August 5, 2024 • 47 mins
Do you get the best from your team? Guest Brianna Ansaldo is CEO of Australia's largest independent podcast production agency in Australia, and has a completely virtual team.
When I started this podcast two years ago, I clicked immediately with Brianna but also knew that after the onboarding I'd be working with the team not Brianna directly. Here's the fascinating bit - her team was just as great to work with. So what was it about her leadership that was creating such a great environment for the team and clients to be thriving?
So nervously I asked a podcasting professional to be a guest on my podcast.
In this episode we talk about her time as famous singer on reality TV, the time we both have been mascots dressed in huge suits with big heads, her journey into podcasting, and the bit you're probably most interested in, her 3 leadership lessons:
- the questions she asks during the interview process to ensure a perfect fit for both the job and the team culture at Bamby Media.
- how to stretch and get the best from your team (hint: it's not a sink or swim approach)
- her foolproof processes for establishing top-notch work standards within her team, preventing any tasks from falling short of excellence and ending up back on her desk.
If Brianna's leadership journey has inspired you to level up your own, here's two ways I can help:
Guest Bio - Brianna Ansaldo, Bamby Media
www.bambymedia.com
After over a decade working as a songwriter, Brianna fell in love with podcast production and founded Bamby Media. Eight years on Bamby Media is now the largest independent podcast production agency in Australia, with a current roster of over 65 clients globally.
Brianna is also a podcast industry judge for the Australian Podcast Awards, Webby Awards and Signal Awards. Working with podcast industry professionals to help celebrate the best of the best has been extremely rewarding and Brianna is excited to work more in this space in the coming years.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
GMT20240306-005514_Recor (00:33):
Today, I am both excited and nervous to
welcome Brianna Ansaldo to thepodcast.
She is the head honcho at BambyMedia and the person that I have
to personally thank for gettingthis podcast off the ground two
years ago.
I got passed on Brianna's namefrom my VA.
She came highly recommended andwas actually the only person I
spoke to about my podcastbecause when we met, there was
(00:56):
this certain something abouther.
that we talked about music andour love for singing, and I just
felt like my podcast was in goodhands.
Something I noticed with workingwith Brianna is she was so great
to work with.
And then when I worked with herteam, they were also great,
which is not always the casewhen we work with people that
are not the CEO of the businessor not the founder of the
(01:17):
business.
And this made me think, huh,there is something about her
leadership that we can learnfrom.
And so today's podcast, we'redigging into some of the
leadership lessons she's learnedalong the way and three in
particular that we have chattedabout and pulled out to talk
through.
The first one is when you'rehiring your team about some
unusual questions.
(01:39):
The second one is about how toget the best from your team.
And I can tell you it's not asink and swim approach.
And the third was aboutstandards, big picture thinking,
and something that I like torefer to as they get a voice,
not a vote.
So we're going to dig into thesethree questions.
Welcome to the podcast, Brianna.
Well, thank you so much, Kate.
(02:00):
Happy to be here.
So, as I said at the beginning,we bonded over our love of
music.
For those that listen to thepodcast know that I am a singer,
a violinist, piano player, and Ilove musical theatre.
Brianna is also a singer, and Ithink you might have been on a
popular talent show, if I recallcorrectly, but you have a degree
in Music from the QueenslandConservatorium of Music.
(02:22):
Can you tell a little bit aboutyour music background and how
you got into podcast production?
Oh, it's been such a funjourney.
So you are right.
I, like you, love music.
I was also in musical theatre.
Uh, I have been a musician sinceI was very tiny, uh, and I'm a,
(02:43):
I play the piano and the guitar.
I did Spanish classical guitarand I did classical voice and
then I moved into jazz voice andthen I moved into Broadway voice
and then I kind of mushed allthose things together to create
like a a mashup, I suppose, ofthose styles.
So I did that for a very longtime.
(03:04):
And yeah, I did, did musicaltheater shows for, uh, quite a
few years as well, uh, during mylast kind of couple of years of
high school.
And then once I, once I was outof high school as well, they
were amateur theater companiesand I would tour around.
I was also in pantomimes.
So I did a bunch of pantomimesall over Brisbane, touring
around.
Uh, that was pretty crazy.
(03:26):
And I was also like the Easterbunny in shopping centers with
like a giant scary Easter bunny.
I was Wonder Kid from, for theChildren's Hospital.
And if you've been in one ofthose big costumes, like mine
had a fan in the head and an icevest.
Oh, they're hot.
Oh my God, you, you, at leastyou got that.
I didn't get any of that.
I was, I mean, at least I wasin, I was in pretty decent air
(03:48):
conditioning, but.
The thing about that, that Ilearnt, was you can actually do
things that are ridiculous, andfeel really hard and silly, and
if you have the right frame ofmind, the right mindset, you can
have a very good time.
I remember.
At the end of that day that Iwas Wonder Kid at the Brisbane
(04:09):
exhibition, my cheeks were sorefrom smiling.
I was in a full body costume,you couldn't see my face, which
just shows it's a whole bodyexperience.
It's a whole body experience,But anyway, I digress.
So I did that.
Obviously I have a very,energetic and entertaining type
personality about me.
(04:29):
I love to be that person.
And I, when I finished school, Idecided I would do a bachelor of
audio production.
So music production at theconservatorium of music.
I did that for four years.
During that time, I also decidedto go and try out for Australian
Idol because it was six years inor something at that point, and
(04:53):
they would allow you to singyour own song in the audition.
And I was like, man, that's thefirst year they allowed that.
I wasn't interested in being apop star at all, but I was
certainly interested on hearingwhat people thought about my
original music.
You're a storyteller.
I really get that.
Yeah, I'd been performing for somany years and I'd written so
many songs and I had a couple ofalbums under my belt already
(05:15):
that I'd produced myself.
So I went to this audition andit was insane and I ended up
getting picked.
I got through the next round andthen I got down to go down to
Sydney and then I was up againsta whole bunch more people.
I made it through that as well.
I got into the final 12 thatwere then on TV.
(05:37):
And, uh, and then I had a chefand I had a driver and we had
paparazzi and, you know, just anincredible, it was an incredible
year.
It was very stressful and Ididn't enjoy a lot of it, but I
also enjoyed Aspects of it, likemeeting behind the scenes people
(05:58):
and your, uh, your productionlawyers and your VP and your,
you know, the other musiciansand the band and putting
together a huge band and anorchestration within.
48 hours.
And, you know, all that stuffwas really, really cool.
So that was quite an experience,but I am profoundly deaf in one
(06:19):
ear and that made it much harderfor me to compete properly on
that program because they didn'thave in ear monitors for us at
that point.
So they'd also make youchoreograph and like walk around
the stage, you know, to be agood showman.
but the band was behind you andyou couldn't hear and the
(06:41):
monitors were really far infront of you, so you actually
couldn't hear all that well.
Foldback.
Foldback, exactly.
So the foldback, you couldn'thear it if you didn't have it in
ears and you're walking around astage.
So for me, I struggle with soundif it's not right here in my
ears because I can't tell.
What's going on?
You know, and I was trying tochoreograph.
(07:02):
So, or like dance around.
Uh, so that was very hard.
And I had a blow up with thehead of, basically the head of
the whole show.
Uh, and I said, you need to giveus in ear monitors.
Like if this is a show aboutbeing a musician, about being a
singer and all that, we need inear monitors.
That no one should be expectedto.
(07:24):
walk around like this.
He said, no, there's no budgetfor it.
You know, that's not somethingwe're willing to do.
And then I got booted off theprogram the following week.
And, uh, then two weeks afterthat, they all had in ear
monitors.
And I was so like, I was a bitjaded by that going man, it's,
it's, it's a show, you know, youshould make the musicians feel
(07:45):
like they can do what they'resupposed to be doing, uh, and so
that brought me into a differentside of it, okay, actually it
was a television program, itwasn't really about the
musicians as much as it is aboutthe judges and highlighting them
and, you know, all those thingsthat you don't kind of realize
when you're in it, and it's justafterwards where you It's a TV
show that happens to also give aplatform to musicians, but it's
(08:09):
definitely not the main thing.
It's like people that watchMarried at First Sight, like
that's not to buildrelationships.
That is like TV.
It's just TV.
If you get a relationship, well,that's like a chance bonus, but
yeah.
So that was really incredible.
I got a little bit agoraphobic,I think after that, because I
was very famous.
for a while, it was just, youcouldn't go anywhere, you know,
(08:32):
going to the shops, just, therewas, even just to get my
groceries, people would come upto you or they'd stare at you
and they'd want your signatureand photos with you and bonkers,
like, just, what did my, what isthis life, you know, it was just
a crazy situation, I wasfeatured in all the papers and
all this paparazzi stuff and,yeah, so eventually, I realized
(08:55):
that's not a kind of life Iwanted to have.
I didn't want to be a celebrity.
I wanted to write music and Icontinued to write music.
I got my music featured on filmand television, sinking deals
and all sorts of fun thingsthrough that.
Then I had a child.
And I was a touring musician fora long time at that point.
And, uh, my husband and I, wehad to move up to Cairns and I
(09:16):
realized I didn't want to be atouring musician anymore because
that was very hard with a youngchild.
And he was also an intern andwas a doctor at the time.
And I was looking at thetrajectory of our lives going,
there's no way, like, there's noway he can be a doctor and I can
be a touring musician.
And we have a child or multiplethat have any stability other
(09:36):
than a nanny, you know.
Yeah, so I had to make a shiftat that point.
And I started getting intopodcasting from that point
because I wanted to take all theskills that I'd learned as an
audio producer.
I'd had, you know, many, many,many hours in big studios and I
understanded the whole aspect ofit.
And podcasting is a form ofstorytelling that I just fell in
(09:59):
love with and I could use musicand I could use stories and I
could highlight people and themake their voices sound
beautiful and clear.
And it just felt like a stepthat I was meant to go on.
And then, was this when Bambywas born?
This was when Bamby, it took acouple of years before it was
born, and then I realized, yeah,like I just started getting so
(10:21):
many jobs from it and referralsand big comp, you know, sort of
big podcasts over in the States.
I was working just with the USAclients for quite a while
because this industry was reallysmall here.
And then I just started.
It was really all word of mouth.
I didn't do any advertising.
It didn't do anything.
And I just started gettingclients.
And, uh, then it just got biggerand I had to hire.
