Truth, Lies & Work

Episode 28 · 1 March 2023 · 1:06:54

What You Must Know for a Successful Exit, with VC Investors & Acquisition Experts (PART 2 of 2)

What You Must Know for a Successful Exit, with VC Investors & Acquisition Experts (PART 2 of 2)

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  1. Recap of Part 1: Why investors back people, not businesses

    panel interview#investing#entrepreneurship#business

  2. Introducing Sarah, Simon & Melissa

    intro#introduction#guests#events

  3. What investors are really looking for

    panel interview#investing#venture-capital#entrepreneurship

  4. The 'family' trap: why culture-as-family backfires

    panel interview#company-culture#leadership#family

  5. Are you the bottleneck or the lifeline?

    panel interview#purpose#leadership#business

  6. Sarah on purpose-led investing & accidental activism

    panel interview#purpose#investing#activism

  7. The famous-yet-unknown deal that changed everything

    panel interview#deals#investing#business

  8. The 4 things VCs and acquirers are looking for

    panel interview#venture-capital#acquisition#investing

  9. Overcoming bias in business & investment

    panel interview#bias#investing#women

  10. Why women exit the workforce — and what that costs everyone

    panel interview#women#workforce#career

  11. Stereotypes, International Women's Day & the data that exposes bias

    panel interview#stereotypes#women#data

  12. Simon's mission: entrepreneurialism in schools

    panel interview#entrepreneurship#education#schools

  13. Melissa on imperfect leadership & self-awareness

    panel interview#leadership#self-awareness#imperfection

  14. Why great leaders don't pretend to know everything

    panel interview#leadership#humility#knowledge

  15. Get your house in order: preparing for due diligence

    panel interview#due-diligence#investing#preparation

  16. Culture can be measured (Leanne's getting a sign)

    panel interview#culture#measurement#business

  17. When belonging becomes a barrier to exit

    panel interview#belonging#exit#company-culture

  18. Well-washing vs. genuine wellbeing cultures

    panel interview#wellbeing#culture#wellness

  19. Simon's final advice & the Make a Difference community

    panel interview#advice#community#resources

  20. Where to find Sarah, Simon & Melissa

    outro#podcast#resources#contact

Show notes

What You Must Know for a Successful Exit — Part 2: Investors, Acquirers & the People They Back

Truth, Lies & Work — In part 2 of this special two-part series, Al and Leanne are joined by three expert guests who've seen the deal from every side: Sarah Chen Spellings (Co-Founder & Managing Partner of Beyond the Billion, the world's first and largest global consortium supporting women-founded companies), Simon Berger (serial entrepreneur who's built and sold 26 exhibitions and conferences worldwide), and Melissa Carson (Founder of Canopy Solutions and former M&A integration specialist at Accenture).

The dirty little secret of the investment world? Investors don't back businesses — they back people. So what does that mean for how you lead, how you build culture, and how you prepare your company for the moment someone writes the cheque?

From the red flags that kill deals to why "we're like a family" might be the most dangerous phrase in your pitch deck, this episode is a masterclass in getting your house in order before the buyers come knocking.

🎙️ What You'll Learn

1. Investors buy people, not businesses. Every one of our guests said the same thing in a different way: the product can change, the market can shift, but the leadership team is the bet. If you're preparing for exit, you're not polishing a pitch deck — you're building a leadership bench.

2. "We're like a family" is a red flag. Sarah, Simon and Melissa all pushed back on the family metaphor. Families don't have performance reviews. Families don't fire people. When you call your team a family, you're signalling that accountability doesn't exist — and that's exactly what investors don't want to hear.

3. Culture is measurable — and due diligence is coming. Leanne says it so many times she's threatening to get a sign made: culture can be measured. If you haven't got the data points ready when the acquirers come knocking, you're not ready to sell.

4. Are you the bottleneck or the lifeline? Sarah's coaching question of the day. The most successful founders know when to step out of the way. If the business can't function without you, it can't be sold — it's just an expensive job.

5. Bias is a structural problem, not a personal one. Sarah's numbers are stark: women exit the workforce, especially post-pandemic, and the investment world still has a pipeline problem. This isn't about "fixing women" — it's about fixing the system that pushes them out.

🔗 Resources & Guest Links

Sarah Chen Spellings

Simon Berger

Melissa Carson

📚 More From Truth, Lies & Work

Connect With Us

Get in touch, book a call, or find Al and Leanne on LinkedIn — all in one place: truthliesandwork.com/connect

Mental health support: findahelpline.com — UK: Samaritans 116 123 · Mind 0300 123 3393 — US: 988 — Australia: Lifeline 13 11 14

Truth, Lies & Work is part of the HubSpot Podcast Network.

