Secret Leaders

Amanda Perry tells us what it’s like to go bankrupt after flying high with her baking business. She’d been featured in Vogue; her cupcakes were flying off the shelves - she thought business was easy. Until it wasn’t, and it was her who was personally on the hook… How do you even go bankrupt from starting a company? What impact does it have on you? And how do you recover from something like that? Amanda’s now the successful Founder of Soup Agency but this is a cautionary tale for anyone thinking about starting a business. ... We'd love your feedback: [email protected] Check out Yotpo, our exclusive sponsor - if you want to grow your ecommerce business: yotpo.com/secret

It’s pretty rare that investors have to ask the Founder they’re speaking to if they’re in a warzone, or insist they have to leave their country for somewhere a little more ‘peaceful’ but that’s exactly what happened to Yaron Galai, the Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Outbrain. Yaron was a captain in the Israeli Navy before smashing it out the park with a few startups he founded. Yaron’s latest company Outbrain (founded in 2006) is one you may not have heard of but you’ve probably used - they power recommended articles on loads of the world’s top news sites. They nearly merged with their biggest competitor (Taboola) a year ago only for that deal to not work out and float instead on the Nasdaq for $1.25 billion. As Yaron says, an exit is a great outcome but a terrible plan, so what was his plan? How has he got multiple exits under his belt? What are the secrets to his success? We talk about: The struggle for funding Israeli military/life/work balance Parents investing to make sure their children got paid Exiting for $400m Why it’s easier to make acquisitions when you’re public -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Steve Witt knows what it’s like to make a lot of money… and lose it all. He knows what it’s like to go from sipping mai tais on the proverbial Caribbean island to sleeping on your mate’s sofa because you’ve got nowhere else to go. And he’s gone through that twice. Find out what happened and how he picked himself up again. ... We'd love your feedback: [email protected] Check out Yotpo, our exclusive sponsor - if you want to grow your ecommerce business: yotpo.com/secret

BorrowMyDoggy is the kind of brand that just sticks in your brain. Once you’ve heard it you can’t unhear it. Today we’re talking with its Founder and CEO Rikke Rosenlund who had an idyllic Danish childhood but still doesn’t own a dog. Find out how she built the company bit by bit - and how they're helping the 25% of dogs who are depressed. We talk about: What your parents say behind your back The issues with dog care in the UK People finding love through pet sitting Real reason women founders get less funding -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

This is the first episode in our new bitesize series (10/15-minute episodes) dedicated to failure. Trinny Woodall’s an A-lister now, and the Founder of Trinny London, but before all the success she experienced a soul-crushing failure around the dotcom boom. Find out what happened, what she learnt from it - and how you should think about failure. ... We'd love your feedback: [email protected] Check out Yotpo, our exclusive sponsor: yotpo.com/secret

What we’re taught at schools is a real pet peeve here at Secret Leaders. Why are we mucking about learning Latin when we could be learning about stuff like nutrition and personal finance - genuinely useful subjects that will help us lead happier, more fulfilling lives? That’s what Max Rofagha thought when, after exiting his previous startup, he didn’t know what to do with his new found wealth. The content on the internet, the advice he was getting, just didn’t cut it - so he founded Finimize. Their idea is to help more ‘ordinary people’, i.e. retail investors (not professional investors) do more with their money, and the company has done pretty well. They were bought last year by Aberdeen (abrdn), making Max the youngest Exec of a FTSE 100 company. How has he done it? What has he learnt about business building that’s delivered two exits from two companies? Let’s dive in… We talk about: What Berlin used to be like Why you should grow up with computers What you should do with your savings Why people don’t understand finance Considering VC funding or bootstrapping How they exited - like, really -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

If you’ve been on holiday - if you’ve been anywhere you’ve Googled - you’ve probably used Tripadvisor. It’s just one of those names synonymous with the internet, and it’s not just because their SEO has been amazing - they’ve been going for 22 years. Extraordinarily it’s had the same person leading it all this time - Steve Kaufer, who’s finally stepping down this year. Tripadvisor has been through a variety of management changes along the way, which have forced Steve to adapt but he’s still here, although not for much longer. Find out why now’s the time he’s leaving. We talk about: The unlikely birth of Tripadvisor The difference between hindsight and wisdom How to handle a business which loses 90% of its revenue The most renewed thing on Tripadvisor How to manage change in company ownership -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

When you’re first dreaming up a business idea, you imagine it at its best - as if your execution was perfect and your resources unlimited. When your friends ask at a dinner party, you say you’ll have Gordon Ramsey teaching cooking and Christina Aguilera teaching singing. Your friends laugh, you cheers each other - and carry on with your meal. But in the case of today’s guest, David Rogier, he’s turned that dream into a reality. Everyone thought he was mad, and pointed it out to him at various stages, but here we are with MasterClass, valued at $2.75b last year according to CNBC - and with the craziest line up of teachers you’ll ever see in one place. How has David pulled it off? And all this from a man who was bullied as a child over his stutter. We talk about: His grandparents meeting in Auschwitz Getting over his stutter How to choose which business to launch How he started Masterclass The real art of storytelling The hardest things he’s ever done Why he kept going when everybody told him to stop -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

How do you buy a ski mountain? How much does it cost? And how do you turn it into the biggest ski resort in North America - Powder Mountain? That’s the kind of thing we wanted to know when we sat down with Elliott Bisnow, who shot to startup fame as Co-Founder of Summit, a now legendary events series which attracted speakers like Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson and Jessica Alba. He’s now the proud Co-Founder of Powder Mountain which is insanely cool. And not bad for a college dropout, although, to be fair, that’s now a pretty common trend on this podcast: drop out of university to start something and make it big. We have a lot of dreamers on this show but Elliott’s dreams are legitimately crazy. Find out how he turns them into a reality and: The book that changed his life Homeschool Building a business with your Dad The tiny first Summit event The real value of co-founders Buying Powder Mountain The most difficult feedback to hear -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

