The Fink Tank

Our older brother Michael once addressed our full school assembly, and spoke in a false baritone so comical Col can’t think about it without squealing with laughter. Pretty much everyone who’s spoken in front of an audience or gotten on camera has inadvertently used a weird Presenter Voice. But really, the only thing weird about it is a hope or expectation that we’ll be able to speak normally. You...

Col has been clearing his to-do list by ticking things off without actually doing them. 🙌 🎉  And then celebrating like he has. What a strategy.  A trick for maximising your productivity is to actively avoid doing nearly everything. Like most human beings, you're amazing. You're smart, talented, capable and adaptable. You could do almost anything! This expansive possibility is both exciti...

Well, you can, but people will probably still regard it as such. It‘s more important that what you present to the world feels real. Especially on a social feed. Col and I both enjoy content that feels a little raw. Stuff with honesty and personality. It should come with effort, curation, and care, but the focus should be connection and relatability, not a dodgy animated logo from fiverr. In this F...

There's this interesting—almost universal—characteristic of human life, whereby we are constantly disappointed by what we're able to achieve in a day, and amazed by what we can achieve in a year, or a decade. It seems that perhaps a lot of our misery (related to work, at least) is actually the product of unrealistic expectations rather than an inability to get stuff done. In this Friday Fi...

My brother Col is a tightarse. So am I, actually, because our parents were tightarses and these apples haven't fallen far from the tree. Our dad was a speTACular tightarse, particularly where clothes were concerned. If you saw him wandering around a supermarket you'd assume he was on minimum wage, despite the fact that he owned a small chain of pharmacies, employed 30-50 people, and at one...

Am I the arsehole? It's sometimes difficult to tell. I remember times I reacted with indignant anger, fuming at how I'd been treated. How DARE this person do this to me! And then, with reflection and maybe new information, I'll start to see how I've been complicit - or maybe directly responsible! - for what happened. Today's Friday Fink Tank topic comes from the amazing Celeste...

In this Friday Fink Tank Col takes aim at people who whinge about tax. More specifically, he invites us to think of tax not as something being taken away, but instead the opportunity to live in a society of abundance and prosperity. We enjoy and expect generosity at the micro level. It seems to get murkier at the macro. A five minute high-level chat can't cover the nuance and politics and comp...

See? This doesn't make any sense! Yet... Conventions exist for a reason, and you should break them only very rarely, and only very deliberately. Putting the punchline first is uncommon, and as you can see, it's jarring when it happens. Conventions make processes easier. Greeting people, playing team sport, going to dinner parties.  We know what to expect, and we know what’s expected of us....

I held hands at a concert with a blind man named Andrew. What happened next was hilarious. Should I feel bad about that clickbait headline? Probably, but I stand by it. I’d gone to the Ocean Alley concert on my own, at the wonderful Forum Theatre in Melbourne. I love going to gigs with friends or my brothers, but the solo outing does leave room for serendipitous encounters. And so it was. I’m so g...

If you’d like to hear Col ’s ocker go-kart bogan accent circa 2009, head to 4:05. George Bernard Shaw said “The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place”. Regardless of what your job is, effective communication is critical. Being an influential, compelling communicator amplifies the value of almost every other skill you've got. We discuss this idea at len...

If you want to be a great communicator, consider this motto: “If everything is practice, nothing is wasted.” In this episode we delve into Jehan Casinader 's rule for growth from his excellent recent LinkedIn post. Jehan says the only way to grow is to say yes to opportunities and try new things. He’s definitely right, but we also don’t want to fail spectacularly! We want to: ⚖ Push our bounda...

Lisa O'Neill says your energy introduces you before you do. Col says people buy your energy before they buy your services. Last night, The Fink Tank went to Lisa's ENERGY book launch in Melbourne and sat with an enraptured crowd as Lisa held court for 90 minutes. As funny as Taylor Tomlinson, as charismatic as Angelina Jolie, as flamboyant as Elton John and as approachable as Graham Norton...

Most of us give applause far more often than we receive it. This lack of practice, combined with a lifetime of humility conditioning, means when we DO receive applause we suck at it, suck the life out of it, and ruin the moment. Many of us have a similar aversion to receiving compliments. Tall Poppy Syndrome has us terrified of being torn down, and our risk-averse brains want to hide and deflect....