Full transcript

Expand full transcript
Al ElliottThe dirty little secret is that most businesses think they know their customers. They have the data, the records, the history, but it's scattered across 3 teams and 4 systems. And in our case, it's about 216,000 spreadsheets, which means nobody can actually use it.
Leanne ElliottWhat you should be doing is using HubSpot, because why? HubSpot connects it all— every interaction, every support ticket, every conversation— into one platform every team Can work from. So when sales talks to a customer, marketing already knows the full story. And when you know more, you grow more.
Al ElliottNice. Check out hopspot.com, the agentic customer platform for growing businesses.
Simon BergerCan I sell it to you? So I said, yeah, yeah, come on, John. He said to me— so he looked at me, came up to the desk, looked at me on the back, and then he took the pencil, broke it in half, and he said, you need another pencil.
Al ElliottHello, and welcome to the Truth, Lies and Workplace Culture podcast, where we simplify the science of people. My name is Al. I'm a business owner.
Leanne ElliottMy name is Leanne. I'm a business psychologist.
Al ElliottAnd if you've been listening to part 1 of this 2-part episode, then you're probably quite excited. We left you on a bit of a cliffhanger. We'll play that in a second. But we're basically going to go back over Um, there's one more thing that VC investors want in 2023. So if you're looking to, uh, potentially raise some money, you're looking to exit, you're looking to acquire, then what we've discovered is from our experts is that people and culture is one of the major things that people look at when they're trying to, when they're trying to acquire or invest. Is that right, Leah?
Leanne ElliottIt absolutely is. And I think, I don't wanna say I was surprised, but I was maybe encouraged that it was so high on the kind of the agenda of what, what investors are looking at. And it makes And I think Simon summed it up perfectly last week. Um, you know, when he said that people don't invest in businesses, they invest in people.
Al ElliottYep. 100%. It's funny because we've both seen, um, over the last sort of 6, 8 months on LinkedIn, a lot of people now talking about people and culture. Um, it seems like it's, it's finally coming to the forefront. It felt like your, your worst word, fluff. It did feel, it did feel like that some, most business owners are looking at it and going, oh, well, this is, you know, this is a nice to have. This is what the IBMs of the world have. Um, but, uh, but now it's definitely coming to the forefront for smaller businesses. And as we're discovering now with our 3 fantastic guests, that, um, it's something that people will actually look for when they're trying to invest or acquire a business. Shall we just go back over and reintroduce our guests?
Leanne ElliottI think we should. Our first guest is Sarah Chen Spellings. Sarah is a venture capitalist and strategist. She is co-founder of Beyond the Billion, which, as you would've heard last week, has already pledged more than $1 billion to women-led businesses. She's also host of the Billion Dollar Moves podcast, our Siblings Show on the HubSpot Podcast Network, and she was named Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2020.
Al ElliottKind of a big deal. Our second big deal is Simon Berger. Simon's been working in the events and exhibitions industry for over 30 years. He's launched multiple event portfolios across the world— Europe, Africa, Asia, Middle East. I think there's a continent he's not on. He's a serial investor in creative people and technologies, and you're gonna hear a bit more about one of his stories in a second. He's a founding partner for Mad World, Make a Difference Media, The Water Cooler, Um, Future Group, loads of other things. And what's more important is that he's bought, and what he's actually acquired or invested in companies and sold about 26 of them over the last sort of 20 years. So again, just an incredible guest.
Leanne ElliottAnd finally, we have Melissa Carson. Melissa is founder, people strategist, and leadership advisor at Canopy Solutions. She works with a whole range of clients from small nonprofits to scaling tech companies, and all with a common goal, ensuring that they have aligned their business and people strategies to drive growth. And we'll be hearing a lot more from Melissa today as we dive into exactly that. How can we align our business and people strategies to enable growth?
Al ElliottSo what are investors looking for? The first thing is entrepreneurship. Obviously, they want to make sure people can entrepreneur well. Um, secondly, they're looking for people leadership. They want to find really good, great leaders. What else they're looking for, Leanne?
Leanne ElliottWell, they were also looking at culture, which we were really, really excited about, and particularly some of the red flags, um, that our investors see, uh, within some cultures And one that Melissa mentioned was when businesses describe themselves as having a family culture. That's not a family business, a business that has a family culture. Let's just remind ourselves what Melissa said.
Melissa CarsonI think when people talk about they wanna feel like a family, that it's just that everybody cares about each other and we're in it for the long haul together. But it, it is, it is a business that people are a part of, and so people will come and go. So I think it's more around, you want the, the respect that comes with colleagues versus With family, sometimes we're not as nice as we need to be because they're family. Like, they can't really disown us, not as easily. But so, I think it's finding the level of respect but making the— creating a feeling that belonging feeling. Hey, we are a team. We are a tribe. You know, people use a variety of different terminologies, but that it's part of something and we stick together. We have each other's back. We care about each other. And so, I think that's more important. But the family thing, You might— you can't fire your family, but you might have to fire, you know, an employee. And you don't want— I mean, if you're doing the right thing for your team and your organization, carrying somebody who is not pulling their weight isn't fair to anybody. It's going to alienate your team that's working really hard, and it's not fair to the person who's not performing because they might be exceptional somewhere else. And sometimes in families, we just— we let the conflict sort of simmer and we just kind of leave it be, and it's not really healthy in the workplace.
Leanne ElliottI think the trap that's some businesses fall into when describing their, their culture is as a family. It's quite right, they're looking for something that's going to pull us all together and get everybody on the same page and all, all on kind of the same boat rowing in the, in the same direction. And I think, as Melissa explains really well there, the analogy doesn't really work in terms of family. And I think what we've seen a lot more recently is the concept of purpose, a purpose-led culture or purpose-led leadership. Having purpose or reason comes down to having a shared vision, something that we can all connect to, that we're all inspired by, and that we all want to contribute to in terms of mission delivery. And we know that these feelings of purpose translate into what Melissa said there, feelings of belonging. And in terms of behaviours in the workplace, that translates to greater discretionary effort. We go the extra mile. And bonus, our wellbeing is also massively boosted by experiencing work with both purpose and meaning.
Al ElliottSo I think most people would think about that and go, purpose, okay, well, my purpose is to make a, make a load of money. Let's build a company to exit it. But that's not really what Leanne was talking about there. The purpose was more like, what are we doing in the world? What's our company here for? And let's be honest, you're not going to have too many people getting excited about a purpose of making you a millionaire while they possibly lose their jobs. So we did ask Sarah about this, and we said, should we be building to exit? Is that the right route? We've heard of lots of companies that built with the, with the sole intention of actually selling to Google. Well, Sarah doesn't think so.
Sarah Chen SpellingsYeah, you know, I might come up with a controversial one. One is actually most of the very successful founders that have actually exited never built their companies towards an exit, right? Like the intention was just to build a great business. And in fact, exiting was the hardest thing that they've ever had to do because it was their baby. And I think that's important, you know, because you need to come at it with the right intention in that you believe in what you do, you believe in what you're building, and that you do want to lead it. And of course, the exit, I always say it's a cherry on top. It's important from a financial aspect for many people, for VCs and investors, but A lot of, I will say, a lot of the best founders did not actually build with that end in mind. And I think that's an important reframe to think about, because if you're just doing it for that sake, you know, are you doing it for the right reasons? Okay, that's part 1. Part 2, if you are building towards an exit, how to get there? I think it's building, you know, again, like I'm a long-term game person, always, you know, think about how you want to build your business and have that in mind every day, every email that you write. You know, there's people that, of course, worship Steve Jobs, that was pretty much a— I wouldn't swear on this podcast, but perhaps rough around the edges for many people who know him. And leaders are eccentric. But I would like to think that leaders that build sustainable businesses have the right intention, are grounded by the right intention, the right purpose, that think about long-term growth. And that means culture. that means not growth for growth, but having big ambitions and being very grounded in what are the next steps to get me there. But I think we can't forget that the founder of the business can be both the bottleneck or the lifeline of a business. So you need to, as much as you're examining your business, you need to examine yourself. Are you the right person to get from point A to point B to point C?