It’s not often you meet real life prodigies but Kieran O’Neill might just be one. By the time he was 19 he’d been sued by Disney and his company had been bought by Carl Page, the brother of Google Co-Founder Larry Page. And then he dropped out of university to start another successful business, because, why not? “At that point I discovered what I want to do for the rest of my life - build things. And I began building a tool that would track which of my housemates was best at a particular game.” Today Kieran is the Co-Founder and CEO of Thread.com, a place where you can get clothes that actually suit and fit you - a reaction to the typical online shopping experience which often results in loads of returns. Plus, plenty of people don’t back their own style - including Kieran. “I keep a text file with various ideas in. And at this point had about 10 that were on not a shortlist, but a medium shortlist. Nine of them were for other people, problems they had but problems I didn't have personally. The problem I had myself was that I wanted to dress well and have good clothes, but found shopping to be really frustrating.” Find out how he took this personal problem and turned it into high growth business. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Building a successful startup is about lots of things but a tonne of people get the first step wrong - picking the right business to launch. So how do you pick the right one? Well, our host and the Co-Founder of Heights Dan Murray-Serter is in the hot seat today answering that very question. This is the second episode in our semi-regular series with Dan, showing what it’s really like to be a Founder, warts and all. The first episode was released on January 18 and we left things at a critical point for Dan and his Co-Founder Joel. Dan wasn’t motivated by what his company had pivoted into. They wanted to give the money back to investors. But things didn’t go the way they planned… -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

One of the extraordinary things about the startup ecosystem is the kind of company that gets celebrated. Most of the time, they don’t make money. They bounce from one funding round to the next, and only a tiny % eventually make it. They’re the kinds of businesses that would’ve made our grandparents shake their heads. Today’s guest, Tom Leathes, the Co-Founder and CEO of used car marketplace Motorway, is different. The first few companies he built were bootstrapped, profitable and he sold them for more money. Which is basically how business worked for centuries. But then Tom found himself leading a VC-backed startup and things didn’t go so well. It was the first time he and his Co-Founders had failed. So after that experience they re-set and they’ve come back fighting with another VC-backed business, Motorway, which was just valued at over a billion pounds. Find out about the key learnings that have made him successful - and lead to a different outcome for Motorway. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

If you’re in the UK and you like your peanut butter, you’ve probably come across Pip & Nut, the brand named after its Founder and today’s guest, Pip Murray. Pip started the business when she was 24, at her kitchen table, with a blender and some nuts. But plenty of people start businesses like that so what makes her special? How has she managed it? Oh, and we’ve also got the return of the king, Rich Martell, Co-Founder of Secret Leaders, who went to university with Pip and was one of her early investors. He couldn’t resist the chance to join Dan in the interview chair - and so he could ask Pip the difficult questions. Like how do you actually get your product listed at Tescos? -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

It’s amazing how important business seems until something really important happens, like a war breaks out. For Aleksandr Volodarsky, Founder of Lemon.io, which connects companies with software engineers, although he and his colleagues had gotten used to operating in a conflict situation since 2014, he was still stunned when Russia invaded. And the most useful thing he can do now is to keep the business going so it can support the war effort - including his employees who’ve gone off to fight. Find out what it’s like in his shoes right now. What’s going on with his team. What’s it like on the ground. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Look, we’re going to tell you straight - this is a blinding episode - and that’s because we’re talking to a man who is unflinchingly honest about his Founder experience. On the outside it looked like Adam Bierman had it all. He was the Co-Founder and CEO of MedMen, a cult phenomenon and the world’s first cannabis unicorn. They were seen as the Apple of weed and they looked unstoppable. But in 2019, a year after hitting its all time high on the Canadian stock market, the company had lost 95% of its value. Adam’s personal wealth was also up in smoke because he hadn’t listened to his advisors - instead of diversifying his assets, he’d bought even more MedMen stock. And then came the lawsuits. Adam is no longer with the company and was in a reflective mood when he sat down with Dan. So what on earth happened? Why did he leave the company? And what has he learnt from all of this? -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

What’s particularly shocking about Nick Telson’s success with DesignMyNight is how deliberate it all seemed. They set themselves a target each year, achieved it and moved onto the next one until they’d hit the numbers they needed for the exit they wanted. How many businesses do that? And it was the first startup he’d ever founded… Nick explains how they sold the business - the actual steps they took - which isn’t a process that most people know about unless they’ve been lucky enough to go through an exit themselves. And in classic startup style, it looked like the whole deal was going to collapse on the day of signing until an unlikely hero stepped up. Since exiting DesignMyNight, Nick has founded Horseplay Ventures, and more recently Trumpet, a mixture of Squarespace and Canva and Slack for sales decks. It sounds like something I would use, tbf. Despite his success, throughout his time leading DesignMyNight, Nick kept one aspect of himself relatively hidden - his sexuality. Find out why and what he’s doing about it now. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

