Undisputed Authority

Season 1 of Undisputed Authority is wrapped. Season 2 is in production and arrives in early 2027.

Before then, two favours.

1. Send me a question. I'm recording a Q&A episode before Season 2. If you have questions about becoming an authority, or about any of the fifteen guests from this season, send them over. Questions by the end of October.

2. Who should I cover next? I'm looking for people recognised as the best at what they do in their market, who got there by publishing their thinking. If you know someone like that, and especially if you can make an introduction, I'd love to hear from you.

For both: DM me on LinkedIn → linkedin.com/in/liamcurley33

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.
Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley works with leaders who sell their expertise, helping them articulate the insights that get them recognised as authorities in their field.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33

It took Jay Acunzo five years to build a successful business as a paid keynote speaker.

At his peak, he did 25 gigs a year and opened the biggest event in his industry to 4,000 people.

Then the pandemic hit, and his business disappeared overnight.

He pivoted, built an advisory business model, and now earns more than he did in his most lucrative years as a speaker.

And he's done that in a way that few other advisors selling expertise attempt.

He prioritises creative projects, blends them with commercial ones, and runs a one-person business that pays musicians, videographers, and illustrators instead of outsourcing to AI.

He's gone all in on vinyl while the market has moved onto streaming.

That's the story I'm telling in Episode 15 of Undisputed Authority, one of advisory built on craftsmanship.

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.

Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

Resources:

• Website: jayacunzo.com
• Podcast: Why They Resonate
• Book: Break the Wheel

Sources used in this episode:

• The Learning Leader Show #349
• The Learning Leader Show #321
• Ira Glass on Storytelling, Part 3 (Current TV)
• Creator Science #63
• Creator Science #81
• The Marketing Companion with Mark Schaefer, Episode 329
• Trinity College English Alumni Panel
• Nothing Is Boring (jayacunzo.com)
• I Had 12 Readers. Google Still Loved My Blog (jayacunzo.com)
• How I Broke Through (jayacunzo.com)
• How I Unf*cked My Marketing (jayacunzo.com)
• On Current and Future Struggles in the Creator Economy (jayacunzo.com)
• Building the Creator Kitchen (Outseta)
• The Worst Advice for Building Your Business or Career: "Be the Best" (Jay's YouTube channel)
• Jay Acunzo on his personal journey (Instagram)
• LinkedIn: Turned 40
• LinkedIn: I hated both Google and HubSpot
• Undisputed Authority with Carl Richards
• Undisputed Authority with Marty Neumeier
• Undisputed Authority with Michael Zipursky
• Undisputed Authority with David C. Baker
• Undisputed Authority with Blair Enns
• Undisputed Authority with Nancy Duarte
• Undisputed Authority with Dorie Clark

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley works with leaders who sell their expertise, helping them articulate the insights that get them recognised as authorities in their field.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33

Roger L. Martin is one of the most influential thinkers on business strategy. 

He has advised the CEOs of companies like Procter & Gamble, Lego and Ford. 

In 2017, Thinkers50 named him the world's number one management thinker, and he has appeared in every one of their rankings since 2009. 

Aside from HBR editorial staff, he has written more articles for Harvard Business Review than anyone this century. And he co-wrote Playing to 
Win, a Wall Street Journal and Washington Post bestseller, one of his 13 books.

But by 1998, almost none of the thinking that would make him renowned was public. Before his 42nd birthday, he had published just four articles.

So how does someone get that far into the first half of their career, relatively unknown outside their network, and then become one of the highest-profile figures in their field?

That's the story I'm telling in Episode 14 of Undisputed Authority.

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.

Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

Resources:

Website: rogerlmartin.com

Substack: Playing to Win Practitioner Insights

Books: The Opposable Mind, The Design of Business, Playing to Win

Sources used in this episode:

• Wisdom From The Top with Guy Raz
• The CEO Series with Karl Moore
• Talk About Talk with Andrea Wojnicki
• HBR IdeaCast — Malcolm Gladwell
• BE GOOD! Podcast — Joe Henrich
• PBS NewsHour — Jerry Seinfeld
• Ira Glass on Storytelling — This American Life
• Consulting Success with Michael Zipursky
• The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish
• Roger Martin's Transformational Legacy — Poets & Quants
• Getting to Know Me I — Roger L. Martin, Medium
• Getting to Know Me III — Roger L. Martin, Medium
• Getting to Know Me IV — Roger L. Martin, Medium
• The Origins of Playing to Win — Roger L. Martin, Medium
• Being Fired Repeatedly — Roger L. Martin, Medium
• Being 'Too Busy' Means Your Personal Strategy Sucks — Roger L. Martin, Medium
• How I Do Strategy, Part One — Roger L. Martin, Medium
• Undisputed Authority with Rory Sutherland

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley works with leaders who sell their expertise, helping them articulate the insights that get them recognised as authorities in their field.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33

Michael Zipursky is the co-founder of Consulting Success, a coaching business that turns over multiple seven figures by helping consultants build and grow their own consulting firms.

