Business Owners & Entrepreneurs Podcast With Peter Boolkah | Business Coach | The Transition Guy®

Are any of us born entrepreneurs? There’s an ongoing discussion about whether entrepreneurs are born or made. Personally, I don’t believe that entrepreneurs are born but that they’re made through an entrepreneurial environment.From my knowledge of biology, it’s hard to believe that a genome exists that makes people born entrepreneurs. However, some people can be born with traits that are necessary for entrepreneurship. For example, the ability to take risks or to invest fearlessly.But more than those traits that people are predisposed to have, I’d say that entrepreneurs are born into entrepreneurial environments that nurture them into entrepreneurship. If you’re surrounded by people with entrepreneurial habits and traits, they rub off on you, and that shapes your behavior and future.If you’ve started a business or businesses, you’re already considered an entrepreneur. But what makes and separates a successful entrepreneur from others? When it comes to entrepreneurship, I believe that it’s definitely a case of

In today’s video, I’m joined by Dov Baron, the architect of Emotional Source Code, a best-selling author and an overall genius, as we discuss how self determination is one of the most critical success factors that can lead you to your future success.For many people, a strong start isn’t always possible. Whether it’s because of where you’re born, the time you were born, or other circumstances, many people find themselves in adverse situations at the beginning of their journey.Dov Baron was no different. He had a rough start to his life. He was brought up surrounded by crime, poverty, violence and abuse. He also later discovered that he had dyslexia, which made it hard for him to be in school. All obvious success factors just weren’t there, and made his future success seem like an impossible task for many.But he knew he was never going to reach his full potential and would just be wasting his time in this traditional school setting. So with self determination, he left school early at the age of 13 to pursue a d

Hiring new salespeople won’t solve your problem! In this episode, I chat with Jim Padilla, CEO of Gain the Edge, about why having sales processes is actually the most crucial to the success of any business (and not changing up your salespeople).The idea of process in sales is something disliked by many people who view sales as an art form. It’s true that there IS a certain aspect of sales that comes down to skills and ability, but the process needs to be there in order to make your sales consistent.It’s no secret that the sales process has drastically changed. Yet very few companies have adapted to these changes. Companies still tend to educate salespeople on the products they sell, rather than on the problems that they can solve for customers. As Jim Padilla and I discuss, knowing about a product is irrelevant if you don't know the problem that you can solve with it.By thinking about process in sales, you can develop a long term method for generating revenue. Sales processes allow you to keep one eye on

In this episode, I chat with Brent Keltner, CEO of Winalytics and author of “The Revenue Acceleration Playbook”, about how customer success stories and client testimonials can transform your sales process.Testimonial marketing is a powerful tool these days, given how noisy the world is. With such an overabundance of information on social media, we as customers have become very resistant to traditional marketing techniques.The traditional approach to marketing was very product-driven. But data shows that the old way is no longer yielding the same results that it used to. Instead, new techniques are needed that better resonate with customers.That’s where customer success stories and client testimonials come in.When we hear a statement, our brains are naturally wired to resist. But testimonial marketing is about getting around this impulse to resist. When you lead with stories about your peers, there's a shift from “you and me” to “we”. That change can make people more receptive.Another benefit of this type

For many of us, our homes have turned into workspaces since the pandemic started. And while employee burnout isn’t unheard of, remote working burnout seems to be an even more rampant problem that’s been on the rise since. Today, I talk to Phil Strazzulla of SelectSoftware Reviews about work from home burnout, and how we can help employees better cope with it.One of the main consequences of the pandemic was how it accelerated the transition to remote work for a lot of businesses. While this is a positive change for a lot of companies in many ways, it has also had some adverse effects.This rapid adjustment to the change in work setup has undoubtedly had an effect on employees in the form of work from home burnout, not to mention the additional stresses to the average worker – fear of the Corona Virus, the global recession, the war in Ukraine – these have all made coping with remote working burnout an even more challenging task.All these factors together have indeed taken employee burnout to a whole new level. A

In this episode, I talk to Kate DiLeo about how to create meaningful conversations so you can truly engage with customers, and have better ways to take people through your customer journey so you can reach a level of customer engagement that actually converts.It all comes down to the types of conversations you’re having. If you’re simply throwing information at people, then they won’t want to engage. But when you speak to them and develop a connection through your brand message, you’ll be able to better convert your traffic.What made us predisposed to generic, megaphone marketing in the first place?For one thing, there’s sales funnels. These allow marketers to offer multiple ways of purchasing, and hit audiences with multiple offers. But this involves an overwhelming amount of information which doesn’t really help us engage with customers.Then there's "Story Brand". This is about making the customer the center of your story. The problem is that many of us took that idea, and ended up writing pa

