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This podcast is brought to you by Label Sessions, the global platform that connects you to the
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best advice from the most interesting people. In this exclusive bonus episode of the series,
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Andy is back alongside show producer Josh Nixon to host a panel of leaders. They go
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over the show's highlights, some of the questions on applying the lessons from the course to
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the businesses that they operate within, and a little bit of behind the scenes magic in
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putting CCNG together. So with that, over to Josh and company.
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Intro
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Hello, thank you so much for taking the time guys to sit down and chat to me. So this is a lovely
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little wrap up episode. I am Josh Nixon, I'm the content producer for Label Sessions and the editor
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of CCNG. I'm making my way in front of the camera for a change, which is nice. And I'm here with the
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one and only Andy Noly, doesn't need an introduction because obviously he's the head and star of the
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show, but he's the Just for Laughs co-founder and the one and only CCNG creator and ambassador in
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following your gut. I'm here also with the leader of Transfabrace for Change responsible for the
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strategic global experience design, education at Sunlife and Afote. The foresight lead and trend
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analyst of Flux Trends and speaker and author of The Future Starts Now, Brawler Williams. And also
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the chief marketing experience officer for the artisanal spirits company, Rebecca Hamilton. So
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thank you so much for joining. Hello everybody. And I just want to make sure you know that that
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was actually Josh's speed of talking. Your podcast speed is not on two or three X at this point in
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time. It was actually Josh's normal talking speed. So there we go. So we'll get started with Andy.
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Yes. How do you feel with the podcast now it's wrapped? Has the genie had any sightings yet?
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No, none whatsoever. And believe me, I am out there rubbing everything, you know, and getting
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in trouble for it. So I'm looking for lamps, but I'm doing like cars and parking meters,
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fire hydrants, small dogs. And so far the genie has not appeared, but I will never give up hope.
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But the other thing that I've seen is that people have been reaching out, which I find amazing,
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people actually been listening to, because when you record a podcast, you're basically in the
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void. And then, you know, when you find out people are listening to it, it's like, wow,
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you actually listen to this stuff. I'm so impressed. So thank you. But no, no genie sightings yet,
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despite the fact that my admiration and my gratitude and my rubbing.
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All right. That answer worked. Okay. I have to retake that one. Josh, let's go.
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Keep going.
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No, no, no. We're doing this live. We're doing this live. So first question for the panel,
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Anna, we'll start with you if this is okay. With a name like Creativity Curiosity and Guts,
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what do you feel is, which one of those three do you feel like is most missing in business culture,
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starting with you, obviously being a patient or candidate?
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Guts. Man, oh man, we sometimes lack guts. I mean, I think that there's lots of creativity,
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but the kind of actioning creativity or being comfortable with taking risks is such a Canadian,
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we are very good at inventing things. We're very difficult about scaling it, taking credit for it.
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So the guts to kind of move forward and not live in kind of this monopolistic inertia,
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there's so much creativity out there. We just got to harness it.
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I just learned a new term, monopolistic inertia. That's the name of the next podcast,
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ladies and gentlemen, monopolistic inertia. Wow. The t-shirts are going to be great.
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The merch lines could be fantastic. But so Rebecca, how do you feel about it? Which one
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of those three do you feel like is missing? Do you agree with Anna or?
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Oh, absolutely. I mean, I'm a very instinctive, intuitive person, very empathetic. So I go on my
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gut all the time, you know, very instinctive in the way I operate. And I think it's so important
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that we understand how to harness that and understand that and interpret that and use it,
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but also feel brave about doing it. I couldn't agree more with what you've just said, you know,
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having the guts to use our guts basically in our decision making is so important and how we create
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and foster culture that allows that to breathe basically and to be as equal in the debate around
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the table as numbers, facts. Yeah. I couldn't agree more.
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Awesome. Well, Bronwyn, I know that you might be inclined to agree, but obviously as a futurist,
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how do you feel about the curiosity aspect of things? I know in one of the episodes,
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the myth of change is all about how, you know, one of the clever little quotes I picked up here is,
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everybody loves change as long as someone else does it first. I think this is obviously quite a
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self preserving factor, trying not to be too curious. And I think it depends on where you're
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looking in an organization or in a business. So what you often tend to find is that the founder,
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the guy that goes out there and takes the risk is not lacking on guts or on creativity. But,
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you know, when you get to that curiosity factor, that becomes a problem when you start bringing
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other people into your team and everyone wants to think that they've kind of got their own
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agenda or their own role, their own domain. And it becomes very, very scary to be curious.
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I definitely encounter this in work that I do with organizations all the time,
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where things don't happen or organizations seem to lose their nerve when it's not actually losing
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their nerve. It's actually very big incentives with people who are not the direct shareholders
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or the entrepreneurs or the leaders or the visionaries behind the business.
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Because there's a lot of incentive to stay where you are. I mean, curiosity leads to more work and
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not necessarily to more pay. And that's something you have to grapple with if you are a curious,
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gutsy leader, right? And not everybody has got the same agenda that you have. And that's the
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constant challenge. That's the constant challenge trying to find a balance between those sort of
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explorers and the farmers within your organization. But I would say that there's a lot of willful
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and curiosity in the world at the moment. What do you think the magic is to flexing
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and training the curiosity muscle? Because that's something that I'm so interested in,
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in terms of how we train ourselves to constantly be curious and test our brains. What do you think
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the sweet spot is? Like, what is the magic trick to be an athlete from a curiosity muscle point of
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view? You know what one of them I think is, Rebecca, is humility. So I think in big companies kind of
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saying, we're big, so we must be the best. And because we're big, we're doing things right,
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although true, is such a curiosity killer. Because it's like, well, why it's fine. Like,
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what we're doing is fine. And I just think sometimes the humility of, well, what we're doing
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may have is working, but there could be more. Like, we can be both proud of what we've accomplished,
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but still be curious and have a desire for more. Yeah, it's more fun too. But I always come back
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to the fact that you kind of got to incentivize that. If you do want to have a curious team,
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you've got to incentivize curiosity. And that comes down to how you manage people, right? In
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terms of managing what gets measured, gets managed, gets manipulated. And if you're measuring people
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on quarterly targets, of course you're going to get people to be willfully uncurious, because
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being curious will only complicate those numbers and complicate those incentives. I don't know,
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I'm speaking generally about small things. Like, what do you value? What do you praise?
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And you get more of what you pay attention to and what you pay, quite frankly.
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I have to balance this with two arguments. One is, I love the curiosity element. And sometimes I
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find myself lazily accepting things. Who's binging whilst I talk? So I find myself lazily
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accepting things. And I have a friend who I do a lot of work with and we're working on a project
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together. I'm always amazed that he'll question everything. When someone will, I'll say, oh,
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okay, well, that's the way it is. And someone's brought this up. He'll question every little
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thing. And I'm saying, wow, maybe it's extreme, but that's the real curiosity element at its finest.
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But on the other hand, I just read a book yesterday called Obvious Atoms. And it's a book written in
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1916. I don't know if you guys have ever heard of it, but it's apparently the... David Ogilvy said
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that he would do, Ogilvy made an advertising agency, legendary, and he said he would get his
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staff to read this book every year. It's 40 pages. It goes by in 20 minutes. But the point of the
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book is sometimes seeing the obvious. And sometimes you have to be curious to see the obvious. And
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it's really a brilliant small book about how sometimes the answers are there in plain sight.
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And one of the things that... Hey, because I think I'll mention it. I think it may have been Anna
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perhaps talked about companies are so big. They said, we must be good at this. Companies realize,
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say, well, you know what? As a consultant or as a company, we have to find the extensive, expensive
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solution rather than the real simple one that may be right in front of our eyes. So the curiosity
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does not necessarily mean, oh, let's look for other than crazy. It just means like finding the
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right thing and looking for it. And sometimes it's right there. Oh, there it is. A quote that came
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to mind that relates quite a lot to what you're just talking about there is the one from episode
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four, life is a black box. You can go through life passively or just let things happen to you,
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or you can make things happen through a lust for learning and what you can discover next.
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Next, like curiosity is a not frivolous at something to manifest your destiny.
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Believe me. Look at us here. Josh, I'm sorry to do this, but can I be curious for a second? I was
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going to wait till the end, but I don't know when this is going to end. So I might as well ask this
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now. But you guys all listen to the podcast and we're talking about sound effects and all that.
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Like one of the things that I tried to do off the top of this, my initial conversation with
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Josh and particularly with Ian and Nick was I didn't want to do like the standard podcast
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with interviews. I really wanted sound effects and silliness and music to play a part of it,
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play a part in it. So what's your take on that? I was going to get your take on what you thought
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just as someone who tried to do something a little bit different with this. And maybe it wasn't that
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different. You will let me know. No, I loved it. It sounded so conversational. Like it sounded real.
