Ben Johnson is the Founder of Particle41. He’s a serial entrepreneur who’s raised $35 million over the course of his career. 

And in today’s episode, we go back to a moment when Ben and his co-founder had gained momentum with their company, Legal Inc. Just when they thought they could take their foot off the gas, they had to press even harder to save their business.

Their main seed investor, who was covering 50% of their $2m round, had dropped out.

Ben and his co-founder were edging close to the danger zone. They had to find a new investor — fast.

Tune in to learn how their pipeline approach helped them to find a solution. 

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Ben Fletcher is the founder of The Mothership, a consumer branding growth company. He successfully raised $22 million in 2 years and got to £10 million in revenue. 

Today we’re going way back… to 1999. 

Ben poured everything into his first-ever virtual event with blue-chip recruiters. He was excited. And the expectations were high.

But after a low turnout. The recruiters are left feeling disappointed.

Some even angry and threatening legal action. 

After a quick call with a lawyer. Ben was paralysed in fear. Will they pursue a lawsuit that could destroy the company?

Tune in to hear how it all pans out.

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We’ve all experienced those nights spent tossing and turning in dreadful anticipation of a difficult conversation. Today’s guest, David Valentine, remembers one particular night five years ago.

It was the night before he had to tell his best friend and business partner that the partnership was over. But here’s the thing about those gut-wrenching moment before a very difficult event. They are usually worth it. 

This episode is evidence that supports the idea that the right thing to do and the hard thing to do are usually the same.

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COVID was an obstacle for many businesses. But while the lockdown created temporary challenges for certain industries, the introduction of remote work completely obliterated the idea of office life. As a result, Lucy Minton’s one-year-old business became almost unviable practically overnight.

In this conversation, we’ll walk through this worst-case scenario. We’ll talk about how to prepare for a bear market, how to be realistic, and how to be decisive to not only survive but thrive.

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We’re constantly trying to find that equilibrium in life where it feels like we’re doing a great job in our business and we’re doing a great job in our personal life. But why does it still feel unachievable?

In this episode, I talk to Jeff Greenfield about practices he’s put in place to ensure quality time with his family, intense focus on his business, and the type of wellbeing that allows you to sleep 12 hours straight.

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Founders love a good stretch target. The only problem is this can often put them under massive pressure. This is exactly what happened to my guest today. 

Ken Babcock's wife Judy was set to give birth in a month and Ken used that deadline to place a somewhat self-imposed timeframe on his fundraising round. Find out what happened in this session. 

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I thought I'd take this opportunity to do a quick episode on taking a look back at this year and looking ahead to next year. 

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We’ve been talking a lot about risk in the last few weeks and today’s conversation puts an even finer point on this topic. What happens if you take the risk and get the worst possible outcome?

Kyle Roof, my guest today, lived that reality. He took what he felt was a measured risk to start a business and he lost everything. Every penny, every employee, and his brother ended up in jail.

But here’s the thing. His story doesn’t end there. The worst happened and he was able to get back on track. He found the right partner to balance the business risk in decision-making and he was ultimately able to do the near-impossible—which is to sell an agency. Here’s his story.

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It’s very tempting to lock ourselves away and build, build, build. We tinker so we feel productive. But what if that’s just a lie we tell ourselves? Are we just avoiding the real work? Are we avoiding the real feedback from our customers?

In this episode, you’ll hear from Scott Hurff, the co-founder of Churnkey. We talk about the risks and safer bets he took when building his SaaS and the processes he’s put in place to protect himself and his team from self-delusion.

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After all that we’ve been through in 2022… and are still carrying from previous years — right now, you just want to make it to the end of the year.

But how can this be transformed into a strong mindset? One that’s calm and ready?

Let’s discuss in this week’s podcast.

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