Podcasts about startup catalyst

Episode Summary Steve Willinger, a partner at the Blockchain Builders Fund, shares his background and journey into the crypto space. He discusses his experience working at Google on projects like Google Glass and his time at Coinbase during the bull market. He also talks about the challenges and opportunities he encountered and the lessons he learned. Finally, he explains his current role at the Blockchain Builders Fund and their focus on supporting blockchain startups.  In this conversation, Steven Willinger discusses his role at the Stanford Blockchain Collective and his experience working with crypto startups. He highlights the importance of building lasting relationships and thought leadership in the crypto ecosystem. Steven also shares his excitement about the innovative ideas and teams he has encountered, including those focused on solving the GPU shortage problem and building privacy protocols.  He reflects on the changes in the crypto environment for founders and emphasizes the need for long-term thinking and building real value. Finally, he explores the potential integration of web3 dynamics in traditional industries and offers advice for current crypto builders. Chapters 00:00 Introduction and Background 15:36 Journey into Crypto and Ethereum  28:47 Experience at Coinbase  35:04 Transition to Blockchain Builders Fund  39:40 Building Lasting Relationships and Thought Leadership  42:12 Exciting Ideas and Innovation in the Crypto Space  48:25 Changes in the Crypto Environment for Founders  53:48 Web3 Dynamics in Traditional Industries  55:56 Lessons Learned and Advice for Crypto Builders Connect with Steven: X (Twitter): @swillinger Farcaster: @steve LinkedIn: Steven Willinger BASS Denver: lu.ma/bassdenver | Referral text: ATXDAO Stanford YouTube Content: @StanfordBlockchainClub To learn more about ATX DAO: Check out the ⁠ATX DAO ⁠website Follow ⁠@ATXDAO⁠ on X (Twitter) Connect with us on ⁠LinkedIn⁠ Join the community in the ⁠ATX DAO Discord⁠ Connect with us on X (Twitter): Mason: ⁠@512mace⁠ Nick: ⁠@nickcasares⁠ Luke: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@Luke152⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Ash: ⁠@ashinthewild⁠ Support the Podcast: If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a review and share it with your network. Subscribe for more insights, interviews, and deep dives into the world of Web 3. Tools & Resources We Love Podcast Recording & Editing - ⁠Riverside FM⁠: We use Riverside FM to record and edit our episodes. If you're interested in getting into podcasting or just recording remote videos, be sure to check them out!

Aaron Birkby is the co-founder of The Unconventional Group, and has over two decades experience working as a founder, advisor, board member, investor and facilitator in the Australian startup ecosystem. He has worked in a variety of roles building and supporting technology startups to grow into global companies, including as CEO of Startup Catalyst, and Entrepreneur In Residence at Queensland University of Technology, James Cook University and Split Spaces. In his conversation with Adam, Aaron discusses how the Queensland startup ecosystem has evolved over the past couple of decades, and what he sees as gaps in the Australian startup ecosystem. See full show notes: https://w2d1.com/aaron-birkby

We're taking a look at some our favorite moments from last year's innovation festival. Here's a conversation about closing the gender financing gap with Allie Burns, CEO of Village Capital; Shruti Chandrasekhar, head of Startup Catalyst and SME Ventures and the Africa regional lead at the International Finance Corporation; and Odunayou Ewaneeyiee, cofounder and COO at Piggyvest.

Patrick sat down with IFC's VC Director for Latin American & the Caribbean Stevon Darling to talk about the organisation's investing approach, its mission, what makes IFC different from traditional VC investors and how they can provide broader financing support beyond equity capital. We also touch upon IFC's leading VC financing programme Startup Catalyst that backs emerging fund managers globally seeding the grounds for future startup ecosystems On this episode you will learn aboutHow IFC is structured globally and how does IFC's private investing arm fit into the overall mission of the organisationIFC's investment process and value add for foundersHow IFC supports emerging fund managers around the globe Stevon's take on the startup ecosystem in LatAm You can find Stevon Darling on LinkedIn or Twitter. Check out IFC's initiatives here.If you enjoy the show, it would be fantastic if you could give us a rating on Apple Podcasts. 