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It sounded very well produced, but not over produced if you know what I mean. Like there was
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a little bit of naturalness and just humanity. Okay, cool. I appreciated the sense of humor.
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I was clearly not someone who took themselves too seriously, which is a great starting point.
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I think that in my role as a contemporary court jester, I've learned very quickly,
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you can't take yourself seriously. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. It's very genuine, authentic, straightforward.
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Okay, cool. Straightforward talking. So it didn't bother you the like the the
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the the the boings and the explosions and the sound. Okay. I think it's the brain thinking,
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right? Like, got to keep the brain on its toes, throwing some random stuff just to keep it going.
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Well, maybe it was random. Was it Josh, we planned that to the tee. But anyway,
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it was all in the script. And that's what I was going to ask next. I was going to go to highlights,
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but I was for talking about them. Do you have a particular sound effect that you remember that
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sort of tickled you? Me or them? All, anybody. There's some sort of cartoon boings that
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were fine. They were pretty cool. Okay. Batman. I remember those cartoon calling vibe. Okay.
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Anyway, okay, mine, we use the the kaching and the explosion a number of times.
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And we had to go, Josh, Josh, it doesn't sound like an explosion. It has to be sound like a
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nuclear explosion, you know, and that's something loud. It can sound like you know, it's what we
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had to get to play with that one. Cut to me looking through like 5060 different explosive
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sound effects just to get the right one. You don't want to sound like you're being
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vaporized. You do want to sound like there's a big explosion. Exactly.
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I need a pair of those flare audio earplugs. Those have become like the I think the mascot of
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this this podcast. Anyway, sorry, I sort of took us off kilter.
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But I'm just happy to go where for the guests to go. And it's quite part of the fun. Yes,
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it is. And so what I was going to ask is, Roman, was there a personal sort of highlight that sort
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of comes to mind off the top your head and it's not putting you on the spot? But no,
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no, that was all good. I like the the failure is always an option. I do like to speak about these
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things quite a lot myself. So yeah, it's kind of part of the fun. Like I know, I know it sounds
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probably quite terrible to talk about. But when it comes to life in general and getting up every
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day, you know, there's always exiting is always an option. But that's kind of what makes the choice
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to stay in the game, stay getting up every day just so much so much better. Like the fact that
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there is risk and that nothing is guaranteed. I think that's quite exciting. But a depressing
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floral for me. So anyway, I enjoyed that. It's a lot. Rebecca, did you have a personal highlight?
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I think anything around what creative is and how we foster it, you know, ultimately,
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what's the creative process? Does process kill creativity? Therefore, how do you crack
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creativity? Anything that talks around that I'm always going to be fascinated in because ultimately
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it's up to all of us to just be conscious and open to creativity all the time and look for it
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and be inspired by it. So yeah, I think for me, that's the theme that obviously has been
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running through many of the podcasts that you've been doing. But that's that's the bit for me
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that I've always been most interested in talking about. It inspires me, but also it interests me
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in terms of how we make the world a better place ultimately by being creative.
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Amazing. And Anna?
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I think the concept that you kind of parsed and articulated and I went, that's it. It's like the
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thing that you kind of know on some level, but you can't quite articulate. Andy, you nailed it.
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This beginner's soul. So not this beginner's mindset, because in the work that I do, you know,
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you bring people into a room and, okay, let's pretend we don't know anything and that the
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performativeness that some of those workshops can be and kind of articulating that the intentionality,
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like the if you're really going to do it and you know, it does, it's not just let's just pretend
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we have a beginner's mindset and carry on. And I think that's that's the difference, right? And
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when I heard you articulated in that way, I thought, that's it. Like, that's the thing.
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That's the thing that's often missing. And that's the thing that I think I need to get better in
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terms of fostering, like really understanding that and really helping people try to get as close to
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that spot as they're able to get. This is all like, I mean, I'm hearing this, I think, wow,
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I can't believe this, that is what you got out of it. Because again, creating it in the void,
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you put it out there, you don't know. But one thing I'll say about creativity that I've learned,
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the process, the games, the this, the that, which is important. But sometimes, in the world,
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throw something at you that you got to get creative with. I'll give you the perfect example,
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but I have to teach this course again in three weeks. And the difference between last year and
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this year has been generative AI. So I have to talk about being creative, I have to come up with
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new ways for either new assignments or new ways to do the old assignments because of the fact
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that it can just, I just can't let it be done by generative AI either with words or pictures.
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So I'll just give you an example. And geez, I don't know how many students will listen to this,
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probably none, but anyway. But the final assignment in the class, which is worth a
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big chunk of remarks, was I asked the students to do a biography of themselves, I guess,
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an autobiography of their lives, but not now, but at the age of 60 or something, looking back.
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It had to be, it asked to be written as an illustrative children's book, illustrated
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children's book. So, you know, a couple years ago, that's tough. And, you know, last year,
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it's tough, although people were sore, they were, you know, they were, you know,
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bored of getting into the generative AI, you know, with Dali, with pictures and all that.
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But now some have just go to Chachi BT and say, just write a story, you know, based, you know,
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in the way of a children's book. So I'm saying, okay, how am I going to get around that? I was
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well, I want to see it, you know, handwritten and with pictures hand drawn. Maybe that's the,
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I don't know the answer yet, but the point is, I got to get creative myself and go right back
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into this to be able to teach creativity. If you get my gist. So it's kind of a, you know,
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circular, you know, yin yang paradox, call it what you want, but I have to get creative
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with teaching creativity because not because of being curious or saying, I really want to
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do something different. It's just, it's a necessity now and you have to answer it creatively. So
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sometimes the world hands it to you on a platter.
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So yeah, another sort of highlight that I just wanted to bring up and specifically point to you,
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Becca, was there's another one that's for episode seven, the magic word, which was the magic word
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business, which is love, obviously. And no matter what the product or service, if someone loves it,
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they'll do your marketing work for you. Forget the concept of word of mouth marketing, the stronger,
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more effective term is word of heart marketing. So what do you think about that as a concept?
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And is that something that you would ever consider applying to your sort of field of work?
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Oh, absolutely. I mean, end of the day, we're all human beings and therefore, it's love that makes
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the world go round. Right. It's connecting with other people and feeling that is what inspires
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us as human beings. But I think particularly in the industry that I work in, where you have a
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product which has been nurtured and cared for and loved by people that are passionate that invest
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their hearts and minds into it every single day. And it's much more than creating a thing. It's not
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just manufacturing a product. They are crafting something. It's an art for them. So they pour
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their hearts and souls into it. And that is, you can taste it when you drink the whiskey. You can
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taste that level of care and nurturing. And at the end of the day, if you trust in putting everything
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into what you're creating and what you're giving out, and you put your best into that, you're going
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to get the best results and it will be felt by the people that are buying it, consuming it, receiving
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the communication around it. They will feel that. They'll understand that. So yes, I couldn't agree
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more. It's ultimately what makes things genuine and good and what's buying into. Whether you be
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a human being and you're trying to decide if you want to be friends with somebody or if you're
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buying into a brand that resonates with you or not. That's exactly the answer I wanted. But no,
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Andrew, what do you think of that? How do you think of that? Well, I got to say, I'm going to
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throw it to Anna, Rebecca, and Bronwyn about this. But you talk about love. One of the things I said
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was that if people love what you do, they'll do your marketing for you. And I was with that,
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I did this interview with Jeffrey Seller in the middle of doing the podcast during the weeks.
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And Jeffrey Seller is the guy who produced Rent, Avenue Q, and Hamilton. So he's done pretty well
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in life and pretty smart guy. And he said the, I don't know if I used this, I don't think I did,
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but he said the only four words that matter in theatrical marketing, everything else is trade,
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everything else is throwing away money. He says the only words that are important are you've
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got to see it. That's it. You've got to see it. And he said that's the only thing you're gunning for.
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That is basically, you know, when you love something enough to tell others about it,
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you've really locked in. So that's what I wanted to do is turn this around, if I may, and say, look,
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you guys obviously, I mean, I'm really truly touched by the fact that you listened to this.
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I hope you'll listen to all of them, most of them, whatever. But you obviously, I mean, again,
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I'm saying this trying to be very, very humble about it. You obviously liked it enough to come
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on this podcast today. So I want to ask you if this love thing worked. And if so, did you tell
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others about it? And be really honest, I don't care. I mean, it's over and I got paid. So,
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but be really honest, did you tell others about it and what did you say? That's all I want to know.
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And maybe you didn't tell it. So I want to know if the love thing worked.
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So India totally works. On the weekend, I found two co-conspirator genies and sent them the genie
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episode and said, if you have 10 or 15 minutes, listen to this. If you have longer, listen to it.
