Pushing Beyond the Obvious

Pushing Beyond the Obvious

By Mukesh Gupta: Author, Blogger, Podcaster, Change Agent. Entreprenuer by Nature, Employee by ChoiceBusinessEducationSelf-ImprovementCareersManagement
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Pushing Beyond the Obvious episodes

  • PBTO16: Neil Patel (@NeilPatel) talks Entrepreneurship

    Who is on the show today: In today’s episode, we have Neil Patel. Neil is a serial entrepreneur & co-founder of Crazy Egg, Hello Bar, and KISSmetrics. He helps companies like Amazon, NBC, GM, HP and Viacom grow their revenue. Why is he on the show He was recognized as a top 100 entrepreneur under the age of 30 by President Obama. The Wall Street Journal calls him a top influencer on the web, Forbes says he is one of the top 10 online marketers, and Entrepreneur Magazine says he created one of the 100 most brilliant companies in the world What are we talking […]

    The post PBTO16: Neil Patel (@NeilPatel) talks Entrepreneurship first appeared on Leaders Worth Following.

    27 min
  • PBTO16: Building and Growing Startups
    Who is on the show today:

    In today’s episode, we have Neil Patel. Neil is a serial entrepreneur & co-founder of Crazy Egg, Hello Bar, and KISSmetrics. He helps companies like Amazon, NBC, GM, HP and Viacom grow their revenue.

    Why is he on the show

    He was recognized as a top 100 entrepreneur under the age of 30 by President Obama.

    The Wall Street Journal calls him a top influencer on the web, Forbes says he is one of the top 10 online marketers, and Entrepreneur Magazine says he created one of the 100 most brilliant companies in the world

    What are we talking about
    In this wide ranging discussion, we talk about entrepreneurship, leadership, selling, marketing, creativity, the importance of culture and how to build a culture, conflicts and a lot more.
    My learnings from the discussion are as below:
    • Leadership:
      • The most important role of a leader/founder/CEO is to be able to create a good team and an open and honest culture.
      • It is also important for a leader to disconnect from all the bustle of the day-to-day work to reflect on what they are doing and if they are indeed on the right path to make their vision a reality. Neil talks about a practice that he refers to as “Monk Days” where he completely disconnects himself to think about his business and makes notes about the course corrections that he wants to make or ideas that he wants to discuss with his team. He does this every month.
      • He also advices that it is ok to not hire someone who could potentially not be a cultural fit and wait for some one, i.e, hiring for cultural fit is more critical than hiring for talent.
      • Marketing:
        • The most important skill that a marketer needs to be successful is the ability to be creative.
        • It also helps a lot if they are able to work with techies and engineers so that they can growth hack or master the techie side of  marketing.
        • Managing Conflicts:
          • When it comes to conflicts, I learn that conflicts by themselves are not good or bad. However, every conflict holds a seed of growth, that can grow into something beautiful provided it has the right environment, which in this case is the culture of the organization. Neil, personally believes that the best way to resolve conflict in his organization is through data.

            • The overarching theme was that keeping things simple and common sensical is critical for success.

            You can find more information about Neil and follow him on twitter @NeilPatel.

            PS: This episode is sponsored by Audible. Visit http://www.audibletrial.com/PBTO to download a free audiobook and a 30 day free trial membership.

            27 min
          • We Cannot be Allergic to Failure and Still be Innovative – @windspike

            Who is on the show today: In today’s episode, we have Aaron Anderson. He is currently, Director of Strategic Organizational Initiatives at San Francisco State University, College of Business. Why is he on the show Aaron has been a consistent contributor to the Managament Innovation Exchange and won a MIX Prize for an experiment that he has been running in how he works.  His entry titled: “Working in Plain View: Using a Wiki & Social Media to broadcast as you work” won the prize in the “Digital Freedom Challenge”. He has been working in plain view of all his organization by using a wiki […]

            The post We Cannot be Allergic to Failure and Still be Innovative – @windspike first appeared on Leaders Worth Following.

            58 min
          • PBTO15: We Cannot be Allergic to Failure and Still be Innovative - @windspike
            Who is on the show today:

            In today’s episode, we have Aaron Anderson. He is currently, Director of Strategic Organizational Initiatives at San Francisco State University, College of Business.

