Naked Ambition Podcast

In this episode, we chat with Aaron Smith, the Chief Cultural Officer of KX Pilates.

Aaron Smith, is an award-winning fitness innovator and entrepreneur. Aaron founded KX Pilates (which is Japanese for ‘continuous improvement’) in February 2010 and has since built it into Australia's largest pilates franchise with an impressive 74 studios across the country and one studio in Indonesia.

In our chat with Aaron, we talk all things:

* Why Aaron and the team attribute their growth and success to innovating in the core of their business (and not getting distracted by the shiny things)

*How Aaron moved from CEO to Innovation lead in order to focus on build and patent their own unique equipment that will allow KX expand globally

*The critical importance of organisational culture (especially post-pandemic) and why every growing company needs a chief culture officer

More about Aaron: As the founder of KX Pilates, Aaron has earnt multiple awards and recognition including being recognised as an influential Victorian to watch by the Herald Sun in 2020, Australian Young Fitness Entrepreneur of the Year in 2019, was named in the top 3 of Australia’s Top 30 Franchise Executives (2020), and featured in the 2019 Top 10 Dynamic Entrepreneurs by Dynamic Business Magazine.

You can find out more about KX Pilates here and connect with Aaron on LinkedIn here.

KX website:

https://kxpilates.com.au/

Aaron LI:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaronsmithkx/

You can also find us at www.naked-ambition.com.au or on Instagram @_nakedambition

In this episode, we chat with strategic and leadership powerhouse Ashleigh Morris, the CEO of Coreo - Circular Economy Strategy Firm/agency

Ashleigh’s recognition as a future leader includes accolades such as Top 100 Corporate Social Responsibility Influential Leader as well as recently being presented with the Young Businessperson Award by the Mayor of Brisbane.

In our chat with shares her insights on: (with the bullets they need to be quite specific - need a 'so what' message)

· What the circular economy is and the benefits to enterprise in adopting these practices

- The power of an individual to drive the Circular Economy in an organisation

- How CE can drive innovation opportunities

- Female leadership and the impact Ashleigh and her team are making with Coreo

More about Ashleigh - Ashleigh has been a Prime Minister’s scholar, an invitee to the 73rd United Nations general assembly and various trade missions, and Australia’s panelist at the World Circular Economy Forum in 2019. If that wasn’t enough, Ashleigh is a proud champion of the Ellen MacArthur Foundation of the Circular Economy, which is a title that's actually only granted to a handful of people worldwide.

You can find out more about Coreo and connect with Ashleigh on LinkedIn here:

Coreo website: https://coreo.com.au/

Ashleigh LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashleighmorriscestrategist/

You can also find us at www.naked-ambition.com.au or on Instagram @_nakedambition

Michael is an accomplished entrepreneurial leader with an executive career spanning three decades and eight countries within start-ups, corporates, government, academia and not-for-profit sectors His unique experiences range from establishing a world first automated antibody facility in Australia, an app start-up, a German DNA engineering company and multiple management positions in tech start-ups, finance and banking.

Michael’s experiences include non-executive director and Chairman roles in banking, innovation, health and medical research. His areas of work include start-ups, growth, leadership and cultural realignments and transformations, stakeholder relations and strategy. Michael is the Executive General Manager at State Trustees where his vision is to humanise an 80+ year-old institution by recognising the changing demographic of Australia; both customers and employees.

Michael’s superpower is to create stretchable boundaries to enable people to grow, a skill he honed starting in his late teens in California, and throughout his stints in Latin America, Europe and Australia.

A true citizen of the world and innovation champion, Michael has been a sought after speaker globally on topics relating to leadership, biotech, complexity, innovation, start-ups and scale ups, culture and courage. A father of two teenage boys in a multicultural household, Michael has hitchhiked, hoboed, and cycled his way across North America, speaks five languages, is a SCUBA instructor, plays Aussie rules football, and is a hopeless handyman… but still trying. Michael does not shy away from taking on a challenge and giving it his best shot, he is the eternal learner and seeker of experiences that make life worth living.

Dom Pym

Dom is an entrepreneur and technologist who launched Up (up.com.au), a next-generation Australian digital bank delivering super powered banking. Up allows you to easily organise your money and simplify your life, giving you the freedom to do the things you love.

Dom has been involved in software, web and mobile development for over 20 years from start-ups to global enterprises in Australia, the UK, the USA and throughout Asia.

Amidst a growing neobank scene, Up was the first to launch in Australia in October 2018 and they have already amassed 280K+ very happy customers.

Co-founder Dom Pym is happy to provide comment on a range of topics related to banking and finance.

Anson Parker

Anson is a digital expert and Head of Product at Up (up.com.au), a next-generation Australian digital bank delivering super powered banking. Up is a clever way to organise your money and simplify your life, giving you the freedom to do the things you love. Amidst a growing neobank scene, Up were the first to launch in Australia in October 2018 and have already amassed 250K+ very happy customers. Anson is the product visionary behind Up.

Anson is passionate about the intersection between creativity and technology, and is a strong advocate for a customer-first approach to product design. Combining an instinctive creative ability with a deep technical and strategic understanding, Anson has a long track record in delivering exceptional products, most recently working with technology start-ups in Australia and San Francisco after earlier stints at News Limited and Optus.

