Scaling a Tech Consultancy: With Andy Neumann

Get ready to unravel the secrets of scaling a services business with our guest, Andy Newman, the Productivity Ninja and CEO at Sensei. Ever wondered how a small town boy turned CEO of two heavyweight companies navigates the complex world of IT? Or how he manages workforce reductions with finesse? From his humble beginnings to his evolution as a leader, Andy's journey is full of invaluable insights.

In our riveting conversation with Andy, we traverse the rapidly evolving project management landscape. We discuss the importance of having a bird’s eye view as well as a detailed perspective for successful project management. We delve deep into the role of human nature on project success, exploring why projects often fail and discussing the potential of Agile and AI in the tech world. We also touch upon the emerging trend of hybrid workforces and the implications of pushing employees back to the office.

As we wrap up, we consider the implications of our ever-increasing screen time and the potential manipulation through targeted, personalized content. Do you ever find yourself caught in the 'endless scroll'? We explore the importance of discipline in averting over-consumption and the role of micro-choices in cultivating healthier habits. Finally, we shine a spotlight on Andy's current endeavor - building Altus as a product company. This episode is a goldmine of insights for anyone navigating the IT industry or managing a team, so tune in.

Hear how some of Australasia's most interesting and successful people are utilising People, Technology and Processes to live a productive life.

For more information on Lee Stevens visit www.leestevens.co

Sponsored by workforcery.com

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome to the Time and Motion podcast with me, your
host, lee Stevens.
For over 25 years, I've workedwith businesses all over the
world to improve the technologyand the people within them.
In this podcast, I share someof my experiences and I chat to
guests who generously sharetheir stories of how to or, in
some cases, how not to live aproductive life.
I hope you enjoy the show.

(00:28):
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first month free.
Andy Newman, productivity Ninjaand CEO at Sensei.
How are you Hello?

Speaker 2 (01:41):
Lee, that's what they tell me at least.
Yes.

Speaker 1 (01:43):
I'm well, was that the right intro?

Speaker 2 (01:46):
That sounds perfect.
That sounds like you set themup.
I'll knock them down.
No, that's good.
How are you anyway?
You?

Speaker 1 (01:53):
doing well, I'm good mate, yeah.
Yeah, as I mentioned, learningthe ropes of product and
realising that can be a bitdifferent to consulting.
Yeah, I feel that as a podcastin its own right.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
It may even make an appearance on this podcast.

Speaker 1 (02:08):
to be honest, Maybe I need someone to interview me
right.
So where in the world are youtoday?

Speaker 2 (02:16):
I am at home in Melbourne.
I just got back from a trip toEurope last week which was
pretty cool.
A bit of business and a bit ofpleasure.
So when I ran and saw somepartners, we've got in Germany
and went to the world's largestheavy metal festival, which is
my deal.
So, yeah, feeling fairlyrefreshed but also just trying

(02:37):
to chew my way through theworkload that I left, as per
usual.
But luckily I'm a ProductivityNinja.
That's what they tell me.
There we go.

Speaker 1 (02:46):
So before we kind of get into who you are, your
background, just for thelisteners out there, just
explain current gig, what Senseido and your current hats that
you wear.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
Yeah, absolutely so.
If you stalk me on LinkedInyou'll see I've got a couple of
gigs that are active, but I meanmy main gig is to see Sensei.
So Sensei is a premiumconsulting business.
We work out of Australia and wemostly service the APAC region,
helping organisations improvethe way they work around project

(03:23):
and portfolio management.
We do that on top of MicrosoftTechnologies, but it's primarily
a consulting play.
That's primary gig.
One secondary gig I guess atthe moment is CEO of Altus,
which is arguably a sistercompany of Sensei, if you like.
So we've spun the product a lotof the smarts in the IP we've

(03:43):
built over time best practices,industry standards type stuff
around project and portfoliomanagement into a product, and
so that's Sepretorg called Altus, and so I've got luckily I've
got a pretty big head which canwear two hats One is the CEO of
Sensei, one is the CEO of Altus,and then I also help out with

(04:05):
some advisory board type gigs aswell.
So yeah, pretty busy beavermost of the time.

Speaker 1 (04:12):
So we cross paths or probably come over every 10
years ago now, so before I madethe big big break to the other
side of the world and I got acouple of job offers on the
table, which I was very gratefulfor, and one of you one of them
was yours, but unfortunately Irejected you.
You'd be probably lucky for you, I guess.
Still stings, still cuss me,still stings.

(04:33):
Yeah, at the time you was, Ithink, md and CEO of OBS, so
there was another big Microsoftpartner, right?

Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yeah, so predominantly a SharePoint
business, but we had aburgeoning or blossoming,
dynamic sharing business at thetime.
But, yeah, same deal Consultingservices about 140 people
around Australia.
And then we sold that businessinto Empyde in 2013, I think.

Speaker 1 (05:02):
Yeah, so the non-compete and the audio net
clause is well and truly gone.

Speaker 2 (05:08):
Absolutely, absolutely.
It's the distant past for menow.

Speaker 1 (05:13):
Okay, so obviously consulting's been your main gig
for most of your career.
Let's go back a bit.
So where did you go up and whatwas early life like for you?

Speaker 2 (05:24):
Oh well, I've been through iterations of what we
see as Andy today Coming up.
I was definitely Andrew so grewup in a small country town here
in Victoria in Australia and Iwas very outdoorsy.
You wouldn't know it.
Looking at me today, body by ITis what you'd see at the moment

(05:46):
but lots of hunting, fishing,camping, that type of stuff
Loved it.
I liked the small town mentalityto a point when I kind of hit
my teen years it got a littlebit tired for me as kids teens I
want to do explore the worldand get a taste of the exciting

(06:09):
life.
So I moved down to Melbourne togo to university and that was
the second chapter of my lifeand that's when I became Newman
I don't know, people getreferred to by just their last
names and that was my universityschooling.
Yeah, a whole world opened uparound social engagement,

(06:29):
learning a bit more about theworld the big bad world that is
a big city.
So that was fun.
And then I started my careerand that's when I became Andy.
So I don't know what the nextchapter will be.
I'll probably get called hey,you.
Actually I get called dad thetaxi driver a fair bit.
So I made it as that.

Speaker 1 (06:46):
Oi, I need picking up .
Oi, yeah, yeah, okay, so whatwas your first full time job?

Speaker 2 (06:54):
Oh, so my first.
So I will share something.
I think my first full time jobwas as a telemarketer, walking
the streets trying to flog justcrappy products I don't remember
what they were, but they werejust terrible door to door and I
think I lasted.
That was a university kind ofbreak gig.

(07:18):
I think I lasted a couple ofweeks in that job before I went.
No, no thanks.
I laughed when you asked mebecause my mind went to the
first or the worst job I've had,which I thought was going to be
the greatest job I had, whichwas working in a chocolate
factory.
I love chocolate.
Chocolate is like my kryptoniteI just now.

(07:40):
It just weakens me in every way.
And I took a job in a chocolatefactory and I lasted one day
there.
I was just like this is backbreaking ordinary work and I'm
going to hate chocolate if Iwork here longer than a day.
So yeah, early career I had abunch of crappy jobs, which I
really love because they helpedme appreciate what a good job

(08:01):
looks like.
You know, I did the usual.
I did a supermarket gig andsome telemarketing via the phone
rather than door to door.
So yeah, did a couple of thosegigs.
Never did hospitality, so maybeI missed out.
Maybe that's in my future, whoknows?