Leanne ElliottWell, I think that's the, the coaching reflection question of the day from Sarah there, isn't it?
Al ElliottAre you the bottleneck or are you the lifeline? It's interesting that Sarah mentioned Steve Jobs there because I think the word she was looking for was somewhere around asshole, uh, perhaps a little stronger, we don't know. Um, but yeah, he came across as a massive asshole, um, and probably a very unpleasant person to, to be around. But let's think, perhaps he did, perhaps his passion was to build the business and sell it, but I don't feel it was. I've read his autobiography. And I think it was more his passion was just to bring something amazing into the world. And that's what made him an asshole, but also what made Apple so, so good in the later years when he came back from Pixar. I think it was he went off— he went off into when they got kicked out. And the whole point in that was that he was passionate about bringing something beautiful to life. He wasn't passionate about building a business to exit. He wasn't like Michael Dell. Um, again, nothing against Michael Dell. If you're listening, Michael, then welcome. But I think that he's, he's seemed to be more about growth and he's like, right, how do we sell as many computers as we possibly can at the lowest possible, uh, at the lowest price with the volume and just basically build the business? Steve Jobs was like, no, I'm passionate about bringing something beautiful into the world.
Leanne ElliottWith that in mind, I'm, I'm reminded of our episode on, on family businesses where Ryan from Hogan was talking about Having the right leader in the right role at the right time. Steve Jobs was absolutely critical in those earlier days, or those kind of reinvention days of Apple. But if he was still in charge now, we'd be seeing like an Elon Musk situation over at Twitter.
Simon BergerOh yeah.
Leanne ElliottLike, it's just not gonna work. So I think it's, you know, as a leader, if you have just secured investment, or you're growing to secure investment, or you're going to exit, really taking a, a really deep introspective look at yourself and your, your leadership capabilities and thinking, am I the right person for the job right now? Am I the lifeline or am I the bottleneck?
Simon BergerI do feel that, um, if you're going to do something, you might as well do something that benefits all if you possibly can. I'm a big believer in doing things you enjoy. That's what I teach my children. I think there's 2 things you have in, in life, you know. One is work, and the other one is love. And if you're lucky enough to marry those 2 together, you know, you've done well. So, you know, we spend an awful lot of our time in our lives working, and I think you should really try and enjoy it. So yeah, over the years I've tried to do events and shows. I'm very lucky, which is probably the reason I'm still in it after, you know, 30-plus years, is that I love the businesses I'm working in. So the first shows we launched were actually in South Africa. We did an optical and ophthalmic show called Vision Africa. We then had a dental show called Dental Africa. We had Africa Laboratory Equipment. We had the South African Toy Show. We did Beauty Africa, which was about cosmetics, and we staged the South African Hairdressing Championships down there as well. We built up this portfolio of shows from 1992 to '95, and then we sold them all to the biggest company in the world at the time, so Reed, a joint venture between Reed and TML. Really, I suppose, if you have that passion and you have the best team and perhaps the best content partners, you can deliver great shows. It's not that I wanted to divest of them necessarily, particularly the first lot, for financial gain. In certain instances, I mean, just the very first example, Envision Africa, the first show we ever did, in Africa. Um, we helped an awful lot of people, um, in what they call the bush over there. But in the bush, people who, you know, who'd lost their eyesight, particularly on the west coast in terms of the— in the mines, you know. And when they lost their eyesight, they would have a marble literally put into their eye. And through Vision Africa, we were able to, um, accelerate everyone having a brand new technology using using coral. It sounds a bit grim here, but they would put coral in the eye and your tentacles would go into the eye, and so your eye would move and then they would paint it. You wouldn't be able to see out of it, but it was cosmetically so much better. Things like that, I just think we were able to do. Then to make that bigger, we chose a partner who had a bigger footprint and more resource to make that show bigger and therefore a better reach and frequency for the audiences and communities that we were providing for.
Leanne ElliottSarah also shared how her personal values and purpose-led investments have shaped her career and decisions as an investor.
Sarah Chen SpellingsI've always been a feminist, but I guess I became an accidental activated feminist in that I've combined, you know, what I believe to be true and important, you know, that women are equal politically, economically, socially, and should be in positions of leadership in many different ways that they are not, but bringing that into the work that I do daily has been, I guess, accidental in that, you know, I started my career in venture capital as a corporate venture capitalist out of Malaysia working for a $13 billion market cap public listed company investing into late-stage biotech companies. But along the way, saw that there were very few around the table that looked like me, spoke like me, and I questioned that. And that questioning led to me becoming a feminist in Malaysia in leading and, or, you know, sort of being the founder of Lean in Malaysia. So bringing the Lean in term from Sheryl Sandberg to Malaysia, localizing that and scaling that to now 7,000 women and men strong who believe in advancing women in leadership professionally and has become the voice of credibility there. And that actually also put me in really interesting spaces to be able to understand the gender venture investment gap, right? So, you know, when I moved to the United States, I was shocked to say the least, that even in the United States, where it's meant to be the beacon of innovation and growth and everything that, you know, looking in from a— as a young, bright-eyed Malaysian girl, as I would say, you know, we look to the United States as the example, right, and the gold standard. But I was shocked to find out that only, you know, at that time, 2.2% of venture capital funding was going to women-founded companies. And me being, you know, certain, and still am, that, you know, my work in at least my first decade and more will be in venture capital. I wanted to make sure that things change and that, you know, I'm not the first, the only in the room, because, you know, we're missing out on the talents of the population to be able to innovate and scale in spaces that are important, the way we work, the way we live, and the way we move forward.
Leanne ElliottIn the past, talking about purpose-led coaches, has typically been tied to a more altruistic drive, or a drive for, for change, or societal change. I'm not sure that's necessarily what a purpose-led culture means now. I think there's many different ways we can find purpose in our work, whether that's very directly, as Simon's experience was, more systemically, as, as Sarah's was, or even as you were saying about Steve Jobs, Al, in terms of wanting to something beautiful. The key with purpose, though, whatever that is, whether it's helping business leaders sleep at night, whether it's creating something beautiful, whether it's changing the face of the world with AI and what it all means, the psychology behind it is that purpose gives us energy. And energy means that we have the resilience needed to grow businesses and, and put all that effort in to scale them and exit them. As Sarah said, this is a long-term game. Purpose gives us energy, and the energy typically results in successful and profitable sales.
Al ElliottSo let's look at one of the, one of the, probably one of the most famous and also at the same time not famous, um, acquisitions, which was WhatsApp, which was bought by Facebook, now Meta, uh, probably about 10 years ago. Um, and if I remember, there was only maybe like sort of 30 or 40 people working on WhatsApp at the time when they were acquired for a lot of money, an awful lot of money. Now you might think, great, well, the founders, their purpose was to sell to Meta, make a shit ton of money, bank it, and go and sit on a beach and earn 20%. But it's funny because there was a lot of pushback from the founders after a year or so of Meta acquiring them, saying they're not using this the way we intended, they're using it to to, to collect information and advertise and all that kind of thing. And they really didn't like it. So I think one of them actually quit, potentially, you know, um, sacrificing their earnout. Um, they quit early and said, I'm not doing this anymore. So it's all down to this passion and this mission and this reason. And if you've got a reason for doing something and money's not enough, I'm sorry, money's never going to make you happy. Money's a magnifier. If you're miserable, And you get some money, you're just even more miserable. If you're generally happy and you make some money, you are even happier. So money isn't the end result. It's gotta be what change are you making in this world, which is down to your reason or your mission.
