As I often discuss with financial advisors, attorneys, insurance agents, bankers, realtors, accountants, digital marketers, M&A brokers, private equity bankers, and others that find business development, origination, and sales important, here’s how to be awesome! (Wow, long sentence!)
Participate in Scheduled Events and Meetings Regularly
Register at the beginning of the month for all events you plan on attending.
Own
I get that call all the time.
An owner, right before a big decision a purchase, a partner buyout, a lease, a loan. Business is good. Cash is tight. And then the question:
“I’m profitable so why am I always out of cash?”
Almost every time, the money is hiding in the same four places none of which they can
In my coaching practice, I regularly work with high-achieving professionals whose lives look, by any external measure, like success stories. Thriving businesses, strong marriages, financial stability. And yet, in session after session, I hear a different story underneath: chronic anger, low-grade resentment, and an inability to name the last time they felt genuine satisfaction in their work or their lives.
We’ve all heard the phrase “culture eats strategy for breakfast.” And over the past few years, we’ve also watched culture take a backseat amid geopolitical mayhem, socioeconomic upheaval, and a pervasive sense of fear and uncertainty that inevitably shapes how people show up in life, and of course, at work.
So, should a founder continue to prioritize building a healthy
Most founders and executive teams today are consumed by product, strategy, fundraising and of course how AI fits into the big picture. Meanwhile, culture falls into a different category – the stuff they assume everyone just “gets” (and if they don’t, well, perhaps we hired the wrong person…)
However – the reality is this. If you don’t articulate how you
Most leadership teams are not struggling because they lack effort.
They’re struggling because everything feels urgent.
New priorities arrive before existing ones are completed. Decisions are revisited. Attention shifts constantly. Over time, reacting becomes the default mode of operation.
At first, this can feel like momentum.
But eventually, leaders begin to notice something important:
Despite all the activity, meaningful progress
Most exclusive things can be bought. The price is the filter, and the filter is the product. Pay enough and you’re in.
The right room works on an inverted principle, and the inversion is the entire reason it works.
If money were the gate, the room would fill with people whose only shared quality is the ability to pay. That
I was on a call recently with a group of partners working through the buyout provision in their shareholder agreement.
Smart group. Good dynamic. Doing this early, which is exactly when it should happen.
And then this came up:
“In a buyout, we’ll each hire an appraiser.”
I hear some version of this all the time.
I’ve reviewed a lot
There’s a persistent belief that a bigger room is a better room. More people, more connections, more chance of the one introduction that matters.
This is true for some purposes and catastrophically false for others.
A large gathering is optimised for breadth. You meet many people briefly. You exchange context, you exchange cards, you find the handful worth following up