Speaker 1 (08:18):
Maybe.
And so you did those early jobsand I've mentioned on previous
shows.
I think we all gain quite a lotfrom those early jobs without
realising, truly realising,until like later in life.
Yeah, you know, if you learnabout customer services and the
customer isn't always right, butyou know, make them think that
and but yeah, lots of thingslike and just good soft skills

(08:39):
and good people skills, right,but you obviously eventually
ended up in consulting in someshape or form.
So how did that happen?

Speaker 2 (08:45):
Yeah.
So it was interesting becausewhen I went to uni I took a left
turn kind of at the eleventhhour.
I was always planning going touni and doing graphic design to
become an architect.
I really wanted to be anarchitect and in year 12, back
in the 1800s when I went to highschool, they started offering a

(09:06):
IT course on IT subjects.
I did that in year 12 and Iwent.
You know what this kind ofbrings together all the exciting
stuff from my Commodore 64,maybe I'll try a career in IT.
So it was pretty late in thepiece, I think.
I changed direction in year 12to take up IT, went to uni, did

(09:27):
a Bachelor of Computer Science,which was excellent, loved it,
lots of math, lots ofprogramming, lots of using, you
know, deck alphas and unix andgraphics libraries and C++.
And then I got my first job,which was none of that, it was
visual basic, and I rocked upthinking, oh yeah, okay, wes,

(09:47):
you know I'll start firing upthe graphics libraries and the
command line interface and waspresented with Microsoft Visual
Basic 5,?

Speaker 1 (09:55):
I think maybe yeah.
So once again, for the peoplethat are listening to us and
going, what the hell is hetalking about?
These are coding languages,right?
So it's the code.
When you're coding, you'resoftware developer.
It's the languages that youwrite applications in.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
Absolutely.
And I looked, I'd been, I'dbeen schooled in the dark arts,
behind the scenes, and I turnedup and was given these wonderful
brand new kind of tools to use.
And so my university degreeaged very rapidly and, yeah, I
took a job in the internetindustry as it was just starting

(10:31):
to come to age, so that was mid90s, 96, and kind of rode the
wave through the idea of, hey,we can have a website, isn't
that amazing?
I actually remember atuniversity they had a subject
called multimedia and theworldwide web and this is a
Monash uni and it was packed tothe rafters.

(10:54):
There was people in the aislesto hear about what is this
worldwide web, what is theinternet, and it was just so
exciting at the time.
So, yeah, I kind of got intotech and then, through ending up
in tech, I was just inconsulting rather than product
land.
So lots of projects, lots ofhelping people out with their

(11:14):
problems where we thoughttechnology could help them.

Speaker 1 (11:17):
So what would have been your first consulting role?

Speaker 2 (11:22):
So I was thrown.
I was a.
I was predominantly aprogrammer and I'll tell anybody
who listened I was a goodprogrammer, never a great
programmer, never an excellentprogrammer like a solid seven
out of 10.
I worked with people who werenine and 10s out of 10.
And so I started this first gig.

(11:44):
I was thrown this thing that Ilike in consulting how hard
could it be?
It's simple, like it's a smallgig build an application to plot
the journey of a train travelerin Melbourne from station A to
station B using the timetables.
So it was an early trip planner, journey planner type thing,

(12:06):
and it needed to be on the webso that people could use it.
And it was just.
It was the greatest bowl ofspaghetti I have ever created.
Just code all over the place.
Like you, look at it wrong, itwould break.
It was horrifying, but theorganization that I was part of
at the time highly supportive.
The client was amazing.

(12:26):
I now look back, however, manyyears later almost 30 and go,
wow, those guys were superpatient, they were incredibly
helpful and we got there in theend.
We managed to get it out andabout.
But boy, it was just a trial byfire, lee, it was absolute
bedlam.
I had a graphic designer on oneside helping me.

(12:47):
I had a project manager on theother, but I was kind of
shouldering the burden of allthe programming as a seven out
of 10 programmer trying to makemy way through it.
So lots of long days, longnights.

Speaker 1 (13:02):
So you did probably.
What few people do actually isyou made that conversion from
developer into consulting,because it's not a typical path.
I don't know.
It's very, very few people todo that, and for different
reasons.
What were some of the things?
You learned very quickly thatyou had to know and you had to
do and you had to be as aconsultant.

Speaker 2 (13:22):
Yeah, well, it was interesting because my journey
went.
It kind of went developer Todevelopment team leader to
project manager and then toconsultant.
And I was lucky becausesomebody at my organization that
first organization kind of tapme on the shoulder and said
you're an okay programmer, butyou got the gift of the gap.

(13:44):
Why don't you try and work withpeople a bit more than
programming?
And I'm like, oh, give that acrack.
And I put that down a lot to mykind of social experiment at
university.
So that's, one of the massivethings I did take away from uni
was the ability to read a room,interact with people, make them
laugh, put them at ease, all ofthat stuff.

(14:05):
So yeah, some of the so I'dalready had some of those
lessons, I guess, baked into mea bit, lee, which was the listen
before speaking.
You know, make sure that youdon't come out too strong with
an opinion to begin with.
Work your way through it, tryand put yourself in the shoes of
others, all of that stuff thatyou tend to learn anyway when

(14:27):
you're at university trying tomake friends, trying to make
girlfriends, you know all thatfun stuff trying to, you know,
work out who's going to pay thebar tab, etc.
But yeah, it wasn't, it wasn't.
It wasn't a typical path whichgoes engineer to consultant, but
I had a couple of steppingstones in there, which was nice.
Some people management alongthe way as well, which always

(14:50):
helps.

Speaker 1 (14:51):
Yeah.
And then you started gettinginvolved in project management
and delivery of projects.
So same question now yeah, whatare some of those key skills
that you thought, oh, I'm goingto have to make sure I learn
this stuff or make sure I reallyget get a grip of these things.

Speaker 2 (15:09):
Yeah, I think I think keen eye for detail Really
important.
Well, I don't know, it's hardto say because you come at it
from your lens on the worldRight.
So I'm incredibly biased in theway that I look at things,
because I go.
Well, that must be the degreeof success I've had because of
blah, blah, blah or because ofthis inherent trait I have.

(15:32):
But I think I think beingacross the detail as well as the
big picture for project manageris key.
You've got to be able to standbehind the numbers you put
forward, stand behind the updateyou put forward, but you also
need to know where you are inthe grand scheme of things, like
is this a big enough problem toworry about right now?

(15:54):
Is it worth raising or, in thefullness of time, will this just
be a bump in?

Speaker 1 (16:01):
the road or a tiny little nikk.
Don't sweat the small stuffbasically.

Speaker 2 (16:06):
Yeah, and I think you need to have that appreciation
of the big and the small.
I don't think you can get awaywith not having the appreciation
of the smallest project manager.
And, as well, it also buildswhen you're project managing and
leading a team.
It builds that empathy for theguys and girls who are doing the
hard yards, the real work, ifyou've got an appreciation for

(16:27):
it.
So I think I think that helpedto some degree around project
management as well, particularlyit project management, because
I had at least a seven out of 10background in how to do this
stuff.

