Search Captions & Ask AI

Lessons From 50 Of The Worlds Greatest Minds with Jake Humphrey | E59

December 07, 2020 / 01:30:43

This episode features Jake Humphrey, a returning guest and entrepreneur, discussing key lessons learned from interviewing high-performance individuals across various fields, including acting, business, and sports. Topics include decision-making, personal growth, and the importance of consistency.

Jake shares insights from his podcast experience, particularly a lesson from Matthew McConaughey about not leaving crumbs, which emphasizes making thoughtful decisions to avoid future regrets. He reflects on his own struggles with punctuality and the importance of self-awareness.

The conversation touches on the emotional challenges of criticism, especially regarding the podcast's focus on success during difficult times. Jake expresses a desire to shift the narrative towards positivity and learning from failures.

They discuss the nature of success and happiness, emphasizing that true fulfillment comes from enjoying the journey rather than just the destination. Jake highlights the importance of being present and nurturing relationships.

Finally, they address the challenges of representation in the podcasting space, particularly regarding female guests, and the responsibility of using their platforms to inspire future generations.

TL;DR

Jake Humphrey discusses lessons from high-performance guests, decision-making, personal growth, and the importance of consistency in achieving success.

Video

00:00:00
this week on the diver ceo we have a returning guest jake humphreys he is an entrepreneur he
00:00:05
is a tv presenter he's also now a podcaster and jake has spent the last
00:00:10
year on his podcast sitting down with some of the most high performance people some of the most accomplished
00:00:16
people in their industries from acting to business to sports you name it and so because of that experience
00:00:23
because of all the insights he's gained over the last year since we last spoke i wanted to sit down with him and
00:00:29
compare notes we have a lot of high performance people on this podcast too i wanted to understand the similarities
00:00:35
i wanted to pick into the minds of some of the guests and what he's learned from them how are they the same what makes them
00:00:42
different and that's what we're going to talk about today so without further ado i'm stephen bartlett and this is the
00:00:47
dire of a ceo i hope nobody's listening but if you are then please keep this to yourself
00:01:00
you've um you've had what 30 people on your podcast today you've got
00:01:05
a lot more coming up one of the key questions that i that i wanted to ask you because it's you know
00:01:10
something that i asked myself is what are those like key lessons that you've learned you've interviewed
00:01:16
you know high performance athletes actors authors um and really sort of high
00:01:22
performance people from all industries what are the key lessons and the themes i think there is one key lesson that was
00:01:29
summed up for me by matthew mcconaughey the oscar-winning actor who came on my pod recently and his phrase is don't leave
00:01:36
crumbs and what he means by that is like when you're making a decision
00:01:42
don't leave stuff behind don't make a bad decision now that later on you've got to go back and pick that crumb up and be regretful about it and
00:01:48
that's brilliant because sometimes when we talk on the podcast we talk about really like big
00:01:54
blue sky thinking you know like we've talked to you about social change setting up social change sometimes to people that are listening and that can
00:02:00
seem like unreal almost untouchable because it's this huge multi-million dollar business that
00:02:06
you've created but actually don't leave crumbs is about making the decisions for a big
00:02:12
big business like that and creating something amazing but also like make sure that you don't have an extra
00:02:17
drink and even in case it leaves you with a hangover tomorrow and you've got work to do or make sure you simply choose your clothes the night
00:02:22
before so you're not doing it in a rush and like i still leave crumbs all the time like i'll tell you when we uh when we
00:02:28
interviewed matthew like he's the first hollywood actor we've had on the pod so for me it was quite a big moment
00:02:33
and i thought i really want to be looking good for this so i thought i'd have a shower and a shave before we do the interview and i was having a shave in the bathroom
00:02:40
my wife was in the bath and she was going to come down and like listen in the corner in my study because she was like she loves dallas buyers club she was
00:02:46
excited and uh she starts having a shave and she goes it's 9 54.
00:02:53
i was like and i thought it was like 9 30 or something we put the kids to bed and then the next thing i'm running
00:02:59
downstairs i haven't done my hair properly i'm on i've got two wi-fi zone because our upload speed living in the
00:03:05
countryside is horrendous so i was then on the wrong wi-fi i then looked for the script i'd written for the questions for matthew couldn't find
00:03:11
them and i was like i was the last one in i'm getting beaten to the interview on my own podcast
00:03:17
by a hollywood actor and i left crumbs and now that's a good lesson for me because i do it all the
00:03:23
time and i think that you only learn about the crumbs you leave by doing it and i just i just really want people i've had a few
00:03:30
negative comments that have come my way about the podcast direct messages from people saying um
00:03:37
you're getting this all wrong we're in a global pandemic i'm having a really hard year and here you are with a podcast that's
00:03:42
just celebrating success all the time and showing up how um how we're all doing badly compared to your great guests
00:03:49
and for me the podcast is a that hurts me to think that because i don't want anyone to come to
00:03:55
the high performance podcast and leave in that way but it's the absolute total opposite of that because when we talk about what
00:04:02
lessons can you learn from people on the podcast the other biggest one is they mess up all the time i think
00:04:07
i genuinely believe successful people make more mistakes than anybody else because they're constantly challenging themselves to do
00:04:14
stuff and you you're no stranger to making decisions that at the time you just simply don't know
00:04:20
but you have to find a way of making that decision um and i'm sure there are times when you've made 10 or 15
00:04:26
life-changing decisions in a week you know the the the point about those crumbs and you know rushing down the stairs
00:04:32
when you realize that you were like what could you have done in hindsight to um to prevent those crumbs being left
00:04:39
behind per se i just need to be really honest with myself that i have weaknesses and i need to address them rather than thinking that everything's
00:04:46
fine and i am notoriously late i am always a few minutes late and always my new year's
00:04:51
resolution is this is the year that i'm not going to be late is but it just i'm surprised you know that you're
00:04:57
late because um the industry you work in i know it's very and look at all the guests
00:05:02
i've had on my podcast we had um sir clive woodward who won the rugby world cup and you think of all of the discipline
00:05:08
and the rules and the mindsets you need to win a rugby world cup the number one thing that stands out for him is something
00:05:14
called lombardi time which was created by the players and they lombardi obviously is a famous
00:05:20
name in american sports and they call it lombardi time because it's a name that sort of resonates with winning and it was 10 minutes early
00:05:26
so if you say to any former england rugby player what's lombardi time they'll tell you 10 minutes early so listen i'm hearing this stuff steven on a
00:05:33
weekly basis and still not getting it right and i think it just goes to show that we are human we have
00:05:38
we are fallible and i do think we have blind spots which there are some things some people find really hard i don't there are some
00:05:44
things that is not an issue for other people and it is a recurring problem for me to deal with
00:05:49
but no one's perfect and how do you emotionally feel about the fact that you have blind spots
00:05:55
in terms of like do you beat yourself up about it yeah yeah i think so
00:06:00
yeah um i think it's a really common phrase isn't it to hear that you're your
00:06:05
own biggest critic i think i'm probably less my own biggest critic
00:06:11
than i was previously like when i first started in my presenting career and i used to come off air on the
00:06:16
formula one i would solely focus on the bad stuff on the issues on the problems and that
00:06:23
was instilled in me by david coulthard because he'd step straight out of a formula one car straight into broadcasting and
00:06:30
tv is a friendly and lovely place to be most of the time you know we're really good at telling each other how great we are and we had
00:06:36
our first production meeting just after the first race and i was just grateful to get through it it was my
00:06:41
first ever bit of live formula one so i was just glad to have survived so i was ready for this lovely you were great you were great you
00:06:47
were great this was great we started the meeting and david coulthard went well sorry
00:06:53
can we just stop and that this is unheard of he goes i'm just not interested in this and the
00:06:59
producer was like sorry i don't understand he's like i'm not interested in sitting here and going through all the good stuff
00:07:05
how does going through the good stuff make the boat go faster why are we not talking about the bad stuff and that was a revelation from me
00:07:12
i was like yes the good stuff's already good so you focus on the good stuff now i have a different mindset and
00:07:20
bearing in mind my first race was 2009 so this is 11 years ago and for a long time my focus was on
00:07:27
the stuff that i was struggling with or the stuff i wasn't very good at or the times where i didn't feel life
00:07:34
was very good so i would look at a bad month or a bad year and go right why was i not flowing why was i not
00:07:40
really in a happy place why was this why don't we focus more on the good
00:07:46
stuff and that is my mindset change that is the thing that i for 2021 that is going to be my focus
00:07:51
let's focus on the good stuff so we realize what the good stuff is just do more of it let's focus on the times when you were flowing and when you were
00:07:58
feeling great when you were barreling around the place and when you were the guy and when everyone wanted to work with you what was i doing what was i eating how
00:08:05
was i sleeping who was i spending my time with what was feeding me what was making me feel
00:08:10
fantastic that's probably a better place to focus on i particularly after the sort of crap
00:08:15
2020 we've all had i feel we've become a nation maybe even
00:08:20
a planet with this light obsession on failure to not fail anymore to be good and it's
00:08:26
almost like a badge of honor isn't it like i'm sure if you said to me three or four months ago how's your relationship with failure my
00:08:33
love failure love faith bring failure on that's how i learn failures where i grow i need to be on the absolute edge so i'm
00:08:39
failing all the time i want to fail forwards and i want to fail often like i still do but when i fail when i
00:08:45
leave crumbs when i'm late for an interview with matthew mcconaughey i'm not thinking why did that happen
00:08:52
because then i'm focusing on the failure i will allow it to be there and i will do my best not to do it again
00:08:58
but i'm gonna try for 2021 to think about the good stuff man and just to see how that changes things for me
00:09:03
super interesting you know do you focus on your failure um i i don't focus on the failure i
00:09:09
think i was just i was actually asking myself that question when you were talking i was thinking do i am i someone that dwells on failure to
00:09:15
be fair i don't i'm very very good at being detached from it all i think i talked earlier in this podcast about
00:09:20
this like um video game mentality that i've taken on my life where
00:09:27
i see my my worst days and to be honest a lot of them no i
00:09:32
think it's just my worst days as if i'm playing a video game and that i am
00:09:37
i am not what's happening and it's and i i think that detachment from what's happening
00:09:42
has allowed me in my most chaotic moments to remain calm it's allowed me to form a
00:09:48
sort of calm within my chaos so if i have a big failure or i really really [ __ ] up and i'm i'm disappointed
00:09:53
with myself or whatever i'm very good at detaching from that um so i think i think the absolute
00:10:00
absolute ownership of what you're doing for me is powerful which is is that the total opposite of what
00:10:05
you're saying because like whatever i do i have to absolutely believe it and own that decision because then if it goes
00:10:10
wrong or people question it i can say listen i really thought it was the right thing it's like the emotional detachment it
00:10:16
means that i'm not i don't think that i'm going to die although i am totally responsible for changing it so i can think of i'm
00:10:22
thinking specifically about the day where um i was driving to work get get the emails and the text messages
00:10:28
saying that our whole server's been hacked and every client we have has been sent really really personal specific abuse by them
00:10:34
from our email server that's come from my business partner's email that looks like it was meant to be sent to my assistant
00:10:40
but the client was just accidentally ccd and this happened this happened about four years ago five years ago
00:10:45
so i'm driving to work and i'm getting all these and in that moment one has a choice whether they want to
00:10:50
fall into the problem and become the problem and become consumed by it or if they want to hold it out in front
00:10:56
of them and deal with it there yeah if it consumes me i'll be crippled with anxiety crying in the corner
00:11:02
but if i can hold it out in front of me and realize that this isn't gonna kill me this isn't gonna end me
00:11:07
yeah this isn't you know but this is something that i have to deal with out in front of me then it becomes much more um possible to
00:11:14
be rational and to think in terms of probabilities and i've come to learn especially over the last year or two
00:11:19
that when you can um make your decisions based on probabilities of the outcome you can make really really good decisions yeah um
00:11:26
you know i was thinking a good example of that is actually um a friend of mine yesterday texts me and
00:11:33
he said to me that it's interesting he said to me that
00:11:38
at his marketing agency his clients passwords have maybe been
00:11:44
exposed to one outside individual so there's one guy another company that might have seen all of his clients
00:11:49
passwords and he said steve i'm going to call all of my clients now and tell them that all of their passwords have been exposed