What separates the best entrepreneurs from the rest? Top investor, founder and ‘Shark' Steve Baxter knows better than anyone. Steve is one of Australia's most successful tech entrepreneurs who gives back as an investor and mentor, while also starring on Channel 10's very popular Shark Tank Australia. In this episode we'll look at what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur alongside Steve's own journey, while next episode we delve into what makes a successful start up business and how you go about evaluating and investing in them. Steve is the living epitome of the old saying that ‘Today I'll invest in what others won't, so tomorrow I can do what others can't!' In 1994, at the age of just 23, Steve put his life savings of $11,000 on the line to launch his first startup, the pioneering internet service provider SE Net, from the spare room of his Adelaide home, as you'll hear in detail during our chat. And it was around that time that I had the pleasure of first meeting Steve, as his business partner was a mutual and longtime friend of mine Chris Foote. Growing rapidly to service more than 35,000 customers, SE Net was eventually sold and acquired by Ozemail under the stewardship of its Founding Director and past Australian Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull. In 2001, Steve then teamed with a schoolmate to launch his second startup, PIPE Networks, a provider of wholesale telecom infrastructure that was listed on the ASX in 2005. Eight years later they sold it to the TPG Group for the princely sum of just $373 million – a truly hard fought and lifechanging moment. Steve then spent a year working with Google in California in 2008, leading a project to deliver high-speed telecommunications systems across North America. Since 2010 he has become an early stage investor in startups through his investment company, Transition Level Investments. This led to the founding of Brisbane tech startup hub River City Labs and the creation of Startup Catalyst and RiverPitch programs, and he's been championing Australian startups and entrepreneurs ever since.  He's also been on the listed boards of Vocus Telecoms, Indoor Skydive Australia Group and Other Levels as well as being on the board of Commercialisation Australia. Steve's also been heavily involved in the early days of founding numerous industry groups and forums such as the South Australian Internet Association, South Australian Internet Exchange, Australian Domain Name Authority, and more. Steve now runs TEN13, an investment syndicate platform for sophisticated investors to invest alongside him and the experienced Transition Level Investments team, as unlike many venture capitalists, Steve puts his own cash on the dash to the tune of an average of 15% to 20% of every seed deal. TEN13 understands that to get great returns you need to invest in global companies, so they've built a global portfolio across five continents with a value of over $2 billion in its first 18 months. So If you're a sophisticated investor looking to diversify your portfolio and invest in top calibre technology companies, reach out to Steve and his high calibre TEN13 investment team who undertake exhaustive due diligence before they invest. Get ‘Self, Health and Wealth' wisdom in your inbox: Join me and many other like minded investors in our Get Invested community right now.  I send a free and exclusive monthly email full of practical ‘Self, Health and Wealth' wisdom that our current Freedom Fighter subscribers can't wait to get each month. It's full of investment and lifestyle tips, my personal book recommendations, apps I use to enhance life and so much more. Just visit bushymartin.com.au and sign up at the bottom of the page … because this is just the beginning! Get Invested is the leading weekly podcast for Australians who want to learn how to unlock their full ‘self, health and wealth' potential. Hosted by Bushy Martin, an award winning property investor, founder, author and media commentator who is recognised as one of Australia's most trusted experts in property, investment and lifestyle, Get Invested reveals the secrets of the high performers who invest for success in every aspect of their lives and the world around them. Remember to subscribe on your favourite podcast player, and if you're enjoying the show please leave us a review. Find out more about Get Invested here https://bushymartin.com.au/get-invested-podcast/  Want to connect with Bushy? Get in touch here https://bushymartin.com.au/contact/  This show is produced by Apiro Media - http://apiropodcasts.com

Aaron activates and enhances community ecosystems and organisations by developing the human capital and talent for high performance, enabling them to grow high-performing teams, who in-turn build high growth ventures. Aaron’s background includes over two decades as a successful startup founder and ecosystem community leader, culminating as the 2016 Entrepreneur Of The Year, plus more recently as a public speaker, hackathon facilitator, corporate innovation advisor, cultural-transformation leader, board member, investor, mentor, and adventure-preneur. On this episode of Stories Behind the Grind, listen to my conversation with Aaron Birkby, CEO of Startup Catalyst and founder or Peak Persona. We do a deep dive into shiny object syndrome, how to deal with follow through, managing shiny object tendencies in your team like Facebook and Adobe does, why motivation is broken and what is the antidote and how to ensure there is a cultural alignment in your team. I hope you get as much value out of this episode as I did. Part 1 with Aaron Birkby: Episode 38 Defining Culture and Improving Founder Mental Health with Aaron Birkby - https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/38-defining-culture-improving-founder-mental-health/id1315760449?i=1000429554052   Peak Persona - http://www.peakpersona.com/   Be sure to follow me on Instagram and say Hi @aidanvoc Subscribe to the podcast on Apple, or anywhere else you listen to your podcasts. You can find this episode plus all the previous episode here. Three ways you can support this podcast Take a screenshot of this podcast and send it to a friend who may like it Rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts! Connect with me @aidanvoc (I respond to all DM’s there)