(10:44):
And eventually my husband quithis job as a doctor six years
in.
He quit it so that he could joinBamby Media and have a different
life for himself as well.
And, uh, yeah.
And tell me about your team now,because I've met quite a few of
them.
How big is the team and whereare they situated?
So at the moment we've got sixin the team.
(11:05):
we've got Deb, Maylee, Emily,who are in, well, Deb's in
Sunshine Coast, Maylee's inBrisbane, Great place, Sunshine
Coast, Sunshine Coast, any case,represent, and then Maylee's in
Brisbane, Emily is on the GoldCoast.
And then Josh, who's also inBrisbane, and then we've got me
(11:28):
and Alex, who are in Brisbane.
So although we're all kind ofSoutheast Queensland ish, none
of us work in the same location,except for Alex and I, who
obviously, you know, we workfrom home.
We have different studios, so webarely see each other, to be
honest, uh, that's a wholedifferent story.
But yeah, it's, it's, uh.
(11:50):
It's a spread team, completelydistributed, so we don't see
each other day to day.
And I think this is interestingto talk about because when we go
through your leadership lessons,sometimes people presume that,
oh, it's easier if you can seesomeone if you're having face to
face time, but you'veessentially built your business
virtually and done theseleadership lessons that I'm
going to talk through today,virtually.
(12:11):
And I think this is a goodlittle side note for people to
keep in mind that this wonderfulculture that you've built has
not been done face to face.
So, you've got a team of six.
The first leadership lesson thatyou had mentioned was about how
you go about hiring.
And I absolutely agree when youtalk about it's about the
person.
And you've got some interestingquestions that you ask.
(12:31):
Can you share a bit more aboutthis?
Yes, so whenever I'm coming toapproach the hiring of a person,
so right now, I think, just togive you context, I've probably
hired eight or nine people, uh,that have come in different
seasons and been with us fordifferent amounts of time,
depending on what else is goingon.
The thing I always look for is,I care less.
(12:54):
about their actual skills, whichseems maybe counterintuitive,
but for a technical job,exactly.
I look to hire people who arecurious, who can follow
direction, who have an ear forsound.
Even if they've never edited apodcast before, because the,
(13:18):
especially in my realm, thestate of podcasting podcasting
changes so rapidly, the softwarethat we use, AI being a thing,
the kind of things they need toknow and learn, it evolves.
over time.
And when I've hired, I hired oneguy who had a music production
(13:38):
degree, very, very good, like,technically amazing.
But, and he was, you know, justa nice dude as well, just a fun
guy, but he was reallyparticular about the edits
because of his background inmusic production.
(14:00):
Which meant that over time, thetime that he took to do an edit
would be much longer thansomeone else's because he was
going, just zooming way too farin and forgetting about the
context, the story, the over,like who this client is, how
they like to sound.
It's a conversation, keep itsounding like a conversation,
(14:21):
not like it's chopped up every,you know, too polished, people
don't feel.
Don't, yeah, exactly, don't makeit too polished.
So, yes, the skill, hetechnically had the skill, but
he didn't have the personalityor he was too technically
skilled to zoom out enough togo,"Am I creating an experience
(14:41):
that the listener will enjoy?"So that's why I always hire and
I always ask questions of peoplearound what they do in their
lives outside of work.
So there needs to be a creativeflair in the person that I hire,
but it doesn't need to betechnically something that
they've had as a job.
(15:03):
So we have Josh here.
Uh, he is a phenomenalillustrator, artist.
He likes to ride one wheels.
He does rock climbing.
He likes building Gundam.
He like loves bonsais, you know,he's very creative.
with all these different things,and he's also a videographer,
(15:23):
and he's probably our mostskilled person.
I would say, but he wasn't soset in his ways that you
couldn't go, I know you'recreative and you can figure this
out.
Doesn't matter what the contextis, you're creative, and that
is, that's, so that's kind ofthe question I always go with is
(15:44):
what's your hobby, what do youdo outside of work?
I also ask them whether theylike peanut butter or Vegemite,
whether they like sunshine orrainbow, rainbows.
Yep, whether they like, uh,nighttime or daytime, like the
preference, and these might seemlike kind of random questions, I
mean they are random, but itgives you a feel of who that
(16:09):
person is, and especially if youthen ask them a question around,
you know, If you could havethree eyes or six legs, which
one would you choose?
You leave it open and then youget them to answer it and a
creative answer tells me thatthere's humour and they explain
(16:31):
why they've, they've sort ofdecided on one thing or another.
It really paints a picture as towho they are and how they think
about things.
I think what you've just said,it tells you how they think,
because that's really, in aninterview, you want to know how
somebody thinks, like, if theyhave a problem, how are they
going to work through it?
It reminds me of, like, maths atschool, where you would do,
(16:52):
like, show your workings, like,that's stupid, I've got the
right answer.
But it's the same thing, like, Iwant to understand how you
think, so when you're in a newsituation, how are you going to
think about it?
When you're under pressure, howare you going to think about it?
I often would ask people ininterviews, Like in my decades
of hiring, like what do you doon the weekend?
What do you do for fun?
And for the same reason, likewhen I'm hiring a person, these
(17:12):
people are going to interactwith the other people and
interact with clients.
And people who like people,people that work with people,
it's so much more than atechnical thing.
Mm, a hundred percent.
And something you and I havespoken about, um, in the book
Legacy by, I was going to sayJames Clear.
That's not right.
We were talking about JamesClear before.
I'll have to think about who theauthor is.
It's about the New Zealand AllBlacks.
(17:32):
And they say that to be afootball player, like a New
Zealand All Black, you must havesomething outside football and
you cannot be an All Black ifyou don't have a hobby.
And they're saying you need tohave a passion outside football
because if something happenswith football, you need to have
something else that you can relyon for your happiness.
And I think this is just a goodbasis for human life.
(17:54):
We can't put everything in onespot and we can't have
everything in our job.
Did you find the author?
I did.
James Kerr?
Yeah, James Kerr.
So close.
Oh man, I mean, it's very close.
Yeah.
it does show why your team, Ifind fascinating and interesting
to talk to because you've hiredinteresting people.
(18:14):
Yeah, they were all, you know,and Emily is a A musician, like
a touring musician.
Deb just finished her yogateacher training.
So she does yoga teaching.
Alex is also really intogardening and woodworking.
May Lee loves board games andshe's on radio every second
Thursday night talking aboutcrazy board games and video
(18:35):
games.
And, uh, you know, so they'veall got stuff.
It just makes it more fun towork with people like that.
As long as you know, you can'tjust like hire a flighty
creative, because you know,there are lots of flighty
creative people that don't wantto commit to anything.
That is a very real problem.
That is a thing.
You also need to lay down thelaw and hire people that
(19:01):
understand that yes, there'screativity.
Yes, there's silly.
Yes, there's fun, but there'salso doing a very good job and
sticking to the processes andthings that we've set out.
I think that segues beautifullyinto your second leadership
lesson, which was about yourteam and how to encourage them,
but not.
It wasn't your word, but I'mgoing to say mollycoddle.
(19:22):
Yes.
Yeah.
Infantilization.
Yeah.
Is, is one of them.
And in fact, one of our clients,The Wholesome Show, did a
podcast episode on workplaceinfantilization a couple of
weeks back, which was kind ofwhat was making me think about
it.
It's a very real thing.
As a manager, it can be, and aleader, it can be so easy to
(19:45):
like micromanage your team andto go,"No, I need it to be done
this way firstly.
But if you don't understand howto do it, let me just do most of
it." And then you do the end bitor alternatively asking the team
if they can handle it.
(20:06):
And if they can't, then you takea bit back, giving them an in to
say,"Oh, that feels like toomuch work for me.
Like, I don't want to do thatwhole thing, or I don't like
editing that client." So give itto someone else.
Like, you can't treat them likechildren.
You have to make them aware thatyes, they can have creative
(20:26):
freedom and they can have lotsof flow in their day.
But also, they need to be incharge of themselves and I'm not
going to be holding their handthrough things.
I talk about this idea ofstretch and support.
So stretch your people becausethey probably can achieve more
than what they think they can.
How do you stretch that comfortzone but also know they're
(20:48):
supported?
Not supported that you will doit for them if they don't do a
good job, but that they're, it'sokay to fail and provide,"this
is a safe place to stretchoutside of your comfort zone.
And yes, it's not going to feelgood all the time and you're
going to get it wrong sometimes.
And, I still expect you to doit." Yeah, exactly.
I still expect you to do it andthat piece on failing as well, I
(21:11):
find very interesting becausethere's also the point where if
they do something wrong, andlet's say they're client facing,
they do something wrong.
There's also a part of you thatmight want to go, Oh, I'll reply
to the client or, you know,I'll, take the blame or I'll
apologize or whatever.
(21:31):
Getting them to do it.
Is actually, yes, it gets themout of their comfort zone, but
it also means that they're somuch less likely to make that
mistake again, because they'refront facing and they have to
own up to the thing that they'vedone.
Now, if this is a bigger processissue, if this is something
that's training that's, youknow, on me, then.
(21:53):
I'm going to be taking the fallfor that and making sure that
the team is processed outproperly.
But if they've made a genuineerror that I feel they can
resolve and they can talk to theclient about, then a hundred
percent, that's what they shouldbe doing.
It reminds me of the idea of,uh, tying your child's
shoelaces.
They're like, Oh, it's justquicker and easier if I do it
(22:13):
myself.
But when they're 16, it'sawkward, right?
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
There's going to be a point thatthey tie their own shoelaces.
So when people talk about likedelegation or giving people
tasks, the responsibility andaccountability has to match.
So if you're giving someone theresponsibility to do a job, they
also need to have theaccountability to follow that up
(22:34):
and to own it, and you cansupport them in doing that.
But unless you give them theaccountability, which is both
the good and the tough stuff,they will never feel responsible
for it, and they will always optout.
100%, I could not agree more.
You just summed that up sonicely.
So I think if you're givingpeople tasks.
Be okay to stretch them and tellthem that it's going to be
uncomfortable.
(22:54):
Like someone's job should be twothirds in what they're great at
and one third what makes themuncomfortable in a stretch.
And also some of the crappytasks, because let's be honest,
we all have some crappy tasksand you just can't avoid them.
but just telling people upfront, and I think that's
something that you do reallywell at Bamby Media talking
about.
