February 5, 2025 • 48 mins
Welcome back to Dawn of a New Era!
Today, I’m sitting down with Will Polston, a coach with a knack for unlocking what’s holding entrepreneurs back and helping them create lives they love.
From lessons learned during his early ventures to how he’s inspiring big shifts for his clients today, we’re talking about the real stories behind success, self-mastery, and finding fulfilment.
Believe me, this episode is one you won't want to miss!
Highlights:
(2:17) Overcoming Limiting Beliefs
(4:10) Self-Worth and Fear of Success
(11:04) Influences and Personal Development
(16:53) Building a Support Network
(22:21) Challenges and Embarrassing Moments
(35:57) Future of Coaching and Personal Development
To connect with Will:
Connect with Dawn:
Instagram @dawnmcgruer @dawnofanewerapodcast
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/dawnamcgruer
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/businessconsort/
Web www.dawnmcgruer.com
This podcast is in association with @HerPowerCommunity - The #1 Female Founders Global Community where connections flourish & growth is intentional
https://www.patreon.com/c/herpowercommunity
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
Dawn it's Dawn McGruer, thebusiness growth coach. And welcome
to dawn of a New Era, thepodcast where we talk all things
health, wealth and happinessand where founders share the good
and bad and ugly of being anentrepreneur. Welcome, Will, to Dawn
of a New Era, and thank youfor traveling to meet us in the studio
in Manchester. So before we goany further, obviously we've met
(00:25):
multiple times. I wasn't awareof the first meet because I was on
stage. Second time we were ina room, part of a network. But share
a little bit about who you areand what you do.
My name is Will Polston and Ihelp driven entrepreneurs to have
more time and less stress. Isthe. The short. Is the super short
version.
And when did you first startyour business?
(00:46):
So, my coaching business, Istarted nine years ago. It's kind
of in a business of two halvesbecause Covid, for a lot of people
changed a lot of stuff. It'sreally funny. So only Monday, I was.
I was chatting someone, theywere talking about how can you get
started with producing onlinevideos? And I said, literally, just
start and get perfect later.And I actually was able to find my
first ever video. I did it onthe 31st of December, 2015, and it
(01:09):
actually made me cry. And itmade me cry for two reasons. One,
it was how bad it was. No, I'mkidding. It made me cry because the
exact same message that I wastalking about then is the same stuff
I talk about now nine yearslater. And I cannot for the life
of you tell me what I said inthat video if you had. Do I remember
doing the video? Absolutely,because I recorded it about 12 times
(01:29):
before I actually posted it.But talking about the same thing
then as I do now, which ishelping people to live their, what
I call North Star, which is amission in life. That's the equivalent
of trying to empty the seawith a spoon. So, yeah, that was
all the way back then, but itmade me cry just because it made
me realize how raw the passionwas. And I had no idea how I was
(01:49):
going to do stuff. I just knewI wanted to do it. And I just looked
at that next step and thatfirst step and went back and went,
wow, that's. I had no ideaback then, but I just did it anyway.
See, I always think it's sointeresting when you talk to entrepreneurs
because one of thecommonalities I see a lot is the
vision. So when I firststarted at 21, I was so passionate
and I was just so eager thatno challenge was a challenge. And
(02:14):
I think it's interesting whenyou talk about the way that your
business started because whatwe have in our mind is we've taken
away some of the limitingbeliefs and we're kind of prepared
to step past them. And I seethis in a lot of entrepreneurs journeys.
What do you think has been thebiggest limiting belief that you've
encountered on your journey?
(02:35):
That I'm not deserving. Likelots of beliefs that we have, they
come from our programming aschildren and whatnot. And I think
that there was a maybe evensort of subconscious unconscious
way that my parents brought meup. And this is not, not blaming
them by any means. They onlywanted the best, which was you get
(02:57):
rewards when you've donecertain things and there's a combination
of wanting to do things andhave a reward because you've done
it, which I get, I understandthe element of that. But then there's
this part of me going, well Ican't do that yet because I don't
deserve it because I'm not Xyet. And I think that there's so
(03:18):
many people that have thisbelief of I don't deserve it, I'm
not good enough yet. If youcontinue to believe that you'll never
be good enough, every singlemonth there is something that I will
maybe not I'll be resistant ofputting out on social media or saying
because I think, oh, am I goodenough to say that? Can I, can I
even ask that question? Can Ido that? Yeah, I think that's definitely
(03:40):
one for sure.
I think self worth comes up alot for men and women in business
because a lot of us are busybuilding the businesses, doing things
for others that we forgetabout our own self care, our own
self compassion. And I thinkas business owners it's quite tempting
also to have the negative selftalk that we are very critical on
(04:02):
what we're doing. And as we'removing forward there's almost a kind
of a belief of like, well,what happens if it all gets taken
away? Have you experienced thefear through success?
I see it more and more andmore. So the majority of my private
clients are entrepreneurs thatare turning over seven, eight, nine
figures. One of my clients hada multi nine figure exit. And what's
(04:26):
interesting is it's the samedrive that gets them going and enables
them to achieve success, quoteunquote traditional success that
they then find themselvesgoing, well I still need to, I need
to do that next thing, I'm notthere yet. I call it when then syndrome.
When I achieve this, then I'llbe happy when I Get that? Then I'll
be content when I get this,then I'll be at peace. And it doesn't.
(04:48):
Like, they keep driving anddriving and driving some obscene
amounts of success that a lotof these people have. And you ask
them, are you successful? Theygo, no, not yet, because I've not
done this part or this part.And that's the big difference between
switching to focus on the gainof what you've already achieved,
rather than constantly lookingat the gap. But it's the gap that
drives them in the beginningfor so long.
(05:09):
See, I think it's alsointeresting that we've had conversations
in the group we're part of,where people have different understandings
of success, which I love. Andthe fact that success is not, you
know, a monetary step, likeit's part of it. You know, every
business needs to beprofitable and sustainable and even
sellable. But sometimes Ithink we get caught up in the online
(05:31):
focus of this kind of 7, 8, 9figures. One of the things that I
love is that I've kind of hita point where I feel like I'm in
balance and I don't need to gofurther on the financial side of
things. I've got more of afocus towards enrichment and experiences
rather than monetary. What'sbeen your shift in terms of, like,
(05:54):
starting a business? How oldwere you when you first started.
First proper business was 24.
So what's been the differencein your values and your motivating
factors then? Because minehave changed a lot since 21 to 31,
to 45?
Yeah. Well, I suppose it'd beinteresting if I. If I go back and
give you a bit of thebackstory. So I grew up with a belief
that money equal happiness.I've got two very wealthy uncles.
(06:16):
One's a billionaire, the otherone's a multi. Multimillionaire.
And my dad always used to saythey just got lucky. That was his
thing. They just got lucky.They just got lucky. I was very fortunate
growing up. I always hadclothes on my back, food in the fridge,
went on holiday every year,albeit they weren't always big, crazy,
lavish holidays. But I had avery fortunate upbringing. But what
I remember growing up was howmuch my dad hated his job. So he
(06:38):
would get up at 5 o'clock inthe morning, get on his bike, ride
to the station, go intoLondon, do a job he hated, come home
and bring the stress and thefrustration home with him. And I
don't know if anyone listeningto this can relate to someone in
their life that when they'rearound that person, they can just
feel the tension. It's like a.It's a force field that they can
feel. And that was the case ofmy dad. And then I remember I must
(06:59):
have been about 10 years old,and one day my dad came home from
work and I was home fromschool, and he was there already.
I was like, this is weird.Dad's never normally home this early.
And it's because he'd quit hisjob and he'd quit his job to set
up a business with one of myuncles. And at the time, I was like,
yes, this is gonna be amazing.Dad's gonna be just like Uncle Steve,
and he's gonna be happy andcontent. Cause my Uncle Steve in
(07:21):
particular, he's this realextrovert, great character, always
full of energy. He was gonnaset up that business, Fast forward
a few months, he'd alreadyquit his job. I was the eldest of
four. I had two brothers andsisters who were seven. They're twins.
And then a baby sister who wasnot even one. Then my mum. Then there
was no job, no income, and mydad fell into a. What we would call
a depression. You know,curtain, shuttle day, didn't leave
the house. Very stereotypicalin that respect. And I was 10 years
(07:44):
old, and I just started toconnect the dots. It was really obvious
for me, Uncle Mark,billionaire, really happy Uncle Steve,
multimillionaire, really happydad. When he worked in London, okay,
he was stressed and frustrateda bit, but he was a lot happier when
he was working than now. Hehas no money, doesn't leave the house.
So for me, at 10 years old, itwas obvious, money equals happiness.
(08:05):
So I went off on that journeyto make as much money as I could
as early as I could. I was thekid in school buying and selling
suites and buying stuff off. Iwas looking for stuff in the paper,
seeing what it was priced atebay. And if I could get it for more
money on ebay, I would buy outthe paper and then put it straight
on ebay and do it, doing allthis stuff. I had two or three paper
rounds, I think, when I was 13or 14. Yeah, there must have been
(08:25):
12 or 13, because then Istarted working in a bar when I was
14. And that was my thing,money equal to happiness. And I started
making money. I remember being14 years old, and this is now 20
years later, being 14 yearsold and making £200 a week cash.
The time we're recording thisis. We've just heard about the budget.
(08:48):
And the budget for certain agegroup is £10. I was earning £10 an
hour 20 years ago. So it's alot of money. And I would just buy
stuff and that's what I woulddo. I would buy stuff. And I then
started buying clothes and Ireally like clothes. And then fast
forward a little bit. I endedup wanting to run my own clothes
shop. And the reason I wantedto own my own design a clothes shop
was because the guy was amultimillionaire. And that's what
(09:09):
I wanted to be. I wanted to bea multimillionaire and do something
I loved, which was beinginvolved with fashion. And there's
a long winded story, but I'mnot going to it all now. But I ended
up leaving that industry andthen working in financial services
and I was a broker. By thetime I was in my late teens, early
20s, I was making 20 grand amonth. And that went on for some
years. I stumbled acrosspersonal development when I was about
(09:32):
18 and I love personaldevelopment because the more personal
development I did, the moremoney I made. And that went on for
some years. And then it was 11years ago that I went to an event
with Tony Robbins. And manypeople listening to this would have
heard of Tony Robbins. Andthat's when I had my lightning moment.
And bam, it just hit me and Icried my eyes out for about 15 minutes.
Because in that moment Irealized my real driver was nothing
(09:54):
to do with money. It had neverbeen about money. It was to do with
my dad and how my dad hadn'tachieved certain things he was capable
of and the impact that had onhim and my mum and me and my family
and the host of other people.And I vowed I don't want anyone else
to ever have to go through thesuffering that he went through and
we went through from thatmoment 11 years ago, it completely
altered the trajectory of mylife. So to your question, have I
(10:15):
ever had any belief valueschange? That moment there was a pivotal
moment and life went in acompletely different direction.
Yeah, I think it's sointeresting, isn't it? Because when
we start a business, obviouslymoney and cash is the king. We need
to focus on getting consistentcash flow and building the business
and again with clients. Andyou'll know yourself that it's often
the biggest worry and thebiggest scaling factor that they're
(10:37):
focused on. So if you thinkabout your values now, what is it
that lights you up inbusiness? Like, what is the true
dream that like is why you dowhat you do.