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And thank you for being a genie for me. And got these very lovely messages back saying,
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a thanks for thinking of me. And, and they said, oh, this is so great. I'm like, right. And so I
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think that love goes both ways. Like when I was listening to Rebecca, it's like, it needs to be
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authentic and it needs to be real. Right. And otherwise it's, it's, it just falls short. But
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I think for those particular people, like I knew that they'd love that idea. And again, an articulation
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of kind of what it is that they're doing in a way that perhaps they haven't thought about before.
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Oh, cool. That's good. Well, thank you. Yeah. I, I, I agree. It's interesting actually
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timing wise because we had a culture, internal culture conversation last week, and we were
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talking about the things that are important to us all. And what I find interesting with the word
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love is that some people sometimes can feel uncomfortable about using it for lots of reasons,
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but there it's important that we can use it as a word that is correct and genuine and has the
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intention that, that we mean. And it, it, there was a timing piece last week where we have this
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conversation. And one of the things that we were saying is what's, what are one of the behaviors
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that we really want. And it's to be loving. So to be loving to each other as colleagues and employees
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and how we work together and also what that means and how it translates to the end delivery that we
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give people and that we provide through our service and our product. And yeah, I think that
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the timing for listening was useful for me because it prompted some of that conversation and it
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prompted a conversation where people in the room thought about something differently and they went
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actually, yeah, that is the right word as opposed to it being kind or well-intended. Loving is
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actually a better word. It means more. So did you, so that said, did you, did you ever share it with
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anybody and what did you say? That's, did you ever share the podcast? I'm listening to this thing,
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you got to listen to it or hear something or maybe? I shared it by spreading the joy about it.
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Okay. I'm not great at forwarding links, but I tell people about stuff. Okay, that's cool. All right.
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Bronwyn? Yeah, so we have on Monday mornings, we have basically like a, like a,
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bring and share a potluck for ideas. So we actually used to have a newsletter that we called
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Train Snack Suit since growing up and now we call it Train Insights to appeal to a corporate
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audience. But the point is that every Monday we basically bring and share tasty ideas to share
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with our small little team. And I was definitely on the table talking about like the whole,
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anything to do with creativity is something we're always looking at and anything that can inspire
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thought in a different way. And what I shared about it is how well-prepared this particular
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piece of content was, because that's another sort of challenge that I've been trying to do with my
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team about how you can, you don't have to improvise all the time. I know, I know we all smart people
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and we can all sort of just wing it, which we're quite famous for in our sort of industry,
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but I did appreciate how much all thought had went into your work. And I thought it was a very good
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example of someone that has chosen every word to be delicious and to roll with it. I mean,
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you basically wrote essays there. It wasn't just, it was, it was, you could tell every word would be
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chosen. I thought it was a great example to show that polishing can, can end up with much better
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content as opposed to the perhaps more reactive stuff we've been putting out. There's more of an
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indictments on my team, but that's, that's how I share it. Indictments are good. I like that.
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That's very Trumpy.
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right.
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Very Donald Trumpian. Very Donald Trumpian with indictments. I feel I have a kind of spirit.
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So I was going to turn it over to the panel. I know that you guys have a sort of question, so I was
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going to ask for a question each, if you have one. So starting from left to right on my screen,
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Bronwyn, would you be okay to volunteer a question for Andy, if you had one for the series?
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Yeah, I've got to start with the probably the most basic question of all. It's like, why did you decide to do
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this? What was, what was the one thing you wanted? Cause you covered a lot of ground in like, what is it,
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nine, 10 episodes. Like what, why, why did you decide to commit your obviously extensive energy that has
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taken you on various different projects across various different industries? Why were you passionate
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enough to apply your considerable energy to this, this cause?
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Okay. Thank you. I will, well, it's, it's quite easy. I've been asked to do podcasts before and people say, well,
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you should do it. And, but I never wanted to do it because I find the, the format boring. It's not always,
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sometimes there are people will, there's projects where people do, you know, they'll tell stories and
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they'll, it's well researched, you know, and they've been made at the Netflix specials and all, but by and
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large, particularly the business ones, their interviews and I found them dull. I found them dull. And every
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time I did one and I listened to it and them saying, who in their right mind would listen to this? Who in
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their right mind would listen to this, you know, for an hour of just two people rambling. And yes, sometimes,
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but yeah, I'd say you have to plow through so much crap to get the nugget of, of, of, of, of intelligence
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and the nugget of insight. I hate, I told, even when I was on, I said, this is ridiculous because I don't
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want to, if I don't want to listen to myself, who's going to listen to me? So when Ian came to me, Ian
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Montgomery came to me and he said, we want you to do a podcast and for label sessions. And you know,
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it based on the course that I was teaching, you know, and now going into its third year, I said,
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okay, but it, but here's the, here are the ground rules. I'll do it only if there are no interviews.
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I'll do it if we could have sound effects and music and have fun with it. Because I, you know, I wrote
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a book and, and I made sure that I was in the book once. I remember I wrote books. I made sure that
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there has to be visuals and typeface has to be explosive and color. And all of my books were
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unfortunately not in color, but there was stuff in it because when people are flipping through it at
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the bookstore, they don't just want to see reams of type. They wanted to see, see what in my mind
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they'd say, oh, wow, this is kind of cool. Maybe I, you know, we'll lead them in sort of like they're
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fishy. So that was to me, those, those lures that would hook you were the sound effects and the
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music and the fact I said, uh, I got to keep them short, keep them short because you know, I don't
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want people to have to listen to this, you know, it's an hour podcast. Let me try to make it over
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15 minutes. And so I'll listen to it at 4x timing, you know, because you lose it. As you said, I'm
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really appreciative of that. We worked really hard to get every word, to get the iterations,
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to get the modulations of voice, just because that's what I thought would be entertaining. So
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that's why I did it. I did it because it was a challenge and I don't want to back away from
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the challenge, but it was a challenge to say, I have to not fit the format. I have to create,
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I don't want to say a new format because I'm sure there's a podcast out there that are 15 minutes
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and then pops and dings and whistles and boings, but that's the only way I did this. And that's
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what made it worth it because I said, okay, let's take this to the next level. I've done the course
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for a couple of years already. Let's take this to the next level and see where it could be done. So
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that's the answer to that. That's what forced me. That makes you both sad and slightly guilty,
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but also quite validated at the same time, because I do have one of those annoying quad
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classes, just interviews, right? But we're turning it into a book now and I absolutely
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insisted on working with a caricature artist who's quite well-known in our part of the world to
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bring the characters to life. But that same reason that you said, books with just plain
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reams of text can be very, very boring. I don't appreciate that. And again, I will say,
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I really appreciate it the way every word had been chosen. It's not quite prose, not quite poetry,
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especially if you read the transcript, there's nothing quite like that out there. It's a new
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art form you're creating there. Well, thank you. Wow. Okay. I'll take that. I'll take that.
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Well, like spoken word podcast. It's not quite a rap that it could be. It's music. You just need
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to see more sound effects. How much time do you got? Yeah. Well, that's great. Thank you.
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That's fantastic. Well, Rebecca, how about you? I have two questions.
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My last one. Which one is the most important? Creativity, curiosity, or guts and why?
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Oh my God. That's like saying, which of your children do you like best?
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They work in tandem. I don't want to say in tandem because they work in conjunction with each other.
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And if you're curious and do nothing with it, then it's lost. If you're creative and I always,
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yeah, I have this debate with artists where I say to me, art becomes art when it comes out of the
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basement and it's a relationship between the viewer and the work of art. Artists have said,
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no, it's not the point. The art happens in the studio where I or we create it. And I always said,
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no, that could be, but I think that's more, and again, this is not said to be nasty. It's just,
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I think that's more self-play. It's more masturbation than it is performers or art
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because of the fact it's a solo effort. So creativity without an audience, well, somebody
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to bring it to is lost. And guts, well, you have to, nobody likes a bore. And maybe people do.
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I don't like bores. People are gutsy with nothing behind it. They're just loud.
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But the loud does not equal guts. Loud is loud. There's a very big difference between loud and
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guts. So I think they have to work together. So what's important is that they do work together
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and it doesn't have to be equal. It doesn't have to be 33, the third, 33, the third, 33, the third,
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but they do have to work in conjunction with each other for proper, I guess, outcome. So
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no, nothing's more important. It's just, they would be impotent without each other, I guess,
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is the best way. So yeah, oh man, well, those are toys I play with perhaps a little bit too often,
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but anyway. So what was the second question? You can ask the second question. It doesn't matter.
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They're free. It was just, what was your favorite? What was your favorite episode and why? What was
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the one you enjoyed the most? I enjoyed all of them. There were a couple of them. We can laugh at
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George now, but oh my God, there were certain ones that were hard to get through. We had to change
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words in the middle because there were certain words that would throw me off. I can't believe it.