This is the concept, you'reresponsible for this, you're
accountable for this, you needto follow up.
I will support you and it's onyou.
(23:17):
Yeah.
A hundred percent.
Totally.
Something else that youmentioned at the beginning of
when we're talking about thesecond leadership lesson was
about process and systems, whichis your third leadership lesson
and something that I personallyhave experienced working with
you because I've got to see howyou set things up.
And as a client, it gives mesuch peace of mind knowing, ah,
there's a system, there's aprocess, everything is under
(23:38):
control.
Can you tell me a bit about thesetting up of processes and how
it's impacted your business?
Yeah, so I learned pretty earlyon, and in fact, I learned this
from my previous role.
So when I was studying as amusician, uh, in my degree, I
had a part time job in a hugetravel company, massive.
(24:00):
And I was the head of training.
in the customer service center,and I was a supervisor and head
of training.
And so, obviously I didn't startthere, but I worked my way up to
that role.
Their processes, because theywere a huge company, were on
point, and you just knew exactlywhat every single job was that
(24:22):
you would need to do, and, uh,there was no margin, really, for
error in the actual process.
So, for me, I then was in chargeof writing and recording and
going through all the trainingfor all the customer service
representatives.
So anyone that came in that wasnew, I would train them.
And I set up systems within thatto go, okay, this is what your
(24:45):
training needs to be, and thisis the part you do yourself, and
this is, you know, blah, blah,blah.
This is where I step in and helpyou, all that.
So I learned that we neededfirstly an intranet.
Yes, which is the back end ofyour team where anything that
you think your team needs toknow lives.
And we've processed that out.
(25:07):
I spent a long time doing it.
We use Confluence for ourintranet where any tutorial.
that they're likely to havelives.
Any question that they're likelyto have, especially because
we're a remote team, a remoteteam, they can't just pop into
my office and be like, Hey,Brianna, blah, blah, blah.
And if they try and get me onSlack, a lot of the time I'm not
(25:28):
available.
I'm in a lot of meetings.
They can't get me a lot of thetime.
And so it is necessary and arequirement that they use the
intranet, which has reallysearch, searchable, like.
terms there, that they can findwhatever they might need to
know.
So from the backend perspective,and intranet is key, as soon as
I started really building thatout and have lots of stuff in
(25:49):
there, ah, the amount ofquestions I got just reduced by
99%.
You know, I don't get askedquestions, and so that, from
that side, it's important.
The other thing I do, and I doless of now, is when we get a
new client, I take the firststep.
So obviously I set that clientup.
(26:11):
I'm the first one theycommunicate with and I, we have
like a Google drive whereeverything's submitted.
They have, they get a welcomeemail.
They get all the processes.
They get a welcome video.
The client really understandshow it's going to roll.
Absolutely.
And then from the other end.
I do the initial introduction tothe team, to the client.
(26:34):
The client's not like getting, Idon't mean like a virtual, Hey,
this is the client.
This is the team.
It's me shooting a tutorial forthe team to go, this is this
client, they're this kind ofpersonality.
They have this kind of sparkabout them.
These are the things this clientlikes that they don't like.
They get a video about thatclient.
And then go, and this is how Iwant you to edit this person.
(26:55):
And then I.
do the edit, they watch that.
So that there, again, is nosituation where I feel like I
haven't represented the clientproperly first to the team, so
that they understand who theclient is.
Now, as I get bigger, that's arole that I have to pass off.
(27:17):
And that's a tricky one, becausefor me, client customer
relations is huge.
But it's something that I, youknow, am training upwards on, so
that I do less of that as well.
Because it's necessary.
On that hiring someone to dothat job, when businesses grow,
like the first thing you hire ispeople to do things that you're
(27:37):
not good at, and the sign thatyou've reached the next level is
that you're hiring people to dothe things that you are good at.
And that can be tricky.
Yeah, it's really, that, the,I'm so personality based, like
I'm so personality driven, Ireally enjoy our clients, and so
to have someone step in, thatmatches my energy.
(28:00):
It doesn't need to be the sameenergy.
That's crazy.
They don't have to be the sameperson, but they need to match
the flair and the brand that isBamby Media.
And I think when it's your ownbusiness, the culture and the
values, they are your values.
And so every time you hire, it'shiring someone that represents
who you are.
Even though it's a company, it'sstill representing who you are.
(28:22):
And as I said at the beginning,the reason that I didn't even
talk to anybody else, I waslike, Oh, yes.
This is the match.
Done.
Yeah.
I love match.
Uh, when you talked about yourprocesses and your systems,
something that I wanted tohighlight to listeners is you're
very good at expectationsetting.
And one of the challenges peoplehave with leadership is you
(28:43):
either expect someone to alreadyknow because they're good at
their job, they'll know what todo, or you expect them to know
nothing.
So you micromanage everything.
And people think there's thisline, it's like, I do everything
micromanage or I'm completelyhands off.
There's actually a triangle andyour leadership style is what we
call, Hmm.
A little bit called somethingelse.
It'll come to me.
(29:04):
The pointy bit of the triangle.
Constructive leadership.
There we go.
Got it.
So it's a third point.
And what people think is likethis, like hands off, go
completely hands on.
You want to find the spot inbetween.
That's not true.
It's a third point.
It's completely different.
And it's setting theseexpectations up front.
So the way that you have metwith the client first, and then
you've explained, this is whatthe client's about.
(29:24):
And these are my expectationsfor working with them.
These are our end goals.
And then they work within that.
So setting clear expectationsand then giving them some scope
to work within it is the keythere.
Because you can set clearexpectations and then
micromanage.
That's not good.
Or you could set no expectationsand expect them to do their job.
They're not going to meet whatyou think.
(29:45):
And then you're going to end updoing it again anyway.
So this falls under when you'redelegating and working with a
team, a rule of three.
So if you do something threetimes, you need to delegate and
have a system for it.
If you do it once, you might aswell do it yourself.
If it's something you only dotwice, by the time you do it
once, figure it out, and thenyou tell someone, there's no
point.
If it's three times, you need asystem.
(30:05):
So if you think about Brianna'sexample, you're onboarding
clients all the time, so itmakes sense that there's a
system.
They are continually doingpodcast episodes, so it makes
sense that from the beginningthey know exactly what you
expect.
and you do the first one, youshow them.
And I'm going to imagine there'sthen a checking process to
making sure that what they'redoing.
Yes.
Okay.
Excellent.
(30:27):
Quality assurance, making surethat you're checking in, that
the expectation you said at thebeginning is being followed
through on the, how does thatchecking process happen?
Now I've put you on the spot.
Yeah.
So that is really a fun one.
The checking process, because Istarted off where I would.
Okay.
It depends on how long you'vehad your team members in place,
right?
(30:47):
Because certainly if they, ifyou take a bunch of newbies,
then I need to be checking allof it.
So for each individual podcastepisode, I would then go in,
there's like a tick box.
We use Trello for our workflow.
So Trello is just a checklistmaster.
It's awesome.
Yeah.
And, uh, there's plenty of them,exactly.
(31:09):
So there would be a checkboxwhere after they've done their
bit, it's like Brianna toreview.
So then I would have to go inand listen, review, give them
feedback via loom and show themthings that they can improve.
Okay.
So it's not just like, yeah,this is good enough.
It's like, no, here's the thingsthat you're missing.
As the team, oh, and that goesfor like content writing as
(31:30):
well, video snippets, thingslike that, that I.
would start off doing.
I would then review everything.
When I was hiring multiple,multiple people at once, that
was, that was awful.
I just, that was my whole life.
I was just reviewing and givingfeedback, but I knew that the
end goal was they'll be reallygood and I'll trust them.
(31:51):
Mm hmm.
To do it.
After about three weeks, Youcould stop.
Didn't have to review anymore.
And then it would only be where,you know, some little things
would come up.
Or sometimes I would just pop inwithout them knowing and just
listen to something and see howthey're going.
Yeah.
That kind of stuff.
But the thing that's happeningnow, which I was trialing, was
(32:14):
they review each other.
Oh, I love this.
Tell me more.
Yeah.
So it's like, instead of megetting my hands in there, These
people that have been workinghere have been working with me
for quite some time.
They are very aware of theprocess and the systems and how
things are supposed to go.
If I assign someone new to atask they haven't done before,
(32:39):
let's say it's content writing,I assign them to it.
Then there's a checkboxunderneath that says, you know,
Deb to review or Emily to reviewor Meili to review.
So that another team member hasto go in.
Listen, review, and give thatperson feedback same way I
would.
(32:59):
Now why this is valuable isbecause it makes, firstly, the
person that knows they're goingto be reviewed by someone else
in their team you know, becausethey, they want to do a good
job.
They don't want to, like, theywant to represent themselves
really well for the otherperson, for their peer.
So it makes them do a betterjob.
It also makes the personreviewing.
(33:20):
Good, because they come in, theylisten, they review, and they
might even learn something fromthe other person, and they're
being critical, and then theyactually take that on to their
own work as well.
So.
That's working really well.
I love this as a concept becauseyou learn so much when you teach
something or you critiquesomething else because you put
(33:40):
it in a different lens.
And I think that is wonderful asa skill set development, but
also as a team, like a teamenvironment, because I also
believe that the way you've setup your culture is this is
viewed as.
I'm on your team, I'm here tohelp, not I'm going to catch you
out.
And that is such an importantdifference.
If you think, yeah, we're goingto do this and then, uh, it's
(34:02):
the team explodes.
It's because they think they'regetting judged by their peers
who they think no less.
Bad culture.
You want to set up in the waythat you are supporting each
other, um, to be better at thejob.
Yeah.
It's fun.
It's a fun little extra thingfor them to do.
And uh, the feedback's beengreat.
Yeah, I have, um, been writingsome leadership programs and I
(34:24):
recently taught a leadershipprogram that somebody else
wrote.
And it was so good for me to siton the other side and see what
it was like to go through thatcontent because it made me
better at my writing skills.
I was like, Oh, I like whatthey've done here.
I'm like, Oh, this is actuallynot clear.
Where have I done that?
So it's a good skilldevelopment, whether intentional
or not.
(34:44):
We're going to put that as yourfourth leadership lesson.
You get a bonus one.
Now, before I dropped the nameJames Clear, when I meant James
Kerr, but James Clear wassomeone that we spoke about just
before we hit record.