So for me, still is aroundself mastery. I love. I'm obsessed
with anything to do with selfmastery, particularly mindset, I'm
(10:58):
fascinated by because I alwayscome back to how can you have two
different people that get thesame information, but one goes and
does stuff and one doesn't.You know, I find that fascinating.
So that's something thatlights me up. I have a real interest
in business and buildingbusinesses. So I suppose that's,
that's one of the reasons whyI work with a lot of entrepreneurs
and business owners because Ihave the very fortunate position
(11:19):
of being able to parachuteinto their businesses and understand
what's going on and love thatvariety. So is essentially unlocking
people. Is unlocking peoplewhat, whatever the barrier is to
achieve their dream lifefaster. You said it earlier, success
is subjective, right? Successfor every single person is different.
So if we can get them really,really clear on, well, what does
that success look like for apoint in time? Not necessarily it's
(11:42):
going to change in a bowl overtime. But if we can get clear on
that and then we can justbreak down those barriers and remove
them or make them themsmaller, then they're going to get
to where they want to get to faster.
So from a mindset point ofview, obviously you've invest in
that and a lot of people willbe kind of newer on their journey.
So when you see people talkingabout like top books and things online
(12:05):
or podcasts, like what are thethings that you remember? Like really
you listened to or you readthat changed your thought process,
you.
Can read the same book overthe course of three or five years,
you know, read it each yearand every time take something different.
There's one book that I'veread, I've read it every summer holiday
since I very first read it,which is a bit of a cliche personal
(12:28):
development book is a bookcalled the Secret by Rhonda Byrne.
It's about the law ofattraction. And the reason why it
was so profound for me was notbecause it introduced me to this
new idea. What it did was itmade me realize that I'd been doing
this thing that had worked forme. I mean, when I was in my early
teens, mid teens, anything Iwanted, I got. I wanted a mini motor,
(12:48):
I'd get it. I wanted electric,I wanted a petrol scooter, I'd get
it. These things, I'dvisualize it, I would see it, I would,
I would do the work to be ableto get it. And I went, ah, so that's
what I've been doing. I thinkthat for so many people, when you
ask them what's the mostProfound personal development book.
For the majority of peopleit's almost always the first book
they've read. So for somepeople it's, I mean it's normally
(13:09):
one of the classics. 7 Habitsof Highly Effective People think
and grow Rich in my instance,the secret because what it does is
it, it has the biggestknowledge jump and then everything
else is incremental gainothers as time goes on. If people
are getting a little bitbigger for particularly the people
in their business right nowthat they've got lots of work, they're
very busy then a book calledthe E Myth by Michael Gerber is really
(13:32):
good. And if people are alittle bit more experienced, if people
are, I would say a millionquid plus even 500k plus in running
their business. A must readbook is the Road Less Stupid by Keith
Cunningham.
Have you seen the hype now forGreen Lights? I think everyone's
reading it.
I've just read it on holiday.
What's your view? Read or not read?
Read. I thought it was goingto be more of a personal development
book for some reason. I thinkit's because it was promoted so much
(13:53):
in personal circles andwhatnot. What really impressed me
was my God, that guy's lived alife. He has absolutely lived a life.
And it's very easy to look atHollywood actors and think, well,
when they've made it, they'vetaken off and they've really had
it. But from a very, veryyoung age and don't get me wrong,
he's had some tough timesgrowing up and those things have
(14:15):
definitely been a factor.Yeah, it was an interesting read
is getting a bit of an insightinto his life with some lessons along
the way. And what fascinatedme, I'm a big journaler. On the way
up here I was journaling butfor, I can't remember how long it
had been at the time when hewrote the book. I think for 35 years
he's journaled pretty muchevery day and real detailed stuff
(14:37):
which a modern day version ofthat is like going on Facebook and
looking at your memories,isn't it? You know, you go back and
see 10, 15 years ago. Imaginedoing 35 years of that. So yeah,
incredible.
So I'm so passionate about theworld of neuroscience and one of
my first books that I read andabsolutely loved was Mapping the
Mind by Rita Carter. It kindof really got me into understanding
(14:58):
the psyche of people'sbehavior and habits. So I wanted
to understand why people didthings and why we would have maybe
such different belief systemsor values around things and what
I talk about now really is allabout sort of, you know, healthy
habits, changing habits, andswitching the environment rather
than the habit. What would beyour biggest sort of growth habit,
(15:21):
whether it's across health orwealth or happiness?
I actually think it's theimportance of. And I do this weekly
reviewing your goals. I thinkit really is as simple as that. So
I have a process calledcreating a North Star, which is this
mission in life. And then wereverse engineer it, which is what
(15:42):
I call a North Startrajectory. It's essentially a plan
of goals that you're workingtowards. And I like to read it every
week. And then I color codethe progress on the time frame that's
ahead. So, for example, itmight be the month ahead. I'm color
coding green if it's done.Amber, it's in progress. Red if it's
done. And it does two things.One is that it gets me to acknowledge
the progress that I'm making,because there's so much that we forget
(16:03):
when we think of the sevenareas of life, how many things that
we're doing that we just don'teven acknowledge that we're doing.
This is one of the things thatI see a lot in a lot of high performers.
It's always next, next, next.What's the next thing? What's the
next thing? They haven't takenstock and just gone, do you know
what? Actually, I'm gonna baskin what I've done. So that's definitely
a factor. The second one youtalk about, neuroscience, is a part
(16:25):
of the brain called thereticular activating system, which
enables you to focus. So ifyou had that experience where you
really wanted a particular bagbecause you think, no one's got this
bag. You get the bag and thenyou see it everywhere, or you get
that no one's got that car inthat color. You get the car and you
see it everywhere. That's thereticular activating system, which
is the. Like I say, the partof the brain that helps us focus.
(16:46):
And if we can constantly stayfocused on those goals, not only
does it. It can help us keepdisciplined, but it can also help
us see opportunities. And. Oh,that'd be a great opportunity to
connect up with that and outof sight, out of mind. So I think
that can be definitely one ofthe. The most powerful for people
looking to accomplish morepersonally, professionally, or financially.
(17:06):
No, I love that, and I likethe strategicness of it. I think
one of the things that Ialways think about in terms of, like,
growth habits, if someone saidto me what's like your number one,
do or die? It's like steppingout of our heads and getting out
of the weeds. One of thethings that I think happens, and
this has happened to menumerous times as an entrepreneur,
is that we get so attached tothe doing. You know, there could
(17:28):
be a to do list of like 5,000things, but, like, why are we doing
it? And I think the thing is,is that as I've grown older, I've
got calmer and just more kindof considered. I think in my approach
to things, where you seepeople dashing to do things or something
is not working, I have adopteda far slower approach to things because
(17:48):
I think when you step out ofthe situation and you look at the
bigger picture and you look atyour values and your beliefs now
and your motivators, it'slike, why are we doing these things?
What is the biggest piece ofadvice you could give entrepreneurs
in terms of, like, just movingthe health forward?
Get around bigger thinkers.Yeah, get around bigger thinkers.
So don't get me wrong, it's ablessing and a curse, like most things
(18:11):
in life. A member of thefamily that's achieved extreme success,
extreme success. And it's veryeasy to then go, well, comparison,
right? But what it's also doneis it's given me this amazing glimpse
into what's possible becauselots of people go, well, that'd be
amazing. But that doesn'thappen to people like me. I can't
(18:31):
say that. I just. I don't havethat ability to do that because we've
seen it happen. So beingaround big thinkers, I have had a
process for, I don't know,however long now, where I used to
keep a list of people thatinfluenced me, I admire and trust.
So people that influence meadmire and trust. And there's two
types of these people. Some ofthese people will be people that
(18:51):
I know. So it might be afriend of mine, it might be somebody
in the local area that I lookup to. For me, it was some people
that were a bit older than methat I used to play rugby with that
I really respected. So they'rewhat I call direct mentors. And then
there's indirect mentors. Sopeople I've never met and probably
will never met by it, I canstill connect with them because I
can read their autobiographiesor I can listen to their podcast,
(19:13):
or I can watch them on YouTubeor I can go to their events and getting
around these people. And it'samazing that when you surround yourself
with their world, even just bylistening to them, it starts to give
you a bit of an insight intohow they think. Yeah, I think being
able to think bigger is greatbecause more often than not, many
(19:34):
of us will realize thatthinking bigger isn't about doing
more, it's just about doing different.
Yeah, totally. And I alwaysthink about community and connection
as my marketing plan. It'slike the absolute pinnacle of everything.
So I think detaching ourselvesfrom the actual process and thinking
more around the benefit, Ithink one of the things that when
I talk to entrepreneurs thatit fascinates me is that we forget
(19:57):
how powerful our networks areand the people that we know. And
there's always somebody whohas influenced the direction or the
trajectory of where we've gonein business. Who was your biggest
influence in terms of like abig growth change in your business
or like a completejuxtaposition of where you were going?
I suppose in my life it wasTony Robbins when I had that, that
(20:19):
big event way back when. Someof the people that have, have helped
me change are. Because I'vemodeled them from a fast. They're
not even people like coachesthat have actually paid, said, do
this, do this, do this. Butthey're people that I've modeled
and gone, oh, well, they dothat over there. What about if we
did this here in a differentindustry? I've said for years that
champagne is a blend ofdifferent grapes, right? So if we
(20:40):
can take those differentgrapes and squeeze it, we make champagne.
And so there was a. There wasa guy, Mark Davis, he had a TEDx
license. And people weretalking about this guy Mark, and
he was really well respected.There was a big organization that
still exists, albeit in adifferent way, called the yes Group.
And he used to be the yesGroup, London leader. They used to
have like 800 people come. AndI really wanted to run these events.
(21:02):
And I had this idea of imaginea personal development sort of big
seminar, the ones you go to inLondon or Birmingham, big city, over
four days. I thought, well,what if we just had that every month
and it was just two hours orthree hours, and we had two guest
speakers at every event. And Ihad one major issue in that I didn't
know any speakers. So Ithought, well, Mark owns a TEDx license
(21:25):
and he used to be part of thisthing called the yes Group. Maybe
he knows some speakers. And Ireached out to him and we sat down
and we went through it and hesaid, yeah, this would be great.
And then he said, and I knowwhat you could do. You could look
at adding another layer inwhich would be a mastermind group.
And at the time he likened itto an organization called Vistage,
which are sort of peer topeer, sort of board peer groups.
(21:48):
And I was like, yeah, I cansee why that would work. And that
was what started my first everMastermind. So that's an example
of having some influence fromsomebody. I had no idea. But he said,
well, what about. And I thinkthose, what about this? Or what about
that? Sometimes you can just,just back the ideas away and sometimes
they could be great runnersbecause we've, we've now got a number
of different mastermind groupsthat have been going for eight plus
(22:09):
years.
I think sometimes it's notalways like the most influential
people. It can just be acircumstance or even just one person
saying something at the righttime that can change our whole way
of thinking. Now we alwaystalk about the good, the bad and
the ugly of entrepreneurshipand you know what's coming. I always
like to ask for the mostimportant embarrassing story because
(22:29):
I think the thing is I alwaysshare my stories and anyone on my
mastermind or retreats knows alot of embarrassing stories. But
what was the most embarrassingstory in your business life?
