The Fink Tank

It started with our shit original band and stupid holiday videos. Now it’s keynotes, coaching, and feature films.

Compound interest isn’t just about money.

In this mid-summit episode of the Fink Tank, Col and I chat about the cruel human condition of being overly critical of our progress or growth.

About how we underplay our past accomplishments in our journeys toward mastery. This whole room of solo pros deliberately and meaningfully joined the dots of their history. And were called out on pointless self-deprecation!

It's really gratifying to reflect on the timeline of your accumulated skills.

Try it!

Eight years ago, I deleted an entire keynote I’d just filmed for Tracey Ezard.

Not a file. Not a clip.

The whole keynote. Gone. Like a magician, but sad.

It felt career-ending.

Tracey, somehow, was kind and forgiving. I, in return, filmed her next keynote free-of-charge and built a shame-fuelled foolproof backup system.

It has never happened again. Mostly because I now treat footage like a live organ transplant.

We all make mistakes. It doesn't feel like it in the moment, but there aren’t many you can’t come back from. I filmed another keynote for Tracey a few weeks ago. She’s still awesome.

This week on The Fink Tank, Col Fink and I set the scene with some glorious childhood dickheadery.

What’s the worst you’ve ever screwed up?

And how long did it take before you could laugh about it?

Day one: everything clicks. You’re in the zone.

Day two: same task, same brain… suddenly you suck?

Even experts like Adam Voigt and Kirsty Lush can turn in the occasional clanger.

It happens. They’re still legends.

So are you (probably).

Before a bad day spirals into a full identity crisis, try this:

Change the space. Change the feel. Change the day.

It might be the context that’s off. Not your competence.

In this Friday Fink Tank, Col and I talk about how performance shifts when your environment does, and why blaming yourself is often the least helpful option. Idiot.

This episode is proudly sponsored by

“I was better yesterday and I don’t know why.”

Ever watched someone speak, lead, or perform and thought, “Wait… that’s it? I could do that!”

Except of course, you couldn’t.

This episode of The Fink Tank is about deceptive simplicity. Watching mastery is often marvelling at how simple it looks in its final form!

And it works both ways, because here’s the thing we forget:

The stuff that feels easy to you now is usually the most valuable to someone else. The stuff that looks effortless because it’s been practiced into your bones.

You’ve done it so many times, you barely notice the skill anymore. But that’s the gold. That’s what people actually need from you.

As Digby Scott succinctly puts it, “meet ‘em where they’re at”

—

Also, I’m feeling a bit of discomfort writing this. Because @Col has used ME as the metaphor!

Antipodean culture spurns blowhards. We’re taught to avoid being the hero in our own story.

But I also believe in owning your expertise. Downplaying effort and practice benefits nobody.

In saying “Yeah, I’m good at this” without being a wanker about it.

I sat down and gave myself a good hard talking to.

Literally. On the Fink Tank matching chairs. In Budapest!

My voice sometimes comes out of someone else’s mouth. If it’s one of my brothers, it’s often the exact sentence I would have said. In a voice that sounds exactly like mine.

In the days of landline phones, someone calling the Fink house couldn’t tell which of the four male Finks in the house they were speaking to. In group conversation with friends, I can often hear my contribution come from someone else, just before I was about to say it. The phrasing or intonation will probably be pretty similar too, even if the exact voice isn’t.

If it’s the ideas I want to share, they’re probably similar to what the rest of LinkedIn is saying (this week hustle culture is dead!)

This is completely normal. We’re all products of our environment, no matter how individual we feel.

So. If my thoughts are indistinguishable from other people’s, do mine matter? Do yours?

In this special Fink Tank episode, sans Col Fink, I sat down with myself in Budapest to talk about it.

Most people do the wrong prep for public speaking.

Here’s a better approach 👇

1. Already have 5 different appearances in front of a thousand people booked across a single weekend.

2. Treat it like a Q&A, even if it isn’t.

Step 1 might be out of your control, but step 2 isn’t.

After some top-shelf sibling dickheadery to open this episode, Col elaborates. He reckon most people would rather see you launch with gusto into good audience questions than watch you battle your way through 30 minutes of slides. He's spot on.

Questions help you: 

- get present with the audience.

- get away from script and slides.

If the audience isn't asking questions (or the right ones), you can ask them of yourself (after reading the room!).

Go you good things!

PS. Tony Wilson and I hit #28 at the Aussie box office a few weeks ago. Out of how many? No idea. Don’t care.

* Laughs all the way away from the bank *

“Now you know why I keep saying the same old shit” 

Colin Hay, writer of Land Down Under and other global hits, isn’t just a great songwriter. He’s a great story teller too. 

At his lives shows, he respects the audience by playing the hit songs. We’ll indulge some new or deep-catalogue songs mid-set, but don’t you dare deprive us of Who Can It Be Now!

He respects the audience by telling the hit stories too.

I’ve seen Colin Hay many times, and I’ve heard him tell the same stories again and again. And I love it!

The one time he told a new story and fluffed the punchline, it only emphasised how much practice and care has gone into the classic anecdotes.

Col opens this Good Friday Fink Tank with one of his “hits”, while I pretend to be an audience of lawyers.

Hopefully it inspires you to make sure you’ve got one or two anecdotes in the chamber that you can pull out at a moment’s notice to grab and hold people’s attention.

What would be the best leadership style in the universe of Dr Seuss?

Col suggests an Autocratic Democratic Anarchistic Meritocracy.

To be fair, he started a reasoned and interesting conversation about combining systems of governance into your approach as a leader. 

The Dr Suess bit was me. 

I later noticed a further similarity with John Travolta’s lines before he launches into “Greased Lightning” in the musical Grease (this car could be systematic, hydromatic, ultramatic). Important stuff.

I digress.

Winston Churchill once said democracy is the worst form of Government, except for all the others. At a societal level he's absolutely right.

In smaller groups, democracy is not necessarily the ideal structure of governance. Especially if you hope to foster some of the most admirable aspects of human psychology; curiosity, courage, innovation, etc.

In this week's Fink Tank, Col and I discuss the intricacies of various styles of leadership, and reach little in the way of firm conclusions.

What would bring out the best in Sam-I-Am, The Lorax, and Marvin K Mooney?

I’ll “just” do it myself.I’ll “just” pay someone else do it.

All of us have uttered those phrases, unaware of the horror that awaits.

It’s easy to think we can solve a problem quickly and easily if we “just” do it ourselves. Or cheaply, if we “just” pay someone else to do it.

When you don’t know what you don’t know, things can go comedically wrong at speed. Something you thought would be quick, easy, and cheap, turns out to be NONE OF THOSE THINGS.

What can we do about it?

If you’re good, it’s okay to be repetitive.

If you’re good, it’s okay to be repetitive.

When Lisa O'Neill starts telling a fresh audience a story I’ve heard ten or twenty times, I am delighted.

I’m delighted for the audience, I’m delighted for me, I’m delighted for the shared experience we’re about to have!

Lisa’s done the work to shape and polish her brilliant ideas into memorable and hilarious stories. She knows her pithy lines. The punchlines we remember and share later.

Have you done the work to nail your pithy lines?