The High Flyers Podcast with Vidit Agarwal

Thank you for rating / reviewing this podcast on iTunes and Spotify, it helps others find us and convince guests to come on the show! Follow us on Instagram, LinkedIn or TwitterEmail  Vidit directly at vidit@curiositycenter.xyz or contact us via www.curiositycenter.xyz to discuss sponsorship opportunities, recommend future guests and share how we can improve. ***Welcome to episode #95 w Joel Connolly! Please enjoy. ***TIMESTAMPS01:50  - Where were you born and live now? 02:00 - What was your first job and now? 02:31 - High Flyer in Joel’s life 03:58 - Darwin and Copacabana 06:57 - Influences of family and public figures 08:53 - Being raised by a single mum 11:18 - First time he came across music and creative world 13:13 - Career plan at age 18 17:08 - Didn’t feeling like a creative till his mid 30’s 18:10 - We’re all born creative 19:36 - Creativity in podcasting 21:39 - The move from music to Venture Capital at Blackbird 28:05 - Unlearning and trying new things at Blackbird 31:50 - How Joel created the Blackbird brand strategy: 36:15 - Community and firm building 38:25 - Most painful learning 42:01 - Balancing creative role in an investment firm 45:13 - Blackbird 2.0 49:03 - What is brand building as an expression of who you are 52:20 - What does crypto have right and wrong about culture? 55:41 - How does Australia encourage Vitaliks (founder of ETH)? 58:31 - Joel’s thinking in themes and not pictures 01:01:12 - Rapid fire 

Thank you for rating / reviewing this podcast on iTunes and Spotify, it helps others find us and convince guests to come on the show! Follow us on Instagram, LinkedIn or TwitterEmail  Vidit directly at vidit@curiositycenter.xyz or contact us via www.curiositycenter.xyz to discuss sponsorship opportunities, recommend future guests and share how we can improve. ***Welcome to episode #94 w Jackie Vullinghs! Please enjoy. ***TIMESTAMPS01:55 - Where were you born and live now? 02:07 - What was your first job and now? 02:26 - High Flyer in Jackie’s life 03:10 - Childhood in the UK w immigrant parents 04:21 - History teacher influence to learn about the world 05:22 - Cultural significance of studying history and connection to VC 07:40 - Success at age 18 09:07 - Do small things and chase curiosity 10:40 - Growth between high school and university 12:54 - Painful learnings 14:50 - Working in investment banking and why she left? 17:42 - Learning more in a startup vs investment banking 19:09 - Building confidence to change professional path 21:07 - Moving from the UK to Australia 22:50 - Applying to Airtree a second time after being rejected 26:25 - Setting up for success in first 6 months at Airtree 29:30 - How did bouncing around help form a world view? 31:01 - Filtering through information 33:12 - How to get to know a company from scratch? 35:22 -  Investing in consumer 37:50 - Airtree playing a leadership role beyond B2B SaaS investments 39:40 - Becoming the first second generation fund in ANZ 41:57 - Decision making adjustment now vs boom times 43:41 - Unpacking MILKRUN 47:23 - How becoming a mother has changed Jackie? 50:08 - Rapid fire 

Thank you for rating / reviewing this podcast on iTunes and Spotify, it helps others find us and convince guests to come on the show! Follow us on Instagram, LinkedIn or TwitterEmail  Vidit directly at vidit@curiositycenter.xyz or contact us via www.curiositycenter.xyz to discuss sponsorship opportunities, recommend future guests and share how we can improve. ***Welcome to episode #93 w Kelly Godfrey! Please enjoy. ***TIMESTAMPS02:02 - What was your first job and now? 02:40 - High Flyer in xx life 03:34 - Family memories 05:16 - Mum’s influence 07:19 - Gymnasts training 4x a week 08:46 - London and Brighton 10:41 - Success at age 18 12:03 - Painful learning 14:48 - Becoming Marketing Director within 6 years 18:09 - Building social capital 21:52 - Agency to in house marketing 25:33 - Leading marketing for ancestry.com 29:15 -  Role of marketing in customer discovery 30:35 - Moving roles and countries at same time 35:15 - Success in first 3 months of new role 40:34 - Taking a sabbatical in 2018 46:57 - Exploring opportunities post sabbatical 50:47 - Learnings about growth in new markets 54:00 - StockX being at the cutting edge of culture 56:07 - Rapid fire 