You just spent five hours agonising over the fine details of <your thing> but your audience are incapable of noticing the difference, even if they wanted to. I wrote that because it’s what I WANT to believe, but I DO believe extra polish is often worth it. In this Friday Fink Tank, Col makes the logical point that your audience are unlikely to be the small percentage of experts who are even...

Is growing your business a good thing? Are knives more deserving of the name chopsticks? Col recalls our teenage mockery of chopsticks. How could inefficiency be a good thing, our adolescent brains mused?? Maybe if the goal ISN’T to shovel as much food into your face as quickly as possible. If you’ve been operating a small business successfully, it’s tempting to chase growth. Hire staff, get more...

The question is not whether you suck at one of these things. The question is "which one do you suck at?" 1. Getting started 2. Getting finished 3. Keeping on going in the middle Col is currently beleaguered in number 3 with his book writing. I finished my MC showreel weeks ago. Have I sent it to people I know who might book me? Or posted it here? Nup. My promotion "plan" is stu...

Tiritiri Matangi Island: Come for the endangered Takahē, stay for the emergency medivac helicopter! After a peaceful day exploring the island and it's diverse native bird species, things took a dramatic turn when Chris' shoulder exploded. Chris was in serious pain and unable to walk. With limited phone reception and the last ferry gone, things were stressful. Less than an hour later, Ross...

Vanity metrics aren’t a problem. Vanity is. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to increase visibility and reach. Just don’t be icky or out of alignment. Agonising over the success of a post you care about is no fun, but having no clients or work is no fun either! In this Friday Fink Tank, we discuss “vanity” metrics, our susceptibility to fall for their allure, and what we can do about it.

As kids, we destroyed several hundred dollars worth of light globes while playing hacky sack in the hallway throughout our childhood. The fact that our parents elected to allow the wanton destruction to continue says something about their attitude towards prioritising our growth. It can be really challenging to cultivate the same level of compassion for mistakes (and encouragement for growth) when...

We record the Fink Tank on Col’s farm. They have lots of animals. Sometimes they die.  As someone fairly new to farming, Col still finds this pretty confronting. Deakin, his 4 year old, is far less affected, because he’s never known anything different.  He’s used to deadstock.  When you’re operating a solo business, you have to get used to your deadstock.  Awkward sales calls, rejections, failed p...

Nearly everyone is prone to dips in self-belief. Those who aren't are surely lying. Oscillations in confidence can be crippling. When starting a new venture, the road is often bumpy. When developing a new skill, it's rarely a smooth ascension to mastery. Most of life's endeavours come with peaks and troughs. Sometimes there are good reasons for them. Often there aren't. It's pa...

When he was fifteen years old, Formula 1 driver Daniel Riccardo learnt a *teeeny* bit about how to drive from Col, who ran a go-kart company at the time. Is your professional life analogous to a world famous F1 driver’s early karting career? Or to his penchant for “doing a shoey” with champagne on the winner’s dais?  Probably not. But this gratuitous name-drop DOES have relevance when we talk abou...

This week's Fink Tank is all killer, no filler! Err... sorry, I've just been handed a note. Apparently that’s, um, like, incorrect.  Turns out this episode of The Fink Tank does, in fact, contain quite a lot of filler. Filler words. You know the ones. Um. Kinda, like, ya know, ummm, if that makes sense? Communication is central to the success of nearly every job. Warren Buffet famously sai...

The statute of limitations has expired, so I confess that on 4 February 2017 I beat up a motivational speaker in the Sofitel ballroom in Sydney. I watched this clown of a presenter commit a litany of egregious public speaking crimes. The captive audience suffered horribly, and I knew I had to act. “The standard you walk past is the standard you accept” Not on my watch.  This speaker, this MONSTER,...

Ready for some Friday morning schadenfreude? After a triumphant first day's skiing in Japan, Col and me crash back down to earth, literally and figuratively! We were lucky enough to be skiing before we started school. We've spent our whole lives being excellent skiers... in Australian conditions. Imagine our shock when Japan exposed just how bad at skiing we can actually be! It was a humbl...