In this episode, I sit down with Bret Rosenthal, founder of the ARMR report, to discuss how to make successful investments, and how to build wealth through intelligent investing.Right now, it’s no secret that the world seems very unstable. For investors, it can seem like a scary time to put money into something.But rather than simply hold on to your cash, you can still invest. And you can still end up with great returns on your investments. You just need to go about it the right way. Like, say, a hedge fund.You see, there's a reason why hedge funds tend to make successful investments and outperform individual investors. It's because they're always taking different positions and different sides. They know how to build wealth because they understand intelligent investing. It doesn't matter if it's a bull or a bear market.Whereas for individual investors, they find an idea that they want to invest in, and use their portfolio as a basket to see if it works. Hedge funds don't do that.

It's been two years into the pandemic, and many companies are now working remotely. Some have found it to be an easy transition but others found difficulties adjusting their business processes.Today, I talk to Owen McGab Enaohwo, CEO and co-founder of SweetProcess, about how documenting processes can help get better results from this new work setup that a lot of us have adopted, and the process solutions that can help companies thrive in this new normal.There’s no doubt about it: the COVID-19 pandemic has changed how we work – possibly FOREVER. Remote working is one of the best and worst things to have come out of the pandemic, depending on how you look at it. Many people are split when it comes to the subject of remote working. Some find it bad for productivity and mental health, while others find it an efficient use of time and resources.But for those who don’t believe in remote working, could the real issue just be an inability to command and control their workforces? And for those who do, what proces

So many people have plenty of great ideas. But only a few people actually make theirs see the light of day. Why?Well, in today’s episode of The Transition Guy, I’m joined by professor and author of “Creative Careers: Making a Living with Your Ideas”, B. Jeffrey Madoff, to talk about executing ideas successfully, getting things done, and why not a lot of us are able to do just that.The truth is that a lot of us have brilliant ideas, and yet so few of us see them through. Making a living out of our creative ideas is possible but very few do so. Not everyone takes action.You might’ve, in one occasion or another, said that you’ve had an idea or a few ones way before anyone else had them. But why have you not done anything with them? What makes executing ideas so difficult that only a couple of us are actually getting things done?As B. Jeffrey Madoff shares, he always starts his first day of class asking students, “How many of you have been…somewhere where you’ve seen things and said, ‘Oh, I had that same idea! I

In this episode, I sit down with Jamie Dixon, author of “The Story Habit”, to talk about some of the techniques behind learning how to tell a story.Why is storytelling in business important to leaders?Well, to answer that question we should first look at what storytelling is. Essentially, storytelling is the art of making meaning.Great storytelling in business is a vital part of getting people’s buy-in. This is the most relevant application to business leaders. As Jamie Dixon points out, learning how to tell a story involves shaping the narratives that people believe in. Everyone has things that they believe that aren't necessarily true, so how can you correct or influence people’s beliefs?There are a lot of parallels between the process of telling a story and learning how to shape one. It comes down to three key words: relate, challenge, and resolve. When storytelling in business, you first have to relate to the listener. Then, challenge them somehow, and eventually resolve whatever tension you've

Can international internships be the answer to the talent gap? In today’s episode, I’m joined by Fredrik van Huynh, founder and CEO of Absolute Internship, to talk about hiring talent, remote internships, and its possible impact on talent scarcity and the talent pool, in general, in the business world.Absolute Internship is an organization that helps university graduates enter the working world through high-quality internships. As a student, Fredrik van Huynh got the opportunity to be an exchange student in China and Japan. This is where he spotted an opportunity to connect students to internships worldwide.Post-COVID, a lot of companies, especially those in bigger cities like London, Hong Kong, Singapore, Shanghai, Tokyo, etc., have started to realize how large their talent pool can be if they look at hiring talent all over the world. With the new Gen Z workforce coming in who thrive in flexibility, are used to working online, and are comfortable with a remote set-up, talent scarcity might very well be a thi

Today, I sit down with Jay Jay, the founder of Ace of Spades PR agency, to discuss social media brand building, and how you can use your online presence and your personal brand to stand out from the competition.You see, nowadays it’s harder than ever to make yourself seen on social media and in the online world. Ten years ago it was a completely different story. When Youtube was just getting started, there was hardly anyone out there compared to today.According to Jay Jay, it’s getting tougher to be seen because it's so noisy. There’s simply so much content of all sorts out there, that even if your content is great, very few people will see it unless you have a strategy.So, where should you start if you want to build your online presence and your personal brand?Well, the first step in social media brand building is to be honest and clear about what you want. Do you want clients? Do you want fame? Or money?Ultimately, a lot of your success would come down to consistently putting your content and your bran