            Why is he on the show

            Aaron has been a consistent contributor to the Managament Innovation Exchange and won a MIX Prize for an experiment that he has been running in how he works. 

            His entry titled: “Working in Plain View: Using a Wiki & Social Media to broadcast as you work” won the prize in the “Digital Freedom Challenge”.

            He has been working in plain view of all his organization by using a wiki and other open tools that allows him to work in ways that we have not seen yet.

            Lessons from his experiment:

            There are some very interesting learnings from this award winning experiment:

            • Lead: It is better to start something rather than wait for approval. Aaron did not create a powerpoint presentation and send it out to his bosses seeking approval for his idea. He went ahead and did what he believed in. True, that he got his fingers burnt a couple of times, however, he learnt from his experiences and continued to improve the effectiveness of the experiment.
            • Learn: It is critical to continue to learn and adapt the experiment to incorporate your learning.
            • Leverage: There are so many tools that are available for teams to use in order to work much more effectively together.
            • Courage: We cant remain allergic to failure and expect innovation in our organizations.
            • Openness: We now live in an era where openness is becoming a key to success and come to be expected as well. Whether it is Tesla opening up all their patents or working in plain view so that people around him can actually catch his mistakes much faster and earlier than when it becomes a much more costlier mistake and much more difficult to correct. Such transparency is not only good by itself but also good for the business.
            • Get Started: There are times when you do not know where you are going, in such situations, it is better to start moving slowly and learn as you go along rather than wait to get all the information before acting. This also means that you can continue to experiment in multiple directions and learn from them.
            • Responsibility without authority: Giving someone responsibility without giving them the authority to make things happen is not only frustrating but also a waste of everyone’s time and effort.

              • These are but some learnings I think I am taking away from this conversation.

              He shares a lot of great insights in the conversation and I do hope that you enjoy the same as well. Please do share with us what is it that you found most interesting by writing a content.

              You can also buy his book:

              Please note that this is an affiliate link.

               

              58 min
            • PBTO14: How do you change behavior of an experienced sales person with @DaveKahle

              Who is on the show today: In today’s episode, we have Dave Kahle. He is also known as the Growth Coach. Why is he on the show Dave Kahle is one of the world’s leading sales authorities. He’s the author of 12 books, including 11 Secrets of Time Management for Salespeople, and How to Sell Anything to Anyone Anytime. He writes a weekly Ezine for salespeople; and has presented in 47 states and ten countries. As a salesperson, he was the number one salesperson in the country for two different companies in two totally distinct industries. For over 20 years, he’s been […]

              The post PBTO14: How do you change behavior of an experienced sales person with @DaveKahle first appeared on Leaders Worth Following.

              59 min
            • PBTO14: How to change the behavior of experienced sales executives - with @DaveKahle
              Who is on the show today:

              In today’s episode, we have Dave Kahle. He is also known as the Growth Coach.

              Why is he on the show

              Dave Kahle is one of the world’s leading sales authorities. He’s the author of 12 books, including 11 Secrets of Time Management for Salespeople, and How to Sell Anything to Anyone Anytime.

              He writes a weekly Ezine for salespeople; and has presented in 47 states and ten countries.

              As a salesperson, he was the number one salesperson in the country for two different companies in two totally distinct industries.

              For over 20 years, he’s been President of Kahle Way(r) Sales Systems, a sales training/consulting company. In that capacity, he’s trained tens of thousands of salespeople and sales managers.

              What are we talking about

              In this discussion we talk about how to change behavior of experienced sales executives. One of the difficult task of sales managers is to get their sales people to change their behavior (specifically the behavior of sales people who have or were successful in the past and need to change to adapt to the new realities.
               
              Dave walks us through his 7 step process to help such experienced sales executives change and transform.
               
              This discussion was inspired by a blog post that he had written. You can find the post with the same title as this episode here.
              Buy his book

              You can also buy her book on amazon by clicking on the book image below. This is an affiliate link.

              You can connect with him at http://www.davekahle.com and on twitter @DaveKahle.