S1E7 - Peter Laurie | Software Engineer | Entrepreneur | Industry MentorThis week you meet Peter Laurie. Peter has been a software engineer for more than 2 decades – he is director of a company that specialises in providing software for technology based start-up’s, he’s an entrepreneur himself and an industry mentor.Follow Us:Join the Advisory Board Chair community and join the conversation over at Facebook https://www.facebook.com/advisoryboardchair/ and LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/19196502/admin/.The Secret Life of Advisors is the podcast of the Advisory Board Chair https://www.advisoryboardchair.com/This is a Cahoots Radio https://www.cahootsradio.com/ production edited by Skye Manson.Hosted by Corinne Butler https://www.linkedin.com/in/corinnebutler/.Let us know your favourite news stories for the week on email corinne@advisoryboardchair.com.aum.auFull Transcript:Corinne Butler: Hi, it's Corinne Butler here from Advisor Adventures, and I'd like to welcome our guest today, Peter Laurie. Welcome.Peter Laurie: Hi.Corinne Butler: Peter you're from Junta. First question I ask everyone is, your business name, how did you come up with that?Peter Laurie: So at the time me and my co-founder, we were looking for words that started with J, for no really good reason. And we found one that we liked, which was Junta. And so the definition was, we were going through word of the day, and the definition is a small group of people seeking to gain power through revolution, which pretty much suited what our mood was at the time.Corinne Butler: So I suppose in business you'd probably see that a little bit, a small group of people who want to make big changes.Peter Laurie: Yeah, that's right. And there's no way to do that in traditional mechanisms so you do that through influence and working with people, as opposed to directing people. Which is where we were at. We are at, yeah.Corinne Butler: So Peter tell me a little bit more about yourself. So who are you and what is your background?Peter Laurie: So my background, I'm an electrical engineer by training, but never worked as one because this thing called the internet turned up. And I burnt my fingers a lot less on the internet. I mean I've been doing software development on and off since I was about 10, but dad put together a computer when I was five. So I'm right at the front of that generation that's always had technology or a computer to play with, so I don't know any different. So I went into electrical engineering after high school and then came out and worked in a few different, what we call startups now, but they were just new ventures back then. So one called Information Dynamics, where we did Ray Whites first website. And then through Y2K, in it's Energex, in their power system. We definitely did fix some things that would have gone explosion. And then went through a few other businesses. I mean I can keep going with the history if you'd like?Corinne Butler: Please, yep.Peter Laurie: So then I was involved in the business that went to crap. We sold it technically, for the technical people out there, we were doing test driven development and we had a model driven architecture at a continuous integration loop. In 2001, was when we were doing it, we solved that technically, it was very much under control and we delivered exactly what we said we were going to deliver. The problem is that the business still went to crap. So I had to work out why. So I went and did an MBA to understand that, and I found out fairly early on in that, that it was actually contract management was the problem. So, not technical. But then I found myself learning whatever I wanted to learn, during this MBA. So I came out of that with strategy, entrepreneurship and multiple economics, which fits my megalomania quite well.Peter Laurie: And I then got involved in starting my own business, after the first six months of that. Because there was a particular bit of insight that I got out of the strategy stuff, which we could talk through later if you wanted to, that unlocked my analysis paralysis. Then in 2011 Steve Baxter said to me "I'm starting a co-working space" so I said shut up and take my money. And then I went down there, took the business, because we didn't need 108 square meters as a two person business. So we went down to the coworking space in Brisbane called Inter City Labs. And then I found myself doing a lot of mentoring and coaching. So I'm the mentor in residence down there now and have been for the last nearly seven and a half years, which is a volunteer position. So I've seen probably several hundred businesses come through and spent a decent amount of time with a few hundred of them.Peter Laurie: And then further to that, I've been doing a lot of entrepreneur in residence roles over the last two years. So two at UQ, two at QUT in the Creative Enterprise and one at River City Labs itself. I do a bunch of mentoring, mainly around startups, and they get me in for the technology to start with and they realize that I actually know a fair bit more than just the technology and we end up working more around strategy and, from the outside it looked like strategic HR.Corinne Butler: So let's talk a little bit more about that mentor in residence. What is that?Peter Laurie: So basically I stick my nose into as many people's businesses that I can. That are in this space. Until they unify against me with pitchforks and torches and chase me out of the room. So they are unified when they do that though, which is an important thing to remember. But basically I jump in and I try and help people out to achieve what they're trying to achieve. And I want them to not fall over in the kiddy pool, to actually get out there and start swimming. So I try and get them to understand the context of what they're doing and how they can go about it and the fact that nobody knows what they should be doing and they need to work it out for themselves.Corinne Butler: So that's huge. Helping people work it out for themselves. How do you do that?Peter Laurie: We do it quite well, thank you.Corinne Butler: How can others do that then?Peter Laurie: So I spent a lot of time teaching people that they need to make their own decisions, rightly or wrongly. So the first thing that I talk about is that nobody knows what they should be doing. Anybody who tells you that they know exactly what you should be doing is lying to themselves, or lying to you. Generally, the first one, there's not many straight up sociopaths out there. The real trick, especially for small businesses and startup, isn't working out where you should be. It's about working out how you get from where you are to where you should be. And the thing to remember is that you're the world expert in where you are and where you should be is part of the problem but the path to get from where you are to where you should be is actually where the art is.Peter Laurie: And then on top of that you've got to be able to stay alive while you're doing that. So it's actually a fairly difficult problem. And the only thing that makes that even harder is the fact that where you should be moves as well. So a lot of people are out there looking for the perfect solution and they think that they can do it once and then they're done. But the fact of the matter is that everything moves and the only thing you can rationally invest in is, is working out which way to go. Doing a little bit of it and then looking where you should go now. So it's really a lot of mindset stuff.Corinne Butler: So is there a difference, do you think, between being a mentor in residence and an entrepreneur in residence? And if so, what is it?Peter Laurie: I mean the reason that it is the mentor in residence and not the entrepreneur in residence is because at the time I didn't feel like I was very much an entrepreneur. And that's a lot more to do with how I felt about what I was doing, than the role itself. And I constructed the role as a title because I needed to differentiate myself from the mentors that were in for one day a year, when I was in there basically 90% of the days for a year doing a very different role, so I needed to differentiate it. The actual entrepreneur in residence role is a little bit more structured in that there's a program that you're normally working towards, be it a three month or a six month program. Whereas the mentor is much more, for the work that I do, much more focused around the way the team is going in the longterm as opposed to hitting the shorter term goals.Corinne Butler: So one of your other roles was a mission lead? What's that?Peter Laurie: First up, not religious. It's not a religious thing. There's an organization called Startup Catalyst, which I've been the youth mission lead for the last four times it's been run. I'm not running it this year. This year is supposed to be about me doing some of my stuff rather than continuing to do other people's stuff. So the youth mission takes 20 18-29 year olds across to San Francisco, Silicon Valley, from across Australia, and blows their mind. The intent behind it is to actually get people to understand that even though the people in San Francisco are held up as something special, that the sky is blue over there, people are the same, and computers and laptops and technology works exactly the same. So the only real difference over there is the perspective that people have and the momentum that they've got.Peter Laurie: We do two main things when we take them over. Well it doesn't really matter. what else we do, we go and do a bit of startups tours. And so we see Google, Twitter, all those sorts of places. But the two main things that we do is we see a good friend of ours, Joel Pobar, who's at Facebook, who grew up in Beenleigh, which is just down the road from Brisbane. And he takes us through what it's like to be a senior manager inside Facebook. It's seriously one of the best experiences that I've been through, and I've done it four times.Peter Laurie: And the other thing we do is we drop the 20 people, and we call them the youths, and we drop the 20 youths into a startup weekend, in the middle of San Francisco. And they have a fairly large imposter syndrome when they start that day. And remember that these people are actually the best we can find out of Australia. So they've got PhDs, or just about to finish PhDs. Bit of machine learning or maths or computing or something like that. And also we have designers and all sorts of people, they're the best we can find, from about 250 to 300 applicants last time. And they still have this massive imposter syndrome, so we drop them into this thing and they dominate that 54 hour business competition.Peter Laurie: Even though they frame themselves as tech, they dominate it because they're smart. And a bit of coaching for us, we tell them what the context is, but they dominate it. But of course they dominate it because we cherry pick from across Australia. And it doesn't really matter. On the last couple of trips I've experimented with telling them that this is what's going to happen to them and they still don't believe it. And then afterwards they are totally transformed, their templates [inaudible 00:12:44] and they come back here, to Australia, wherever they're from, their various regions. And then they have the impact on the ecosystem where they're operating, which is exactly what we're trying to do.Corinne Butler: Wow, that sounds absolutely amazing. So imposter syndrome, we hear that quite a lot lately. What is it?Peter Laurie: So the way I describe imposter syndrome is that it's that feeling that you get when you're sitting in a room that you feel like you shouldn't be there. And at any moment someone's going to walk in and tell you, actually Mr. Laurie, we need to take you out, you shouldn't be here. And everybody has it. There's people that I've spoken to that are currently looking after $100 million funds for investment that don't think that they should be doing that. And the next year that they're going to get $400 million to look after. That's international. A lot of people that I speak to here in the ecosystem locally, or even across Australia, actually have a fair bit of imposter syndrome. And the nice thing is that it's a human trait. When you don't have the ability to get yourself to feeling an impostor syndrome, it's actually when you're a bit of a sociopath. So the example I normally use is Trump, right? So Trump never feels imposter syndrome because he doesn't appear to have that self awareness. So confidence just keeps going up. So I see it as a very normal, very human thing and it never goes away. You just learn to deal with it and acknowledge that it's there.Corinne Butler: That's a great definition. So you touched on a day in the life