And talking now of these nextsection of the podcast is the
one percenters.
So like, what is some practicaltips and some one percents that
people could take for theirleadership straight away?
(35:06):
And one person you said wasJames Clear.
Yeah.
So, I mean, his book, AtomicHabits, just like, if you
haven't read it.
It's a great book.
It's just everywhere.
Go to the program.
Just get, just get to it.
Uh, and he has this journal, Soyou can get this that goes with
it.
I don't know if you, you mightnot have the video, but if you
(35:27):
can look for on Amazon, uh, it'sjust like Atomic Habits Journal
or something.
The thing that's cool about thatis that it gives you a tangible
way to track your habits, thelittle things that you want to
improve.
There's like a habit trackerthing at the back of the book
where you can go month andhabit.
(35:51):
And then every time you do thathabit, you can give a cross to
it.
You can then see over time howmany times you've done that
thing.
now for me, if we look at justmore generally, let's, I'll just
show you.
Hang on, I'll see if I can findwhat I was habiting out here.
Okay.
So for me to feel like I can bea human in the world and get 1
(36:14):
percent better, I came acrosswhat I felt like were the things
that helped me feel better, bemore creative and then lead
better.
And for me, it was meditate, butnot like a massive meditate.
It was like two minutes.
Meditating for me is.
I, I find it kind of, you know,boring, but I can do it for a
(36:34):
couple of minutes.
Qi Gong, which is like aprocess, oh, Qi Gong, you look
it up, it's, it's basically asystem of slapping yourself.
So you're just like, you're justlike slapping yourself all over,
like your whole body.
That's not the whole thing.
This is not where I thought thispodcast was going.
Yeah.
You're just slapping yourself.
(36:55):
Um, and it's so energizing.
It's really Thinking about thescience of it, it makes sense.
Oh man, like really like goingat it everywhere and you look
like an absolute mental personjust like, you know, just
whatever, like everywhere, butQigong is really cool for that.
And again, you don't need to doa lot of it, but it's an
(37:17):
energetic match for me to go.
I need to wake myself up.
I sit here at my desk all thetime, playing music, journaling,
bed by nine 30.
reading, walking every day inthe morning and checking in with
my partner.
They're the main, like, things.
Obviously there's kids stuff inthere and all that sort of
stuff, but so much of getting 1percent better is firstly
(37:40):
acknowledging that you have aproblem.
You have a problem you're tryingto fix and get better at in some
way.
And then for me, it always goesback to personality.
Who am I as a person?
What was I like as a child?
How can I bring in elements ofthat person into my day to day
to then be a better functioninghuman and be a better leader as
(38:04):
a result of that?
Yeah, I love that.
The quote that you loved fromJames Clear was about Um, goals
and systems you rise.
Was it You, you do not rise tothe level of your goals.
You fall to the level of yoursystems.
Yeah.
And I think you can have all thegoals.
(38:24):
Yeah.
I was saying to Brianna that.
one of my previous podcastguests, Lauren Fraser from Thea
Media, who was on probably abouta month ago when this comes out.
Um, she talked about the sameone about having these goals,
but then realizing that thesystems for her life she didn't
have in place and for herbusiness.
And I think your habit trackeris actually a really good
example of how you have set upthese systems and processes for
(38:46):
your life that then impact yourbusiness and your leadership.
And it's setting you up for theperson that you want to be.
Yeah, it's You 100 percent needto think about yourself more
than you're thinking aboutyourself, I think is, is the
thing that a lot of people don'tdo.
They really don't reflect onthemselves, who they are now,
(39:08):
who they want to be, and howthey can get to where they want
to be.
And a lot of people don't evenknow where that place is.
Like, where do they want to go?
Where do, who do they want tobe?
It's only through a process ofself reflection and doing little
incremental things that youenjoy.
where you start to actuallyrealize what it is that you
overall want to do.
(39:29):
I think your question there willleave a lot of people thinking.
Um, and I love that you finishedoff like, what are the little
things?
So sometimes that question canbe so overwhelming, like who are
you and what are the things thatmake you who you are?
Like, ah, okay, well, let'sthink about 1%.
What's something small thathelps to make you who you are?
And for me, there's some similarthings like being outside,
(39:49):
exercise, music, singing.
Those are the things that the 1%ers, when that other question
gets too big, they're the thingsthat help bring me back to sort
of the base of who I am and lifebecomes easier.
So, Jay, we're going to givepeople some homework for this
podcast.
Yeah, get onto it, guys.
Go and find that.
I have a tracker or there'splenty of online ones as well.
Yes.
(40:10):
There's a couple of other thingsyou mentioned in your 1% ers,
other books or, people that youfind interesting.
Can you share a couple of those?
Yes, for sure.
So I obviously put down theJames Clear book, Atomic Habits.
Yes.
There's also an incredible bookcalled Principles by Ray Dalio.
Ray's like 65 or 70 ish now, andhe is the head and founder of
(40:34):
Bridgewater Investments, whichis like The biggest financial
hedge, like investment fund inthe world or something.
It's crazy.
Don't quote me on that, but he'shuge.
Okay.
Bridgewater is massive and hebuilt a huge team and he wrote a
book pretty recently.
where he splits the book up intotwo.
There's life principles, andthen there's work principles.
(40:56):
Which I think is really cool,because he goes through all the
things that he does in his life,the things that are important to
him in his life and his familyand all that, and then you kind
of break and pause, and then hetalks about the work ones.
Now, a lot of the work But heframes things in a very
interesting way in the work partof like keeping your, team
(41:16):
accountable to things and howthey work through disagreements
and how they give feedback and.
It's just an incredible book.
And again, there's a journalthat goes with it where you can,
you can tell I like journaling,where you can write down your
principles and like reflect onthat and, and change things over
time.
So that book is incredible.
I highly recommend, please, uh,go through that.
(41:38):
There is a big section in themiddle, uh, beginning where he
talks about his backstory, whichunless you're into financial
investment.
and things knowing about that.
It's just a very hard read, thatsection.
And he even says, if thisdoesn't interest you, I'm not,
I'm not like offended if youskip this bit.
I was like, oh, good.
Okay.
Cause I started reading it and Iwas like, no, this is, this is
(42:00):
well above something I'minterested in.
So his is really good.
Uh, a hundred million dollarleads.
I mean, I know we all hear aboutAlex Formosy all over the place
at the moment, but his book wasactually Written for like a four
year old, you know, as in like,it's so easy to read, so
accessible, so easy to read, sounderstandable.
(42:20):
And he recorded the whole bookas video lessons as well.
So that teaches you about howto, yeah, how to get more leads,
how to generate them.
And, uh, that's a really goodone.
Four hour work week, I foundinteresting by Tim Ferriss.
A lot of it I don't agree with,but there was certainly aspects
of it like, you know, notchecking your emails 50 Agreed.
(42:42):
Yeah, some great principles inthat one.
And then I love our client,Christina Carlson, who's the
founder of Kiki K and we've beenworking with her now for quite
some time.
She does these, she has apodcast called Your Dream Life
Podcast.
She's done some incrediblethings and she's also very
humble and she's very into selfdevelopment and that's, she's a
(43:05):
person to just witness.
and enjoy her stuff.
Her podcast is also very wellreceived and she, uh, interviews
some huge people.
And then Matt Gray is anotherone I found just more recently.
I can't remember what the nameof his business that he, I think
it's called Founders orsomething at the moment that
he's running, but he's aninteresting character.
(43:26):
YouTube him.
He's just starting to surfaceeverywhere.
And he's talking about, yeah,teams and being a founder and,
uh, you'll find him interestingas well.
And he steps things, a lot of, alot of things out on LinkedIn in
these really cool infographicsthat he just writes himself.
Awesome.
Well, Brianna, as I said at thebeginning, the reason that this
(43:46):
podcast got off the ground isbecause I was working with you
and your team.
So if somebody else has apodcast that is looking to
really make it special, howcould they work with you?
There's a few ways.
So they can, if they want tokeep doing the thing themselves,
they have their own productionteam or they're producing it
themselves or whatever, thenthey can do what we call the pod
(44:08):
coach service.
Essentially it's, that's great.
What we do is we give youfeedback on your episodes.
We look at you without youknowing about it.
Too much, you know, so we'lllisten to your episodes, we'll
score them, we'll look at theway you share on social media,
we'll, uh, read your articles,we'll, you know, broad spectrum,
(44:29):
not just like, is this contentgood?
It's like, what is this persondoing for their podcast?
on a consistent basis.
We give you feedback in a,again, systemized, processed,
production schedule.
Uh, we shoot lean videos.
You get access to a Slackchannel.
We give you feedback on thereand we track all your metrics
over a three month period.
(44:49):
where we then, every time wegive you feedback, we expect you
to, again, 1 percent better.
Make a change based on whatwe've said.
Probably hold them accountableto it because that is the key.
Exactly.
So, Podcoach is awesome.
Three month minimum commitment.
If you want to keep doing ityourself, that just means that
we're.
We're paying attention to youand, uh, it's a fun one.
(45:09):
There's lots of people in thatpodcoach service already and I
just love it.
So you can do that.
Uh, you can also hire us as aproduction team.
You can find that on ourservices page.
There's a bunch of differentthings that you can do there.
We can help you launch your showand then produce it every week
based on your package and yourbudget.
And.
And.
You can also do some free stuff,like we have a DIY podcaster
(45:32):
program, which I actually justmade completely free and you can
go in there and learn how toproduce your show yourself, do
the whole thing.
It's a video tutorial, everysingle episode, it's all using
the script and I did have itpaid as a course and I had
members in there and I justdecided one day, look, I think I
(45:53):
actually just want to make thisfree and then instead those
members.
Went into pod coach.
Mm-Hmm.
So as in they could, they gotthat then in Yeah.
So that they weren't gettingnothing, uh, out of it.
So that's really cool.
Do it yourself.
Again, go to the site.
You'll see that we also have afree audit service where we will
just give you feedback, 48 hoursturnaround, which is awesome.
(46:14):
That's the main things.
I'll make sure I put all thelinks in the show notes so
people can find you.
today I felt nervous at thebeginning because it's always
nerve wracking when youinterview someone that is really
good at what you're doing.
As we said at the beginning, Ithink it's good to be outside
your comfort zone.