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I can't get that goddamn word. And sometimes there were the very simple words. There were
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not some of the more heady, multi-syllabic words, he says multi-syllabically. But anyway, I really
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liked the love episode. That was one of my favorites because of the fact that it sort of
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exuded love. I really liked the one about neopne, which is a very tough word, the childlike element.
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I found that resonated. I also liked the one about spirit animals. I thought that was kind of fun
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because I got to mention my granddaughter and that was kind of fun too. Irrelatable software.
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But yeah, so those were my fave. But in the end, I liked them all. I listened to them all.
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And those are the ones that really popped in my mind. Thank you. Cool. Thank you.
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I just really, I so enjoyed it and it kind of left me inspired. So thank you. And my frustration
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always and the reason for inspo always is trying to get other folks who perhaps don't see this vision
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or don't see the world quite the same way to act with some kind of urgency. So I often feel like
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there are people that can kind of see around corners and see the future. And I say to sometimes
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people, I feel like the crazy lady yelling at the train going down the tracks, like it's going,
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it's going. And everyone's like, it's fine. It's fine. So you've had a storied career. So
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you must have some wisdom on how to create some of that urgency so that we can bottle some of the
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magic of the genie and actually do the things as opposed to talking about the things. I guess the
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best urgency, um, prompter one could say is knowing that you're not alone. What I mean by you're not
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alone is I would say this all the time at, at just for laughs. And we just say that airborne too,
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but we called it the two kids in the basement theory and two kids in the basement theory are
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while you are preparing and doing this, sending this up and getting ready, there are two kids in
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the basement with a plan that will destroy your business. Not that they, they're, they're, you
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know, uh, mean or that they, they, they have the intention to do it. It's just as they're going to
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come up with something that is going to destroy your business. So before they do it, you'll get
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out there and this has happened so often. And there were so many examples and one I, I, I,
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I didn't use in the podcast because we just were over abundant with examples of the time
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where it would, uh, was, um, Michael Eisner and tops and, uh, I don't think Bronwyn and Rebecca,
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this, this may be like culturally off kilter, but I'll explain it anyway. Tops were the licensees,
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um, of, uh, baseball cards. They do a hockey car, like, you know, collecting cards and that
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actually I have a couple here on my shelves, but, um, okay. So, so tops have for years and years and
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years were the, you know, when they used to open it up with bubble gum inside, they were the ones,
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purveyors and the maestros and the, the top slate of baseball cards. I mean, you know, tops were the
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gold standard and Michael Eisner bought tops and he said, oh, this is great. We, we, you know,
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we're going to do this. Here's the plans with the company and we're going to do this. We're going to
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go digital and, you know, and then what happens is before we, as he makes this announcement,
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we're going to go public. Hello person in Rebecca's background. Um, so I'm going to do this. It'll be
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edited really nicely. So Michael Eisner bought tops with all the great intentions in the world.
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And while he's doing it, and he announces it, he bought it. This is what we're going to do.
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Um, what's the name of that? That fanatics is a company that does, um, merchandising and, and
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sports betting now in the States, but they have all the contracts to do t-shirts and all the
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sports merchandise. They go in and they make a secret deal with tops. Um, with circuit, a secret
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deal with major league baseball that they will get the rights for baseball cards. They've never done
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baseball cards, but they put in so much money. They leverage all their other, um, relationships
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for apparel and everything else that they just swooped the license away from tops. So Eisner
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bought this company that had its major license just taken the rug pulled right under his feet.
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So that go, that's the urgency element because there's somebody out there unbeknownst to you,
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uh, maybe again, not being nasty or negative in their, their intention perhaps with fanatics,
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it's a little bit different, but there's somebody out there that you don't know what they're doing.
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So if that doesn't push you to get things done and to get things done faster, I don't know what
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will because you're nobody in the world, no one gives a rat's ass about your plans and about your
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timing. Oh, it will be released on Friday because nothing's going to happen on Tuesday, Wednesday
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or Thursday. And suddenly Wednesday comes like, Oh God, somebody released something that kills my
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Friday and now it's hurry, hurry, hurry because somebody out there as the tools to kill you.
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And again, not in the malicious way, but just that's to make sure the beast. So that, if that
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doesn't make you get off and do things faster, I don't know what will. I love it. Thank you.
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You can tell that this is, uh, you know, experience with somebody who's been burned before, but anyway,
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you're touching on something that's really important for the creative industry,
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if anyone that considers themselves a creative, absolutely in the sort of future of work features
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discourse that I'm involved with and a lot of this sort of the consulting that we do. So a lot of
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people really scared about copyright law and the future, right? And like what's happening with
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digital replicability of content and like that ship has sailed, like the whole web two era was
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about essentially information wanting to be free. And now we're trying to sort of put borders back
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in place, but that car already mostly bolted. The conversations really got a shift to instead of
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focusing and worrying about your copyrights and holding onto your past. You have to be more
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concerned about creating because that's where all new value is going to come from in a world that
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is more digitized. Anything that can be digitized can be replicated and if it can be replicated,
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it can be done by someone else, by another competitor. And the only way to stay ahead of
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that curve, the only way to stay ahead of the API curve or the AI curve, whatever curve you're
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looking at is to keep on creating and shipping. You've got to look forward. You can't look back.
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And then creativity becomes that killer app because the only thing that has value, something's not
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already in the system. It can't be mirrored and distorted through the fun house mirrors,
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the art technology, that all the future is in new things, new ideas, new creativity,
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which should be so empowering actually for the creative plus because the managerial plus is the
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one that therefore that they're the ones standing with like, you know, no pants on as the tide goes
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out. You really start to think about it. So I don't know all these conversations that sound
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like they're quite negative. When you start to unpack them, you actually see the opportunity and
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opportunities to keep moving, keep shipping, keep working, keep creating. Could not agree, could not
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agree more. And you know what? That's why, Bronwyn, that's why people say, well, why'd you stop at 13
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episodes? A, because that's all the information I had. I mean, it's based on the class. And B,
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something I learned with British television many years ago. And I remember in the United States,
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a series was like 23 episodes long. And, you know, and I remember that back in the days when
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people watched real terrestrial television, they were long and they were, you know, a series.
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They didn't talk about series. It was just, it ran the first year, they ran the second year,
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the eighth year, the tenth year. And I remember when I went to Great Britain, the series was
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six episodes and was over. And sometimes, you know, they did it again. Like I remember
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back in the day of Blackadder, Rowan Atkinson. And they did a series and the next series was
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completely different. It's the same character, but it was completely different. It was not,
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okay, let's just keep going on. And not end well, right? I mean, like you have to know when to end
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well. Yes, you have to know when to end well and start again with something. Speaking of ending well,
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ending well, we're just about up for time. So I just had one last question to ask you, Andy. Have
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you spoken to any of the students who went through the course originally and what do you think they've
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kept in mind from the course? And do you think it'll have a similar impact to the podcast
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listeners as well? One of my students just got a job at a major consultancy in Toronto and he
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posted on LinkedIn and everyone's saying, wow, congratulations. Guy's name is Shariar. Hopefully
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he's listening to this. And Shariar posted this and I sent him, I could look it up now, but I'm
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not going to because of time, but I sent him a congratulatory message and I said to have a great
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time. I said, remember, even though you're in a consultancy, don't be boring. And he goes, yeah,
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I kind of learned that that's something I'm going to be sure to bring to the table.
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So I guess that's the point. One of the points was it doesn't matter where you are, this can be
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applied anywhere. It just, you know, you have to push a bit and you have to, and maybe if you've
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got pushback, there's some secret channel that you can do it. And if you can't do it in the office,
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find a way to do it in your personal life. But you cannot let the bastards get you down. And I
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think that's one of the things that they learned. So he realized, he says, okay, I won't be boring.
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I will not be boring despite the fact I'm in some conglomerate consultant. Amazing. Well,
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that's a great spot to wrap up that. So thank you so much guys for all your time. If you just want
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to say, oh my God, it's the end of an era. It's the end of an era. This is, this is the bonus
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episode. I think Andy, what can I say? Thank you for your service. I love it. Don't let the
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bastards get you down and making new humans not boring one person at a time. So hopefully
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we've inspired a few to not toe the line and color inside the lines. Hey guys, I thank you
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because these are not, you know, the days are, you know, these are not easy days. And the fact
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that the hearing that, you know, three people from all over the world are actually, have actually
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listened to this. I mean, I'm beside myself. You've made my month. You've made my August. Thank you.
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Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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This podcast is brought to you by Label Sessions, the global platform that connects you to the best
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advice from the most interesting people. Around the world, we work with brands to connect their
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00:41:49,120 --> 00:41:54,320
people to true leaders, just like the people you hear on this podcast for live sessions of advice,
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00:41:54,320 --> 00:41:59,760
mentorship, or sometimes to collaborate on ideas. To find out more, visit labelsessions.com
466
00:41:59,760 --> 00:42:19,520
and book in for a demo with our team.
