insights and some wonderful ancient wisdoms that we have stopped listening to and Owen's mission is to re-introduce people to those ideas. His book 'Belonging' is being released in paperback in the northern hemisphere (alongside the existing digital and audiobook) which looks at teaming through the lens of homo sapiens evolutionary story, our ancestor's wisdom and provides a glimpse into some elite contemporary environments. In today's episode we talk about: The importance of communicating your values through stories, specifically the 'story of us' celebrating diversity but also anchoring it to a shared sense of identity How we should measure our lives by the impact we have on others The importance of painting a picture of shared vision and the research which underpins this Practical and profound ideas for embedding behaviours you want to see within your organisation The importance of living above the line to support high performance and how environment is critical to success. Quote: "Your time in the sun will be revealed in due course and that's how we understand our place in the world and our connection with other people." Contact Owen: Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/owen-eastwood-4867a39/ Buy Owen's Book: Belonging: The Ancient Code of Toegtherness Amazon: mybook.to/OwenEastwood Simple Scaling Book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Today, I am speaking with Dr. Geoff Smart. Dr. Geoff Smart is the Chairman & Founder of ghSMART. Founded in 1995, ghSMART helps Fortune 500 CEOs & boards, billionaire entrepreneurs, and heads of state to confidently achieve their goals through hiring, developing, and leading talented teams. ghSMART serves clients globally from its 12 offices in North America and Europe. For three consecutive years, Forbes named ghSMART the best management consulting firm in its industry segment, based on thousands of surveys of business leaders. The firm was named one of the world's top firms in the book The Art of Managing Professional Services. ghSMART is the subject of two Harvard Business School Cases, titled "ghSMART & Co.: Pioneering in Professional Services." The firm has published three bestselling books. Who: The A Method for Hiring (Smart & Street) is a New York Times bestseller that is currently ranked #1 on Amazon.com on the topic of hiring talented teams. Shanghai Daily named Who a "Top 5 Business Book in China," Globe and Mail named it the "#1 Best Business Book of the Year," and the book was also listed in the 2015 Inc. Magazine article, "19 of the Best Books Written by Super‐Successful CEOs." Power Score: Your Formula for Leadership Success (Smart, Street, and Foster) is a Wall Street Journal bestseller, and appeared on an international newspaper's list of "The 10 Best Business Books of 2015." The CEO Next Door (Botelho & Powell) is a critically acclaimed New York Times bestseller. In addition, Dr. Smart published Leadocracy: Hiring More Great Leaders (Like You) into Government, a New York Times bestseller which won the IPPY Award and the Axiom Book Award for #1 Best Business Book of the Year. In the 1990s, Dr. Smart co‐created the Topgrading brand for talent management. He earned a B.A. in Economics with honors from Northwestern University, and a M.A. and Ph.D. in Psychology from Claremont Graduate University, where he was a student of management guru Peter F. Drucker. Key points we talk about include: The fundamental elements of ghSMART's own scaling success The four step A Framework for optimal hiring to increase your probability of success from 50% to 90% Hiring mistakes to avoid How best to structure the conversations so that everyone can benefit from your scaling success Three characteristics of high performing teams Four traits of great leaders Key Takeaway "Scaling with purpose is about aspiring to build a business that matters and has a net positive effect on the world. Great businesses are founded under the premise that helps someone solve a real need or problem. It is about building a business that has a big impact on others. Scaling a business without purpose would be blindly trying to make the revenue and profits go up without much regard for those who benefit." Contact Geoff LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drgeoffsmart/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/GeoffreySmart Email: https://ghsmart.com/ Buy the book Who: The A Method for Hiring Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3NYXx6k Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3NXsHee Power Score: Your Formula for Leadership Success Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3DY8Vuv Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3jk2vMP Book Recommendations Time Smart: How to Reclaim Your Time and Live a Happier Life Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3NRTQPA Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/38rJe9R The CEO Next Door: The 4 Behaviors that Transform Ordinary People into World-Class Leaders Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3Jox8eE Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3KuJYJq Simple Scaling book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Today, I am speaking with Cynthia Dearin. Cynthia is an international business strategist on a mission to empower business leaders to scale internationally and amplify their impact in the world. In 2001, Cynthia joined Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs & Trade and became a diplomat, representing Australia in the Middle East. A few years later, Cynthia traded the foreign service for management consultancy and worked with British and United States' governments in Iraq, to restart the economy and get businesses and government working again after 30 years of isolation and a decade of war. In 2010, Cynthia returned to Australia and became the first female CEO of the Australia-Arab Chamber of Commerce & Industry, working to create international opportunities for Australian business. She founded Dearin & Associates in 2013, assisting blue chip organisations such as ANZ, Qantas, Aurizon Rail, Abu Dhabi Government, Orica Mining, Qatar Airways, and the Victorian State Government, to lift their game on the global stage. Cynthia has also helped dozens of smaller companies to create and implement international strategies that increase momentum and revenue, and position them for global success. She is on a mission to empower business leaders to scale internationally and amplify their impact in the world. Key points we talk about include: The blueprint for international success The importance of creating strong professional and personal relationships as you scale internationally Having laser beam focus How research and data is critically important when entering new markets How we should celebrate diversity and seek to put ourselves in others' shoes Key Takeaway "If you want to amplify your impact especially if you are selling products or services that can really change people's lives and make a big change in the world then you need to do that outside your own back yard." Contact Cynthia LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cynthiadearin/?originalSubdomain=au Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cynthia.dearin.global Twitter: @cynthiadearin Email: [email protected] Buy the book: Business Beyond Borders: Take Your Company Global Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3qUSh9R Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3u3qIwO Simple Scaling book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

In this episode I am talking with Alan Williams. Alan is the Founder and Managing Director of SERVICEBRAND GLOBAL. SERVICEBRAND GLOBAL's purpose is to enable authentic service organisations to thrive and flourish in the new paradigm of what we term the Values Economy. This is done by helping progressive leaders to design, implement and improve a brand-aligned customer experience delivered by their employees, using the SERVICEBRAND approach to deliver significantly better, sustained business performance. SERVICEBRAND's projects have delivered measurable business impact across a balanced scorecard of measures and has been recognised with industry awards. Alan graduated in Hotel & Catering Administration at Surrey University where he has been a visiting lecturer and then enjoyed senior roles at InterContinental Hotels, Whitbread/Marriott, and Compass, leading £10-125m revenue businesses with large teams in demanding customer service environments before founding SERVICEBRAND GLOBAL in 2005. He is an international speaker and published author who has co-authored books about values "THE 31 PRACTICES: release the power of your organisation's VALUES every day" and "My 31 Practices: Release the power of your values for authentic happiness" have received international critical acclaim. Key points we talk about include: The importance of future thinking How to determine your organisation's values, who should be involved and how to turn values into a conscious daily practice through the 31 Practices Framework The importance of celebrating success How values provide the framework for culture The importance of delivering brilliant customer service Key Takeaway "Values are defined as what is really important to us. They are our emotionally laden motivators. They are what guides us in the decisions we make, the choices we make and our behaviours." Contact Alan LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alanservicebrandglobal/?originalSubdomain=uk Website: http://www.servicebrandglobal.com/ Buy the book: The 31 Practices: Release the power of your organization VALUES every day Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/36MQ3C8 Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3wNhaI2 Simple Scaling book Check out our book, an Amazon Best-Seller: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