It’s the stuff entrepreneurs dream of. Houzz, a marketplace for home renovations, evolved from an evenings and weekends passion project into a multi-billion dollar company with investors queuing up to get a slice of their proverbial pie. So how did the two Co-Founders, husband and wife Adi Tatarko and Alon Cohen, do it? “I think, in retrospect, delaying it and bootstrapping it, the way we bootstrapped it without even understanding that this is what it is back then helped us tremendously down the road.” “Go invest the first six months and validate and see that this idea can really scale, people will really use it, you're really invested in it, and you really love it. And then you will not need to prove these things to investors.” Find out how they secured an investment from legendary investor Mike Moritz in a matter of days - and what they did next to dominate their category. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Life is the sum of your choices, says Jeffrey Kolovson, COO and Co-Founder of Faire, an online wholesale marketplace for retailers and brands. At the end of the day, it’s not what you say, it's what you do and the choices you make and the accumulation of those over time that matters. “I once had a mentor tell me that the prize for winning the donut eating competition is more donuts. And that kind of stuck with me, as things don't necessarily get easier. And the more you do, the more you have to do.” Jeff isn’t one for taking the easy route. He’s made quite a few interesting choices over the years. Like the time he had to build 60 futons in 36 hours, or the time he left Square to start Faire only to have to leave Faire in its infancy, before returning once more to Faire a few years later. Now, having just raised $400 million in their last funding round off the back of a $12.4 billion valuation, why did Jeff have to leave Faire in the first place? Well, for very good reason - to protect his mental health. “And so you both have to one: figure out how to be at peace with the unrelenting nature of it and two: how you don't let it overwhelm you at any given time. One of the tricks I do is that I like to think about the problems from a year ago or two years ago, how quaint they seem to me now.” The thing is, says Jeff, when you put your head down and work hard, you have to be able to enjoy it. There has to be enough about what you’re doing and the people you’re doing it with, that you derive enjoyment from what you’re doing, otherwise, what’s the point? -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Cocaine, £1,000 on roulette, sleeping with the client, a boss demanding bail out of a Malaysian prison, a restraining order - and that’s just one of the stories in this special episode where we turn the microphone on our host, Dan Murray-Serter. This is the start of a semi-regular series where we interview Dan roughly every three months because: If you listen to the podcast regularly we thought you might want to get to know him better. Who is this guy in your ears every week? Dan is the Founder of braincare startup Heights so we thought we could grill him every 3 months so you can find out what it’s really like in the Founder hot seat - warts and all. This episode is focused on the early part of Dan’s career - a period when Dan learned how he wanted to lead - from bad bosses. Dan grew up with an entrepreneur of a father - and saw the toll it took on him. It wasn’t a life Dan wanted, so what eventually convinced him to take the plunge into entrepreneurship? “Entrepreneurship is a bit of a drug. And the scariest part of it always is and always has been leaving my job to do this full time, that was always the scariest part, because there's no, you know, there was no safety net.” What was Grabble, Dan’s previous startup? Why did it fail? How did he get invited to Buckingham Palace? Who did he joke about to make the Queen laugh? And why did Brexit kill Grabble? “I mean, the thing is, it is quite a long story, because sadly, what we should have done is pull the cord. And we didn't do that, we did death by 1,000 paper cuts.” -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Having grown up poor, Founder and CEO of Vuori Joe Kudla always wondered what it would be like to have money and go on holiday, so he spent the first chapter of his career proving to himself that he could make money. But then he started to make life decisions differently. “I see myself on my deathbed. And I am coming to terms with that moment, am I going to look back and feel like I went for it, like I seized the day? Did I live a life in alignment with my passions, my heart, my interests? Or did I take the safe path?” In 2013 he founded Vuori, an activewear brand initially aimed at men. They nearly ran out of money in 2015, but a few pivots and several years later Vuori is worth $4b and launching in the UK this spring. How has Joe done it in such a competitive industry? How has he done it having raised a pittance compared to his rivals? And why is clarity the ultimate currency? -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Curve CEO and founder Shachar Bialick is a multi-exit entrepreneur with a background in the Israeli Defense Force special forces. “There's a joke in Israel: how do you win a competition in racing? You start as fast as you can, and you slowly increase the pace.” Curve brings all your credit cards and debit cards into one app and card. The idea first came to Shachar in 2006, but he knew that launching a business is all about timing. And so he waited until 2014 to pick it back up, when he knew the world was ready. After creating a proof of concept in 2015, and raising the first series seed funding of £1.2m in 2015, Shachar launched Curve in 2016. “When we [first] went to MasterCard and told them about what we’re trying to do and the vision we have, we were laughed out of the room, literally they said, ‘Have you opened the MasterCard rules?’” So how did he rack up 4 exits? How big can Curve really be? And why is he using Amazon, Netflix and Spotify to validate his mission? -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

How did NetSuite grow from its humble beginnings above a hairdressers in 1998 to almost 20,000 employees 23 years later, and selling to Oracle for $9.3 billion dollars? Today we’re speaking to Evan Goldberg, founder and EVP of NetSuite who make software which helps businesses with stuff like accountancy and inventory management. “We provide [services] for businesses that are fast growing, that have increasing complexity, they've outgrown the simple systems that they were using to help them track their business when they had just a couple people. And we provide a business application and one system that really helps you grow your business more effectively.” None of it would’ve been possible if tech giant Larry Ellison (Founder of Oracle), worth $124b at the last count, hadn’t taken Evan under his wing and invested in the company. So how did they do it? What makes Larry special? And what was it like meeting Steve Jobs? -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

The only certainty in life is death (and taxes!) And yet the industry of death had remained largely unmodernised by the time Farewill was co-founded by Dan Garrett in 2015. “Out of 100, losing a spouse, or a parent or a best friend, is the 100 out of 100 worst thing you ever go through. And what a great funeral can do is bring back some of that connection that you have with someone.” Dan says that despite death affecting every single one of us it’s also historically lacked the kind of customer-centricity you see in great tech companies the world over. And that’s simply because we have a profoundly human aversion to talking about and thinking about death. “When you're grieving, your amygdala, your hippocampus basically shuts down. It's really difficult for you to make decisions when you're dealing with grief. And you will just go to a high street funeral director and end up paying loads of money for something that you don't necessarily want.” Find out what innovation in the death industry actually looks like and the beautiful, personal things that people are doing with their wills and funerals. You might even get some inspo, if you can bear to think about it… -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Being a Founder takes its toll on you - even if it looks like everything is rosy from the outside. Today we’re learning from Alex Lieberman, Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Morning Brew, which became a darling in the media industry because it actually became commercially successful. But whilst everyone else was applauding the company’s success, for Alex at least, he was trying to cope with anxiety and panic attacks. The company sold late last year to Insider Inc (of Business Insider) for $75 million which means Alex doesn’t need to worry about money any more. But he does need to worry about the best way to use his time and freedom. He used to think chasing your passions was bullshit, but now he’s not so sure. Find out why Alex wants to be more like Benjamin Button and how you can make your life more meaningful. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