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:07,500
This podcast is brought to you by Label Sessions, the global platform that connects you to the
2
00:00:07,500 --> 00:00:13,920
best advice from the most interesting people. In this exclusive bonus episode of the series,
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Andy is back alongside show producer Josh Nixon to host a panel of leaders. They go
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over the show's highlights, some of the questions on applying the lessons from the course to
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the businesses that they operate within, and a little bit of behind the scenes magic in
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putting CCNG together. So with that, over to Josh and company.
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Intro
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Hello, thank you so much for taking the time guys to sit down and chat to me. So this is a lovely
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little wrap up episode. I am Josh Nixon, I'm the content producer for Label Sessions and the editor
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of CCNG. I'm making my way in front of the camera for a change, which is nice. And I'm here with the
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one and only Andy Noly, doesn't need an introduction because obviously he's the head and star of the
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show, but he's the Just for Laughs co-founder and the one and only CCNG creator and ambassador in
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following your gut. I'm here also with the leader of Transfabrace for Change responsible for the
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strategic global experience design, education at Sunlife and Afote. The foresight lead and trend
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analyst of Flux Trends and speaker and author of The Future Starts Now, Brawler Williams. And also
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the chief marketing experience officer for the artisanal spirits company, Rebecca Hamilton. So
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thank you so much for joining. Hello everybody. And I just want to make sure you know that that
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was actually Josh's speed of talking. Your podcast speed is not on two or three X at this point in
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time. It was actually Josh's normal talking speed. So there we go. So we'll get started with Andy.
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Yes. How do you feel with the podcast now it's wrapped? Has the genie had any sightings yet?
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No, none whatsoever. And believe me, I am out there rubbing everything, you know, and getting
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in trouble for it. So I'm looking for lamps, but I'm doing like cars and parking meters,
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fire hydrants, small dogs. And so far the genie has not appeared, but I will never give up hope.
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But the other thing that I've seen is that people have been reaching out, which I find amazing,
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people actually been listening to, because when you record a podcast, you're basically in the
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void. And then, you know, when you find out people are listening to it, it's like, wow,
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you actually listen to this stuff. I'm so impressed. So thank you. But no, no genie sightings yet,
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despite the fact that my admiration and my gratitude and my rubbing.
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All right. That answer worked. Okay. I have to retake that one. Josh, let's go.
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Keep going.
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No, no, no. We're doing this live. We're doing this live. So first question for the panel,
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Anna, we'll start with you if this is okay. With a name like Creativity Curiosity and Guts,
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what do you feel is, which one of those three do you feel like is most missing in business culture,
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starting with you, obviously being a patient or candidate?
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Guts. Man, oh man, we sometimes lack guts. I mean, I think that there's lots of creativity,
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but the kind of actioning creativity or being comfortable with taking risks is such a Canadian,
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we are very good at inventing things. We're very difficult about scaling it, taking credit for it.
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So the guts to kind of move forward and not live in kind of this monopolistic inertia,
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there's so much creativity out there. We just got to harness it.
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I just learned a new term, monopolistic inertia. That's the name of the next podcast,
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ladies and gentlemen, monopolistic inertia. Wow. The t-shirts are going to be great.
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The merch lines could be fantastic. But so Rebecca, how do you feel about it? Which one
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of those three do you feel like is missing? Do you agree with Anna or?
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Oh, absolutely. I mean, I'm a very instinctive, intuitive person, very empathetic. So I go on my
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gut all the time, you know, very instinctive in the way I operate. And I think it's so important
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that we understand how to harness that and understand that and interpret that and use it,
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but also feel brave about doing it. I couldn't agree more with what you've just said, you know,
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having the guts to use our guts basically in our decision making is so important and how we create
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and foster culture that allows that to breathe basically and to be as equal in the debate around
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the table as numbers, facts. Yeah. I couldn't agree more.
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Awesome. Well, Bronwyn, I know that you might be inclined to agree, but obviously as a futurist,
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how do you feel about the curiosity aspect of things? I know in one of the episodes,
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the myth of change is all about how, you know, one of the clever little quotes I picked up here is,
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everybody loves change as long as someone else does it first. I think this is obviously quite a
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self preserving factor, trying not to be too curious. And I think it depends on where you're
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looking in an organization or in a business. So what you often tend to find is that the founder,
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the guy that goes out there and takes the risk is not lacking on guts or on creativity. But,
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you know, when you get to that curiosity factor, that becomes a problem when you start bringing
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other people into your team and everyone wants to think that they've kind of got their own
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agenda or their own role, their own domain. And it becomes very, very scary to be curious.
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I definitely encounter this in work that I do with organizations all the time,
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where things don't happen or organizations seem to lose their nerve when it's not actually losing
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their nerve. It's actually very big incentives with people who are not the direct shareholders
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or the entrepreneurs or the leaders or the visionaries behind the business.
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Because there's a lot of incentive to stay where you are. I mean, curiosity leads to more work and
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not necessarily to more pay. And that's something you have to grapple with if you are a curious,
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gutsy leader, right? And not everybody has got the same agenda that you have. And that's the
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constant challenge. That's the constant challenge trying to find a balance between those sort of
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explorers and the farmers within your organization. But I would say that there's a lot of willful
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and curiosity in the world at the moment. What do you think the magic is to flexing
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and training the curiosity muscle? Because that's something that I'm so interested in,
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in terms of how we train ourselves to constantly be curious and test our brains. What do you think
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the sweet spot is? Like, what is the magic trick to be an athlete from a curiosity muscle point of
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view? You know what one of them I think is, Rebecca, is humility. So I think in big companies kind of
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saying, we're big, so we must be the best. And because we're big, we're doing things right,
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although true, is such a curiosity killer. Because it's like, well, why it's fine. Like,
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what we're doing is fine. And I just think sometimes the humility of, well, what we're doing
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may have is working, but there could be more. Like, we can be both proud of what we've accomplished,
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but still be curious and have a desire for more. Yeah, it's more fun too. But I always come back
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to the fact that you kind of got to incentivize that. If you do want to have a curious team,
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you've got to incentivize curiosity. And that comes down to how you manage people, right? In
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terms of managing what gets measured, gets managed, gets manipulated. And if you're measuring people
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on quarterly targets, of course you're going to get people to be willfully uncurious, because
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being curious will only complicate those numbers and complicate those incentives. I don't know,
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I'm speaking generally about small things. Like, what do you value? What do you praise?
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And you get more of what you pay attention to and what you pay, quite frankly.
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I have to balance this with two arguments. One is, I love the curiosity element. And sometimes I
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find myself lazily accepting things. Who's binging whilst I talk? So I find myself lazily
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accepting things. And I have a friend who I do a lot of work with and we're working on a project
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together. I'm always amazed that he'll question everything. When someone will, I'll say, oh,
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okay, well, that's the way it is. And someone's brought this up. He'll question every little
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thing. And I'm saying, wow, maybe it's extreme, but that's the real curiosity element at its finest.
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But on the other hand, I just read a book yesterday called Obvious Atoms. And it's a book written in
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1916. I don't know if you guys have ever heard of it, but it's apparently the... David Ogilvy said
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that he would do, Ogilvy made an advertising agency, legendary, and he said he would get his
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staff to read this book every year. It's 40 pages. It goes by in 20 minutes. But the point of the
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book is sometimes seeing the obvious. And sometimes you have to be curious to see the obvious. And
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it's really a brilliant small book about how sometimes the answers are there in plain sight.
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And one of the things that... Hey, because I think I'll mention it. I think it may have been Anna
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perhaps talked about companies are so big. They said, we must be good at this. Companies realize,
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say, well, you know what? As a consultant or as a company, we have to find the extensive, expensive
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solution rather than the real simple one that may be right in front of our eyes. So the curiosity
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does not necessarily mean, oh, let's look for other than crazy. It just means like finding the
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right thing and looking for it. And sometimes it's right there. Oh, there it is. A quote that came
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to mind that relates quite a lot to what you're just talking about there is the one from episode
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four, life is a black box. You can go through life passively or just let things happen to you,
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or you can make things happen through a lust for learning and what you can discover next.
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Next, like curiosity is a not frivolous at something to manifest your destiny.
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Believe me. Look at us here. Josh, I'm sorry to do this, but can I be curious for a second? I was
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going to wait till the end, but I don't know when this is going to end. So I might as well ask this
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now. But you guys all listen to the podcast and we're talking about sound effects and all that.
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Like one of the things that I tried to do off the top of this, my initial conversation with
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Josh and particularly with Ian and Nick was I didn't want to do like the standard podcast
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with interviews. I really wanted sound effects and silliness and music to play a part of it,
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play a part in it. So what's your take on that? I was going to get your take on what you thought
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just as someone who tried to do something a little bit different with this. And maybe it wasn't that
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different. You will let me know. No, I loved it. It sounded so conversational. Like it sounded real.