of a Facebook manager. What's that like?Peter Laurie: Well, that's really Joel's story to tell. But I will tell you that the majority of what he's doing is actually people. In the context of technology. And we actually got him out her last year to do a presentation around how he manages the people that he's working with. The last time I spoke to him he had a span of control of about 12, which is ridiculous. They shouldn't be letting him do that. But he was getting it done and he's a very methodical guy. He came back and talked about how he actually gets people and takes them through and teaches them how to lead. Which is excellent. But again, that's really his story to tell. But from a personal point of view, he's no different than anybody that you'd run into in Brisbane. He's got some more experience, he's got some harder problems that he's taken on. But the lovely thing about it is that I run into people who could be as effective and have as big an impact as Joel is having, every day here.Corinne Butler: Wow. That's such an amazing space to be in. So tell me, what else is happening in your industry?Peter Laurie: Well, there's a lot of different things happening in general. Not the amount of investment that's happening in this sort of, I see my industry, it will be the startup or innovation industry or something like that. The first thing I want to do is I want to qualify this with, I'm a little bit inside a bubble, so I'll talk about it in terms of the way that I think about it. I won't try and translate it outside the bubble, because I don't know if I can properly do that. I will do the stuff that I can. So the first up thing is there's a lot more money turning up into the ecosystem at the moment, be it through the super funds look like they're investing locally, or investing through venture capital firms locally instead of overseas, which is a good sign.Peter Laurie: The local angel networks are starting to get better. They're still not great but it's happening. The state government in Queensland is throwing a lot of money, or investing a lot of money, throwing it makes it sound like it's flippant, but it's not. Deliberately investing a lot of money into the region, to everybody's surprise. A lot of that is stuck. So there's been a lot of things that have been very positive, independent of what you read in the papers. A lot of things that are very positive and, not everything's perfect, but as an ecosystem where you used to that, not being perfect. The worst case isn't so much missing out on what's perfect, but what we do not being perfect, is missing out on the opportunity to be perfect, you've got to take your shot. From a technology point of view, the factors of production, so the ability for us to create something is getting easier and easier.Peter Laurie: So it moves from being a technical problem to being more of a creative problem or an artistic problem. So [inaudible 00:17:22] is a good way to speak about it, is that the biggest problem isn't whether we can build stuff now, it's whether we're actually building the right thing. And I spent a lot of time locally talking about ways to actually build the right thing and discover what it is because, like I was saying before, nobody knows what the right thing is. Up here in Brisbane, in Queensland in general, our universities are producing people that are world class. And then there's no denying that. And that seems to be an infinite resource of people coming out of there. The sad thing about it is that not a lot of people end up in this space where it's fully utilizing the skills that they have when they come out. But that's exactly what Startup Catalyst and the startup ecosystem is trying to open up.Peter Laurie: What else is going on? We're in a bit of a transition now. The startup ecosystem has been going long enough that the people that are purely driven by asset are starting to say that they've had enough and we're looking for the next generation of people to start to come through and make sure it's sustainable. And that's drawing a lot of my attention at the moment. That's what's top of my [inaudible 00:18:39]. Is that what you're after?Corinne Butler: That's great, thank you. So the podcast is called Advisor Adventures. And you've just mentioned that this year is really about you doing your stuff. So what adventures are you up to?Peter Laurie: The way that I operate is interesting. And, as someone who does a lot of thinking about it, I can categorize it quite well. I mean, it presents as something that's lacking a lot of focus. So I'm doing lots and lots of different things. I've had HR people talk to me about it being a portfolio career. So I'm doing lots of different things. And the biggest fear for me isn't so much doing the work, it's only doing that work. So for example, whenever I do dip my toe back into corporate work, I go for five weeks and then all of a sudden it's 18 months. So that's the sort of work that I end up doing. To me at the moment there's some interesting stuff around very early stage investment that I'm starting to think about and may well be able to open up through the crowdsource funding. So filling a gap sort of before Angels, or helping that sort of a phase go quickly, which is really more formalizing some of the investment that I'm doing at the very early stage now.Peter Laurie: Also, as a software developer, I can sit down and have a good idea and build something out, which I find entertaining and fun. I think a lot of other people would consider it work. So I'd probably say I've got about 10 or 15 balls in the air at the moment, which sounds crazy, except to run with the analogy that what I'm focusing on is the ability to juggle. So the balls aren't the things that I'm focusing on. They're opportunities, they're important, I'll push each of them as hard as I can. But the longterm capability that I'm building, the long term skills that I'm building, what I'm constantly trading on, which I'm laser focused on is the ability to juggle. Which has its own set of issues. So at the moment I'm learning to, not so much deal with the fear of missing out or FOMO, it's to embrace what a friend of mine calls the JOMO, which is the joy of missing out, which is a hard transition.Corinne Butler: I think you've got a very valid point there because we do focus a lot on FOMO and I think JOMO is potentially something to even research.Peter Laurie: Yeah, well it's not their term and it's not my term. It's definitely a term that's out there. So by all means have a look.Corinne Butler: So your own personal BHAG so big hairy audacious goal. What's the five-year dream, or 10 year dream?Peter Laurie: I'm a little bit different to a lot of people in that I don't really have a tight five-year or 10 year dream that I'm converging on. Which is described before as the juggling. So my goal isn't to reduce the juggling set down to one ball, it's actually to put more balls in the air. So for me, the goal that loosely describes what I'm doing is to try and get our ecosystem to work properly. One of the attributes when I first started in it, probably closer to 10 years ago, but it's hard. But formally, when the River City Labs opened up, in 2012, is that the ecosystem wasn't flowing. It was just sort of stuttering along. And made a conscious decision to work on that and in that, to make that work. So my five year goal is to have a vibrant, well executing, innovation ecosystem here in Southeast Queensland.Peter Laurie: One of the attributes, because I've got the skills that I have I can go and work wherever I want, and I'd much prefer it to be here than elsewhere. Mainly because I'm here. I don't see a lot of value in heading off elsewhere because it's better there. I mean that's how we never get it here. So I'm trying to get up work here. So I suppose, long story short, five year, 10 year goal is to have a vibrant and virtuous innovation ecosystem here in Brisbane. And as a result of that, across the rest of the state, and then hopefully across the rest of the country as well.Corinne Butler: Sounds great. Now you work with a lot of different businesses and business owners. What would be your top three tips for them?Peter Laurie: Okay, so the first one, like I said before, is that nobody knows what you should be doing. I open with that every time now. Because some people kind of give you a puzzled look and then eventually it turns into this empowering situation. And one of the ways I talked about before is that a lot of people will tell you where you should be, but not a lot of people understand where you're at. And the art's in getting from where you are to where you should be. And then off the back of that, sort of in the same sort of vein, is that to be able to interact with people around that, you need to learn to critically analyze what you're hearing. When you're new to something, you don't have the capability to measure how good someone is, but you can measure how confident they are.Peter Laurie: So you have to learn to listen to everybody and then critically analyze what they're saying to you and then make a decision yourself about what you should be doing, as opposed to blindly following someone. And the main reason behind that is that if you make a decision and it goes wrong, then you learn that you need to make better decisions. If you blindly follow someone and it turns out that they're wrong, your analysis is I need to start and find another person who might know what's going on. So it's really about opening that learning loop, about getting through and doing that.Peter Laurie: So the next one is, I see this one a lot, is that when you're building a business, you're not building products and services. You're building a business that builds products and services. And it's very important to separate yourself out from that. I mean, the goal as a business owner is to become redundant as soon as you can. However people still seem to bring this sort of empire building focus there. You're trying to build something that's sustainable that doesn't require you to be there. You're not trying to construct yourself a job, you're trying to construct yourself a business.Peter Laurie: And even a lot of people that are feeling that through sort of sit back and think about that when I throw that at them. That's a surprising one. I'm just looking down at my notes to see if there was another one that I had. That's probably enough. Actually, the third one is that given that nobody knows what you should be doing, you should be building a business that builds products and services. You're on a constant learning thing. So you need to learn how you learn new things and you need to consciously make that competency stronger. Because that's the only thing that you can rationally invest in given how everything changes so quickly.Corinne Butler: And it's interesting you say that and what you've mentioned there because I agree with you. I see a lot of the time is people don't do themselves out of jobs and they don't invest in themselves. So I think that's great advice. So Peter, what else would you like our audience to know? Any other adventures that you'd like to share?Peter Laurie: Well look, probably the first thing I'd do is, one of my problems that I've got with the innovation ecosystem is that everybody thinks that it's executed by people who are 19 years old and skate to work. When that's not the situation at all. I mean it is who I spend a lot of time working with because that's the only people that turn up. In fact, there's a lot of data suggesting that the most successful entrepreneurs are 45 plus. And the ones that are 18 and do this thing are absolute anomalies and highly unlikely to be successful. And I find a lot of people ruling out this is an option because they think they're not the right person to do it. So I treat this as an invitation to go down and get involved with your innovation ecosystem.Peter Laurie: So there'll be called startup spaces or coworking spaces. There'll be things like startup weekends and events and meet up groups. And get down there with your eyes open and critically analyzing everything, but get involved. You'll find that you are actually sitting on a whole bunch more skills than you think. And if I could make you do one thing, it'd be try and go out and do a startup weekend. It's by no means a comfortable experience, but it's an incredibly solid way to learn what you need to know to be able to execute in this newer, faster moving environment.Corinne Butler: I think that's great advice. I think we should all go and do a startup weekend.Peter Laurie: Yeah.Corinne Butler: So Peter Laurie from Junta. Thank you so much for joining us today on Advisor Adventures.Peter Laurie: You're welcome. Thank you very much for having me.