How many times have you stood in front of a wall of wine in a supermarket and taken a punt on one because the bottle looked nicer than the others? We’ve all done it… and often been disappointed by results. So, in 2009 Heini Zachariassen, Co-Founder, Former CEO and current board member of Vivino, decided to fix the problem. “Why is wine something that nobody has disrupted? And why is wine something where the only thing I can base my decision on is looking at a label.” Vivino’s mission is to help people find better wine and they’ve been doing it primarily through their mobile app which lets you scan bottles to find reviews, ratings etc. - and ultimately make better wine buying decisions. Vivino isn’t Heini’s first rodeo. His first foray into entrepreneurialism was with BullGuard, a company delivering cybersecurity and VPN solutions. “The real success for me in doing your first startup is learning. It's just incredible how much you learn, what kind of mistakes you do, and that just comes back at you later. That's why second time founders are just better than first time founders.” You don’t build a startup alone, says Heini, you aren’t the only one doing the work. Your family has to make sacrifices, your spouse, your children. And when things go wrong, you feel them in your body. Find out what he means… -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Growing a company to 14 million users and a valuation of $1.5 billion should be cause for celebration, but, like so many founders, for Vinay Hiremath, Co-Founder and CTO of Loom, it’s difficult to enjoy your successes. In fact it’s the failures that tend to stick with you. Loom, a video communication tool for businesses, wouldn’t be here today if Vinay and his Co-Founders hadn’t had their ‘sliding doors’ moment which revealed what they should be building right before they were going to have to give up. “Half the battle is figuring out what the fuck the problem even is, right? What pain points do people actually have? As you're pivoting, you end up finding something that works, and maybe it doesn't line up with your hypothesis perfectly, and usually it doesn't make any sense. And if you see traction, that's the point where you hop on and say, Okay, I'm here for the ride.” And what a ride it’s been. Most founders would be ecstatic if they hit one macroeconomic trend - Loom hit four or five, back to back. But the problem with phenomenal growth is the human cost: the toll it’s taken on the team, on the engineers, on Vinay’s mental health. Is it worth it? “Every year or two years, you're faced with some situation where you're like, is this worth it? Like, am I the right person? I wish I could say that it gets easier. But for me, it really hasn't.” -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Larry Gadea built the world's biggest Pikachu pictures website at 12 years old, was recruited by Google at 17, joined Twitter after college and then left to found Envoy in 2013. He did all this after getting smuggled out of Romania as a young child in the late 1980s and watching his parents have to restart their lives several times. Normally childhoods filled with upheaval breed an aversion to risk - but not in Larry. Envoy is a workplace management tool that helps with things like letting you know when visitors have arrived at your office and booking meeting rooms. 16,000 workplaces were using Envoy, so on paper it looked like Larry had the dream career. But then Covid hit. “So here we are with our products almost exclusively built for these workplaces that you can't go in. At first it was a little bit crazy. It was very scary, like what do you do?” Find out how Larry and Envoy have got past this genuine iceberg. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

After exiting Songkick, Michelle You was burnt out. It felt like failure and grief (her words). She spent a year backpacking around the world, living on $2 per day, trying to figure out what it took to make her happy, to figure out what mattered to her and what her next business move was. “I went camping and hiking and surfing and climbing for the first time. And it was that that made me fall in love with nature. And that was my gateway drug into the climate change crisis.” Michelle is determined not to repeat the same mistakes she made at Songkick at Supercritical, the climate tech startup helping businesses actually achieve net zero. “It took me personally lots of coaching and conversations to feel like okay, I really feel ready now to dive in again, because I was scared, you know, I was really scared of failing, I was scared of having a bad idea, scared of replicating terrible decisions, terrible experiences.” Find out how Michelle found herself again after feeling like a massive failure from her first startup, and why she’s built a climate tech software platform that isn't all just planting trees. “We measure the carbon footprint end to end. This typically takes somebody six months of working with a consultant charging five figures. And that's what I learned [during] my time at LocalGlobe. This can be done with software.” We chat about: Why the end of Songkick felt like grief The importance of a good product discovery process Why climate is the next diversity and inclusion -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Miki Agrawal was forced to become an entrepreneur having started her career, in her own words, as an awful employee: “I got fired from pretty much all of my jobs growing up, because I just wasn't listening, or I was questioning or I was talking back or I was running in the hall or I was eating while on the job or giving away smoothies to friends. Whatever job I had, I did something wrong.” The daughter of an immigrant who came to the US with $5 in his pocket, Miki learned early that if you see something you don’t like, question it and fix it even if you don’t have resources - even if you have no money. Miki nearly didn’t become an entrepreneur - she was going to be a professional footballer before fate decided otherwise. But now she’s the founder of Tushy, one of the most unusual startups we’ve had on the show. Tushy makes a collection of bidets and other accessories for the bathroom to help you become more hygienic, less wasteful - and kinder to your bottom. “My boyfriend, now husband, got me this really crappy birthday product that he found in some Asian place and he installed it for Valentine's Day and he was like, ‘Look, these will help your butt’ and then it truly changed my life.” Find out how Miki dealt with theft in her first startup and poisonous politics in her second venture making period pants before she realised how much our bottoms need saving. We chat about: Why entrepreneurs have to be naive The best interview question ever Conscious businesses outperform non-conscious by up to 13 times -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Jesse Powell grew up poor and hustling from a young age. First, he sold physical gaming cards, then he sold virtual ‘gold’ in the game World of Warcraft - and now he’s the Co-Founder and CEO of Kraken, Europe’s largest crypto exchange - with talk of going public for $20 billion. How did he make the jump? “Bitcoin, when I read about it, I thought it was interesting. I first saw it and just thought it was like another World of Warcraft gold that we can sell on the website.” Jesse has been in crypto pretty much since the beginning, helping out in the aftermath of the infamous Mt. Gox hack when $460 million got stolen from the world’s biggest exchange. It taught him a lot about security but today it’s NFTs that have got him excited. “I think NFTs are going to be a much bigger thing. I think you'll see the tokenization of basically everything. We're already starting to see tokenized securities, stocks becoming tokenized, art is becoming tokenized.” Find out how he found the world’s best hacker and the biggest mistakes he’s made in building a multi billion pound company. “If I could go back again, what I would do is, even if I didn't need the money, I would go through one of the major Silicon Valley accelerators, I would apply for Y Combinator, and I would do it for the network. Because, you know, it's basically like your entrance fee into this elite club.” -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