Leanne ElliottAbsolutely. And I'm sure I saw an article recently. It might have been on Medium that, and I didn't, I didn't read it. I think I saved it. But the headline was something like, selling my business was the worst day of my life. Because it's this whole, like, moment you've been building up to, and then it and it's gone. And then what then? You know, there's trauma counseling, there's transition counseling, there's so much coaching. There's a whole field of coaching dedicated to working with entrepreneurs that have sold their business. This is a big deal because typically, as Sarah says, those successful businesses that grow and exit are usually purpose-led.
Al ElliottOkay, so just to recap then, the 4 things that, um, either companies looking to acquire or VCs are looking for is, is there some kind of entrepreneurship And that's pretty obvious. Uh, if you've seen Dragon's Den, you know what that means. Um, is there a good leadership team in place? Have you got the right people in the right roles? Thirdly, is there a good culture? And finally, is there a purpose? Is the company working towards something? Have they got a mission and a reason for getting out of bed in the morning? Now, I think what you mentioned before, Leanne, was that there is a slight bias though here.
Leanne ElliottYeah. So, I mean, it is all well and good always sitting here saying these are the 4 things you need to do to attract the attention of investors. Investors without having a conversation and recognizing the bias that currently exists both with— both within the world of work and the world of investment. We heard from, from Sarah just earlier, and she raised a really important issue. You know, the bias, or perhaps unconscious bias, that is prevalent in the world of investor funding is real. She said when she got involved, only 2.2% of VC-funded businesses were led by women. So let's hear more from Sarah on this very important issue.
Sarah Chen SpellingsI believe women need to be recognized and given opportunities and earning those opportunities equally, politically, socially, and economically, right? And that goes— those are broad statements into many different areas, including positions of leadership in finance and venture capital, which is where I work in, but also being heard, right, and being recognized for their talents. The quote that I like to use is when you think about talent, talent is universal, but opportunity is not. And there are real structural barriers that exist, legacy systems, stereotypes, things like that that hold women back today. And so for me, feminism in 2023, you know, sometimes people think that we've moved so far ahead and, you know, this women's issue is no longer an issue. But, you know, look at the data. I think the data speaks for itself. The fact that Sanna Marin and Jacinda Ardern were being asked as 2 leaders of their country why they were meeting because they were similar in age and things like that. You know, I think that comes to just show, sure, we've made some progress, but not nearly enough. And the work continues. I think ultimately you want to get to a stage where we recognize women for who they are, not because they're just women, right? And I think the goal of a lot of the work that I do is really, frankly, to put myself out of a job in which, you know, it's mainstream that we're investing in women, that we're hiring women. But this is not yet the case, and that's why my job still exists. And I've been doing this for a while now, so hopefully that changes in generations to come and my daughter doesn't have to think about things like this. But some of the skill sets I will say when I look at the many women that have come to the forefront is, of course, because of some of the structural issues that have existed. You know, you look at women-founded startups, they tend to fare very well because they've been— the good news, bad news is they've been underfunded for so long and they've had to be resourceful, right? So with the capital that they've been able to, you know, get from VCs and external capital, because limited, they've been able to figure out their runways. And, you know, this is something especially as we're heading into another tough year, unfortunately, right? The consensus is the recession is already here. Things are improving, but still we're seeing layoffs all around. So good news, bad news. But the fact of the matter is, you know, we do a report beyond the bell in my firm. We report on the state of women in B.C. with PitchBook every year. And one of the key findings is that women is are still underrepresented in the that the valuation drop for women-founded companies have not been as high or as severe, as drastic compared to male-founded startups. And the reason for that, Leanne, is pretty simple. You know, when I think about it, I think about the realistic projections that they're making, the fact that they are very careful and cautious with their cash burn, right? So cash burn rates are also a lot lower for women-founded companies. And what that means Because in a tough time, in a crunch time, you know, they're going to continue to outperform and pivot when necessary and do what's necessary because that's the way they've been built. Women have been built to be resilient, and we continue to show how well we continue to do.
Leanne ElliottOne of my biggest frustrations, I think, when we talk about the progress made either in terms of women's rights, in terms of rights in the queer community, trans Is that there can be a sentiment of, oh, but look how far you've come. You know, 50 years ago you wouldn't have even been able to be alive or do what you do.
Simon BergerOr—
Leanne Elliottand I call bullshit because, yeah, of course it is awesome how far we've come, but as Sarah says, if we look at the data, if we look at what's actually happening out there in the world, there is so much further we need to go. And also, without this consistent awareness and, and, and advocacy for it, we see things being rolled back. How many laws in the US have we seen rolled back over the last 12 months that have had devastating impacts both for women and, and trans people? It's, it's not enough to go, oh, but look how far we've come. And of course, that, you know, the challenges that women face in the world of work aren't just limited to the entrepreneurial space or the investor space. I was actually reading a McKinsey report fairly recently that was saying that women leaders are leaving companies at the highest rate we've ever seen. So it basically said that every woman who is promoted into director level, there is another woman at director level that is choosing to leave the company. So we're never really kind of getting more women in a leadership position because at this point more women than ever are leaving senior positions. So I asked Sarah for her take on this. Why are women starting to make that choice to leave corporate roles.
Sarah Chen SpellingsWe've seen women exit the workforce, and especially during the pandemic, right? And part of that was very clearly the fact that, as I quote, you know, one of my counterparts' reports being in China back in the day, when they looked at the reason why women were not progressing at the rate that they should be in China, one of the key statements that really stuck with me is the battle for women is not just in the workplace, but in the household, in the home. And the reality is that globally, everywhere, the lion's share of domestic responsibilities, you know, whether that's taking care of an elder family member, taking care of the chores, taking care of the children, the lion's share of that responsibility still does fall upon the woman, you know, whether that's stereotyping, culture, the way women have been socialized to believe that this is their thing to do, you know. So women, some people say women should also be blamed because we want certain things a certain way and end up doing ourselves. But of course, you know, that all comes from socialization, right? And, you know, during the pandemic, I think you and I know how hard that has been for women to juggle all of it, right? So I hate to actually frankly bring in this work-life balance, but women have had to shoulder twice the responsibility than men at home. And this has definitely impacted the way they thought about things. And look, in America, you know, I'll bring the American context, you know, the cost of childcare is really sky high. Talent is short. You know, during the pandemic, it's been hard to find support, and the workforce is changing in that we're becoming more hybrid. You know, some jobs are no longer in existence. Some jobs are, you know, you're going to continue to work from home. And women have had to, or couples have had to think hard about the choices that they're making moving forward. And unfortunately, still to today, you know, talking about how relevant feminism is, is in 2023. It still is because we're talking about this, right? We're still thinking about the fact that, you know, in a career where it's a dual household income, the woman is highly likely to take a step back because it's more reasonable for her to do so. And, you know, I think you spoke about this a lot as well, the burnout, the mental load that this all causes on a woman that she has to shoulder has definitely had effects, and we continue to see that. And that's part of the reason we're seeing women leave the workforce at such a rate. But, you know, I'm hopeful that things will change and that we continue to see role models who are able to do it, and that we build, we address the systemic deficiencies and structural issues that exist, right, from childcare to expectations and beyond.