Many businesses are at risk because of the current inflation storm, and they need to become better at dealing with the depreciation of money and rising costs. In today’s episode of The Transition Guy, I’m joined by Simon Severino, the CEO and founder of Strategy Sprints, as we discuss how to tackle inflation and share measures to control inflation in your business.One of the biggest challenges that most global economies are facing is inflation. The last occurrence of inflation of this kind in European economies was in the 1970s, so for many businesses, this is a new phenomenon.Currently, we are seeing inflation spiral out of control. To top it all off, there are other post-pandemic issues that businesses are facing such as supply chain challenges. For this reason, business owners must develop measures to control inflation to ensure their business’ survival throughout this period.Realistically, this inflation period could last a couple of years. As a base case, I'm looking at an inflation of around 14%, w

In today's conversation with Jason Kingsley, we talk about how you can turn your hobby into a business by simply following your passion. For Jason, building a company from hobby to business started from a desire to get better at the things he loves.When Jason Kingsley started out, it really wasn't possible to build a company in the gaming industry. Computers were still in their infancy.But he fell in love with computers from an early age, and eventually started to develop games with his brother. Jason wanted to become a creative entrepreneur, something that represented a whole new area of exploration for him.He ended up going to Oxford and getting a degree in Zoology because he saw it as something sensible to do. But all the while, he continued to work on video games. Jason Kingsley never gave up on the idea that you can turn your hobby into a business.But he wasn't always business-savvy and didn’t have it in mind to transform a hobby to business when he was first working on his passion. In fac

Has the selling process or sales cycle changed since the COVID-19 pandemic? Honestly, the pandemic has changed the world and has affected customer buying decisions, thereby affecting sales. And today, I discuss how to improve sales performance, and get around all the changes that happened with Jeremy Miner, Chairman, and founder of 7th Level.Many salespeople have felt the brunt of the pandemic in their sales performances. According to them, sales cycles have become longer. The world has indeed moved forward, so it makes sense that selling processes would change. In fact, it might be dangerous for your company if your salespeople are still using pre-pandemic sales processes in a vastly different world.Several factors influence customer buying decisions. One of them, perhaps the most significant factor, is uncertainty. When a prospect is uncertain about whether your product or service will change their lives or at least the way they do things for the better, then they're unlikely to want to buy.This is why

In the past, there’s been a lot of resistance to the idea of artificial intelligence in business. As Neil Sahota and I talk about in today's episode, many people fear that automating jobs will lead to unemployment, or that the technology isn’t safe.But then the pandemic came, and the great resignation along with it. Now, both in the UK and the US, there are a lot of job vacancies. This people shortage has been a great accelerator for AI. With less people working, artificial intelligence in business has become more useful than ever. In fact, this technology is developing rapidly. Already, there are programs capable of doing creative and problem-solving tasks.And yet, with all of the possibilities associated with the incorporation of artificial intelligence in business, many small and medium-sized companies have been reluctant to embrace this technology. Not just in terms of automating jobs, but across the board.Why? Well, this partly has to do with the perceived expense of artificial technology. But it al

Is it the end of digital investments?You may have seen the news about the very recent bear market in cryptocurrency. You may have even heard people say this may be the huge crash that marks the end of cryptocurrencies for good.Today, I'm joined by Blake Templeton, who has analyzed the situation and has shared refreshingly different thoughts on the matter. In fact, according to him, this might even be the best time to invest in cryptocurrencies.You see, he shares that beyond the current headlines about digital investments, there’s a game being played. Having been into this for quite some time now, he (like a couple of others) feel that big names, BlackRock and Citadel, may have very well engineered this bear market in LUNA. What they'd gain from this and how they've done it is something Blake also explains in this episode.At the end of the day, Blake thinks that despite it being a bear market, this is still an excellent time to invest in crypto. In fact, if you look back at all of the bear marke

Dealing with uncertainty is something that's easier said than done. And so in this conversation with Michele Rosenthal, we talk about the keys to confidence that can help you, and how you can use them to thrive in your business and in life no matter how unpredictable the circumstances.First, let's talk about trauma. Most people think of it as something that must be huge and life-altering. But the truth is that everybody experiences trauma. That's because trauma is really as basic as something that feels less than good.When the world changes and takes away your sense of certainty just as what's happened in the pandemic, it also often takes away those things that you've built your identity or the identity of your business around. That can be traumatic. But dealing with uncertainty in a more positive way means you'll have to NOT let your circumstances control you.So, what allows some people to thrive in uncertainty and move past the trauma, while others suffer and stagnate? The diff