Curveball

Jack Manning Bancroft was 17 when he walked into Australia’s most prestigious college at Sydney University. Think sandstone buildings, young men wearing suits and gowns to the dining hall each evening.  

Jack, a talented athlete and student and a Bundjalung man, had been awarded a scholarship to St Paul’s College. 

The level of privilege he was surrounded by made him angry, but it wasn’t long before he channeled that into establi...

“We bought computers that had never been connected to the internet. Phones were taken out of the room and I unplugged everything, including televisions and fridges. At one point the cabinet secretary pointed out through my window to a block of flats across the water and said, ‘You realise the Chinese will be in there and they’ll have a laser on that tumbler of water, and they’ll have turned it into a microphone. They can listen to ...

“I love that moment on the blocks. It’s the most high pressure moment. You can feel your heart beating. Your palms are all sweaty. Often when I’m going down onto the block and they say ‘take your marks’ my hands and legs are shaking. It’s a place of great failure and great success. They’re both possible in that very same moment”. 

Bronte Campbell could be the second best 100-metre sprint swimmer on the entire planet, and still not...

Graeme Wood knew his planet was in danger even as a little kid. No one had to tell him: he could tell by how rapidly his fishing hauls on Moreton Bay were diminishing each year. But what was a bored kid in Brisbane going to do about it?  

Come 2014, entrepreneur Graeme Wood sells Wotif, his internet travel booking platform, and for the first time he has the potential to enact enormous change. So why does this devoted conservationi...

“It's nothing short of an Australian small business fairy tale that's about to unfurl.” 

Poppy King was barely out of high school when she launched her first company in 1991, quickly gaining a cult-like following for her dreamy 1940s Hollywood-inspired matte lipsticks. 

By 1995 she was Young Australian of the Year, but not long later the company fell apart amid investor disputes.  

The young entrepreneur moved to New York to wor...

“When my friends were all going out and still doing Contiki tours, I was navigating a divorce.” 

Growing up in a traditional Fijian-Indian family, Shivani Gopal was given the message that women should be nice, they should serve others, that a woman’s value came from kindness and doing the right thing by others. 

So when Shivani fell in love as a teenager and her family arranged for her to be married, she tried to be the perfect w...

Best-selling author and journalist Trent Dalton appreciates things most people wouldn’t give a second glance. 

Growing up, Trent had no choice but to see the best in people, because if there wasn’t some light in those he loved, the world would be too dark a place to bear. 

When he sat down to transform that story into his best-selling debut novel Boy Swallows Universe, little did he know his experience would be adapted for the st...

The thin timber floorboards and sticky carpet were a thin shield from the noise at the pub downstairs. But a 17-year-old Dee Madigan was trying to drown it all out as she studied for her final high school exams. 

The room above a bar hardly qualified as optimum living quarters but moving back to the city on her own to get a good education was Dee’s best shot at getting into university. After years of ups and downs in her parents’ ...

One day you can be striding into work in a suit worth thousands of dollars, and the next you can be at home in your pyjamas struggling to connect your laptop to the wifi in time for a job interview well below your pay grade.  

Tragedy, failure, loss – they’re all part of life’s ups and downs. Life happens to all of us, no matter how much success you’ve achieved, how fancy your job title is, or how much money you earn. 

But when t...

Ever wondered how much you could grow your business, if only you could amplify your message? 

Now that 40% of Australians regularly listen to podcasts, it’s a great way to communicate to your clients and customers. 

Let Deadset Studios help you make a show! We’re a full-service production company and our team’s made many of the country’s most popular podcasts like: 

Australia’s most downloaded podcast Conversations 
Winner of...

“She helped me completely dismantle a media personality I constructed and wasn’t happy with. It was a media personality I constructed to be a television presenter. To be sort of charming, maybe trying to be funny, trying to be a smartass here and there. But it was a struggle because it wasn’t who I really am.” 

Richard Fidler’s had more careers than most. He’s best-known as a host of the ABC’s most popular radio show and podcast Con...

Legacy can be a bit of a loaded term when it comes to family businesses. If you’re taking over at the helm, how do you honour the legacy of those who came before you? Do you keep things as they were, or should you shake things up? 

Buckaroo Belts owner Tanya Van Der Water asked herself exactly these questions when her father fell ill in 2013. Unexpectedly, she was thrust into the CEO role in his place.  

Once upon a time, she wasn’t ...

There’s sweat flying everywhere at the Alice Springs YMCA as a young instructor cheers the class through their workout. Michelle Bridges is learning how to bring the heat, honing her craft as the motivator-in-chief for people looking to turn their lives around.  

Michelle had been teaching fitness classes and entering bodybuilding competitions while she was living in the desert with her then boyfriend. 

She was building a small yet l...

The sun’s setting in the Sydney suburbs, but a young Brandon Jack’s still running his science experiment. Or rather, he’s still pretending to run his science experiment. In reality, he’s just kicking an Aussie Rules football around. But when you’re the son of an NRL legend, you have to come up with a good cover story to even go near other football codes. 

Brandon’s talent for side-stepping the truth about football continued into adu...

We get it! It’s scary being your real self out there. Being vulnerable. Laying it all on the line when you’re feeling uncertain, not quite sure if you’ve got it right. 

We’ve noticed so many Curveball guests have had a moment where they could choose to be the all-knowing tough guy/gal, but instead decide to let their guard down. 

It might be emotionally risky, but how can you make vulnerability work for you in relationships, on a pro...

Once upon a time, a young Kirstin Ferguson wanted to be Australia’s first female Prime Minister. And she figured the free university education and rigorous leadership training of the military would make a good first step.  

But – surprise! - the Royal Australian Air Force Academy of the 1990s wasn’t the most welcoming environment for an ambitious young woman. Kirstin had to adjust her behaviour in ways that would affect everything s...

Think back to the toughest challenges you've ever faced - the longest grind, the lowest low... What would you do if, almost as soon as it ended, you were told you had to do it all again? 

For Kath Koschel, former New South Wales cricketer, this question isn’t hypothetical. She’d already faced loss of her fiancé and was overwhelmed with grief. And after months of rehab following a debilitating back injury, she wanted to get back on t...

As Kath Koschel steps behind the crease, she grips her bat just a little tighter than usual: she’s pushing through an annoying but minor back injury.  

The next thing she sees is the sky. She’s laying flat on her back. She can’t feel her legs. Turns out that back injury wasn’t so innocuous, and Kath’s on her way to the hospital.  

She doesn’t know it yet, but it’s not going to be her last operation, and it’s certainly not going to be...

“We’re building it for the people comfortable doing mobile banking, who are living on the edge of the future,” says fin-tech entrepreneur Dom Pym.

“All the things we do with Up are different than other banks. Because when you’re carrying your phone in your pocket, doing everything with your finger on your phone, or with your face or your voice, that user experience becomes so much more important than a web browser with a mouse and a...