ScaleX™ Insider Podcast

Marketing differentiation can feel uncomfortable when you're used to doing what everyone else in your industry does. You know your business does good work. Your customers value what you offer. But getting more people to notice you can still feel like an uphill struggle. So what do you do? Follow what others in your industry are doing? Spend more on the same marketing? Or try something different, e...

SME leadership lessons become useful when you can put them into practice. In this clip from the ScaleX Insider Season 21 wrap-up, Brendan McGurgan and Claire Colvin revisit Guy Kawasaki's framework for creating a product or service that is both unique and valuable, Stephen Rogelberg's advice on better meetings, and JL Holdsworth's insights on how we respond to pressure. Claire also shares what she...

AI for SMEs starts with a clear question: what problem are you trying to solve? In this clip from the ScaleX Insider Season 21 wrap-up, Brendan McGurgan and Claire Colvin reflect on Paul Cheek's advice on adopting AI. Claire shares how her own frustrations with technology have shaped her approach, and why identifying three to five business challenges with the team could give AI experimentation a u...

Scaling your business brings plenty of questions. Are your meetings helping people move forward? Where could AI make a useful difference? And how do you keep learning while managing the demands of leadership? In this Season 21 wrap-up of ScaleX Insider, Brendan McGurgan and his business partner, Claire Colvin, revisit the guests, conversations and practical insights that stood out across the seaso...

What makes someone truly remarkable? Is it their success, their personality, or the impact they leave behind? In this 5-minute clip from ScaleX Insider, Brendan McGurgan speaks with Guy Kawasaki about his experience working with Steve Jobs and what separates remarkable leaders from the rest. Guy shares his candid perspective on Jobs' brilliance and difficult personality, explains why Canva founder...

What if the secret to scaling your business is to stop worrying about scaling? In this 7-minute clip from ScaleX Insider, Brendan McGurgan speaks with Guy Kawasaki, former Apple chief evangelist and current Canva chief evangelist, about what businesses should focus on before pursuing growth. Guy explains why doing things that don't scale is often essential to winning your first customers, why smal...

What does it really take to build a business worth scaling? Guy Kawasaki on scaling, entrepreneurship and what makes a business truly remarkable. In this episode of ScaleX Insider, Brendan McGurgan sits down with Guy Kawasaki, former Apple chief evangelist, current Canva chief evangelist, bestselling author and host of the Remarkable People podcast. Drawing on decades of experience working alongsi...

Becoming a scaling leader starts with how you see yourself and the habits you build. In this clip from ScaleX Insider, Brendan McGurgan and JL Holdsworth explore the connection between identity, consistent action and leading a growing business. Drawing on his experience as a powerlifter, JL shares his perspective on why new leadership practices can feel uncomfortable at first. They discuss how hab...

Staying calm once felt unfamiliar to JL Holdsworth. In this clip from ScaleX Insider, he tells Brendan McGurgan how a four-day workshop in South Africa led to an unexpected change that his wife noticed in just four words. JL had travelled there to improve his performance. Instead, he describes finding himself responding calmly to a conversation that would previously have triggered anger. That expe...

Leadership under pressure can mean dealing with a key employee leaving, a difficult customer or an unexpected setback. In this episode of ScaleX Insider, JL Holdsworth joins Brendan McGurgan to explore how leaders can stay calm, think clearly and lead through uncertainty. A world champion powerlifter, entrepreneur and performance coach, JL shares how a serious back injury led him to explore human...

Will AI replace the people currently providing remote support to businesses? In this clip from ScaleX Insider, Brendan McGurgan asks Anne Lackey, Co-Founder and CEO of HireSmart Virtual Employees, how she sees AI and remote work evolving as digital agents become more capable. Anne isn't ignoring the potential disruption. But she also believes businesses need to look beyond the hype and consider th...

One of the biggest mistakes leaders make when managing people isn't hiring the wrong person. It's failing to tell them what success actually looks like. In this clip from ScaleX Insider, Anne Lackey, Co-Founder and CEO of HireSmart Virtual Employees, explains why leadership clarity matters regardless of where your team is based. People can't perform against expectations they don't understand. Anne...