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It sounded very well produced, but not over produced if you know what I mean. Like there was
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a little bit of naturalness and just humanity. Okay, cool. I appreciated the sense of humor.
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I was clearly not someone who took themselves too seriously, which is a great starting point.
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I think that in my role as a contemporary court jester, I've learned very quickly,
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you can't take yourself seriously. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. It's very genuine, authentic, straightforward.
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Okay, cool. Straightforward talking. So it didn't bother you the like the the
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the the the boings and the explosions and the sound. Okay. I think it's the brain thinking,
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right? Like, got to keep the brain on its toes, throwing some random stuff just to keep it going.
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Well, maybe it was random. Was it Josh, we planned that to the tee. But anyway,
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it was all in the script. And that's what I was going to ask next. I was going to go to highlights,
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but I was for talking about them. Do you have a particular sound effect that you remember that
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sort of tickled you? Me or them? All, anybody. There's some sort of cartoon boings that
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were fine. They were pretty cool. Okay. Batman. I remember those cartoon calling vibe. Okay.
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Anyway, okay, mine, we use the the kaching and the explosion a number of times.
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And we had to go, Josh, Josh, it doesn't sound like an explosion. It has to be sound like a
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nuclear explosion, you know, and that's something loud. It can sound like you know, it's what we
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had to get to play with that one. Cut to me looking through like 5060 different explosive
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sound effects just to get the right one. You don't want to sound like you're being
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vaporized. You do want to sound like there's a big explosion. Exactly.
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I need a pair of those flare audio earplugs. Those have become like the I think the mascot of
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this this podcast. Anyway, sorry, I sort of took us off kilter.
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But I'm just happy to go where for the guests to go. And it's quite part of the fun. Yes,
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it is. And so what I was going to ask is, Roman, was there a personal sort of highlight that sort
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of comes to mind off the top your head and it's not putting you on the spot? But no,
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no, that was all good. I like the the failure is always an option. I do like to speak about these
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things quite a lot myself. So yeah, it's kind of part of the fun. Like I know, I know it sounds
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probably quite terrible to talk about. But when it comes to life in general and getting up every
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day, you know, there's always exiting is always an option. But that's kind of what makes the choice
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to stay in the game, stay getting up every day just so much so much better. Like the fact that
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there is risk and that nothing is guaranteed. I think that's quite exciting. But a depressing
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floral for me. So anyway, I enjoyed that. It's a lot. Rebecca, did you have a personal highlight?
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I think anything around what creative is and how we foster it, you know, ultimately,
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what's the creative process? Does process kill creativity? Therefore, how do you crack
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creativity? Anything that talks around that I'm always going to be fascinated in because ultimately
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it's up to all of us to just be conscious and open to creativity all the time and look for it
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and be inspired by it. So yeah, I think for me, that's the theme that obviously has been
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running through many of the podcasts that you've been doing. But that's that's the bit for me
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that I've always been most interested in talking about. It inspires me, but also it interests me
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in terms of how we make the world a better place ultimately by being creative.
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Amazing. And Anna?
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I think the concept that you kind of parsed and articulated and I went, that's it. It's like the
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thing that you kind of know on some level, but you can't quite articulate. Andy, you nailed it.
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This beginner's soul. So not this beginner's mindset, because in the work that I do, you know,
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you bring people into a room and, okay, let's pretend we don't know anything and that the
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performativeness that some of those workshops can be and kind of articulating that the intentionality,
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like the if you're really going to do it and you know, it does, it's not just let's just pretend
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we have a beginner's mindset and carry on. And I think that's that's the difference, right? And
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when I heard you articulated in that way, I thought, that's it. Like, that's the thing.
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That's the thing that's often missing. And that's the thing that I think I need to get better in
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terms of fostering, like really understanding that and really helping people try to get as close to
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that spot as they're able to get. This is all like, I mean, I'm hearing this, I think, wow,
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I can't believe this, that is what you got out of it. Because again, creating it in the void,
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you put it out there, you don't know. But one thing I'll say about creativity that I've learned,
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the process, the games, the this, the that, which is important. But sometimes, in the world,
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throw something at you that you got to get creative with. I'll give you the perfect example,
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but I have to teach this course again in three weeks. And the difference between last year and
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this year has been generative AI. So I have to talk about being creative, I have to come up with
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new ways for either new assignments or new ways to do the old assignments because of the fact
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that it can just, I just can't let it be done by generative AI either with words or pictures.
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So I'll just give you an example. And geez, I don't know how many students will listen to this,
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probably none, but anyway. But the final assignment in the class, which is worth a
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big chunk of remarks, was I asked the students to do a biography of themselves, I guess,
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an autobiography of their lives, but not now, but at the age of 60 or something, looking back.
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It had to be, it asked to be written as an illustrative children's book, illustrated
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children's book. So, you know, a couple years ago, that's tough. And, you know, last year,
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it's tough, although people were sore, they were, you know, they were, you know,
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bored of getting into the generative AI, you know, with Dali, with pictures and all that.
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But now some have just go to Chachi BT and say, just write a story, you know, based, you know,
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in the way of a children's book. So I'm saying, okay, how am I going to get around that? I was
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well, I want to see it, you know, handwritten and with pictures hand drawn. Maybe that's the,
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I don't know the answer yet, but the point is, I got to get creative myself and go right back
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into this to be able to teach creativity. If you get my gist. So it's kind of a, you know,
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circular, you know, yin yang paradox, call it what you want, but I have to get creative
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with teaching creativity because not because of being curious or saying, I really want to
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do something different. It's just, it's a necessity now and you have to answer it creatively. So
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sometimes the world hands it to you on a platter.
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So yeah, another sort of highlight that I just wanted to bring up and specifically point to you,
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Becca, was there's another one that's for episode seven, the magic word, which was the magic word
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business, which is love, obviously. And no matter what the product or service, if someone loves it,
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they'll do your marketing work for you. Forget the concept of word of mouth marketing, the stronger,
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more effective term is word of heart marketing. So what do you think about that as a concept?
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And is that something that you would ever consider applying to your sort of field of work?
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Oh, absolutely. I mean, end of the day, we're all human beings and therefore, it's love that makes
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the world go round. Right. It's connecting with other people and feeling that is what inspires
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us as human beings. But I think particularly in the industry that I work in, where you have a
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product which has been nurtured and cared for and loved by people that are passionate that invest
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their hearts and minds into it every single day. And it's much more than creating a thing. It's not
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just manufacturing a product. They are crafting something. It's an art for them. So they pour
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their hearts and souls into it. And that is, you can taste it when you drink the whiskey. You can
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taste that level of care and nurturing. And at the end of the day, if you trust in putting everything
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into what you're creating and what you're giving out, and you put your best into that, you're going
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to get the best results and it will be felt by the people that are buying it, consuming it, receiving
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the communication around it. They will feel that. They'll understand that. So yes, I couldn't agree
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more. It's ultimately what makes things genuine and good and what's buying into. Whether you be
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a human being and you're trying to decide if you want to be friends with somebody or if you're
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buying into a brand that resonates with you or not. That's exactly the answer I wanted. But no,
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Andrew, what do you think of that? How do you think of that? Well, I got to say, I'm going to
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throw it to Anna, Rebecca, and Bronwyn about this. But you talk about love. One of the things I said
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was that if people love what you do, they'll do your marketing for you. And I was with that,
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I did this interview with Jeffrey Seller in the middle of doing the podcast during the weeks.
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And Jeffrey Seller is the guy who produced Rent, Avenue Q, and Hamilton. So he's done pretty well
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in life and pretty smart guy. And he said the, I don't know if I used this, I don't think I did,
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but he said the only four words that matter in theatrical marketing, everything else is trade,
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everything else is throwing away money. He says the only words that are important are you've
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got to see it. That's it. You've got to see it. And he said that's the only thing you're gunning for.
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That is basically, you know, when you love something enough to tell others about it,
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you've really locked in. So that's what I wanted to do is turn this around, if I may, and say, look,
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you guys obviously, I mean, I'm really truly touched by the fact that you listened to this.
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I hope you'll listen to all of them, most of them, whatever. But you obviously, I mean, again,
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I'm saying this trying to be very, very humble about it. You obviously liked it enough to come
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on this podcast today. So I want to ask you if this love thing worked. And if so, did you tell
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others about it? And be really honest, I don't care. I mean, it's over and I got paid. So,
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but be really honest, did you tell others about it and what did you say? That's all I want to know.
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And maybe you didn't tell it. So I want to know if the love thing worked.
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So India totally works. On the weekend, I found two co-conspirator genies and sent them the genie
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episode and said, if you have 10 or 15 minutes, listen to this. If you have longer, listen to it.