Speaker 1 (16:38):
So OK, and then you see digit time.
There's some time at SDM as aninformation worker, so that
sounds very, very librarian.

Speaker 2 (16:50):
It does, doesn't the amount of titles that have been
thrown around the it industrySpectacular?
Unfortunately, I'm still yet tocollect evangelist in my title,
but I hope one day.
One day I'll be an evangelist,yeah, but yeah, information
workers.
I let a small business theredoing share points and custom

(17:13):
programming, custom developmentand the early days of what
became forms and automation.
So that was his talk and infopath for those collecting, you
know, microsoft.

Speaker 1 (17:25):
And it's interesting.
You look back because that was2006 to 2008 and looking on
LinkedIn, that you did that.
So you know what, 17 years ago,right, and you think that was
just like yesterday, right, andI know you probably ran a time I
was getting involved inSharePoint as well, but at the
time you should think about whatthose products did.
So it was like a set of Legobricks and it let you do some

(17:46):
forms, it let you store somedocuments, it was like a drop
box, it was like a, it was likea slack, it was like it was so
many different things.
That was quite, you know, great.
And the thing is, unfortunatelyit got such a bad rep because it
always got known as a documentmanagement tool, right, and it
was where documents go to die,as someone said to me once,
right, so, but you know, I thinkit was.
You know, suddenly you lookback and you start realizing,

(18:08):
actually the the a lot of theevolution of the modern tech
that we now use and certainlysoftware as a service and
products is probably all theorigin Probably go back to some
tools like that, I would imagine.

Speaker 2 (18:18):
And it's, it's funny what you do appreciate or don't
appreciate at the time as well,I think, because you know, you
look back at some of this stuffand I remember, I don't know,
maybe 15 years ago, saying whyare we still doing intranets?
Doesn't everybody have anintranet at this point in time?
Like isn't that a thing, Don'tpeople?
haven't we solved that problem?
And still you read about newintranets going out today.

(18:41):
Oh yes, yeah, some stuff movesincredibly fast when you're in
the moment and sometimes youdon't see the glacial speed of
it either.

Speaker 1 (18:51):
Yeah, so you ended up becoming managing director at
OBS, yep, so was that like anatural progression, like a lot
of people in IT?
For for me, I think what I likeabout a lot of the people who
kind of tend to progress to theranks is that they've got a good
amount of technical knowledge,because you say we're solid,
seven out of 10, but no, no, no,not to be dangerous, more than

(19:13):
dangerous.
We've also got a real desireand a sense to lead and when
others don't, so did that feellike a natural fit for you when
you kind of progressed to becomean MD and a general manager?

Speaker 2 (19:26):
Yeah, look, I think so.
You know, you could probably doa eight part series on my
previous bosses and get theiropinions on what I was like as a
as an employee I have.
I don't know how this will comeacross in the podcast.
You might need to edit it outlater.

Speaker 1 (19:44):
I did ask if you didn't want to talk about it.

Speaker 2 (19:46):
No, no, no no, no, no , I might come across sounding
like a complete tool is what I'mworried about.
I it's funny, I never.
I just I don't think I've everbeen a good employee when I
thought I'm an employee and I'vealways been an employee to some
degree, even like with, youknow, equity within a business

(20:08):
like we've got at the moment.
I still answer to somebody, Istill answer to a board, I
answer to myself, I answer tothe problem, I answer to my
co-founders, I answer like Ialways answer to somebody, but
when I feel like I'm an employee, I can only imagine I'm a
rubbish employee.
Actually, I'm just, you know,find ways to be just a pain in

(20:31):
the bum, I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 (20:34):
Yeah, I can vouch for that.
I did, I was exactly the same,and so a couple of my bosses in
my time, you know, in the, inthe yellow ship, you know, but I
was awful, I was terrible.
I just think to myself, andit's only when she actually
start growing a team and youhave a bigger team to look after
, you go.

Speaker 2 (20:51):
Oh my God, what a, what a complete tool I was then,
and I think I think you have tokind of learn that, like again,
I had, I had a bunch of directreports through my twenties and
thirties, but it was only when Igot to my late thirties that
something clicked and I went oh,hang on a minute, that is a
young version of me, whoa, Ibetter make some apologies quick

(21:15):
, smart, my previous bosses.
But yeah, so that drive I meanyou asked about the drive of
leadership or the progression,and happy to dive into that, but
I think that I think it doestake a certain, a certain kind
of self perspective to go.
Now I know that I want to dostuff, let me do stuff, and

(21:40):
there's an element of confidenceto it, not overconfident, it's
not arrogance, but just I've gotthis aspect to it that I think
needs to be there for that, forthat progression through to
being at least a reasonable, youknow, healthy human leader.

Speaker 1 (21:54):
Yeah, what were one of your secrets or your tricks
to scale a services business?

Speaker 2 (22:03):
The obvious one, which is just get great people.
But you know, I think I think Ihave been extremely blessed in
my career, through multiplebusinesses, of having
exceptional humans around me,and that is from, you know, the
person that answers phonesthrough to the to IC or the CFO.
I'm just finding those peoplethat can carry, carry the load

(22:29):
that can add to your view of theworld and that just aren't
tosses.
Yeah, so I think I think that'sit.
I mean you can, you can, youcan.
There's plenty of tricks thatyou can do around sales or Rev
or profit or whatever.
But if you want to truly buildsomething that's fun along the

(22:50):
way, that's going to grow, Ithink getting the right people
is critical.

Speaker 1 (22:56):
Was there any ever a time sort of say that again.
Was there ever a time where youthought this is hard, this is
really really hard, oh yeah.

Speaker 2 (23:07):
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And the one like my mind alwaysgoes back to.
There was a time when we weregrowing pretty fast, about 12
years ago, 13 years ago, back atOBS, and we had to let some
people go.
We had to chop the workforceand you know we're not talking

(23:27):
50%, we're talking at the time Ithink it was about 10, 15%.
And I just remember going, ohno, we've just stepped too far
forward and like the actual,actual process of working out
how we were going to shrink ourworkforce was a challenge.
But the emotional challengethat went along with that of

(23:49):
going all right, lee, I've gotto make a call, lee's not in,
and that means at least life andwife and kids and everything
gets impacted.
So that's, those are probablythe low points and they're the
most challenging because theychallenge you not only on a, on
a what am I going to do to solvethe problem?

(24:10):
Perspective, but also anemotional angle as well, I think
.

Speaker 1 (24:16):
Okay, so OBS I can remember at the time were quite
prominent and quite efficient intheir partnering approach.
If I remember rightly so, twonotable ones I can remember were
Microsoft, obviously theobvious one, and Nintex, which,
from my understanding that, spunout of OBS, or was it the other

(24:38):
way around?

Speaker 2 (24:39):
Well, yeah, it depends who you ask, but yes,
we'll say it.
Yeah, sister company in thepicture spun out in the early
days but soon became thejuggernaut that is Nintex for
sure.