Known by Many Leaders as "The Business Growth Guru" Cameron Herold is a top business consultant, best-selling author, and speaker. He's the mastermind behind hundreds of companies' exponential growth and he's touched thousands of businesses indirectly through his work. At age 21, he had 14 employees. By 35, he'd helped build his first two $100 million companies. By the age of 42, Cameron had engineered 1-800-GOT-JUNK?'s spectacular growth from $2 Million to $106 Million in revenue in just six years. His companies landed over 5,200 media placements in those same six years, including coverage on Oprah. Not simply a theory guy, Cameron teaches what he knows from experience and is passionate about sharing his expertise with today's most dynamic business leaders. He is a best-selling author and has published five books including The Miracle Morning, Double Double, Meetings Suck, Free PR, and Vivid Vision. According to Cameron, vision statements don't work and for those business leaders listening today that think they just need to update or review their vision statement, Cameron Herold would recommend that you flush it down the toilet and start again. Key points we talk about include: How to use the vivid vision concept to help make your dreams happen The importance of creating a vision to inspire people to get involved Why you should focus on the 'Who' and not the 'How' when it comes to executing What characterises Elon Musk's brilliance How can use vision to great effect Key Takeaway "Entrepreneurs need to tell themselves that their role is to share the vision, infuse people with energy and help remove obstacles for people." Contact Cameron LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cameronherold/?originalSubdomain=ca Website: https://cameronherold.com/ Your Vision Statement Sucks | Cameron Herold | TEDxVancouver - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCgK5M3hY8Y Invest in Your Leaders Course - https://investinyourleaders.com/ Buy the book: Vivid Vision: A Remarkable Tool for Aligning Your Business Around a Shared Vision of the Future Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3D1tupp Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3L2HAcV Simple Scaling book Check our Amazon Best-Seller book: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

In this episode, I'm speaking with Michael Gelb. Michael is the world's leading authority on the application of genius thinking to personal and organizational development. Michael is a pioneer in the fields of creative thinking, innovative leadership and executive coaching. Michael is a Senior Fellow at The Center for Humanistic Management and a member of the Leading People and Organizations Advisory Board at the Fordham University Gabelli School of Business. He was also awarded a Batten Fellowship in Innovation from the University of Virginia's Darden Graduate School of Business, and co-directed the acclaimed Leading Innovation Seminar there for more than 10 years. In 1999, Michael was honored as "Brain of the Year" by the Brain Trust Charity – other recipients include Steven Hawking, Garry Kasparov and Edward De Bono. He is the author of 17 books including, How to Think Like Leonardo Da Vinci, Discover Your Genius, Innovate Like Edison, and The Art of Connection: 7 Relationship Building Skills Every Leader Needs Now. Michael's books have been translated into 25 languages and have sold more than one million copies. Recent releases include The Healing Organization: Awakening the Conscience of Business to Help Save the World, co-authored with Prof. Raj Sisodia, and Mastering the Art of Public Speaking: 8 Secrets to Transform Fear and Supercharge Your Career. Key points we talk about include: 7 principles to help you model Leonardo's creativity and learning skills, so you can think creatively, sharpen your mind, expand your self-expression, liberate your intelligence, and fulfil your true potential. Powerful questions to improve the quality of your personal and professional life. Why your brain is better than you think and an approach to using your whole brain to see the bigger picture The importance of a growth mindset Why people want false security and why we fear failure The importance of a coach who understands the power of a higher purpose and who can develop your growth mindset How you can make life more beautiful for you and others The power of journaling The mindset of the leader Key Takeaway "Learning from experience of course means learning from mistakes and it's another reason that businesses don't scale. The more you scale, the easier it is to have a public fail. For Da Vinci there's no such thing as failure, there's just feedback." Contact Michael LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gelb/ Website: https://michaelgelb.com/home Webinar How To Think Like Leonardo da Vinci: Supercharge Your Creativity! Reignite Your Passion! Create Your Dream Life! - www.geniusmastery.com Buy the book: How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci: Seven Steps to Genius Every Day Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3qa4yqm Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3Jjnhaw Our Book Check out our book: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business available from the 15 March on Amazon About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team Contact Simple Scaling: www.simplescaling.com

In this episode I'm speaking with Nick Bradley. Nick Bradley is a world-renowned business growth expert, who works with entrepreneurs, business leaders, and investors, building high-value companies. Over the last decade, he has built, bought, and sold 24 businesses with a combined valuation of $5.2 billion dollars. He also works with Private Equity and Venture Capital firms across the UK and the US leading business turnarounds, mergers, acquisitions, and scale-ups. He is also the co-founder of The Fielding Group, a growth consultancy that helps companies improve business performance. In addition to this, Nick owns 7 other businesses and is always looking to build his portfolio via acquisitions and joint ventures. Originally from Australia, Nick is a dedicated family man who has a strong background in physical fitness, having completed 67 marathons and 24 ultra-marathons worldwide. He is also a qualified personal trainer and performance coach. He is absolutely committed to personal growth, becoming the best version of himself, and inspiring others to achieve the same. His mission is to help create business empires with impact – bringing entrepreneurial skillset and mindset to people all over the world as a driving force of progression and prosperity. Key points we talk about include: Why you can only scale a business to the level of your identity How to achieve freedom, accumulate wealth, and accelerate impact How to achieve scale through acquisition as well as organic growth The difference between Private Equity and Venture Capital Values – how important are they? When you should seek to exit your business How mindset is fundamental to scaling your business The top three questions every business leader should be asking themselves right now Key Takeaway "Scaling with purpose is asking for something greater than yourself. It is digging in, showing up and taking the required actions even if it feels uncomfortable because the impact that you want to make for yourself, or the world is more important than anything else." Contact Nick LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/therealnickbradley/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/therealnickbradley/ Website: https://www.fielding.global/about Check out our book: Simple Scaling: 10 Proven Principles to 10X Your Business available from the 15 March on Amazon About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Claire Colvin. Claire has worked as a partner to business leaders and entrepreneurs of high growth businesses helping them to scale through their people. As the former Talent Director on the Board of a rapidly growing global organisation, Claire built the optimum people centred structures and systems to enable the company to significantly scale across 6 continents. Prior to that, she spent almost 15 years with an award winning, technology SME, which operated in a highly competitive environment. Finding great talent is the #1 reason why businesses are unable to scale. In 2019, Claire became my business partner and we set out on a journey of discovery to extensively research exemplars of scaling to identifying the key attributes that made them successful. In today's episode, Brendan and Claire talk about: Their favourite moments from Season 3 The importance of developing others and ourselves How diversity can bring diverse thinking and innovation to your business Why a crisis mentality in business can be a positive thing The importance of resilience The power of purpose The importance if of taking thinking time Key Takeaway "Creating a crisis mentality in business triggers and seeds a mindset that is open to change. I have found that we were at our most innovative during the Dotcom bubble, 911 and the Global Financial Crisis. Each of these events were a catalyst for innovation in our product set and in our processes and forced us to change. A crisis mentality ensures that you don't keep doing what you have always done." Contact Claire LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/claire-colvin-586a162b/ The Simple Scaling Book Claire and I have co-authored a book for leaders of SMEs who are ambitious to scale. Centred around our 10 Principles of Scaling it will be published on the 15 March, 2022. If you would like to be notified of its release provide us with your email here. About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. Contact Brendan on LinkedIn - here

In this episode I'm speaking with Garry Ridge. Garry is the Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of the WD-40 Company (NASDAQ WDFC) headquartered in San Diego, California. WD-40 Company is the maker of the household staple, WD-40 as well a number of other product lines including hand cleaners and household cleaning products. Garry has been with WD-40 Company since 1987 in various management positions, including Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer and Vice President of International. He has worked directly with WD-40 in 50 countries. Garry holds a philosophy on company culture which is based on a quote from Aristotle – "Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work." He turns that philosophy into action every day in WD-40. He believes that all leaders can create a workplace where you go to work each day, make a contribution to do something bigger than yourself, learn something new and feel safe and protected. That belief extends to WD-40's values which he credits with giving freedom to employees as well as happiness. Garry is an adjunct professor at the University of San Diego and teaches leadership development, talent management and succession planning in the Master of Science in Executive Leadership program. He has a litany of awards including Director of the Year for Enhancement of Economic Value by the Corporate Directors Forum in 2003 and the Arthur E Hughes Career Achievement Award from the University of San Diego in 2004. In 2009, Garry co-authored a book with Ken Blanchard titled "Helping People Win at Work: A Business Philosophy called "Don't Mark My Paper, Help Me Get an A", Release in May 2009, FT Press. #MG 100 coach. Key points we talk about include: How he increased market