Scaling Up Business with Bill Gallagher

Many start-up companies scale up by leveraging venture capital, but what are venture capitalists looking for in the companies that they choose to invest in? Even if you aren’t interested in securing funding, this episode highlights the differentiators that will set your company apart at every stage of scaling up.   Kate McAndrew is a co-founder and General Partner at Baukunst. In addition, she is the founder of Women In Hardware. Kate previously was a Partner at Bolt, where she built the firm’s venture capital practice and community presence over two successful funds. She has over nine years of experience as a first-round lead investor & board member with a focus on companies that are evolving the cultural conversation. When Kate first encountered an accelerator program, she thought it was the most insane thing she had ever heard. She also absolutely loved the idea of empowering entrepreneurs with capital and quickly found herself in the deep end of the venture capital pool. Many entrepreneurs may think their solution or offering is what makes a startup company special, but it’s really the people that make the difference. Special people have special ideas, and exceptional people can execute them. Kate highlights her experience with Bobbie Baby, including what she was looking for from their offerings and what it takes to succeed in the venture path. Bobbie was a multibillion-dollar idea with incumbent players and a customer base that was going out of their way to get their hands on the product. The critical components of Bobbie’s success were the passion and experience of the team, their unique solution to a major problem, and the innovative business model for their brand. Kate also highlights the power and danger of debt-side funding, pre-seed funding, and the best money you can have in funding a venture capital — revenue. At Fyto, venture capital helped to address a broken system with major environmental and social impacts. They reimagined the way a system was architected with the passion of a founder who was ready to completely change big problems in the ideal location. That is what it takes to make venture capital work. Interview Links: Baukunst EO Accelerator Program   Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Short List (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.

How do you keep people in the game? It’s all about coaching. This is where you can remind people about the inspiration and action that brought them to where they are today.   Powerful coaching is rooted in powerful listening. Bill once coached a man who was overly rigid in his approach to his team. As he got more curious and set aside what he thought he already knew about his team, he realized that the team was better able to change and evolve. The best place to start being a great coach is to stop having so much to say. Listen, rather than talk. Show curiosity rather than offering endless solutions. You can be a far better coach when you close your mouth more often. Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Shortlist (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.

Build the fort! Ideas that seemed simple when you were a kid may seem insurmountable as an adult, but scaling up and building out your dreams really doesn’t have to be that hard.   Dubbed “The Startup Whisperer” by startup community enthusiasts, Christopher Heivly is a life-long entrepreneur and multifaceted investor who spent forty years working as, for, and with entrepreneurs. Prior to becoming a successful startup community builder and consultant, Chris co-founded MapQuest — which sold to AOL for $1.2 billion. He currently serves as a managing director of The Startup Factory and is a highly sought-after public speaker. Building a fort is a metaphor for all of the things that are required to hack away at a vision. Get rid of the noise, stop overanalyzing, and simplify your approach. How would you have tackled a project as massive as building a fort when you were 10 years old? Whether you’re building a startup or scaling up your business, Chris takes an approach that feels as simple as building a fort. Chris shares several stories that highlight his simplified approach to upping your game and building out your dreams. From building out the life-changing (at the time) MapQuest to the work that he has done with Written Word Media founder Ricci Wolman, he has seen the power of creating a community, fostering successful founders, and learning the ways that will make your company work. There are a thousand ways to mess up your company, but experimenting is a critical component of success. Whether you are facing company, campaign, or hiring failures, just assume that you’re going to make a bunch of mistakes and then go back to the simplicity of building a fort. Embrace failure, learn from the mistake, and just keep trying. It’s really not that complicated. Interview Links: Build the Fort   Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Short List (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.

Great execution has a great rhythm. It’s all about proactive talking, planning, and making things happen.   Years ago, Bill had to create annual plans and quarterly reviews on a corporate job that worked beautifully. With his own business, he would often forget his annual plans and so added in a mid-year check-in. Even then, they still forgot about the plans. A quarterly review combined with weekly meetings and daily huddles, and Bill now knows the power of executing plans proactively with a regular rhythm that works. The key to success here is to consider when each plan is going to take place. Keep it consistent, keep it regular, and watch the progress happen. Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Shortlist (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.

What is stakeholder capitalism and why should you care about it? If the work that you’re doing doesn’t help you sleep better at night, there just might be some room for improvement in your efforts in stakeholder capitalism.   Kent Gregoire is a serial entrepreneur and the co-founder of Stakeholder Business. He is on a mission to help entrepreneurs transform their companies for maximum impact. In his consultancy work, he is known as the “CEO to CEOs” who focuses on a win-win approach that delivers exponential value to all stakeholders. Kent’s efforts over the years have evolved from conscious capitalism into stakeholder capitalism, which focuses on building a socially and environmentally sustainable world. When companies begin to create value and optimize that value for their stakeholders — not just their shareholders — they become stronger, more resilient, and more profitable. Stakeholders are a 360-degree group, including the customers, investors, employees, community, environment, suppliers, business partners, and more. Every one of these has an impact on a business. And companies that consider the role of each of these players are shown to be more resilient and more profitable. Kent highlights the realities of stakeholder capitalism in the coffee industry, and how strategic moves can benefit not only the company but its stakeholders as well. Kent details the success of Interface, a carpet company that has successfully maximized stakeholder capitalism and changed the carpet industry worldwide. Bill shares ways that he has intentionally increased customer connections and Kent highlights the efforts that have solved major challenges with suppliers and securing even more business, all with a greater focus on becoming a stakeholder business. Interview Links: Stakeholder Business   Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Short List (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.

