Warsha Joshi 00:00

And here we are, in part two of the best of 2021 show off The Dare to Scale podcast. The Part one was received so wonderfully. So, thank you very much for tuning in and joining us on this journey from where we started to where we are today.

Evan Le Clus 00:18

Absolutely and welcome. Yeah, it’s fun to record and absolutely wonderful to go. I can have that little trip down memory lane. I think we’d said in the first episode, oh, goodness me how embarrassing. You know, some of those early episodes were but you know what, that’s where we started and that was the excellence of the day and you know what, they’re actually great episodes, and we had so many good laughs and it’s just been such a wonderful journey.

Evan Le Clus 00:44

Hello, you were listening to The Dare to Scale Show with me, Evan

Warsha Joshi 00:49

And me Warsha. This show is about all things scaling, scaling your business, your journey and you.

Evan Le Clus 00:58

You’re here because you dare to dream, dead to dream big. So, sit back and enjoy the conversation, or perhaps even join in

Warsha Joshi 01:10

episode 23 featured Reim El Houni. Reim is the founder and CEO of the award-winning company Ti22 Films, Dubai on demand and several other companies which he runs completely featuring her thought leadership on video content production. Reim has won several awards global awards from Cannes to New York Film Festivals and as some of the things that you shared in this episode really made a mark when first of all, should I say Reim is one of those biggest believers in the biggest of dreams. Dream big, believe in them, work towards it, and make them a reality and that stands out really well in this episode. Some of the highlights of this episode was serendipity and action never miss an opportunity and She sure has not. So here is Reim talking about her own journey.

Reim El Houni 02:12

Remember that your audience are watching you to learn something. So, it’s not about pitching your business. It’s not about selling fine; you may still attract people in that way but you will not attract fans and you will not attract people who will want to come back. The goal is to grow an audience base who wants to hear you want to learn from you and that’s only going to happen if you keep providing value time and time again, one key fact that I can take away and actionable facts I can take away I can apply it I can learn and I can come back to you for more. So, keep it simple and above all consistency. You know, that is the one key thing that’s going to help you grow, be there every single week. Ideally, same day, same time, build that habit for your audience, the same way used to tune into your favorite TV shows, you want people to tune into your content and wait for it and that’s where you’re going to see a shift. If you can be consistent for them. They will be consistent for you.

Warsha Joshi 03:10

Evan, this is one of your favorite quotes, isn’t it? If you are consistent for them, they will be consistent for you.

Evan Le Clus 03:17

Absolutely and Reim was very generous with their time and she taught us a little bit about video editing and that sort of thing and while we’re not experts, one of the things she kept running into as far as consistency Same time, same bat channel basically and every week be there and absolutely is true.

Warsha Joshi 03:36

Episode 25 was a conversation with Rajat Karol. Rajat is a global level corporate CFO turned tech entrepreneur. Rajat has co-founded Vadi Health and DHI where he works and that company focuses entirely on creating awareness and normalizing discussions of women’s Hormonal Health. What a concept to bring, because when you listen to his episode, you will know the amount of work and the amount of thought that has gone out into building this brilliant business.

Evan Le Clus 04:14

Oh, totally and challenging is that environment is I remember Rajat talking about his own personal journey in the unlearning of a corporate mindset and that supports this matter a corporate has, in so many cases without you really realizing it and it’s that step into entrepreneurship, when he building a business and just how different that is but I totally love his focus on the social impact of his chosen fields that that’s obviously in healthcare, but also education and media. So, here’s the clip.

Rajat Karol 04:44

The end of the day, life is all about balance, whether we talk about corporate life or personal life. So, it’s extremely important to find things that allow you to grow, but always having a base having something that you can return back to. So, everything you do Balance and for me, Goldilocks is a nice way to make sure that anytime you try to do something big, you make sure that there is a counterbalance. If you try to do something big in your professional life, making sure that you have the right support in your personal life, your financials are sorted, then you can go make that leap. Otherwise, it’s not taking a leap. It’s like jumping blindly.

Evan Le Clus 05:22

And hot on the heels of that was episode 26 and that was with Surbhi Dedhia. She runs her own boutique marketing company, and is actually the host of her own podcast ‘The making of a thought leader’. You know, it was a great conversation, she shares her learnings and experiences as a digital marketer and how businesses would you know, large or small anybody can learn and leverage from modern marketing sort of techniques to create value for their customers.

Warsha Joshi 05:47

A couple of things that really stood out in this episode for me were the rookie mistakes most businesses make when it comes to digital marketing. Sometimes I think we overthink things. Yeah, and one of my biggest takeaways really was some of those mistakes that most of us make without even realizing and without even thinking about it, we love this conversation. So here is a way for you.