Anson is a popular presenter amongst millennials and tech audiences, and is happy to provide comment on a range of topics.

Damien Mu is one of the most genuine (and genuinely charismatic) leaders you will come across. Over the years I’ve witnessed him give many-a-rousing speech at AIA and the awe and admiration he inspires from their people is something else.

Damien has been in the CEO seat at AIA Australia and NZ for the last 6 years and in that time has led one of the sectors most ambitious acquisitions and integrations, as well as introducing the market-leading Vitality offer.

In this candid conversation Damien speaks about what it really means to be purpose-led (beyond rhetoric), how the events of 2020 gave him a new personal clarity and saw him connect more deeply to the needs of AIA’s people. He also shares how this translates to making a difference for the AIA customer (like no other insurer) plus, what all this means for their transformation journey.

Damien Mu has more than 20 years’ experience in the Australian financial services industry, with management experience spanning operations, claims and underwriting, superannuation, investments, distribution, product, pricing and marketing. On 1 August 2014, Damien was appointed to the role of Chief Executive Officer. Damien is married to Simone and has two children, Bailey and Kai. He is passionate about people and leading an organisation whose purpose is “Making a Difference in People’s Lives”.

Fred is an executive advisor on strategy and innovation. Fred works with senior leaders on how to develop an innovation culture, explore new growth engines and transform their business.

He has been working with or in large organisations for more than 20 years and knows their challenges from the inside. Fred is the co-author with Alex Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur and Alan Smith of The Invincible Company, a guide to make innovation more manageable and help executives build resilience in their organisation.

Madeleine Grummet is an award-winning education technology entrepreneur, startup mentor, 2020 Amazon Web Services Scout, Angel Investor, Board Director (MAICD), and Founder of leading career education and employability skills platform Future Amp. She is also the Founder and CEO of girledworld, which has connected 100’s of global industry mentors with 30,000+ female high school students to upskill them for the future of work. Mads is qualified in Design Thinking and Innovation with Stanford University and holds a Master of Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital Executive Scholarship. She is the winner of the University of Melbourne 2020 Leadership Award for her work across the startup ecosystem. Mads is also a regular media contributor, cohost of the Human Cogs podcast and an ex-journalist who remains incurably curious. A writer at heart, she is pretty much always on the sniff for a good story. But her greatest learning moments are always led by her four daughters.

Lisa Gray is the CEO of VFMC – the Victorian fund management corporation. Her career spans over 25 years predominantly in financial services having held various executive roles at NAB, MLC and Axa.

Lisa is a winner of the Telstra Business Women’s Award for medium-sized enterprises and prestigious Rupert Murdoch Fellowship for Leadership and Management.

This conversation covered so much of Lisa’s vast knowledge in leading for strong cultures and innovation including:

• Her ‘on the couch’ technique of sharing teams backstories to create more connection while the team is distributed

• Challenges and some success in creating an innovation culture (especially in financial services) an shares some ways leaders encourage creativity in their teams

• Why she is re-thinking how they approach strategy at VFMC now – replacing the detailed roadmap with an agile strategic agenda (20 mins)

• Beliefs about large scale transparency in organisations – offering everyone access to the same information (24 mins) and how we can make better decisions with limited information

Lisa holds a Bachelor of Town & Regional Planning with Honours (University of Melbourne), Graduate Diploma in Management (RMIT), MBA (University of Melbourne / Columbia University) and AMP (INSEAD).

If you are a leader (or aspiring to be) you do not want to miss this episode. Amy Child’s – award-winning Managing Director at Momentum Energy shares deeply and highly practical advice, and candid perspectives on how she had dealt with and led through the challenges of recent months. If you want no-nonsense advice on how to lead with courage and humanity - this is the episode of you.

Amy shares:

- Reflections on the empathic leadership style we need to see more of right now and what it means to relinquish control in times of major upheaval

- How an unconventional childhood growing up in Chile, plus family tragedy, shaped her beliefs around equality that influence many of her decisions today

- Her dedication and vision for workplace wellness and how she has managed to put this first at Momentum – plus details of the three initiatives the team have implemented to keep their people physically and mentally well.

Amy Child’s is the Managing Director of Momentum Energy. In just 4 years at Momentum, Amy has grown the customer base by a third and driven a major digital transformation to improve the customer experience and create efficiencies in the business. She's also established new, flexible ways of working with the fit-out of an environmentally friendly activity-based workplace - which recently won Gold at the Melbourne Design Awards.

Jasmine Smith is the Director of People and Culture at Swisse. Jasmine Smith, Director, People and Culture, at Swisse Wellness, is a passionate people development professional who has extensive experience in leading and developing engaged and high performing teams.

Over her years of working with many innovative and successful brands (Lush Handmade Cosmetics, Mecca Cosmetica, T2 Tea), Jasmine has learnt that people are always an organisation’s most powerful differentiator.

In this episode Jasmine shares:

- How recent events call for new models of leadership and what they look like

- Lessons learned over the last few months and how Swisse is changing how they work

- Her beliefs about the ‘whole person’ approach to thriving at work, and how her past experiences have guide today

We hope you enjoy!