cap by 10X whilst at the same time recording employee engagement at 93% The three components of scaling success How Garry broke down a culture of fear to cultivate one that celebrates learning moments Garry's greatest learning moment from the pandemic Why creating a tribe culture is more impactful than having a team Key Takeaway "Fear is the most debilitating emotion we have. I wanted to take the word 'failure' out of the organisation but equally didn't want to make people think that we were never going to fail. I also wanted to create a culture of learning. We took the word 'failure' out and replaced it with 'learning moments.' A learning moment is a positive or negative outcome of any situation that needs to be openly and freely shared to benefit all people." Contact Garry LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/garryridge/ Website: https://thelearningmoment.net/ Buy the book Helping People Win at Work: A Business Philosophy Called "Don't Mark My Paper, Help Me Get an A" (Achieving at a Higher Level) Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3gdqVWJ Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/3L8lgj5 About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In this episode I'm speaking with Gabor George Burt. Gabor is a pioneer of re-imagining market boundaries, turning crisis into opportunity, creating irresistible customer experience design and future-shaping business transformation. Gabor created the Slingshot Framework, which enables individuals and organizations to go beyond perceived limitations in pursuit of high growth, expanded relevance, and strong customer attachment. As the foundation for Slingshot, Gabor was a leading expert of Blue Ocean Strategy, the new millennium's most influential business strategy approach. He contributed case study material to the worldwide bestselling book of the same name and originated the most popular blog on the topic. Gabor is actively involved in shaping high-impact strategy for a diverse group of international organizations, ranging from top multinationals & governments to start-ups, academic institutions & NGOs, and leads by example through his own market-driving initiatives. Gabor has been a featured speaker at high-profile events including Forum One, one of Europe's biggest leadership conferences, alongside Sir Richard Branson and Seth Godin. He is cited among Top 13 Disruptive Visionaries and is featured in influential business publications including the Harvard Business Review, Forbes and Entrepreneur Magazine. His book, Slingshot: Re-Imagine Your Business, Re-Imagine Your Life is a must read. Key points we talk about include: How Gabor went from emigrating to America, working on Wall St. to scaling businesses The importance of psychology and understanding how people think Why diversity in your teams will enhance your ability to innovate and think creatively Culture vs. Product development and the parts that both imagination and systematic creativity play in leading a company culture; one that works towards scaling What we mean by being in 'perpetual crisis' and having an ongoing 'crisis mentality' can create new opportunities in your business 3 levels of transformation and innovation and the role of (creating) simplification from complexity Key Takeaway "Disruption is all around. It is now evident that doing the same as what we have done before is not an option. We need to continuously move and evolve. That is based on your ability as a leader to nurture and support creativity in your organisation." Contact Gabor LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabor-george-burt/ Website: https://gaborgeorgeburt.com/ Useful Resources How to begin re-imaging boundaries - https://gaborgeorgeburt.com/ Buy the book Slingshot: Re-Imagine Your Business, Re-Imagine Your Life Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3nJdnGr Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/33sNJPD About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode, I'm delighted to introduce Ryan Gottfredson PhD who is the cutting-edge mindset author of 'Success Mindsets: The key to unlocking greater success in your life, work and leadership'. Ryan is also a researcher and consultant and helps improve organisations, leaders, teams, and employees by improving their mindsets. He also works with organisations to develop their leaders and improve their culture in what he calls collective mindsets. He has worked with some of the top leadership teams across the globe at CVS Health, Deutsche Telekom and dozens of other organisations. As a respected authority on leadership management and organisational behaviour, Ryan has published over 15 articles across a variety of journals and his research has been cited over 2000 times since 2014. Ryan is currently a leadership and management professor at the College of Business and Economics at California State University, Fullerton. He holds a Ph.D. in Organisational Behaviour and Human Resources from Indiana University and a B.A. from Brigham Young University. Key points we discuss: The importance of psyche and an understanding of your mindset when leading a scaling business What it means to have a growth-oriented mindset and we explore what Ryan terms mindset 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0 and how we can elevate ourselves to a 3.0 mindset How to create a stronger and more positive culture by developing leaders in a culture of collaboration. The focus on vertical development to encourage transformational changes and what we mean by vertical development The importance of being agile and future ready and how we sometimes risk more by not doing something and holding on to what we already know can prevent us from scaling. Key Takeaway "There are two different forms of development. Horizontal Development which is when we add knowledge, skills, and capabilities to a leader. The second, Vertical Development is where we elevate a person's ability to make meaning of their world in cognitively and emotionally sophisticated ways." Contact Ryan Website: https://ryangottfredson.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryangottfredson/ Useful Resources The Mindset Test: https://ryangottfredson.com/personal-mindset-assessment Purchase the Book, 'Success Mindsets: The key to unlocking greater success in your life, work and leadership'. https://amzn.to/3A81wXB - Amazon.co.uk https://amzn.to/3nxEgxf - Amazon.com Recommended Reading Mindset, Changing the Way You think to Fulfil Your Potential by Carol Dweck Think Again by Adam Grant Principles by Ray Dalio Can't Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds by David Goggins Leadership and Self Deception by The Arbinger Institute Bonds That Make Us Free by C. Terry Warner (which Ryan highly recommends) About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode, I'm delighted to introduce Myriam Sidibe. Myriam is one of the world's leading experts of brands that drive health outcomes through mass behavioural change. During her 15-year career at Unilever Myriam spearheaded a movement - To change the hand washing behaviour of one billion people globally, which she achieved in 2019. Myriam passionately believes that more of the private sector should consider mission-led marketing, especially during the pandemic, when many people are looking to business for real leadership. Incredibly, she also conceived and helped establish the multi award-winning UN recognised Global Hand Washing Day which is now celebrated annually in over 100 countries. Her 2014 Ted talk, 'The Simple Power of Hand Washing' has been viewed more than one million times. Originally from Mali, Myriam lives in Kenya and is currently on sabbatical from Unilever to Harvard Kennedy School where she is the Senior Fellow at the Mossavar Rahmani Centre. Myriam is a Board Member of WaterAid and the Kilimanjaro Blind Trust, was a Commissioner for the Lancet on the Future of Health in Africa and an Honorary Assistant Professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She is the author of Harvard Business Review – 'Marketing Meets Mission' as well as the book 'Brand on a Mission – How to Achieve Social Impact and Business Growth through Purpose'. Myriam was unsurprisingly recently honoured as one of the 100 most influential Africans of 2021. Key points we discuss: The importance of purpose and vision and being a brand on a mission How Myriam went from being hired as a partnership manager to achieving her vision of reaching one billion people to wash their hands - changing behaviour positively for good How finding the right business model can be critical to scaling your business How purpose can be profitable and the importance and need for having a real purpose Why marketing is the most important function of a company What it takes to drive business growth and create real change in the world Key Takeaway "Profit can be purposeful, and purpose needs to be profitable." Contact Myriam Website: https://myriamsidibe.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/myriam-sidib%C3%A9-she-her-2516254/?originalSubdomain=ke Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/myriamonamission/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/Myriam_Sidibe The Purpose Tree The Baobab tree with its five deep roots brings the purpose to life with benefits to the business, society and the environment. It is based on five key principles including behaviour change, partnerships, brand advocacy, measurement and winning corporate support. To find out more, about The Purpose Tree, read the Harvard Business Review Article in Useful Resources. Useful Resources Harvard Business Review: Marketing Meets Mission https://hbr.org/2020/05/marketing-meets-mission Buy the book 'Brand on a Mission – How to Achieve Social Impact and Business Growth through Purpose'. Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3f71UMk Amazon.co.uk: https://amzn.to/332DJvV Routledge Taylor & Francis https://bit.ly/3teYi36 About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Sam Watson Jones. Sam is the Co-Founder and President of Small Robot Company, an innovative business which is reimagining farming to make food production sustainable. Using robotics and artificial intelligence, they have created an entirely new model for ecologically harmonious, efficient, and profitable farming, Per Plant farming. Small Robot company was highly commended in the Heroes of Net Zero competition at the COP26 Summit and has a mission to transform farming, make it more sustainable and are committed to net zero emissions. I'm really excited to share this conversation with you as going green and sustainable is not only beneficial for businesses across the world; it also maximises the benefits from an environmental focus in the long-term. Key points we discuss: How someone from a fourth-generation family-owned farming business is pioneering technology to improve modern farming towards averting a potential global crisis. How Sam overcame a lack of investor appetite to scale a business that has achieved £4m investment through the crowdfunding platform, CrowdCube. How new opportunities to scale can be found by changing industry paradigms. The core principles behind innovative change. How time away from the business can lead to more productive workdays. Key Takeaway "We should be using technology to transform the way we take decisions and transform the way we take action so that in the farming industry we stop doing things inaccurately and improve how we interact with the environment." Contact Sam Website: https://www.smallrobotcompany.com/ Same Watson Jones LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sam-watson-jones-93725860/?originalSubdomain=uk Small Robot Company LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/small-robot-company-limited/ Twitter: @smallrobotco Crowdcube: https://www.crowdcube.com/ About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I am delighted to introduce Lee Brower. Lee is the Founder of Empowered Wealth, LLC, and the creator of The Business Family Coach®, a revolutionary program for entrepreneurs and business leaders. Using a proprietary coaching model, The Business Family Coach® applies the Empowered Wealth System™ in both businesses and families. The result is not only success and prosperity but sustainable prosperity™. His breakthrough concepts on empowering wealth are influencing leadership across private homes and small businesses to public corporations and large educational institutions. He co-authored Wealth Enhancement & Preservation and in his latest book, The Brower Quadrant, he shares the specifics of applying the Empowered Wealth principles. I'm really excited to share this conversation with you because Lee is a visionary in thought and action and a true "change agent". He is dedicated to revolutionising how family-owned businesses create and nourish their wealth — at home, at work and beyond. Key points we discuss: How extending your reach with purpose and running a company with gratitude attracts more of the people and the business (work) you want. The importance of being in motion, having a determined focus and an open mind can lead to bigger and better opportunities. What we mean by a positive growth culture and how scaling businesses with a strong culture are the businesses that make better decisions. How principles are "values in action" with lots of great examples from Lee. Key Takeaway "The difference between values and principles is that principles are values in action." Contact Lee https://leebrower.com/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/lee-brower-0365374/ About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm speaking with Patrick McKeown. Patrick is a world-renowned author and breathing practitioner. In a career spanning 20 years and having trained 1000's of people around the world Patrick has become a best-selling author and expert on the topic of optimal breathing for improved health, well-being and performance. Among his many books, two have consistently remained in the top ten best sellers on Amazon.com: 'Close Your Mouth' and 'Asthma Free Naturally'. One of his more recent books 'The Oxygen Advantage®' is based on 4 years of scientific research and tailors breathing exercises for anyone seeking to improve their performance inside and out of the office. We also delve into his most recent book Atomic Focus, a wonderfully well written and accessible book for anyone curious about breathing practices for performance. Following last week's episode with Dr Alan Watkins where we touched on the importance of rhythmic breathing, I'm really excited to share this conversation with you because today we go much deeper on the topic and Patrick's message is simple: how you breathe will affect your overall performance. Key points we discuss: Patrick's own discovery of finding purpose that suited his character and abilities How your ability to concentrate and focus as well as your everyday energy is directly related to how well you sleep and breathe The effects of breathing patterns on heart rate variability and decision-making How if we can control our breathing, we can control our mind and comfortably deal with stress How we can sabotage ourselves with our own thoughts Tips on every day breathing covering the various types including 'invincible breathing' Key Takeaway "You don't have control of your mind if you don't have control of your breathing". Useful Links How breathing can help you make better decisions: Two studies on the effects of breathing patterns on heart rate variability and decision-making in business cases https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30826382/ Contact Patrick https://oxygenadvantage.com/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/mckeownpatrick/?originalSubdomain=ie About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I am delighted to introduce Dr. Alan Watkins. Alan is the CEO & Co-Founder of Complete Coherence. His ambition is to accelerate the development of leaders globally and reduce human suffering. He believes that every single person can become a better, more complete, and effective human being. He is a global thought leader on human performance, complexity and well-being and draws on his background as a physician and neuroscientist. I'm really excited to share this conversation with you because Alan has created the formula to align our bodies and our minds so that we can do well in our careers, relationships and just about everything else. Today we discuss: The important differences between ambition, strategy, and purpose How human performance is not a mystery when we look at how we behave from a biological, emotional, and feeling driven point-of-view What creates consistent performance The 3 Chasms of Scaling The three big 'Es' to boost energy The 4 levels that we can't see that we are driven by How the ability to adapt to change can offer you a competitive advantage in a world that is getting faster. Key Takeaway "The two most important days in your life are the day you were born and the day you discover why you were born". Useful Links Heart Rate Variability – Complete Coherence, Coherent Heart Trainer - Download the app on Apple and other platforms Website: https://complete-coherence.com/ Complete Coherence LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/complete-coherence/ Alan Watkins LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dralanwatkins/ About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I am delighted to introduce Sherry Coutu CBE. Sherry is the founder of the UK ScaleUp Institute, which was incidentally a major inspiration for the creation of Simple Scaling. She is a serial entrepreneur and an Angel Investor in more than 70 companies. Sherry is highly accomplished and is currently a non-executive Director of Pearson plc, London Stock Exchange plc, DCMS, Workfinder, and Raspberry Pi. Since founding, scaling, floating and exiting interactive investor (a company now estimated to be worth almost £1.5bn), Sherry has accumulated decades of experience chairing FTSE companies, acting as Senior Independent Director, Chairing Remunerations Committees, Nominations Committees and serving on Audit Committees. Philanthropically, she supports Founders4Schools, Digital Boost, and Cancer Research UK. She was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for services to entrepreneurship in the New Year's Honours List 2013 and she was commissioned by the UK Government in 2014 to author the Scaleup Report on UK Economic Growth. Although, not one for the spotlight she has quietly built a reputation as an instrumental figure in the UK's thriving tech scene over the last two decades. I'm really excited to share this conversation with you because Sherry has made extensive connections between people and technology helping millions of people's lives become easier. Today we discuss: How talent is the lifeblood of any organisation and is one of the keys to scaling a business Sherry's knack of spotting a problem and then putting a team together to create a solution Removing systematic barriers to scaling in communities Why it is important to build peer groups when scaling a business – no one has all the answers Why you need to think about what customers need, where there are gaps in the market and what doesn't exist but should exist. Key Takeaway "The businesses that scale the most are those that are a talent magnet." Contact Sherry LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coutu/ About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce John Spence. John is recognised as one of the top business and leadership development experts in the world alongside the likes of Sergey Brin, Larry Page and Jeff Bezos. At 26 years old, John was appointed as CEO of an international Rockefeller foundation, overseeing projects across 20 countries. He is the author of four books. I'm really excited to share this conversation with you because John has built his entire career on "Making the Very Complex… Awesomely Simple". Today we discuss: John's secret to excelling in college after a bad start - offering 3 tips to help anyone get the most out of an educational experience How at the age of 26 he found himself in an important leadership position with Rockefeller Whether leaders are born or taught and the importance of emotional intelligence The importance of leaving a legacy The significance of adaptability The formula for business excellence How culture eats strategy for breakfast and culture is cash 4 Ps of expert performance and the 6 things 'A - Players' look for when considering being a part of your team and business. Key Takeaway "You must have a vivid, compelling and well communicated vision and strategy for growth. The vision is the thing that keeps everyone aligned and excited and helps them understand the role they play in the organisation. The Purpose of an organisation is equally important. It plays to the noble purpose that you serve. People will get out of bed and go to work for a pay check but they will jump out of bed and do world class work for a purpose." Contact John https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnbspence/ About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE Global. He spent 12 of those as Group MD and navigated 911, the dot com collapse and the global financial crisis steering the company to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and to 