And a good testament to Briannais like, just your personality,
we've always got along so welland how comfortable this process
(46:38):
is.
thank you for coming and joiningand sharing your leadership
lessons.
And it's so nice to hear thestories from the inside of the
things that I've witnessed fromthe outside, because I guarantee
your clients have a sense ofyour business.
It'll be because of the thingsthat are happening on the
inside, they permeate to theoutside.
Um, and so it's lovely to hearwhat's like the magic that
(47:00):
you're doing inside your companyto make it so magical on the
outside.
So thank you so much for sharingyour stories today.
Oh, that's just such a nicething to say, Kate.
Well done.
That's just awesome.
Thank you so much for having me.
I've had a great time.
I've definitely been judging youreally heavily this whole time.
And I've got some notes.
(47:20):
Oh, trust me, I've got notestoo.
Thanks so much.
I hope everyone enjoyed this.
Thank you.
Today, I am both excited and nervous to
welcome Brianna Ansaldo to thepodcast.
She is the head honcho at BambyMedia and the person that I have
to personally thank for gettingthis podcast off the ground two
years ago.
I got passed on Brianna's namefrom my VA.
She came highly recommended andwas actually the only person I
spoke to about my podcastbecause when we met, there was
(00:56):
this certain something abouther.
that we talked about music andour love for singing, and I just
felt like my podcast was in goodhands.
Something I noticed with workingwith Brianna is she was so great
to work with.
And then when I worked with herteam, they were also great,
which is not always the casewhen we work with people that
are not the CEO of the businessor not the founder of the
(01:17):
business.
And this made me think, huh,there is something about her
leadership that we can learnfrom.
And so today's podcast, we'redigging into some of the
leadership lessons she's learnedalong the way and three in
particular that we have chattedabout and pulled out to talk
through.
The first one is when you'rehiring your team about some
unusual questions.
(01:39):
The second one is about how toget the best from your team.
And I can tell you it's not asink and swim approach.
And the third was aboutstandards, big picture thinking,
and something that I like torefer to as they get a voice,
not a vote.
So we're going to dig into thesethree questions.
Welcome to the podcast, Brianna.
Well, thank you so much, Kate.
(02:00):
Happy to be here.
So, as I said at the beginning,we bonded over our love of
music.
For those that listen to thepodcast know that I am a singer,
a violinist, piano player, and Ilove musical theatre.
Brianna is also a singer, and Ithink you might have been on a
popular talent show, if I recallcorrectly, but you have a degree
in Music from the QueenslandConservatorium of Music.
(02:22):
Can you tell a little bit aboutyour music background and how
you got into podcast production?
Oh, it's been such a funjourney.
So you are right.
I, like you, love music.
I was also in musical theatre.
Uh, I have been a musician sinceI was very tiny, uh, and I'm a,
(02:43):
I play the piano and the guitar.
I did Spanish classical guitarand I did classical voice and
then I moved into jazz voice andthen I moved into Broadway voice
and then I kind of mushed allthose things together to create
like a a mashup, I suppose, ofthose styles.
So I did that for a very longtime.
(03:04):
And yeah, I did, did musicaltheater shows for, uh, quite a
few years as well, uh, during mylast kind of couple of years of
high school.
And then once I, once I was outof high school as well, they
were amateur theater companiesand I would tour around.
I was also in pantomimes.
So I did a bunch of pantomimesall over Brisbane, touring
around.
Uh, that was pretty crazy.
(03:26):
And I was also like the Easterbunny in shopping centers with
like a giant scary Easter bunny.
I was Wonder Kid from, for theChildren's Hospital.
And if you've been in one ofthose big costumes, like mine
had a fan in the head and an icevest.
Oh, they're hot.
Oh my God, you, you, at leastyou got that.
I didn't get any of that.
I was, I mean, at least I wasin, I was in pretty decent air
(03:48):
conditioning, but.
The thing about that, that Ilearnt, was you can actually do
things that are ridiculous, andfeel really hard and silly, and
if you have the right frame ofmind, the right mindset, you can
have a very good time.
I remember.
At the end of that day that Iwas Wonder Kid at the Brisbane
(04:09):
exhibition, my cheeks were sorefrom smiling.
I was in a full body costume,you couldn't see my face, which
just shows it's a whole bodyexperience.
It's a whole body experience,But anyway, I digress.
So I did that.
Obviously I have a very,energetic and entertaining type
personality about me.
(04:29):
I love to be that person.
And I, when I finished school, Idecided I would do a bachelor of
audio production.
So music production at theconservatorium of music.
I did that for four years.
During that time, I also decidedto go and try out for Australian
Idol because it was six years inor something at that point, and
(04:53):
they would allow you to singyour own song in the audition.
And I was like, man, that's thefirst year they allowed that.
I wasn't interested in being apop star at all, but I was
certainly interested on hearingwhat people thought about my
original music.
You're a storyteller.
I really get that.
Yeah, I'd been performing for somany years and I'd written so
many songs and I had a couple ofalbums under my belt already
(05:15):
that I'd produced myself.
So I went to this audition andit was insane and I ended up
getting picked.
I got through the next round andthen I got down to go down to
Sydney and then I was up againsta whole bunch more people.
I made it through that as well.
I got into the final 12 thatwere then on TV.
(05:37):
And, uh, and then I had a chefand I had a driver and we had
paparazzi and, you know, just anincredible, it was an incredible
year.
It was very stressful and Ididn't enjoy a lot of it, but I
also enjoyed Aspects of it, likemeeting behind the scenes people
(05:58):
and your, uh, your productionlawyers and your VP and your,
you know, the other musiciansand the band and putting
together a huge band and anorchestration within.
48 hours.
And, you know, all that stuffwas really, really cool.
So that was quite an experience,but I am profoundly deaf in one
(06:19):
ear and that made it much harderfor me to compete properly on
that program because they didn'thave in ear monitors for us at
that point.
So they'd also make youchoreograph and like walk around
the stage, you know, to be agood showman.
but the band was behind you andyou couldn't hear and the
(06:41):
monitors were really far infront of you, so you actually
couldn't hear all that well.
Foldback.
Foldback, exactly.
So the foldback, you couldn'thear it if you didn't have it in
ears and you're walking around astage.
So for me, I struggle with soundif it's not right here in my
ears because I can't tell.
What's going on?
You know, and I was trying tochoreograph.
(07:02):
So, or like dance around.
Uh, so that was very hard.
And I had a blow up with thehead of, basically the head of
the whole show.
Uh, and I said, you need to giveus in ear monitors.
Like if this is a show aboutbeing a musician, about being a
singer and all that, we need inear monitors.
That no one should be expectedto.
(07:24):
walk around like this.
He said, no, there's no budgetfor it.
You know, that's not somethingwe're willing to do.
And then I got booted off theprogram the following week.
And, uh, then two weeks afterthat, they all had in ear
monitors.
And I was so like, I was a bitjaded by that going man, it's,
it's, it's a show, you know, youshould make the musicians feel
(07:45):
like they can do what they'resupposed to be doing, uh, and so
that brought me into a differentside of it, okay, actually it
was a television program, itwasn't really about the
musicians as much as it is aboutthe judges and highlighting them
and, you know, all those thingsthat you don't kind of realize
when you're in it, and it's justafterwards where you It's a TV
show that happens to also give aplatform to musicians, but it's
(08:09):
definitely not the main thing.
It's like people that watchMarried at First Sight, like
that's not to buildrelationships.
That is like TV.
It's just TV.
If you get a relationship, well,that's like a chance bonus, but
yeah.
So that was really incredible.
I got a little bit agoraphobic,I think after that, because I
was very famous.
for a while, it was just, youcouldn't go anywhere, you know,
(08:32):
going to the shops, just, therewas, even just to get my
groceries, people would come upto you or they'd stare at you
and they'd want your signatureand photos with you and bonkers,
like, just, what did my, what isthis life, you know, it was just
a crazy situation, I wasfeatured in all the papers and
all this paparazzi stuff and,yeah, so eventually, I realized
(08:55):
that's not a kind of life Iwanted to have.
I didn't want to be a celebrity.
I wanted to write music and Icontinued to write music.
I got my music featured on filmand television, sinking deals
and all sorts of fun thingsthrough that.
Then I had a child.
And I was a touring musician fora long time at that point.
And, uh, my husband and I, wehad to move up to Cairns and I
(09:16):
realized I didn't want to be atouring musician anymore because
that was very hard with a youngchild.
And he was also an intern andwas a doctor at the time.
And I was looking at thetrajectory of our lives going,
there's no way, like, there's noway he can be a doctor and I can
be a touring musician.
And we have a child or multiplethat have any stability other
(09:36):
than a nanny, you know.
Yeah, so I had to make a shiftat that point.
And I started getting intopodcasting from that point
because I wanted to take all theskills that I'd learned as an
audio producer.
I'd had, you know, many, many,many hours in big studios and I
understanded the whole aspect ofit.
And podcasting is a form ofstorytelling that I just fell in
(09:59):
love with and I could use musicand I could use stories and I
could highlight people and themake their voices sound
beautiful and clear.
And it just felt like a stepthat I was meant to go on.
And then, was this when Bambywas born?
This was when Bamby, it took acouple of years before it was
born, and then I realized, yeah,like I just started getting so
(10:21):
many jobs from it and referralsand big comp, you know, sort of
big podcasts over in the States.
I was working just with the USAclients for quite a while
because this industry was reallysmall here.
And then I just started.
It was really all word of mouth.
I didn't do any advertising.
It didn't do anything.
And I just started gettingclients.
And, uh, then it just got biggerand I had to hire.
(10:44):
And eventually my husband quithis job as a doctor six years
in.
He quit it so that he could joinBamby Media and have a different
life for himself as well.
And, uh, yeah.
And tell me about your team now,because I've met quite a few of
them.
How big is the team and whereare they situated?
So at the moment we've got sixin the team.
(11:05):
we've got Deb, Maylee, Emily,who are in, well, Deb's in
Sunshine Coast, Maylee's inBrisbane, Great place, Sunshine
Coast, Sunshine Coast, any case,represent, and then Maylee's in
Brisbane, Emily is on the GoldCoast.
And then Josh, who's also inBrisbane, and then we've got me
(11:28):
and Alex, who are in Brisbane.
So although we're all kind ofSoutheast Queensland ish, none
of us work in the same location,except for Alex and I, who
obviously, you know, we workfrom home.