00:11:55
so i said let's go through the probabilities here if you lined up a hundred people like the guy that might have seen these
00:12:00
passwords how many of them would do something malicious with that information we both agreed it was probably less than one percent
00:12:07
of like reputable people that would take a bunch of passwords and do something malicious so i said okay so one person out of 100
00:12:13
or less so your probability of harm is less than one percent um what's the probability of harm if you
00:12:20
call all of your clients and tell them that all of their passwords have been leaked probably greater than one percent
00:12:25
yeah so let's think about ways we can get that less than one percent down to like zero so i said
00:12:30
email all your clients and tell them you've done a security review and that um you you highly recommend they all turn on two-factor
00:12:36
authentication today and that means the probability of harm goes from less than one percent to zero
00:12:41
and but he was like in the in the emotional mindset he was just like i'm going to call them all yeah apologize because you probably felt a duty of care
00:12:48
but if you do the two-step authentication i suppose you're still it's like you zero yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah music to zero percent
00:12:55
it's a duty you're balancing their duty of care and you know how do i remove harm from my clients but also
00:13:00
remove harm from my business but he was so emotional when he called me that he wasn't thinking rationally yeah
00:13:05
and that's why holding it out in front of you allows you to think in terms of rational employment perspective that perspective is so
00:13:11
important to have like i've always had like this irrational fear of imminent disaster
00:13:16
so when i was a kid i used to come in from school my mom would go and walk the dog and she might be 15 or 20 minutes most kids would just watch cartoons
00:13:22
i would be like out the window after 10 minutes singing where's my mom where's my mom and then these little voices come in my head all maybe
00:13:28
something really bad's happened to her maybe she's like slipped over and banged her head and or maybe she's lying in a field right i
00:13:33
might have to go and find one my mum is and then she reappears i'm like oh thank goodness even now with my kids if i'm out someone
00:13:39
they go around the corner i don't just think to myself i'll walk around the corner and my kids will be there until i can see my kids again and there
00:13:45
might be parents listening to this that relate the worst possible things that could happen to one's children is a
00:13:52
is happening to my kids until i can see them so i find myself like speeding up or saying to my friends yeah hey let's go and sit over here so we can keep
00:13:58
just literally so i can keep an eye on the kids and then i'm a little bit of a hypochondriac so i fear that and then
00:14:03
when my phone goes and or someone sends me a message going hey jake can we have a chat later like it could be someone from
00:14:09
whisper or it could be someone from bt sport or someone about the pod i don't go yeah yeah cool i'll call you later i'm like oh what could that be
00:14:15
my brain goes to worst case scenario and i found myself really quickly going so it's got a really important call to make
00:14:21
my heart's racing 10 to the dozen and then as soon as i if i find out what it is i'm like oh
00:14:26
thank goodness where does this come from i don't know because there is no skeleton in the closet like a friend rang me the other
00:14:32
day and the message that you gave me was he's separating from his wife which is massively sad but he rang me
00:14:37
and said listen i'm really sorry to call you with this um quite awkward news i'm immediately thinking oh my goodness right
00:14:44
what on earth can this be but in my head it's gonna end everything it's gonna cost me my marriage my kids
00:14:49
my job my house isn't that ridiculous but i now have the perspective that i know
00:14:54
this is how i am i've had this since i was like 11 or 12 years old i know this is how i'm made so that is a
00:15:01
really powerful thing for me because i then think when i feel this feeling beginning like when my kids go around the corner i now
00:15:07
say to myself listen your kids are going to be fine playing the other side of a tree
00:15:12
you know yourself well enough to know that this is just a rational anxiety it's your brain and it's just playing a trick on you
00:15:18
that's all this is you talk a lot about responsibility yeah um there you just said this is how i'm made yeah
00:15:24
that sounds like giving up responsibility yeah yeah so now i think i'm taking i yes you're
00:15:30
right you are totally right but then i feel like i'm taking the resp i'm slowly still learning even at 42.
00:15:37
i'm taking the responsibility back by saying right i'm not going to allow myself to get anxious about that because i know what i'm like if i'm the
00:15:43
most chilled out person in the world and i find a reason to be anxious maybe i should be worried about that i'm going to tell them about the lift
00:15:49
jake so we're on the fourth floor here and uh jake jake came up uh
00:15:55
knocked on the door looking pretty sweaty and said uh i just took breath he said i just took the stairs because i
00:16:00
opened the lift and i didn't trust it this lift there's never been any problems with it if you look at the stats around deaths in lifts or things
00:16:12
you and me are not hanging out today that seems somewhat connected to what you're saying yeah i think you're probably right yeah
00:16:18
maybe i should have taken the lift because i know that everything will be fine in the lift and i should know that i'm a bit claustrophobic but
00:16:23
i think it just goes to show that again and you've spoken about this so powerfully over the years on your podcast is that from the outside world
00:16:30
you look at someone like me and think wow a couple of kids few businesses great house nice broadcasting career
00:16:36
what a lovely carefree life he must live every day man is riddled with little anxieties and little worries
00:16:42
um a few years ago probably almost to the point of derailing as we've discussed on your previous
00:16:48
podcast with me but now knowing myself knowing yourself is so powerful because
00:16:54
only then like can you love yourself you think that's also somewhat linked that you said earlier on about that comment you
00:17:00
read where people are like jake you know you shouldn't be doing a podca happy podcasting sad times basically
00:17:06
yeah the fact that you remembered that and you referred to it as hurting you seems also somewhat correlated to this
00:17:12
yeah i think i don't know i think it's a i think it's a it's a fair point
00:17:18
i find that a harder thing to get i find external criticism is a harder thing for me to deal with i
00:17:24
find that more i find that a more difficult um thing to own in my head why
00:17:30
um i think because probably human beings just want people to like what we're doing i mean i find it confusing as well
00:17:37
because i think if you're being offended by my high performance podcast like
00:17:42
wow that that shows the level of offence that some people can take because i really want i honestly
00:17:48
want it to just be a holy positive experience from the moment that someone clicks subscribe or starts listening to
00:17:55
the pod to the minute they leave i just i just want people to be happier to get
00:18:00
takeaways to live a more empowered life to go and be successful i honestly believe it like
00:18:05
it comes you've got thousands and thousands and thousands of reviews on your podcast yeah it's rated five stars
00:18:11
people pour their heart out telling you how much they love it how much value it brings and we're talking about this one guy i'm
00:18:16
a human i suppose am i i think you slightly over index a little bit in terms of caring about this stuff though
00:18:22
and i i actually you know when people asked you know what you're like after meeting you i said he's just such a nice
00:18:27
guy such a good guy and you are such a good guy and it it's
00:18:32
maybe that is part of i don't know is that somewhat connected to your i think so don't you think that
00:18:38
don't you think the two are completely connected though that if i wasn't the kind of guy that genuinely wanted people to
00:18:44
you know be in a better place i wouldn't give a [ __ ] whether someone said my podcast was useless i'd be like well i don't care anything i'm just doing it to
00:18:50
make some money for me that podcast and i will openly say this i've not made a penny from
00:18:56
creating and operating for an entire year and we talk all the time that this is about the outcome not the income
00:19:03
and and i think the reason why it has been successful is that whether it's me or whether it's
00:19:08
damien or whether it's the guys that help us to film and edit the podcast together all of us totally believe and buy into
00:19:15
what we're doing like i genuinely think that it is what people need to hear
00:19:21
because it is empowering people and do great things who have been you know a lot of my friends messaged me
00:19:26
after you had johnny wilkinson yeah and they said that was [ __ ] weird it was deep wasn't it i had to listen to
00:19:31
that back five times and i did the interview you know what was the remark i haven't heard it what was the surprising
00:19:38
so the the bravery really from from someone who won a rugby world cup as a certain
00:19:44
person and now is a completely different person i mean i can give you like a sort of salacious headline like he told us that
00:19:50
winning the rugby world cup is no more important than doing the washing up and the the way that he squares that off in his
00:19:57
mind is he says what are you doing if you're playing rugby moving your body to achieve a goal what you're doing if you're doing the washing
00:20:03
up moving your body to achieve a goal and if i make winning the rugby world cup more important or to hold more value
00:20:11
than doing the washing up and i'm no longer a rugby player what am i less valuable because i'm no longer doing the thing that was more important
00:20:17
that was the that is the sort of sentence that he was sharing with us which i think is
00:20:22
brilliant and brave and i can relate to it and i and i can understand it um
00:20:28
[Music] but i think that for me the sort of the real the real
00:20:33
revelation that came out of the johnny wilkinson episode and what i really want people to understand if they listen to it
00:20:39
is that when you strip everything back he is someone who has
00:20:45
totally changed from where he was when he was conquering the world because when he was conquering the world as a rugby player
00:20:51
he thought he had to stress and struggle and sacrifice and fail and now he realizes that
00:20:57
stressing and struggling and sacrificing and failing leads to
00:21:02
more stress and struggle and sacrifice and fail and actually one of the amazing things
00:21:08
he said he said when i released a book after winning the rugby world cup i wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't a spike in mental health
00:21:13
cases from people that read that book because the book was saying you've got a struggle you've got a struggle you've got to you've got to
00:21:20
really struggle in life to be successful and i think that that is something that i
00:21:25
when we first started the high performance podcast i loved it when people spoke to me about
00:21:31
the battle and the struggle and the strife and the sacrifice and the late nights and the early starts
00:21:36
because i wanted people at home to go yeah man i'm gonna work harder i'm gonna commit more i'm gonna
00:21:41
sacrifice more now i think that is so so so wrong that
00:21:47
is the total antithesis of what i now the message i now want my podcast to give to people
00:21:53
it's tough isn't it because it's hard to find someone who's been really successful at the very top of
00:21:58
their game whether it's business or sport hasn't done that yeah so i've contended with this i've like contended mentally
00:22:04
with this idea as well well again when i started putting content out there especially when i was really young like 18
00:22:09
i was bragging about how late i was staying up i was like look at me at 4 a.m and i'm still working
00:22:14
and i was doing that because i was trying to portray an image that i was i don't know a superhuman or something and my content
00:22:21
followed that theme and then i got to the point where i probably flipped the other way because of public pressure and people's and the
00:22:27
the world now thinks that if you go on the high performance podcast and say hard work really really matters you will
00:22:33
take an l you are an [ __ ] for saying that because you're going to make people depressed and anxious and you're a hustle porn star
00:22:39
and then i got to another place which is if it's the truth it's the truth and i'm comfortable with
00:22:45
the truth and so there's so many levels of nuance it's like the most successful people you'll
00:22:51
encounter at the very top of their industries worked like hell to get there yeah yeah
00:22:57
yeah it's you know will smith you know circlive woodward or um any anyone in it
00:23:04
that's a very consistent theme elon musk right but it but what i've come to do over the
00:23:10
years is detach that from happiness first and foremost because it doesn't necessarily mean they're happier
00:23:15
and then also redefine what success is because success can be being a great parent yeah or is
00:23:22
it to you then i it has to be happiness i feel like yeah that's my answer yeah
00:23:28
that has to be because you can still have the hard work and you can still have the
00:23:34
sacrifice but you don't have the struggle that's the that is the mistake i made i thought the struggle was part of the hard work
00:23:40
and it was part of the early starts and the late finishes and it was part of sacrificing some things that's what i thought the high
00:23:45
performance podcast was about but it isn't you're totally right it's about happiness and you can still get up at five like i probably take too
00:23:52
much on and i probably get up early than i need to and i go to bed later than i need to
00:23:57
but i am so happy and that's what it has to be and it can't be happiness at the
00:24:02
detriment of others happiness yeah it has to be being happy content with yourself and spreading that happiness and that again
00:24:09
is something that johnny wilkinson spoke about which for me has been one of the biggest revelations being absolutely present
00:24:16
absolutely totally present so when i'm here with you my phone is down on the floor and it's
00:24:22
actually on silent but it should be off because i need to be totally present with you right now because what's happened is gone what's
00:24:29
yet to happen which is me going off to do a game at bt sport is a story i can write that in my head if i like but i'm probably going to get