One that stands out and it'snot even that bad really. But at
the time it really haunted mewas I talk fast, I type fast, I do
certain things at speed a lotof the time. And I sent out this
(22:53):
email about setting out yourstall, and the subject line was setting
out your stall, only to thensend it out to however many thousand
people on the email list andget. I couldn't tell you how many
dozen replies saying, I thinkyou meant stall as in s T a double
L. And I'd put setting outyour stall S T double O, L as in
(23:15):
poo. So that was one of thosemoments where your sort of heart
sinks and you go, oh, whydidn't I just double check that email
that I sent out? So that's oneexample that comes to mind. And it
is one of those things becauseI really did go, oh my God, I can't
believe I've done that. Andjust felt so ashamed for a few hours.
(23:35):
It's funny though, isn't it?We put such pressure on ourselves
and we've all done it. Eventoday, we'll have in probably the
past week or months, donesomething or sensed something that
wasn't right. And when yousaid that, it just reminded me of
when we were doing captions ona video. And when I say the word
popular, for some reason, itrecognizes it as cop killer. Thankfully,
just before it uploaded toYouTube. We noticed it, but, you
(23:57):
know, we've all sent thesethings out, but we beat ourselves
up, don't we, that an emailwasn't right. And I think I used
to hold on to that a lot morewhen I was younger. Now not so much.
I think, you know, we all makeerrors. What's your view on obviously
people who are verycontroversial online? Because we
see a lot of this and a lot ofpeople are trying to carve out a
brand around being supercontroversial or we see a lot of
(24:21):
people jumping in on commentsand you know, and I see it online,
I have to kind of distancemyself because I find it quite harsh
some of the times that peopleare naming shaming, condemning. There's,
there's a lot of opinion. Butwhat is overstepping the mark these
days?
It's the rants. The irony ofwhat we're about. What I'm about
to say is one of the thingsthat I can't stand is people that
(24:46):
just ran and. But rant for thesake of ranting because they know
it's whipping up a storm andthere's a particular guy that I'm,
I'm doing some work at themoment and in part of the content
plan, it's. And on this dayyou do a rant and I'm just not doing
it. And I appreciate the ironyin what I'm saying because the thing
I'm ranting about is ranting.Right. So, but, but yeah, it's. It's
(25:07):
people that are whippingpeople up for frenzy. And a perfect
example of this is thepolitical situation. Without going
into politics in, in the UKand definitely over in the US at
the moment, it has gone so farthat there is just no rules anymore
for these. There is no moralline that people can cross to be
bad. And I think that's adangerous position when you've got
(25:30):
the major political partiesof, of major economies that are operating
that way. And yeah, people doit for the likes, they do it for
the engagement and that theydo what they do. But I know that
I generally take a bit of avanilla stance. Not because I am
afraid of being shot down oranything like that. It's not a fear.
Well, at least I don't thinkit's a fear of tall poppy syndrome.
(25:53):
It's more just. I just can'tbe bothered with it. I just can't
be bothered with it. And Ireally attempt to have a balanced
view on things. And by havingthat balanced perspective, it means
that I don't have judgmentsone way or Another, because ultimately
there's 4,828, I think, humantraits, and every one of us have
(26:14):
them. So if people are saying,I can't believe that person is making
fun of other people, well,there'll be a time when you've made
fun of other people, so youend up just becoming a hypocrite.
I read something of the daythat has stuck with me. The fact
that we have about 4,000 weeksin our life that is quite scary.
And when you start to quantifyit with a number, you start to think
like, well, next week thatwill be like, 3,000. Whatever. What
(26:37):
is your biggest mission interms of leading a life that has
impact, but not just for otherpeople, but for you? Like, what is
the legacy you want to do for Will?
Well, and this is a good oneto talk about, because people Talk
about that 4000 weeks andbeliefs are powerful. You know this,
Dawn. They're so powerful. Andif people are told something enough,
(26:57):
whether it's true or not,they'll believe it. And I think the
fact that 4,000 weeks maybe ofwhat people have lived to until now,
but that that definitely isn'tgoing to be the case moving forward.
There's going to be people inour lifetime, our generation, that
are living to 120, and notjust living to 120, as spending 40
(27:18):
years as a decrepit old personwith a walking stick or being pushed
around a wheelchair, but asactive as we are today, like, that
is happening. And I've got areal interest in life longevity.
And one of my things is I'mgonna live till I'm 150 years old.
And there'll be people thatlisten to this now going, who is
this delusional guy she's goton the podcast? But actually, if
(27:39):
you looking into the sciencesand you look into epigenetics and
you look into the developmentsin the human genome, and there's
an amazing book calledlifespan by Dr. David Sinclair. And
there's a whole bunch ofpeople that are. Mark Hyman and a
whole bunch of others aredoing really great work on this that
are making us become awarethat this is going to be more than
possible, women in ourlifetime. So that's one of the first
(28:01):
things. But for me, it's. It'sabout empowering people to live a
life that they love and givingthem the. The tools to be able to
do that. Because I think thatso many people, we all get schooled,
but we don't all get aneducation, right? So if we can get
this knowledge and the Stuffthat you've learned over the years
of being an entrepreneur thatjust imagine if you'd have been taught
(28:23):
that from five years old likeyou are maths and English and some
of these other topics, andmindfulness and the Power of mind,
the book that you mentioned.You know, if you'd have been given
that when you were 11, I knowyou started super early and super
successful really early on.And I know you built networks, you
used to run your events atAston Martin garages and you were
doing those things and theywere so powerful. Imagine knowing
(28:45):
that stuff at 11.
Oh, it's crazy. Honestly, Ifeel that I've been always passionate
about bridging the digitalskills gap, talking about, you know,
women in tech and gender paygap and things like that. But I think
what is changing and we'reseeing a shift is the amount of women
who are speaking on stages,starting podcasts and actually scaling
(29:09):
businesses. Because I honestlyfeel that from the age of 20 to like
35, it was a very solo journeyin a male dominated world. Every
time I showed up on stage itwas men. Every time I was going on
podcasts it was men. And evennow there are very few female speakers
in comparison to men. And alsoeven if you look at the charts, the
amount of podcasts that are inthe top 50. So it's a real passion
(29:33):
for me to see women moveforward. How have you seen women
in business change sinceyou've been in business?
I run a group of entrepreneursand one of the three rules that we
have is that they have to turnover a million pound plus and there
is probably only betweenbouncing between 15 and 20% of people
(29:53):
in that group that are women.And that's not because we're trying
to keep women out. There arejust not that many of them that are
turning over over a millionquid plus. Now the irony is out of
the 140 odd people in thegroup, the person in the group that
does 200 million is a woman.Right. So you, you go from one extreme
to another. What I've seen isthat there's a lot that's changed
(30:18):
in, in years gone by withtechnology. So technology enables
us to be able to do morefaster. Covid made working from home
acceptable for a lot ofpeople. So they're right. They've
been able to do certain thingsthat, that they've wanted to do.
And I think for a lot ofwomen, and I'm really interested
in your opinion on this, isthat a lot of them get caught in
this dilemma between. Well, Iwould really Love to do this, but
(30:42):
also I do really want to beable to be there for the kids and
do this and do that. And inyears gone by, they've had to make,
not had to, but there's been achoice that's been made and technology
is enabled and working fromhome and doing these things has enabled
that, I believe, to become easier.
I think there's probably a lotof like, stigmas and societal norms
(31:04):
that women have felt maybecompelled to adhere to because there
is that kind of guilt that ifthey do have a family that should
they be working and going outand about. And last week I heard
a story of a lady who had ababy who was in my network. She hasn't
even announced it on socialmedia because she's working in tech
(31:28):
and she lost one of herinvestors because she was pregnant.
And I think this is reallyquite scary that we're seeing this
now. It's like, what can we doto shift these mindsets and challenge
these norms? And I think thisis an interesting conversation because
obviously I talk to men andwomen about it. Where do you see
(31:48):
the change coming to get morewomen to scale to a million?
I think it comes back to whatdo they want? You know, if they want
to do it, great. Well then inthe same way that you equipped people
to be able to move into thedigital environment, you were one
of the really early adopters.You created your training schools
and your curriculums thatenabled people to go, I want to do
(32:09):
this. And what you're able todo is you're able to bridge that
gap. And I think the morepeople go, well, I would love to
do this, I just don't know thehow. For the majority of people,
people, it's not that theydon't know what they want to do,
it's just they don't know thehow. And the more those bridges can
be gapped and go, well, thiscan be done. And here's an example
of somebody that's done it.Here's an example of somebody that's
(32:31):
done it. And it's the same forguys as well. You know, I've got
so many. I'm at an age where alot of my friends are having kids
and they're the same. Theywant to be able to do the school
run, they want to be able tobe there for after school clubs and
to be able to watch whatever.They want to be able to do these
things. And it's a case ofjust knowing, well, how and who's
done it in a way where they'vebeen able to do both. And I think
(32:52):
that's the difference.
Yeah, finding the flexibilityso that it works. And I think it
is. It's like balance. I mean,there is no true work life balance.
I think, like, sometimes workwins, sometimes home wins, sometimes
there's a blend. But I thinknow with technology there is more
opportunity. And I guess itcomes down to understanding or having
the belief that, like,infinite success is possible for
all of us. It's just a choice.And I think maybe perception is now
(33:17):
that, you know, there are morepeople doing it and there are more
people kind of, you know,bridging that gap. I'm not saying
that a million has to be themilestone. I mean, it could be that
someone has a business that'sa hundred thousand and that's their
absolute dream. Where is yourdream, like your vision for Will
in the next five, ten years?Like, where do you want to take your
(33:37):
business?
What I'm attempting to do iscreate the go to platform for personal
development for entrepreneursin the uk. So in terms of online
resources, having everythingwhere people can come together, the
community element is a hugecomponent. Content is a huge element.
I'm a massive believer incollaboration and having great people,
(34:01):
great minds with greatknowledge that can come onto the
platform, share via theplatform, have the community element
that connects people, have thecoaching for people that want to
maybe accelerate that andbridge. Those are not bridge, but
have those three elements tohelp people bridge that transition.
So if they don't know whatthey want, we can help them get clear
on what they want to do. Ifthey know what they want to do, but
they don't know how to do it,we can help them do it. And that's
(34:24):
really something that I dofeel. Feel passionate about. You
mentioned it early on. Youknow, vision is. What is that vision?
What does it look like? Likepractice. If you were to close your
eyes and imagine waking up onyour ideal day, where are you waking
up? Who are you waking upwith? What's the next thing you're
going to go and do? I know youlove your Wellness Wednesdays.
Yeah, Wellness Wednesdays andFree Time Fridays.
(34:45):
Wellness Wednesdays and FreeTime Fridays. And being able to have
these things. Well, that'swhat I want to be able to do. And
then I want to go and do a bitof this, and then I want to come
do a bit of this. And it comesdown to choice. And I think that's
why so many people go intobusiness, the majority of them, even
though they might say they gointo business for money, they're
not going into business formoney, they're going into business
for freedom. And the money,money they perceive gives them the
(35:07):
freedom in, in the majority ofcases. So how do you create that
life that gives you thefreedom, whether it's the holidays,
whether it's this, whetherit's that, whatever it might be that
enables you to do things, orother people's freedom. So for a
lot of people it's, they wantto be able to earn a certain amount
of money, to be able to givetheir children or their grandchildren
or their grandchildren'schildren the freedom to be able to
do what, what they wouldreally love to do. And, and that's
(35:29):
where I think that we will seemore and more people when they've
got those role models of beingable to say, hey, look, I was able
to do really well in business,but I didn't sacrifice my family
for 20 years. And that's thedifference that I think online we're
only really starting to see,although we've been online since
whatever it is, 1990, whateveryear. But now I think it's easier
(35:52):
than ever to be able to createan online business that can help
others.
