How do you build a magnetic employer brand that attracts and retains new talent? In this special episode of Speak Like CEO, we are reposting the final instalment of Employer Branding: The Inside Podcast by Georgiana Ghiciuc. Georgiana and Oliver dissect how any company can become a magnetic employer of choice by focusing on three aspects of building a great company: culture, internal communications, and employer branding. Drawing from my latest book, "MESSAGE MACHINE: How Communications Will Mak...
Aug 16, 2023•44 min•Ep. 202
Does your message cut through the noise? How do you achieve message-market-fit as a startup? We are excited to bring you an episode from WHU’s The Most Awesome Founder Podcast, hosted by globally-recognised startup expert Gerrit McGowan and entrepreneurship professor Dries Faems. In this episode, Jag Singh, Managing Director at Angel Invest, and Speak Like a CEO host Oliver Aust discuss their latest book, "MESSAGE MACHINE: How Communications Will Make You An Unstoppable Founder." We discuss topi...
Aug 09, 2023•1 hr 21 min•Ep. 201
This week's podcast guest holds an impressive list of credentials. She is an investor, board member, speaker, and co-founder and managing director of 2hearts . She was also awarded the title Impact Entrepreneur of the Year in Germany in 2023. Gülsah Wilke shares her unique journey in the tech & startup industry as an immigrant's granddaughter with Turkish roots. She has a simple but impactful mission: to build tomorrow's tech society with cultural diversity. To this end, she co-founded Europ...
Aug 02, 2023•33 min•Ep. 200
As a CEO, you want to own your message. Thanks to technology and social media, this has never been easier. This is according to Oliver Kaltner , the former CEO of Leica, the iconic camera brand, and current CEO of Cherry - a leading manufacturer of computer equipment. Both are listed companies at the forefront of technology and engineering. His mantra is that business is not about talking, but about doing - so how does that fit in with communications? Leading in a hybrid work environment is all ...
Jul 27, 2023•43 min•Ep. 199
Erik Podzuweit is a former German Rugby Champion, and co-founder and co-CEO of Scalable Capital - one of Europe’s leading FinTechs. In this week's podcast episode he talks about how he leads and communicates with his gut! Developing and trusting your gut feeling takes dedication and tenacity, but in turn you will have a team and clients who trusts you and a thriving business. His approach is always keeping it simple and straightforward, and that honesty pays off in the long run. Check out my con...
Jul 19, 2023•38 min•Ep. 198
Founderland is Europe’s fastest growing community of women founders of colour. In this week's episode of Speak Like a CEO, Oliver hosts Stephanie von Behr , Managing Director of Founderland. Founderland is not your average community. Stephanie, together with experienced founders Deborah Choi and Alina Bassi (our guest in E94) have been highly intentional about building the brand, deepening the community and making a real-life impact. Stephanie urges everyone to branch out and to hire from differ...
Jul 13, 2023•26 min•Ep. 197
We have a special episode of Speak Like a CEO for you: an Ask Me Anything session with Oliver Aust. Oliver answers five of the most frequently asked questions. How to deal with the transparency dilemma, how to make something boring sound interesting, common communications mistakes, how to inspire an audience, and the changing trends of founder communications. Subscribe to the Message Machine newsletter and become an unstoppable founder yourself. https://www.eoipsocommunications.com/kontakt/...
Jul 06, 2023•23 min•Ep. 152
His company has dressed 41 out of 46 US presidents, is the oldest apparel brand in America in continuous operation, and was the first brand to introduce ready-to-wear. Brooks Brothers is nothing short of a legendary brand, and Ken Ohashi is the man behind its revival. He took over as CEO after the company had to file for bankruptcy during Covid. After an impressive turn-around, the company had a record year in 2022 and paid out bonuses to its employees for the first time in over a decade. What i...
Jun 30, 2023•39 min•Ep. 195
Most people abhor change. But without change, your business will never succeed. This is why Jörg Hellwig puts change at the centre of everything he does – from digitalising companies, building new businesses, and adapting communication processes. Jörg is the former CDO of multi-billion Euro revenue company LANXESS, founder of CheMondis, and angel investor. According to Jörg, any success should be followed by change. When things are going well you are in the best position to change because it lea...
Jun 22, 2023•46 min•Ep. 194
Has a speech ever changed the way you see the world? Now imagine being able to write a speech that has this effect on people. That is what Simon Lancaster does. As one of the best speechwriters in the world, author of several books, and multiple TedX speaker, Simon knows all the secrets to captivate an audience with words. And the secret dates all the way back to ancient Greece and Rome, and the rhetoric art of ethos, pathos, and logos. It is all about establishing credibility, portraying emotio...