Speaker 1 (24:50):
Yeah, so essentially that was a business that solved
the challenge of businessprocess automation and how do we
digitize a lot of the keyprocesses that probably would
have been paper-based and manualprocesses up to that point.
So the Microsoft partnershipand Microsoft relationship yeah,
you ask different people, youget different responses right as
to what that is, and it'seither Camp A or Camp B

(25:12):
generally.
But what were some of thesecrets or some of the things
that worked for you and what didthat partnership mean for you
when you was MD at OBS?

Speaker 2 (25:25):
Yeah, I think we had a really healthy relationship
with Microsoft because we spenta lot of time trying to
understand what made the variouslevels of Microsoft tick.
And, like any large corporate,there are things that matter to
head office, there are thingsthat matter to the local team,

(25:45):
there are things that matter toindividuals.
So we spent a lot of timemaking sure that we had
information and understanding ofwell, how am I going to make
Lease job easier, how am I goingto make this local sales team
or this local product team shineand look incredible, and what's

(26:06):
the greater goal at an orglevel.
And if we connect with thoseand find ways to demonstrate
that we can further Microsoft'sticks in boxes, then they will
bring stuff to us which willhelp us.
And they were.
They were really good.
I mean, these large orgs as wellgo through their own
metamorphosis over time andpeople come and people go and

(26:28):
vibes come and vibes go.
But at the time when we wereengaging with Microsoft in kind
of the late noughties, earlytens, it was really great.
It was, it was awesome.
Actually, you know, not allsuperstars and some people are
more transactional than others,but for those that we really

(26:49):
engaged with and I couldprobably spend time rattling off
about 30 names that I said oh,phil was amazing and karma was
amazing and, you know, mick wasamazing.
There were a lot of people whoyou just felt like you were
doing good work with them.
So, and that's that's the truesense of that partnership aspect
.
There's something in it forboth of you.
It's fair, it's equitable, it'snot one sided.

Speaker 1 (27:11):
Yeah, I was about to say that because I think a lot
of partners and potentialpartners completely missed the
point on that from myunderstanding.
So, essentially, they turn upand they go right, we want some
projects, go and walk us intothis bank or this insurance
company or this big, big, andpeople don't get like, well,
what have you?
You know, what are you doingfor me?
And you know, and the wholetrip for me and I can't remember

(27:34):
it must have been one of mybosses, I think you know,
probably three or four, you know, probably about 10 years ago
now, and he said to me the tripwith partner and is it's never
about you, it's always aboutwhat you.
It's up marriage, right.
What are you actually going todo for your wife?
What are you going to do foryour partner?
Right, and once you get that, Ithink you know actually the
world's a better place becauseit's 100% and we get offers now
and you make offers.

(27:54):
But ultimately, partnershipsshould be about you trying to
sell more stuff for them, right,or make their life easier.

Speaker 2 (27:59):
Yeah, absolutely.
And you know, I still.
I still recall conversationswith partners 10 years ago who,
you know paraphrase were angrybecause Microsoft's only going
to give me 35% free money wherethey used to give me 45% free
money.
And I'm like guys, you'remissing the free money part,

(28:21):
don't, don't, don't, get upsetLike this is feeling very gimme,
gimme, gimme rather than apartnership of give and take.

Speaker 1 (28:28):
Yep 100% Okay.
So you was obviously managingdirector there when the Empire
yes, takeover happened.
So once again for peoplelistening out there, just just
from your perspective, talk usthrough what that was like as a

(28:49):
business and kind of what thatmeant for you and what were some
of the key kind of notablepoints there about that buyout,
because I'm guessing it probablyit wasn't all plain sailing but
I'm guessing it wasn't thehorrible, nasty experience
either.
You know that a lot of peoplesay when buyouts happen as well,
yeah, so just just talk usthrough that.
That sell, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (29:05):
Okay, so this will be an extended podcast running for
18 hours.
I can edit this bear.
No, no, I think there is just.
You know I side note, I helpedadvise a business on exiting
selling last year and I wastalking to one of the leaders of
that business and I said you'vegot to understand how lucky you

(29:27):
are to go through this processright now Because, yes, it's
scary and daunting and there'sunknown, but you will get out
the other side of this and youwill have, you know, a laundry
list of lessons that you havelearned and takeaways.
And I feel like that abouteveryone that I've been involved
with and I've been lucky to beinvolved with a couple the OBS,

(29:48):
the Empire one.
You're absolutely right, it wasnot sunshine and unicorns, but
at the same point in time, itwasn't.
It wasn't terrible, it was farfrom it.
Actually, you read some realhorror stories and that was not
us.
So, and I think that'stestament to you, look across
the way that the business didtransition.
We made some mistakes but wegot some stuff right.

(30:08):
You know, we're, we're here tostart, I think.
I think, look, we, we understoodthat OBS needed a new home in
any way, like it was a case ofwe needed to go bigger.
We've been going, we've beenscaling up for a while, but we

(30:29):
understood that there was abetter, better together story
with somebody else.
And we went out and we lookedat a bunch of people who could
be that new home for us.
And, you know, we we elected,we selected Empire for a variety
reasons.
It wasn't just because theywere the, you know, they had the
biggest checkbook or they hadthe best technology or anything.

(30:49):
It felt like the right home forus and I think that that was
that was the first right call tostep out on the right foot to
go with.
Well, these guys are betterthan these guys.
These guys are these guysbecause it's a more holistic
home for us to step into.
So, so that that was good.
But you know, we kept the OBSbrand for a long time in market.

(31:11):
I look back on that and I think, oh, maybe we should have
called that earlier, maybe weshould have, you know,
consolidated the brandingtogether.
And that was actually one of myjobs later on in Empire was to
consolidate the branding of OBSand Intogen and Empire and
Conduced If there was a fewbusinesses in that in that
little stable.

(31:32):
But there was just so muchchange.
I think change management andthe comms around it was probably
the biggest thing I Took awayfrom that.
I still struggle with thattoday in terms of like we do
change at sensei or any otherbusinesses I'm involved with and
I always think I know gotta doit seven times, gotta do it 19

(31:55):
times, gotta do it 28 times justto keep Change message a lot.

Speaker 1 (31:59):
Yeah, I agree with you 100% around the skills that
you acquire for that sales price, any sales process.
I've gone for a couple of timesmyself now, but there's
definitely mistakes make alongthe way that cost you a whole
heap of money, but I canguarantee you never make it
again.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So it's a few things like that.
But also I think for me likepretty goes back to the

(32:19):
partnership approach.
You know I've been quitefortunate on both the times.
It's been a win, win for allparties, right.
And I think if that you can getto a point where you know they
always want this, you alwayswant more, and but you get to a
point where Everyone's gettingwhat they want from the
agreement, that's surely got tobe the goal, right.
And if you can, if you can walkaway with that in mind, then

(32:40):
Then yeah, 100%.
One thing I did realize thatobviously Intergem within later
quite by empire that the about ayear later I think I might be
even less than that and then webecome colleagues despite school
and you know, and Rejecting youend up working with you anyway.
But but I was interesting whenwe was an integer at the time
because I always said thecompany I left wasn't the

(33:02):
company I joined, and it justbecame more.
The one thing I liked about itI guess it was it had that
personality and the people inthe directors, and the minute it
gets acquired by a largerbusiness has got aspirations to
scale.
All those things that you needto scale kind of do, kind of
dilute the character of thebusiness somewhat.
And so I kind of felt itchanged a little bit, but not in

(33:23):
a horrible way.
It was just more slick and moreprofessional.
Your time sheets had to be noton Friday and yeah, and it just,
it just does evolve.

