Business Leader Breakthroughs

How often do you sit around your meeting table, pull out your mission statement and brand values, and say "Hey, how well do we live these?" Are you constantly changing around your most important values to match what is the top priority that month? Do you even KNOW the values you say your business lives by? Finding it difficult to answer one or more of these questions, don't worry, this podcast epi...

Mike and Ryan discuss the question so many of us are asking "What is the ideal working model going forward in Level 1?"  For many businesses and their people what was once the norm is now a choice; to work from home, to return to the office or something in between.  It can be challenging to sift out the pull of the familiar versus the opportunity to reimagine and reengineer a new way of working, a...

WARNING: STRONG LANGUAGE David Galbraith shares frank insights and funny personal stories on how to live your best life with courage and care. He draws on a wide range of experiences as a clinical psychologist, high performance mental coach of athletes from Super Rugby (Chiefs) to Olympic sports, youth worker, author, husband and dad.  Known as the HOGman, Habit of Greatness, he committed early on...

Welcome to our first podcast "back" with Mike and Ryan recording in our office together instead of through Zoom (which has been the mainstay for so many of us during these past 8 weeks of our nationwide lockdown). We are all adjusting from what was our old normal to the new normal or, as Mike says, our different normal. Being a business leader during this time comes with a lot of tension. Most of...

Think about the learning workshops you've done over your career. Did you go away, have an inspiring day or two, only to go back to your workplace and keep doing what you've always done? You may have been introduced to some great new ideas and skills, but there was no path to bring that into your work within the organisation. In this episode, Mike and Ryan talk about how learning must be embedded t...

In this week’s podcast, Ryan sat down with David Pich, CEO of the Institute of Managers and Leaders Australia and New Zealand. David has worked as a leader for more than two decades across all sectors, which has lead to his long held and deep seated passion for sound and impactful leadership. David has truly found his home within leadership and strategy, has his two best selling novels, Leadership...

In this podcast episode, Ryan has the pleasure of talking with Heather Polglase, who has 20 years’ experience as an HR professional and is now the HR Director at Spark New Zealand. She has led a number of critical initiatives at Spark, such as Spark's Leadership and Development Programme, and held key roles across the Customer and Marketing areas of Spark.     Heather talks about the implementatio...

In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan discuss how to successfully work from home during these challenging times of COVID-19. They share the mechanics of working remotely and give tips on finding ways to get into a productive routine. They also talk about ways to maintain both physical and emotional health, stressing the importance of physical routines, communication, and accepting to be emotional...

In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan address the question that most business leaders have when they are about to invest in leadership training – How do you measure the results of leadership development programmes? Since it is difficult to attribute a hard value to soft skills, or translate it directly into measures like profit, this can be a challenging question to answer.  Mike and Ryan briefly...

In this podcast episode, Ryan has the pleasure of talking with Gihan Perera, who is an author, conference speaker and consultant. As a futurist, Gihan researches trends that will impact the future of work and brings these insights to audiences in a relevant way.  Gihan talks about one of the biggest trends at the moment, artificial intelligence, and explains how it is already everywhere in our liv...

In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan get philosophical and talk about the top 5 regrets of the dying, from the book by Bronnie Ware . Bronnie Ware has had a long career in palliative care, during which she would talk with the people she took care of, and wrote down their insights in her book.  The Breakthrough Company has applied the lessons learned from this book for a long time, finding that b...

In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan talk about how to transform a business. They use the “leadership diamond” framework as developed by McKinsey in their book “Leadership at Scale”, and discuss and relate it to their own insights and experience with transforming organisations. Do you have any experience or insights on transforming a business? Let us know in the comments! Links Watch it on YouTu...

In this podcast episode, Ryan interviews Joanne Fair, co-founder of FutureWorks Studio. FutureWorks provides an alternative solution to the traditional 9-5, by pioneering an integrated platform that allows talent to work on projects in different departments of the organisation they work in, as well as allowing the organisation to bring in external talent from other organisations on a freelancer ba...

In this podcast, Mike and Ryan discuss how to effectively run a meeting, and how to deal with people and situations that get your meeting off track. They talk about why face to face meetings are so fundamental and beneficial, given they are run well. They go over 6 situations that can derail meetings and how a good meeting runner can resolve them and “rerail” the meeting. Do you have any insights...

In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan talk about how team meetings can shape your company culture, and how they are instrumental in creating (or bringing down) energy. They talk about do’s and don’ts in team meetings and share some examples from our own meetings at the Breakthrough Co, providing a great starting point for creating an energising team meeting and culture. How do you create energy i...

In this podcast episode, Ryan has the pleasure of interviewing Michelle Gibbings. She is the founder of consultancy Change Meridian and a best selling author of 2 personal career development books with a third coming out in May. Michelle and Ryan talk about the future of work and how leaders, teams and team members can adjust themselves to a more technology-driven work environment. Michelle shares...

In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan discuss culture in organisations. Creating a company culture is not simply writing some values on the walls and expecting your employees to live them. Mike and Ryan talk about how to define culture, what the most important components are, and why having a good culture is important for performance. Most importantly, they discuss how a good culture can be achie...

In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan talk about mindfulness at work. Mindfulness at work is about being open and present in the moment and actively thinking about how to add the most value for your organization, rather than practices like meditation and yoga that are characteristic of personal mindfulness. Mike and Ryan explain what mindfulness at work entails and why it is so important, and sha...

In this podcast episode, Ryan and Milena discuss outsourcing and freelancing. They share with you the lessons they have learned during the various times they have outsourced work at the Breakthrough. They talk about when you should think about outsourcing and how to decide on the right option for each situation, whether it be a virtual solution or a freelancer or agency. They give tips on finding...

In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan share 3 big strategic questions that can help you bring your business to the next level. These questions will unlock your thinking and open possibilities you had never thought of before. Mike and Ryan discuss them in depth and give real examples of how asking these questions has helped their clients improve their businesses. Links  Watch it on YouTube Find ou...

In this podcast episode, Ryan has the pleasure of interviewing Kate Daly, director of people at BNZ. She has held roles in human resources in many of the world’s largest brands and some of New Zealand’s household names, and is a board member at Auckland Rugby and The Blues. In the podcast, she talks about what culture means to her and what they are doing at BNZ to improve it, giving examples of va...

Being good at product isn’t enough, you need to be great at marketing too for your business to be successful. In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan discuss the power of having clear principles. They talk about how crucial it is to have clearly defined values, and the importance of keeping these principles alive and exercised by every member of the team. They share the principles we have at the Br...

In our new podcast episode, Ryan has the pleasure of interviewing Ryan Ghisi, the general manager of global people programs at Xero. Xero is one of New Zealand’s most successful tech companies and has had phenomenal growth over the last few years. Ryan talks specifically about flexible working, an important part of Xero’s work environment. Ryan dives into what Xero's flexible working looks like an...

Learning can be hard, but it’s the key to unlocking your own and your organization’s potential. In this podcast episode, Mike and Ryan share their insights around learning and give advice on how to learn effectively. They discuss what learning is exactly, what the stages of learning are, why learning is hard and why it’s supposed to be hard, and how you can motivate yourself to achieve your learni...

In this podcast episode, Ryan has the pleasure of interviewing Franceska Banga, or Frank as we know her. Frank is a recipient of the Officer of New Zealand Order of Merit Award, is the former Chief Executive Officer of the New Zealand Venture Investment Fund, and has held board roles on many of New Zealand’s most prominent tech and economic development boards. She is passionate about working with...