Surbhi Dedhia 06:10

That’s smart, digitally smart. So that’s where I was meaning when I say that don’t go after all the shiny tools, apps that are out there. Think long term, like for one, I can say SEO is definitely long term, which means that if you invest in it, you are going to get results. It builds like the feedback mechanism from the variety of tools available. So, SEO is a great tool to have if you’re investing invest in SEO, it brings you a lot of data understanding of what keywords people are looking for, what are people searching for what problems are they typing into the search string, so those kinds of things.

Evan Le Clus 06:49

Now moving on Elie Ghoussoub in Episode 27 was a fantastic chat. He’s the co-founder of an innovative company that is working with more persons of determination in old speakers, people with disabilities. You know, it’s something that’s so commonly overlooked these days, well, maybe not overlooked but it’s hard to get right. Put it that way and in this particular episode, he shares his unique perspective, his chosen field, obviously, entrepreneurship, how early he sorts of got into that, and how he discovered his passion for helping make this world a safer and more inclusive place and obviously, how to chase your dreams.

Warsha Joshi 07:26

Oh, the couple of things that stood out for me over here was the mindset you need to have when you start your own company. Do you know we very often see, when you’re scrolling through any social media platform, there’s a question that always comes up are entrepreneurs born or train someone to be an entrepreneur, you can train someone to be a business owner and this incredible episode sort of made me wonder entrepreneurs are really born and they because Ellie’s journey started so early in life, and oh, my god, the ambition, the innate ability to pursue your dreams, their resourcefulness and hand that that hustle that he brought in, and what an engaging conversation this turned out to be. Some of the things that he talked about was what the millennials or the young entrepreneurs of today should bear in mind when they go through their lives. What an episode water speaker Elie Ghoussoub for you, ladies and gentlemen,

Elie Ghoussoub 08:27

I would like to think that people don’t discern value in most people around them, we take people for granted and that is difficult for our community of people with disabilities. Most people who don’t know the first thing about science will look at Stephen Hawking and saying, Who’s that? You know, like, he can’t do anything, you know but just imagine the Stephen Hawking having been born decades earlier than he did or you know, maybe centuries earlier than he did, without the possibility to do the technology that was developed to support him. How much would humanity have lost?

Warsha Joshi 09:08

In Episode 29, Sagarika Sahoo talked about her, I dare to statement now many of you may know, in Dare To Scale, when we record episodes, when we record episodes with guests, we usually ask them what is their I dare to statement and Sagarika as was she does to build communities. Now, that is absolutely true for her and she lives it whether it is in a business or social life, her friends. Sagarika is all about building long term relationships.

Evan Le Clus 09:40

Yeah, and the one big thing that I remember was her saying, you know, your net worth is your network and that is so there powerful because the significance of every experience and most of all, you know, who you meet and the value in what you learn from people that you meet is something that you take with you and that really is the thing that that stuck with stuck with both of us, I think.

Warsha Joshi 10:03

That is true. So here is award winning entrepreneur Sagarika Sahoo.

Sagarika Sahoo 10:09

Yes, I’ve gone through my ups and downs but the thing that sticks to me is always that the tough times don’t last tough people do and I come into second bracket of being there. Such a thing I’ve always learned to accept this is it, and let’s move forward. You do look back for lessons but I would never take a step back. That’s for sure. This is it and let’s go forward and that’s what I love about being an entrepreneur, you can afford to do that. You can always afford to move forward and keep learning on from this

Warsha Joshi 10:41

Ambitious entrepreneur, consultant, turned entrepreneur, Mahwussh Alam spoke to us about every bit of challenge that she went through taking her business, from scratch, to building it to where it was, bring it down during the pandemic and rebuilding it. Oh, wow, what a journey. Mahwussh Alam truly is that Entrepreneur on Fire and I know Evan, there was a very, very specific key takeaway for both of us. Over to you for that.

Evan Le Clus 11:14

Yeah, and its Episode 30, by the way, and what are those key things were in Dare To Scale, like Warsha are you’re very strong on looking after your team and that was something that came out with the episode with Mahwussh, oh, my goodness, look after your team, teach them everything you know, and you know, the accountability, build them up and looking after your team means you’re absolutely be looking after your customers, you never have to worry about that and it just be so powerful for us. So, here’s the clip. Enjoy.

Mahwussh Alam 11:44

Teach your team, teach your people with the most sincerity with all your heart, tell them everything that you know, if you will not leave the space for them to come and acquire it, you will not be able to move up on the ladder. So, it’s so important to give everything that you have sincerely and then at the same time, keep learning.