Speaker 2 (33:32):
It's funny we had a company meeting at sense I just
on Friday just gone and somebodyasked so we open for questions
like a town hall, and somebodyelse are there plans to list
Sense at some point on the ASX?
And it's a parable againstempire as well, I think, because
when we joined empire overyears it was joining a public

(33:53):
company and I that was.
One of my big lessons is thatworking in a public listed
company Is vastly different tocontrolling your own destiny in
a private enterprise and I usethe expression is not mine, I
stole it from somebody like it's.
Working in a public company islike trying to change your
underpants in public.
I know you want to do, unlessyou've been in that skit where

(34:14):
he changes his swimwear at thebeach.
It's near impossible right yeah,because it just does change
your focus a little bit Fromwhat matters day to day versus
what matters long term.
And that's not bad, it's just.
It's just an evolution of theway the company works and I
think that was a big thing forthe OBS to empire, probably into

(34:38):
junior to empire as well, andit's it makes me wary of listing
a business because it doessomewhat compromise what you can
do yeah, and I think thatcharacter I tell it story with
time, but you might even listento this one day, but I don't
remember.

Speaker 1 (34:53):
Paddy was one of the directors, interesting, right,
and so he was the reason Ijoined when I decided to move my
family the other side of theworld and, and it came down to
make a decision.
He did this video, was walkingaround as a lolly fairy and
maybe very highly inappropriate,I'm sure, these days, but Be it
was just basically on a Friday,was like you know it didn't
take himself too seriously.
I did this video, which was anissue in portals, videos when I

(35:16):
wake up, when I want to feelgreat and I want to take on the
world.
That's the guy I want to workwith, right, that's the one.
And and you know, I thinkthat's that's what you lost.
You lost a little bit ofcharacter, but but yeah, it was.
So you presumably had to stickaround for a little bit after
that.

Speaker 2 (35:32):
So yeah, I did not, not too long I did.
I definitely hung around longerthan what was required, you
know, contractually.
And that was, I think, becausewhat was the terrible places?
I said I didn't turn into ahorror bag, but there was.
There was a level ofstewardship slash, making sure
things were Going to be okay,that I wanted to commit to.

(35:55):
So yeah, I think postacquisition is around for about
three years there about yeah,yeah, I can look on LinkedIn,
mate.

Speaker 1 (36:05):
So it says two years, six, two years and six months.
There you go to an after.
If I was getting skeptical, I'dsay that was six months long
and you probably should havedone what so.

Speaker 2 (36:22):
Maybe it was and again, one of the big one of the
good things about going throughan acquisition and learning
lessons as well, as you areafforded opportunities.
So you know, stepping from andthe of abs, we've got everything
on your shoulders.
I was able to take on some justdifferent roles within and
because I'll be so, I turn myhand in marketing.

(36:43):
For a little while I was aninnovation lead, trying to spin
off an innovation.

Speaker 1 (36:49):
They were all nice little you know you think people
value that, because I thinkthat you know the reality is
that there's the war stories,but then you probably CV in your
professional profiling team,which None of that's really
gonna tell the story about allthose things.
You would use my chrome momentsand those little nuggets of
wealth.
You've not get some kind ofknowledge you gained along the

(37:10):
way, right.
So so you know, I wonderwhether you know it might feel
at the time you keep learningheaps, but you know no one else
really cares.
But I could be.
I could be being skepticalbecause I do.
I'm with you on that,completely unlike you know that
that was almost like a littlemini NBA right to learn about
business and sales and all thethings need to prepare for

(37:32):
selling a business, and so andit was all good, you know and
you learn a whole heap of that.
But yeah, I was one.

Speaker 2 (37:38):
I do wonder if people like you downplay and yeah, it
is interesting because I thinkthose things do crop back up in
time, right, they just crop backup through experience or
whatever to your point.
It probably doesn't play outwell in a CV when you're putting
a job application forwards, butI think if you, if you Earn the

(38:01):
experience in, you demonstratethe experience, then those
opportunities probably come toyou rather than you going to
them.
In the lead up to this, I wasthinking about how I've got to
where I've got to this chat andI think it has been a level of
I've been afforded somewonderful opportunities and you

(38:24):
know people have asked me to dothings, that that I've been very
, very lucky and some of that isprobably based on where I,
where I was, what I look like,who I am, all that type of stuff
.
But some of that aspect is alsoearned through the experience
and the doing Of anything like acapable guy.
Why don't we try and get him so?

Speaker 1 (38:45):
yeah, but thank you, you downplay yourself a little
bit because you know mosteveryone I've spoken to about
you there.
I mean the fact that you just ahundred percent good human.
You know when you people gointo war for you right.
I think that says a lot aboutyou and probably what you've
achieved a lot.
As you say, you don't get goodpeople.
If you've been a bit of a donutright, you get good.

(39:06):
You work with good people.
You people.
People choose to work with you,not the way around.

Speaker 2 (39:10):
I'm glad that.
I'm glad this is audio andother videos where they can't
see me slipping you the fiftybucks.

Speaker 1 (39:17):
Well, these funny money over, anyway, make me
spend it anyway.
Okay, so you went through thatthat sales process did you?
Did your time now and then didyou take some time out and did
you just go on holiday to gosurfing, to go to some rock
festivals, eat some chocolate,or did you crack straight onto
it?

Speaker 2 (39:35):
Well I, I did keep on trucking so it was interesting
because there's an overlapbetween sensei and empire.
So I was on the board of sensei, as it was not back then I PMO
for a year, in my final year ofempire and I think that was part
of the spark being relit in meto go.
I think I want to go Downscale,I think I want to go back to

(39:59):
the start and, you know, growagain rather than sitting.
I mean I'm probably when I leftNine hundred people or
something like that, and I wason the board of IPM, I sensei
later rebranded but I PMO those,doesn't people, those my mates
best bit my best mates business,and I was helping out on the

(40:20):
board of directors and I reallyenjoyed that role, that advisory
role.
And then when I made the call,you know what, I'm gonna step
out of empire, maybe I'll startmy own thing, maybe I'll go join
a big corporate.
I thought about that for abouttwo seconds and then dismissed
it.
But yeah, the appeal ofstepping into a small business

(40:40):
at the time and trying to do acouple of transformations around
branding, around moving to thecloud, around product that was
that was pretty exciting to me.
So so no, I didn't take a break.

Speaker 1 (40:53):
Is that he is the answer there but you didn't have
any Any moments of confidencecrisis though.
There where you kind of startedout and you thought you always
knew you was gonna be okay andwas your stop was pretty high
and you kind of knew you'd fallon your feet.

Speaker 2 (41:07):
I figured it would be okay.
And again I again editing laterto remove the tool aspects of
my.
But I it's just, it's areasonable, quiet confidence,
not an arrogance, but justthings will be okay and maybe
that's my.
I mean, I'm a very positive,optimistic person generally, so

(41:28):
I just figure it'll be fine.
It'll be fine, like a.
Do I back myself?
Yeah, yeah, I reckon, and so Ican I work it out.
Yeah, and if it doesn't workout, what's the worst it would
happen.
Well, I look like a bit of adickhead and that happens on a
daily basis anyway, so that I'msure it doesn't.