Yeah, definitely. Like Covidwas the catalyst there. But, but
I would say that we've seen ahuge shift in the online space and
the coaching industry sincethen. And maybe not all positively,
there is a lot of talk aboutentrepreneurs being burned, having
awful scenarios where they'vebeen put off. Actually, you know,
(36:15):
being in business, what's yourview of the online and particularly
the coaching space right now?
Yeah, it is a big topic and,and I'm, I'm going to link it back
to, to, to you and what youdid very early on. So with your academy,
I know you jumped throughloads of hoops that were really difficult
and challenging, but it meantthat you had to tick a lot of boxes
(36:38):
and do a lot of things thequote, unquote right way. And that
meant that you had to adhereto a certain protocol and code of
conduct to make sure thatcertain things were delivered on.
And then also you had lots ofthese pop up people teaching digital
(37:00):
marketing online that havemaybe got a tiny little bit of experience
and all of a sudden aredelivering on that. So the difference
being is that you've gone anddone the proper qualifications, let's
call it, and got theappropriate accreditations to be
able to deliver it. Butbecause it's not something that's
regulated, other people coulddo it. The same things happen with
(37:22):
coaching. One of the thingsthat I did really early on when I
first decided that I wanted tobecome a coach. I spoke to a bunch
of different coaches and askedhow did you do it? What did you do
again? Modeling other people.And one of the coaches said to me,
well, one of the things Ihighly recommend you go and do is
go and do a training course,but make sure you go and do it with
one of the companies that isICF accredited. So the ICF is not
(37:43):
the notorious West Hamintercity firm, the football hooligans,
but is the InternationalCoaching Federation. And at the time
they were regarded andarguably still are the gold standard
of coaching accrediting bodyaround the world. And nowadays if
people are coaches and they alot of the time want to go into corporate,
they will request for an ITFaccredited coaches or if it's uk,
(38:07):
I think it's called the ACassociation of Coaching. From off
the top of my head, the sortof the two organizations and what
that did was it took a lotlonger but I went through a certain
process. Whereas now peoplehear the word coach and you could
have someone that has learnedto lay flooring and all of a sudden
they're a flooring coach. Andwe just use this term and it's not
(38:28):
a protected term.Interestingly, accountant isn't a
protected term. Anyone cancall themselves an accountant, but
not anyone can call themselvesa chartered accountant. And there's
lots of examples ofchartership. So what do I think is
going to happen? I think thatat some stage there will be some
form of chartership that willhopefully come in because it will
(38:49):
separate people. We will seethere are some great organizations.
So there's an organizationcalled CPD Standards. They created
a body to essentially, Isuppose you could call it regulate
coaches because the ICF dealswith creating accreditation on what
you've trained in, whereaswhat this particular organization
(39:11):
we're doing under the CPDStandards, which is called Coach
of Excellence, they're nothelping you get qualified, but once
you're qualified, they hadthis really, really strict process
and I've never seen anythinglike it in terms of the stuff that
they wanted to get from me toprove that I've done a certain level
to be able to get accreditedin coach of excellence. So they're
(39:31):
doing a great job, but they'restill, they're a private organization
that are, that are trying to,I suppose, quote, unquote, clean
up the industry. But until yousee something across the board, that's
where, where people go, I wanta coach, but I'll go with this person
because they're cheaper onlyto then get Burned. And it's the
same. I say accountants as anexample. People have had a really
bad accountant because theydidn't want to pay the money for
(39:52):
the chartered accountant. Butthe reason you pay the money for
the chartered accountant isbecause if it goes wrong, you can
claim on their professionalliability insurance and, and all
that stuff. Professionalindemnity insurance.
I mean, I don't even think alot of coaches even know what professional
indemnity is. And I guess itcomes down to the fact that I suppose
in the space we see people besuccessful in their business or the
service they provide and thenobviously think, well, I can teach
(40:16):
that for me that I see thatmore as mentoring. And you know,
I think there's a real trickyarea that when you maybe haven't
gone with, and there'smultiple accreditations out there,
we've got our own accredited,you know, growth coaching certification.
If you haven't got the toolsmaybe to manage some of the things
that come from coaching, whichis often mindset led, this is where
(40:37):
I think there can be sometricky territory because I've had
a lot of people come to me whohave gone to somebody who is maybe
a traditional mentor and thebiggest success barrier they've got
is their own mindset. Soregardless how much they learn, they're
never going to move past it orthey've, they've gone to retreats
and things like that openthemselves up. That person maybe
has unlocked something andthere's been no one to manage that
(41:00):
process through. And I've,I've had to step in myself and do
these things at events andretreats and are even mine. So I'm
hoping or hopeful that we dosee more of regulation around it
because, you know, obviouslypeople doing a digital marketing
degree, that's one thing, butdoing a coaching qualification, you
know, I think there has to bea line maybe carved out of how people
(41:22):
present themselves. So if youthink about where you'd like coaching
to go, what would be your hopeor vision that it becomes.
A recognized professionalservice? So solicitors is a form
of professional service.Accountants is a form of professional
service, just to name a coupleof examples. And for it to be recognized
(41:42):
in that way. And there is anorganization, isn't there, the Chartered
Institute of PersonalDevelopment from memory. But it's
being able to have it as thatrecognized skill. You or I couldn't
do the electrics for thisbuilding that we're in and sign them
off because you have to bequalified in a certain way. And I
think that, that if it gets tothat level where people have to have
(42:04):
a certain level of training inthe same way that an electrician
would or a plumber would oranything else to be able to do the
work with somebody. Everyindustry is going to have guys that
aren't as good as others andyou're going to have the, the rogues
and whatever else. But in thesame way they got, or they've attempted
to get rid of a lot of therogue builders and the rogue trades
people and all the rest of it,we're just going to follow suit and
(42:27):
hopefully sooner rather thanlater because it will just mean that
there'll be less people that,that are affected as a result.
Yeah, and it is, it's aboutthe person who's impacted because
it can be quite catastrophic.I've always had to do CPD from a
digital side of things andalso for coaching and I do around
about 120 hours a year. So Ithink in any practice you would want
or hope that the person wasstill learning themselves. What's
(42:49):
the biggest thing in terms ofyour own personal development around
coaching that you feel is important?
Continuous learning. You know,Kite Kaizen Continuing, never ending
improvement. That, thatconstant process of growing. There's
stuff that I have learned nowthat I didn't know five or six years
ago and I. Mastery for me isnot a destination. Yes, you can do.
(43:11):
If you, if you think intraditional terms, you do your GCSEs
or whatever they call themthese days, then your A levels, then
you go to university, you do adegree, then you do a master's, then
you do a PhD. People are justgetting more and more knowledge in
a specific area. And generallyspeaking, you, you niche down, don't
you? You do a PhD in aspecific, really micro niche area.
(43:35):
And that is what I love to do.There's, there's a few key areas
that I just love to go really,really deep on and learn more and
more and more because itbecomes the nuances. That's the bit
that I love is the nuances.And, and I think it was Albert Einstein
that said, the more I learn,the more I realize, the less I know.
(43:56):
Or something to that effect.It may not have been Einstein. And
I've certainly found that tobe the case. The more I'm learning,
the more I'm going, wow, Ididn't realize that. And it unlocks
this little bit moreinformation, unlocks a whole nother
area of areas because now Ican start connecting everything up
together and create theselittle nuances that are tiny but
(44:16):
actually can make a Hugedifference for people. So, yeah,
I agree.
I mean, I've been doing a loton holistic meditation, modalities,
nlp, really kind of gettinginto delving deeper and deeper into
neuroscience and reallylooking at not just the process of
it, but things like the. Thehabits of highly successful people
and linking that back to whatwe can do day to day. So, on a final
(44:38):
note, then, if you think aboutone parting statement or piece of
advice you could give ouraudience, who are a mix of, obviously
business owners, male andfemale, what would that piece of
advice be?
To create a life or have amission in life that you never achieve.
(44:59):
And the reason for that is somany people, they put all of this
time, this energy and thiseffort into a particular point in
the future, which is thatgoing to be their pinnacle moment,
their moment where they go,oh, ah, I've made it, I can kick
my feet up now, I can sitback, I can relax. There are so many
(45:19):
people that we've worked withthat have achieved, by pretty much
everybody's standards,incredible success, and they get
to that moment. Is this it? Isthis it? Is this what it's really
about? Whereas if you havethat mission, that's the equivalent
of trying to empty the seawith students. Why I call it the
North Star? Like, what's theNorth Star? Because. Because once
(45:40):
upon a time, there's a famousstory involving a baby. It was born
in December in a stable andthere was three men that. That found
this baby and they followedthe North Star, but they never went
to the North Star, they justused it as their guiding light. So
if you can forever use thisguiding light that you accept you're
never going to achieve, yes,you can create milestones that you
want to achieve along the way,but you're constantly moving forward
(46:00):
and feeling fulfilled asyou're moving forward. And there
will be challenges, butoptimal growth comes at the border
of support and challenge. Soyou're growing when you're being
challenged and you're notgrowing. And in fact, you're potentially,
you're not growing when it'stoo comfortable as well. So it comes
out. If you're not growing,you're dying, that type of view.
So have it having that thingand working towards it and it will
(46:20):
happen, it will flow and itwill change. You're not going to
stay perfectly on track. But Ithink that that's one of the most
important things that peopledo to have a fulfilled life. Because
when it comes to the end,whenever that is, whether it's in
4,000 weeks or whether it's150 years old.
I'm living to 150.
I think we all want to lookback and go, do you know what? What?
I gave it my all. Yeah, sure,there were times when I was a little
(46:42):
bit scared and sure, therewere times when I thought that I
wasn't going to get throughit, but you can go, I gave it my
all. I absolutely went for it.And I had great fulfillment along
the way. And as cliche as thesaying is, enjoy the journey. Because
that, that's what you can dowhen you've, when you've got that
thing that every single dayyou're working towards, no matter
how small that tiny action is,it's getting you closer and closer
(47:05):
to fulfilling that mission. Ithink of it like, you know, once
upon a time when we used touse computers and they used to have
the loading bars, you know, alot of them don't have them now because
they're so quick. Everythingjust loads so quickly. But it used
to be loading, loading,loading, it gets to 100% and then
it was done. Whereas I thinkof it of a never ending loading bar
and you constantly can look atit and go, wow, look how much blue
there is. For example, if it'sthe blue part that's showing the
(47:26):
progress, look how much thereis. And we see it that way.
I love it because it's kind oflike a ever evolving process, purpose,
something that we're like,it's our mission, our vision, our
passion. It's like we'reconstantly striving for something
that we love and enjoy andreally want to do. So if someone
wants to get your book orconnect with you, where is the best
place to find?
Well, best place to find willis willpolston.com if you want to
(47:48):
sort of head to the website,you can get to all of the social
channels from there and we'llpost them on. On everything on, on
pretty much all the socialchannels. The book Book North Star
Thinking. Master your mindsetand live a life you love. Easiest
place for most people is Amazon.