Evan Le Clus 12:07

Next, we decided we’d switch gears and we started doing something a little bit different and that was focusing on the entrepreneur and it was The Dare to Scale ‘You’ Show, so to speak and the next guest we had on episode 31 was Paul Zelizer absolutely wonderful conversation. I mean, he’s a leader in global conversations and it’s at the intersection of conscious entrepreneurship and social impact, mindful leadership in business, and creating emotionally intelligent cultures in our workplaces. Incredible.

Warsha Joshi 12:38

Paul is also an ultra-marathon runner, and he is a lifelong athlete is an ultra-marathon trail runner and during this conversation, one of our biggest takeaways came from the conversation around the difference between high performance and optimal performance. We live in a high-performance environment today and we almost wear it like a badge of honor and yet, Paul talks a great deal about how humans are designed for optimal performance and the key to optimal performance is rest. This was one of our milestone episodes. This is Paul Zelizer for you.

Paul Zelizer 13:20

You know, our marketplace moves so quickly and there are so many changes and there are so many different like issues that are asking for attention as leaders before staying with business for a moment, that when we don’t optimize our own nervous system, we’re like that 20-year-old computer, we’re bringing a leader and human organism that’s driving everything and touching everything, sometimes more, sometimes less butwhen we’re a leader or when we’re a founder, we’re setting the tone for everything and if our nervous system is running in sub optimal state, it’s like we’re bringing a 20-year-old computer to every single thing in that venture.

Warsha Joshi 14:06

I love that analogy. If you are not at that optimal state, you are bringing a 20-year-old computer to work Wow made us think that day.

Evan Le Clus 14:18

Next we had a really inspiring conversation with Peter Winick and Peter over the last few decades has been helping entrepreneurs, individuals and organizations grow their revenue streams by identifying and developing individual thought leadership platforms and remember this really resonated with us because Peter believes in the small to medium business or SME segment being the backbone of any economy and that’s exactly where we operate and particularly working with, you know, brick and mortar businesses and the experience there is those businesses have a lot of know-how, but they don’t know how to market themselves really well and by developing your thought leadership platform, they can really move the needle.

Warsha Joshi 15:03

They do and the other thing that totally resonated with us because this is something that when we say so much and Dare To Scale as well, and it was lovely to hear Peter say this as well that your strategic plan, your strategic thinking document is always a dynamic document, it is important to have that as a dynamic document. It is not just something you develop once, put it in a drawer and forget about it. Everything stems from there. So have it a constant, constant, live document that we usually say and that was brilliant and it really was, as you said, it was such an inspiring conversation and we had great fun recording it. This is Episode 32, Peter Winnick,

Peter Winick 15:45

I would challenge any entrepreneur out there to figure out why they couldn’t do some form of thought leadership in some way to either elevate their personal brand, or more importantly, drive the business in a way they want to do it. To me, it is the absolutely the most cost-effective marketing tool, customer client, that new client acquisition tool, etc but it’s different, right? And you have to learn and you have to be willing to commit etc. It’s not as easy as signing up for a Google AdWords campaign and I’m not saying it’s better than or substitute for, but it should be a tool in your toolbox that you’re constantly sharpening and getting out there.

Warsha Joshi 16:23

In The Dare to Scale ‘You’ series, guess who starred David Meltzer starred in our show? Oh, wow, does it get better than that? His career is so impressive and, you know, he is today counted as the top 100 business coaches in the world. David Meltzer is legend. Absolutely, legend and that episode is a milestone episode. Yes, and I say this very often because oh my god, some of the guests have been so phenomenal but this particular one is brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Evan, I know you have very, very specific takeaways from this one,

Evan Le Clus 17:06

Ah! completely though, just lots and lots and lots of little gems everywhere. You know, there’s a lot of humility in what David does. One of the things he always talks about as being kind to a future self, there’s this constant improvement for all of us, we’re getting better all the time. So be kind to your future self. Don’t be too hard, but also obviously get better and you know, it’s just it was a wonderful story. Like where he’s maximizing energy for daily activities. He he starts the next day at 9pm The day before because you’re getting yourself mentally ready and resting and we talked about resting in previous episodes where in fact Paul Zelizer was talking about that being, you know, optimal, and David very much resonates with what he speaks about resonates with that same key message. So be kind to your future self be humbly ignorant. I love that phrase. You know, it was just okay. Yeah, I don’t know everything but I can find out. Oh, by the way, listen to the episode because there’s a great law of Goya G-O-Y-A Goya. Listen to the episode to find out what that is.