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And thank you for being a genie for me. And got these very lovely messages back saying,
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a thanks for thinking of me. And, and they said, oh, this is so great. I'm like, right. And so I
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think that love goes both ways. Like when I was listening to Rebecca, it's like, it needs to be
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authentic and it needs to be real. Right. And otherwise it's, it's, it just falls short. But
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I think for those particular people, like I knew that they'd love that idea. And again, an articulation
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of kind of what it is that they're doing in a way that perhaps they haven't thought about before.
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Oh, cool. That's good. Well, thank you. Yeah. I, I, I agree. It's interesting actually
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timing wise because we had a culture, internal culture conversation last week, and we were
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talking about the things that are important to us all. And what I find interesting with the word
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love is that some people sometimes can feel uncomfortable about using it for lots of reasons,
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but there it's important that we can use it as a word that is correct and genuine and has the
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intention that, that we mean. And it, it, there was a timing piece last week where we have this
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conversation. And one of the things that we were saying is what's, what are one of the behaviors
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that we really want. And it's to be loving. So to be loving to each other as colleagues and employees
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and how we work together and also what that means and how it translates to the end delivery that we
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give people and that we provide through our service and our product. And yeah, I think that
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the timing for listening was useful for me because it prompted some of that conversation and it
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prompted a conversation where people in the room thought about something differently and they went
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actually, yeah, that is the right word as opposed to it being kind or well-intended. Loving is
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actually a better word. It means more. So did you, so that said, did you, did you ever share it with
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anybody and what did you say? That's, did you ever share the podcast? I'm listening to this thing,
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you got to listen to it or hear something or maybe? I shared it by spreading the joy about it.
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Okay. I'm not great at forwarding links, but I tell people about stuff. Okay, that's cool. All right.
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Bronwyn? Yeah, so we have on Monday mornings, we have basically like a, like a,
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bring and share a potluck for ideas. So we actually used to have a newsletter that we called
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Train Snack Suit since growing up and now we call it Train Insights to appeal to a corporate
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audience. But the point is that every Monday we basically bring and share tasty ideas to share
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with our small little team. And I was definitely on the table talking about like the whole,
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anything to do with creativity is something we're always looking at and anything that can inspire
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thought in a different way. And what I shared about it is how well-prepared this particular
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piece of content was, because that's another sort of challenge that I've been trying to do with my
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team about how you can, you don't have to improvise all the time. I know, I know we all smart people
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and we can all sort of just wing it, which we're quite famous for in our sort of industry,
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but I did appreciate how much all thought had went into your work. And I thought it was a very good
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example of someone that has chosen every word to be delicious and to roll with it. I mean,
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you basically wrote essays there. It wasn't just, it was, it was, you could tell every word would be
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chosen. I thought it was a great example to show that polishing can, can end up with much better
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content as opposed to the perhaps more reactive stuff we've been putting out. There's more of an
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indictments on my team, but that's, that's how I share it. Indictments are good. I like that.
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That's very Trumpy.
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right.
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Very Donald Trumpian. Very Donald Trumpian with indictments. I feel I have a kind of spirit.
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So I was going to turn it over to the panel. I know that you guys have a sort of question, so I was
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going to ask for a question each, if you have one. So starting from left to right on my screen,
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Bronwyn, would you be okay to volunteer a question for Andy, if you had one for the series?
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Yeah, I've got to start with the probably the most basic question of all. It's like, why did you decide to do
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this? What was, what was the one thing you wanted? Cause you covered a lot of ground in like, what is it,
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nine, 10 episodes. Like what, why, why did you decide to commit your obviously extensive energy that has
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taken you on various different projects across various different industries? Why were you passionate
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enough to apply your considerable energy to this, this cause?
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Okay. Thank you. I will, well, it's, it's quite easy. I've been asked to do podcasts before and people say, well,
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you should do it. And, but I never wanted to do it because I find the, the format boring. It's not always,
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sometimes there are people will, there's projects where people do, you know, they'll tell stories and
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they'll, it's well researched, you know, and they've been made at the Netflix specials and all, but by and
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large, particularly the business ones, their interviews and I found them dull. I found them dull. And every
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time I did one and I listened to it and them saying, who in their right mind would listen to this? Who in
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their right mind would listen to this, you know, for an hour of just two people rambling. And yes, sometimes,
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but yeah, I'd say you have to plow through so much crap to get the nugget of, of, of, of, of intelligence
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and the nugget of insight. I hate, I told, even when I was on, I said, this is ridiculous because I don't
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want to, if I don't want to listen to myself, who's going to listen to me? So when Ian came to me, Ian
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Montgomery came to me and he said, we want you to do a podcast and for label sessions. And you know,
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it based on the course that I was teaching, you know, and now going into its third year, I said,
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okay, but it, but here's the, here are the ground rules. I'll do it only if there are no interviews.
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I'll do it if we could have sound effects and music and have fun with it. Because I, you know, I wrote
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a book and, and I made sure that I was in the book once. I remember I wrote books. I made sure that
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there has to be visuals and typeface has to be explosive and color. And all of my books were
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unfortunately not in color, but there was stuff in it because when people are flipping through it at
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the bookstore, they don't just want to see reams of type. They wanted to see, see what in my mind
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they'd say, oh, wow, this is kind of cool. Maybe I, you know, we'll lead them in sort of like they're
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fishy. So that was to me, those, those lures that would hook you were the sound effects and the
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music and the fact I said, uh, I got to keep them short, keep them short because you know, I don't
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want people to have to listen to this, you know, it's an hour podcast. Let me try to make it over
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15 minutes. And so I'll listen to it at 4x timing, you know, because you lose it. As you said, I'm
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really appreciative of that. We worked really hard to get every word, to get the iterations,
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to get the modulations of voice, just because that's what I thought would be entertaining. So
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that's why I did it. I did it because it was a challenge and I don't want to back away from
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the challenge, but it was a challenge to say, I have to not fit the format. I have to create,
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I don't want to say a new format because I'm sure there's a podcast out there that are 15 minutes
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and then pops and dings and whistles and boings, but that's the only way I did this. And that's
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what made it worth it because I said, okay, let's take this to the next level. I've done the course
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for a couple of years already. Let's take this to the next level and see where it could be done. So
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that's the answer to that. That's what forced me. That makes you both sad and slightly guilty,
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but also quite validated at the same time, because I do have one of those annoying quad
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classes, just interviews, right? But we're turning it into a book now and I absolutely
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insisted on working with a caricature artist who's quite well-known in our part of the world to
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bring the characters to life. But that same reason that you said, books with just plain
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reams of text can be very, very boring. I don't appreciate that. And again, I will say,
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I really appreciate it the way every word had been chosen. It's not quite prose, not quite poetry,
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especially if you read the transcript, there's nothing quite like that out there. It's a new
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art form you're creating there. Well, thank you. Wow. Okay. I'll take that. I'll take that.
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Well, like spoken word podcast. It's not quite a rap that it could be. It's music. You just need
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to see more sound effects. How much time do you got? Yeah. Well, that's great. Thank you.
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That's fantastic. Well, Rebecca, how about you? I have two questions.
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My last one. Which one is the most important? Creativity, curiosity, or guts and why?
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Oh my God. That's like saying, which of your children do you like best?
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They work in tandem. I don't want to say in tandem because they work in conjunction with each other.
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And if you're curious and do nothing with it, then it's lost. If you're creative and I always,
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yeah, I have this debate with artists where I say to me, art becomes art when it comes out of the
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basement and it's a relationship between the viewer and the work of art. Artists have said,
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no, it's not the point. The art happens in the studio where I or we create it. And I always said,
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no, that could be, but I think that's more, and again, this is not said to be nasty. It's just,
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I think that's more self-play. It's more masturbation than it is performers or art
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because of the fact it's a solo effort. So creativity without an audience, well, somebody
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to bring it to is lost. And guts, well, you have to, nobody likes a bore. And maybe people do.
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I don't like bores. People are gutsy with nothing behind it. They're just loud.
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But the loud does not equal guts. Loud is loud. There's a very big difference between loud and
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guts. So I think they have to work together. So what's important is that they do work together
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and it doesn't have to be equal. It doesn't have to be 33, the third, 33, the third, 33, the third,
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but they do have to work in conjunction with each other for proper, I guess, outcome. So
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no, nothing's more important. It's just, they would be impotent without each other, I guess,
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is the best way. So yeah, oh man, well, those are toys I play with perhaps a little bit too often,
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but anyway. So what was the second question? You can ask the second question. It doesn't matter.
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They're free. It was just, what was your favorite? What was your favorite episode and why? What was
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the one you enjoyed the most? I enjoyed all of them. There were a couple of them. We can laugh at
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George now, but oh my God, there were certain ones that were hard to get through. We had to change
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words in the middle because there were certain words that would throw me off. I can't believe it.