We have different studios, so webarely see each other, to be
honest, uh, that's a wholedifferent story.
But yeah, it's, it's, uh.
(11:50):
It's a spread team, completelydistributed, so we don't see
each other day to day.
And I think this is interestingto talk about because when we go
through your leadership lessons,sometimes people presume that,
oh, it's easier if you can seesomeone if you're having face to
face time, but you'veessentially built your business
virtually and done theseleadership lessons that I'm
going to talk through today,virtually.
(12:11):
And I think this is a goodlittle side note for people to
keep in mind that this wonderfulculture that you've built has
not been done face to face.
So, you've got a team of six.
The first leadership lesson thatyou had mentioned was about how
you go about hiring.
And I absolutely agree when youtalk about it's about the
person.
And you've got some interestingquestions that you ask.
(12:31):
Can you share a bit more aboutthis?
Yes, so whenever I'm coming toapproach the hiring of a person,
so right now, I think, just togive you context, I've probably
hired eight or nine people, uh,that have come in different
seasons and been with us fordifferent amounts of time,
depending on what else is goingon.
The thing I always look for is,I care less.
(12:54):
about their actual skills, whichseems maybe counterintuitive,
but for a technical job,exactly.
I look to hire people who arecurious, who can follow
direction, who have an ear forsound.
Even if they've never edited apodcast before, because the,
(13:18):
especially in my realm, thestate of podcasting podcasting
changes so rapidly, the softwarethat we use, AI being a thing,
the kind of things they need toknow and learn, it evolves.
over time.
And when I've hired, I hired oneguy who had a music production
(13:38):
degree, very, very good, like,technically amazing.
But, and he was, you know, justa nice dude as well, just a fun
guy, but he was reallyparticular about the edits
because of his background inmusic production.
(14:00):
Which meant that over time, thetime that he took to do an edit
would be much longer thansomeone else's because he was
going, just zooming way too farin and forgetting about the
context, the story, the over,like who this client is, how
they like to sound.
It's a conversation, keep itsounding like a conversation,
(14:21):
not like it's chopped up every,you know, too polished, people
don't feel.
Don't, yeah, exactly, don't makeit too polished.
So, yes, the skill, hetechnically had the skill, but
he didn't have the personalityor he was too technically
skilled to zoom out enough togo,"Am I creating an experience
(14:41):
that the listener will enjoy?"So that's why I always hire and
I always ask questions of peoplearound what they do in their
lives outside of work.
So there needs to be a creativeflair in the person that I hire,
but it doesn't need to betechnically something that
they've had as a job.
(15:03):
So we have Josh here.
Uh, he is a phenomenalillustrator, artist.
He likes to ride one wheels.
He does rock climbing.
He likes building Gundam.
He like loves bonsais, you know,he's very creative.
with all these different things,and he's also a videographer,
(15:23):
and he's probably our mostskilled person.
I would say, but he wasn't soset in his ways that you
couldn't go, I know you'recreative and you can figure this
out.
Doesn't matter what the contextis, you're creative, and that
is, that's, so that's kind ofthe question I always go with is
(15:44):
what's your hobby, what do youdo outside of work?
I also ask them whether theylike peanut butter or Vegemite,
whether they like sunshine orrainbow, rainbows.
Yep, whether they like, uh,nighttime or daytime, like the
preference, and these might seemlike kind of random questions, I
mean they are random, but itgives you a feel of who that
(16:09):
person is, and especially if youthen ask them a question around,
you know, If you could havethree eyes or six legs, which
one would you choose?
You leave it open and then youget them to answer it and a
creative answer tells me thatthere's humour and they explain
(16:31):
why they've, they've sort ofdecided on one thing or another.
It really paints a picture as towho they are and how they think
about things.
I think what you've just said,it tells you how they think,
because that's really, in aninterview, you want to know how
somebody thinks, like, if theyhave a problem, how are they
going to work through it?
It reminds me of, like, maths atschool, where you would do,
(16:52):
like, show your workings, like,that's stupid, I've got the
right answer.
But it's the same thing, like, Iwant to understand how you
think, so when you're in a newsituation, how are you going to
think about it?
When you're under pressure, howare you going to think about it?
I often would ask people ininterviews, Like in my decades
of hiring, like what do you doon the weekend?
What do you do for fun?
And for the same reason, likewhen I'm hiring a person, these
(17:12):
people are going to interactwith the other people and
interact with clients.
And people who like people,people that work with people,
it's so much more than atechnical thing.
Mm, a hundred percent.
And something you and I havespoken about, um, in the book
Legacy by, I was going to sayJames Clear.
That's not right.
We were talking about JamesClear before.
I'll have to think about who theauthor is.
It's about the New Zealand AllBlacks.
(17:32):
And they say that to be afootball player, like a New
Zealand All Black, you must havesomething outside football and
you cannot be an All Black ifyou don't have a hobby.
And they're saying you need tohave a passion outside football
because if something happenswith football, you need to have
something else that you can relyon for your happiness.
And I think this is just a goodbasis for human life.
(17:54):
We can't put everything in onespot and we can't have
everything in our job.
Did you find the author?
I did.
James Kerr?
Yeah, James Kerr.
So close.
Oh man, I mean, it's very close.
Yeah.
it does show why your team, Ifind fascinating and interesting
to talk to because you've hiredinteresting people.
(18:14):
Yeah, they were all, you know,and Emily is a A musician, like
a touring musician.
Deb just finished her yogateacher training.
So she does yoga teaching.
Alex is also really intogardening and woodworking.
May Lee loves board games andshe's on radio every second
Thursday night talking aboutcrazy board games and video
(18:35):
games.
And, uh, you know, so they'veall got stuff.
It just makes it more fun towork with people like that.
As long as you know, you can'tjust like hire a flighty
creative, because you know,there are lots of flighty
creative people that don't wantto commit to anything.
That is a very real problem.
That is a thing.
You also need to lay down thelaw and hire people that
(19:01):
understand that yes, there'screativity.
Yes, there's silly.
Yes, there's fun, but there'salso doing a very good job and
sticking to the processes andthings that we've set out.
I think that segues beautifullyinto your second leadership
lesson, which was about yourteam and how to encourage them,
but not.
It wasn't your word, but I'mgoing to say mollycoddle.
(19:22):
Yes.
Yeah.
Infantilization.
Yeah.
Is, is one of them.
And in fact, one of our clients,The Wholesome Show, did a
podcast episode on workplaceinfantilization a couple of
weeks back, which was kind ofwhat was making me think about
it.
It's a very real thing.
As a manager, it can be, and aleader, it can be so easy to
(19:45):
like micromanage your team andto go,"No, I need it to be done
this way firstly.
But if you don't understand howto do it, let me just do most of
it." And then you do the end bitor alternatively asking the team
if they can handle it.
(20:06):
And if they can't, then you takea bit back, giving them an in to
say,"Oh, that feels like toomuch work for me.
Like, I don't want to do thatwhole thing, or I don't like
editing that client." So give itto someone else.
Like, you can't treat them likechildren.
You have to make them aware thatyes, they can have creative
(20:26):
freedom and they can have lotsof flow in their day.
But also, they need to be incharge of themselves and I'm not
going to be holding their handthrough things.
I talk about this idea ofstretch and support.
So stretch your people becausethey probably can achieve more
than what they think they can.
How do you stretch that comfortzone but also know they're
(20:48):
supported?
Not supported that you will doit for them if they don't do a
good job, but that they're, it'sokay to fail and provide,"this
is a safe place to stretchoutside of your comfort zone.
And yes, it's not going to feelgood all the time and you're
going to get it wrong sometimes.
And, I still expect you to doit." Yeah, exactly.
I still expect you to do it andthat piece on failing as well, I
(21:11):
find very interesting becausethere's also the point where if
they do something wrong, andlet's say they're client facing,
they do something wrong.
There's also a part of you thatmight want to go, Oh, I'll reply
to the client or, you know,I'll, take the blame or I'll
apologize or whatever.
(21:31):
Getting them to do it.
Is actually, yes, it gets themout of their comfort zone, but
it also means that they're somuch less likely to make that
mistake again, because they'refront facing and they have to
own up to the thing that they'vedone.
Now, if this is a bigger processissue, if this is something
that's training that's, youknow, on me, then.
(21:53):
I'm going to be taking the fallfor that and making sure that
the team is processed outproperly.
But if they've made a genuineerror that I feel they can
resolve and they can talk to theclient about, then a hundred
percent, that's what they shouldbe doing.
It reminds me of the idea of,uh, tying your child's
shoelaces.
They're like, Oh, it's justquicker and easier if I do it
(22:13):
myself.
But when they're 16, it'sawkward, right?
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
There's going to be a point thatthey tie their own shoelaces.
So when people talk about likedelegation or giving people
tasks, the responsibility andaccountability has to match.
So if you're giving someone theresponsibility to do a job, they
also need to have theaccountability to follow that up
(22:34):
and to own it, and you cansupport them in doing that.
But unless you give them theaccountability, which is both
the good and the tough stuff,they will never feel responsible
for it, and they will always optout.
100%, I could not agree more.
You just summed that up sonicely.
So I think if you're givingpeople tasks.
Be okay to stretch them and tellthem that it's going to be
uncomfortable.
(22:54):
Like someone's job should be twothirds in what they're great at
and one third what makes themuncomfortable in a stretch.
And also some of the crappytasks, because let's be honest,
we all have some crappy tasksand you just can't avoid them.
but just telling people upfront, and I think that's
something that you do reallywell at Bamby Media talking
about.
This is the concept, you'reresponsible for this, you're
accountable for this, you needto follow up.
I will support you and it's onyou.
(23:17):
Yeah.
A hundred percent.
Totally.
Something else that youmentioned at the beginning of
when we're talking about thesecond leadership lesson was
about process and systems, whichis your third leadership lesson
and something that I personallyhave experienced working with
you because I've got to see howyou set things up.
And as a client, it gives mesuch peace of mind knowing, ah,
there's a system, there's aprocess, everything is under
(23:38):
control.
Can you tell me a bit about thesetting up of processes and how
it's impacted your business?
Yeah, so I learned pretty earlyon, and in fact, I learned this
from my previous role.
So when I was studying as amusician, uh, in my degree, I
had a part time job in a hugetravel company, massive.