David Meltzer 18:10

If you’re willing to live between limitlessness and infinity, and live and find meaning with everything you see, then you’re an entrepreneur. If you’re worried about anything if you have the need to be right offended, separate, inferior, superior, anxious, frustrated, angry, guilty, resentful for any amount of time. You’re not an entrepreneur, you’re not built to be an entrepreneur, you literally know that infinity is there, and you’re striving to scale to infinity.

Warsha Joshi 18:39

Striving to scale for infinity. That episode really still gives me goosebumps What a brilliant conversation. Episode 34 is named redefining True Grit. The word entrepreneurship is usually followed by freedom, flexibility, being your own boss, and very rarely followed by entrepreneurship also means facing the reality which is also blood, sweat and tears, blood, sweat and tears is exactly what Amit’s journey has been and he shared this story, this stuff journey, so transparently and so generously because the whole point of sharing the story was when you have those dreams and stars that you have built for your entrepreneurship journey, it comes with a price and you must pay the price because when you pay the price you’ve come out on the other side facing and making those dreams and stars a reality. This is an Amit Grover story. What a story what a man, what a legend.

Evan Le Clus 19:46

Yeah, it was actually inspiring because not once or twice, you know, there were the ups and the downs and I remember when we were initially talking with Amit there was he spoke about some of the corporate journey, you know, shining as it was and he stopped his own business and stuff and that all of that was just amazing butI remember there was that turning point and that really is where the grit comes in. It was so generous and forthright in the honesty of just his whole story, nothing was held back and that’s really what he wanted to talk about. It wasn’t so much about, you know, I’ve done this, I’ve done that it was you’ve got to dig deep, you’ve got to get back on your feet, if that’s what you want, you have to get back on your feet and there is nothing that is insurmountable and he totally and utterly proves that absolutely inspiring conversation.

Amit Grover 20:32

In terms of the commonality with all the founders that I’ve worked with that driven, they are ambitious, they want to create a change in their own way. Of course, everybody’s changes is different and everyone’s purpose is different, but I must say out here, what differentiates a growth stage company from a corporation is the ability to let go, the very, very miniscule percentage of founders want to get it.

Evan Le Clus 20:59

And that the final in the series of part two is episode 35. With Justin Recla, our man who was that was just powerful was unlocking superpowers and making an impact. You know, Justin’s a, like an Army veteran, as a former counterintelligence agent, in bringing those skills, that’s what I really found amazing was the transferability of skills and finding the opportunity anyway. So, he takes those skills and delivers them to the boardroom, and he helps business owners protect their two most valuable assets, time and money. Awesome, you know, and the main message, and the greatest takeaway for us is very much for Justin says it’s, you know, helping others do things better, and to have self-dominion over everything they do. so powerful,

Warsha Joshi 21:40

That bit self-dominion, I like that basically, what does that mean taking responsibility for your own actions, being in command of the situation, and not being the victim, because what he said later was so, so wonderful and he says, it is vital to understand that everything happens for a reason, there are no victims that are only opportunities to get to the core of our consciousness, most people are beginning to see the power and exploring the consciousness and remaining creators in their world instead of being consumers. That to me was a big aha, becoming a creator, rather than a consumer is a brilliant way to shift your thinking from being a victim, to now taking charge of your own life and the results that you want out of your life. This is Justin Recla ladies and gentlemen, do listen in.

Justin Recla 22:35

Oftentimes, we want to identify as the emotion, you are not your emotion. Emotions are just a tool to let you know what’s going on in your environment and if it doesn’t feel good, do something different.

Warsha Joshi 22:53

Such a beautiful message just that that audio clip was so brilliant. If it doesn’t make feel good, do something different change it, take ownership of that and change it change is always in your hands. Fabulous episode.

Evan Le Clus 23:07

Absolutely. Totally well worth listening to again and that is a wrap. So that’s a wonderful summary of all of our guest episodes to date and you know, it’s been fun, that whole journey learning and you know what, season two in 22 is going to get just awesome. With all the new stuff that’s coming.

Warsha Joshi 23:28

Thank you for being our wonderful audience. None of this would have been possible without your support. So, we really appreciate you continuing to be part of our journey, encouraging us supporting us every step of the way. Keep daring, keep dreaming, and keep scaling. Have a wonderful rest of the day. Speak to you very soon in season two.

Warsha Joshi 23:54

Thank you for joining us and for listening all the way through. To get the show notes, the transcription and of course to subscribe, visit dare to scale.fm

Evan Le Clus 24:07

The success of the show is thanks to you. So please keep the five-star reviews coming. Remember to share this with your network and keep the community expanding. We’ll catch you at our next episode and in the meantime, keep daring and keep growing