Amazing. Thank you so much forjoining us.
Thank you for having me.
Thanks for listening to dawnof a New Era, the podcast brought
(48:09):
to you in association with theHer Power community. This initiative
was founded by myself and it'sall about empowering female founders
to recognize their limitlesspotential and pursue their ambitions
with confidence. Now there isless than 1.8% that goes into investing
in female founded businessesand we are here to make positive
(48:31):
change. So come and support uson Instagram at Her Power community
and find out more about whatwe're doing to support female founders
to scale and grow their businesses.
Dawn it's Dawn McGruer, thebusiness growth coach. And welcome
to dawn of a New Era, thepodcast where we talk all things
health, wealth and happinessand where founders share the good
and bad and ugly of being anentrepreneur. Welcome, Will, to Dawn
of a New Era, and thank youfor traveling to meet us in the studio
in Manchester. So before we goany further, obviously we've met
(00:25):
multiple times. I wasn't awareof the first meet because I was on
stage. Second time we were ina room, part of a network. But share
a little bit about who you areand what you do.
My name is Will Polston and Ihelp driven entrepreneurs to have
more time and less stress. Isthe. The short. Is the super short
version.
And when did you first startyour business?
(00:46):
So, my coaching business, Istarted nine years ago. It's kind
of in a business of two halvesbecause Covid, for a lot of people
changed a lot of stuff. It'sreally funny. So only Monday, I was.
I was chatting someone, theywere talking about how can you get
started with producing onlinevideos? And I said, literally, just
start and get perfect later.And I actually was able to find my
first ever video. I did it onthe 31st of December, 2015, and it
(01:09):
actually made me cry. And itmade me cry for two reasons. One,
it was how bad it was. No, I'mkidding. It made me cry because the
exact same message that I wastalking about then is the same stuff
I talk about now nine yearslater. And I cannot for the life
of you tell me what I said inthat video if you had. Do I remember
doing the video? Absolutely,because I recorded it about 12 times
(01:29):
before I actually posted it.But talking about the same thing
then as I do now, which ishelping people to live their, what
I call North Star, which is amission in life. That's the equivalent
of trying to empty the seawith a spoon. So, yeah, that was
all the way back then, but itmade me cry just because it made
me realize how raw the passionwas. And I had no idea how I was
(01:49):
going to do stuff. I just knewI wanted to do it. And I just looked
at that next step and thatfirst step and went back and went,
wow, that's. I had no ideaback then, but I just did it anyway.
See, I always think it's sointeresting when you talk to entrepreneurs
because one of thecommonalities I see a lot is the
vision. So when I firststarted at 21, I was so passionate
and I was just so eager thatno challenge was a challenge. And
(02:14):
I think it's interesting whenyou talk about the way that your
business started because whatwe have in our mind is we've taken
away some of the limitingbeliefs and we're kind of prepared
to step past them. And I seethis in a lot of entrepreneurs journeys.
What do you think has been thebiggest limiting belief that you've
encountered on your journey?
(02:35):
That I'm not deserving. Likelots of beliefs that we have, they
come from our programming aschildren and whatnot. And I think
that there was a maybe evensort of subconscious unconscious
way that my parents brought meup. And this is not, not blaming
them by any means. They onlywanted the best, which was you get
(02:57):
rewards when you've donecertain things and there's a combination
of wanting to do things andhave a reward because you've done
it, which I get, I understandthe element of that. But then there's
this part of me going, well Ican't do that yet because I don't
deserve it because I'm not Xyet. And I think that there's so
(03:18):
many people that have thisbelief of I don't deserve it, I'm
not good enough yet. If youcontinue to believe that you'll never
be good enough, every singlemonth there is something that I will
maybe not I'll be resistant ofputting out on social media or saying
because I think, oh, am I goodenough to say that? Can I, can I
even ask that question? Can Ido that? Yeah, I think that's definitely
(03:40):
one for sure.
I think self worth comes up alot for men and women in business
because a lot of us are busybuilding the businesses, doing things
for others that we forgetabout our own self care, our own
self compassion. And I thinkas business owners it's quite tempting
also to have the negative selftalk that we are very critical on
(04:02):
what we're doing. And as we'removing forward there's almost a kind
of a belief of like, well,what happens if it all gets taken
away? Have you experienced thefear through success?
I see it more and more andmore. So the majority of my private
clients are entrepreneurs thatare turning over seven, eight, nine
figures. One of my clients hada multi nine figure exit. And what's
(04:26):
interesting is it's the samedrive that gets them going and enables
them to achieve success, quoteunquote traditional success that
they then find themselvesgoing, well I still need to, I need
to do that next thing, I'm notthere yet. I call it when then syndrome.
When I achieve this, then I'llbe happy when I Get that? Then I'll
be content when I get this,then I'll be at peace. And it doesn't.
(04:48):
Like, they keep driving anddriving and driving some obscene
amounts of success that a lotof these people have. And you ask
them, are you successful? Theygo, no, not yet, because I've not
done this part or this part.And that's the big difference between
switching to focus on the gainof what you've already achieved,
rather than constantly lookingat the gap. But it's the gap that
drives them in the beginningfor so long.
(05:09):
See, I think it's alsointeresting that we've had conversations
in the group we're part of,where people have different understandings
of success, which I love. Andthe fact that success is not, you
know, a monetary step, likeit's part of it. You know, every
business needs to beprofitable and sustainable and even
sellable. But sometimes Ithink we get caught up in the online
(05:31):
focus of this kind of 7, 8, 9figures. One of the things that I
love is that I've kind of hita point where I feel like I'm in
balance and I don't need to gofurther on the financial side of
things. I've got more of afocus towards enrichment and experiences
rather than monetary. What'sbeen your shift in terms of, like,
(05:54):
starting a business? How oldwere you when you first started.
First proper business was 24.
So what's been the differencein your values and your motivating
factors then? Because minehave changed a lot since 21 to 31,
to 45?
Yeah. Well, I suppose it'd beinteresting if I. If I go back and
give you a bit of thebackstory. So I grew up with a belief
that money equal happiness.I've got two very wealthy uncles.
(06:16):
One's a billionaire, the otherone's a multi. Multimillionaire.
And my dad always used to saythey just got lucky. That was his
thing. They just got lucky.They just got lucky. I was very fortunate
growing up. I always hadclothes on my back, food in the fridge,
went on holiday every year,albeit they weren't always big, crazy,
lavish holidays. But I had avery fortunate upbringing. But what
I remember growing up was howmuch my dad hated his job. So he
(06:38):
would get up at 5 o'clock inthe morning, get on his bike, ride
to the station, go intoLondon, do a job he hated, come home
and bring the stress and thefrustration home with him. And I
don't know if anyone listeningto this can relate to someone in
their life that when they'rearound that person, they can just
feel the tension. It's like a.It's a force field that they can
feel. And that was the case ofmy dad. And then I remember I must
(06:59):
have been about 10 years old,and one day my dad came home from
work and I was home fromschool, and he was there already.
I was like, this is weird.Dad's never normally home this early.
And it's because he'd quit hisjob and he'd quit his job to set
up a business with one of myuncles. And at the time, I was like,
yes, this is gonna be amazing.Dad's gonna be just like Uncle Steve,
and he's gonna be happy andcontent. Cause my Uncle Steve in
(07:21):
particular, he's this realextrovert, great character, always
full of energy. He was gonnaset up that business, Fast forward
a few months, he'd alreadyquit his job. I was the eldest of
four. I had two brothers andsisters who were seven. They're twins.
And then a baby sister who wasnot even one. Then my mum. Then there
was no job, no income, and mydad fell into a. What we would call
a depression. You know,curtain, shuttle day, didn't leave
the house. Very stereotypicalin that respect. And I was 10 years
(07:44):
old, and I just started toconnect the dots. It was really obvious
for me, Uncle Mark,billionaire, really happy Uncle Steve,
multimillionaire, really happydad. When he worked in London, okay,
he was stressed and frustrateda bit, but he was a lot happier when
he was working than now. Hehas no money, doesn't leave the house.
So for me, at 10 years old, itwas obvious, money equals happiness.
(08:05):
So I went off on that journeyto make as much money as I could
as early as I could. I was thekid in school buying and selling
suites and buying stuff off. Iwas looking for stuff in the paper,
seeing what it was priced atebay. And if I could get it for more
money on ebay, I would buy outthe paper and then put it straight
on ebay and do it, doing allthis stuff. I had two or three paper
rounds, I think, when I was 13or 14. Yeah, there must have been
(08:25):
12 or 13, because then Istarted working in a bar when I was
14. And that was my thing,money equal to happiness. And I started
making money. I remember being14 years old, and this is now 20
years later, being 14 yearsold and making £200 a week cash.
The time we're recording thisis. We've just heard about the budget.
(08:48):
And the budget for certain agegroup is £10. I was earning £10 an
hour 20 years ago. So it's alot of money. And I would just buy
stuff and that's what I woulddo. I would buy stuff. And I then
started buying clothes and Ireally like clothes. And then fast
forward a little bit. I endedup wanting to run my own clothes
shop. And the reason I wantedto own my own design a clothes shop
was because the guy was amultimillionaire. And that's what
(09:09):
I wanted to be. I wanted to bea multimillionaire and do something
I loved, which was beinginvolved with fashion. And there's
a long winded story, but I'mnot going to it all now. But I ended
up leaving that industry andthen working in financial services
and I was a broker. By thetime I was in my late teens, early
20s, I was making 20 grand amonth. And that went on for some
years. I stumbled acrosspersonal development when I was about
(09:32):
18 and I love personaldevelopment because the more personal
development I did, the moremoney I made. And that went on for
some years. And then it was 11years ago that I went to an event
with Tony Robbins. And manypeople listening to this would have
heard of Tony Robbins. Andthat's when I had my lightning moment.
And bam, it just hit me and Icried my eyes out for about 15 minutes.
Because in that moment Irealized my real driver was nothing
(09:54):
to do with money. It had neverbeen about money. It was to do with
my dad and how my dad hadn'tachieved certain things he was capable
of and the impact that had onhim and my mum and me and my family
and the host of other people.And I vowed I don't want anyone else
to ever have to go through thesuffering that he went through and
we went through from thatmoment 11 years ago, it completely
altered the trajectory of mylife. So to your question, have I
(10:15):
ever had any belief valueschange? That moment there was a pivotal
moment and life went in acompletely different direction.
Yeah, I think it's sointeresting, isn't it? Because when
we start a business, obviouslymoney and cash is the king. We need
to focus on getting consistentcash flow and building the business
and again with clients. Andyou'll know yourself that it's often
the biggest worry and thebiggest scaling factor that they're
(10:37):
focused on. So if you thinkabout your values now, what is it
that lights you up inbusiness? Like, what is the true
dream that like is why you dowhat you do.
So for me, still is aroundself mastery. I love. I'm obsessed
with anything to do with selfmastery, particularly mindset, I'm
(10:58):
fascinated by because I alwayscome back to how can you have two
different people that get thesame information, but one goes and
does stuff and one doesn't.You know, I find that fascinating.
So that's something thatlights me up. I have a real interest
in business and buildingbusinesses. So I suppose that's,
that's one of the reasons whyI work with a lot of entrepreneurs
and business owners because Ihave the very fortunate position
(11:19):
of being able to parachuteinto their businesses and understand
what's going on and love thatvariety. So is essentially unlocking
people. Is unlocking peoplewhat, whatever the barrier is to
achieve their dream lifefaster. You said it earlier, success
is subjective, right? Successfor every single person is different.