Jun 15, 2023•50 min•Ep. 193
How many digital tools do you use? Chances are you’ve already used at least a dozen by the time you got to the office today. Now imagine managing the digital tools for a company of several thousand people… As the company and team grow, so does the number of tools we use and need to manage. Software is now in the top 3 of expenses for many companies. This is the problem Sven Lackinger is solving with his company, Sastrify , that just raised a €30m Series B round. He helps companies make sense of ...
Jun 08, 2023•35 min•Ep. 192
80% of the global workforce are deskless employees. They don’t have email or Slack, they don’t respond to calendar invites and won’t attend conference calls. But they are the biggest part of the workforce. Keeping them informed, engaged and aligned is a major challenge for businesses. While working at Porsche, Benedikt Ilg noticed how hard it was to reach his colleagues in production. The solution that Benedikt and his co-founder came up with is Flip – an app that allows deskless employees to re...
Jun 02, 2023•50 min•Ep. 191
How many entrepreneurial journeys have started with a wrongly booked ticket to China? Alone in a hotel room in Beijing, Johannes Reck realised how a city is transformed when you have access to tour guides and experiences. Two years later, with a failed student tour guiding company behind them, the two university friends took a leap of faith and launched GetYourGuide – a platform that unlocks unforgettable experiences. Fifteen years later, the app offers more than 70.000 unique experiences worldw...
May 25, 2023•56 min•Ep. 190
Viktoria Lindner is a former model, psychiatrist, CEO and founder of digital mental health startup Mindsurance . Mindsurance is an all-in-one solution for organisations to streamline their entire employee mental healthcare operations. They help to analyse employee mental health, find and match the right care provider, and deal with the bureaucratic parts of insurance providers. Improving mental health among employees is essential, also because absence rates in organisations are increasing from y...
May 19, 2023•33 min•Ep. 189
What an entrepreneurial journey: three college friends decide to build a gaming company. Their two biggest challenges: they have no clue about creating games or building a startup. Games bomb, investors decline, failure seems inevitable. Just a few short years later, Idle Miner Tycoon counts 100+ million users and the three founders sell Kolibri Games for 100 million. Daniel Stammler - entrepreneur, co-founder of Kolibri Games and a Forbes 30 under 30 laureate - shares his unique insights into h...
May 10, 2023•48 min•Ep. 188
50% of our personal communication is non-verbal. Yet most business leaders never train their body language. That’s a huge oversight. Boosting our body language gives us more confidence and makes us more successful in business, says Martin Brooks . Martin is the author of Body Language Decoder and a leading expert and what our bodies say. In this highly actionable episode, he gives founders and CEOs a body language tool box on everything from speaking to the team to pitching to investors. Some hi...
May 03, 2023•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 187
Tim Dettmann is a former badminton champion and the founder of sports tech startup BEAT81 . He is inspired by a simple idea: to deliver happiness and lasting wellbeing to people via fitness, tech & hospitality. To make BEAT81 as big and relevant as Crossfit, Tim and his team need word-of-mouth. Word-of-mouth is the most powerful marketing tool there is. 90% of people are much more likely to trust a recommended brand (even from strangers), and it is more effective than paid ads. Unfortunately...
Apr 28, 2023•33 min•Ep. 186
“ I'm a former academic and psychologist. Our answer to everything is ‘it depends’. But in the business world, that's just not how things work, ” says Darja Gutnick , the co-founder and CEO at Bunch . She is on the Business Punk Watchlist, a “rebel psychologist” (Forbes) & podcast host . Her Berlin & NYC-based startup is on a mission to unlock the potential in every professional. Their aim: help you become a better leader in 2 minutes a day with AI-powered coaching that is personalised a...
Apr 19, 2023•50 min•Ep. 185
In this special Easter episode, we give you eggs without chickens. Tanja Bogumi l is the CEO and founder of Perfeggt , a food innovation startup that changes what people eat by taking the animal out of the food system. They created plant-based eggs that may do for eggs what Oatly did for milk - provide a true alternative and create a new product category. Their approach is remarkable for several reasons: Perfeggt builds hardware with the speed of software by applying the lean startup approach of...
Apr 03, 2023•44 min•Ep. 184
“Communication is so important for us because communication is part of the treatment. What we don’t want to do is take an old, grumpy doctor and sit him in front of a camera and treat our patients,” says this week’s guest Florian Semler , co-founder and CEO of Formel Skin . Formel Skin is a telemedicine scale-up that treats skin conditions. They are on a mission to make medicine approachable and accessible thanks to digitalisation and state-of-the-art communications between doctors and patients....
