Lee Kuan Yew was the founder of modern-day Singapore. He took Singapore from third world to first in one generation. His candour in analysing other counties such as the UK, US & China is incredibly insightful. So here is what you are in for the next 45 minutes of your life. I want to look at: Who was Lee Kuan Yew? What was the back story to Singapore we see today? What were his principles and guiding philosophy of pragmatism and meritocracy? Considering Singapore famously had no real assets ...
Apr 26, 2020•48 min•Season 2Ep. 3
In this podcast, I use Will & Ariel Durant's book Lessons from history to examine why there is a tension between freedom and equality. "Nature smiles at the union of freedom and equality in our utopias. For freedom and equality are sworn and everlasting enemies, and when one prevails the other dies." I look at examples such as Andrew Carnegie, Bill Gates, John D Rockefeller and Jeff Bezos and question are some people just better equipped to compete for scarce resources than others in a free ...
Apr 14, 2020•41 min•Season 2Ep. 2
I want to dive into the Roman Stoic’s and in particular why the believed tranquillity or peace of mind should be an ultimate goal. First, we need an introduction into the Roman Stoics, second why the goal of tranquillity or peace of mind was deemed so important and finally, I think more importantly I want to share some of the techniques that the stoics practiced for peace of mind. Hopefully given the wild times that we are living in at the moment these tried and tested ancient techniques might b...
Mar 28, 2020•17 min•Season 2Ep. 1
I am currently going deep into how technology is impacting Healthcare. As part of that I am speaking to early-stage entrepreneurs in the initial staging of funding, but as part of my research, I came across Rami Weiss who is the CEO of a fully scaled up health tech business called Healthshare, which is building innovative products that improve access to health information and health practitioners. The conversation feels quite timely as we covered the debate over the Australian Governments design...
Mar 04, 2019•26 min•Season 1Ep. 13
One of the areas that I have thought a lot about over the years, is the financial sustainability of social ventures. I think it's fair to say that my track record on this is mixed. The positive intention has without doubt been there. For example, I started writing the outline for the business that became TVN in the foreword of the book by Mathew Bishop Philanthrocapitalism I bonded with TVN's co-founder Josh Ismin whilst at a Microsoft event in Atlanta where Blake Mycoskie founder of Tom's Shoes...
Mar 04, 2019•1 hr 4 min•Season 1Ep. 12
It's June 30th 2017 and Josh Ismin and myself are at the end of a two-year earn-out for the acquisition of our company TVN, the digital video marketplace we started in my basement in Tamarama 7 years ago. All the vital signs of the company are great: Our revenue is pushing $45million, we are operating in 9 different countries in Asia Pacific, we have survived competition from Google and Facebook as well as a host of well funded US ad tech companies trying to squash us in every way you could imag...
Mar 04, 2019•1 hr 16 min•Season 1Ep. 11
Let's be honest, there are lots of well-documented problems in the world and luckily there are also people in the world who see those problems and are driven to take massive action. On the podcast today we have one of those people, Bronwyn Sheehan founder and CEO of the Pyjama Foundation an organisation that promotes numeracy and literacy to children in the foster care system. I have got to know Bronwyn really well over the years as a board member of the Pyjama foundation and I continue to be bl...
Mar 04, 2019•56 min•Season 1Ep. 10
What should western organisations consider when thinking about launching in Asian countries? What is it like to be a non-native speaker running Google in Thailand? Why is the digital economy in China accelerating so quickly? Where is Google headed in Machine Learning? How does a sporting career influence building high performing corporate teams? I discuss all this and more with my good friend Ben King. Ben is Country Director of Google Thailand. Ben and I first met at Microsoft in Australia and ...
Mar 04, 2019•1 hr 1 min•Season 1Ep. 9
How do you balance creative thinking whilst ensuring you have output? Can you apply the scientific method to art? What is the future of art in an ever more technological world? My guest this week Charlotte Rose Hamlyn, is a renaissance human, whose creative output across various platforms whilst pondering the scientific method would have made Leonardo smile. Charlotte is a published author with Penguin Random House, of the children's graphic novel Opposite Land, screenwriter of various kids TV s...
Dec 05, 2018•1 hr 6 min•Season 1Ep. 8
Mike Lee (@officialmikelee) is not your average pro boxer. He has a 21-0 record holding the N A B O boxing title, but on top of that he is super smart, a business school graduate of Notre Dame, who has turned his business acumen to found Soul CBD https://mysoulcbd.com/ which is experiencing crazy growth right now. We speak about taking calculated risks, visualising elite performance, the benefits of CBD oil, fighting nine rounds with broken ribs and the small matter of the future of humanity. I ...
Nov 07, 2018•54 min•Season 1Ep. 7
This episode is all about balance. A few months back I was joined by Yoga superstar Persia Juliet. Persia is an incredible Yoga practitioner, teacher, writer and business women and benefits from an incredibly soothing voice! Having grown up on both sides of the Atlantic ocean, and then having living spells in Australia and currently calling Bali home, Persia has an incredible worldview and perspective of inner balance in an increasingly wobbly world which we dive into in the show. Persia shares ...
Oct 24, 2018•46 min•Season 1Ep. 6
Exploring human potential through the eyes of world-class leaders in technology, business, sport and health. On this week's show, we have my good friend, mentor and business partner Gary Gorrow. Gary is a leading Vedic meditation teacher, surfer, and general wise soul. He works with a host of celebrities, executives, sports teams. I first met Gary when my life from everything from my business, to my personal life was going to shit. In hindsight, Gary teaching me to meditate gave me not on only a...
Oct 03, 2018•1 hr 26 min•Season 1Ep. 5
For me, the last 18 months following the development of Blockchain and Cryptocurrency has been a little bit of an emotional rollercoaster. I have gone from.... this changes everything, to just drive the UBER I don't want to buy into your ICO. Today we are hopefully passed peak hype and I am actively involved as an advisor in companies with blockchain at there core. So I was particularly intrigued when my legal counsel Dan Brush from when I sold my company TVN told me he was now COO and counsel t...
Sep 15, 2018•1 hr 6 min•Season 1Ep. 4
If you have ever wondered how high performance in elite sport was attained then this is going to be a great episode for you. On this weeks show we have Paul Devlin Head of High Performance at Australian NRL giants The South Sydney Rabbitohs. Having played professional rugby for European cup winners Munster, Sale Sharks and our hometown team of Widnes Vikings he has played with legends such as Jason Robinson, Christian Slater and Paul O'Connell. More recently as a coach, he has worked with some o...
Sep 15, 2018•1 hr 19 min•Season 1Ep. 3
This episode is what it says on the tin and is for all the golfers out there in the constant search to get better. Bobby Walia is a certified instructor, who has played professionally on the sunshine tour, he's played the best golf courses in the world as the onboard instructor of the ship called The world and is an all-around great human and teacher. With more time on my hands these days I am a walking cliche "obsessed with golf" its hard, it's addictive and if you have never been addicted to i...
Sep 14, 2018•35 min•Season 1Ep. 2
This episode follows the founder's journey of Brad Shofer, founder of the now iconic accounting software MYOB. MYOB was one of the first high profile tech IPO's in Australia and Brad's journey was really enjoyable to listen to and remarkably shared many coincidences with the journey that I went through with TVN. As with many of the successful guests that I have interviewed on the Podcast, Brad has used his business success to continue to develop as a person. Brad has the analytical mind you woul...
Sep 14, 2018•1 hr 24 min•Season 1Ep. 1