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Claire Colvin. Claire has worked as a partner to business leaders and entrepreneurs of high growth businesses helping them to scale through their people. As the former Talent Director on the Board of a rapidly growing global organisation, Claire built the optimum people centred structures and systems to enable the company to significantly scale across 6 continents. Prior to that, she spent almost 15 years with an award winning, technology SME, which operated in a highly competitive environment. Finding great talent is the #1 reason why businesses are unable to scale. In 2019, Claire became my business partner and we set out on a journey of discovery to extensively research exemplars of scaling to identifying the key attributes that made them successful. In today's episode, Claire and Brendan talk about: Their favourite moments from Season Two The importance of slowing down to go faster The importance of setting a vision How paying your communication debts can make you feel better Why we need to take the complex out of lean Everything we do as leaders should be to enable those around us to be successful We are not always appointing the right people into leadership roles and when we do we're not developing them to be able to communicate with influence The three underlying values instilled into a RAF Fight pilot are humility, approachability and credibility Companies who had a purpose aligned to the UN SDGs did 11% better in terms of their profitability than those without Timeless takeaways Tom Kolditz - It's not all about you. Amy Rowlinson - Are we living or are we existing? Maura Nevel Thomas – Make a choice or live a life of distraction. Key Takeaway If you're constantly affirming to yourself that you're not good at something, then ultimately that will trigger certain thought patterns, which will determine how you act and the results that you get. That inner work, understanding that your subconscious is actually the operating system or paradigm or collection of thoughts, feelings, attitudes, beliefs is actually our programming. Contact Claire https://www.linkedin.com/in/claire-colvin-586a162b/ About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Marga Hoek, a member of Thinkers50. Marga is that rare combination: a true visionary on sustainable business and capital and a successful, innovative business leader who understands and applies the commercial realities of business. Marga is also the award-winning author of the Trillion Dollar Shift which is the first ever business book on the opportunities that the UN's Sustainable Development Goals open to business and capital. It features over 50 inspiring case studies, across every sector from agriculture to energy to ICT and advanced technologies. As the most appreciated speaker on sustainable business and capital, she is considered one of the most influential thought leaders leading the way in the transition towards a sustainable world. Marga was the CEO of three businesses and board member of many international companies. In today's episode, Marga talks about: How sustainable business is good business How tech can help businesses meet sustainability goals How tech can be good for the planet Businesses don't have to make a choice between profit and sustainability The breakthrough in setting the UN's Sustainable Development Goals How SMEs can leverage the Sustainable Development Goals to scale with purpose Why businesses cannot survive in a collapsing world How the COVID crisis brought a lot more awareness about sustainability How business leaders can create a more sustainable business and the benefits Why your clients, your customers and your employees expect you to be sustainable Why the majority of millennials want to work for a purpose driven company How an organisation can become sustainable Why companies with a purpose attract better talent, clients and more profit Why the Sustainable Development Goals provide a framework for companies who may struggle with the whole concept of purpose. The five qualities of an SDG leader The importance of bold objectives How gender equality equals growth Advanced technologies and what to do with them Key Takeaway If you are an SME and want to become sustainable, choose one or two things to begin with. You can't do everything. Focus on the things that will make a difference for your clients, tie into your markets and help you to grow as a business. Contact Marga https://www.linkedin.com/in/margahoek/ Orsted Energy The World's most sustainable energy company, and a global leader in the transition to green energy https://orsted.co.uk/ About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Chris Yonker, a Vision Alchemist, Speaker, and Author who specialises in vision creation to align your business and your life. Chris is a world-leading expert in vision creation. He and his team work with companies (big and small) as well as high achievers like executives, entrepreneurs, athletes, and celebrities to get clarity on what they really want—and then make the strategy mindset and behaviour shifts to create that. Chris embraces a uniquely collaborative and experiential approach of being in the "zone," developing clarity and composure under fire, and discovering unlimited potential. He is a seventh-degree black belt, Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) Practitioner, and thought-leader on Personal Performance. He is regular contributor to the Coaches Council at Forbes.com and his book Soul Intention: An Executive's Guide to Building a Life by Choice, Not by Chance is available on Amazon. He also has his own podcast, the secret thoughts of CEOs. In today's episode, Chris talks about: How our beliefs are based upon our past experiences and how they can influence our current reality How our core values can be used as filters to help us make better decisions The importance of vision The importance of creating an empowering belief system rather than disempowering belief system Why sensory acuity is powerful How and why we are motivated by pain and pleasure and why it doesn't have to be painful to grow a business How psychology controls and limits what we do. Key Takeaway "Our sensory acuity is a very powerful thing. We don't tend to think about how all these senses are the conduit to how we absorb what is going on around us. We take all of this information in; we censor it in our own filters with all of our illusions about ourselves and that's how we are driving the reality of this machine called life. But we can make it different. It can be more balanced, and more whole. You can grow with a higher sense of ease and grace. We don't have to get to where we want to go next doing what we did to get here. This is in part why some businesses don't grow because they have a paradigm that says, I've got to do more of what I have done going forward, but I've got nothing left to give". Download Chris' Free Vision Workbook here: https://greatestyearsofyourlife.com/ Contact Chris https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisyonker/ About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Kevin Shulman. Kevin is President of Shulman & Associates/Sandler training, where he has been training business owners, sales managers and salespeople to help them grow their business and reach their full potential. He is the author of 'Goal-Setting Bootcamp' which provides a practical 'how-to' approach with goal setting. It is designed for anyone with dreams and visions for success both personally and professionally. In today's episode, Kevin talks about: The importance of having long and short-term goals with written plans Why you should never do goal setting as a solo exercise The importance of going back to your values Setting goals because of societal pressure The major mistakes people make when setting goals What we need to give up when setting goals Setting the right goals to ensure you are not overwhelmed The importance of setting personal goals before business goals Why we do not need to limit the number of goals we set Why your subconscious works like Google The power of positive affirmations Going public with your goals The importance of setting smart goals How having an accountability partner can help you achieve goals . Listen Out For: When setting goals, figure out what you want your life to look like a year from now, five years from now and in retirement. Then look at your business and say, OK, what do I need to do in my business to get that lifestyle? We've got a supercomputer that lives on top of our shoulders. It can process an awful lot. We used to say 30-40 years ago that we could only work on two or three goals at a time but what we now know is that you can have 2030 goals and it's not a problem Your subconscious can't distinguish the difference between what's fact or fiction so if you continue to tell yourself something, then ultimately that just becomes part of your overall programme. Key takeaway A very wise man once said, "you're either part of your own plan or you're a part of someone else's. Make sure you're a part of your own plan". About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Tom Kolditz, the founding Director of the Ann and John Doerr Institute for New Leaders at Rice University. The Doerr Institute was recognised in 2019 as the top university leader development program by the Association of Leadership Educators and named the 4th Leader Development Program in the world by Global Gurus, London. He has been named as a leadership Thought Leader by the Leader to Leader Institute and as a Top Leader Development Professional by Leadership Excellence. In 2020, he has continued to be ranked in the global top 25 coaches and in 2021, the #6 Start-up expert worldwide. He developed the concept of in extremis leadership—an original crisis leadership model—while serving in the oil fields and palace cities in Iraq. His book on that topic, In Extremis Leadership: Leading as if Your Life Depended On It, is used in at least 8 service academies in the US, China, Japan, and Israel. His second book, Leadership Reckoning: Can Higher Education Develop the Leaders We Need, is driving a leader development reform movement in higher education in collaboration with the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. In today's episode, Tom talks about: How leadership is about giving people what they need How to build trust and respect as a leader and make your team want to follow you The importance of emotional intelligence in leadership The mistakes many leaders make when attempting to win the trust of those they serve. How to identify leaders in your organisation The importance of getting to know your people Why every leader needs feedback How