Explore your curiosity with Elise Kennedy, who leads the Australian equity research team covering tech and internet stocks at the investment bank, Jarden. I really wanted to have Elise on because equity markets, inflation, interest rates, and the general economy are a hot topic of interest.Learn about the status of current markets and why we’re in this position, how are companies rated as under or over valued, the role of M&A and leveraged buyouts during volatility, geographical impact, tourist investors perhaps exiting the market and more. Please enjoy! ***Find out more about Curiosity Center, including 90+ episodes at www.curiositycenter.xyz Find out more about Jarden at https://www.jardengroup.com.au/Share your feedback and discuss sponsorship opportunities with us by directly emailing vidit@curiositycenter.xyzFollow the show on Linkedin / Instagram / Twitter***TIMESTAMPS01:46 - Elise’ path into investment banking 02:56 - Life as an associate 03:52 - Life now as Vice President 04:32 - Perception vs reality of titles like Managing Director 05:15 - Overview of current markets (public and private) 07:18 - Tech companies seeing sell offs despite strong fundamentals 09:09 - How do investment banks rate a stock as under or overvalued? 11:55 - Tech pull back vs broader economy 14:12 - Inflation impact on the consumer 16:07 - Geographical impact and correlation between Australia and the US 18:18 - Does Elise’ role change in an up vs down market 19:29 - The role of M&A and leveraged buyouts in volatility 21:32 - Opportunities for VC’s deploying capital at better valuations 23:51 - “Tourist” investors leaving the market 25:14 - Super funds tightening capital allocation 26:56 - Cross over funds requiring re-alignment of exposure 27:36 - Metrics of EBITDA, Price to earnings ratio, CAGR 29:09 - Filtering through speculation 32:30 - Structuring work week and reports Elise reads 34:05 - Elise using her recreational pilots license to switch off 36:00 - Personal areas of investment interest 

Explore your curiosity with Gael Aitor, one of 5 hosts of the largest teen mental health podcast in the world called Teenager Therap, based in the US. We connected a few months ago through a mutual friend and this was great fun.Learn about how they started this podcast and movement in their quest to talk about and Improve mental heath, their 3 biggest learnings to date, actionable insights on how we can all improve our mental health and we went deep into the state of podcasting, media and some of the innovation and trends we’re excited to see. Please enjoy! ***Find out more about Curiosity Center, including 90+ episodes at www.curiositycenter.xyz Find out more about Teenager Therapy at https://teenagertherapy.com/Share your feedback and discuss sponsorship opportunities with us by directly emailing vidit@curiositycenter.xyzFollow the show on Linkedin / Instagram / Twitter***TIMESTAMPS01:46 - Moving to the US from Mexico at age 16 02:30 - Starting the largest teen mental health podcast (globally) 02:50 - Discovering podcasts for the first time 04:18 - Biggest learnings about the root cause behind mental health issues 08:30 - Core root causes of a lack of mental health amongst all age groups 10:40 - how to improve your mental health space 14:38 - Balancing performance with inner relaxation 15:51 - How mental health differs based on culture and country 18:26 - The role of social media in vulnerability and connection 22:45 - Seeking approval as a creator based on likes and comments 24:07 - Most exciting trends over next 12 months in podcasts and media 27:35 - Changing landscape of media and discovery limitations 31:15 - Building a niche vs generalist show 33:21 - Vidit & Gael riff on what they’d love to have in podcasts 