So if we can get them really,really clear on, well, what does
that success look like for apoint in time? Not necessarily it's
(11:42):
going to change in a bowl overtime. But if we can get clear on
that and then we can justbreak down those barriers and remove
them or make them themsmaller, then they're going to get
to where they want to get to faster.
So from a mindset point ofview, obviously you've invest in
that and a lot of people willbe kind of newer on their journey.
So when you see people talkingabout like top books and things online
(12:05):
or podcasts, like what are thethings that you remember? Like really
you listened to or you readthat changed your thought process,
you.
Can read the same book overthe course of three or five years,
you know, read it each yearand every time take something different.
There's one book that I'veread, I've read it every summer holiday
since I very first read it,which is a bit of a cliche personal
(12:28):
development book is a bookcalled the Secret by Rhonda Byrne.
It's about the law ofattraction. And the reason why it
was so profound for me was notbecause it introduced me to this
new idea. What it did was itmade me realize that I'd been doing
this thing that had worked forme. I mean, when I was in my early
teens, mid teens, anything Iwanted, I got. I wanted a mini motor,
(12:48):
I'd get it. I wanted electric,I wanted a petrol scooter, I'd get
it. These things, I'dvisualize it, I would see it, I would,
I would do the work to be ableto get it. And I went, ah, so that's
what I've been doing. I thinkthat for so many people, when you
ask them what's the mostProfound personal development book.
For the majority of peopleit's almost always the first book
they've read. So for somepeople it's, I mean it's normally
(13:09):
one of the classics. 7 Habitsof Highly Effective People think
and grow Rich in my instance,the secret because what it does is
it, it has the biggestknowledge jump and then everything
else is incremental gainothers as time goes on. If people
are getting a little bitbigger for particularly the people
in their business right nowthat they've got lots of work, they're
very busy then a book calledthe E Myth by Michael Gerber is really
(13:32):
good. And if people are alittle bit more experienced, if people
are, I would say a millionquid plus even 500k plus in running
their business. A must readbook is the Road Less Stupid by Keith
Cunningham.
Have you seen the hype now forGreen Lights? I think everyone's
reading it.
I've just read it on holiday.
What's your view? Read or not read?
Read. I thought it was goingto be more of a personal development
book for some reason. I thinkit's because it was promoted so much
(13:53):
in personal circles andwhatnot. What really impressed me
was my God, that guy's lived alife. He has absolutely lived a life.
And it's very easy to look atHollywood actors and think, well,
when they've made it, they'vetaken off and they've really had
it. But from a very, veryyoung age and don't get me wrong,
he's had some tough timesgrowing up and those things have
(14:15):
definitely been a factor.Yeah, it was an interesting read
is getting a bit of an insightinto his life with some lessons along
the way. And what fascinatedme, I'm a big journaler. On the way
up here I was journaling butfor, I can't remember how long it
had been at the time when hewrote the book. I think for 35 years
he's journaled pretty muchevery day and real detailed stuff
(14:37):
which a modern day version ofthat is like going on Facebook and
looking at your memories,isn't it? You know, you go back and
see 10, 15 years ago. Imaginedoing 35 years of that. So yeah,
incredible.
So I'm so passionate about theworld of neuroscience and one of
my first books that I read andabsolutely loved was Mapping the
Mind by Rita Carter. It kindof really got me into understanding
(14:58):
the psyche of people'sbehavior and habits. So I wanted
to understand why people didthings and why we would have maybe
such different belief systemsor values around things and what
I talk about now really is allabout sort of, you know, healthy
habits, changing habits, andswitching the environment rather
than the habit. What would beyour biggest sort of growth habit,
(15:21):
whether it's across health orwealth or happiness?
I actually think it's theimportance of. And I do this weekly
reviewing your goals. I thinkit really is as simple as that. So
I have a process calledcreating a North Star, which is this
mission in life. And then wereverse engineer it, which is what
(15:42):
I call a North Startrajectory. It's essentially a plan
of goals that you're workingtowards. And I like to read it every
week. And then I color codethe progress on the time frame that's
ahead. So, for example, itmight be the month ahead. I'm color
coding green if it's done.Amber, it's in progress. Red if it's
done. And it does two things.One is that it gets me to acknowledge
the progress that I'm making,because there's so much that we forget
(16:03):
when we think of the sevenareas of life, how many things that
we're doing that we just don'teven acknowledge that we're doing.
This is one of the things thatI see a lot in a lot of high performers.
It's always next, next, next.What's the next thing? What's the
next thing? They haven't takenstock and just gone, do you know
what? Actually, I'm gonna baskin what I've done. So that's definitely
a factor. The second one youtalk about, neuroscience, is a part
(16:25):
of the brain called thereticular activating system, which
enables you to focus. So ifyou had that experience where you
really wanted a particular bagbecause you think, no one's got this
bag. You get the bag and thenyou see it everywhere, or you get
that no one's got that car inthat color. You get the car and you
see it everywhere. That's thereticular activating system, which
is the. Like I say, the partof the brain that helps us focus.
(16:46):
And if we can constantly stayfocused on those goals, not only
does it. It can help us keepdisciplined, but it can also help
us see opportunities. And. Oh,that'd be a great opportunity to
connect up with that and outof sight, out of mind. So I think
that can be definitely one ofthe. The most powerful for people
looking to accomplish morepersonally, professionally, or financially.
(17:06):
No, I love that, and I likethe strategicness of it. I think
one of the things that Ialways think about in terms of, like,
growth habits, if someone saidto me what's like your number one,
do or die? It's like steppingout of our heads and getting out
of the weeds. One of thethings that I think happens, and
this has happened to menumerous times as an entrepreneur,
is that we get so attached tothe doing. You know, there could
(17:28):
be a to do list of like 5,000things, but, like, why are we doing
it? And I think the thing is,is that as I've grown older, I've
got calmer and just more kindof considered. I think in my approach
to things, where you seepeople dashing to do things or something
is not working, I have adopteda far slower approach to things because
(17:48):
I think when you step out ofthe situation and you look at the
bigger picture and you look atyour values and your beliefs now
and your motivators, it'slike, why are we doing these things?
What is the biggest piece ofadvice you could give entrepreneurs
in terms of, like, just movingthe health forward?
Get around bigger thinkers.Yeah, get around bigger thinkers.
So don't get me wrong, it's ablessing and a curse, like most things
(18:11):
in life. A member of thefamily that's achieved extreme success,
extreme success. And it's veryeasy to then go, well, comparison,
right? But what it's also doneis it's given me this amazing glimpse
into what's possible becauselots of people go, well, that'd be
amazing. But that doesn'thappen to people like me. I can't
(18:31):
say that. I just. I don't havethat ability to do that because we've
seen it happen. So beingaround big thinkers, I have had a
process for, I don't know,however long now, where I used to
keep a list of people thatinfluenced me, I admire and trust.
So people that influence meadmire and trust. And there's two
types of these people. Some ofthese people will be people that
(18:51):
I know. So it might be afriend of mine, it might be somebody
in the local area that I lookup to. For me, it was some people
that were a bit older than methat I used to play rugby with that
I really respected. So they'rewhat I call direct mentors. And then
there's indirect mentors. Sopeople I've never met and probably
will never met by it, I canstill connect with them because I
can read their autobiographiesor I can listen to their podcast,
(19:13):
or I can watch them on YouTubeor I can go to their events and getting
around these people. And it'samazing that when you surround yourself
with their world, even just bylistening to them, it starts to give
you a bit of an insight intohow they think. Yeah, I think being
able to think bigger is greatbecause more often than not, many
(19:34):
of us will realize thatthinking bigger isn't about doing
more, it's just about doing different.
Yeah, totally. And I alwaysthink about community and connection
as my marketing plan. It'slike the absolute pinnacle of everything.
So I think detaching ourselvesfrom the actual process and thinking
more around the benefit, Ithink one of the things that when
I talk to entrepreneurs thatit fascinates me is that we forget
(19:57):
how powerful our networks areand the people that we know. And
there's always somebody whohas influenced the direction or the
trajectory of where we've gonein business. Who was your biggest
influence in terms of like abig growth change in your business
or like a completejuxtaposition of where you were going?
I suppose in my life it wasTony Robbins when I had that, that
(20:19):
big event way back when. Someof the people that have, have helped
me change are. Because I'vemodeled them from a fast. They're
not even people like coachesthat have actually paid, said, do
this, do this, do this. Butthey're people that I've modeled
and gone, oh, well, they dothat over there. What about if we
did this here in a differentindustry? I've said for years that
champagne is a blend ofdifferent grapes, right? So if we
(20:40):
can take those differentgrapes and squeeze it, we make champagne.
And so there was a. There wasa guy, Mark Davis, he had a TEDx
license. And people weretalking about this guy Mark, and
he was really well respected.There was a big organization that
still exists, albeit in adifferent way, called the yes Group.
And he used to be the yesGroup, London leader. They used to
have like 800 people come. AndI really wanted to run these events.
(21:02):
And I had this idea of imaginea personal development sort of big
seminar, the ones you go to inLondon or Birmingham, big city, over
four days. I thought, well,what if we just had that every month
and it was just two hours orthree hours, and we had two guest
speakers at every event. And Ihad one major issue in that I didn't
know any speakers. So Ithought, well, Mark owns a TEDx license
(21:25):
and he used to be part of thisthing called the yes Group. Maybe
he knows some speakers. And Ireached out to him and we sat down
and we went through it and hesaid, yeah, this would be great.
And then he said, and I knowwhat you could do. You could look
at adding another layer inwhich would be a mastermind group.
And at the time he likened itto an organization called Vistage,
which are sort of peer topeer, sort of board peer groups.
(21:48):
And I was like, yeah, I cansee why that would work. And that
was what started my first everMastermind. So that's an example
of having some influence fromsomebody. I had no idea. But he said,
well, what about. And I thinkthose, what about this? Or what about
that? Sometimes you can just,just back the ideas away and sometimes
they could be great runnersbecause we've, we've now got a number
of different mastermind groupsthat have been going for eight plus
(22:09):
years.
I think sometimes it's notalways like the most influential
people. It can just be acircumstance or even just one person
saying something at the righttime that can change our whole way
of thinking. Now we alwaystalk about the good, the bad and
the ugly of entrepreneurshipand you know what's coming. I always
like to ask for the mostimportant embarrassing story because
(22:29):
I think the thing is I alwaysshare my stories and anyone on my
mastermind or retreats knows alot of embarrassing stories. But
what was the most embarrassingstory in your business life?
One that stands out and it'snot even that bad really. But at
the time it really haunted mewas I talk fast, I type fast, I do
certain things at speed a lotof the time. And I sent out this
(22:53):
email about setting out yourstall, and the subject line was setting
out your stall, only to thensend it out to however many thousand
people on the email list andget. I couldn't tell you how many
dozen replies saying, I thinkyou meant stall as in s T a double
L. And I'd put setting outyour stall S T double O, L as in
(23:15):
poo. So that was one of thosemoments where your sort of heart
sinks and you go, oh, whydidn't I just double check that email
that I sent out? So that's oneexample that comes to mind. And it
is one of those things becauseI really did go, oh my God, I can't
believe I've done that. Andjust felt so ashamed for a few hours.