              PS: Please do leave a rating or a review on iTunes if you really liked the episode 

              A blog post that Dave mentioned:

              • How do you change the behavior of  an experienced sales person
              • You can join his mailing list here to subscribe to his ezine.
              • You can find more information about the Kahle System here.
                •  
                59 min
              • PBTO13: @LetsGrowLeaders – In conversation with Karin Hurt

                Who is on the show today: In today’s episode, we have Karin Hurt. Her award-winning blog, Let’s Grow Leaders, has grown into a highly interactive, International community. Her book, Overcoming An Imperfect Boss is available on Amazon. Why is she on the show She has a diverse background of executive leadership experience in sales, customer service, call centers, human resources, merger integration, training and leadership development – the last 20 years of which have been with Verizon. Most recently, she served as Executive Director of the Strategic Partnership Channel at Verizon Wireless where she transformed customer service outsourcing, working with companies and call centers to build […]

                The post PBTO13: @LetsGrowLeaders – In conversation with Karin Hurt first appeared on Leaders Worth Following.

                47 min
              • PBTO13: @LetsGrowLeaders - In conversation with Karin Hurt
                Who is on the show today:

                In today’s episode, we have Karin Hurt. Her award-winning blog, Let’s Grow Leaders, has grown into a highly interactive, International community. Her book, Overcoming An Imperfect Boss is available on Amazon.

                Why is she on the show

                She has a diverse background of executive leadership experience in sales, customer service, call centers, human resources, merger integration, training and leadership development – the last 20 years of which have been with Verizon.

                Most recently, she served as Executive Director of the Strategic Partnership Channel at Verizon Wireless where she transformed customer service outsourcing, working with companies and call centers to build strong cultures that deliver positive customer experiences.

                Her high-trust, high-collaboration approach drove substantial improvement across the portfolio, with centers performing at parity or above internal centers.

                Prior to that she led a Verizon Wireless sales team, leading the nation in store sales to the small and medium business space. Karin’s consulting takes a comprehensive approach to developing confident, competent, and creative front-line teams.

                She has also co-authored “Parents Guide to Leadership”, which is a book about teaching children to be leaders. You can download the book here.

                What are we talking about
                In this freewheeling conversation we talk about
                • Importance of teaching leadership skills to our children.
                • What is the most important thing that one should do to inculcate leadership skills in our children
                • How can you systematically create leaders
                • What is the role of a leader in a business settings
                • The importance of engaging hearts and minds of people you want to lead.
                • Seven traits of leaders
                • The importance of translating the vision to specific behaviors
                • Some of the most common mistakes that leaders commit and how to avoid them
                • How can leaders continue to add value to their teams
                • What causes leadership failures?
                • How leaders can remain grounded
                  • Buy her book

                  You can also buy her book on amazon by clicking on the book image below. This is an affiliate link.

                  You can connect with her at http://www.letsgrowleaders.com and on twitter @LetsGrowLeaders

                  PS: Please do leave a rating or a review on iTunes if you really liked the episode 

                  A blog post that Karin mentioned:

                  • When MBWA Becomes Oh Crap Here They Come
                  • 10 Questions Your Team Is Afraid to Ask
                    • 47 min
                  • PBTO12: Making Breakthrough Innovations Happen with @PorusMunshi

                    Who is on the show today: In today’s episode, we have Porus Munshi, author of the best selling book “Making Breakthrough Innovations Happen”. Why is he on the show I have worked with Porus on an innovation project and from experience know that he is a great coach and has the uncanny ability to guide the teams to achieve their goals without any compromises. His understanding of the breakthrough or leapfrog innovation process is very deep and I have learnt a lot in every conversation that i have had with him over the past few years. . What are we talking […]

                    The post PBTO12: Making Breakthrough Innovations Happen with @PorusMunshi first appeared on Leaders Worth Following.

                    1 hr 10 min
                  • PBTO12: Making Breakthrough Innovations Happen with @PorusMunshi
                    Who is on the show today: In today’s episode, we have Porus Munshi, author of the best selling book “Making Breakthrough Innovations Happen”. Why is he on the show I have worked with Porus on an innovation project and from experience know that he is a great coach and has the uncanny ability to guide … Continue reading "PBTO12: Making Breakthrough Innovations Happen with @PorusMunshi"
                    1 hr 10 min

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