00:24:34
it wrong because it hasn't happened yet exactly the way the day's going to go so i need to like look you in the eye right now and i can now promise you that
00:24:41
on this podcast i am absolutely here with you and it might be in half an hour i leave but
00:24:46
that's cool because when then we're done and i'm then traveling and then i'm totally present and i'm
00:24:52
into that that is a really important thing that has again been a mindset change for
00:24:58
me on the high performance podcast and maybe now i sit and talk to you maybe this whole thing is like a totally selfish
00:25:03
exercise for me because i must have said four or five times that this podcast has rewritten the way that i see the world
00:25:10
and the way that i operate and i think maybe maybe i want this podcast to be messages to my kids like i talk
00:25:17
already about my anxiety probably another of my anxieties is how much longer am i going to be on the earth you never know what's around the
00:25:23
corner i love the fact that if it all ended for me as a walk out onto shoreditch high street today and a car comes along
00:25:30
what can my wife say to my kids that oh i don't know my dad very well listen to these 25 episodes listen to these 30
00:25:36
episodes of the high performance podcast there's your dad that's him you walk out here today then
00:25:41
yeah touch glass um and bus comes boom yeah it's over what are the things you
00:25:49
you in you would regret not having done more of uh traveling with the kids probably but
00:25:57
they're only little they're only young it's such a hard question for me because
00:26:02
i think i think probably um maintaining relationships with people has always been an issue for me
00:26:09
because i i failed my a-levels as you know at school so all my mates went off to uni so that was kind of lost because
00:26:15
they went off having fun and i redid them and then i've always found that one of the issues
00:26:20
with trying to really be present is that you're totally present in that part of your world at that moment and so i was then totally plugged into
00:26:26
life on children's bbc and then i got this amazing opportunity at formula one and i was totally plugged
00:26:31
into my life in formula one and then i got you know a big opportunity at bt sport and i had to
00:26:36
make that work so then i was totally plugged into my new producers and my my new colleagues and you know i
00:26:42
had a conversation with someone the other day and they said you know like who you who are your real friends
00:26:49
it's a hard question that for me once i moved beyond my wife because i've got four or five mates who
00:26:56
i'm close with but they're i would probably name people that live on my street well i've
00:27:02
only lived there for four years i might name a couple of parents on the school run my kids have only gone to that school for four years
00:27:08
i'd name a couple of people i've run my production company whisper with but that's only been going less than a
00:27:15
decade i'd now probably class damian hughes and i do the high performance podcast with
00:27:21
well i've done that for less than a year but i'm in this and maybe that is
00:27:27
possibly the only regret i think but maybe i don't need i don't know maybe we don't need to hold
00:27:32
on to people for too long maybe we have to accept that people come and go from our lives and that's okay
00:27:38
and do you think it's because you you haven't sort of perhaps you said like you haven't prioritized investing in those relationships as much
00:27:45
i think it's because i'm always too invested in the thing that i'm doing at that moment
00:27:50
like i am so absolutely committed to whisper coral eyewear the high
00:27:57
performance podcast bt sport my kids my wife and my family
00:28:05
there isn't an awful lot left right i guess the question the better question to ask would be then but you're are you happy
00:28:11
because that if that is the ultimate goal then you know society will tell you to live have loads of friends and do this
00:28:17
and have this car and whatever but then the question the most important is be happy happiest i've ever been
00:28:23
i've been the happiest i've ever been yeah so you've got to be doing something right right yeah i think yeah i mean i i love what i do
00:28:30
like i really like work i like getting up early i like having five or six things on the
00:28:37
burn all the time i like having a whole page of jobs that i'm gonna do other people are not like that my wife
00:28:43
is the opposite she's got four or five jobs she's like oh man i feel so stressed i got i don't want all this stuff whereas
00:28:50
sometimes i sit there and i'm not making a list of big things on the horizon and i'm i need
00:28:56
to have a lot of them and again maybe i give a c to everything and i'd be better to have fewer things and give them more than an
00:29:01
a matthew mcconaughey tells a great story about cutting off two of his big businesses because he was giving a b
00:29:07
to five things and he wanted to be an a in three things the guests you've had on
00:29:12
your podcast all these wonderful people you've met do you sometimes get the impression that some of them aren't
00:29:19
that happy yes yeah um it's one of the things i've
00:29:24
learned from doing this as well yeah it's really interesting and and i totally get that everyone is
00:29:30
everyone is in it for different reasons aren't they like we spoke to sean wayne who and i
00:29:36
would say you know sean wayne is not a household name he's one of the most successful rugby league managers in the uk
00:29:42
but if someone wanted to get into the high performance podcast and they wanted like a first podcast to listen to
00:29:47
don't just go for the big names i'm telling you now sean wayne gave us the most moving and
00:29:54
revelatory interview and he in his sort of broad northern accent
00:30:01
he said you don't i'm not bothered about being happy he said i'm not not happy i don't care about happy and that
00:30:07
was not you know happiness was not his thing he's con as soon as he achieved something within moments it's about the next thing
00:30:14
and we sort of broke it down that he was very badly abused by his dad as a kid you know physically punched in the face by a big man often
00:30:23
and that his entire life his entire energy comes from wanting to redress the
00:30:28
balance and he's now a rugby league coach the the england rugby league coach because he
00:30:33
he has this deep-seated desire to make the lives of other people better now he might personally never be happy
00:30:40
after the story that and the path that he's been through but he's definitely making other people
00:30:46
happy and he is also totally comfortable with not being happy
00:30:51
now that's not everyone's story that's his story um but i certainly think that
00:31:00
we like in the past we've thought that success and happiness are mutually exclusive what do you want to be here
00:31:05
and be successful you can be happy how wrong are we to think like that the
00:31:11
very flame of success should be happiness
00:31:16
that should be the absolute nub the crux of everything what's the point otherwise man what is the point i i get that a lot
00:31:24
with guests that i've had on they seem to some guests seem to be very neurotically obsessed with
00:31:30
the next thing and the next thing and the next thing in the next thing and when you ask them to pause and reflect on hey when this ends or
00:31:36
um or why they're doing it it always seems to flick back to their childhood eddie ham was the was the same um i know
00:31:42
he's been on yours he was on mine last week and he uh when i was talking to him about his aspirations for the future
00:31:47
with matroom he says i want to sell for five billion and we'll do this and we're gonna there and i said why do you wanna sell for five billion you're happy now he goes
00:31:53
he goes well you know we should be doing we could we should be selling five billion that's why i want to do it but why does that matter and he goes and
00:31:59
he goes back to his dad when he's younger he goes back to the fact that his dad used to criticize him and didn't give him praise and it's
00:32:05
and it's weird that those early moments have driven so and it's the same with me
00:32:11
to be honest they drove this like obsessive desire to just keep climbing a never-ending mountain
00:32:17
and that's the trend that i've seen in very successful guests and very successful people is often some kind of
00:32:25
it's a strange thing to say but something that went not to plan yeah when they're younger seems to be
00:32:30
the reason that we all adore them admire them it's something that had hit them in their emotions or their wiring that
00:32:36
sent them into an obsessive state in in never as good as you think it would be though you know when you get
00:32:41
when you achieve those things that you want to achieve like the the biggest thrill i've ever had was
00:32:46
when i spent 9 750 pounds on a green mgf it's my first ever car
00:32:52
i could still remember the number plate njn and i looked at that car i bought it from an elderly gentleman in
00:32:59
colchester and i went to his house and i said i've got a banker's draft and i was working on children's bbc
00:33:05
he took me out to his garage and you know those old like um fluorescent light strips they flicker
00:33:12
come on i remember it's still on my head as vivid as the day it happened the light flicking and just lighting the car up for a
00:33:18
second and then it goes and i looked at it and i was like i cannot believe now fast forward to
00:33:25
where i am now you know a successful tv presenter invested in coral eyewear run a podcast
00:33:33
um have two beautiful children um who have a production company the kids
00:33:40
and my personal relationships are aside from this because that is that is on a deeper level than anything else but in terms of material successes
00:33:47
nothing and i mean nothing man nothing has come close to spending less than 10 grand
00:33:53
on a green mgf so you've got to enjoy the journey you've got to enjoy the travel because a
00:33:58
it's not as good when you get there as you think it will be b you spend an awful lot more time getting
00:34:03
there than arriving like you have to answer this totally honestly
00:34:08
you have you've totally left social change now yeah with money in the bank yeah that you
00:34:14
wouldn't have had if you hadn't walked away from that business right yeah what is more thrilling to you to
00:34:19
look at your bank account now and see the number in the bank account or to know the journey you went on the social chain
00:34:25
oh yeah of course i mean the bank could be double triple quadruple
00:34:30
ten times it wouldn't matter now if i said to you if i came to you in manchester when you went to nab frozen pizza just to feed yourself and i
00:34:36
said listen dude you can either absolutely work your nuts off for the next 10 years
00:34:42
like build a business hang out with people develop some good relationships or i'll just bang 100 mill in your bank
00:34:47
account today there you go yeah and now here you are you've got 100 mil and the thrill came from
00:34:52
the journey there's something like i'm always conscious of my own like hindsight bias
00:34:57
because it seems to be the case that every broke person um goes on the journey to
00:35:03
get rich you know that ends up being successful they get the money they go it doesn't matter but it's a wonderful thing to say when you have you right like
00:35:10
part of the reason it doesn't matter is because there's so much of it now it really mattered when i was stealing those pizzas right and when i was like
00:35:15
going behind the sofas in this pub looking for the pound coins and i found 13 pound coins so i went back the next day and like it really really mattered in fact
00:35:21
it was all that mattered you know in that moment so i'm super conscious of that bias that we have because
00:35:27
um and you should be by the way and we we are the same on high performance when i say or you
00:35:33
know you need to have the bad times to appreciate the good times and um the the the traumas and the difficult
00:35:39
things will will equip you for the rest of your life i honestly know that there are people that would
00:35:45
listen and go hold on a minute middle class white guy from a lovely village in
00:35:50
norfolk yeah you've had a few issues with mental health and bullying and that as you know the death of my
00:35:56
grandma which was quite tragic and things like that you haven't really struggled yeah so then i think it's
00:36:03
important that we uh we've done an interview that we haven't put out yet for the podcast with ceo khaleesi
00:36:08
first ever black spring box captain and he tells us a story in the podcast about not being able
00:36:15
to sleep at night because his stomach hurts so much because he was so hungry so his grandmother gave him sugar water just to get him to
00:36:22
school so he could have a day at school and she died in his arms at eight years old when he sits on the podcast
00:36:28
and says he will go through some really dark and difficult horrendous times you know he grew up
00:36:34
in the most deepest poverty you could imagine in south africa when he sits there and goes
00:36:40
you can get through it and you can use it as a flame and a fire that is i think when you listen um
00:36:47
it's um i i have to say i also completely agree that uh you know the things that have mattered
00:36:52
most to me professionally especially as i reflect have been doing as you say doing work i love but then like doing it with people i love
00:36:59
um and a mission that's worthwhile and there's just always people talk about this topic of burnout a lot um
00:37:05
and i tend to believe and i'd like to get your opinion on this i tend to believe that your burnout is somewhat inevitable if
00:37:12
you're doing things that you don't intrinsically love doing especially if you're doing it with people you don't
00:37:17
you know really really love as well and i feel like in any facet of your life if you're doing it too much you don't enjoy it the outcome
00:37:24
is burn out um but is burn out a topic that's been sort of prevalent on your podcast no you know it
00:37:31
i suppose partly the reason why burnout hasn't come up very often is because we're talking to people who are in the midst
00:37:37
of their successes or who have been successful and they love what they're doing and they love what they're doing they're full of passion whereas
00:37:43
people who have perhaps tried to do something that wasn't quite right and have suffered burnout and it hasn't worked
00:37:48
we we don't know about them because the burnout ended the dream but it's so funny that's such a good point
00:37:54
that the fact that your pod you haven't had that come up as a topic on a podcast that speaks to people who have clearly been intrinsically
00:38:00
driven by their passion to the very top of their game passion is everything you know you say you spoke to eddie hearn what's his
00:38:06
what's his podcast no passion no point i mean he is a great advocate of finding something that you believe in