(23:35):
It's funny though, isn't it?We put such pressure on ourselves
and we've all done it. Eventoday, we'll have in probably the
past week or months, donesomething or sensed something that
wasn't right. And when yousaid that, it just reminded me of
when we were doing captions ona video. And when I say the word
popular, for some reason, itrecognizes it as cop killer. Thankfully,
just before it uploaded toYouTube. We noticed it, but, you
(23:57):
know, we've all sent thesethings out, but we beat ourselves
up, don't we, that an emailwasn't right. And I think I used
to hold on to that a lot morewhen I was younger. Now not so much.
I think, you know, we all makeerrors. What's your view on obviously
people who are verycontroversial online? Because we
see a lot of this and a lot ofpeople are trying to carve out a
brand around being supercontroversial or we see a lot of
(24:21):
people jumping in on commentsand you know, and I see it online,
I have to kind of distancemyself because I find it quite harsh
some of the times that peopleare naming shaming, condemning. There's,
there's a lot of opinion. Butwhat is overstepping the mark these
days?
It's the rants. The irony ofwhat we're about. What I'm about
to say is one of the thingsthat I can't stand is people that
(24:46):
just ran and. But rant for thesake of ranting because they know
it's whipping up a storm andthere's a particular guy that I'm,
I'm doing some work at themoment and in part of the content
plan, it's. And on this dayyou do a rant and I'm just not doing
it. And I appreciate the ironyin what I'm saying because the thing
I'm ranting about is ranting.Right. So, but, but yeah, it's. It's
(25:07):
people that are whippingpeople up for frenzy. And a perfect
example of this is thepolitical situation. Without going
into politics in, in the UKand definitely over in the US at
the moment, it has gone so farthat there is just no rules anymore
for these. There is no moralline that people can cross to be
bad. And I think that's adangerous position when you've got
(25:30):
the major political partiesof, of major economies that are operating
that way. And yeah, people doit for the likes, they do it for
the engagement and that theydo what they do. But I know that
I generally take a bit of avanilla stance. Not because I am
afraid of being shot down oranything like that. It's not a fear.
Well, at least I don't thinkit's a fear of tall poppy syndrome.
(25:53):
It's more just. I just can'tbe bothered with it. I just can't
be bothered with it. And Ireally attempt to have a balanced
view on things. And by havingthat balanced perspective, it means
that I don't have judgmentsone way or Another, because ultimately
there's 4,828, I think, humantraits, and every one of us have
(26:14):
them. So if people are saying,I can't believe that person is making
fun of other people, well,there'll be a time when you've made
fun of other people, so youend up just becoming a hypocrite.
I read something of the daythat has stuck with me. The fact
that we have about 4,000 weeksin our life that is quite scary.
And when you start to quantifyit with a number, you start to think
like, well, next week thatwill be like, 3,000. Whatever. What
(26:37):
is your biggest mission interms of leading a life that has
impact, but not just for otherpeople, but for you? Like, what is
the legacy you want to do for Will?
Well, and this is a good oneto talk about, because people Talk
about that 4000 weeks andbeliefs are powerful. You know this,
Dawn. They're so powerful. Andif people are told something enough,
(26:57):
whether it's true or not,they'll believe it. And I think the
fact that 4,000 weeks maybe ofwhat people have lived to until now,
but that that definitely isn'tgoing to be the case moving forward.
There's going to be people inour lifetime, our generation, that
are living to 120, and notjust living to 120, as spending 40
(27:18):
years as a decrepit old personwith a walking stick or being pushed
around a wheelchair, but asactive as we are today, like, that
is happening. And I've got areal interest in life longevity.
And one of my things is I'mgonna live till I'm 150 years old.
And there'll be people thatlisten to this now going, who is
this delusional guy she's goton the podcast? But actually, if
(27:39):
you looking into the sciencesand you look into epigenetics and
you look into the developmentsin the human genome, and there's
an amazing book calledlifespan by Dr. David Sinclair. And
there's a whole bunch ofpeople that are. Mark Hyman and a
whole bunch of others aredoing really great work on this that
are making us become awarethat this is going to be more than
possible, women in ourlifetime. So that's one of the first
(28:01):
things. But for me, it's. It'sabout empowering people to live a
life that they love and givingthem the. The tools to be able to
do that. Because I think thatso many people, we all get schooled,
but we don't all get aneducation, right? So if we can get
this knowledge and the Stuffthat you've learned over the years
of being an entrepreneur thatjust imagine if you'd have been taught
(28:23):
that from five years old likeyou are maths and English and some
of these other topics, andmindfulness and the Power of mind,
the book that you mentioned.You know, if you'd have been given
that when you were 11, I knowyou started super early and super
successful really early on.And I know you built networks, you
used to run your events atAston Martin garages and you were
doing those things and theywere so powerful. Imagine knowing
(28:45):
that stuff at 11.
Oh, it's crazy. Honestly, Ifeel that I've been always passionate
about bridging the digitalskills gap, talking about, you know,
women in tech and gender paygap and things like that. But I think
what is changing and we'reseeing a shift is the amount of women
who are speaking on stages,starting podcasts and actually scaling
(29:09):
businesses. Because I honestlyfeel that from the age of 20 to like
35, it was a very solo journeyin a male dominated world. Every
time I showed up on stage itwas men. Every time I was going on
podcasts it was men. And evennow there are very few female speakers
in comparison to men. And alsoeven if you look at the charts, the
amount of podcasts that are inthe top 50. So it's a real passion
(29:33):
for me to see women moveforward. How have you seen women
in business change sinceyou've been in business?
I run a group of entrepreneursand one of the three rules that we
have is that they have to turnover a million pound plus and there
is probably only betweenbouncing between 15 and 20% of people
(29:53):
in that group that are women.And that's not because we're trying
to keep women out. There arejust not that many of them that are
turning over over a millionquid plus. Now the irony is out of
the 140 odd people in thegroup, the person in the group that
does 200 million is a woman.Right. So you, you go from one extreme
to another. What I've seen isthat there's a lot that's changed
(30:18):
in, in years gone by withtechnology. So technology enables
us to be able to do morefaster. Covid made working from home
acceptable for a lot ofpeople. So they're right. They've
been able to do certain thingsthat, that they've wanted to do.
And I think for a lot ofwomen, and I'm really interested
in your opinion on this, isthat a lot of them get caught in
this dilemma between. Well, Iwould really Love to do this, but
(30:42):
also I do really want to beable to be there for the kids and
do this and do that. And inyears gone by, they've had to make,
not had to, but there's been achoice that's been made and technology
is enabled and working fromhome and doing these things has enabled
that, I believe, to become easier.
I think there's probably a lotof like, stigmas and societal norms
(31:04):
that women have felt maybecompelled to adhere to because there
is that kind of guilt that ifthey do have a family that should
they be working and going outand about. And last week I heard
a story of a lady who had ababy who was in my network. She hasn't
even announced it on socialmedia because she's working in tech
(31:28):
and she lost one of herinvestors because she was pregnant.
And I think this is reallyquite scary that we're seeing this
now. It's like, what can we doto shift these mindsets and challenge
these norms? And I think thisis an interesting conversation because
obviously I talk to men andwomen about it. Where do you see
(31:48):
the change coming to get morewomen to scale to a million?
I think it comes back to whatdo they want? You know, if they want
to do it, great. Well then inthe same way that you equipped people
to be able to move into thedigital environment, you were one
of the really early adopters.You created your training schools
and your curriculums thatenabled people to go, I want to do
(32:09):
this. And what you're able todo is you're able to bridge that
gap. And I think the morepeople go, well, I would love to
do this, I just don't know thehow. For the majority of people,
people, it's not that theydon't know what they want to do,
it's just they don't know thehow. And the more those bridges can
be gapped and go, well, thiscan be done. And here's an example
of somebody that's done it.Here's an example of somebody that's
(32:31):
done it. And it's the same forguys as well. You know, I've got
so many. I'm at an age where alot of my friends are having kids
and they're the same. Theywant to be able to do the school
run, they want to be able tobe there for after school clubs and
to be able to watch whatever.They want to be able to do these
things. And it's a case ofjust knowing, well, how and who's
done it in a way where they'vebeen able to do both. And I think
(32:52):
that's the difference.
Yeah, finding the flexibilityso that it works. And I think it
is. It's like balance. I mean,there is no true work life balance.
I think, like, sometimes workwins, sometimes home wins, sometimes
there's a blend. But I thinknow with technology there is more
opportunity. And I guess itcomes down to understanding or having
the belief that, like,infinite success is possible for
all of us. It's just a choice.And I think maybe perception is now
(33:17):
that, you know, there are morepeople doing it and there are more
people kind of, you know,bridging that gap. I'm not saying
that a million has to be themilestone. I mean, it could be that
someone has a business that'sa hundred thousand and that's their
absolute dream. Where is yourdream, like your vision for Will
in the next five, ten years?Like, where do you want to take your
(33:37):
business?
What I'm attempting to do iscreate the go to platform for personal
development for entrepreneursin the uk. So in terms of online
resources, having everythingwhere people can come together, the
community element is a hugecomponent. Content is a huge element.
I'm a massive believer incollaboration and having great people,
(34:01):
great minds with greatknowledge that can come onto the
platform, share via theplatform, have the community element
that connects people, have thecoaching for people that want to
maybe accelerate that andbridge. Those are not bridge, but
have those three elements tohelp people bridge that transition.
So if they don't know whatthey want, we can help them get clear
on what they want to do. Ifthey know what they want to do, but
they don't know how to do it,we can help them do it. And that's
(34:24):
really something that I dofeel. Feel passionate about. You
mentioned it early on. Youknow, vision is. What is that vision?
What does it look like? Likepractice. If you were to close your
eyes and imagine waking up onyour ideal day, where are you waking
up? Who are you waking upwith? What's the next thing you're
going to go and do? I know youlove your Wellness Wednesdays.
Yeah, Wellness Wednesdays andFree Time Fridays.
(34:45):
Wellness Wednesdays and FreeTime Fridays. And being able to have
these things. Well, that'swhat I want to be able to do. And
then I want to go and do a bitof this, and then I want to come
do a bit of this. And it comesdown to choice. And I think that's
why so many people go intobusiness, the majority of them, even
though they might say they gointo business for money, they're
not going into business formoney, they're going into business
for freedom. And the money,money they perceive gives them the
(35:07):
freedom in, in the majority ofcases. So how do you create that
life that gives you thefreedom, whether it's the holidays,
whether it's this, whetherit's that, whatever it might be that
enables you to do things, orother people's freedom. So for a
lot of people it's, they wantto be able to earn a certain amount
of money, to be able to givetheir children or their grandchildren
or their grandchildren'schildren the freedom to be able to
do what, what they wouldreally love to do. And, and that's
(35:29):
where I think that we will seemore and more people when they've
got those role models of beingable to say, hey, look, I was able
to do really well in business,but I didn't sacrifice my family
for 20 years. And that's thedifference that I think online we're
only really starting to see,although we've been online since
whatever it is, 1990, whateveryear. But now I think it's easier
(35:52):
than ever to be able to createan online business that can help
others.