(24:00):
And I was the head of training.
in the customer service center,and I was a supervisor and head
of training.
And so, obviously I didn't startthere, but I worked my way up to
that role.
Their processes, because theywere a huge company, were on
point, and you just knew exactlywhat every single job was that
(24:22):
you would need to do, and, uh,there was no margin, really, for
error in the actual process.
So, for me, I then was in chargeof writing and recording and
going through all the trainingfor all the customer service
representatives.
So anyone that came in that wasnew, I would train them.
And I set up systems within thatto go, okay, this is what your
(24:45):
training needs to be, and thisis the part you do yourself, and
this is, you know, blah, blah,blah.
This is where I step in and helpyou, all that.
So I learned that we neededfirstly an intranet.
Yes, which is the back end ofyour team where anything that
you think your team needs toknow lives.
And we've processed that out.
(25:07):
I spent a long time doing it.
We use Confluence for ourintranet where any tutorial.
that they're likely to havelives.
Any question that they're likelyto have, especially because
we're a remote team, a remoteteam, they can't just pop into
my office and be like, Hey,Brianna, blah, blah, blah.
And if they try and get me onSlack, a lot of the time I'm not
(25:28):
available.
I'm in a lot of meetings.
They can't get me a lot of thetime.
And so it is necessary and arequirement that they use the
intranet, which has reallysearch, searchable, like.
terms there, that they can findwhatever they might need to
know.
So from the backend perspective,and intranet is key, as soon as
I started really building thatout and have lots of stuff in
(25:49):
there, ah, the amount ofquestions I got just reduced by
99%.
You know, I don't get askedquestions, and so that, from
that side, it's important.
The other thing I do, and I doless of now, is when we get a
new client, I take the firststep.
So obviously I set that clientup.
(26:11):
I'm the first one theycommunicate with and I, we have
like a Google drive whereeverything's submitted.
They have, they get a welcomeemail.
They get all the processes.
They get a welcome video.
The client really understandshow it's going to roll.
Absolutely.
And then from the other end.
I do the initial introduction tothe team, to the client.
(26:34):
The client's not like getting, Idon't mean like a virtual, Hey,
this is the client.
This is the team.
It's me shooting a tutorial forthe team to go, this is this
client, they're this kind ofpersonality.
They have this kind of sparkabout them.
These are the things this clientlikes that they don't like.
They get a video about thatclient.
And then go, and this is how Iwant you to edit this person.
(26:55):
And then I.
do the edit, they watch that.
So that there, again, is nosituation where I feel like I
haven't represented the clientproperly first to the team, so
that they understand who theclient is.
Now, as I get bigger, that's arole that I have to pass off.
(27:17):
And that's a tricky one, becausefor me, client customer
relations is huge.
But it's something that I, youknow, am training upwards on, so
that I do less of that as well.
Because it's necessary.
On that hiring someone to dothat job, when businesses grow,
like the first thing you hire ispeople to do things that you're
(27:37):
not good at, and the sign thatyou've reached the next level is
that you're hiring people to dothe things that you are good at.
And that can be tricky.
Yeah, it's really, that, the,I'm so personality based, like
I'm so personality driven, Ireally enjoy our clients, and so
to have someone step in, thatmatches my energy.
(28:00):
It doesn't need to be the sameenergy.
That's crazy.
They don't have to be the sameperson, but they need to match
the flair and the brand that isBamby Media.
And I think when it's your ownbusiness, the culture and the
values, they are your values.
And so every time you hire, it'shiring someone that represents
who you are.
Even though it's a company, it'sstill representing who you are.
(28:22):
And as I said at the beginning,the reason that I didn't even
talk to anybody else, I waslike, Oh, yes.
This is the match.
Done.
Yeah.
I love match.
Uh, when you talked about yourprocesses and your systems,
something that I wanted tohighlight to listeners is you're
very good at expectationsetting.
And one of the challenges peoplehave with leadership is you
(28:43):
either expect someone to alreadyknow because they're good at
their job, they'll know what todo, or you expect them to know
nothing.
So you micromanage everything.
And people think there's thisline, it's like, I do everything
micromanage or I'm completelyhands off.
There's actually a triangle andyour leadership style is what we
call, Hmm.
A little bit called somethingelse.
It'll come to me.
(29:04):
The pointy bit of the triangle.
Constructive leadership.
There we go.
Got it.
So it's a third point.
And what people think is likethis, like hands off, go
completely hands on.
You want to find the spot inbetween.
That's not true.
It's a third point.
It's completely different.
And it's setting theseexpectations up front.
So the way that you have metwith the client first, and then
you've explained, this is whatthe client's about.
(29:24):
And these are my expectationsfor working with them.
These are our end goals.
And then they work within that.
So setting clear expectationsand then giving them some scope
to work within it is the keythere.
Because you can set clearexpectations and then
micromanage.
That's not good.
Or you could set no expectationsand expect them to do their job.
They're not going to meet whatyou think.
(29:45):
And then you're going to end updoing it again anyway.
So this falls under when you'redelegating and working with a
team, a rule of three.
So if you do something threetimes, you need to delegate and
have a system for it.
If you do it once, you might aswell do it yourself.
If it's something you only dotwice, by the time you do it
once, figure it out, and thenyou tell someone, there's no
point.
If it's three times, you need asystem.
(30:05):
So if you think about Brianna'sexample, you're onboarding
clients all the time, so itmakes sense that there's a
system.
They are continually doingpodcast episodes, so it makes
sense that from the beginningthey know exactly what you
expect.
and you do the first one, youshow them.
And I'm going to imagine there'sthen a checking process to
making sure that what they'redoing.
Yes.
Okay.
Excellent.
(30:27):
Quality assurance, making surethat you're checking in, that
the expectation you said at thebeginning is being followed
through on the, how does thatchecking process happen?
Now I've put you on the spot.
Yeah.
So that is really a fun one.
The checking process, because Istarted off where I would.
Okay.
It depends on how long you'vehad your team members in place,
right?
(30:47):
Because certainly if they, ifyou take a bunch of newbies,
then I need to be checking allof it.
So for each individual podcastepisode, I would then go in,
there's like a tick box.
We use Trello for our workflow.
So Trello is just a checklistmaster.
It's awesome.
Yeah.
And, uh, there's plenty of them,exactly.
(31:09):
So there would be a checkboxwhere after they've done their
bit, it's like Brianna toreview.
So then I would have to go inand listen, review, give them
feedback via loom and show themthings that they can improve.
Okay.
So it's not just like, yeah,this is good enough.
It's like, no, here's the thingsthat you're missing.
As the team, oh, and that goesfor like content writing as
(31:30):
well, video snippets, thingslike that, that I.
would start off doing.
I would then review everything.
When I was hiring multiple,multiple people at once, that
was, that was awful.
I just, that was my whole life.
I was just reviewing and givingfeedback, but I knew that the
end goal was they'll be reallygood and I'll trust them.
(31:51):
Mm hmm.
To do it.
After about three weeks, Youcould stop.
Didn't have to review anymore.
And then it would only be where,you know, some little things
would come up.
Or sometimes I would just pop inwithout them knowing and just
listen to something and see howthey're going.
Yeah.
That kind of stuff.
But the thing that's happeningnow, which I was trialing, was
(32:14):
they review each other.
Oh, I love this.
Tell me more.
Yeah.
So it's like, instead of megetting my hands in there, These
people that have been workinghere have been working with me
for quite some time.
They are very aware of theprocess and the systems and how
things are supposed to go.
If I assign someone new to atask they haven't done before,
(32:39):
let's say it's content writing,I assign them to it.
Then there's a checkboxunderneath that says, you know,
Deb to review or Emily to reviewor Meili to review.
So that another team member hasto go in.
Listen, review, and give thatperson feedback same way I
would.
(32:59):
Now why this is valuable isbecause it makes, firstly, the
person that knows they're goingto be reviewed by someone else
in their team you know, becausethey, they want to do a good
job.
They don't want to, like, theywant to represent themselves
really well for the otherperson, for their peer.
So it makes them do a betterjob.
It also makes the personreviewing.
(33:20):
Good, because they come in, theylisten, they review, and they
might even learn something fromthe other person, and they're
being critical, and then theyactually take that on to their
own work as well.
So.
That's working really well.
I love this as a concept becauseyou learn so much when you teach
something or you critiquesomething else because you put
(33:40):
it in a different lens.
And I think that is wonderful asa skill set development, but
also as a team, like a teamenvironment, because I also
believe that the way you've setup your culture is this is
viewed as.
I'm on your team, I'm here tohelp, not I'm going to catch you
out.
And that is such an importantdifference.
If you think, yeah, we're goingto do this and then, uh, it's
(34:02):
the team explodes.
It's because they think they'regetting judged by their peers
who they think no less.
Bad culture.
You want to set up in the waythat you are supporting each
other, um, to be better at thejob.
Yeah.
It's fun.
It's a fun little extra thingfor them to do.
And uh, the feedback's beengreat.
Yeah, I have, um, been writingsome leadership programs and I
(34:24):
recently taught a leadershipprogram that somebody else
wrote.
And it was so good for me to siton the other side and see what
it was like to go through thatcontent because it made me
better at my writing skills.
I was like, Oh, I like whatthey've done here.
I'm like, Oh, this is actuallynot clear.
Where have I done that?
So it's a good skilldevelopment, whether intentional
or not.
(34:44):
We're going to put that as yourfourth leadership lesson.
You get a bonus one.
Now, before I dropped the nameJames Clear, when I meant James
Kerr, but James Clear wassomeone that we spoke about just
before we hit record.
And talking now of these nextsection of the podcast is the
one percenters.
So like, what is some practicaltips and some one percents that
people could take for theirleadership straight away?
(35:06):
And one person you said wasJames Clear.
Yeah.
So, I mean, his book, AtomicHabits, just like, if you
haven't read it.
It's a great book.
It's just everywhere.
Go to the program.
Just get, just get to it.
Uh, and he has this journal, Soyou can get this that goes with
it.
I don't know if you, you mightnot have the video, but if you
(35:27):
can look for on Amazon, uh, it'sjust like Atomic Habits Journal
or something.
The thing that's cool about thatis that it gives you a tangible
way to track your habits, thelittle things that you want to
improve.
There's like a habit trackerthing at the back of the book
where you can go month andhabit.
(35:51):
And then every time you do thathabit, you can give a cross to
it.