00:38:11
but i also get that again you had a real passion for what you do like i honestly
00:38:17
like i have a such a deep love and a passion for all the things that i'm involved in because if i didn't
00:38:24
then i wouldn't do them or i'd try and find something else but there were times in my life where i've done certain things like i don't
00:38:30
as a tv presenter you often get asked to do like corporates you know standing up at awards and things like that and you
00:38:35
you need to welcome people on stage and shake your hands have a photo and i i find them a real struggle i don't know
00:38:42
why i just don't get a thrill out of doing those things so that's a good thing for me because i
00:38:48
i've noticed that's something i don't like and that for people that are listening to this thinking you know what what's my passion like what am i one of
00:38:54
one of the really good ways of finding you is to look at all the things that is not you
00:38:59
who are the people that don't make you feel good what are the days when you feel drained and exhausted what are the the
00:39:05
trips or the phone calls or the conversations or the lunches where you leave thinking every time i see that person i feel like
00:39:11
this if you can see the see the stuff that isn't good for you and strip that stuff away you will
00:39:17
eventually and it might take a while be left with who you are and that's the time to really then think right
00:39:23
what am i about what am i as a person because i don't think you you can obviously get
00:39:28
tired and you can be in and you can have problems but i think with real passion i don't think you suffer burnout
00:39:35
because every day i seem to get this like so you've not got kids yet right but when you do you have argument you have a
00:39:42
beautiful feet remember when my daughter was born i love her with every piece of my heart right i had this real
00:39:48
fear that when my son was born where's the love going to come from yeah no you do there's a feed that is
00:39:55
it's a quite common thing for parents like my daughter had every single bit of love in my body so my wife
00:40:02
obviously would we're really super close but love for your child is so different it feels very different from the moment
00:40:07
that child is born and i could not have loved my daughter not one percent more so then my son is
00:40:14
about to be born my daughter's gone off to the grandparents and i'm watching my wife in labour thinking i've got nothing left for for sebastian
00:40:22
what's this about sebastian's born and within two seconds i love him equally so there's no
00:40:30
diminishing of the love for my daughter not one bit but all this new love has just appeared
00:40:36
out of nowhere and i could love my son exactly the same how is that possible and it is exactly
00:40:42
the same when you have a real passion or a real love for something like every day that i get up and i'm making
00:40:48
phone calls or i'm having conversations or i'm you know brainstorming or blue sky thinking or thinking about guests or
00:40:53
heading to do live television it's all filler it's filled up again i'm full i'm ready to go
00:40:59
you know i don't feel like i'm like the cup is draining slowly because i love the stuff that i'm doing
00:41:05
and that's a great point because i think people tend to believe that passion is a singular thing yeah and then they're searching for it aimlessly
00:41:11
like it's an easter egg hidden somewhere yeah and that you can drain you can't drain your passion yeah you can have multiple
00:41:16
passions yeah and you know you've met a ton of you know high-profile people on your you
00:41:23
know from your from your presenting career but also from your podcast i'm sure you've come across a bunch of [ __ ] as well
00:41:30
yes i'm not gonna ask you to i'm not gonna ask you to name them holly tucker on her podcast came out with her you
00:41:37
know what it's like she created not on the highstreet.com she said i'd rather have a hole than an [ __ ] in other words
00:41:44
i would rather hang out with no one than hang out with someone that i don't like which i which i thought was uh which i thought
00:41:50
was a good one but then matthew mcconaughey said do you want an [ __ ] or an idiot give
00:41:56
me the [ __ ] because at least you know where you stand really yeah so he was like at least and
00:42:02
i i do relate to that somewhat the people that i really struggle with in my life are the people who
00:42:07
one day you see them and they're like your best mate the next day it's like you've never met them before i do struggle with that i i like to know
00:42:13
where i stand with people i'm cool if you want if you and me want to have like a distant professional relationship
00:42:18
and you'll send me a text saying happy new year i hope the podcast goes well maybe hook up sometime in 2021
00:42:24
and we never see each other socially and you come back on high performance i come back on here and we use to and throw a bit professionally
00:42:30
that's absolutely that is cool what i don't want is
00:42:36
hey let's have a coffee do you let's meet up in london yeah great oh man it's so nice to see you so how's things how's life we chat a bit more have you got a
00:42:42
partner how's your dog as your life and then you hear nothing for six months and you think whatever happened to that dude
00:42:48
and then they reappear again i'm so sorry for not texting you back there's the truth i feel like you're
00:42:53
shouting um there's the there's the difficult thing for me not knowing where i stand with people i you
00:42:58
know i don't want to be everyone's best friend but i do want meaningful relationships with people and they can be meaningful
00:43:04
from a distance or super intense on that point of arseholes as well i think um what made you what made you ask
00:43:11
that i just i just one of the things i i could you know what it is i remembered one day
00:43:17
you meet a lot of people and when you do this podcasting thing and you you have an initial perception of how they're going to be
00:43:22
and then you meet them and sometimes you know sometimes they're souls i actually don't think i've had anyone on the podcast that was an [ __ ] but i have
00:43:28
had experiences i remember this one day i got in this plane i think i was flying emirates or virgin or something
00:43:33
um and in front of me i saw that guy from the food guy the guy that eats all the
00:43:39
food on tv someone give me his name oh um yeah yeah yeah yeah um everyone in the podcast
00:43:45
man versus food guy yeah man versus food i mean i don't know his name yeah and i don't care about saying this
00:43:50
um and we run this huge food channel at social change so we have you know tens of millions of followers on a food channel
00:43:56
so i text the food team and i'm like oh my god he's on the plane they said i'll go up go up and ask him a question which
00:44:02
is a question we always ask us on our food channel so i went over to ask him this question he was sat in um business i sat in
00:44:09
business as well and he's just he just he looks at me and goes
00:44:14
listen give me a second okay and i'm like whoa so i walk back to my my chair and i have
00:44:21
to tell the 500 people in this like company group oh so i went up to him and this person that you all
00:44:27
absolutely love i've he's just cussed me out um and he will never know the impact he had
00:44:32
on me or the 500 people that i then told and also the you know hundreds of thousand people that i'm
00:44:37
telling right now um if you got to the point though where you're brave enough to call that sort of stuff out because i think that is the important
00:44:44
thing when he's when he does it to his face yeah for me that would be like
00:44:49
ego because you go from you yeah it would be like do you know who the [ __ ] i am or it'd be like
00:44:54
why are you saying that for me the piece was like no reaction yeah because there was no win there was no win
00:45:00
in me calling him out i wasn't going to win so the win for me was saying okay no worries and we're going back to my chair
00:45:06
and also not letting it ruin my day um but but i'm sure you the reason i asked you the question is because you have tons of
00:45:12
guests in your presenting career but also your podcast when you encounter an [ __ ] um i guess how'd you deal with it
00:45:20
you just know that you're there for a stop and not stay i think and you um does it break your heart a little bit
00:45:27
sometimes um when it's someone that you uh admired yeah i suppose so i suppose i don't
00:45:35
worry too much about it because i just think you know what you can you're just not for me and also
00:45:41
like who am i to sort of judge whether their behavior is arseholery if it's clearly a rude and unfair and unkind absolutely
00:45:49
i i now feel like i'm 42 and i'm a parent and i want my kids to operate in a world
00:45:56
where um they can be themselves and they can't be bullied or pushed around i think we're
00:46:02
i'm old enough now and i definitely wasn't like this a few years ago where i can hold my chin up and say that behavior is really not
00:46:08
acceptable would you call someone yeah you would but i wouldn't do it in an arrogant look at me i'm a being a dick
00:46:13
where i just say listen i just think that behavior isn't acceptable and have you done that um yeah
00:46:19
to someone someone i work with you in your presenting career uh yeah name
00:46:26
and address and actually do you know what you find is that often i've done it twice and
00:46:32
both times they've gone yeah i'm really sorry that is actually unacceptable i mean we we had an interesting experience because
00:46:39
my wife used to work in production so heard she was a production secretary which is not very high up the ladder of
00:46:45
people in television and i was a presenter so she would be looking after security
00:46:51
taxis tickets logistics clothing call times all the stuff that makes
00:46:58
television happen but is not the glamorous side and the number of times i would say i met this person today
00:47:04
aren't they great and she'd be like really and then we would meet those people
00:47:10
and i'd be like oh yeah i think you know my wife harriet and they were like oh right yeah hi
00:47:17
because they would be you guys love to come around sometime for some food and harry's like that's not how they were really when they
00:47:22
thought i was just sorting out their travel and that is the definition of an article yes i think it is because you just treat
00:47:28
everyone the same man and they're treating you well because you can potentially benefit them in some way
00:47:33
i don't know it's weird isn't it like why i've got a job on the television why treat me any differently because you're all connected and you can
00:47:39
that is what really annoys me we see that and i saw that in my business over the years and i i came to believe that even with me
00:47:46
leaving the business it won't break the business but i do believe that like so i believe one person leaving a business doesn't break it and you can apply this to your
00:47:52
relationships your life your friendship circle but an [ __ ] staying can me leaving
00:47:58
the business i don't actually think will be as detrimental to a couple of [ __ ] staying in the business not that there are any but
00:48:04
um i know what you mean yeah don't you think though like this is like it sounds naive and
00:48:09
churlish and a bit childish probably from a 42 year old bloke that has a
00:48:15
decent career and runs a few businesses but like i honestly think that we do have the power to make the world
00:48:22
positive and happy despite all the issues because all you have to do is worry about your immediate circle
00:48:28
and that is why i get frustrated with people who spread negativity and criticism and i just i've just got no
00:48:34
space in my life now for negativity from people because i just think if let's say that i know seven people
00:48:40
and i just say you know i'm gonna really radiate a positive energy i'm gonna lift them up i'm not gonna be critical i'm gonna do
00:48:47
everything i can to make them feel like a million dollars the only agreement is that they have to
00:48:52
do the same and you say that to those people listen i'm going to do this thing i'm going to be really super positive and i'm going
00:48:58
to do everything i can to help you and if you ever need something i'm going to be the person that comes and helps you out all i'm asking is that you do it for the
00:49:04
people in your circle be the change see how quick that would radiate yeah so my seven
00:49:09
so if i go if each of them goes to seven you know what i mean yeah no and it just feels stupid doesn't mean that's that's what karma is yeah you
00:49:16
know i don't believe in wishy-washy karma isn't like oh if i help a lady then someone's going to help me in the future but i think from a logical perspective if i help
00:49:22
everyone i encounter maybe they'll be more helpful and that can make its way back around to
00:49:27
maybe my niece you know but you know so true i just i can't see any i can't see any benefit
00:49:35
any benefit to criticism and negativity and like driving other people down someone that get feels better for driving someone
00:49:42
else further down is like for me the absolute epitome they are the worst of them do you ever get jealous
00:49:47
be completely honest uh yeah um i get jealous but i only ever get
00:49:53
jealous through comparison and that is ridiculous you know it's the nasty is it the nasty jealous where you're like
00:49:59
why have they gotten yeah probably yeah yeah but you've got but i think that is innate i think that is
00:50:04
almost there i am giving up responsibility again for someone that talks about 100 responsibility but i think that it's
00:50:11
innate in human nature to to compare and to contrast and look at someone else
00:50:16
so it's not a very long experience for me i will look at someone and i'll go but hey listen i'm so happy
00:50:24
and i've got all this i'm gonna and actually sometimes i look at life as a graph and you literally don't know where life
00:50:30
is gonna take you so let's say like the people that i now sit with in a tv
00:50:35
studio like um i sit with they say when i when i had robin van persie stephen jarrod and rio
00:50:43
ferdinand were all the pundits on bt sport there was a time where all three of those were three of the most famous
00:50:48
footballers in the country earning phenomenal sums of money competing on the world stage representing their country
00:50:56
and i was a a guy post a level failure trying to sort of find a
00:51:02
job and earning six thousand pounds a year and there was a time where they were there and i was there and our graphs over the time have done
00:51:08
whatever's happened look where i've ended up sitting next to them on a tv studio now it may well be that they go up there
00:51:14
again and something happens to me and i go down here or it might be that i do that and they do that but you never know where that graph is
00:51:19
going to go and that is what i think is that for me is one of the most exciting things about this world that we live in
