Top 5 Lessons from the 1st Year of The Inner Chief Podcast

G'day, Chiefs,

What started off as an experiment by interviewing a few CEOs has gone gangbusters, with tens of thousands of downloads and interviews with 28 chiefs and gurus across all sorts of industries and professions.

It has been one of the most incredible learning experiences of my life. What a privilege and an honour it has been to delve into the backstories and minds of some of the most successful people in our community.

In this episode, I count down the top 5 big lessons from the first year. I picked these ones in particular because, more than anything, they give me hope. They have inspired me to push myself, to grow, and to just be a better human. I hope they’ve done the same for you.

In putting this list together, I’ve added a quote from all 28 of our chiefs and gurus. So, if you’ve got a favourite, keep a lookout for them.

Counting down from 5 to 1, here are the Top 5 lessons from the inaugural year of The Inner Chief podcast.

Number 5 – Employ on character and fit, and then set the highest standards

By far the greatest stress or blocker to leading a turnaround and having a high-performance team culture is people that aren’t a good fit for your values and goals as a team. The more you employ quality people around you, the more success as a team you’ll achieve, and the more you’ll be free to look at bigger tasks.

Our chiefs, in particular, were hot on this. They had zero tolerance for low performers. It was 'improve or remove'.

CEO of T2 Tea, Nicky Sparshott, explained, “It’s important to practise service leadership, which is really paying it forward and recognising that there is no time better spent than in nurturing capability.”

So, learn to hire good people and make this job the best job they’ve ever had by developing that capability and keeping the standards high. The thing is, if you let the standards drop, everyone suffers. As Daniel Hunter, CEO of HealthShare NSW, said, “If you tolerate poor behaviour from one of your leaders, then you're complicit in it.”

And the final point here is that enforcing high standards does not mean an environment that is all work and no play. Quite the opposite, in fact. High-performance teams are fun and challenging.

WaterCorp CEO, Sue Murphy, reminded us of that through her timeless wisdom, “I'm looking for someone with a sense of humour, who's not up themselves, that I could actually imagine enjoying my time with them.”

This is the thing, if you and your people don’t love your work, then everyone will know and you’ll have regrets about your career at the end. “We have to work out what it is that gives us a happy dance,” advised Hetty Johnston.

So, employ on character and fit, and then set the highest standards, and remember to keep injecting capability and fun into your team.

Number 4 – Grow and Learn throughout your life

The key principle here is that reading books will always be important. In the words of Jeff Brown, “Readers lead and leaders read!”

However, many of our chiefs learnt in many other ways as well, because their load of reading is immense in their role. They tended to learn through three main avenues:

a. Learn through immersion

Jonathan Ling, former MD of Fletchers Building and GUD Holding, outlined that he rarely even reads a book, but he spends his time getting immersed in different fields and projects to learn from a whole array of different people. That immersion keeps the energy high and exposes him to different practices and thinking.

b. Join a mastermind

Nearly half of the chiefs mentioned that they were apart of a mastermind where they met other like-minded people that pushed each other to greatness and with big challenges. This was always framed as a way of learning and connecting.

Mitch Matthews made a vital point about this kind of networking and any sort of relationship-building, “Stop trying to be interesting and just be interested.” Doing this will free your mind of its own importance and create the space for you to truly learn from others.

c. Get wide-ranging experience across the business

This third principle to learning is critical to rounding out your understanding of how companies work. If you really want to grow, then shift sideways for a period and learn the different parts of the business.

In the end, it was the decision to keep growing, and owning their own growth, that was most important:

“If I am not investing in myself, why would anyone else invest in me?” said Vivek Bhatia, CEO and MD of iCare.

Continuous learning through immersion, networking with other like-minded chiefs and from other departments is number 4 on our list.

Number 3 – Make Change Happen and Get Results

Every single chief had a strong track record of transformation. This isn’t negotiable if you want a high-impact career and to leave a legacy. And, in order to build that track record, that carried three principles:

a. Being bold

“As a leader, sometimes you have to break the rules to succeed. If a rule is there to impede you, then you have to challenge the rules,” explained Paul Broad. This ties in nicely with Jennifer Holland's attitude of determination in the face of resistance: “I love the saying 'today's no is tomorrow's yes'.”