Mar 29, 2023•30 min•Ep. 183
Valerie Bures is a serial entrepreneur, and founder, CEO, investor, board member, and a mom of three with an incredible track record. Over the past 20 years, she founded and scaled Mrs.Sporty , Pixformance and VAHA - successful businesses at the intersection of fitness, health and technology. Mrs.Sporty is a Europe-wide chain of fitness clubs that Valerie helped to scale to around 300.000 members in 550 Clubs and 10 countries with revenues of more than 80 Million EUR during this time period. The...
Mar 22, 2023•50 min•Ep. 182
“Make it a story people remember. That’s the great thing about startups. Startups have great stories to tell. That’s what founders should use.” Our guest is the accomplished entrepreneur Jan Reichelt. He built and sold two massively successful ventures, Mendeley and Kopernio, before bringing 10x Founders into existence in 2021. In a short period of time, 10x Founders has become one of the top funds in Europe with the vision to boost the European entrepreneurial ecosystem. Jan and the team raised...
Mar 17, 2023•39 min•Ep. 181
Sophie Chung is back on the podcast! She is the founder & CEO of Qunomedical where she is building a much-needed CRM for hospitals to improve patient care. A force of nature, Sophie was our guest on Episode #9, “No Bullshit”, and she still lives by that mantra - now more than ever. Sophie and Oliver discuss how especially in tough times, “No BS” really counts. But you often see the opposite, argues Sophie. “You just know they are bullshitting.” “It’s misleading, it’s not helpful. I’m trying ...
Mar 09, 2023•41 min•Ep. 180
“We knew that if we didn’t jump, we’d regret it for the rest of our lives.” It was a leap into the unknown that paid off. Jochen Engert is the founder and former long-time CEO of Flix , a German startup best known for Flixbus that has grown into a global tech and transportation company with more than 60m passengers per year - a journey he describes as “absolutely crazy”. Jochen led Flix for 11 years, from knowing little about trains and buses to expanding globally and taking over the iconic Grey...
Mar 03, 2023•36 min•Ep. 179
Storytelling is bloody difficult. It is only easy if you don’t know how it is done. Fortunately, Communications Designer Jeremy Connell-Waite breaks it down for us. He leads IBM’s "Wild Ducks" industrial storytelling programme , where he coaches partners to create compelling pitches and presentations. Stories are how you move people to action as a leader. But not random ones. Effective stories and speeches have structure. Following the structure gets you to into the top 20% of communicators. But...
Feb 24, 2023•48 min•Ep. 178
“The role of the CEO is to tell stories and make sure that they become true.” Josef , who has two nine figure exists under his belt, is a serial founder, successful entrepreneur, and investor. But success didn’t come easy. Starting out at the age of 16, he dropped out of school to build his first company which he sold only two years later to buy his parents a house. Since then, Josef, who loves to spend his weekends hiking in the alps, has climbed many entrepreneurial mountains. Among others, he...
Feb 17, 2023•44 min
Hybrid working is here to stay. What’s harder to figure out is how CEOs and founders can lead, communicate and make an impact in this brave new work. Top international executive coach Bettina Hausmann and Oliver Aust both see opportunities in communicating in a hybrid world - if done right. In this episode, they give leaders the roadmap to be more impactful and avoid the spectre of mediocre communications that no organisation can afford in a rapidly changing world. Tune in a find out: 🎨 How to ...
Feb 10, 2023•37 min•Ep. 176
“There is no day without communication.” In his new book “ Helden werden in der Krise geboren” (Heroes are born in crisis), Holger G. Weiss dissects the archetypical, existential crises many founders encounter - from product to founders to investor crisis - and how they avoid meltdown and instead emerge stronger. As German Autolab s founder and CEO Holger knows, communication is a central part of your life as a CEO, especially when your startup encounters a crisis. Holger's book provides tangibl...
Feb 03, 2023•38 min•Ep. 175
Life's a pitch and you need to nail this skill for basically everything you do in life, says Bryony Cooper. Her life story is both unusual and impressive: She stepped up to the mic early as a professional singer, which gave her the communications skills and stage presence to successfully pitch her first tech startup. After building several startups, she became a VC and currently is the Managing Partner at Arkley Brinc VC. In her experience, pitching and communications are superpowers that founde...
Jan 27, 2023•44 min
How do you write four books in four years? Should you write a book? Welcome to a special episode in which Oliver gives us a behind-the-scenes look at how he managed to write and publish 4 books in 4 years, the last two of which became Amazon bestsellers. Oliver not only shares why he did it, but also shares his process and hard-won insights on writing, building an audience, publishing and marketing. Tune in and find out: 🗓️ How to write a book in a year 🖨️ Why you don’t need a publisher 💸 How...
Jan 20, 2023•48 min