00:51:25
like you are only one step away from a phone call where someone goes hey guess what and your graph goes so don't worry about
00:51:32
where other people are on that graph because it might be in five years time you're right alongside them i guess that's where that that hate a
00:51:39
lot of the hate comes from so if you take the jealousy feelings that even you have as you know one of the nicest people i know and you just you know times it by ten
00:51:47
but you know and that's the you know people feel a certain way about their lives and how their lives are going
00:51:52
that's because it's it's chucked in our faces all the time yeah what is instagram if it isn't a tool for comparison what is it
00:51:59
why are you having a great day and we i and i'm we're jealous of that i'm not jealous we're guilty of it making other
00:52:05
people jealous of what we do but we went out for uh we went for a couple of days away as a family to a
00:52:11
lovely hotel called clifton and it was lovely but the kids for some reason were just badly behaved and it
00:52:16
does happen sometimes and we had this meal it was breakfast actually and they were like it took ages for the food to come
00:52:21
and the kids were like climbing the wall and that's having to say to the waiter at least i'm really sorry but like we've been waiting for 20 minutes which is
00:52:28
fine for me and my wife but the kids yeah they need and it was a posh hotel where you're trying to said you get to
00:52:33
just stay at the table sit and sit nicely don't make too much noise and then at the end of it i was
00:52:38
stressful man and i said hey i'll tell you what the family will want to know where we are so i'll get my phone out and i go kids kids just
00:52:44
smile and we take a photo and we put it we have a family what's up group with harriet's mum and dad my mum and dad all
00:52:50
the cousins all the aunts and uncles right we're all smiling everything looks great just had a lovely breakfast at the hotel
00:52:56
i said and then then we get loads of messages back like from people like my sisters are going oh you're
00:53:01
your life always looks perfect and my brother going oh another great day for you and i think actually yes like i've just
00:53:07
given them an absolute falsification of what my sunday morning cleveland house was like that was a stressful hour and i've taken
00:53:14
the one thing that wasn't stressful why have i put that in the group why haven't i just gone hey guys hope you're having a good sunday call we've just had
00:53:20
a [ __ ] half an hour here having some breakfast but hey don't we all that's and that's what we all do all the
00:53:26
time why else do all the people you follow on instagram put the things they put out there i i've
00:53:31
you know i think the world has somewhat flipped is flipping back the other way in the sense that when we
00:53:36
all started instagram it was this new thing you had these filters and it was like a show the best holiday you've ever had in your
00:53:42
life to the world that was kind of the that's the thing you'd get the rewards for and that represents
00:53:48
in terms of being able to relate to that or it's like 0.00 of the viewer's life like most of
00:53:54
our lives the 99 of our lives as i've said in this podcast before is like eating the pot noodle in bed and now i see that the win with personal
00:54:00
branding and building um an instagram page is the antithesis of showing that it's like
00:54:05
i've just woken up with my face covered in spots in fact the last you know two podcasts ago we had christian here who's like a superstar
00:54:13
influencer entrepreneur and i was trying to understand why her community are so engaged with her so engaged with
00:54:20
her versus even like even compared to mine or other people's and it's because she wakes up in the morning she goes
00:54:26
my face is covered in spots oh my god i'm not gonna put the filter on today and you see the spots on her face and
00:54:31
stuff like that and then she'll cry on her instagram story because her you know her best friend lost her mother and
00:54:38
you really can resonate with that you can and also the amount of supply
00:54:43
on social media of that realness is low demand is super high because it
00:54:48
represents the 99 of our lives supply is super low and uh and people joe wicks is the same he he will
00:54:56
he will tell you everything i feel like [ __ ] today you know and people just and that's the thing i think you can
00:55:01
form a bond with a real deep bond so even as i reflect on my instagram now
00:55:07
i said to my team earlier this week i'm like i need to like go on my instagram story more and do a lot of the stuff that i do on
00:55:12
the podcast which is just like telling you the [ __ ] stuff too yeah um and so i i say this yeah if you want
00:55:19
to build a personal brand i'm like you know you really need to get comfortable with that make you happy though let's go back
00:55:24
to where we began would you make me happy yeah because i know that it would not make me happy i my
00:55:31
instagram isn't a lie it is real but it's real with the things
00:55:36
that i choose to share basically yeah do you know what i mean by the way i have no lunch can i knock yourself down it's actually yeah
00:55:42
this one actually worked this month so it's um what is it this one this is not had one present for you though when
00:55:47
i saw that you've got huels yeah it's just great i was panicking i'd undone it and i was going to flip fuel
00:55:52
all over your lovely rug in here doesn't matter that that would be a cool piece of promo um nutritionally complete
00:55:58
drink yeah yeah yeah i think it's great man so i've eaten nothing today what's the time it's vegan 20 past one so this is perfect for
00:56:04
me now this is my lunch and my breakfast try let me know what you think
00:56:10
this is my favorite flavor of all that's good and if you have this all day
00:56:17
um which i don't know if that's to be recommended but all of your sort of essential minerals
00:56:22
are in there vitamins high in protein so it's 20 grams of protein at the same time slow releasing
00:56:27
carbs spill a bit on your really lovely glass table it's fine don't mind low sugar gluten free yeah it's great
00:56:34
that's nice it's lovely yeah and i drink it because um because i skip meals
00:56:40
that's how i first well i'm trying to intermittently fast because i've seen um other people's six packs on social
00:56:45
media and they make me feel at me okay they make me feel like i just need to
00:56:50
you know right why do you feel the need to share more of yourself on instagram like so yeah so what's the benefit the
00:56:57
benefit is if i share more of my truth all the the tough stuff which is pretty much why i started the
00:57:03
podcast in the first place i feel that i'm helping a lot of people and do i enjoy helping people and
00:57:09
getting um and helping them overcome their problems yes yeah i mean you do that already on this
00:57:15
podcast yeah but i don't do it on instagram and i i think that do i want to have a deeper connection with my audience on
00:57:21
instagram yes what am i doing on instagram predominantly just posting quotes to be honest so if i want to have a deeper connection
00:57:26
with my audience on instagram then i should go deeper with them yeah as i do on this podcast because the podcast audience are like a cult
00:57:33
you know they're super engaged because of the depth and the realness so i think it would make me happy in the
00:57:38
long run there must be a reason i don't do it that's a good point this i mean it's been a huge revelation for me doing a
00:57:44
podcast because when you're a football presenter you don't get nice messages
00:57:51
on instagram you don't get like an engaged core saying this resonated with me that resonated
00:57:56
with me partly because you're not the story you're there to facilitate former pros to be the superstars i mean i liken my
00:58:03
job on the football to like being a referee like if i'm not seen that's probably a good thing i make them look good i make
00:58:08
them feel good and people let's be totally frank tune in to watch the game more people will tune in for man united
00:58:16
the more tuning for norwich city more people won't tune in for me because i'm just
00:58:23
the facilitator whereas with the podcast the nicest thing has been this genuine
00:58:28
conversation connection like creation of a proper community and that's that's been
00:58:36
a totally new thing to me i thought i knew everything that was to know about broadcasting and you know with a million followers on
00:58:42
twitter and an instagram account and running a tv production company and being a tv presenter like i knew what it
00:58:48
was about i knew how to connect to people i've never known anything like it never seen feedback like it never had fulfillment like it
00:58:56
it's amazing is there something crazy about podcasting though versus all other channels and i think it's that depth
00:59:01
the messages you get if i post something on instagram i'll get a oh i can totally relate the podcast you
00:59:08
get a like essay about you know they return with their story
00:59:13
yeah and it's like depth begets depth yeah yeah yeah i totally see what you're saying
00:59:19
and i and it's um it stops it from like because when i
00:59:24
first started the high performance podcast i wanted it just to be me opening up amazing people to benefit
00:59:31
other people and i will now admit part of the thrill of that podcast is seeing the response and seeing
00:59:37
seeing the reaction and i'm i'm not foolish enough to think that isn't my ego at work it absolutely is my ego that
00:59:42
likes it but it is like it's amazing when you see hi i listened to your podcast and i
00:59:48
changed jobs after wanting to do it for 20 years hi i listened to your podcast and i've quit doing something that's
00:59:53
been bad for me for my whole life i've reached out to create relationships with people that are allowed to die
00:59:59
from listening to our podcast bloody hell what's the most emotional moment you've
01:00:05
had with a guest that you can recall on the podcast is there a particular
01:00:10
moment that you know yeah who there's quite a few times that i've kind
01:00:16
of um that i've sort of edged towards tears and i think you know someone i've
01:00:22
already mentioned sean wayne you know when um when someone talks to you about
01:00:28
that sort of the devastation of being physically abused by a parent and
01:00:35
they've got i suppose what was emotional for me was the was the learning during the interview with sean and i
01:00:41
knew very little about him before we spoke the learning that all of the good stuff
01:00:47
he's done you know he talks about if he's got an issue with one of his players he doesn't just have to chat with him after training he turns up at
01:00:52
their house in the evening he says what's the deal man how can i help how can i solve this um
01:00:58
and he is now a parent himself and a really loving and caring parent to have the start in life that sean had
01:01:04
and to for your whole life to be about helping other people that was like
01:01:09
that that was a that was a hugely moving conversation with him yeah i think all of all of the guests
01:01:15
i've had that have um moved me in the same way is almost identical it's nice isn't it i
01:01:21
don't know whether you're like this with podcasts but i love that we have footballers on and don't talk about football
01:01:27
we have rugby players and i don't really talk about rugby um we just talk about it
01:01:33
my podcast is a podcast about life exactly like this one is and we were talking before we started recording today about the
01:01:40
the desire to try and avoid the typical talking points with guests and i think this is maybe just a general a general point for people that are
01:01:46
trying to start a podcast you know um there are so many podcasts out there yeah and
01:01:52
in order to what would your tips be then for someone who's considering starting a podcast from what you've learned in your
01:01:57
30 or you know you've you've recorded a total of 50 so far but yeah we've done that live
01:02:02
what tips what did you give to someone who's thinking of starting their own first of all go for it because i honestly what i honestly
01:02:10
was this close to not doing it the great thing about podcasts that you that i didn't have in my life was
01:02:15
ownership so i'd spent my career working for children's bbc working for
01:02:21
formula one and the bbc working for the premier league on bt sport and i sat down with someone they said
01:02:26
like how's your career and i said yes great i'm really happy i love doing the football i love being with the players
01:02:32
and everything and they said what if you've got a phone call tomorrow to say that that had ended what would you be left with
01:02:39
and i was like um today i have to go and find another job they said so what do you own of all
01:02:44
these years of graft and hard work like what's yours and the answer was nothing and then the next question they
01:02:50
you know they obviously knew what they were talking about i said what do you really want to do and i said well i don't really care
01:02:57
if liverpool beat man united or norwich city be ipswich not really but i
01:03:04
love like the effort and the graphs and i love sitting with the pundits i love the way that
01:03:09
rio ferdinand and steven gerrard watch a game of football i love how they turn up looking smart or they bring their own food in little
01:03:14
plastic containers still or the day that i first met lewis hamilton and he walked in the room and he like
01:03:20
took off his watch and he didn't just chuck his watch on the side he got it and he closed up the clasp
01:03:25
and he put it down and he moved it and he goes bracelet off and he went
01:03:31
[Music] i just looked at i thought ah that desire for perfection that elite mindset
01:03:38
mentality i said to them that's what i want i want to speak to elite performers and elite thinkers
01:03:44
because i think that everyone can benefit from that everyone can think and operate and perform better because
01:03:49
there's no tricks there's no secrets like you just need to have the passion and go out and do it
01:03:55
and they said well then that's what you should do a podcast so that was it right great i'm doing a podcast and then i mentioned it to a couple of
01:04:01
people and they went why you can't do a podcast i was like why because everyone does podcasts like there's literally so many
01:04:08
podcasts you can't you're not gonna make a splash there's thousands of podcasts and then i rang an old friend of mine
01:04:14
from children's bbc and she is i don't really even ever told her this but she's the reason i do the podcast
01:04:19
fern cotton who does happy place i said hey i think i'm doing a podcast now she is
01:04:26
such a nice person she is not the sort of person to go oh hold on a rival podcast yeah she'd never even
01:04:32
consider she would oh my god you'd be great at doing a podcast like she spoke about what it was about