Leanne ElliottSome really important issues and challenges raised by Sarah there, which I'm sure we will dive even deeper into in future episodes. But returning to the world of investment, I want to recap on some some of the data that, that Sarah has shared, women-founded businesses are consistently showing higher performance. They have quicker exits, more stable valuations, and this is, you know, in comparison to their, their male counterparts. So it did leave me wondering, if the VC world is all about return, it's all about the numbers, it's all about the data, it's all about the money, where's the disconnect? Why is there still a gender gap, and a huge gender gap, in terms of women-founded businesses securing funding? I asked Sarah.
Sarah Chen SpellingsI ask myself that question all the time, but part of that is really, as I alluded to, it's a real structural issue, right? So there's not a lack of talent. I will say some people will come back at me and say, you know, find me a woman in AI doing this very specific thing, and it'll take me a couple weeks, but I'll be able to find her. And that just comes to show that it is the power of your networks. You know, we see many people from the outside who are outside of the industry may not know this fact, but it really started as a cottage industry, right? People had extra money and they were thinking about what to do. And of course, when you're investing your own money, there is a sense of familiarity that you're looking for, right? So we call it patterns of success. And if you think about all the barriers that women have had in the past, women and people of color, I'll add, You know, women and people of color have not had the same opportunities and privileges to be able to match this pattern of success, right? So when you think of, okay, who's the next big tech CEO, what image comes to mind, right? That's a simple— it's probably a guy that looks like Zuckerberg with a hoodie, and he looks very different to you and I, right? So that stereotyping is deeply ingrained in both men and women, by the way, because we've been socialized. So we need to change that, number one. Number 2, so that's, you know, what I'm talking about there is unconscious bias, subconscious bias, whatever you call it. And there's studies that show, you know, they did a— and Dana Kanze actually wrote a really good piece and did a TED Talk on this. But basically, there was a study that was done where they examined women and men that were pitching startups, and men were being asked growth questions, right? So promotion questions is what we call it. How big will this grow? What's the total market share? You know, what's the valuation growth here. And women were being asked preventative questions, i.e., what's the risk here? You know, what could go wrong? And we know that money follows vision. You know, uh, when you think about— I'm sure some of your, your listeners and audience would have watched WeCrashed, right, with Adam Neumann. I mean, he crashed pretty hard, but he sold a very big vision. And guess what? He's back at it again. And I would good question, you know, to, to, to answer your question there, uh, the audience, if, you know, this could happen for a woman, could she fail so dramatically and drastically and rise from the ashes like a phoenix?
Leanne ElliottStereotypes are so ingrained. There was such a brilliant, um, campaign last year for International Women's Day. Did you see it out, the big posters?
Sarah Chen SpellingsNo.
Leanne ElliottSo it was, it was, um, it was a company called CPB, um, an ad agency in, in the UK. They did this study with 1,000 parents and 1,000 kids aged between 5 and 11. And what was really— I don't know what the right word is, but it basically showed that bias is embedded at a young age. So 45% of kids polled, that's 5 to 11, 45% of children believe that nurses are always women. 60% of kids think being a plumber or an electrician is a man's job.
Simon BergerJob.
Leanne ElliottAnd half of boys and girls surveyed said that men make better engineers. And these are kids. And of course, that's coming from, you know, socialisation. It is, Sarah said, it is a really, really big thing. But they had these massive posts, and I'll share some on my Instagram. But it said, imagine a CEO, big letters, and then in smaller writing underneath it said, is it a man? Imagine a feminist, is it a woman? Imagine someone crying in the office, is it a woman? And it's, and it's like Sarah said, it's men and women have these gender stereotypes. And, and I think changing that is gonna be a real, really, really difficult job. But I think could be the, the kind of the catalyst we need to really kind of break through it in terms, terms of equality. How we do that, I don't know. That's a job for a social psychologist. So maybe we should get one of them on the show.
Al ElliottBut this is a cause that's very close to Simon's heart. Simon's Simon's mission, which he declared on his website, is to ensure that entrepreneurialism— that's a difficult word to say. I heard someone say that if you can spell the word entrepreneur, you're not one. So entrepreneurialism is made a compulsory part of the global education curriculum. We asked Simon a little bit more about this.
Simon BergerBut, you know, education is still very much the same. You know, it's still done, if not on a blackboard or whiteboard, but it's still, you know, it's maths, it's English, it's a modern language. perhaps not as useful as it should be. It's sort of a bit of sport. The soft skills of art and creativity are still, to this day, frowned upon rather than celebrated. Your dramas, your dance, your woodwork, your art, they're not serious degrees. I can tell you categorically that is how big business still views it. But it's the polar opposite. It's those creative skills that actually set you apart. We all have to do English and maths and get them, and I did get those at A-level, I'm pleased to tell you, to go any further. But at the same time, those soft skills of learning an instrument, learning a language, being able to use your hands more, are actually the points of difference that should be celebrated, and not enough are. It's the same for business. I think if everyone's taught how to present— I mean, how wonderful would that be if you're taught at school how to present in front of people, how to put together a basic business plan, or a home budget, a budget, a business budget, which you could then use in your personal life as well? Um, how to create or design. What are the important things of a business in terms of, you know, marketing, operations, finance, P&L, um, sales, how to sell something, you know. Here, here, everyone in the class, here's a pencil. How would you sell that to me?
Leanne ElliottI think there is still a bit of snobbery around kind of arts versus science-based topics, and I think what Simon's saying there is that, you know, it's this diversity of skills that actually gives you all the skills that you need in that VUCA world that we talked about last week that is volatile and unpredictable. We need people who are gonna think differently, who are gonna think creatively, or we need people that together are gonna bring different points of view to solve a problem. So I think, as both Sarah and Simon have said, it's really important that we have those role models at a younger age where if we are dissatisfied disadvantaged in terms of systemic challenges within the system, whatever that be, education or business or corporate, that we have these role models that show us it is possible, champion for us, advocate for us.
Al ElliottI love the idea of entrepreneurialism in schools. I think that I was— I trained as a maths teacher. I left it before I got the job, before I even graduated, I think, just because it was— it felt felt like prison to me. Like, you have to do these things, sit there, shut up, learn this. And I was like, why the hell can't they be asking questions? And this is what I liked about what Simon was saying, is that he's basically saying that rather than teaching people how to do algebra, which is actually useful in certain situations, but probably teaching people how to do that, or trigonometry— not sure I've ever needed trigonometry since I've left university— but concentrate on problem-solving. And the idea of being able to sell is probably some of the most important— most important skill you can get. Simon's got a great variation on the sell me this pen idea from The Wolf of Wall Street.
Simon BergerI remember his name. His name was Charlie Blewett. And in this classroom, and he basically— I gave them all a pencil. I said, right now, come and sell this to me. This was in Regent's College. So these were young people, okay? Well, they were young, and they're sort of like undergrads. So Charlie put his hand up. Charlie Blair put his hand up and he said, can I sell it to you? So I said, yeah, yeah, come on, Charlie, sell it to me. So he looked at me, came up to the desk, looked at me on the platform, and he took the pencil, broke it in half, and he said, you need another pencil. Who does that in life? You don't get that until you— if there are any young people who would do that, it's just genius. So I said, Charlie, right, as soon as you finish here, you're coming to work with me.
Al ElliottSuch a great story.
Leanne ElliottAnd did you know that the UK's number one management podcast, that's us, by the way, and the UK's number one marketing podcast are both on the same podcast network?
Al ElliottWe actually have a lot in common. We both use behavioral science to help people do better at work.
Leanne ElliottAnd we both had to wrangle Rory Sutherland on an episode.
midroll (Phil Agnew, Nudge)And 2 out of 3 of us are devilishly good looking.