The business is driven by publishing insight. They have a weekly newsletter with more than 45,000 subscribers, a podcast with more than 400 episodes, and several books.

Some time ago, a listener said to me, "All these authorities you study went to a prestigious university, or have Google or Apple on their CV. I don't have that. Is it even possible for someone like me, without an impressive CV, to become an authority?"

Michael Zipursky had none of that. No elite degree or famous employer. He’s not even had a proper job.

So, when you have none of the traditional credentials associated with being an authority, how do you become one?

That's the story I'm telling in Episode 13 of Undisputed Authority.

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.

Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

Resources:

• Website: consultingsuccess.com
• Podcast: Consulting Success Podcast
• Books: Consulting Success Books

Sources used in this episode:

• Bacon Wrapped Business
• Forecast with Ahmad Munawar
• GSD Podcast
• Your First Thousand Clients
• On The Brink with Andi Simon
• Red Cedar Marketing
• Undisputed Authority with Ryan Deiss

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley works with leaders who sell their expertise, helping them articulate the insights that get them recognised as authorities in their field.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33

Debbie Millman is one of the world's leading authorities on branding.

For two decades she was President of Sterling Brands, where she had a hand in around 20% of the brands on the US grocery aisle.

She has built her career on an understanding of how and why brands work, and at the centre of that understanding is the concept of deliberate differentiation. That branding is the act of attaching meaning to an object, idea, or movement.

So when people ask her how to build a personal brand, her answer is surprising: don't.

She thinks it's a trap. So how did the world's foremost branding expert build her own authority without ever branding herself?

That's the story I'm telling in Episode 12 of Undisputed Authority.

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.

Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

Resources:

• Website: debbiemillman.com
• Podcast: Design Matters
• Books: Books & Writing

Sources used in this episode:

• The Tim Ferriss Show
• Hello Monday
• Chase Jarvis
• The Great Discontent
• Good Life Project
• Unlocking Us
• Creative Boom
• TED - How symbols and brands shape our humanity
• 99U
• Wayne's World
• Sandra Bullock — 2010 Oscars
• Undisputed Authority with Rory Sutherland
• Undisputed Authority with Chris Do
• Undisputed Authority with Nancy Duarte
• Undisputed Authority with Blair Enns
• Undisputed Authority with David C. Baker

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley helps experts identify what makes them uniquely valuable, then develop the positioning, frameworks, and insights that differentiate them from everyone else in their field. These are people who lead businesses where their expertise is the product.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33

Chris Do is the founder of The Futur, an education business with 2.79 million YouTube subscribers.

But he didn't start there. He spent two decades running Blind, an Emmy-winning motion graphics studio working with Nike, Google, Microsoft and the NFL. At its peak, Blind was the kind of business most designers spend their careers trying to build.

So why did he walk away from it? And once he made the call, why did it take five years before the new business worked?

That's the story I'm telling in Episode 11 of Undisputed Authority.

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.

Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

Resources:

• Website: https://thefutur.com/
• YouTube: The Futur
• LinkedIn: Chris Do

Sources used in this episode:

• The Right Questions with James Victore
• Marc Gutman on Baby Got Backstory
• Hao Tran on Vietnam Innovators
• Chris Do on The Futur
• Jay Clouse on Creator Science
• Morgan Housel on Quiet Compounding
• Undisputed Authority with Ryan Hawk
• Undisputed Authority with Rory Sutherland
• Undisputed Authority with Marty Neumeier
• Undisputed Authority with Ryan Deiss

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley helps experts identify what makes them uniquely valuable, then develop the positioning, frameworks, and insights that differentiate them from everyone else in their field. These are people who lead businesses where their expertise is the product.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33

Jonathan Baker co-founded Monday Night Brewing in 2011, then spent almost a decade building it into an award-winning Atlanta craft brewery with taprooms across four states.

But at the height of that success, he stepped away to join his father David, who runs a 7-figure, one-person advisory firm in the creative services industry. David's a high-profile authority in the niche, working under the personal brand of "David C. Baker".

When Jonathan joins David, it's not as an employee. He's coming in as an equal. So how does a son build his own authority inside a niche where his father already owns the name?

That's the story I'm telling in Episode 10 of Undisputed Authority.

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.

Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

Chapters:

[00:00] Intro
[01:07] Chapter 1 - Monday Night Brewing
[14:23] Chapter 2 - The menu of projects
[30:10] Chapter 3 - Scaling the operation

Resources:

• Website: https://punctuation.com/

Sources used in this episode:

• Creative Mornings Live
• Mighty Roar
• The Emma Stratton Show
• Undisputed Authority - David C. Baker
• Undisputed Authority - Carl Richards

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley helps experts identify what makes them uniquely valuable, then develop the positioning, frameworks, and insights that differentiate them from everyone else in their field. These are people who lead businesses where their expertise is the product.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33

Across three decades, David C. Baker has become the leading authority on positioning and lead generation in the creative services space. That stature is driven by a phenomenal body of work.