01:04:37
and i said but my issue is i just think that like there's loads of them out there and then she was the one that said look
01:04:43
we worked together at children's bbc yeah television had been invented for 50 years there must have been
01:04:48
hundreds of channels thousands of programmes did you think i'm not going to work in telly because there's already loads of tv programs no course you
01:04:55
didn't you just thought well i'm gonna work in telly and make my mark she said you need to do exactly the same thing with your podcast
01:05:01
um so the first thing you is you have to do your podcast you have to go out and do it but the second and that's the biggest
01:05:07
challenge though isn't it starting it's just in every facet of life yeah entrepreneurs contact me and i'm like the biggest risk you face
01:05:14
of all the things that might yeah i think you can do a podcast risk-free though you know you can spend a very minimal sum of money if any money at all
01:05:20
on on the equipment 100 but then you can you can so cheap yeah no you could start
01:05:26
you could do a great podcast in terms of sound quality with less than 100 pounds yeah the risk
01:05:32
though is overthinking it to the point of procrastination to the point of select
01:05:39
paralyzing yourself i think in all facets of life business my dm's are full of people that are like
01:05:45
steve i want to start a business i have an idea i want to start a podcast or this project but there's just this one problem which
01:05:51
is preventing me starting and i always say the biggest risk of the success of your business the number one thing that's going to stop
01:05:57
you becoming a billionaire honestly is the probability that you'll just never start and also
01:06:03
that you'll think you need all of the answers to all of the questions you have before you start yeah well i don't know this i don't have the
01:06:09
funding i don't like when i started my business i was 18 didn't know the word entrepreneur no money went on google and typed in
01:06:16
like how to build a website spent three months googling it but that was me starting you know um and i think it's the same
01:06:24
with podcasting i'm like my first episode was dog [ __ ] i was downstairs inside
01:06:29
what is it when telly would say the first is the worst you know that's the way it is that's the way it has to be but the point is
01:06:35
you got going you started and i think you need to begin and then you need to be consistent and
01:06:40
you need to keep going and don't expect instant success and instant gratification but i think the other thing for it like i get a lot of
01:06:47
i get a lot of people sending me letters saying i want to be on the television
01:06:52
and i always reply in the positive because i always say well someone has to be doing my job
01:06:58
in 20 years time when i'm 62 i will not be presenting the premier league on bt sport i just won't be someone has to be could
01:07:05
be you why not make it you make the decision now that it's going to be you that's the next well-known sports tv broadcaster and
01:07:11
then i remind them that when i started out in 1998 99 to be on the telly to be a
01:07:18
broadcaster you actually needed a job that was not very easy to go and get now
01:07:23
you can pick up your phone and you're a broadcaster you can have a youtube channel you can have an instagram handle
01:07:29
you can have a twitter page you can have a podcast as long as you've got a passion because
01:07:34
you then funnel everything into that passion and everything feeds everything else so the instagram handle points people towards
01:07:40
the podcast the podcast is fantastic so people go and watch the podcast that you've recorded on
01:07:45
youtube and then you start to build an audience there and you make a little bit of money and it slowly starts to build
01:07:50
be consistent but have the passion have the thing that's different like i will get maybe 10 times a week hi jake
01:07:57
um i just wonder whether you would come and be on our podcast we just want to talk about you know your journey and how
01:08:03
you got to where you are now it'd be really great to have a chat and you roll your eyes and it's like man you've got to be better than that
01:08:10
everyone can go and have a conversation about your journey and the highs and the lows and the struggles
01:08:15
what's the niche what's the team yeah so tell me anything tell me what someone would have to say to you that has
01:08:20
basically no listeners or is starting out that would make you go on their podcast because like passion would be absolutely
01:08:25
definitely about their passion and i have done plenty of podcast interviews in the last year where there hasn't been a big audience
01:08:31
but i've really loved the fact that the person has come to me known a lot about me and said i really
01:08:37
want to explore this particular area with you i think just the broad brush stroke of can we just talk about your inspiration and
01:08:43
talk about your upbringing and talk about how you first got into broadcasting yeah let's like i'm a bit like this now
01:08:51
and everything i do like even when i'm broadcasting i'm not interested in canon united win the league i am much more interested
01:08:57
in um looking at one of the players marcus rashford for example and having a really proper
01:09:02
deep conversation with paul scholes and rio ferdinand like explain to me how hard it is for him to
01:09:09
concentrate on football when he's got so many people criticizing him on social media for doing the school
01:09:16
dinners or how difficult is it for him to run out of old trafford and really
01:09:21
perform at a high level when he hasn't got 80 000 people how much of a difference does it really make to have the crowd at
01:09:26
old trafford they're inspiring you and driving you on like that is a much much more of an interesting
01:09:32
conversation for me because it feels much more real yeah than just the general stuff so that would be my advice to people is
01:09:37
make it really specific make it really passion based and there's that big about like having
01:09:43
you want them to show evidence that they've done their research on you so because listen people send emails invite you
01:09:48
onto a podcast or dms whatever but most of our lives um and the success of our lives
01:09:54
as least as i can recount it in my journey has been predicated on me knowing how to ask someone for something
01:10:01
that they really didn't have a huge clear incentive to give me yeah asking in the right way so we're not just
01:10:07
talking about inviting jake onto podcasts here we're talking about how you ask for something how you knock on a door that uh you know
01:10:13
maybe is a bit above you at that point i think that often you get a lot of respect there
01:10:18
just for asking the question and i think i think the other thing is for people to remember when they're in our position
01:10:24
you've been in that position as well like you have been there and don't expect them to be perfect by the way
01:10:29
like everything that you now find easy about sitting here and recording this podcast once you didn't find easy
01:10:35
yeah you found it a struggle that's the really important point and those people are often right at the beginning of their journey and they're
01:10:40
finding their way and why can't you give them 10 minutes even if you can't go on their podcast stephen why can't you just go do you
01:10:46
know what just give me your number i'll give you 10 minutes 10 minutes of your day is nothing could change your entire life
01:10:51
so there's a lot of people asking for 10 minutes this is the problem and if you add it up there's then we don't have much time left for anything else and i i sometimes think to myself
01:10:58
if i gave all of these people 10 minutes i wouldn't be the type of person that they'd be asking for you can't do stuff you don't have time
01:11:04
to do but you probably can do 10 minutes once in a while a couple of times a day yeah
01:11:09
the thing that annoys me a couple of times with the dm's the night once in a while yeah once a couple times a day yeah
01:11:15
anyway yeah do you know i'm doing it anyway for like i told you about my friend that called me with a problem like so i give him 20 minutes to solve
01:11:22
the problem with him i'm doing that all day every day and my employees all at social change now that i've left contacted me more than
01:11:27
i think they did it when i was there asking me how to solve problems with each other with the company what
01:11:33
should we be doing so yeah i still feel like i'm mentoring a lot of people don't always look for like the
01:11:38
instant value and stuff no i know that when someone rings you and goes um stephen i know i'm a social
01:11:44
chain and i know i wasn't very high up the chain at social chain but and i know you've left i [ __ ] love
01:11:49
what you did a couple of quick questions right yeah you might look at it and go do you know what i remember that person i just
01:11:54
haven't got the time i've got to get in the gym right let's say you did yeah what you've done is you've seen the value to you
01:12:00
in that moment of giving them 10 minutes of your time what about if that person then goes on and thinks
01:12:05
wow i've been so impressed by what i've done at social channel i'm going to set up my own business i'm going to do this and suddenly the snowball effect comes
01:12:11
and then in a couple of years time you get the phone call steve and i'd love you to be on the advisory board of this business i set up because i actually set
01:12:16
it up because you gave me a bit of inspiration a few years ago there's the value you never see it's invisible if you don't give them the few
01:12:22
minutes at that time i call it hand it out man invisible pr yeah you never see it in the moment you never
01:12:28
see the impact it's having but when it matters the most it will show up so for example the guy told you about from man vs food
01:12:35
we have a huge food channel and we're looking for hosts for this food channel that would potentially get paid a ton of money
01:12:40
and in that one moment he will never see he saw the value giving you 10 seconds in that moment and then with
01:12:45
no value yeah but but now he's clearly going to be excluded from the process of deciding who hosts the food channel yeah just because of that
01:12:52
10 seconds he'll never know because it's invisible pr um but what i see what does make me annoyed is i'll get messages from
01:12:58
someone and i'll say steve i swear to god i got this message i screenshotted and said it's my friends because it
01:13:03
it's synonymous of the wrong approach steve um i'd love to know uh how you did what you
01:13:09
did i've produced thousands of videos podcasts interviews
01:13:18
blogs on how i did what i did there's actually a video called like how i built a 200 million company or whatever
01:13:24
and for me when someone says that i think you don't actually want to know because
01:13:29
if you really wanted to know you would have put that into google yeah or you would have put more effort in you're being super lazy and then i said
01:13:36
to the guy i saw it you're not fine got the video where i explained how i didn't i did what i did and i sent it to him he goes uh you know
01:13:42
you should write a book i
01:13:48
maybe he just doesn't yet know what he doesn't know and if you showed him these these little
01:13:54
bits in 10 years time he'd be embarrassed and maybe if you looked at some of the early interactions you had with people
01:14:01
you'd be embarrassed about what you i know i would some of the emails i sent i've i so i have a really old hotmail account
01:14:06
that i've had literally since the beginning of time and i don't use it anymore but sometimes it's quite cathartic for me to go back into that hotmail account
01:14:13
zoop back to the very beginning we're talking about emails i was sitting in 2001. and i'm surprised man i get my tone
01:14:20
wrong and i'm a bit bulshy and i'm a bit pushy and i think this doesn't sound or
01:14:25
seem like me maybe i just think benefit of the doubt man always benefit of the doubt and i'm not
01:14:31
saying you need to bust your balls and spend two days giving this person a private seminar but definitely do i mean i think it's
01:14:37
great you replied and just reply go listen here's all the stuff that i've done but when he replies and says
01:14:43
you should write a book a he's giving you a compliment b he might be a bit nervous you know the
01:14:48
problem is so there's thousands and thousands of people like this on a weekly basis yeah so my
01:14:54
my decision as to who to help or to who to engage with is based on the message they send
01:14:59
and if someone says some people would message me go so um so what is social change come on like if
01:15:05
you just googled it yeah if you if you clicked on the word in my bio there's a description of exactly what it
01:15:11
is but people will still and for me that's laziness because if i like i can't think
01:15:17
of a point in my life where if i wanted to know whether i was 16 or 26 whether if i
01:15:22
wanted a piece of information i would have just my my attempt at getting it would have just been to
01:15:28
message the person you know the public figure whatever you say so uh how did you uh win that uh formula one
01:15:34
championship lewis i would have at least tried you know what i mean do you think there's an issue here with um
01:15:41
like with a social media now there's a complete lack of formality so like when you and i were growing up and we wanted
01:15:47
to run a business that someone had set up and sold for hundreds of millions you literally could not get to that person
01:15:52
unless it was a real graft to get there so by the time you did manage to get an email address for some ceo of some big
01:15:58
business it had been such a journey you weren't going to lose the opportunity or waste the opportunity
01:16:03
because it had taken you two or three months just to get to the point of being able to send something part of the issue now is the people who
01:16:09
want information from you literally this is how long it takes steven bartlett
01:16:15
direct message h-i-s-t-e-v hi steven um can i know about your
01:16:21
business right that's taken me 30 seconds that's how long it is so that's why
01:16:26
the quality of effort is so low because because they're just used to it that's how we now communicate with each other but then the other thing
01:16:33
is 20 years ago when you were trying to get hold of a ceo of a big business
01:16:38
there was quite a good filtration process so that by the time you got the email address of that guy or that woman at the top of that
01:16:44
business it was a journey you would have had 20 knockbacks 10 or 15 setbacks blah blah blah blah blah
01:16:51
so actually the person that got those email addresses were the grafters man and the ones that were
01:16:56
finding the route and finding the path and it shows though that the most important thing one of the
01:17:01
2020 growth hacks for your career is knowing how to ask yeah because everyone everyone has now