“Every time you masturbate, God kills a kitten, and I went ‘right, that's it, that's what I'm calling my business.’” This is the story of Killing Kittens, the cult-like sex party, founded by Emma Sayle. “Everyone starts talking to each other and mingling and then you'll see maybe a few couples disappear off into a room, or you know a group of girls go off. One minute you've got a packed bar and the next minute it's only 10 people in the bar and everyone's gone off into different rooms, getting naked, having sex, doing whatever. It’s like Dante's Inferno, limbs everywhere.” Killing Kittens begun life in 2005 as a series of monthly hedonistic parties led by empowered women in London, but it has since grown into a global movement including apps like the most private of private messaging platforms. In this latest episode, Emma shares where the idea for Killing Kittens came from, why women today are much better at owning their sexuality, sexual double standards, what to expect at a KK party, and how to turn something like this into a big business. “I need to raise money because we need to go big or go home on the whole platform side of it. And to make it fly before some Silicon Valley upstart with millions in the bank comes in claiming to own the female digital sex space.” -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

How do you live a happier, healthier, more productive life? This is the question that doctor-turned-YouTuber Ali Abdaal is obsessed with. “Most of my childhood was spent chasing this dream of making magical internet money that mostly didn't work out. And it was like a string of failures. But when I did end up making magical internet money, I felt that a lot of the failures from childhood had been worth it.” Ali’s first business, 6Med, which he started in university in 2013, helps people get into medical schools and has been used by over 10,000 prospective doctors. But recently his career took an interesting turn when, having paused being a doctor to focus on becoming a YouTuber, he realised that his real love was teaching. With over two million subscribers and videos that have racked up over 145 million views, Ali has definitely found his niche. “I started seriously asking myself the question like, what the hell do I want to do with my life? One exercise I found really helpful was thinking about what do I want written on my gravestone? I ended up landing on some combination of good dad, good husband, and inspirational teacher.” Find out how to be more productive, why having fun with your work is so important, and how to tell your mum that you’re packing in medicine for a career on YouTube (eek). -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

“It’s really hard for companies to get acquired. I was shocked at how many entrepreneurs reached out to me after we announced the acquisition [of Bizness Apps], like ‘how did you get acquired?’” With a couple of exits already under his belt, Andrew Gazdecki saw first-hand how broken the process of selling a company was. He used that experience to start MicroAcquire in January 2020, a platform that helps startups get acquired by connecting them with buyers within 30 days. The goal is to give startups an alternative to brokers that’s easier, cheaper and more likely to succeed - and it’s working. In this episode, Andrew discusses the cut-throat world of clarinet playing, graduating Chico State with 2.07 - the lowest GPA of any student in their history; starting and exiting Bizness Apps and Altcoin.io; diagnosing the problems between private equity and entrepreneurs, and why he would support any of his employees who quit MicroAcquire to start their own company. “Entrepreneurship isn't for everyone. It's about understanding who you are as a person. But what I think about a lot is just, the fear of regret is so much heavier than the fear of failure.” -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

“When I was about 28 or 29 I had a squirting orgasm, I completely lost my mind. I couldn't tell if I was having a religious moment or a seizure, or maybe both or neither. As I lay there on the cold tile floor staring at the ceiling, all I could think was, oh my god, how do I do that again? And more importantly, how do I do that again by myself?” Lora DiCarlo is the founder of the sex tech startup also called Lora DiCarlo, and is determined to change the face of sex products. Having won an award for their first prototype at the world famous Consumer Electronics Show in 2019, the award was subsequently revoked for being ‘obsence, profane and immoral’, prompting outrage over the double-standards on women’s sexuality. Lora’s is a story of orgasms, scandals, celebrity power, the patriarchy, and a sprinkling of robotics engineering. Oh and find out how to bring on board Cara Delevingne as a co-owner. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Dame Stephanie Shirley, known as ‘Steve’ for reasons explained in the podcast, escaped Nazi persecution before founding a software startup in 1962 with just £6 which provided employment to hundreds of women when they weren’t taken seriously in the workplace. “I remember selling a six figure software project to a junior minister, and he was trying to pinch my bottom. It was very hard to maintain a sort of professionalism.” Steve’s story is one that reminds us both how much the world has moved on since the early days of her startup, and sadly how little has changed. “I can't believe how today we're still talking about the same sorts of things that I was talking about 50 years ago: feeling undervalued, women’s ideas taken and presented by men as their own, women being talked over, women being patronised, women being sexually assaulted.” From coming to England on the Kindertransport in 1939, to falling in love with mathematics, being appalled at pay inequality, founding her own company (Xansa plc, now part of the Sopra Group) in 1962, and navigating the 1975 equal opportunities legislation: “We tried to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. But all in all, we realised that that was the way the world was going. And now of course, all of business is much more inclusive. But it was a struggle. In the early days, women were second class citizens.” Having retired from the business aged 60 (she’s now 88), Steve is now a full time philanthropist, focusing on things she knows and cares about, treating her various charities as businesses. Her advice to listeners? “All the important things that I've done have been either disruptive or long term. Sticking with 11 years for this, 17 years for that, five years [there]. These are not things that are done overnight with a burst of energy.” We chat about: From refugee to entrepreneur Why she had to become Steve to get traction Surviving a nervous breakdown Becoming a good philanthropist Links: Book - Let It Go Book - So To Speak -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

“​​Technology does not appear from nowhere, it is closely allied to the shape of society. And if you have exponentially changing technologies, they will force changes on society, or create a gap.” Humans coming second best to technology isn’t a new subject but our guest today, Azeem Azhar, has a new, thoroughly researched take on it which goes further than anything we’ve seen before. Azeem is a founder, journalist, speaker and now author of the book ‘Exponential: How Accelerating Technology Is Leaving Us Behind and What to Do About It’, which is being released right now. His book, and our conversation, is about the expanding gap between technology and society - not just computing power, but energy, market control, and even how our countries are run. He presents the immense problems and opportunities this creates for us as a species. When’s the precise start date of the exponential wave? Will the growing gap between tech and society inevitably lead to conflict? Why are cities important in the exponential age? What are the major problems accelerating tech can solve? Yes, it can be a huge force for good. Find out what the future holds for our civilisation. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

