Uncommon

Bernard Wheelahan AM is a retired business executive whose career spans multiple continents across mining, resources and renewables.

His work in building Latin-American and Australian relations has been recognised with scholarships named in his honour at ANU, and a membership to the Order of Australia. He’s served in an incredible array of positions, that makes my life look like child's play. Bernard has served as Chairman of Pacific Hydro and the Council of Australia Latin America Relations, President of Shell in Venezuela, and directorships that have included Transfield, Woodside and Karoon Gas.

After I interview each guest I always want to know: If they could pick just one guest to be on the podcast, who would it be? When I asked Phil Ruthven this question, he said Bernard’s name in a heartbeat.

Bernard is wise, kind and full of brilliant stories from an individual who has clearly taken his fair share of responsibility through life.

We've been working on this for quite a few months and very excited to share with you all - take a listen to find out more.

Special thanks to our first two clients who essentially spurred us on the create the service and monetise the podcast, without slamming you all with ads.

Henrik Andersson CFA is the CIO of Apollo Capital Management - an active fund manager of crypto assets across currencies, ICOs, arbitrage and event-driven trades. Henrik has over 17 years experience in global financial markets, with almost a decade on Wall Street. Henrik holds a Master of Science in Engineering Physics from the Royal Institute of Technology and a Master of Science in Business Administration and Economics from Stockholm University.

The financial services industry doesn’t stand as high and mighty as it once was. Like an old dilapidated building, it tries to keep out the weather of scandal after scandal. But distrust and frustration continues to grow as we start to rip off the band-aid from the GFC globally. There are crypto junkies who believe that the evolution of cryptocurrency will be as dramatic as the planes hitting the Twin Towers, and that the financial world will be split into pre and post-crypto.

For those who want a less radical and more rational approach, then seeking the opinion of institutional investors like Henrik - who are able to wade through the backwaters of crypto hysteria - are incredibly valuable.

Henrik is in my opinion, one of the wiser owls in this space. His Swedish background and incessant focus on learning, brings a level-headed approach that’s required for the industry to mature - while providing us with the opportunity to understand what these assets actually are, and how to value them.

Dr Iggy Soosay is a GP, former Chairman of the Australasian College of Nutritional and Environmental Medicine, Lecturer and Member of the RACGP-AIMA working party on Complementary Medicine. Iggy is an Integrative/Functional Medical Doctor with over 35 years, who has led the way in Australia for treating chronic gut related issues.

While the treatment of the gut has become the nouveau riche trend in our Instagram feeds over the last few years with Kombucha & Sauerkraut as your trend products, the gut has been treated by people like Iggy for decades. For me, it’s been a long issue in my adult life that I’ve constantly battled within this strange David (me) v Goliath (the gut) in which the gut is easily winning.

Iggy refers to Hippocrates, the father of medicine, and his quote “all disease begins in the gut”. I can assure you, that for someone who has constantly dealt with chronic gut issues - that’s what life feels like. The impunity of which your gut can react to anything around you; environment, food, stress - largely dictate my ability to perform at an average level of competence. Fatigue, pain, random autoimmune reactions, and impact on your lifestyle are just some of the features that the gut can hammer onto us long time sufferers.

Meeting Iggy has been a relief for me personally. After interviewing him, I took it on board to visit him as a patient. Needless to say, he discovered elements of my history (including regular antibiotics as a child), that no GP would have discovered in a microscopic five minute appointment - as I bounce around aimlessly over the last 5 years, like a ball in a medical “pinball machine” from specialist to GP to specialist.

Wade and Byrne are the founders of the brand and podcast known as Sci-gasm, and two of Australia’s brightest young science communicators. If you like that skeptical combination of science and comedy, that brings an understanding of science to a scientific pleb like me, then I’m absolutely sure you’ll love the work of these two gentlemen.