John Lee Dumas summed it up with, “All the magic happens outside the box when you try and do something different.”

Remember, when you do try and take a new path, there will be resistance. It’s the way of things. Don’t be upset by that. You know it’s coming. Just prepare yourself and keep finding new ways to get results.

b. Bring big energy and your A-Game

Jim Soorley was one of the most energetic guests we’ve had and one of his go-to plays in getting results was bringing so much positive energy to a room that people jumped on board.

The energy is so important because you have to know your people. And that takes energy. Brad Gordon said, “The people aspect of running a business is extremely important and you can’t do that from sitting behind a desk.” Keith Wootton had this to say on the topic of energy: “Opportunity. Sometimes it knocks. But sometimes you have to go out and chase it.”

So business requires energy. Energy to make change AND energy to be your best.

Time and again, the chiefs challenged us all on whether we are working hard and bringing our A-Game.

Daniel Herbert said, “Hard work will beat talent when talent doesn't work hard.” and quite a few asked, “Are you bringing your A-game every single day?”

The chiefs laid down the challenge. Bring energy and your A-Game every single day.

c. Keep Laser Focus

One of the greatest challenges in the modern business world is actually doing less. According to Mal Bundey, “A big mistake leaders make, I think, is there's a propensity of people in leadership roles trying to do too many things. I think focus is the key to leadership and running a successful organisation. Making choices is critical; but it does mean that you would love to do some things and you just can't.”

The thing is, every minute you waste is gone forever. And as Kate Erickson, EOFire Productivity Guru, added, “You are actively creating your future through the actions and decisions that you’re making right now. So make them count.”

So the importance of taking focused, deliberate action towards the big goal is just vital. You can’t do everything. In fact, doing everything is the enemy of performance. In the end, without focus, your performance plummets. Remember, Peter Knight, our mastery guru coached us as follows, “Actual Performance = Optimal Performance – Distractions.”

So Number 3 on our Top 5 Countdown is to make change happen by being bold, energetic with your A-Game and keep laser focus. If you do that, you’ll move mountains.

Number 2 – Build Trusted Relationships

Being bold and getting that track record is vital. But according to Mike Pratt, “What matters more than anything is relationships.”

But, beware the trap of being all about building relationships without building ones that create trust AND get results.

So here are a couple of vital principles:

Remember, “Complexity Kills Trust” according to Paul Jones. What we mean by this is to keep your messaging and communication simple and know your customer. The clearer your communications, the more people will like and trust you.

Give without counting the cost. Noel Whittaker said, “I keep putting money into the universal bank and the universal bank keeps paying me back with interest.”

Kill politics. “Political correctness is at the other end of the spectrum to authenticity,” Jonathan Ling, former MD of GUD and Fletcher Holdings says. Politics can create turf wars and internal competition. What you really want as a team is to follow the advice of Trevor Matthews: “Compete aggressively on the outside and collaborate superbly on the inside.”

So Number 2 is to build trusting relationships that drive both personal and team growth. Politics and compliant relationships will get you nowhere.

Number 1 – Humility and Ownership are THE Way

Humility, ownership and authenticity is not a path to the top; it is THE path to the top.

Kevin Young, from our very first episode, described it like this: “CEOs are humble, but with fierce resolve.” All the chiefs and gurus spoke about a level of ownership of their future.

“Change is what happens to you. Transformation is what you do to yourself,” offered Geoff Lloyd, while Angela Buglass said, “You must be the creator of your own destiny.”

Also, none of them shied away from the truth. Todd Hunter, MD of Turners Automotive, gave some encouragement. “There will be times that you are scared shitless about what you're being asked to do. But pressure is a privilege, and someone believes you can do this.”

And so that brings us to a close. The big 5 countdown and our first year down.

I want to thank you all for tuning in. I never could have known the impact this would have had. It has been the most interesting, rewarding and addictive project of my career.

To close, I want to finish with a quote from our Spiritual Guru, Damien Price, who summed up what it takes to be a true chief in one beautiful sentence.

“Choose integrity before politics, choose vulnerability before power, and trust the resultant inner wisdom.”

That about sums it up, Chiefs.

Thank you again for being so encouraging, for spreading the word, and nominating so many great chiefs.

Stay epic,

Greg Layton, Chief Maker

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