How many of us are kicking ourselves for not investing $100 in Bitcoin in 2010 - it would be worth almost $48 million today. Anthony Di Iorio, one of the co-founders of Ethereum, the massive open-source blockchain, which is home to Ether, the second biggest cryptocurrency in the world after Bitcoin, is not kicking himself. Anthony was an early investor in Bitcoin putting in $8,000 back in 2012. With the proceeds of his first sale of Bitcoin, Anthony was able to initially fund Ethereum with the few million dollars he made. Anthony stepped away from Ethereum in 2015, and is currently the founder and CEO of the blockchain company Decentral - a software development company he founded that focuses on blockchain tech. Anthony’s story is wild - not your average entrepreneur tale. He needs round the clock bodyguards and for a man who’s spent his working life seeking freedom, that doesn’t sit well. “I always search for freedom, to be empowered, where I can be in control of my life utilising technology to do that. A big turning point for me [was] when I'm surrounded by security guards and thinking, is this really the life that I want? And the answer is no. The more I search for freedom, the less freedom I actually get.” Links: Decentral Ethereum.org -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Most investors didn’t understand the concept. Most non-technical entrepreneurs at the time didn’t get it either. But Howie Liu, Co-Founder and CEO of multi-billion dollar tech juggernaut Airtable, had the conviction to bet the next 10 years of his life on it. “I didn't come up with Airtable as an idea, on a lark, it was informed by a lot of the research I did, a lot of the observations I had of the enterprise software landscape, of looking back at other companies that did similar things. I then came to this gut decision that this was a big opportunity.” Airtable is a low-code relational database, a highly versatile platform that’s grown massively since its founding almost 10 years ago. In the interim, Howie has learnt how to articulate a unique product to a huge customer base, and grow it from the ground up to become a category defining piece of software. But how did a home-brew startup become a Silicon Valley darling? Howie shares his story from lifeguarding, ghosting Accenture on the first day of his new job, joining the Y Combinator, founding Etacts and his subsequent decision to sell it to Salesforce less than a year later: “We felt woefully ill prepared to go and try to build a larger and more ambitious company from the starting point that we had set out with. And a few acquisition offers did come around, including Salesforce, we felt like they would be great learning opportunities.” Find out what Howie did next on his way to a near $6b valuation. -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

What would you do if you sold your business and effectively retired at the ripe, old age of 28? Phenomenally successful serial entrepreneur Norman Crowley took just three weeks before jumping back into business. “A business isn't just a vehicle to make money. A vehicle is an expression of your creativity, it's working with friends. And then the thing nobody warns you about is that when it's sold, you just end up with a bank balance, and the friends are gone, the mission has gone.” Norman has founded multiple businesses in welding, gaming and eco-friendly energy. Each time he’s turned them into multi-million pound ventures, before selling them and moving on to the next big thing. Norman has had his fair share of bruises - including having a dream billion dollar deal slip right through his fingers at the last minute. “An Icelandic hedge fund, who already owned 25% of the business, offered to buy the whole thing for $1 billion. And when somebody offers to buy your business for $1 billion, it's impolite to say no, so we agreed to sell.” His focus now is on climate change, and despite being asked to sell his current business every six months, he’s resolute that this one isn’t for sale. Don’t miss Norman share his fascinating story in this episode. From how his childhood impacted his career, to the commonality of anxiety and entrepreneurship, starting and selling five businesses, learning to control the business narrative, building a gambling machine business from £70 to £300m in revenue, missing out on selling a business for £1bn, founding the cloud, tackling climate change with The Cool Planet Group, and learning how to walk on hot coals. “Keep fucking walking. This business shit is not easy. Anyone who tells you it's easy is not trying hard enough, so keep walking. Don't give up.” We chat about: Mental health and entrepreneurship Starting and selling 5 businesses Why his current business is not for sale Learning how to walk on hot coals Want to receive our podcast on a weekly basis? Subscribe to our newsletter! -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Mathilde Collin is the co-founder and CEO of Front, a communications platform that has developed a cult following - despite having to stop working at one point because her anxiety had become so debilitating. Find out how Mathilde learned to overcome burnout, an incapacitated co-founder, and a serious case of competitiveness that almost let work take over her whole life. Front has grown quickly since its founding in 2013, amassing a cult following, and recently announced a huge series C round with some investors including Eric Yuan - the founder of Zoom. In this candid conversation, Mathilde shares why she was so unhappy as an intern before starting Front, meeting her co-founder, her Y Combinator experience, meeting Patrick Collison - CEO of Stripe, why dealing with anxiety has been so challenging, and why she considers discipline and transparency to be important skills for happiness and success. “For me, what matters is when I'm not working, I want to make sure that I'm not working. I think the biggest thing that prevents people from having a good work life balance isn't obviously the number of hours, but the fact that when they're off, they're on.” We chat about: Make something people want How YC gave her the confidence that Front would be a great company Transparency and discipline at Front Her super power Links: Mathilde Collin – Medium Want to receive our podcast on a weekly basis? Subscribe to our newsletter!

Tarilian Laser Technologies (TLT) was a medtech company founded by husband and wife team, Dr Sandeep and Nita Shah, who bamboozled everyone from the UK government to PWC. They claimed to have a revolutionary wearable blood pressure monitor, powered by a secret, proprietary algorithm. They raised millions, before everything came crashing down. This is an audio exclusive with the journalist who just broke the story in The Sunday Times, Sara McCorquodale, founder and CEO of CORQ. When Sara, a former journalist, first heard what TLT had done, she knew it was a story she had to report on and has spent the last year investigating. “It was just six lines of JavaScript”, said Sara, of the secret algorithm. “It was a GCSE level sum, it wasn't an algorithm, it was barely an equation. And that sum had a £52 million valuation.” “Sandeep and Nita Shah, they were very credible characters… Usually you don't Google the person who owns the [scam] company and find search results which include them winning awards, and being endorsed by the government of their country.” It was a 13-year scam. How did they get away with it so long? Where did all the money go? Why didn’t anyone raise the alarm? Links: The Theranos story Tarilian Laser Technologies Book - Influence: How Social Media Influencers Are Shaping Our Digital Future Want to receive our podcast on a weekly basis? Subscribe to our newsletter!