actions speak much louder than words. The role that education today has claimed in developing leaders for the future. Key Takeaway "Leadership is about giving people what they need. It's not about the quality of an individual or a style. People don't care about style; they just have needs. You need to see the world through the eyes of your people to influence and motivate them and give them direction and purpose". About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-mcgurgan-11854a13/ https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Dr. Oleg Konovalov, the Da Vinci of Visionary leadership. Dr. Oleg Konovalov is a thought leader, author, business educator, consultant, and coach with over 25 years' experience operating businesses and consulting Fortune 500 companies both in the UK and internationally. In today's episode, we talk about: How having a vision is critical and fundamental to scaling a business with purpose How to inspire others to become multipliers of your vision How to overcome the challenge of evolving your vision over time Less than 0.1% of SME organisations have a vision Vision should involve the leadership team, not just the CEO Why being positive makes you become a giant Why it's the CEO's responsibility to ensure that the vision inspires and motivates the team Why leadership is an art Revising your vision Conditioning ourselves to create a vision How caviar can help organisations Why you need a clear vision for the culture of your organisation Listen Out For: If you don't have a vision, your strategy is a bridge to nowhere. A great vision should inspire people to go beyond themselves. When we work on vision and leadership, medium sized businesses return on investment is at about 3000%. Large companies are barely hitting 1000%. When visioning, you must talk with people throughout your organisation. They will bring more value than you expect. Their input will make your vision multidimensional. Most people are afraid of thinking about the future because they're afraid of it. They don't know what's going to happen, but they must be courageous enough to set the vision and follow it. Companies with a vision that sets out to serve others enshrined within that vision, ultimately attract the right people. They have solidity in their purpose, and they are more profitable. You must make people free by showing a clear direction where to go. If you don't know where you are going, then you are not free, and you become a hostage of doubts, assumptions, and opinions. Vision for organisations means that we have vision for the people working in the organisation, because without right people, an organisation is only a certificate of incorporation. The stronger the vision, typically the stronger the culture because you attract people to the organisation who has sight of that vision. Vision is not a gift, it just a way of thinking which can be developed. If we accept that we have infinite potential, then a vision creates the beacon for us to move towards that potential. Vision doesn't have a gender, age, or race. Ego kills vision instantly because you don't see the world or the people around you. An ambitious vision means that there is more discretionary effort from your team because there's a level of co-ownership. People become more positive about their future, and you make them multipliers of your vision and passion. We are not talking about motivating people, we are talking about inspiring people. Every team member becomes a huge power station of a future inspiration. Leadership is an art; a scientific art and vision is a beautiful construct of clearly articulated thoughts. A vision must be dynamic, practical, elegant, and simple, regardless of whether it is for now or for years to come. About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Amy Rowlinson, a Life Purpose Coach, Podcast Mentor and a leader in purpose and fulfilment. Amy helps people to focus on their WHY with clarity, uniting their passion and purpose with a plan to create the life they truly desire. Her mission is to reach unfulfilled people who are looking for their WHY to guide them to live a life with purpose and fulfilment. Amy is Qualified as a Life Purpose Coach, Journal Therapy Coach, Master Practitioner of Time Line Therapy™️ & Hypnosis and an NLP Practitioner and works with clients to help them to design the life they desire through 'living' and not 'existing'. In today's episode, Amy talks about: Where to start when defining your vision and purpose How to live with purpose as opposed to existing How big and small moments have impact The importance of aligning with our values How purpose determines who we are How its never too late to be who you might have been Listen Out For: You need to understand the difference between living and existing. Are you doing things just because they need to be done as opposed to really focusing on why you are doing them? You may get to the very top of the ladder and then find it has not been leaning against the right wall. A. Raine. People need to ask themselves what their superpowers are and link that with what the world needs right now. Then you can focus on where you can help and what you can get paid for. This should be a combination of your passion, profession, and vocational mission. Ikigai – the Japanese concept of finding your purpose and creating a long and happy life. Your purpose determines who you are. We are all driven by purpose. It's your foundation and heartbeat. Quite often people can lose their way. It can be referred to as feeling stuck, or unhappy or not quite right. When we do things that are purposeful, they are aligned with our values. Establishing your values is an essential part of finding your purpose. When businesses apply their values and purpose right from the start, it becomes their core driver. It becomes their key focus and is at the heart of their decisions. Quite often business values are echoed from the business leader's personal values. When employees' values align with those of the company, that's when the magic happens. It's the purpose, the mission and the values of a company that retains people and that's when the productivity will rise. The vision talks about the company's future, its aspirations, its hopes, and dreams, and it gives it their direction. To enhance performance, it is important to praise people, to encourage them in their roles, to provide them with great feedback and processes and give them opportunities to thrive and grow. Journaling is important. By understanding and listening to yourself and your fears, it helps you to reduce stress, boost your working memory and it helps you to become more empowered by regulating your emotions. It provides a gateway to unlock your emotional intelligence and creativity. Flow essentially is focus. When you are in flow, you're being more productive. When you are in flow, time just disappears, and you are in the zone and in a state of creative. About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Maura Nevel Thomas. Maura is an award-winning international speaker, trainer, and author on individual and corporate productivity and work-life balance and is the most widely cited authority on attention management. She helps driven, motivated knowledge workers control their attention and regain control over the details of their life and work. Maura has trained thousands of individuals at hundreds of organisations on her proprietary Empowered Productivity™ System, a process for achieving meaningful results and living a life of choice. In today's episode, Maura talks about: Why time management is outdated How attention management is the new path to productivity How to be present in the moment How we become conditioned to distractions The biggest challenge of a team's productivity is the culture of the organisation and the behaviour of the leaders. Winning the war against information overload Managing people's expectations Why we must control technology, or we end up at the mercy of it How we are training our brains to expect interruptions The importance of single tasking How to avoid distraction Managing work-life balance How business leaders can improve their productivity Listen Out For: The biggest challenge that we have is distraction and you can't solve a distraction problem with a time solution. It doesn't matter how much time you have. If you are distracted and frequently task switching, you will not be able to muster brainpower momentum. It's not the moments in your life that matter, it's the life in your moments that matter. Productivity is about the legacy that you leave behind all the way down to the most important thing you need to do today, and anything in between. The more distracted we are, the more distracted we will be, and. We have become conditioned into a habit of distraction. When we apply ourselves fully, when we unleash that brainpower momentum, that's when we do our best work. That's when we feel satisfied and accomplished and competent at the end of our day and happy . This habit of distraction that we all have is insidious, because it lies to us about what makes us happy Productivity has six components and we need all six to really achieve our most significant results on a consistent basis. Burnout is such a huge problem. Every time you choose to work, you're not doing something else right. You're not exercising or you're not sleeping, or you're not spending time with your family. Leaders have a lot more influence on the lives, the happiness, the health, the wellness and the well-being of their employees. When people are happy at work, they tend to be happier at home which affects their kids, their spouse and their communities. When they're miserable at work, then they have nothing left to give to their families or their communities. Exhausted workers mean exhausted families and exhausted communities and exhausted worlds. Exhaustion is optional. Just because people expect it doesn't mean that you must conform to those expectations. The more you think about ways to single task only one thing at a time mentally, the more you will find that your ability to stay focused increases. Your habit of distraction starts to fall away, and you are reconditioning your brain. Sometimes the best thing that you can do for your work is not work. Work Life Balance in simple terms is 'don't work too much' and if you wonder what too much means, studies show that productivity starts to go down after about 50 hours a week. About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