(41:49):
Okay, and now over to my familyfor special comments.

Speaker 1 (41:52):
Yeah, yeah, we'll ask them later.
So you obviously become CEO atSensei and so on.
Linkedin it says you probablyclients to prove where they work
, but it's projects andportfolio management.
So did that kind of feel likean?
I'm assuming that's all basedon the Microsoft stack as well
mainly, yeah, and so Did thatfeel like a natural progression?

(42:16):
It was like because essentiallyit was just the content.
You know, the principles werethe same, the approach was the
same, but it was just that thecontent was slightly different.
Well, it's interesting.

Speaker 2 (42:24):
It's interesting I don't get to tell too many
people this story, but it was.
It was both a step forwards anda step backwards into
familiarity.
So in the early days I mean wetalked to early about SharePoint
and info path, back in the daypre my involvement with them.
So we're talking 2006, seven,eight I was involved with this
product from Microsoft calledproject server and it was about

(42:47):
helping people manage theirprojects better and it was
clunky and ugly and certainlynothing that was shiver there,
mate.
So yeah yeah, yeah, so it was.
It was.
So.
That was where I cut a lot ofmy consulting teeth back in the
kind of Of four, five, six,seven kind of that period, and

(43:08):
so I had touched it in a decade.
But stepping back into it Irealized it was moving more into
this cloud platform, that theproblem it was solving was still
so, very, very, very relevantand that we could actually take
a level up, rather than makingit a chore for people to do

(43:28):
their projects or manage theirportfolio of work, to give them
some real insights and step upthe way they work like actually
improve how they go about theirday to day delivery.
So so it was a little bitmoving forward.
So you're right, it was aprogression from Internets and
custom builds and digitizationworkflow.
So it was hot, arguably highervalue moving to these large

(43:52):
organizations that managemillions, sometimes billions of
dollars of projects.
But it was a little bit comfortfeel as well, because it was.
It was a tech and a and aproblem I knew well.
So is.
It is a beautiful littleintersection.

Speaker 1 (44:05):
I think so.
You've been doing that forseven years, seven months.
What's changed in those sevenyears?
Yep?

Speaker 2 (44:18):
So I'd like to say that the problem has changed a
huge amount, but it hasn't.
I mean, you're still readingthe papers every week, somebody
runs over on their projects orsomebody doesn't know what's
going on.
We roll into plenty ofenterprise businesses that just
have this problem.
I think what's changed iscertainly some of the working

(44:42):
practices of people.
So you know, we had thispandemic.
I don't know if you heard, butit made people work from home a
lot and collaborate a lot moreonline.
So some of the methods in whichpeople collaborate have changed
and I think agile or agilepractices or less of this
traditional waterfall projectapproach has come into play, but

(45:05):
not in all areas.
I mean, we still deal with lotsof construction organizations
or banks or governmentdepartments where they are
managing to a methodology, aframework and even, arguably, a
tool that is 30 or 40 or 50years old.

Speaker 1 (45:22):
It's hard to be iterative and agile when you're
dealing with raw materials aswell, right?

Speaker 2 (45:27):
Yeah, you can't have too many cracks at building a
sky scraper.

Speaker 1 (45:30):
You do it or you don't, right, yeah, okay, and in
terms of so it goes to thosecore principles of how people
manage and run projects.
But what about from a techstack?
Because obviously they startedcreeping in 10, 15 years ago.
Oh, there's a product fromthere and we now found that Dave

(45:51):
and Deirdre down the road havebeen using Mondaycom, or they've
been using your Airtable orthey've been using your Insert
any random software as a servicetype.
But that project governance andthat kind of governance of
tools and tech must be a prettybig deal these days, isn't it?

Speaker 2 (46:06):
Oh, look it is, and I think, if anything, so yes, the
footprint of available tools touse has certainly expanded over
the last five years, 10 years.
So you see things creeping inthat are advertising at airports
, huge investment, mondaycom,and then you see the local
person that spun up somethingsmall that's sold to two

(46:29):
organizations but just happensto be the client that you're in
it.
So I think you know, if Ireflect on my answer from
earlier, one of the changes hasbeen trying to integrate all of
those platforms together,because you end up at a RMIT or
Melbourne University and youknow the capital business has
one tool and their studentbusiness has another tool and

(46:51):
their corporate business hasanother tool.
But at the end of the day, thatuniversity just wants to know
how are all my projects going?
Am I spending money in theright areas?
Are we progressing on strategicgoals?
And a lot of those tools don'tplay well with each other.
So that's part of what we do isto try and integrate and
aggregate, give peoplevisibility across the whole lot.

(47:13):
From a tech stack point of viewthough, yeah, now we're in a
sass world.
Stuff pops up all the time andsome of it is really really well
crafted for purpose and some ofit just misses a mark, like
some stuff.
You just there's some basicproject management stuff you
can't do.

Speaker 1 (47:31):
What would you say?
The main reasons are thatbusinesses choose the Microsoft
stack for their projects.

Speaker 2 (47:42):
I think I don't want to say it's a bit like IBM.
You know, nobody ever got fivefor buying IBM.
But there is an element ofMicrosoft is a trusted,
well-known enterprise player.
So when you deal at thatenterprise level, when you're
talking government department,banks, utilities, etc.
They've almost certainlyalready got a Microsoft

(48:07):
footprint.
Their IT business knows how touse it.
They users know how to use it.
So there's an element of trustand familiarity there.
On top of that, though,microsoft in the last five years
has become you know, and justignore the anti-competitive

(48:28):
trust lawsuits but you know theyhave become more open and more
considerate.
They consider other playersmore, so you can integrate a bit
better.
So we don't care if you'regoing to run a different type of
, you know, office collaborationsuite.
We'll still be able to connectto that a different database

(48:51):
other than SQL Server.
Who cares?
We can deal with that.
Even if you want to run in adifferent cloud, we can make
that work.
Microsoft is probably a littlebit more open as an integrator
in the enterprise space as wellthan others.
I would think so.

Speaker 1 (49:07):
Why do you think most projects fail?

Speaker 2 (49:11):
Look, that's a bloody good question, leigh.
My gut reaction to that waspride that people are too proud
to admit when things are goingoff the rails.
I think projects can be hard,don't get me wrong.
There can be very complexprojects and sometimes those

(49:32):
complex projects go off therails.
But it's probably a lack oftransparency, slash visibility,
and that's one of the things wetry and do, which is raise the
visibility and connect the dotsso that if something is going
off the rails early, we raise ared flag.
But it's probably the pride ofpeople involved, whether you're
the project manager or theenterprise architect or the

(49:54):
sponsor or whoever's involved,maybe that one developer who
doesn't want to admit that theyfudge the code and now we have
to revisit nine months' worth ofwork.

Speaker 1 (50:07):
Yeah, I read somewhere a few months ago that
someone asked that question whyprojects fail or projects
projects.
I don't want to be having to goout and be about that, but it
wired.
The most projects fail.
And it all came back to thisinnate ability for humans to
over egg what they capable of.