Al ElliottI'm not gonna say which. Phil, host of Nudge, UK's number one marketing podcast. It's brought to you— we need to do this in threes—
Leanne Elliottthe HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals.
Al ElliottSeamless, seamless. Tell us about your latest episode, Phil.
midroll (Phil Agnew, Nudge)Uh, we've just done an episode on fake fandom and how New York indie bands are paying agencies to create fake TikTok videos about how much they like their work. And we talk about the behavioral science behind fandom and how that encourages people to enjoy the music and all of that good stuff, and do some big things about how this affects the world of politics, business, and brands as well.
Leanne ElliottIt is. It's such, it's such a good show. Of course, you'll hear all the stuff you want to hear about how to grow your business by using behavioural science in your marketing. But there's also just some really interesting episodes that'll be right up your street. Personally, I enjoyed Can Balsamic Vinegar Make Beer Taste Better?
midroll (Phil Agnew, Nudge)It can.
Leanne ElliottAnd Are We All Just Status Seekers?
midroll (Phil Agnew, Nudge)I am.
Al ElliottGo and listen to Nudge wherever you get your podcasts.
Leanne ElliottBut come back.
Al ElliottYeah, come back.
midroll (Phil Agnew, Nudge)Definitely come back, 'cause Nudge isn't as good as this, so come back.
Al ElliottI'll cut that out.
midroll (Phil Agnew, Nudge)Keep that in.
Al ElliottYou know, I think so many people overcomplicate the idea of sales. Anyway, this is not about— this is not about selling. So I think this— what this story does for me is it kind of says, your job isn't to sell something to me, it's to provide something that you desperately need. VCs desperately need businesses to invest in, otherwise they don't have a business. And if we talked before, then I want you— if we can help people to stop being quite so biased, and again, no criticism necessarily of a particular type of people, but we've said there is bias, we've shown that, uh, gender, education, um, then really selling is all about providing something that people really, really want. So let's finish up with 3 tips for business owners looking to grow, get funded, or get acquired. So quickly, these tips are: number 1, invest in your leadership development. Number 2, get your house in order. And number 3, build a great culture. Leah, do you wanna take number 1?
Leanne ElliottI would love to. And this is a section where we're gonna be hearing a lot more from our 3rd guest, Melissa Carson. Um, as we mentioned as well last week, Melissa has worked with Accenture for a number of years before establishing her own consultancy business. So in terms of, of kind of putting all of this into practice and into, into kind of tactical things you can do within your business, she is a person we will be talking to. So first, number 1, invest in your leadership development. As we've heard, our effectiveness as both business and people leaders is a key priority for investors. That's what they're looking for when they're considering buying or investing in a business. And of course, none of us are perfect. We all need to be self-aware of our flaws, our strengths and opportunities for development. Here's Melissa to explain more.
Melissa CarsonAt the end of the day, we are all imperfect leaders, and I, I think about all of us as individuals as leaders because we at least have to lead ourselves. We might also have responsibility for leading families or community activities or work teams, but at the end of the day, we all still have to lead ourselves, and we aren't perfect, and we will never be perfect. We can aspire to that, And one of the things that I've seen a lot in the workplace, predominantly with women, but not unique to women, is this bar of expectations of here's what I should be and not feeling that it's good enough. And so, one of the things that I wanted to do is focus on how do we make the bar a little bit more reasonable and recognize that we don't have to be perfect and it's okay But the flip side is you can't just accept, hey, this is the way I am, like it, and move on. It's really around recognizing uniquely for you where are those areas of imperfection. I call them gremlins. But where are those and what do you want to do about that? How do they show up for you and what's your responsibility to try and address them? My belief is that what we have to do is harness that messiness part of it and so figure out how do what can be an imperfection for me. So, for me, one of the things, particularly under stress, I want to be a controller. Like, I show up and I might be impatient, I might be short, etc. So, at the end of the day, that is an imperfection in how it shows up as a leader. However, if I handle it right, it is a positive, the fact that I can get things done. I'm known for that ability to control the dynamics. I just have to do it in a way that is supportive of the people around me or not problematic. And so, we have to be intentional about what are we doing. So, I talk about going from imperfect to intentional leadership. So, you know, we all— I was just reading something recently and somebody had talked about, well, I find myself in this this habit of doing that, but then I catch myself. And so it's that catching yourself to say, okay, now how do I, how do I redirect? How do I re-navigate where I'm going?
Leanne ElliottTo rephrase one of the greatest philosophers of current times, RuPaul Charles, if you can't lead yourself, how the hell are you gonna lead anyone else? Can I get an amen?
Melissa CarsonCan I?
Al ElliottUh, yeah. Do I just say amen? Yeah. I don't watch, I don't watch drag Drag show? Is that what it's called?
Leanne ElliottRuPaul's Drag Race?
Al ElliottOh, sorry.
Leanne ElliottNo, it's RuPaul. Honestly, she, she's just brilliant. But, um, but yeah, I think that's exactly it. And I think, do you know what analogy kind of springs to mind? It's like if you were going back to saying you were selling a car, and imagine that your car is your business and your VC investor is your, your person who's interested in buying your car. And the outside is all shiny. You've done— you've gone through all your financials, you've got it all kind of your P&L sorted, all that's looking sexy. It's all shiny and sparkly, and it's got like a little, you know, the little dings on the advert. And then they open the car and the steering wheel is missing. It's like, well, that's you. You're the leader. If you've not invested in your own development up to the point where you're ready to present your entire business, you're basically—
Al Elliottyou've got a car without a steering wheel. Yeah, a really good—
Leanne Elliottwell, I'm not gonna say really good analogy.
Simon BergerAdequate analogy.
Melissa CarsonAdequate.
Leanne ElliottHave you got a better one?
Sarah Chen SpellingsNo, no, no.
Al ElliottI'll work on it. I'll work on it.
Leanne ElliottThat was brutal, man. I thought it was pretty good.
Al ElliottBut here's the thing. A great leader doesn't pretend they know everything. Here's Melissa again.
Melissa CarsonThere's still some people that are looking to go back in time to say, well, this is what has always worked, and it always worked, so it should still work. So I think we're seeing some of that still be prevalent. And I think that's a discomfort with change and not an openness. And I think the other thing is there's still some concern around the vulnerability of saying, I don't have all the answers. I think it got a lot better. And we saw, you know, different leaders during the early parts of the pandemic handle things very differently. Some show up and say, I don't have any answers. So, don't say anything, and then people make up answers. And we saw some that gave the right balance of, I don't have all the answers. Here's what I'm doing to find out. Here's what we're going to do, and share that. So, I think sometimes there's still a little bit of ego or concern of, if I don't know it all, how will I be perceived? And I think that is scary, but I think if you do it in the right way and say, hey, I have a great team around me. We're going to go figure out the answers and the solutions to these questions, but I don't personally have to know all the That's why I hire, you know, great people.
Al Elliott100%, Melissa. Those people who pretend they know everything, you generally know they're just frightened they're gonna be found out. So what's number 2, Leanne? First one is invest in your leadership. Second tip is?
Leanne ElliottNumber 2, get your house in order. In almost every business, as we've heard, investors, acquirers buy people, and that's why there is an earnout. If you are, you know, the, the leader of that incoming acquired business, business, the investors want to ensure that you're, you're going to stick around. And Melissa explains how Accenture approached this. Businesses who want funding or to be acquired quite simply need to get their house in order.