Thank you for rating / reviewing this podcast on iTunes and Spotify, it helps others find us and convince guests to come on the show! Follow us on Instagram, LinkedIn or TwitterEmail  Vidit directly at vidit@curiositycenter.xyz or contact us via www.curiositycenter.xyz to discuss sponsorship opportunities, recommend future guests and share how we can improve. ***Welcome to episode #90 w Dom Pym! Please enjoy. ***TIMESTAMPS03:09 - Where were you born and live now? 03:33 - What was your first job and now? 05:20 - High Flyer in Dom’s life 07:34 - Growing up in the mountains 09:25 - Rich dad poor dad 13:33 - Always being a bullet train 16:46 - Meeting now wife when they were 6 yrs old 19:20 - 3 traits for his kids to have 22:00 -  First trip overseas, to South Korea 27:37 -  Getting through bad days and pain 30:01 - Setting goals monthly, quarterly and annually 38:43 - Importance of healthy body and mind to be successful 41:25 - How to scale Dom to have the most impact and get the rest he deserves? 43:19 - How to build trust from scratch? 46:11 - Inspiration for the creativity of Up Bank 51:30 - Biggest commercial difference between physical and digital bank 54:46 - First time investing in startups and how it happened 1:00:52 - How to add value beyond capital 01:01:48 - Final sprint 

Explore your curiosity about the community centred startup Dan & his co-founders are building in Earlywork, that’s scaled from 0 to 3000 members.I’ve enjoyed being a member of this community from the early days so this was fun to learn more about how the co-founders compliment each other, Dan’s personal learning journey, why raising funding is not the mark of success, managing quantity vs engagement and more. Please enjoy! ***Find out more about Curiosity Center, including 85+ episodes at www.curiositycenter.xyz Find out more about the Earlywork at https://www.earlywork.co/Share your feedback and discuss sponsorship opportunities with us by directly emailing vidit@curiositycenter.xyzFollow the show on Linkedin / Instagram / Twitter***TIMESTAMPS01:54 - Sydney, Wollongong and Bondi 03:08 - Siblings being high flyers 04:25 - Tattoos and creative 04:58 - Unknowns of co-founding team at EW 08:26 - Founding team being a community, building a community 11:31 - Dan’s own personal learning journey 14:23 - Founders 12 months ahead as support 15:49 - Growth & fundraising for a community first startup 19:33 - Initial investment not being success 24:46 - Hardest learning to date 27:48 - Revenue models for community based startup 30:02 - Managing quantity vs engagement 33:08 -Anonymity in community 36:10 - Founders not being the first line of contact 38:07 - Key opportunity in next 12 months 39:39 - Two questions Dan gets the most 42:00 - Most engaged social platforms beyond slack

Thank you for rating / reviewing this podcast on iTunes and Spotify, it helps others find us and convince guests to come on the show! Follow us on Instagram, LinkedIn or TwitterEmail  Vidit directly at vidit@curiositycenter.xyz or contact us via www.curiositycenter.xyz to discuss sponsorship opportunities, recommend future guests and share how we can improve. ***Welcome to episode #88 w James Tynan! Here are 5 key takeaways you will learn from this episode:1. Growing up in an ambitious household, being very driven from day 12. Why James felt the need to move to the US post university3. Key learning from scaling Khan Academy from a YouTube channel to the world’s biggest ed tech (at that time)4. Energy management learnings from dealing with a number of autoimmune illnesses5. Behind the scenes of James' workings with founders & personal development areasPlease enjoy!***TIMESTAMPS02:58 - Fun facts about James 03:38 - Wife Kate being a high flyer 04:33 - Big change when James was 10 years old 05:20 - Parents in architecture and medicine 05:44 - Personality in high school 06:36 - Biggest influence in first 10 years 07:42 - Success at age 18 09:41 - How life changed in first year of university 11:38 - Learning movement building with Obama 2008 campaign 13:17 - 4 key learnings from scaling Khan Academy, joining very early 16:50 - Critical story that helped understand emotional intelligence 19:16 - How the move back to Australia happened 20:31 - Seeing the building of Australia’s startup ecosystem in 2014 22:36 - Energy vs time management 25:23 - Why energy management hacks are not useful 27:50 -  Balance in Health vs performance 29:28 - Transition from startmate to squarepeg 32:11 - Joining Squarepeg during COVID lockdowns 34:14 - Making founders comfortable in the 1st meeting 36:47 - Connection to younger vs seasoned founders 39:40 -  How does SquarePeg  differ to other big VC’s? 42:49 - SquarePeg’s global presence across ANZ, Israel and Singapore 43:58 - Analysis of current economic market 45:47 - Does the VC firm or partner matter more? 49:02 - Personal investment philosophy outside VC 51:12 - Thesis on climate-tech 54:57 - Area of improvement focus 57:45 - Final sprint 