(50:29):
Yeah, so there's like a person.
So, for example, you might sayto me how long do you think
it'll take you to run around theblock and I'll say, yeah, do
that in four minutes.
And you know you probably likethis.
We're going to be really closeto four minutes.
But there's a like a I don'tknow what the term are used, but
basically it's something inyour DNA or wire that says why
I'm going to be because you'reso competitive, right, it goes

(50:51):
back to the caveman.
So I can do this, I can kill,you know, 10, 10, save a two
tigers instead of a seven, eight.
But you that's what I know Ireckon all that, a lot of the
projects, it's basically ashumans we have this inability to
actually be realistic in termsof at competitive street creeps
in.
I just wonder how many of thoseprojects especially when
someone says, well, could youget this done in three months
you go, we'll get it done in two.
Yeah, exactly, and.

Speaker 2 (51:15):
I wonder, I wonder if agile is a bit of a response to
that as well, where we want toiterate, where we want to show
progress rather than do this bigbang approach of going okay,
well, I'll just go away for twomonths and then I'll come back,
and it'll be done, becauseanytime somebody goes away for
two months, they're not comingback before four months later.

Speaker 1 (51:34):
Right.

Speaker 2 (51:36):
So yeah, I don't.
An iterative approach at leastis a let me show you what's
happening along the way.
I'll do a little bit here, alittle bit there.
So yeah, it's it's.
You know it's not the hardestwork in the world.
There's people who've got wayworse jobs than you or I.
But it can be.
It can be complex, I get thatcan be challenging.

Speaker 1 (51:57):
What do you think some of the key trends are with
the tech and, I suppose, interms of projects as well.

Speaker 2 (52:03):
Yeah, I think you know it wouldn't be a podcast
unless I said AI.
Right, I've got to say AI atsome point.
Tech, that one's done, yeah,and I think I think AI will.
I think AI will be a massivebenefit to the way in which we
run projects because it willremove the administrative burden

(52:24):
that just takes up time, thatmanual, just time sink, it's
data update reports, yeah, butwe're still.
We're still a while's away fromthat, because I, you know, in
the project world for at least awhile yet, I think AI will only
be able to give you still data.
You'll still need to deriveinsights from it properly,

(52:45):
because there is a lot ofexperience that's required.
We might get there, but it'sstill fairly fatty at the moment
, like you know.
It feels like a bit of a phase.
So I think it is very powerful,but we'll need to wait for the
potential to come through.
I think that the hybridworkforce for projects, for the

(53:06):
way we manage projects, for theway we collaborate, is one of
the trends that will beinteresting to see.
I don't get at the moment whyemployers are, here in Australia
at least, starting to reallyput their foot back down to say
come back to the office.
That's, that's a bit puzzlingto me.

Speaker 1 (53:28):
You don't get what they are, or they are doing it.

Speaker 2 (53:30):
No, yeah, no, I don't get why that Well, I theorize
as to why and I can read thepapers, but I'm just like, well,
come on at the internet, like,unless and there's some
circumstances where it makesabsolute sense, right, like you
know, you're a bank teller,you're kind of going to be in
the bank, right, but for therest of the knowledge worker,
information worker, remoteworkers unless there's a

(53:56):
wholesale connection problem,people, people can have proven
that they can work.

Speaker 1 (54:03):
I read somewhere online apparently it all comes
back to who well he owns thebuilding.
So in the States, for example,it all applies back to real
estate.
So essentially, what happens isthat often the business is the,
you know, is the pension fundrelates to the you know, the
lease or the relent on thebuilding so or similar building.

(54:26):
So if you're not going in meansthe rates are going to go down,
which means the pension fundsgoing to tank, and it means
there's a lot and also there's awhole sub industry of cafes and
restaurants and nearby placesthat are struggling, right,
because no one's going intothese offices.
And there was a Scott GallowayI don't know if you follow him.
He showed the key fob data forthe top five cities and it's

(54:48):
only 50% of what it was preCOVID, right?
So only half of people haveactually come back.
And he talks about you knowoffices being like the pyramids.
You know it's what people?
You know people marvel at thembut they serve no functional
purpose and that.
I do wonder if there's a momentof that.
But, yeah, interesting, so that.
But how does that?
Do you think that's a goodthing or bad thing for projects?

Speaker 2 (55:12):
I think I'll step outside of projects and just say
people and I'll come back toprojects, because I think I
think it's.
I think it's a good thing forpeople as long as they can
control their time that they'respending, because you know, we
saw that early on in thepandemic that people just went
right.
I'm work from home.
Now that means I need to workwhenever I'm awake, which is not
a great outcome for theemployer, for the people, for

(55:35):
the work, all of that stuff.
So so I think I think, if itcontinues in this thread that
we've been in, as long as peopleare controlling their time they
spend nominally at work versusat play, then it's still a great
thing, I think, for projects.
I think it is a good thing thatpeople are unable to do their
best work.
When they do their best work,where they do their best work,

(55:58):
it does require an added layerof governance and visibility,
though, not necessarily tocontrol that, but just to make
sure that all the parts areworking at the same point in
time, because projects are, youknow, usually highly dependent
activities.
I depend on you, you depend onBob, Bob depends on Sally, so

(56:18):
you just got to make sure thatyou know getting all the way
back to some of those lessonsfrom project management.
You understand the smalldetails, but you understand the
bigger picture as well, so Iwould really I hope that this
hybrid work scenario continuesto pan out as it does and that
we don't swing too far backtowards in the building.

(56:40):
Likewise, I don't think we canbe at home all the time either,
so, yeah, what about some otherpeople trends that you see?
Um, I I.
My mind immediately went to Iworry how much time people spend

(57:00):
on their phones.
Like I worry how much timepeople spend in front of a
screen.
It's not just because I've gota teenage boy, but you know,
there is, there is an element ofso many eyes on screens.
And then combine that, combinethat AI trend that's coming,
particularly the generatedcontent, that we can generate

(57:22):
content through our.
I just wonder how much thiswonderful, special, remarkable
thing called the internet willget diluted with just a whole
bunch of targeted, personalizedcrap.
So I I do worry that perhapsthe fly on effect of people is
that they limit their intake ofinformation to only that which

(57:46):
is carefully crafted for them.

Speaker 1 (57:50):
It's easy to be swayed as well.
So you look at the Facebook andthe, that film is it?
There's a great, great hack orthere's a program on Netflix and
it talks about how theyinfluence the swing voters.
So over a period of time, wecan show you enough kind of
right wing or left wing stuff tokind of make you sway one way

(58:10):
or the other and it completelydoes work.
Really cool book as well ascalled stolen focus.
But yet you and Hari, so listento the audiobook of that and it
talked about how this stuff'shappening and, for example, up
when we're the endless scroll.
Right, this is the endless.
That was an invention and thereason that came up, because

(58:31):
they want you spending more timeonline.
So if you can never get to thebottom, you're spending more
time on time online, which meansmore advertising dollars.
But they were saying you know,and it's not your fault, so if
you might be be moaning the factthat I can't, I can't Instagram
and I'm on the scroll of death,you know before you go to bed,
etc.
They say it's not your faultbecause every time you think
you're going to be able to putsomething in place to put blocks
in the two hundred engineersout there that is, whose job is

(58:54):
just solely get you doing thatmore and more.
And they talked about theGoogle buzz.
You know that was a relativenew invention, that buzz when
you phone, you get an email,your phone buzzes and all of a
sudden it's, and it's thatboosted your dopamine and great,
I'm important.
But yeah here, yeah, I don'tknow, that could definitely be
dog of social media.
Yeah, but, then on the flip side, I think you know, and you know

(59:16):
and Harry talks about this book, yeah, I remember when we
couldn't do this and how.
Yeah, it seems like distantmemory and you need crowded
lifts and crowded concerts andstuff like that.
But I think people do crave andas humans we kind of crave real

(59:37):
life connection.