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I can't get that goddamn word. And sometimes there were the very simple words. There were
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not some of the more heady, multi-syllabic words, he says multi-syllabically. But anyway, I really
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liked the love episode. That was one of my favorites because of the fact that it sort of
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exuded love. I really liked the one about neopne, which is a very tough word, the childlike element.
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I found that resonated. I also liked the one about spirit animals. I thought that was kind of fun
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because I got to mention my granddaughter and that was kind of fun too. Irrelatable software.
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But yeah, so those were my fave. But in the end, I liked them all. I listened to them all.
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And those are the ones that really popped in my mind. Thank you. Cool. Thank you.
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I just really, I so enjoyed it and it kind of left me inspired. So thank you. And my frustration
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always and the reason for inspo always is trying to get other folks who perhaps don't see this vision
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or don't see the world quite the same way to act with some kind of urgency. So I often feel like
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there are people that can kind of see around corners and see the future. And I say to sometimes
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people, I feel like the crazy lady yelling at the train going down the tracks, like it's going,
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it's going. And everyone's like, it's fine. It's fine. So you've had a storied career. So
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you must have some wisdom on how to create some of that urgency so that we can bottle some of the
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magic of the genie and actually do the things as opposed to talking about the things. I guess the
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best urgency, um, prompter one could say is knowing that you're not alone. What I mean by you're not
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alone is I would say this all the time at, at just for laughs. And we just say that airborne too,
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but we called it the two kids in the basement theory and two kids in the basement theory are
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while you are preparing and doing this, sending this up and getting ready, there are two kids in
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the basement with a plan that will destroy your business. Not that they, they're, they're, you
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know, uh, mean or that they, they, they have the intention to do it. It's just as they're going to
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come up with something that is going to destroy your business. So before they do it, you'll get
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out there and this has happened so often. And there were so many examples and one I, I, I,
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I didn't use in the podcast because we just were over abundant with examples of the time
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where it would, uh, was, um, Michael Eisner and tops and, uh, I don't think Bronwyn and Rebecca,
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this, this may be like culturally off kilter, but I'll explain it anyway. Tops were the licensees,
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um, of, uh, baseball cards. They do a hockey car, like, you know, collecting cards and that
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actually I have a couple here on my shelves, but, um, okay. So, so tops have for years and years and
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years were the, you know, when they used to open it up with bubble gum inside, they were the ones,
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purveyors and the maestros and the, the top slate of baseball cards. I mean, you know, tops were the
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gold standard and Michael Eisner bought tops and he said, oh, this is great. We, we, you know,
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we're going to do this. Here's the plans with the company and we're going to do this. We're going to
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go digital and, you know, and then what happens is before we, as he makes this announcement,
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we're going to go public. Hello person in Rebecca's background. Um, so I'm going to do this. It'll be
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edited really nicely. So Michael Eisner bought tops with all the great intentions in the world.
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And while he's doing it, and he announces it, he bought it. This is what we're going to do.
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Um, what's the name of that? That fanatics is a company that does, um, merchandising and, and
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sports betting now in the States, but they have all the contracts to do t-shirts and all the
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sports merchandise. They go in and they make a secret deal with tops. Um, with circuit, a secret
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deal with major league baseball that they will get the rights for baseball cards. They've never done
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baseball cards, but they put in so much money. They leverage all their other, um, relationships
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for apparel and everything else that they just swooped the license away from tops. So Eisner
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bought this company that had its major license just taken the rug pulled right under his feet.
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So that go, that's the urgency element because there's somebody out there unbeknownst to you,
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uh, maybe again, not being nasty or negative in their, their intention perhaps with fanatics,
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it's a little bit different, but there's somebody out there that you don't know what they're doing.
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So if that doesn't push you to get things done and to get things done faster, I don't know what
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will because you're nobody in the world, no one gives a rat's ass about your plans and about your
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timing. Oh, it will be released on Friday because nothing's going to happen on Tuesday, Wednesday
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or Thursday. And suddenly Wednesday comes like, Oh God, somebody released something that kills my
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Friday and now it's hurry, hurry, hurry because somebody out there as the tools to kill you.
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And again, not in the malicious way, but just that's to make sure the beast. So that, if that
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doesn't make you get off and do things faster, I don't know what will. I love it. Thank you.
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You can tell that this is, uh, you know, experience with somebody who's been burned before, but anyway,
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you're touching on something that's really important for the creative industry,
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if anyone that considers themselves a creative, absolutely in the sort of future of work features
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discourse that I'm involved with and a lot of this sort of the consulting that we do. So a lot of
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people really scared about copyright law and the future, right? And like what's happening with
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digital replicability of content and like that ship has sailed, like the whole web two era was
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about essentially information wanting to be free. And now we're trying to sort of put borders back
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in place, but that car already mostly bolted. The conversations really got a shift to instead of
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focusing and worrying about your copyrights and holding onto your past. You have to be more
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concerned about creating because that's where all new value is going to come from in a world that
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is more digitized. Anything that can be digitized can be replicated and if it can be replicated,
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it can be done by someone else, by another competitor. And the only way to stay ahead of
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that curve, the only way to stay ahead of the API curve or the AI curve, whatever curve you're
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looking at is to keep on creating and shipping. You've got to look forward. You can't look back.
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And then creativity becomes that killer app because the only thing that has value, something's not
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already in the system. It can't be mirrored and distorted through the fun house mirrors,
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the art technology, that all the future is in new things, new ideas, new creativity,
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which should be so empowering actually for the creative plus because the managerial plus is the
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one that therefore that they're the ones standing with like, you know, no pants on as the tide goes
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out. You really start to think about it. So I don't know all these conversations that sound
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like they're quite negative. When you start to unpack them, you actually see the opportunity and
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opportunities to keep moving, keep shipping, keep working, keep creating. Could not agree, could not
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agree more. And you know what? That's why, Bronwyn, that's why people say, well, why'd you stop at 13
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episodes? A, because that's all the information I had. I mean, it's based on the class. And B,
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something I learned with British television many years ago. And I remember in the United States,
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a series was like 23 episodes long. And, you know, and I remember that back in the days when
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people watched real terrestrial television, they were long and they were, you know, a series.
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They didn't talk about series. It was just, it ran the first year, they ran the second year,
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the eighth year, the tenth year. And I remember when I went to Great Britain, the series was
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six episodes and was over. And sometimes, you know, they did it again. Like I remember
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back in the day of Blackadder, Rowan Atkinson. And they did a series and the next series was
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completely different. It's the same character, but it was completely different. It was not,
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okay, let's just keep going on. And not end well, right? I mean, like you have to know when to end
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well. Yes, you have to know when to end well and start again with something. Speaking of ending well,
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ending well, we're just about up for time. So I just had one last question to ask you, Andy. Have
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you spoken to any of the students who went through the course originally and what do you think they've
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kept in mind from the course? And do you think it'll have a similar impact to the podcast
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listeners as well? One of my students just got a job at a major consultancy in Toronto and he
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posted on LinkedIn and everyone's saying, wow, congratulations. Guy's name is Shariar. Hopefully
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he's listening to this. And Shariar posted this and I sent him, I could look it up now, but I'm
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not going to because of time, but I sent him a congratulatory message and I said to have a great
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time. I said, remember, even though you're in a consultancy, don't be boring. And he goes, yeah,
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I kind of learned that that's something I'm going to be sure to bring to the table.
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So I guess that's the point. One of the points was it doesn't matter where you are, this can be
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applied anywhere. It just, you know, you have to push a bit and you have to, and maybe if you've
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got pushback, there's some secret channel that you can do it. And if you can't do it in the office,
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find a way to do it in your personal life. But you cannot let the bastards get you down. And I
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think that's one of the things that they learned. So he realized, he says, okay, I won't be boring.
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I will not be boring despite the fact I'm in some conglomerate consultant. Amazing. Well,
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that's a great spot to wrap up that. So thank you so much guys for all your time. If you just want
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to say, oh my God, it's the end of an era. It's the end of an era. This is, this is the bonus
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episode. I think Andy, what can I say? Thank you for your service. I love it. Don't let the
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bastards get you down and making new humans not boring one person at a time. So hopefully
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we've inspired a few to not toe the line and color inside the lines. Hey guys, I thank you
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because these are not, you know, the days are, you know, these are not easy days. And the fact
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that the hearing that, you know, three people from all over the world are actually, have actually
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listened to this. I mean, I'm beside myself. You've made my month. You've made my August. Thank you.
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Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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This podcast is brought to you by Label Sessions, the global platform that connects you to the best
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mentorship, or sometimes to collaborate on ideas. To find out more, visit labelsessions.com
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and book in for a demo with our team.