On this episode of Stories Behind the Grind with Aidan Vuocolo, listen to my conversation with Aaron Birkby, CEO of Startup Catalyst and co-founder of peak persona. We discuss qualities to look for when hiring, how to improve founder mental health and when should a business define its culture. Also discover: How the evolution of Yes can save you from becoming overwhelmed. What emphasis should be placed on mindset compared to raw talent What motivated Aaron to start, Startup Catalyst and Peak Persona    Links: Startup Catalyst - www.startupcatalyst.com.au/ Peak Performance Persona - www.peakpersona.com/ Venturer Program - https://advance.qld.gov.au/venturer-program High Performance Habits by Brendon Burchard - https://www.amazon.com/High-Performance-Habits-Extraordinary-People/dp/1401952852 Be sure to follow me on Instagram and say Hi @aidanvoc Subscribe to the podcast on Apple, or anywhere else you listen to your podcasts. You can find this episode plus all the previous episode here. Four ways you can support this podcast Take a screenshot of this podcast and send it to a friend who may like it Take your Grind to the next level by implementing a sales funnel to turn your passive website visitors into paying customer with ClickFunnels, the #1 sales funnel software in the world. You can get a free trial by going to www.clickfunnels.com Rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts! Connect with me @aidanvoc (I respond to all DM’s there)