Speaker 2 (59:38):
So People generally is the discipline that they
apply to the way in which theylive their life.
So the ability to know when tostop scrolling and when to, when
you're at a concert, be in themoment rather than going.
All right, well, yeah, I'mgonna get my phone up and I'm

(59:59):
gonna record the whole thing.
And that that comes down tochoices, micro choices that are
made at a discipline level, andI just don't know.
I don't know if we're gettingbetter or worse at that.
It's hard for an old white kids.

Speaker 1 (01:00:14):
I, like you say, because it's it's there's so
much, it's like I say there's somuch money and so much effort
being pushed to make themaddicted, which you know it's
not great, right.
So I think all you can try anddo is it's like smoking or any
other addiction you just try andteach me and say, look, you
know, it's your choice, but youknow, make an informal choice,
right?

Speaker 2 (01:00:32):
Yeah, just demonize it then it'll be fine.

Speaker 1 (01:00:36):
Yeah, your grandfathered head.
Okay, so what's next round, orAndrew?

Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
Yeah, I don't even know what the next version of me
is.
Look, it's interesting.
So we were talking just beforethis kicked off today about
product and where we're headed.
I think I'm excited about thepath we have moving forward in.
Establishing altars is productcompany, so that'll take a lot

(01:01:05):
of my time and energy.
But you know I won't take awayfrom sense as well, which is
still my baby and I love it tobe.
I think you know I'm just builtthis way, but I love to work.
I genuinely I have a very highWork ethic, or workload or

(01:01:25):
whatever, or Again in the middleyeah, yeah, I really love that.
I genuinely love that, so Idon't think I'll ever run out of
stuff to do.
I do enjoy advising otherbusinesses as well.
I've done that a couple timesover the last couple of years,
so I do like kind of dippinginto businesses and sharing some
Experience.
So maybe there's a bit more ofthat.
But you know, as you get older,as the kids get older, you get

(01:01:49):
different perspective on life.
So you know, I said I promisedmy wife Yonks ago, 20 years ago,
that I retire when I was 50 andregardless of the fact that I
look in 106, I'm still.
I'm still the right side of 50,south of 50.
But I can see 50 becoming 55and 55 becoming 60 and 60

(01:02:11):
becoming 65.

Speaker 1 (01:02:13):
If you enjoy it.
That's the main thing.
This is what else we do, likethat.
I think you mentioned earlierabout that growing and I think
that was really important for me.
When you know, when the sale ofmy business went through, I
kind of stopped growing and thatdidn't sit nice to me and so,
yeah, you can do product and I,before we come on out of the
moon, how hard it is all thesekind of all of these kind of

(01:02:36):
issues that you face.
But you learn from them, right,and you look back and you go,
wow, look at the last, Iprobably learned more in the
last six months.
I've done the last six yearsright, just because you've got
to.
So I think I think, yeah, onceyou stop growing and stop
learning, I think that's oftenthe time.
Or, if you want to stoplearning, you just tired even
after.
That's the time to put yourfeet up, but yeah and that's and

(01:02:57):
that's.

Speaker 2 (01:02:57):
If you're built like that, that's fine, right, that
that is a legitimate choice foryou.
But you know, I do say thisprobably on a weekly basis to
somebody how lucky are we, howlucky are we that we get to do
this thing today that we'venever done before, and we might
Like horribly screwed up, butthat's okay too.
That's completely cool because,as a hundred and six year old

(01:03:20):
white man, how often do I getthe opportunities to To try this
stuff, to actually push my waythrough?
So yeah, I think I there's a.
There's still a lot of learningto be done and a lot of growing
to be done, so I'm excitedabout that.

Speaker 1 (01:03:36):
Okay.
So last question, which I askeveryone on the show If you
could go back and give 21 yearold Andy or Andrew, yes some
words of advice, what would thatbe?

Speaker 2 (01:03:49):
I've heard you ask this before, so I was a little
bit prepared for this one and ittook a while.
It took a while for me to comeup with an answer because my
initial answer was just stay thepath.
Things have worked out prettywell, just keep going.
But then I thought no, that's acop out answer.
Andy Lee will want more thanthat.
So I think that a little bitmore.
I think probably probably couldtweak a couple of things.

(01:04:15):
I could probably have had alittle bit more funny my 20s.
But having said that, you know,the work ethic I laid down in
my 20s served me well for my 30s, in my 40s and beyond.
So so there's probably that.
But the other thing would be Iwould have liked to have
traveled a little bit more in my20s.
I didn't really get the travelbug until I was late in my 20s.
So yeah, I wasn't in a positionto take a gap year or anything

(01:04:40):
like that.
But how do I work a little bitdifferently?
Maybe I could have traveled alittle bit more in my 20s to see
the world.
But other than that, it's.
It's actually I've learned allthe right lessons.
I think it reasonably the righttimes, and I'm still learning
them, so that's cool.

Speaker 1 (01:04:59):
Andy, thanks so much for making time to come on to
the show and great catching upand find out a bit more about
your past and few, few littlenuggets there which I kind of
didn't know.
So I'm sure everyone would havefound that to be a great use,
and a lot of people who listento us who know you as well, so
I'm sure they'd appreciate yourapproach and how open and honest

(01:05:19):
you was.

Speaker 2 (01:05:20):
I can't wait for the feedback from all my quote
unquote friends telling me howit went.
So, yeah, no, I don't know, itwas a blast, thankfully.
Thanks for asking, that'sawesome.

Speaker 1 (01:05:30):
No problem, and so if anyone else?
So if anyone wants to get holdof you or find out more about
you, what you do, how do theyget hold of you?

Speaker 2 (01:05:37):
Oh look, probably the easiest ways to look me up on
LinkedIn.
I'm pretty responsive there.
So, andy Newman, I'm sure youcan find me, or, leo, put a link
or something like that, andy,and the M A N N as well.

Speaker 1 (01:05:52):
Right, that's it.

Speaker 2 (01:05:54):
Many answers.
Your bike.

Speaker 1 (01:05:56):
Andy.
Thanks so much, mate.
Hope you enjoyed the rest ofyour week and look forward to
seeing the continued success ofsensei.
Awesome thanks, mate.
Cheers, mate, take care aboutit.
So that's another great episodedone and dusted, as always.
I'd love to hear from you ifyou know anyone that's got a
really good story to tell abouthow they are, or not, living a
productive life.

(01:06:17):
If you want to get in touchwith me, please do so by my
website, wwwleastevansco.
You can email me, lee, atLeastEvansco, or get in touch on
LinkedIn, which we'll also hangout in the meantime.
Have a good week.