Melissa CarsonIt is difficult work, particularly for the company being acquired, um, because it's a huge shift. For me, I remember doing the first one and, you know, really didn't know what I was doing because obviously it's the, the first, but I found it fascinating to talk to the leaders that were selling their businesses, understand what their concerns were, and figure out how it was going to best fit within sort of the Accenture world. Because obviously, there's— in integrations, there's some things that you want to preserve, and then there's some things that you need to rationalize, like your processes or your payroll cycles or, you know, some of those types of things. But there were some really interesting ones that I got to work on and figure out how do we have this fit in? How do we not lose what's really what we're buying? We're buying the people, maybe we're buying a product or an offering that they have, but at the end of the day, we're generally buying the people capabilities that that organization has. And how do you make sure you're going to retain them for at least a transition? And so, that's fascinating. I think have your house in order, like, so that you can easily say, here's how I run my people side of my business, particularly if that's the thing that you think will be attractive to a seller. But I think the biggest piece of advice that I have for a seller is to really do the work for themselves of what it's going to mean, assuming they go along with the integration, they go along with the acquisition into the integration, not to be the owner anymore, not to be the person in charge because that is a big transition. I've seen people do it very successfully, but it's awkward and an uncomfortable space to be. And so, I think doing the work for yourself to understand that you really are ready to have somebody else take those reins and being really clear on the culture match of if If certain things are really important to you and your team about how you communicate, for instance, be clear. How does that acquiring organization communicate? How do they make decisions? Will you be involved in those decisions? Because those are super critical. So, I think it's important to have clarity on how your processes as much as you can and know how you're running your business. But I think also it's a piece around Making sure you're selling it to the right kind of company.
Al ElliottSuch great advice. And it's really interesting to say that culture is a big thing. I think that people who start businesses, particularly from nothing, they don't really think about culture until it's a bit too late. So that's really interesting. So while we're talking about culture, number 3 is understandably invest in your culture. Now, culture is really interesting because culture is sort of belonging to a tribe. As Seth Godin always says, people like me do things like this. And that's what creates this tribe, sort of tribal idea. So culture isn't some magic mission statement or some ridiculous team-building exercise where you have to build a raft or fall off, fall into someone else's arms. It's about building a tribe where people feel they belong.
Leanne ElliottThe cool thing about culture as well is that it can be measured. I understand it might feel a bit intangible. It might feel something that, that's just the way that we do things around here, but culture can be measured. The foundations of culture that are driving performance within your business, and that's individual performance and organisational performance, can be measured. And if you've got those data points, when your investors come in and say, tell us about your culture, what your retention rate's like, you know, what's important to you when, when we manage this integration and bring you into the business. You've got the data points there, so when they're running their due diligence, it's already ready. Culture can be tangible. Culture can be measured. Do I need to say it again, Al?
Al ElliottNope.
Leanne ElliottCulture can be measured. Culture can be measured. Culture can be measured. I'm gonna get a sign for next week.
Al ElliottWell, the good news is, Melissa agrees.
Melissa CarsonYeah, I mean, so I, um, through listening to a variety of Brené Brown and some of the speakers that she has, you know, this you know, when we talk about DEI, the B on the end is the important part, the belonging. Because at the end of the day, when we feel like we belong somewhere, like you get the smile on your face, you feel like there are people that are like you, there are people that care about you, that you want to show up. And so, it's one more factor in sort of the engagement and retention, you know, calculation of if people feel like they belong somewhere, They are less likely to leave because they see that what they do is valued. They see that their voice matters. They feel that in how things are communicated and how decisions are made. And so, I've sort of adopted what I've been reading and listening to. I think it starts with the one-on-one relationships of just how do I— how does my team work together? How does my my boss treat me? Do I feel like I can speak up in a meeting? Does that supervisor ask, hey, Susie, I haven't heard from you yet, or Pedro, I haven't heard from you yet. Hey, I'd love your opinion. I know you might have a different perspective. Somebody's pulled in. It feels inclusive. And once they say something that is maybe different perspective, that that's like, oh, I mean, that there's an acknowledgment that it's different, but okay. And so, just little things like that that don't cost money and don't take a lot of time make a huge difference.
Al ElliottBut sometimes you build so much belonging and purpose into a company that you realize you actually don't want to sell it. You can't bring yourself to sell it. Simon's got a business like that right now.
Simon BergerMy partner, Mark Piegoo, and myself, I've started Mad World Summit, MAD being an acronym for Make a Difference, I'll come on to that, which is basically a show that is dedicated and focused, it's now in its 7th year, to workplace wellbeing through the lens of mental health. And it came as a result of a very tragic episode in our lives where we were touched by suicide. Caroline, Mark's daughter, attempted to take her life with her then-boyfriend. 7 years on, Caroline's doing well, and thankfully didn't manage to succeed. But very tragically, and conversely, Mark, her boyfriend, did. And The ramifications of that, obviously, for Mark, his family, who I knew very well, and of course Caroline, were huge. This was set up in a workplace and it was almost on the intranet type thing. If people had been looking, if people had been more aware, I think Mark would still be here today. What we decided to do in his memory, we just actually sold a very big business to Clarion. We sold the Internet Retailing Expert Conference to Clarion. And so it was a very particularly euphoric moment for us. It was a very big sale, our biggest yet, and we were going to go off and fish for a year or so, you know what I mean? But anyway, we decided that as a result of this that we couldn't go anywhere and we wanted to use our 30-odd years, 60-odd years collectively, of business contacts to try and make a difference in every workplace and any workplace for of each and every employee on the planet, whether you're a big company or small company or on a sports field, on a building site, whatever. We wanted to try and prevent that ever happening again by creating an event where we would invite people to come and learn about mental health and mental health awareness in the workplace. That's a huge, huge, huge passion for both Mark and I. He said that we don't— I mean, normally we're very commercial about what we do, but this is a show that we couldn't possibly sell. It's something that I love, unless someone came to me and said to me, right, I can do it better, or I feel, you know, that, you know, I'm losing my passion for it, which at the moment I don't think will ever wane. Then it stays with us because we drive it forward with pure passion.
Leanne ElliottMake a Difference Media really is an incredible organization, one of the best newsletters I've signed up to as a people and culture practitioner. And in terms of, as Simon mentioned there, uh, the events, uh, both in person— they have lots of webinars. We will share all the, all the links in the show notes.
Al ElliottBut, you know, even if your business doesn't have the kind of personal mission that, that Simon's has, a culture of well-being and avoiding toxic leadership All you really need to worry about, because if your people, um, have, uh, have the right reason to, to come up, wake up and go to work every day, um, you know, have all the resources they require, they've got the resilience to be able to deal with the change and deal with the growth that you want and that you wanna push. If you've got all these things in place, if they've got great relationships with their leaders, you really only need those 2 things to build something pretty incredible. And if you build something pretty incredible, then people will come and they'll want to be part of it, whether they want to invest in it, acquire it, et cetera, et cetera. So trying to reverse engineer and be greedy and go, I wanna sell this for £2 million, £20 million, £2 billion, whatever it's gonna be. Um, it's just, you're gonna fall on your ass because you need people to build that business. And again, we've talked about it, leadership and culture, most important things.
Leanne ElliottLet's hear a bit more from Simon on the importance of a wellbeing culture.
Simon BergerThere's so many solutions out there, and that's what people are calling well-washing and stuff. Now it's about using evidence-backed solutions, tracking them, making sure they work. If you're a company and you've got 5 grand to spend on workplace wellbeing with your staff, you're a small company, or 10 grand, 100 grand, whatever it might be, I want it to work for you. So we will only promote things that are evidence-backed, that actually truly work. There is no silver bullet. We all know that. And it's all very personal and it's not easy, but for goodness' sake, let's get rid of the things that don't work and start focusing on the things that do work. And I think that's really important. And the other thing you mentioned, which is the attention to prevention, which comes on to nutrition, to sleep, to mindfulness and physical exercise, the 4 elements of, you know, that can give you better mental health. And teaching and learning more about that, I just think it's super important.
Melissa CarsonYeah.