Explore your curiosity about the exciting culinary marketplace they’re building, positioned as the amazon for food.You’ll learn about the journeys of Joint CEO/Co-founders Elle Curan and Josh Abulafia to founding ChefPrep, initial proof points in the first 3 months, how food is disrupting e-commerce, What questions should a restaurant ask before partnering, and hear about their hiring plans over the next 12 months. Please enjoy! ***Find out more about Curiosity Center, including 85+ episodes at www.curiositycenter.xyz Find out more about the ChefPrep at https://chefprep.com.au/Share your feedback and discuss sponsorship opportunities with us by directly emailing vidit@curiositycenter.xyzFollow the show on Linkedin / Instagram / Twitter***TIMESTAMPS02:02 - Elle’s journey to ChefPrep 06:19 - Being life and business partners 06:52 - Josh’s journey to ChefPrep 11:30 - Validating early proof points in ChefPrep 16:38 - The ChefPrep model and how it’s evolved 21:35 - Consumer behavior and range selection 27:52 - What questions should a restaurant ask before partnering? 31:46 - Managing volume vs quality when scaling 33:16 - Biggest learning to date 34:32 - Focuses on hiring over next 12 months 35:42 - How to consider the move from corporate to startups?  

Thank you for rating / reviewing this podcast on iTunes and Spotify, it helps others find us and convince guests to come on the show! Follow us on Instagram, LinkedIn or TwitterEmail Vidit directly at vidit@curiositycenter.xyz or contact us via www.curiositycenter.xyz to discuss sponsorship opportunities, recommend future guests and share how we can improve. ***Welcome to episode #86 w Kate Cornick! Here are 5 key takeaways you will learn from this episode:1. Grandma’s influence to believe, and outdoorsy childhood with mad passionate for animals2. Accidentally falling into engineering after moving to Australia in her teens from the UK3. How shyness evolved and building public speaking skills (great tips for anyone looking to develop!)4. Building a life of work across academia, business and government, including deputy Chief of Staff 5. Being headhunted to be CEO @ LaunchVic role after moving on from scaling her startup through to IPOPlease enjoy!***TIMESTAMPS03:07 - Fun facts about Kate 03:39 - Re-imagining a high flyer 04:14 - Influence of family growing up in London 06:00 -  Learning responsibility and power of work through horses 07:40 - Grandma being a big influence to dream big 10:24 - Accidentally falling into engineering 11:56 - How Kate got past being shy and nervous 17:00 - Nerves are selfish 18:00 - Success post PhD 22:04 - Learning how to build trust from politics 29:09 -  Exterior vs Interior leadership 33:18 - Insecurity becoming arrogance 38:30 - Understanding the business and academic worlds 43:38 -  Being headhunted to lead LaunchVic as CEO 48:28 - LaunchVic funding startmate and other champions 50:45 - The unique unlock of government funding for a startup 54:50 - Final sprint