You can then see over time howmany times you've done that
thing.
now for me, if we look at justmore generally, let's, I'll just
show you.
Hang on, I'll see if I can findwhat I was habiting out here.
Okay.
So for me to feel like I can bea human in the world and get 1
(36:14):
percent better, I came acrosswhat I felt like were the things
that helped me feel better, bemore creative and then lead
better.
And for me, it was meditate, butnot like a massive meditate.
It was like two minutes.
Meditating for me is.
I, I find it kind of, you know,boring, but I can do it for a
(36:34):
couple of minutes.
Qi Gong, which is like aprocess, oh, Qi Gong, you look
it up, it's, it's basically asystem of slapping yourself.
So you're just like, you're justlike slapping yourself all over,
like your whole body.
That's not the whole thing.
This is not where I thought thispodcast was going.
Yeah.
You're just slapping yourself.
(36:55):
Um, and it's so energizing.
It's really Thinking about thescience of it, it makes sense.
Oh man, like really like goingat it everywhere and you look
like an absolute mental personjust like, you know, just
whatever, like everywhere, butQigong is really cool for that.
And again, you don't need to doa lot of it, but it's an
(37:17):
energetic match for me to go.
I need to wake myself up.
I sit here at my desk all thetime, playing music, journaling,
bed by nine 30.
reading, walking every day inthe morning and checking in with
my partner.
They're the main, like, things.
Obviously there's kids stuff inthere and all that sort of
stuff, but so much of getting 1percent better is firstly
(37:40):
acknowledging that you have aproblem.
You have a problem you're tryingto fix and get better at in some
way.
And then for me, it always goesback to personality.
Who am I as a person?
What was I like as a child?
How can I bring in elements ofthat person into my day to day
to then be a better functioninghuman and be a better leader as
(38:04):
a result of that?
Yeah, I love that.
The quote that you loved fromJames Clear was about Um, goals
and systems you rise.
Was it You, you do not rise tothe level of your goals.
You fall to the level of yoursystems.
Yeah.
And I think you can have all thegoals.
(38:24):
Yeah.
I was saying to Brianna that.
one of my previous podcastguests, Lauren Fraser from Thea
Media, who was on probably abouta month ago when this comes out.
Um, she talked about the sameone about having these goals,
but then realizing that thesystems for her life she didn't
have in place and for herbusiness.
And I think your habit trackeris actually a really good
example of how you have set upthese systems and processes for
(38:46):
your life that then impact yourbusiness and your leadership.
And it's setting you up for theperson that you want to be.
Yeah, it's You 100 percent needto think about yourself more
than you're thinking aboutyourself, I think is, is the
thing that a lot of people don'tdo.
They really don't reflect onthemselves, who they are now,
(39:08):
who they want to be, and howthey can get to where they want
to be.
And a lot of people don't evenknow where that place is.
Like, where do they want to go?
Where do, who do they want tobe?
It's only through a process ofself reflection and doing little
incremental things that youenjoy.
where you start to actuallyrealize what it is that you
overall want to do.
(39:29):
I think your question there willleave a lot of people thinking.
Um, and I love that you finishedoff like, what are the little
things?
So sometimes that question canbe so overwhelming, like who are
you and what are the things thatmake you who you are?
Like, ah, okay, well, let'sthink about 1%.
What's something small thathelps to make you who you are?
And for me, there's some similarthings like being outside,
(39:49):
exercise, music, singing.
Those are the things that the 1%ers, when that other question
gets too big, they're the thingsthat help bring me back to sort
of the base of who I am and lifebecomes easier.
So, Jay, we're going to givepeople some homework for this
podcast.
Yeah, get onto it, guys.
Go and find that.
I have a tracker or there'splenty of online ones as well.
Yes.
(40:10):
There's a couple of other thingsyou mentioned in your 1% ers,
other books or, people that youfind interesting.
Can you share a couple of those?
Yes, for sure.
So I obviously put down theJames Clear book, Atomic Habits.
Yes.
There's also an incredible bookcalled Principles by Ray Dalio.
Ray's like 65 or 70 ish now, andhe is the head and founder of
(40:34):
Bridgewater Investments, whichis like The biggest financial
hedge, like investment fund inthe world or something.
It's crazy.
Don't quote me on that, but he'shuge.
Okay.
Bridgewater is massive and hebuilt a huge team and he wrote a
book pretty recently.
where he splits the book up intotwo.
There's life principles, andthen there's work principles.
(40:56):
Which I think is really cool,because he goes through all the
things that he does in his life,the things that are important to
him in his life and his familyand all that, and then you kind
of break and pause, and then hetalks about the work ones.
Now, a lot of the work But heframes things in a very
interesting way in the work partof like keeping your, team
(41:16):
accountable to things and howthey work through disagreements
and how they give feedback and.
It's just an incredible book.
And again, there's a journalthat goes with it where you can,
you can tell I like journaling,where you can write down your
principles and like reflect onthat and, and change things over
time.
So that book is incredible.
I highly recommend, please, uh,go through that.
(41:38):
There is a big section in themiddle, uh, beginning where he
talks about his backstory, whichunless you're into financial
investment.
and things knowing about that.
It's just a very hard read, thatsection.
And he even says, if thisdoesn't interest you, I'm not,
I'm not like offended if youskip this bit.
I was like, oh, good.
Okay.
Cause I started reading it and Iwas like, no, this is, this is
(42:00):
well above something I'minterested in.
So his is really good.
Uh, a hundred million dollarleads.
I mean, I know we all hear aboutAlex Formosy all over the place
at the moment, but his book wasactually Written for like a four
year old, you know, as in like,it's so easy to read, so
accessible, so easy to read, sounderstandable.
(42:20):
And he recorded the whole bookas video lessons as well.
So that teaches you about howto, yeah, how to get more leads,
how to generate them.
And, uh, that's a really goodone.
Four hour work week, I foundinteresting by Tim Ferriss.
A lot of it I don't agree with,but there was certainly aspects
of it like, you know, notchecking your emails 50 Agreed.
(42:42):
Yeah, some great principles inthat one.
And then I love our client,Christina Carlson, who's the
founder of Kiki K and we've beenworking with her now for quite
some time.
She does these, she has apodcast called Your Dream Life
Podcast.
She's done some incrediblethings and she's also very
humble and she's very into selfdevelopment and that's, she's a
(43:05):
person to just witness.
and enjoy her stuff.
Her podcast is also very wellreceived and she, uh, interviews
some huge people.
And then Matt Gray is anotherone I found just more recently.
I can't remember what the nameof his business that he, I think
it's called Founders orsomething at the moment that
he's running, but he's aninteresting character.
(43:26):
YouTube him.
He's just starting to surfaceeverywhere.
And he's talking about, yeah,teams and being a founder and,
uh, you'll find him interestingas well.
And he steps things, a lot of, alot of things out on LinkedIn in
these really cool infographicsthat he just writes himself.
Awesome.
Well, Brianna, as I said at thebeginning, the reason that this
(43:46):
podcast got off the ground isbecause I was working with you
and your team.
So if somebody else has apodcast that is looking to
really make it special, howcould they work with you?
There's a few ways.
So they can, if they want tokeep doing the thing themselves,
they have their own productionteam or they're producing it
themselves or whatever, thenthey can do what we call the pod
(44:08):
coach service.
Essentially it's, that's great.
What we do is we give youfeedback on your episodes.
We look at you without youknowing about it.
Too much, you know, so we'lllisten to your episodes, we'll
score them, we'll look at theway you share on social media,
we'll, uh, read your articles,we'll, you know, broad spectrum,
(44:29):
not just like, is this contentgood?
It's like, what is this persondoing for their podcast?
on a consistent basis.
We give you feedback in a,again, systemized, processed,
production schedule.
Uh, we shoot lean videos.
You get access to a Slackchannel.
We give you feedback on thereand we track all your metrics
over a three month period.
(44:49):
where we then, every time wegive you feedback, we expect you
to, again, 1 percent better.
Make a change based on whatwe've said.
Probably hold them accountableto it because that is the key.
Exactly.
So, Podcoach is awesome.
Three month minimum commitment.
If you want to keep doing ityourself, that just means that
we're.
We're paying attention to youand, uh, it's a fun one.
(45:09):
There's lots of people in thatpodcoach service already and I
just love it.
So you can do that.
Uh, you can also hire us as aproduction team.
You can find that on ourservices page.
There's a bunch of differentthings that you can do there.
We can help you launch your showand then produce it every week
based on your package and yourbudget.
And.
And.
You can also do some free stuff,like we have a DIY podcaster
(45:32):
program, which I actually justmade completely free and you can
go in there and learn how toproduce your show yourself, do
the whole thing.
It's a video tutorial, everysingle episode, it's all using
the script and I did have itpaid as a course and I had
members in there and I justdecided one day, look, I think I
(45:53):
actually just want to make thisfree and then instead those
members.
Went into pod coach.
Mm-Hmm.
So as in they could, they gotthat then in Yeah.
So that they weren't gettingnothing, uh, out of it.
So that's really cool.
Do it yourself.
Again, go to the site.
You'll see that we also have afree audit service where we will
just give you feedback, 48 hoursturnaround, which is awesome.
(46:14):
That's the main things.
I'll make sure I put all thelinks in the show notes so
people can find you.
today I felt nervous at thebeginning because it's always
nerve wracking when youinterview someone that is really
good at what you're doing.
As we said at the beginning, Ithink it's good to be outside
your comfort zone.
And a good testament to Briannais like, just your personality,
we've always got along so welland how comfortable this process
(46:38):
is.
thank you for coming and joiningand sharing your leadership
lessons.
And it's so nice to hear thestories from the inside of the
things that I've witnessed fromthe outside, because I guarantee
your clients have a sense ofyour business.
It'll be because of the thingsthat are happening on the
inside, they permeate to theoutside.
Um, and so it's lovely to hearwhat's like the magic that
(47:00):
you're doing inside your companyto make it so magical on the
outside.
So thank you so much for sharingyour stories today.
Oh, that's just such a nicething to say, Kate.
Well done.
That's just awesome.
Thank you so much for having me.
I've had a great time.
I've definitely been judging youreally heavily this whole time.
And I've got some notes.
(47:20):
Oh, trust me, I've got notestoo.
Thanks so much.
I hope everyone enjoyed this.
Thank you.
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