Simon BergerSo the most important thing before you do anything is to assess where you are. I mean, let's put it another way, Jim, right? So you could have all the EAPs and the wellbeing opportunities in the whole world in your— up to you, but at the end of the day, if I've got a toxic manager or a toxic workplace, it doesn't make any difference. So you've got to do assessments. Where are the red flags? Where is— And then you build up the engagement. You know, what are you offering? How many people are using it? I mean, one of the most horrific facts— and my EAP clients and sponsors will shout and scream at me, but the model is based on this, by the way— is, you know, they don't get even up to 4% engagement.
Leanne ElliottI'm sure regular listeners will not be surprised that Simon is my hero. Just to recap some of the things he said there: start by understanding where you are right now. If you don't understand where you are now, you can't plot a path to where you want to go. 2, measure it. You can measure it. Have I mentioned this, Al? One can measure it. And also, you know, in terms of wellbeing, it isn't about all these fancy EAP programmes, uh, employee assistance programmes. Um, so we've talked about perks before, and that could be classed as like an EAP, something usually some kind of, um, platform that will pull together lots of different current physical, um, psychological, financial wellbeing interventions. Yeah, resources. Um, but yeah, it's not a case of having, having more EAPs and, and more interventions if nobody is accessing them. Start with doing better, not more.
Al ElliottSo let's wrap things up. We asked Simon if he had any more advice or resources that might help, and he talked about his events, which are amazing.
Simon BergerWell, for us, we do these annual events. One is a The Mad World Summit happens in and around World Mental Health Day. This year it's on the 12th of October, so it's either on the 9th, 10th, 11th, or 12th. 10th of October is always International Mental Health Day. That happens in the City of London. It's a very highbrow event. For me, it's like having the whole of the Premier League in this industry come together. And it's like one big family, and we listen and we learn and we share and we teach and we have lots of storytelling. We have lots and lots of research, evidence-backed, what has worked, what hasn't worked, equally important, if not more important. We look at the new solutions that are out there, the new vendor providers. We try and bring in the policymakers. And changes. Um, and it's a— but that's all through mental health in the workplace. Okay. Um, and then the Water Cooler, which is on, I think this is April the 25th and 26th at Excel. So it's a— Mad World has about 1,000 people. The other one we do, the Water Cooler, is about 5,000 people. That's not a paid-for event. We want everyone to come to that event, whether you're in finance, you're in HR, you're one of the newfangled names of wellbeing or happiness, or people or offices and things like that, and everyone in between. I mean, anyone who's interested in workplace, you know, wellbeing, and that's your mental, physical, financial, social, and environmental, come and have a look around. We also run another event, strangely enough, nothing to do with it, but it's interesting that we do it. It happens at exactly the same time in the 4 halls to the left of it. It's another one of our events that we own. Which is called SME Expo, and it is what it is on the tin. We have another 5,000 SMEs coming. Clearly, they have a huge amount of challenges at the moment, which we try and help and advise them. We co-located with them last year. But for me, I wanted, despite those challenges and helping them through them, and there's some phenomenal speakers on that, you'll have to have a look at them. All the dragons and Tej and Deborah and various others and the CEO of Pimlico Plumbers and everyone else. You have a look, it's great. But also I wanted to keep it on their top table. You know, for goodness' sake, don't let your people, the well-being of your people, come down to even second position. You know, you've got to look after them despite the other challenges that you're going through. And so I'm very proud of that event. As well. So yeah, those 2 events. And then we have this media company, which Claire runs as the editor-in-chief, which, you know, we just— if you subscribe to it, you'll get to know every day— well, not every day, but every week, literally a blow-by-blow account of insights, trends, case studies, research from our community, and hoping to help you either start— what's your first 100 days look like? Or, you know, if you've already implemented it, making it better, you know, better engagement and all that sort of stuff, and hopefully moving forward and bettering, you know, the lives of your staff and your managers.
Leanne ElliottMake a Difference Media really is an incredible resource. We will leave the link in the show notes. And also, another great thing about Simon, he just underlines what Melissa was saying earlier about not having having to have all the answers. He's open to ideas.
Simon BergerI think it's important that if any of your— one of the things I, I, you know, we are a community of people who, um, who have either had lived experience or, uh, both good and bad, by the way. And so if any of your listeners have an idea, um, some of our best content has come from people who we didn't even know phoned up and said, listen, Listen, this is what worked. And they could be from ambassadors, they could be from some mentors, they can be from mental health champions. You know, so in other words, if anyone has an idea of what we should put into the content, that could be at any one of our events or on the media, it could be an interview that you think that our community would benefit from. And it can be as controversial as you want. In other words, goodness sake, please don't use this solution. It's absolutely rubbish. Because there are solutions out there which I'm afraid are well-washing. We want to not name and shame, because I'm sure people don't mean it that way, but we also need to track results. All I'd ask is that if anyone has any ideas to let you know or me know or Claire Farrow know. And we, we listen to every suggestion, um, and give it, um, the right due diligence.
Leanne ElliottIf you have an idea for Simon, get in touch. You can contact us at Truth, Lies and Work, and there is a contact form and chat box on there, um, or you can email us podcast@oblonghq.com.
Al ElliottAnd penultimately, go and check out Sarah's podcast, Billion Dollar Moves. Uh, she's got some Some amazing guests on there, a really interesting one. I don't know whether we're allowed to talk about it. She did mention it in the private Slack. But there's one on there which, which, if it's published now, will be an amazing interview. This is what Sarah says.
Sarah Chen SpellingsBillion Dollar Moves is the show for the next generation global leader. I would say it is the most raw and unfiltered form of deconstructing the billion-dollar moves of the top US and Asia leader, right, in the venture ecosystem. So I have had, I mean, today we just released an episode with someone from Meta, and he did tear up on my podcast, and he's never done this before, talking about his own purpose and bringing his work and his advocacy together in putting the spotlight on Asian Americans and why that matters today. I've had, as I mentioned, you know, a founder who has something like 2 million followers, and she was in the spotlight, and what it's like to fail very publicly and rise again. Right. And I think these are all important billion-dollar moves that we don't talk about. And I try to bring that on my podcast.
Al ElliottAnd our final guest, Melissa, you need to go and check out her brand new website, all very fancy, at canopystrategies.co. She's got this new— I don't know whether it's new or not, but I've only just seen it pop up on the website, something called the Fire Circle. It's a small group programme for women leaders who want to maximise their impact by accepting, embracing, and celebrating what makes them unique. Looks very cool. Clearly not for me.
Leanne ElliottBut it might be for me though. That sounds cool.
midroll (Phil Agnew, Nudge)Yeah.
Al ElliottYeah. And there's an acronym as well.
Leanne ElliottF.I.R.E.
Al Elliottis an acronym.
Leanne ElliottOh, go on.
Al ElliottNo, no, no. Let's, let's, let's build the—
Leanne ElliottIf you, if you wanna know, you need to head to my website.
Simon BergerYou need to go to canopystrategies.co.
Al ElliottThe link's in the show notes.
Leanne ElliottThat's canopystrategies.co. And finally, I may have harped on in this episode about how you can measure If you would like to know more about that, get in touch with us. Uh, you can get to me directly if you want, uh, find me on LinkedIn, Leanne Elliott, or you can drop us an email, leanne@oblonghq.com.
Al ElliottSo Leah, we are talking about coaching versus mentoring next week.
Leanne ElliottWe are. We have talked a lot about investing in your own leadership development, and we really believe that coaching and mentoring is an excellent way to do that. So that's what we're talking about next week. Again, more practical advice. For you on that. But until then, thank you so much for listening. Thank you to our incredible guests, Sarah, Simon, and Melissa. You were awesome. We, we, yeah, absolutely loved it. Some really great advice there.
Simon BergerYep.
Al ElliottLooking forward to, uh, to seeing you all on LinkedIn where we'll post this and come and talk to us. Come and tell us what you think about it. Come on. If you've got an idea for Simon, then maybe you can give it to us via LinkedIn. We'll take the credit for it if it's a good one.
midroll (Phil Agnew, Nudge)Honestly.
Leanne ElliottSee you next week.
Al ElliottBye-bye.
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