We all view ourselves and the world around us in either optimistic or pessimistic ways, but really, we need both views to get a clear picture of reality.   Planning for what is most likely to go wrong has great benefits because things are going to go wrong. Focusing on what might go wrong doesn’t guarantee that thing will happen, it just gives you the opportunity to prepare for that possibility. Bill once made a mistake by not preparing for what could go wrong and ended up wasting several million dollars on materials and production that he wouldn’t need for years. Don’t make the same mistake he did, just consider what could go wrong and what you can do to prepare for it. Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Shortlist (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.

What can we learn from sports about making the right calls? Sally Jenkins has been a Washington Post columnist and feature writer for nearly 30 years. She was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2019 and the winner of the Associated Press Red Smith Award for Outstanding Contributions to Sports Journalism in 2021.   For sports fans, business leaders, and anyone who wants to elevate their game — whatever that game may be — Sally has joined the podcast today to share what it takes for ordinary people to achieve extraordinary results. Sally’s new book The Right Call highlights how people make the right decisions under pressure. Sally grew up with a front-row seat to some of the greatest sporting events of all time and watched how leaders make decisions in real time. Her book examines the commonalities of decisions made under stress and the methodologies that lead to making the right call. Making the right call starts with approaching each day with an organized method. Too often we drift through our days without any real intention, but successful athletes don’t waste a single minute of their day. They make micro-decisions down to the minute that make all the difference in their success. Sally shares the example of Peyton Manning’s practice with wet footballs that led to the Indianapolis Colts Super Bowl win against the Chicago Bears. Preparation diffuses pressure. Pressure is what happens when you don’t know what to do, but taking the time to prepare can immensely reduce that pressure. When preparing for a meeting, take time to consider what you will say when you don’t have much time, when you’re in adverse conditions, or when you’re dealing with a hostile audience. If you can handle less-than-ideal conditions when practicing, you will be more prepared when it’s time to perform. There is plenty that the average person can’t replicate about professional athlete performance, but there is more than you may think that can be replicated. As Laird Reynolds once said, “We spend a lot of time seeking comfort, and comfort is not the only thing we are seeking.” There is a time for relaxation and self-care, but there is so much more to success than that. Pushing yourself to adapt to the stress that comes before success will give you the personal power that you need to succeed. Interview Links: Sally Jenkins   Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Short List (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.

Where is the best place to look to do great planning? Too often businesses look only at the here and now of the problems and issues they’re facing.   Bill worked with a contractor a few years ago who had a well-developed cadence of weekly “issue discussion” meetings. While they were solving a lot of short-term issues, they made little progress on their bigger, strategic goals. If you only focus on present issues, you’ll never have a chance to make progress in the future. Start with the end in mind. What is your BHAG? Break it down and figure out what you can do this year to reach it. When you put your intentions further out, you are far more likely to reach your biggest goals. Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Shortlist (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.

Whether or not you consider yourself a risk taker, life requires taking risks every single day. From relationships and parenting to the financial and careers we pursue, we all take risks, bet big, and hopefully win often. We are surrounded by risk, and how we look at it, relate to it, and leverage it makes all the difference.   Angie Witkowski is the NY Times best-selling author of the business books SPARK, Bet on You, and Leading From the Front. She’s been a coach inside the world’s best businesses and has shared a keynote stage with some of the most influential leaders of our time. Angie served as an officer in the Marine Corps and holds a BA and MBA from the University of Michigan. Too often we celebrate overnight successes while overlooking the years of hard work and risk that went into making the success happen. Taking your time, fully understanding your financial situation, and relying on your ability to make good decisions will all have a major impact on the outcome of the risks you take. Consider first how much time you are willing to invest in your risks. You can take the short-term route if that is where you feel most comfortable, or you can dive in head first and see what happens. The truth is, you can always make more money if this risk fails. Angie and Bill share their process for approaching and evaluating risk. Bill aims to first look for the opportunity, then consider the worst-case scenario and create a coping mechanism from there. Angie tends to see opportunities everywhere but asks herself two questions when considering risk: Do I have the bandwidth to make this happen, and do I actually want to do this? The answers to these questions will make the next steps clear. Interview Links: Angie Witkowski   Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Short List (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.

What happens when you hear “no’”? How do you handle that rejection?   Bill once coached a woman named Debbie who was in conflict with her business partner. She wasn’t handling the rejection very well, and it was clear that she hadn’t considered what her business partner possibly thought about her. When she was able to think more openly about the other side of the conflict, she realized that she was also contributing to the tension. At Bill’s recommendation, when she showed more interest in her partner’s project, she got the results she wanted. With just one shift in her actions, the partner magically changed. Simply put, if you can shift the way you handle rejection, change can happen. Resources: 20,000 Scaleups Scaling Up Summits (Select Bill Gallagher as your coach during registration for a discount.) Bill on YouTube Recruiter.com Shortlist (use code scaleup) Scaling Up is the best-selling book by Verne Harnish and our team for Scaling Up Coaches (formerly Gazelles). We share how the fastest-growing companies succeed where so many others fail. Bill Gallagher, Scaling Coach and host of the show, is an international business coach who works with C-Suite leaders to achieve breakthrough growth. We help leadership teams with the biggest decisions around People, Strategy, Execution, and Cash so that they can Scale Up successfully and beat the odds of business growth. Scaling Up is based on Verne’s original best-selling business book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. Did you enjoy today’s episode? If so, then please leave a review! Help other business leaders discover the Scaling Up Business Podcast so they, too, can benefit from the ideas shared in these podcasts.