I am delighted to introduce Dan Lowes, a former RAF Fighter pilot and Executive Officer of the world-famous Red Arrows. Dan has made it his life's goal to consistently operate at a world class level and is immersed in the power of effective communication and the art of debriefing. In today's episode, Dan talks about: The importance of self-reflection when creating a high-performance culture Mentally preparing for flying at 1300 mph Why planning is important Fear of failure Tasting failure, accepting it and preparing for it and moving on from it How self-reflection can make you highly motivated How you can learn from people in your field that you admire Three principles to live by when you're a Top Gun graduate How his attitude and mindset earned him his place in Top Gun school How he stays grounded and humble What you can learn from a Red Arrows debrief and how you can apply it to your business The importance of communication Listen Out For: I would not be who I am now or achieved what I have achieved if I hadn't failed. I accepted failure, I learned from failure, and I moved on. I pinned my life ambition on joining the Royal Air Force and being a fighter pilot at 18 but didn't get into the Air Force on my first interview. I had to go away and reassess what was important for me in life and what I really wanted and grow into that which meant that one year later when I reapplied, I was successful. Failure is just a data point on a journey towards your overall goal. It depends on what you do with it which ultimately determines whether you achieve the goal or not. I love reading about the people who have been there and done it already. I have clearly defined goals and aims. I work out how I can get there. I then choose someone that I really respect in the area and then I model myself on them. To be the best in the room, you don't have to shout about it, you don't have to hang banners, you don't have to have badges, you don't have to have the big office and you don't have to have the big car parking space. You just have to be the one that everyone knows when the chips are down, you are going to come running through. Do not make assumptions. You have no idea at any point in time what is going on in somebody's life - how they left the house that morning or what information they had or did not have. It is all about asking the right questions before you jump to conclusions. Do something that you love and when you stop loving it, work out why and find something else even if that means you have to do something completely different. You need to constantly love what you do because that means you will relentlessly pursue it to the highest levels. When you expect something from someone, expect it to be the same all the time. Be consistent across the board which will mean that expectations can be managed and people understand how to operate to the best of their capacity. About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode, I'm delighted to introduce Sam Rathling, one of the world's experts in social selling strategies. Sam is the Chief Visionary Officer (CVO) at the Pipeline 44 Group and Linked Inbound and is a Best-Selling Author and International Speaker. Recently named by Yahoo! Finance as a Top LinkedIn Expert to follow, Sam and her team are on the ambitious mission to generate over £1billion in new sales for their clients. Her book 'Linked Inbound' became an Amazon Best-Seller in just 6 days! In today's episode, Sam talks about: Her vision to help her customers reach £1 billion revenue by 2025 through LinkedIn and how she helped one client reach £1.2m in revenue. How to create a great LinkedIn profile The three things that business leaders should be doing every day on LinkedIn How you can find great talent using LinkedIn LinkedIn's Social Selling Index (SSI), what it is and how to improve it to become a true thought leader Why LinkedIn has become a vital tool for sales teams The future of LinkedIn and digital interaction post COVID What a butterfly can teach you about the journey of a scaling business owner and entrepreneur Listen Out For: 98% of the people you reach out to will not be ready to buy today. Once you connect with someone, use LinkedIn and content to build your brand and stay top of mind with those people. Make sure you have a great profile. Use a professional headshot and the new cover story feature where you can film a 30 second introduction. Identify your target audience and understand who your ideal client is and what their pain points are. Be Specific. Create amazing content that speaks to your ideal client such as the journey that you are on, what's happening in your organisation, your culture and values and case studies. Use keywords as your LinkedIn profile acts like a web page. Your LinkedIn profile can drive organic search. By the time potential buyers speak to you they are 57% of the way through the buying process. CEOs and business leaders have so much expertise and value to give to their customers and potential customers. It's imperative that leaders of businesses get onto LinkedIn and lead from the front. The CEO or the leader that decides to take the leap and build their personal brand and audience will win every time. Embedding social selling throughout the organisation is vitally important. If every employee was empowered to build their personal brand it would amplify a business 100,000-fold. To become viral and visible, challenge the norm and create content that polarises opinion. LinkedIn creates a sales pipeline and develops your talent pipeline. The Social Selling Index score (SSI) is a metric out of 100 points. If you want to be positioned as a thought leader or an expert in your field, then this score is critical. Salespeople have had to up their game in terms of learning how to sell in a new and different way. Tools such as LinkedIn are important for sales because they can't knock on doors anymore. They can't do the lunches. They can't network. Post pandemic, it's the brands and companies that choose to leverage LinkedIn that are going to be the ones that win, and they're going to be the ones that take market share. They are going be the ones that get ahead of their competition. About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce Paul Akers, the Founder and President of FastCap which started in Paul's garage in 1997 when he simply "fixed what bugged him" and developed his first product: the Fastcap Cover Cap. From humble beginnings, FastCap has thousands of distributors worldwide in over 40 countries. He wrote his first book, 2 Second Lean, about creating a fun, lean culture which is now available in 15 languages. In 2015, he wrote his 2nd book, Lean Health, in 2016, he wrote Lean Travel and in 2019, he wrote Lean Life and Banish Sloppiness. In 2016, Paul's book, 2 Second Lean, was recognised by the Shingo Institute and won the Research and Professional Publication Award. In today's episode, Paul talks about: The concepts of lean and how it changed his business How he took a 45-minute process to five minutes The eight deadly sins of waste His unique approach to recruiting people His simple test to identify star players Developing and learning together as a team The three characteristic traits of great leaders Three pieces of practical advice for growing your people. Listen Out For: Lean is the ability for someone to tap deeply into their weaknesses and address them aggressively Lean is the greatest green concept in the world. If you become a lean thinker then you're going to save the planet We have a very mature culture. It's like a university for us where we talk about our problems, we show our solutions and look at other leading companies around the world Every day, for the first two hours of business, we just develop our people and the way we think I have a daily ritual and it's simple. I treat every person that I meet with respect and dignity. Be kind and appreciative. Don't feel like anybody ever owes you anything Recruitment - We don't accept resumes. They are all lies. We ask for 60 second videos. If we like the potential candidate, we bring them in for a paid test day. We then ask for the opinions of eight or nine staff and if we don't get 100% of those people indicating that they want to work with them, we don't hire. It's a bulletproof system Our people get more done in six to eight hours than the average person gets done in 48. I'll take six hours of my people against 40 hours of anybody else We don't have a marketing, sales or HR department and our CFO works 4 days a month. We have six people in our office managing a very complex business with 800 products around the world. In any other business there would be 50 people managing what we do with six. About the Host Director and Founder of Simple Scaling, Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Previously, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. https://simplescaling.com/meet-the-team

Over the past 23 years Claire has worked as a partner to business leaders, founders and entrepreneurs of high growth businesses helping them to scale through their people. As the former Talent Director on the Board of a rapidly growing global organisation, Claire built the optimum people centred structures and systems to enable the company to significantly scale across 6 continents. Prior to that, she spent almost 15 years with an award winning, technology SME, which operated in a highly competitive environment. The company was growing 30% year on year, first organically and then through acquisitions, winning major contracts and attracting some of the best talent in the industry. A growing awareness that finding great talent is the #1 reason why businesses are unable to scale drove Claire to explore this further and in 2019, Claire and I became business partners and started out on a journey of discovery to extensively research exemplars of scaling to identifying the key attributes that made them successful. Our research culminated in us writing a book, SIMPLE Scaling, Ten Proven Principles to 10x Your Business, which will be published later this year. In today's episode, Claire and I will be recapping on our favourite moments from the series, the lessons that can be learned from the guests on the show, the takeaways we will adopt moving forward and how people are our greatest enabler when scaling a business. Listen out for: The #1 reason as cited by business leaders for their inability to scale up their business is lack of talent. From an HR perspective, I've never been one to reach for the rulebook as it doesn't get the best out of people. Once you work out the vision of the company, your greatest enabler is your people. One of my favourite quotes is by Zig Ziglar, "You don't build a business. You build people, and people build the business". In the world of HR, once you go down the road of compliance, the best you can hope for is mediocracy One of the key themes that came