“Impact X exists because I'm tired. And there are a lot of people who are tired of asking the question - what to do to improve the lives of black Britain? We've been having this conversation for a long, long time.” Meet Eric Collins. He’s done some work for President Obama, built some of the world’s biggest tech companies, is the host of a new TV show on Channel 4 called ‘The Money Maker’, and is the CEO of Impact X, a venture capital fund in the UK for underrepresented founders. How did Eric find himself here? “I got a network of extraordinary people. When I say these people are extraordinary people I'm talking about when I was an undergraduate, there was a woman named Michelle Robinson, who was a student in my brother's class, you will know her as Michelle Obama.” Eric shares his incredible story from building a network at university with the selective eating club, Cottage Club, to the global tech behemoths he helped build, to the mistakes and reflections he gained from his time at SwiftKey, to hosting ‘The Money Maker’, and finally founding Impact X, a venture capital group for and by underrepresented entrepreneurs. We chat about: Building your network from university Going from $5 million to $70 billion in 3 years at AOL Funding underrepresented entrepreneurs Want to receive our podcast on a weekly basis? Subscribe to our newsletter!

Today’s guest is at the helm of probably the biggest company we’ve ever had on Secret Leaders. Jeff Lawson is the Co-Founder and CEO of Twilio, a cloud communication platform that helps businesses use everything from text to video calls in their sites and apps. Since its founding in 2008, Twilio has grown to 4,500 employees, annual revenue of $1.74 billion, and is valued at $65 billion. Yup, $65 billion. Woof. All this despite investors not being interested at the beginning which forced Jeff and his team to make a decision. “When choosing between listening to investors and customers, we're gonna choose customers. And we're gonna let customers guide our actions. And if that works, then investors will follow suit. And sure enough, they did.” But how did Jeff actually do it? How do you build a company like Twilio? We chat about: Learning how to start companies How big companies work How to reinvent yourself if you want to stay CEO How to have difficult conversations IPOing on the day of the Brexit vote

Before he was the manager for Nas and Gwen Stefani, before he was the producer for the film 8 Mile, before he was getting into fights with P Diddy and 50 Cent, Steve Stoute was an entrepreneur. He’s always been an entrepreneur - starting out shovelling snow and selling mortgages. And boy has he got some stories to tell, like what Roger Moore said to him when 007 met Steve and Bono in a bar in Monaco. Find out how Steve is turning the music industry on its head as the founder of United Masters, having recently raised $50 million from an all star trio: Apple, Google and Andreessen Horowitz. “As an entrepreneur, your job is to have an idea, build out the vision so that it's clear, and that people can buy into it. Employees, outside partners, strategic partners, bankers, whatever it may be, you have to get people aligned around your vision.” Steve shares his journey, from growing up in Queens, New York, around the birth of hip hop, to investing in music producers, and creating and producing albums for Gwen Stefani and Nas: “Once you start getting momentum and you have heat, you know, heat attracts heat, people want to be around what’s hot, and working with Nas and then LL Cool J and Foxy Brown, Mariah Carey, Lauryn Hill and the Fujis...” Steve has learned from Sit Paul McCartney, has had public fallings out with 50 Cent, founded an advertising agency - Translation - and now with United Masters has created a record company that gives artists back their power. “Don't listen to the noise, be irrational with your pursuit of perfection, be irrational with your belief in your idea. And don't allow people to tell you that you can't do it. They're actually just putting their limitations on themselves, on you.” We chat about: The impact the rise of hip hop had on him Taking advantage of every opportunity Founding the record company in your pocket His darkest days as an entrepreneur Links: Book - The Tanning of America -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

“I came across a job advert for a psychologist to join a matchmaking agency. I wouldn't describe myself as a spiritual person, but it just felt like my dad had sent [me] this opportunity. I had butterflies in my stomach. That was the moment that changed my life.” Are you unlucky in love? Or perhaps you’re exploring a very niche entrepreneurial path, then don’t miss Rachel Vida MacLynn, the founder of The Vida Consultancy, widely considered the best elite matchmaking agency in the world, on this week’s Secret Leaders. “One of our biggest challenges is we don't get to keep our clients for a lifetime. We have to keep finding new clients because most of our clients only stay with us for 12 months, and they're expensive to acquire.” It's a fascinating niche - they're a matchmaking service for high net worth individuals, entrepreneurs and business people looking for long term relationships. “I've pulled more and more psychology into the service, because it's become more apparent to me that a lot of clients think they know what they want in a partner, but what they think they're looking for isn't actually right for them.” But how does elite matchmaking work? What is the business model for such a niche? What does it cost? And how did Rachel get into it in the first place? From starting up to international expansion, to learn about Rachel’s incredible journey in elite matching and more, download and listen to this latest episode. We chat about: The role of psychology in matchmaking Finding customers for elite matchmaking Funding and international expansion -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Want to know what it’s like to negotiate for a person’s life? Want to learn the secrets of great negotiation? Want to find out why a deal can break down with no warning? “The deal-killers are as important as the decision maker”, explains Chris Voss. “We've changed our hostage negotiation strategies to take the people not at the table into account. And we found the exact same dynamic in business.” If you feel like your negotiation skills need sharpening, you’ll like this episode with Chris Voss, former chief international hostage and kidnapping negotiator for the FBI and author of the best-seller, Never Split the Difference. He’s got some pretty crazy stories too. Now the Founder and CEO of The Black Swan Group, Chris has carved out a career as the world’s number one negotiation coach, taking what he learned during his years at the FBI and applying those techniques to the business world. “Listening is not waiting for your turn to talk. It's an evolved skill. There isn't any negotiation book out there that doesn't list listening as an advanced skill that you have to actually work at.” Learn about Chris’s journey to becoming a negotiator, why listening and being coachable are the core skills of a great negotiator, what’s happening psychologically during negotiations, the art of the calibrated question, why Bono is one of the best negotiators in the world, why deference is a superpower... and why you should never split the difference. Links: Book - Never Split the Difference -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