01:17:08
got the email or the dm but there's a real art in knowing what to say when you're in there
01:17:13
i know that people like you are getting a lot of messages every day all of the same quality but that's great
01:17:21
because it's easy to stand out if you want to say a good thing if you send me a voice note that jumps
01:17:27
up in the queue if if the voice note is um well researched as you say jumps up in the
01:17:32
queue further if you're asking here's the thing for me it's like if you're asking me for something and you're making some attempt to
01:17:39
acknowledge the fact that um that you know i don't have a lot
01:17:44
of time that also jumps up in the queue because i think you this person's a little bit more you know savvy and it's being more realistic um but yeah it
01:17:51
makes a huge difference coral yeah i want to talk about this so
01:17:56
i eyewear brand i received these lovely um sunglasses in the post and as i said to you before
01:18:03
we got on out i'd usually look a little bit weird in sunglasses but this pair of sunglasses and i'm not just saying this
01:18:10
and i actually said this behind your back as well so this is how you know it's legit right um i actually think i look quite cool
01:18:16
you do look good yeah and i would never wear sunglasses like this normally because i couldn't find
01:18:21
the right shape yeah tell me all about coral and and what this is this is your first sort of significant investment yeah it's the first time i've ever
01:18:27
invested in a business really obviously whisper group is different because i was a founder and we set that up together
01:18:32
um but i've wanted for a long time to do what i can to help people who are perhaps in a
01:18:38
position where i can have some influence on their lives so about a year ago i set up a scholarship
01:18:44
with the uea the university of east anglia in norwich it's pretty simple when people apply for
01:18:50
the film and tv course they're means tested so they have to fill in a form so we can find out their
01:18:55
family income and if the family income is below a certain level i will pay five grand a year every year
01:19:01
that they're at university so 15 grand over the time of their course to make it affordable for them to go to
01:19:06
uni so it's literally my way of finding people who wouldn't get a chance in the tv industry it's similar to the ethos we
01:19:13
have at whisper like we want to lift up people that are underrepresented and i think there's amazing tv talent out
01:19:18
there and they literally will never get the opportunity to have a tv career purely for financial means and that
01:19:25
really makes me sad so i set that up and then i had this great relationship with the uea and they introduced me to a
01:19:30
young guy called george bailey and he's a 19 year old student he's 20 now at the uea
01:19:35
and he had this idea for recycled eyewear and it is literally taking fishing that's out of the sea
01:19:40
taking plastic out of landfill and turning them into eyewear and ice and i said you know what george
01:19:46
like that's a really good idea i really like it but it will be everywhere already because it's so
01:19:51
simple because when we sort of run through the numbers there's something like nine million pairs of eyewear sold in the uk every
01:19:57
year almost all of them virgin plastic covered in lacquer full of glue full of
01:20:02
metal bad for the environment not doing any good for the planet at all
01:20:08
so i sort of heard what he said and thought this would be happening already and i was actually in london for a meeting with my agent in west london i
01:20:14
thought the perfect place for recycled sustainable eyewear brand is west london so i went into all of the high street
01:20:21
eyewear places that you could possibly imagine you know david klullo and um sunglasses
01:20:27
hut and all of these others on oxford street and bond street i was in that area and i said the same thing every time i walked in hi
01:20:32
can i see your range of recycled eyewear blank faces can i see your green range
01:20:37
your sustainable range the same nothing response and i was straight on the phone to george i said
01:20:43
listen we need to make this happen we really need to make this happen and we're not the only brand in the world
01:20:48
making eyewear from recycled material but we're the only brand who have gone
01:20:54
and got our own eyewear designer so it's original designs handmade in a factory in italy we then
01:21:00
offset all the carbons when that gets delivered to you there's not been a single hit on the planet from the carbon and
01:21:07
the plastic has been taken out of the world to create those the lenses are infinitely recycled and
01:21:12
we have a system where you send the lenses or the whole eyewear back to us and we can recycle them so it all goes again
01:21:17
so the phrase i use is planet positive it's not just like not putting pollution into the planet it's actively removing
01:21:24
plastic and turning it into something that you would otherwise have gone and purchased um and look we're a startup we're small
01:21:31
it'll be a slog and it'll be a battle but i wouldn't have got involved like everything else i've been talking to you about if i
01:21:36
didn't passionately believe that those are the answer none of us go shopping now
01:21:42
without a plastic bag in our hand already or a reusable tote bag or whatever but none of us think twice before we go
01:21:48
and buy a pair of sunglasses and coral i wear i want to be the answer the case there that's made from plastic
01:21:54
oh this case or this case yeah that's recycled plastic the cloth inside recycled plastic you'd never know would
01:22:00
you no even one of the things that really struck me as well is how high quality it all feels like it feels super luxury like the
01:22:05
the case and then well that's the thing we want we also didn't want people to think yeah i want to sort of help the environment but i'll have to look a bit
01:22:11
rubbish we actually want people to think i can still buy a really nice high-end high-quality bit
01:22:17
of eyewear you got a little note there from george yeah what's he said on this says hey there thank you so much for choosing coral and our vision to make
01:22:24
the eyewear industry kinder to our planet smiley face george that's super nice
01:22:29
yeah no i i was you know i was i was nervous because when friends send me things and then he probably sometimes i don't say yeah and i'm i'm
01:22:37
known for being really honest with my friends um and saying oh i don't really like this about it or whatever because i just think the truth sets you
01:22:42
free and that's what people really value as you said earlier it's like the the critique is often um more valuable at certain stages than
01:22:50
just total praise one word you said earlier that i has become incredibly important in my
01:22:56
mindset these days is the word consistency yeah um maybe from meeting exceptional guests
01:23:03
maybe just from understanding the root cause of my own accomplishments but um i you know i used to think that
01:23:09
intensity was was the answer but if you look at all of the success that i've had whether it's getting a million followers
01:23:14
on instagram or social channel whatever it was it was that word and i never really appreciated the importance of
01:23:20
that word up until recent i think when i was writing my book what have you learned about consistency i've learned
01:23:26
exactly as you have that consistency is the root of all good stuff because if you find
01:23:32
something that works for you you have to do it consistently like i used to say consistently relentless
01:23:39
i regret the use of the word relentless a little bit now i i do think you have to be relentless but i now change it to you have to be
01:23:45
consistently happily relentless and if you can be consistently
01:23:51
happily relentless i don't think you will go far wrong because you'll be doing a passion project which
01:23:57
is what makes you happy you will be consistently doing things and consistency is absolutely key for people to understand what you're
01:24:03
about and let's be totally frank we can sit here and be fluffy and friendly and say oh you know let's not
01:24:10
push people too hard in the modern world because it might cause issues and whatever you do have to be relentless
01:24:17
for success but it's okay to be relentless if you're being relentless and you're happy being relentless
01:24:23
so try in 2021 to be consistently happily relentless and let's see where
01:24:30
we all are in 12 months time i have one more question for you it's probably a question people don't really
01:24:36
talk about in the podcasting game but um we have struggled at times to get
01:24:43
women to come on the podcast yep um for a variety of different reasons
01:24:48
men seem much more willing than women have you found the same thing yeah we have yeah it's
01:24:54
interesting you should say that yeah we have i don't think that we have found women
01:24:59
not willing to come on the podcast i think it's only when you start doing a podcast about
01:25:06
relentless high achievement that you realize how dominated by men
01:25:13
the tops of our industries are yeah that's the problem and i you know we keep on saying right who should we get on as really great
01:25:18
inspirational female leaders and all the suggestions people keep making to us are in the sports space i keep saying no not sports women
01:25:25
because we are totally i am totally plugged into the fact that i want to celebrate
01:25:30
brilliant successful females you know i have a daughter and i want her to listen to this podcast in years to come
01:25:36
when she's old enough and go that's who i want to be that's what i want to be inspired by and i think that sometimes we like to
01:25:41
trick ourselves into thinking oh no we live in a really equal society now what are you talking about there's loads of powerful females at the top of
01:25:47
businesses when you break it down we are still in a male dominated society
01:25:54
and it's a good reminder that we need to keep on lifting up female role models and pushing them to
01:25:59
the absolute top and we are on the high performance podcast we are totally aware of that um and we will
01:26:04
continue to do what we can because actually when we get brilliant female leaders on
01:26:09
there and we just recorded with joe malone um who set up the amazing joe malone brand she now runs
01:26:15
joe loves we've recorded with holly tucker who was fantastic dame kelly holmes who was really inspirational and moving steph horton is
01:26:22
going to be on the series in the not too distant future we've had brilliant female
01:26:29
leaders on our pod but it is still a challenge compared to the amount of
01:26:35
male leaders lining up going i'll definitely come on there and talk and there is something else that maybe
01:26:40
we need to address in the next 12 months black women at the top of business mate
01:26:45
where are they why what is happening that is not allowing them to shine as they should
01:26:52
and that's one thing and i just say one thing that really is pissing me off massively at the moment is when people talk about the
01:26:58
over-representation of black and mixed-race or female role models in society
01:27:03
and they say oh everywhere you turn now you know that's all this and i drive this home to the whole time i say listen you've got this completely wrong
01:27:10
the reason why we now have to promote and push and celebrate and shout about black men and black women
01:27:18
and women in general and underrepresented areas of society is that if you are a
01:27:24
little kid growing up in norwich or manchester or birmingham or
01:27:29
los angeles you have to see those people there to believe that you can get there as well
01:27:34
there's no good saying oh yeah they'll eventually make it through we have to show them now that you can no matter who you are no
01:27:39
matter what the color of your skin no matter what your gender no matter what your background no matter how affluent you are
01:27:45
you can get there and that's why we have to push them to the forefront now to inspire the next generation because
01:27:51
once they're there they'll stay there and it'll be a much better more equal society for everyone we've both got a big responsibility yeah
01:27:58
with our platforms yeah and it and we should we absolutely should listen thank you for your time no one
01:28:03
was incredibly busy it's always nice to sit down yeah thanks for lunch no it's always
01:28:09
fascinating and i i you know you're discovering um incredible stories through your own podcast high performance and
01:28:15
it's uh it's really powerful to kind of compare notes sometimes with with people uh
01:28:20
because yeah my one of the things i've learned from doing the podcast which i'm sure you have as well is that the themes that have made people
01:28:27
successful and giving them that high performance mindset are actually quite consistent yeah yeah yeah i think when i
01:28:32
started my podcast i was expecting to find 50 different ways you know to become
01:28:38
successful but it all seems to be distillable down to these simple themes like you know consistency and discipline and
01:28:44
passion and then for me anyway much of the root cause of that consistency or that obsession with
01:28:49
that passion has come from often in many circumstances something that might not have gone
01:28:55
right yeah on the playground or some insecurity they had or something their dad or mum said to them
01:29:00
um and that for me is fascinating but yeah thank you again for your time it's pleasure and um it just reminded me that we're all on a
01:29:06
journey right and i said to harriet when i was coming on here today i said oh i'm going back on diary of a ceo with steven
01:29:13
and she said again what are you going to talk about because you only went on there a few months ago and you know when i now sit here and
01:29:18
talk to you i'm a different person to the one that you spoke with before i began doing my podcast before i began doing my
01:29:25
stuff with coral airway even in the last year i feel like i'm sitting here as a different person
01:29:31
and i didn't realize that you could learn and change and develop and adapt quite so much quite so late so man look
01:29:38
joe biden took him until he was 77 until he nailed it as the president you know sometimes you have to wait a
01:29:44
long time in life for your dream job or your dream opportunity what has changed since we last spoke for you in terms of who you are just a much
01:29:50
deeper understanding of how other people operate i hadn't
01:29:55
i've spent my life hadn't like on my own journey me as a presenter me learning me setting up a business
01:30:01
what am i gonna do the high performance podcast was the first time i'd ever sat down and just said from the outside this is
01:30:07
what i think you're doing can you just explain it please what a growth period it's been for me personally
01:30:14
absolutely unbelievable and therapy at the same time right yeah it's therapeutic absolutely um
01:30:34
[Music]
01:30:41
foreign