across in the series was consistency and discipline. People respond really well to rhythm and building up a regular cadence because they learn to know what to expect. This is particularly important when scaling a business where there is a lot of change. Sebastien Tondeur referred to the fact that 'routine set him free.' As a business leader it is important for you to understand yourself and do the inner work. David Jenyns referred to it as 'work harder on yourself than you do on the business.' Other key themes that that have come through from the podcast series are kindness, decency, humility, and respect. It is not often that you hear kindness and business in the same sentence. Innovation is important to those organisations that have aspirations to scale, but it is not solely the domain of the product development function, it is being innovative in all aspects of the business including being innovative and creative about how you recruit people. The top three key attributes in top performers are ability, likeability and drive. To test for ability, we may ask a candidate to present on their area of expertise. To test for likeability, you can look for a good cultural fit and understand if their values align with those of the business. You can test for drive by looking at an individual's network. Look at their outside hobbies and interests and look for signs of passion for what they do. When working in competitive environments you must be creative in your approach to recruitment. Process is critically important to freeing up the founder, CEO or leader and allowing them to get back to the creative genesis of the business as opposed to getting choked and working in the bowels of the business. In terms of what I will introduce into my life going forward, I will be incorporating the pre-mortem referred to by Damian Hughes. I think it is important to understand what could go wrong before you start anything so that you can address it quickly if it arises. Timeless Takeaways: "Think big, start small, scale fast. Change can be minor but the results can be enormous". Sebastien Tondeur "Now is the end of the beginning", Adam Hale. What got you here won't necessarily get you there. Business leaders need to constantly refresh and do things differently. "Love your team like they are your children". Emmie Faust "If your business depends on you, you don't own a business – you have a job. And it's the worst job in the world because you are working for a lunatic". Michael E. Gerber About the Host Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Most recently, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. He currently acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of the CDE Group), a company he co-

In today's episode I'm delighted to introduce JT McCormick, President and CEO of Scribe Media (formerly Book in a Box), a publishing company that helps aspiring authors write, publish and market their books. Scribe has worked with more than 1,000 authors and Entrepreneur Magazine recently ranked it as having the Top Company Culture in America. Previously, JT was the President of Headspring Software, which he helped grow to a multimillion-dollar, 100-plus person company that was repeatedly ranked as one of the best places to work in Texas. JT is also the author of 'I Got There: How I Overcame Racism, Poverty, and Abuse to Achieve the American Dream.' His book tells the story of how he worked his way out of poverty, starting with his career cleaning toilets and eventually becoming the President of multiple companies. In addition to his role at Scribe Media, JT has mentored at-risk youth in the juvenile justice system, as well as youth in low economic communities. JT's work has been featured on CNBC, Entrepreneur, Forbes, Inc, and many others. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife, Megan, and their four children. In today's episode, JT talks about his unique life experience and how being the son of a pimp and an orphan made him the leader he is today. He also discusses how an organisation's culture is everyone's responsibility and more importantly how you should develop it as you scale, the importance of having belief coupled with core values and how he selects the very best people for his organisation by hiring for culture first. Finally, he provides his unique insight into the transparent world of Scribe Media and the importance of vision and execution Listen out for: • Vision without execution is worthless. A vision without a plan or execution is a wish. • It doesn't matter what you do in your life – be the best at it. • I don't like the word 'unfair'. Nothing is fair. I don't look at fair, I look at possibility. • I can't change what happened in the past, but I figured out that I can change the next hour, the next week and year. • The one thing that is most important for me is that I am consistent. I was always consistent. I was always willing to do the things that the next person wasn't willing to do. I was always willing to go the extra mile and willing to be consistent with follow up and follow through. • At Scribe, we don't have direct reports, we have direct supports. If you are in a leadership position your role is to serve and support the people you work with. No one works for me, people work with me. • Our number one value is our people. The number two principle is to do right by people. I truly believe that if you have great people, you can build great processes, you can make great profits and as an added bonus you can do great things for the community you serve – but, it all starts with people. • The most unpredictable thing in the world is also the most important thing in business – people. • It is easier to get into an Ivy League school than it is to get into Scribe. Our hiring process, while not perfect has served us very well. It is a process of a series of video interviews, phone interviews, in-person interviews with multiple people from Scribe Media. We hire the very best people, the most qualified and people and those that will serve the culture as well. • For people to be successful at Scribe Media – perform in your role, drive results and uphold the principles and values. • We hire for culture first, skillset second. • We don't train people. We coach and mentor. We don't have job descriptions, we have career descriptions. • A note for HR – Stop using the word retain. Retain means possession. No one wants to be retained. • No one should be surprised that they are doing a great job. We have 30-day check-ins. We go through what is going great, we review what we need to stop and start doing. I always ask, if you were the CEO tomorrow morning, what would you do? • Ask questions. My whole career has been built on asking questions. Timeless Takeaways: • Celebrate life • Don't grumble about work if you are not doing anything to change your circumstances • Don't live your life with 'comparisonitis' through the lens of social media • Be consistent • Replace, hope, wishing and luck with belief, goals, hard work and execution About the Host Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Most recently, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. He currently acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of the CDE Group), a company he co-promoted in 2006. In 2019, he co-led the successful private equity funding round which secured investment from IIFL, India's leading integrated financial services group to support the company's futur

Today's episode features Niall O'Murchu, an official Wim Hof Method Instructor. Niall has had a huge impact on my own life and the lives of 1000's of others and strongly believes that you can transform how you feel and think by using your breath, nature and the Wim Hof Method. In this episode we discuss, the Wim Hof Method, why it has risen to prominence in recent years, how the Wim Hof Method improves focus and the ability to maintain clarity and calmness amidst chaos, the application of the Wim Hof Method for leaders of scaling businesses, how to lock out fear and surrender, the importance of self-leadership and why exposure to the cold is one of life's great teachers Listen out for: • How Wim Hof is a simple, highly effective, scientifically proven way of improving your health, strength and mood. • Wim Hof is centred around three pillars: learning how to breathe in a very specific way, combining breathing with a gradual exposure to the cold and using the cold and breathing to sharpen and strengthen the mind. • One of the deep lessons of the cold is that it teaches us how to surrender, it teaches us to let things unfold and to not try and control them. • The beauty of the breath is that it works both ways. We can simply change how we breathe and that changes how we feel and how we think. • The most effective way of dealing with stress, uncertainty and worry is changing how we breathe. • You can develop greater mental resilience by getting into the cold. • For any person who wants to improve their performance, whether that is in the boardroom or on the basketball court, being able to use your breath and cold together to sharpen the mind is like having an unfair advantage. • 'The limit is not the sky, the limit is the mind'. Wim Hof • The mind is the master of everything. The mind is the master of the breath. • For the business leader to scale up that mountain, the vision has to be there. The vision isn't muddled by tactics. So, we are either in the tactics or up in the vision. • The more we practice the breathing, the more we practice the cold, the more we realise the mind is an ally, rather than an enemy. • 'You never get your best ideas in the office' Brendan McGurgan, Simple Scaling About the Host Brendan brings 25 years' experience of scaling businesses. Most recently, Brendan spent 16 years as a global business leader with CDE, 12 of those as Group MD, steering the company through the global financial crisis to considerable strategic growth success with offices now in 6 continents employing almost 700 people across the world (from 15) and 25X revenue growth. He currently acts as a Non-Executive Director to CDE Asia (part of the CDE Group), a company he co-promoted in 2006. In 2019, he co-led the successful private equity funding round which secured investment from IIFL, India's leading integrated financial services group to support the company's future growth ambitions throughout the Asia region. In 2016, he was awarded the Institute of Directors UK Young Director of the Year and Overall Director of the Year. An avid sportsman and advocate of self-leadership through good well-being practices, Brendan is also training to become a Wim Hof Method instructor. To find out more head over to: https://simplescaling.com/