Yeah, definitely. Like Covidwas the catalyst there. But, but
I would say that we've seen ahuge shift in the online space and
the coaching industry sincethen. And maybe not all positively,
there is a lot of talk aboutentrepreneurs being burned, having
awful scenarios where they'vebeen put off. Actually, you know,
(36:15):
being in business, what's yourview of the online and particularly
the coaching space right now?
Yeah, it is a big topic and,and I'm, I'm going to link it back
to, to, to you and what youdid very early on. So with your academy,
I know you jumped throughloads of hoops that were really difficult
and challenging, but it meantthat you had to tick a lot of boxes
(36:38):
and do a lot of things thequote, unquote right way. And that
meant that you had to adhereto a certain protocol and code of
conduct to make sure thatcertain things were delivered on.
And then also you had lots ofthese pop up people teaching digital
(37:00):
marketing online that havemaybe got a tiny little bit of experience
and all of a sudden aredelivering on that. So the difference
being is that you've gone anddone the proper qualifications, let's
call it, and got theappropriate accreditations to be
able to deliver it. Butbecause it's not something that's
regulated, other people coulddo it. The same things happen with
(37:22):
coaching. One of the thingsthat I did really early on when I
first decided that I wanted tobecome a coach. I spoke to a bunch
of different coaches and askedhow did you do it? What did you do
again? Modeling other people.And one of the coaches said to me,
well, one of the things Ihighly recommend you go and do is
go and do a training course,but make sure you go and do it with
one of the companies that isICF accredited. So the ICF is not
(37:43):
the notorious West Hamintercity firm, the football hooligans,
but is the InternationalCoaching Federation. And at the time
they were regarded andarguably still are the gold standard
of coaching accrediting bodyaround the world. And nowadays if
people are coaches and they alot of the time want to go into corporate,
they will request for an ITFaccredited coaches or if it's uk,
(38:07):
I think it's called the ACassociation of Coaching. From off
the top of my head, the sortof the two organizations and what
that did was it took a lotlonger but I went through a certain
process. Whereas now peoplehear the word coach and you could
have someone that has learnedto lay flooring and all of a sudden
they're a flooring coach. Andwe just use this term and it's not
(38:28):
a protected term.Interestingly, accountant isn't a
protected term. Anyone cancall themselves an accountant, but
not anyone can call themselvesa chartered accountant. And there's
lots of examples ofchartership. So what do I think is
going to happen? I think thatat some stage there will be some
form of chartership that willhopefully come in because it will
(38:49):
separate people. We will seethere are some great organizations.
So there's an organizationcalled CPD Standards. They created
a body to essentially, Isuppose you could call it regulate
coaches because the ICF dealswith creating accreditation on what
you've trained in, whereaswhat this particular organization
(39:11):
we're doing under the CPDStandards, which is called Coach
of Excellence, they're nothelping you get qualified, but once
you're qualified, they hadthis really, really strict process
and I've never seen anythinglike it in terms of the stuff that
they wanted to get from me toprove that I've done a certain level
to be able to get accreditedin coach of excellence. So they're
(39:31):
doing a great job, but they'restill, they're a private organization
that are, that are trying to,I suppose, quote, unquote, clean
up the industry. But until yousee something across the board, that's
where, where people go, I wanta coach, but I'll go with this person
because they're cheaper onlyto then get Burned. And it's the
same. I say accountants as anexample. People have had a really
bad accountant because theydidn't want to pay the money for
(39:52):
the chartered accountant. Butthe reason you pay the money for
the chartered accountant isbecause if it goes wrong, you can
claim on their professionalliability insurance and, and all
that stuff. Professionalindemnity insurance.
I mean, I don't even think alot of coaches even know what professional
indemnity is. And I guess itcomes down to the fact that I suppose
in the space we see people besuccessful in their business or the
service they provide and thenobviously think, well, I can teach
(40:16):
that for me that I see thatmore as mentoring. And you know,
I think there's a real trickyarea that when you maybe haven't
gone with, and there'smultiple accreditations out there,
we've got our own accredited,you know, growth coaching certification.
If you haven't got the toolsmaybe to manage some of the things
that come from coaching, whichis often mindset led, this is where
(40:37):
I think there can be sometricky territory because I've had
a lot of people come to me whohave gone to somebody who is maybe
a traditional mentor and thebiggest success barrier they've got
is their own mindset. Soregardless how much they learn, they're
never going to move past it orthey've, they've gone to retreats
and things like that openthemselves up. That person maybe
has unlocked something andthere's been no one to manage that
(41:00):
process through. And I've,I've had to step in myself and do
these things at events andretreats and are even mine. So I'm
hoping or hopeful that we dosee more of regulation around it
because, you know, obviouslypeople doing a digital marketing
degree, that's one thing, butdoing a coaching qualification, you
know, I think there has to bea line maybe carved out of how people
(41:22):
present themselves. So if youthink about where you'd like coaching
to go, what would be your hopeor vision that it becomes.
A recognized professionalservice? So solicitors is a form
of professional service.Accountants is a form of professional
service, just to name a coupleof examples. And for it to be recognized
(41:42):
in that way. And there is anorganization, isn't there, the Chartered
Institute of PersonalDevelopment from memory. But it's
being able to have it as thatrecognized skill. You or I couldn't
do the electrics for thisbuilding that we're in and sign them
off because you have to bequalified in a certain way. And I
think that, that if it gets tothat level where people have to have
(42:04):
a certain level of training inthe same way that an electrician
would or a plumber would oranything else to be able to do the
work with somebody. Everyindustry is going to have guys that
aren't as good as others andyou're going to have the, the rogues
and whatever else. But in thesame way they got, or they've attempted
to get rid of a lot of therogue builders and the rogue trades
people and all the rest of it,we're just going to follow suit and
(42:27):
hopefully sooner rather thanlater because it will just mean that
there'll be less people that,that are affected as a result.
Yeah, and it is, it's aboutthe person who's impacted because
it can be quite catastrophic.I've always had to do CPD from a
digital side of things andalso for coaching and I do around
about 120 hours a year. So Ithink in any practice you would want
or hope that the person wasstill learning themselves. What's
(42:49):
the biggest thing in terms ofyour own personal development around
coaching that you feel is important?
Continuous learning. You know,Kite Kaizen Continuing, never ending
improvement. That, thatconstant process of growing. There's
stuff that I have learned nowthat I didn't know five or six years
ago and I. Mastery for me isnot a destination. Yes, you can do.
(43:11):
If you, if you think intraditional terms, you do your GCSEs
or whatever they call themthese days, then your A levels, then
you go to university, you do adegree, then you do a master's, then
you do a PhD. People are justgetting more and more knowledge in
a specific area. And generallyspeaking, you, you niche down, don't
you? You do a PhD in aspecific, really micro niche area.
(43:35):
And that is what I love to do.There's, there's a few key areas
that I just love to go really,really deep on and learn more and
more and more because itbecomes the nuances. That's the bit
that I love is the nuances.And, and I think it was Albert Einstein
that said, the more I learn,the more I realize, the less I know.
(43:56):
Or something to that effect.It may not have been Einstein. And
I've certainly found that tobe the case. The more I'm learning,
the more I'm going, wow, Ididn't realize that. And it unlocks
this little bit moreinformation, unlocks a whole nother
area of areas because now Ican start connecting everything up
together and create theselittle nuances that are tiny but
(44:16):
actually can make a Hugedifference for people. So, yeah,
I agree.
I mean, I've been doing a loton holistic meditation, modalities,
nlp, really kind of gettinginto delving deeper and deeper into
neuroscience and reallylooking at not just the process of
it, but things like the. Thehabits of highly successful people
and linking that back to whatwe can do day to day. So, on a final
(44:38):
note, then, if you think aboutone parting statement or piece of
advice you could give ouraudience, who are a mix of, obviously
business owners, male andfemale, what would that piece of
advice be?
To create a life or have amission in life that you never achieve.
(44:59):
And the reason for that is somany people, they put all of this
time, this energy and thiseffort into a particular point in
the future, which is thatgoing to be their pinnacle moment,
their moment where they go,oh, ah, I've made it, I can kick
my feet up now, I can sitback, I can relax. There are so many
(45:19):
people that we've worked withthat have achieved, by pretty much
everybody's standards,incredible success, and they get
to that moment. Is this it? Isthis it? Is this what it's really
about? Whereas if you havethat mission, that's the equivalent
of trying to empty the seawith students. Why I call it the
North Star? Like, what's theNorth Star? Because. Because once
(45:40):
upon a time, there's a famousstory involving a baby. It was born
in December in a stable andthere was three men that. That found
this baby and they followedthe North Star, but they never went
to the North Star, they justused it as their guiding light. So
if you can forever use thisguiding light that you accept you're
never going to achieve, yes,you can create milestones that you
want to achieve along the way,but you're constantly moving forward
(46:00):
and feeling fulfilled asyou're moving forward. And there
will be challenges, butoptimal growth comes at the border
of support and challenge. Soyou're growing when you're being
challenged and you're notgrowing. And in fact, you're potentially,
you're not growing when it'stoo comfortable as well. So it comes
out. If you're not growing,you're dying, that type of view.
So have it having that thingand working towards it and it will
(46:20):
happen, it will flow and itwill change. You're not going to
stay perfectly on track. But Ithink that that's one of the most
important things that peopledo to have a fulfilled life. Because
when it comes to the end,whenever that is, whether it's in
4,000 weeks or whether it's150 years old.
I'm living to 150.
I think we all want to lookback and go, do you know what? What?
I gave it my all. Yeah, sure,there were times when I was a little
(46:42):
bit scared and sure, therewere times when I thought that I
wasn't going to get throughit, but you can go, I gave it my
all. I absolutely went for it.And I had great fulfillment along
the way. And as cliche as thesaying is, enjoy the journey. Because
that, that's what you can dowhen you've, when you've got that
thing that every single dayyou're working towards, no matter
how small that tiny action is,it's getting you closer and closer
(47:05):
to fulfilling that mission. Ithink of it like, you know, once
upon a time when we used touse computers and they used to have
the loading bars, you know, alot of them don't have them now because
they're so quick. Everythingjust loads so quickly. But it used
to be loading, loading,loading, it gets to 100% and then
it was done. Whereas I thinkof it of a never ending loading bar
and you constantly can look atit and go, wow, look how much blue
there is. For example, if it'sthe blue part that's showing the
(47:26):
progress, look how much thereis. And we see it that way.
I love it because it's kind oflike a ever evolving process, purpose,
something that we're like,it's our mission, our vision, our
passion. It's like we'reconstantly striving for something
that we love and enjoy andreally want to do. So if someone
wants to get your book orconnect with you, where is the best
place to find?
Well, best place to find willis willpolston.com if you want to
(47:48):
sort of head to the website,you can get to all of the social
channels from there and we'llpost them on. On everything on, on
pretty much all the socialchannels. The book Book North Star
Thinking. Master your mindsetand live a life you love. Easiest
place for most people is Amazon.
Amazing. Thank you so much forjoining us.
Thank you for having me.
Thanks for listening to dawnof a New Era, the podcast brought
(48:09):
to you in association with theHer Power community. This initiative
was founded by myself and it'sall about empowering female founders
to recognize their limitlesspotential and pursue their ambitions
with confidence. Now there isless than 1.8% that goes into investing
in female founded businessesand we are here to make positive
(48:31):
change. So come and support uson Instagram at Her Power community
and find out more about whatwe're doing to support female founders
to scale and grow their businesses.
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