In this episode we cover the book that changed how software companies build product, interact with customers and measure success: The Lean Startup. A staple of MBA students, product managers and every startup company trying to build the next big thing. The Lean Startup, has built a new lexicon of terms you must know to work in the high tech industry: MVP, Pivots, Innovation Accounting. Join us as your co-hosts Chuck and Gunnar bring their unique views of Product vs. Engineering, as they cover this book. Also, joining the podcast is guest Jim Flannery, founder of Four Athen's a startup accelerator in Athens, GA, who has also worked as an Startup Catalyst at Atlanta's famous ATDC startup accelerator and currently teaches Entrepreneurship at the University of Georgia. This conversation get's interesting as Jim drops the mic with the question: "Can entrepreneurship be taught?"

This week on the pod we're turning our focus to the importance of founder health and wellbeing.We invited Aaron Birkby, CEO Startup Catalyst and Co-founder of Peak Persona, and welcomed back Amanda Price Head of High Growth Ventures to the pod discuss this topic.KPMG Australia’s High Growth Ventures just released the findings from their Startup Founder Survey, supported by Blackbird Ventures, AirTree Ventures, Square Peg Capital, Reinventure and Right Click Capital, which polled founders of 70 Australian venture-backed startups.The report validates a lot of assumptions about startup founders; they work longer hours than average workers, two-third are very or extremely stressed, and 57 percent said that their stress has a large impact on the ability of their startup to succeed. Amanda explains they commissioned the research to shine a spotlight on some of the “unspoken challenges” founders face and highlight the link between founder wellbeing and business performance.Read the full report: //home.kpmg.com/au/en/home/insights/2018/08/startup-founder-research-2018.htmlOur main guest this week isAaron Birkby. His CV and list of accomplishments is extensive; founder entrepreneur, management consultant, television presenter, spy, restaurateur, mentor, advisor, board member, as well as being a leading voice on founder performance.As CEO of Startup Catalyst, Aaron leads missions to Silicon Valley, Europe, Israel and Asia for youths, founders, investors and innovation leaders. To date they’ve completed 14 missions, with over 200 alumni, and each mission is tailored for participates to meet tech giants, high-growth startups, local investors, corporate innovators, accelerators, incubators, and co-working spaces.Last year Aaron launched Peak Persona which delivers programs and content to assist founders to optimise their lives for peak personal performance. The program introduces participants to routines and tools to achieve peak mental performance, manage stress and emotions, find work/life balance, and generally perform at your best in all aspects of your life.This episode explores the importance of founder health, why we should all be talking about it, along with advice on how founders can maintain high performance and avoid burnout. Enjoy and let’s keep the conversation going.

