The Extraordinary Business Book Club

'The process of writing, the process of reflecting on where we are right now and what must happen for us to move forward towards where we want to be, this is a process of living with greater intention.' What's your most precious resource? Time? Money? Or is it, in fact, your energy? No matter how smart or skilled we are, if our physical, emotional, mental and spiritual energy is depleted, day after day, we won't be showing up to do our best work. In this conversation, Simon Alexander Ong reveals how we can design our lives to maximize our energy, so that we can maximize our impact. Spoiler alert: writing is one of his secret weapons...

Ever wondered how a journalist picks which expert to provide a quote on a story in your industry, or why a national paper runs a story on your competitor and not you? Media relations might seem like a dark art, but when you understand what journalists are looking for, it's easier to pitch a story that will grab their attention, so that YOUR business can benefit from that powerful exposure. In this week's conversation, Felicity Cowie talks about life as both a journalist being pitched and a consultant helping businesses pitch effectively, and she shares the two essential questions every journalist asks themselves that decide whether a story will run or not.

'Having a book has really begun to change how I think about my business and my brand... I am truly surprised about the ripple effect it's having.' At the risk of being meta, there's a lot about conversation in this conversation. Conversations between managers and their sales team that empower and enable; conversations that spark ideas and reveal needs; and the conversation that the author has with the reader - on the page, and beyond the page. Fascinating insights into sales coaching, the writing process and the impact of a book on a business.

Storytelling is one of the most basic human impulses. And in the digital age, it's also one of the most complex and confusing: how do you choose between the multitude of channels and tools to help YOUR story connect with the people who matter the most to your business? Rob Wozny has been in the storytelling game all his life, as a journalist, content strategist and professional business communicator, and he's put that lifetime of expertise into his new book, Storytelling for Business: The art and science of creating connection in the digital age. In this conversation we talk about both the art and the science of business storytelling, and also the misery and magic of writing a book about it...

In 1907, pioneering psychologist William James wrote this: 'The human individual lives usually far within his limits; he possesses powers of various sorts which he habitually fails to use. He energizes below his maximum, and he behaves below his optimum.' That insight reflects the message of my guests on this podcast recently, and inspired the title of this episode: we CAN do hard things. This isn't just about writing a book – although writing a book is a damn hard thing to do – but more generally about the things that simply feel beyond us, too big, too far out of our comfort zone. Prepare to be inspired by insights from: Tim Bradshaw, Richard Rumelt, Corinne Sawers and Eric Lonergan, Graham Eisner, Daniel H. Pink, Catherine Sandland, Louise Third, Brian Moran and Michael Lennington, and Peter Elbow.

'If you've got something that's important, meaningful to you, that needs to be heard, why not say it on one of the biggest platforms?' Have you thoughts about giving a TEDx talk? If so, you've probably got lots of questions. How do you apply, for a start? How do you put together a TEDx-worthy talk? How on earth are you supposed to do it without an autocue? And perhaps most fundamentally of all, given the huge amount of time and energy involved: why do it in the first place? In this episode I draw on the wisdom and experience of a wide range of TEDx speakers and particularly Catherine Sandland, the fabulous speaking coach at TEDxNorthwich, to answer all these questions and more. The red dot is waiting... this is where you begin your journey.

'Writing is a form of figuring it out. And in fact for me, sometimes it's essential. It's like, what do you think about this? I don't know, I haven't written about it yet.' Dan Pink has written quite a few books, and they've done pretty well. So how does he do it? It's about showing up, he says, especially on the days you don't want to, and it's also about curiosity, hunches, thinking onto paper, and structure. (The structure REALLY matters.) Discover too why regret is such a positive force for good, and why feeling better doing necessarily make us do better. (But you certainly won't regret the time you spent on this.)

'We don't compromise rigour and intellectual honesty, but we try to make it as accessible as possible.' I don't know what you and your life partner achieved in lockdown. Eric Lonergan and Corinne Sawyers wrote a book. They brought their complementary skillsets - Eric in economics and monetary policy, Corinne in climate and sustainability - and produced Supercharge Me: Net Zero Faster, a call to action for policy makers and individuals alike to embrace the challenge and indeed the opportunities of reimagining our world more sustainably. They also discovered a way of writing together that preserved those individual perspectives while creating a unified argument. And a lot of it happened over the dinner table...

'The basic failure of strategy work is a failure to define the challenge that you're trying to meet.' Richard Rumelt is one of the world's leading authorities on strategy. He's also a keen rockclimber, and it was climbing that gave him the inspiration for his new book: The Crux. In this wide-ranging conversation we talk about why strategy is such a controversial concept in business, and also why writing is such an important discipline for business thinkers.

Do you make a difference? Or do you make excuses? Tim Bradshaw has done many remarkable things in his life, from military training to endurance events, and when I spoke to him he had just returned from a relief mission to Ukraine. He's simply living out his mantra: #BecauseICan. And it turns out that writing a book was the adventure that took him further out of his comfort zone than any that had gone before... Ready to be challenged?