What if scaling your business isn't about doing more, but getting the right people doing the right work? In this episode of ScaleX Insider, Brendan McGurgan is joined by Anne Lackey, Co-Founder and CEO of HireSmart Virtual Employees, to explore how remote staffing can help business owners create capacity, delegate effectively and build a business that doesn't depend on them for everything. Anne's...

Growing a small business doesn't always mean spending more, hiring expensive executives or raising outside capital. For Jeremy Middleton, the priority is proving that the business already works. In this clip, Jeremy explains why small businesses need people who can execute, not simply more strategy, and why raising early-stage capital can be an expensive way to fund growth. Before scaling, he look...

What makes a business partnership work as the company grows? For Jeremy Middleton, it starts with trust, alignment and clarity — but the original agreement shouldn't necessarily be set in stone. In this clip, Jeremy shares how his 50/50 partnership with Sir Richard Harpin evolved as HomeServe grew, and why Jeremy himself suggested changing the deal when Richard became the driving force behind the...

What does it really take to build a business that can keep growing for decades? In this episode of ScaleX Insider, Brendan McGurgan is joined by Jeremy Middleton, co-founder of HomeServe and founder of Middleton Enterprises, to explore what long-term business growth looks like from someone who has experienced it first-hand. Jeremy co-founded the business that would become HomeServe alongside Sir R...

After interviewing around 1,000 people, Jordan Harbinger has heard thousands of stories. But some conversations have stayed with him long after the recording ended. One was with former Soviet spy Jack Barsky, whose story forced Jordan to think about what happens when work and duty are prioritised over family. Another was with Kobe Bryant. After their interview, Jordan expected Kobe to move quickly...

Networking often falls to the bottom of a founder's to-do list. Not because relationships aren't important, but because "networking" can feel vague, time-consuming and difficult to turn into a practical habit. Jordan Harbinger argues it doesn't have to be. His approach is something he calls Connect Four. Find one to four people you haven't spoken to in a while and send them a simple message. Remin...

Business networking, relationship building and scaling with purpose are more connected than most leaders realise. In this episode of ScaleX Insider, Brendan McGurgan sits down with Jordan Harbinger to explore how relationships, ambition and clear goals shape the way we scale. Jordan is the host of The Jordan Harbinger Show and has interviewed around 1,000 guests across business, psychology, scienc...

Paul Cheek explains why simply giving everyone access to ChatGPT isn't AI transformation. The real opportunity isn't a 10% productivity boost. It's moving towards 10x efficiency by deeply embedding AI across the business. But before SME leaders start building AI agents and automating workflows, Paul says there's one place they need to start: AI literacy. His advice? Set aside some "Tinker Time" to...

Paul Cheek explains why AI is creating an entirely new model for how businesses scale. Traditional SMEs can start with limited upfront investment, but their growth often remains linear. Innovation-driven enterprises can achieve exponential growth, but typically require significant risk capital. Paul's AI-Driven Enterprise model brings those two worlds together — combining lower upfront resource re...

Stop using AI just to save a few minutes. Paul Cheek, MIT Senior Lecturer, entrepreneur and author of No One Works Here, joins Brendan McGurgan on the ScaleX Insider podcast to explain why the real opportunity with AI isn't a 10% productivity boost — it's building an AI-driven enterprise capable of unlocking 10x efficiency. They explore where SME leaders should actually start with AI, why every te...

Eighty percent of employees are disengaged. Benjamin Granger, organisational psychologist and author, tells Brendan McGurgan on the ScaleX Insider podcast that dominance and prestige are the only two strategies humans use to achieve social status, and only one of them builds a business worth scaling. Dominance works in the short term. Every social animal uses it, from crickets to chimps to boardro...

Dr Benjamin Granger explains why he would hire for EQ over IQ when choosing leaders — but why gut instinct alone is never enough. The best hiring decisions combine validated assessments, structured interviews, human-to-human conversations and a clear definition of what success looks like. And once you've done the due diligence? That's when Dr Benjamin believes you should listen to your gut. 00:00...

On ScaleX Insider, Dr Benjamin Granger explores the leadership skills that make someone worth following — from self-mastery and emotional intelligence to communication, body language and the ability to influence others. Benjamin is Chief Workplace Psychologist at Qualtrics Experience Management Institute and two-time best-selling author of A Leader Worth Following. His work explores the psychology...