This was our pilot Podcast – RECUT - with one of life's true gentlemen Aaron Birkby. He is not an entrepreneur but he is entrepreneurial and prefers the title “Founder”. He has the best job in the world as CEO of Startup Catalyst and he travels the world sharing the love of Australian Startups. He is a loving Husband, a great father and an all round great guy. Hope you enjoy the RECUT version of our first ever released podcast. Aaron Birkby you are an Awesome Human…..

This was our pilot Podcast – RECUT - with one of life’s true gentlemen Aaron Birkby. He is not an entrepreneur but he is entrepreneurial and prefers the title “Founder”. He has the best job in the world as CEO of Startup Catalyst and he travels the world sharing the love of Australian Startups. He is a loving Husband, a great father and an all round great guy. Hope you enjoy the RECUT version of our first ever released podcast. Aaron Birkby you are an Awesome Human…..

Awesome Humans - Aaron Birkby. Aaron is an entrepreneur, CEO of Startup Catalyst and an Awesome Human. Listen to how it all began for Aaron and what is next in this amazing life. Brett McCallum - @bjmaca tracks down some awesome humans to get their stories on life.

  Terri talks to life coach and artist Svetlana Saitsky about learning to not be afraid of the darkness, the importance of acknowledging your inner saboteur and how asking for help is a sign of strength and not weakness.        Who is Svetlana Saitsky?  Throughout the last decade, Svetlana has worked with many corporations including Google, Apple, Lululemon, Great Place To Work Institute and YouCaring. Her expertise in culture building, coaching, and mindfulness are brought to life through interactive workshops, and speaking engagements targeting individuals and companies looking for transformation. She is also an artist whose work focuses on mental health awareness. Svetlana's work best supports creatives, entrepreneurs needing an extra push to achieve, and those going through massive career and life changes.   Show Highlights  Svetlana talks about saying yes to an opportunity without knowing how she was going to make it work  Svetlana and Terri met over shoes at a Guild event (https://theguilded.org)  Svetlana talks about how it took her ten years to really decide to become a life coach  She reached her goal and realized it didn’t feel good and fell into a severe depression  She describes the importance of having a support team in place and the first step in getting help is recognizing you need help  She realized that it wasn’t all about inspiration and following your bliss and that you need to embrace the darkness  Terri and Svet talk about tall poppy syndrome in Australia and the imposter syndrome and embracing the saboteurs in our heads; stop resisting the resistance  We are more powerful than we can imagine  Svet would wave a magic wand to give everyone the courage to tap into their own creativity    Terri’s Key Takeaway  We need to continue to redefine our definition of success as we learn and grow and to appreciate the journey and not just the destination.      References in the Podcast  Beverly Ryle: http://www.beverlyryle.com/  The Geography of Bliss:  https://www.ericweinerbooks.com/books/the-geography-of-bliss/description/  InTeaHouse:  https://inteahouse.com/  Startup Catalyst: http://www.startupcatalyst.com.au/  TiE Global: http://tie.org/  Inside Out:  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2096673/      Contact  Svetlana can be reached via her website www.svetlandasaitsky.com or on Instagram and Twitter @jetsvetter.     You can follow Terri on Twitter at @terrihansonmead or go to her website at www.terrihansonmead.com or on Medium:  https://medium.com/@terrihansonmead.   Feel free to email Terri at PilotingYourLife@gmail.com.  To continue the conversation, go to Twitter at @PilotingLife and use hashtag #PilotingYourLife. 