He has several books, one of which, The Business of Expertise, is in my opinion the best book you'll find on positioning. And his podcast with Blair Enns, 2 Bobs, is the most listened to podcast in the space.

But he built that body of work at a time when there was less competing content. People were more likely to read emails, and readers determined what showed up in their feed rather than social media companies.

If David was starting today, would his deep and thoughtful content style rise to the top in a crowded marketplace of, mostly, shallow, easy-to-consume clickbait?

That's the question I'm asking in Episode 9 of Undisputed Authority.

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.

Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

Chapters:

[00:00] Intro
[00:54] Chapter 1 - Borrow
[17:07] Chapter 2 - Insight, not content
[30:29] Chapter 3 - Mind Your Own Business

Resources:

• Website: https://punctuation.com/
• Books: Financial Management of a Marketing Firm, The Business of Expertise, Secret Tradecraft of Elite Advisors, Selling your Professional Service Firm
• Podcast: 2Bobs

Sources used in this episode:

• 2Bobs
• Recognised Authority Podcast
• Consulting Success
• SharpSpring
• The Visible Expert
• The Soloist Life

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley helps experts identify what makes them uniquely valuable, then develop the positioning, frameworks, and insights that differentiate them from everyone else in their field. These are people who lead businesses where their expertise is the product.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33

Marty Neumeier is one of the world's most influential voices on brand. His book 'The Brand Gap' has sold more than 500,000 copies, and when Google wanted to create the Dictionary of Brand, they commissioned Marty.

But before he worked in brand, Marty ran an award-winning software packaging design agency. At the peak of its success, he launched a magazine called Critique and poured his agency's resources into funding it. After 5 years of losing money, he had to shut it down. And when a recession hit in the early 2000s, he had to close down his agency, too.

And yet, launching the magazine was the best business decision that Marty ever made.

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.

Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

Chapters:

[00:00] Intro
[01:11] Chapter 1 - Where The Money Is
[10:10] Chapter 2 - Not Specialised Enough
[26:30] Chapter 3 - Critique

Resources:

• Website: https://www.martyneumeier.com/
• Books mentioned: The Brand Gap, Zag, Brand A-Z
• LinkedIn: Marty Neumeier

Sources used in the episode:

• The Creative Shit Show
• The Futur with Chris Do
• Brand Design Masters with Philip VanDusen
• Everyone Hates Marketers with Louis Grenier
• Behind The Brand 
• The Sleeping Barber Marketing Podcast
• The 2pt5
• Just a Chat With

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley helps experts identify what makes them uniquely valuable, then develop the positioning, frameworks, and insights that differentiate them from everyone else in their field. These are people who lead businesses where their expertise is the product.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33

Rory Sutherland is one of the most influential voices in advertising.

He's a best-selling author, a sought after keynote speaker, and his views on advertising psychology regularly find an audience of millions.

For almost 40 years, Rory has worked at Ogilvy, one of the world's most prestigious advertising agencies.

But it wasn't his status at Ogilvy that turned a respected ad man into an undisputed authority.  It's his method of finding and articulating ideas that others overlook. And that method is available to anyone.

So how did he do it?

That's the story I'm telling in Episode 7 of Undisputed Authority.

Get the 10 Patterns of Disruptive Wisdom

There are 10 specific behavioural patterns that consistently separate authorities from equally talented experts who remain invisible.

Get the free 10-part email series where I break down those 10 patterns → liamcurley.co.uk/subscribe

Chapters:

[00:00] Intro
[00:58] Chapter 1 - The R&D Lab
[15:40] Chapter 2 - Fat Tailed
[29:28] Chapter 3 - Noticing what others only see

Resources:

• Book: Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don't Make Sense

Sources used in the episode:

• Jake Humphreys on The Room Where it Happened
• Scratch: CMO Interviews
• Patrick O’Shaughnessy on Invest Like The Best
• The Louis Theroux Podcast  
• Darren Lee
• TED Talk, Life Lessons of an Ad Man
• Infinite Loops Podcast
• One One One
• ContentUK

About Undisputed Authority

Each episode tells the story of how one expert became THE voice in their field – through deep research, conversation, and a three-chapter narrative structure. Not hacks. Strategies and patterns you can apply to your expertise-driven business. 

About Liam Curley

Liam Curley helps experts identify what makes them uniquely valuable, then develop the positioning, frameworks, and insights that differentiate them from everyone else in their field. These are people who lead businesses where their expertise is the product.

• Work with Liam: liamcurley.co.uk
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/liamcurley33