“We were 100% sure about one thing: if you go to the fucking moon, you shouldn't go to the supermarket. We have the technology to go to space and we’re still going to the supermarket? This is counter intuitive.” Kağan Sümer is the founder and CEO of Gorillas, a grocery delivery service which promises to have your order delivered to your door in under 10 minutes, at retail prices. They’ve been blowing up. Recently launched in the UK, they’re the quickest ever European startup to be valued at over $1 billion and they’re only just getting started. “Gorillas is about four things: being authentic, taking bold decisions, keeping riding, and constantly changing things and owning the change.” Kağan (pronounced Kaan, not Kağan) is celebrating Gorillas becoming the fastest ever European startup to reach a billion dollar valuation, and is now fighting hard to introduce the venture to the UK and US. If you haven’t heard of Gorillas, you can bet your bottom dollar they’re about to be everywhere. “You can outsmart me. You can out-structure me. You can out X me. But you cannot out self-discipline me. You can't outwork me. Because if I want something, I go for it.” Before we strap ourselves into the Gorilla rocketship, we first find out what made Kağan the man he is, what shaped his foray into entrepreneurialism, how the company grew from one man storing drinks on his balcony to a billion dollar company, the four values of Gorillas, how Kağan’s vision for revolutionising delivery, building a new supply chain and infrastructure led to Gorillas phenomenal growth, and knowing when it’s time to move on and hand the mantle over. If you’re keen to learn from Kağan’s success story or to follow in his shoes, don’t miss this incredible episode. We chat about: Kağan’s path to Gorillas Gorillas phenomenal growth The mega funding round led by Coatue Management Hiring for behaviour, not skills. The four values of Gorilla Links: sifted.eu/startuplife gorillas.io -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

Most of the founders we speak to have already achieved much of their startup’s mission, but today’s Secret Leader is in the midst of a much longer journey with his company. Meet Matteo Berlucchi, a serial entrepreneur and the founder of Healthily which has spent several years building their product to a point where they can play for the ‘big prize’. “Healthily is a moonshot, it’s the textbook definition of a moonshot. The idea behind Healthily is to use technology to enable people to manage their health in a better way... To become the Spotify or Netflix of healthcare.” Launched in 2015, the app formerly known as Your.MD, now Healthily, is the first medically approved self-care app in the world, and is aiming for a user base of over a billion people. “To me, success is not making money, it has never been my definition of success. To me, success is building something that has impact.” From his first days founding startups, to helping create Healthily and turn it into a profitable startup; investment, failure and limiting beliefs, don’t miss Matteo’s hard fought insights. “Provided that you always do things with integrity and with belief, you believe that you're doing the right thing, then if it doesn't work out, it doesn’t work. Failure is lying to yourself, doing something knowing that it's not going to work and doing it anyway, that's a failure.” We chat about: What is actually success and failure Self care is the self service of healthcare How to make a company like Healthily profitable Failing to sell the story of Healthily to investors properly -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

“I was a keen gym goer and I used to buy protein powder from what was the leading sports nutrition company in the UK at the time. And about six months in I looked at the back and thought, ‘what actually is this?’” Oliver Cookson founded the sports nutrition business Myprotein in 2004 with just a £500 overdraft, selling it to The Hut Group seven years later having kept 100% equity. The deal ended up being worth north of £350m for him. So how did he pull it off? “I don't live with regrets because some people said to me, ‘should you have held onto Myprotein longer?’ If I did, I’d be a billionaire now. There's no doubt about it. It is always growing. However, you can only make a decision at that moment, where you are now.” Oliver has written a book about his experience - Bootstrap Your Life - and hosts a podcast of the same name (links below). “If you want to create a leading brand, a national leading brand, or an international brand, there's no work life balance, especially if you’re bootstrapping. It’s impossible.” From students with an idea to FTSE 100 CEOs, this is an episode no entrepreneur should miss. “Stick to your guns. One thing private equity will do is they will try and ship you. So call their bluff early. I did. They will try and get you on bits and bobs of what comes out of the due diligence. Don't be bullied in that situation.” We chat about: Handling growth and achieving £1m EBITDA, still fully bootstrapped What you have to sacrifice for success Selling Myprotein to The Hut Group Working on the board with people he’s in litigation with Links: www.myprotein.com Bootstrap Your Life - book Bootstrap Your Life - podcast -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes

How did two Americans called Jeff come to lead Seedrs, one of the UK’s leading crowdfunding platforms? And why did their planned merger with bitter rivals Crowdcube get blocked? In today’s ‘Double Jeffardy’ episode, Seedrs Co-Founder Jeff Lynn and CEO Jeff Kelisky share their experiences and learnings - from the biggest missed opportunities when scaling, to what the CMA got wrong with the merger. “The CMA has chosen to take an exceedingly aggressive stance on anything that looks like a tech merger. I think they feel very burned by having approved Facebook and Instagram, where they didn't understand or see the platform power that would emerge.” In this episode you’ll learn about: The biggest mistakes Seedrs made in the early days Seedrs vs Crowdcube When Jeff realised he needed to hire a CEO How to integrate a new CEO into a founder-led company The failed merger How to get motivated to compete again after a merger like that collapses -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secretleaders Vanta - get 20% off security certifications like ISO27001 and SOC2: https://vanta.com/secretleaders Vertice - save on your SaaS or cloud spend ($5k off or a free benchmark) using the code secretleaders: https://www.vertice.one/l/secretleaders -- Newsletter Sign up here: https://secretleaders.email/ You can find our historic newsletters here: https://www.secretleaders.com/episodes