Meet this week's studentpreneur Astrid Jonelynas, 20 y.o., who went to visit the Silicon Valley with the Startup Catalyst programme. Astrid is  a Mechatronics Engineering Student at Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia. In the ecosystem supporting studentpreneurs, there is one element that we haven't talked about yet but is starting to become mainstream: a trip to visit startups. Of course the top of the top is to get to go to the Silicon Valley and visit some of the famous startups. That's what Astrid got a chance to do! She initially started her first venture in a hackathon. After a few months, it went sour. She then heard of the Startup Catalyst program, an annual mission to Silicon Valley for twenty young people who have the potential to be Australia’s next batch of globally successful tech entrepreneurs. She got selected and went to San Francisco. Here are a few of her insights: Australian are humble whereas Americans are very proud of their accomplishment. People are people over there, they are not super stars. The main difference is the support for entrepreneurship Main advantage of being a studentpreneur  Links: Twitter: @ajonelynas Startup Catalyst programme: StartupCatalyst.com.au Astrid's blog on the trip: AstridJonelynas.com LinkedIn If you have what it takes you can apply to share your story on air. CLICK HERE

Highly sought after due to his candid counsel to both startups and Fortune 1000 companies alike, he has been requested by organizations such as IBM, Coca-Cola, UPS, Cox Communications and Autodesk. K.P. has spoken at universities all over the U.S. including: Harvard, Georgia Institute of Technology, Vanderbilt, Stanford, Emory, San Jose State, University of South Carolina, and Cleveland State. According to Crystal Knows: "He is ambitious, critical, and moves quickly to make progress, but understands how to support others in the process." Innovative and witty, K.P. speaks to leaders with intriguing topics such as: Your Culture Sucks Because You Suck, Why Big Companies Can’t Innovate, Disruption Is Not A Marketing Campaign, Why You’re Not a CEO, Yet… and Why Every Recent Grad Should Work at a Startup. In 2012, K.P. published BIM for Building Owners and Developers, a book on the adoption of advanced technology in the infrastructure space employed by leading companies and universities. K.P. is a Startup Catalyst, helping organizations accelerate through coaching and programs such as: Startup Weekend, Customer Discovery Classes, Accelerators and Hackathons. These can range from one day to six week cohorts, depending on your needs and timeline.Kristen Stocks is the founder of Kids Boost, a non-profit organization designed to help kids give back to the world using their gifts, talents and passions. Mission: After reaching a certain level of success in his career, K.P. and his business partner in CTW were on a mission to do something bigger and better. With an intimate understanding of the startup landscape they knew companies with bold, market-changing innovations would have the highest likelihood of fundraising, grants and ultimate success. Mindset: K.P has seen is all when it comes to entrepreneurs and their ideas for changing the world.  I asked him the one trait that he looks for when meeting new entrepreneurs and his response may surprise you. It has to do with our biggest resource: time. Marketing: If you are looking to differentiate yourself in the marketplace, you must listen to K.P.'s perspective on market-risk companies versus technology-rick companies. CTW focuses solely on technology-riska nd for a very important reason. Listen and K.P. distinguishes the two and see how your wheels begin to turn as you reflect on your own business model and offerings. Momentum: Gaining momentum, growth and expansion are everything when it comes to the goal of creating a sustainable company. K.P. shares extremely valuable insights for any startup that is struggling to gain momentum and meet benchmarks. Hear his advice for a change in terminology that could get you on your way faster. Masterminds: K.P. shares his method for closed group collaboration and how it's evolved over time.  As businesses reach different levels, the information they need changes. Listen as he offers insight that applies to business of all levels on how to seek out the right people and the lens through which you should receive their advice. Mastermind Challenge: I found K.P.'s words on market risk and technology risk very thought provoking. I challenge you to take a step back and evaluate the innovation that you bring to the marketplace. Could your business generate more momentum if you allow yourself to get creative and think outside the box? How would new innovation serve your existing customers and enhance your product or service?  Learn more at mastermindyourlaunch.com