I became enthralled with science as I went through an interesting stage of self improvement, driving to and from university listening to Dr Karl spin fascinating stories from boring peer reviewed papers. I matured with Neil Degrasse Tyson as he made me realise we’re really just cruising through space on a giant green, earth-shaped convertible. I became aware of my hunger for rationalism and the truth as I discovered the likes of Richard Feynman and Sam Harris in my most recent years of self discovery.

Scientific communication is the toughest form of storytelling and a noble task - you’re aiming for the truth while also making it palatable for the everyman. I have immense respect for what Wade and Byrne are able to do, and I think you should discover that to.

Dion McCurdy is a lawyer and co-founder of NewVote, an independent nonpartisan nonprofit. NewVote is a foundation whose aim is enhance democracy through their digital participation app; allowing you to gain access to a dedicated public record of every political issue, goal and solution facing Australia, a source of balanced information, a tool to co-create policy and be part of the decision making process, and a channel to communicate with representatives.

Politics is a fascinating area we’ve covered across many interviews with MPs, media commentators and pundits in the past - so I thought it would be prudent to get a individual that can help all of us better understand the structure of democracies.

Democracy and free speech is being tested in the West by polarising groups from both the left and right, this interview should kick us off in the right direction around structuring and managing democracy - one of the most important creations for managing societies.

Jamie Skella is the Co-founder of Horizon State, co-owner of eSports gaming bar GG EZ, and former board member of MiVote.

I’ve had the pleasure now of hosting a few Australian cryptocurrency chiefs, so us mere mortals can further understand the exceptional capacity of the blockchain technology. Many of you have asked me, “what else can blockchain do?”.

So I thought it was prudent to reach out to Jamie, a rare innovator actually building a tool with immediate utility. Horizon State is like the digital Electoral Commission, or more colloquially known as “The Decision Token”. Jamie and his team have truly built a mechanism and secure voting system for the 21st century. By doing so they have destined the admirable end of the old paper voting system that defines western canon in democracy, capitalism and law.

Josh Wade is a comedian, entertainer, podcast host, and co-founder of Verve Network. Josh has built an incredible comedy career at a very young age, forged in the pits of YouTube with his character “Cunny”.

If I was a comedian, I feel that my style would be very much in line with Josh. He’s just as skeptical as I am, always questioning what’s real and what’s a mirage - all the while looking to improve both himself and others. He’s almost like a young Aussie George Carlin.

When we spoke last time he made mention of his business Verve briefly, but in this episode we really got to hear about what his plans are, and potentially what the next few years looks like for a guy who’s chomping at the bit to get shit done.

Adam Stone is an entrepreneur, Founder of Speedlancer and serial globetrotter.

The son of our former guest, Adrian Stone, Adam has been running businesses in the eCommerce and Telecomm space since the early age of twelve. His award as Australia's Student Entrepreneur of the Year in 2013 by the Entrepreneurs' Organisation and the Forbes Asia 30 Under 30 List, speaks to his constant desire to build both businesses and a lifestyle he enjoys.

Speedlancer is currently the world’s fastest freelance marketplace (at least of what I could find through Google). As a regular user of Upwork to support our business infrastructure at Neuralle, I can with absolute assurance that communities of curated professionals like Speedlancer, is almost certainly where the future of work will be.

Shayne Hunter is a comedian and ex-leader of radical left wing group, Antifa in Australia.

He’s probably one of the most intelligent and intense comedians I’ve ever come across. He’s floated in and out of ideology over the last few years - initially a right wing libertarian, then an anarchist/leftist radical and now a steadfast libertarian pushing people to not fall into identify politics.

Shayne is socially aware and poignant in his analysis of society, a benefit to anyone wanting to learn more about group-think or ideology.

This is a brilliant lesson in how people can be sucked into cabbaging their minds about belief, ideology and cults. Most of my time was spent getting out of Shayne’s way, letting him explain the journey and ideology of the radical left - the group he believes is ideologically more dangerous than ISIS.