Badges

This episode stands out for the following:

  • 70
    Most inspiring
  • 70
    Best overall
  • 70
    Best concept / idea
  • 60
    Most emotional

Episode Highlights

  • Matthew McConaughey's Key Lesson
    Jake shares a pivotal lesson from Matthew McConaughey: 'Don't leave crumbs' when making decisions.
    “Don't leave crumbs.”
    @ 01m 29s
    December 07, 2020
  • Embracing Failure
    Jake discusses how successful people make more mistakes and the importance of failing forward.
    “I want to fail forwards and I want to fail often.”
    @ 08m 39s
    December 07, 2020
  • Johnny Wilkinson's Insight
    Winning the rugby world cup holds no more value than everyday tasks like washing up.
    “Winning the rugby world cup is no more important than doing the washing up.”
    @ 19m 50s
    December 07, 2020
  • Redefining Success
    Success should be defined by happiness, not just hard work and struggle.
    “The struggle was part of the hard work, but it isn't anymore.”
    @ 23m 34s
    December 07, 2020
  • Enjoying the Journey
    The journey is more important than the destination; enjoy the process of getting there.
    “You've got to enjoy the journey; it's not as good when you get there as you think it will be.”
    @ 33m 53s
    December 07, 2020
  • Choosing Your Circle
    A discussion on the importance of surrounding oneself with positive people and avoiding negativity.
    “I'd rather have a hole than an [ __ ] — at least you know where you stand.”
    @ 41m 37s
    December 07, 2020
  • Spreading Positivity
    The speaker discusses the impact of positivity and how it can radiate through one's circle.
    “If I help everyone I encounter, maybe they'll be more helpful.”
    @ 49m 22s
    December 07, 2020
  • The Unpredictability of Life
    Life can change in an instant, and opportunities can arise unexpectedly.
    “You are only one step away from a phone call where someone goes, 'Hey, guess what!'”
    @ 51m 25s
    December 07, 2020
  • The Power of Connection
    Connecting with elite performers can inspire everyone to operate at their best.
    “I want to speak to elite performers and elite thinkers.”
    @ 01h 03m 38s
    December 07, 2020
  • The Value of Time
    Giving just 10 minutes of your time can change someone's life.
    “10 minutes of your day is nothing could change your entire life.”
    @ 01h 10m 46s
    December 07, 2020
  • Planet Positive Eyewear
    A startup turning plastic waste into high-quality eyewear, aiming to remove pollution actively.
    “We need to make this happen, and we're not the only brand in the world doing it.”
    @ 01h 20m 43s
    December 07, 2020
  • Representation Matters
    Addressing the underrepresentation of women and minorities in leadership roles.
    “We have to push them to the forefront now to inspire the next generation.”
    @ 01h 27m 51s
    December 07, 2020

Episode Quotes

Key Moments

  • Embrace Failure08:39
  • Self-Awareness16:54
  • Multiple Passions41:11
  • Positivity and Karma49:22
  • Life's Unpredictability51:25
  • Emotional Conversations1:00:28
  • Podcasting Advice1:01:46
  • Representation in Leadership1:25:54

Words per Minute Over Time

Vibes Breakdown

Related Episodes

Podcast thumbnail
Chris Williamson: The Shocking New Research On Why Men And Women Are No Longer Compatible! | E237
Podcast thumbnail
Moonpig Founder: How I Built A $150 Million Business WITHOUT Sacrifice: Nick Jenkins | E97
Podcast thumbnail
The Money Making Expert: The Exact Formula For Turning $100 into $100k Per Month! - Daniel Priestley
Podcast thumbnail
Kevin O'Leary: This $28 Habit Is Keeping You Poor! Every Time You Get Paid, Do This!
Podcast thumbnail
The Business Expert: How To Build A Brand In 2025! They're Lying To You About Work-Life Balance!
Podcast thumbnail
Tony Robbins: No One Is Ready For What's Coming! Why The Next Decade Will Break People!