The Happy Entrepreneur

How do we put down our armour of self-sufficiency and competence?While it protects us from challenges and shields us from criticism, it also cuts us off from deep connection and essential support.We think that we need the armour to “hold ourselves together” because if we “let go”, we might not be able to pull ourselves together again.Holding it all in affects our ability to be creative, make healthy business decisions, and have lives which spring from our core values.Holding it all in is a form of unkindness to ourselves because we’re not allowing ourselves to show weakness. We’re telling ourselves that weakness is bad.Holding it all in means we don’t really get to see what’s inside.We cut ourselves off from our sense of inner knowing, and from really knowing others.We are social animals that have evolved to survive as a group. Not as individuals.But in the modern world of the hyper-successful founders and all-knowing influencers we’ve forgotten this.We’ve forgotten how to be really happy  because we’re too busy striving.To experience real happiness we need to experience all three directions of kindness: giving to others, giving to ourselves, and receiving.Which means from time to time we need to put our armour down.On this episode of the podcast, we’re joined by Anya Pearse, an intuitive advisor, Head of Positive Psychology at The Museum of Happiness, and Fellow of the Positive Psychology Guild.She has reframed her 15 years of disability through chronic illness into a spiritual path, combining a researcher’s curiosity, a poet’s turn of phrase, and a comic’s sense of timing to explore and share positive psychology and self-compassion with others.At the Happy Startup School we believe that community is foundational to helping creative entrepreneurs thrive in this modern money-driven world.We’re not built of the same stuff as the unicorn driving silicon valley founders or the hard nosed CEOs of the corporate world.We crave connection and we thrive on mutual support.In our conversation we explore how kindness and compassion are essential to our way of doing and being in business.

Writing a book takes time and effort.And life's too short to write a book that no one will read.On this episode, we invited someone to help us understand how to minimise the risk of writing books that aren't actually useful or reach their audience.His name is Rob Fitzpatrick and he's the author of Write Useful Books, The Workshop Survival Guide and one that we've been recommending for years, The Mom Test.Carlos has been reading his latest book Write Useful Books and thought it was a really useful  take on how to approach writing non-fiction that helps people.He combines the product design, lean strategy and marketing concepts to provide a practical and structured approach that helps you focus on writing something of value.Rob is an entrepreneur of 14 years and has written three books about his learnings along the way, including the best-selling handbook for doing better Customer Development, The Mom Test: How to talk to customers and figure out if your business is a good idea when everyone is lying to you.Back in 2007, he dropped out of grad school to go through YCombinator with his first startup, and has been building products and businesses ever since. Beyond software, he has also kickstarted a physical card game, built an education agency, and more.A programmer by training, Rob was forced to learn enterprise sales the hard way at his first company. With a foot in each of those worlds, and with his experience both bootstrapping and raising funding across a wide range of products, industries, and business models, he offers an broad and balanced view of the entrepreneurial journey.

We’re joined by Tad Hargrave, founder of Marketing for Hippies, who shares his thoughts on how to market well so that sales becomes effortless. We talk about purpose, problems, premise and promise.Our obsession with selling tactics is actually compensation for our poor marketing.When we’re having to work hard to “convince” people of the value of our work then we’re probably talking to the wrong people.As a creative or purpose-driven entrepreneur you’re repulsed by the idea of manipulating people or having to convince them to buy from you.And so you’re put off the idea of “selling”.Unfortunately selling has for a long time been associated with winning and losing; a dominance game of who has the strongest influence.But where is the consent?If you’re doing hard sales it feels like trying to get the other person to agree with the choice you’ve already made for them. It’s a mission to hear your words come out of their mouths.Is that the kind of selling you want to do?If you’re like us this feels awful and unethical.But you don’t have to do it that way.You can actually do sales better if you go for truth rather than persuasion.You need to tell your truth and the truth of your work in a way that it connects with the right people.And that’s all about marketing and storytelling.When done well you can stop “selling”.All you do is just connect your truth with the truth of your customers. When they’re ready they’ll work with you.

Most creative and purpose-driven entrepreneurs love coming up with new ideas and working with their customers and clients.But they hate sales, marketing and working on finances and spreadsheets.They also complain about cashflow, profitability and burnout.Their wheels are spinning because they focus on a narrow aspect of their business (delivery and ideas).And they ignore all the other bits that they consider “boring” or “uninspiring” or “difficult” (finances, marketing, positioning, selling, recruitment etc…).There’s a massive imbalance in where they put their attention and energy.Alan, our mentor and friend, joins us to help you learn to love all of the business of business.He lays out the different building blocks of your business and helps you appreciate the bits you shy away from, and how working on them can bring more ease to your life.

How do we realise worthwhile ideas in the world? Define a goal, create a plan, build a great team? That's how we're told to do it. How about instead, we listen to what we're really called to do?Tom Nixon is an entrepreneur, founder of org-chart startup Maptio, and the author of the book Work with Source, which introduces a new perspective on being a founder, based on research conducted by Peter Koenig.Chatting with Laurence and Carlos, he discusses how finding and cultivating sources of creativity leads to greater autonomy and happiness, and the balance that needs to be struck between giving people creative freedom, and not sufficiently defining roles.Go furhterGail Bradbrook, founder of Extinction RebellionYvon Chouinard, founder of PatagoniaWL Gore: the company others try and fail to imitateFanny NorlinRocket Fuel: The One Essential Combination That Will Get You More of What You Want from Your Business, by Gino Wickman

What if you don’t agree with mainstream definitions of success?What if, when looking at what everyone seems to value and strive for, you start to feel like “do I actually belong here?”You see the well trodden path to successThe one validated by the hundreds of thousands that have gone before you. Each of their steps deepening the footprints of those that went before. As if this is the only way.But it isn’t.Not everyone has a path dictated to them by others.And some of us don’t even know what path we want to take.Instead we take a more creative and emergent route.Also known as the experimental path.The opposite is the conceptual path; you formulate a vision of what you want to accomplish and then work backwards to plan all the steps to get there.However, if you have no vision of the future the only way forward is to just choose the next step based on what feels right.This isn’t for everyone as it’s much more uncertain and possibly much slower.It’s like following the small country lanes instead of the motorway.In this episode of the podcast we unpack the ideas of a conceptual vs experimental type of person with Kendra Patterson, founder of the Stepping Off Now podcast.We also talk about being a late bloomer and how she came to living a more emergent life.Some key points from the episode:Kendra remembers feeling like a late bloomer at the age of 22, and while working on her PhD suffered a significant period of burnout which led to her resetting her own career expectations.Honestly, I had no vision for the future.Kendra had to redefine for herself what success meant, and avoid judging her own success by what she thought were clear examples of having "made it". For her, a linear trajectory where one thing built to the next simply wasn't reflected in her actual life experience.I'm gonna do what feels good to me.Kendra had to discover a sense of faith that the next moment would bring her what she needed, so she created her own guidepost to lead her forwards.F you guys, I'm just gonna do my own thing!As a novelist, Kendra has had to deal with gatekeepers who make a decision on what's "worth" publishing, and what isn't. Many of those gatekeepers faced similar challenges in the past, and have now pulled the ladder up from beneath them. For Kendra, self-publishing her work has enabled her to reach more readers, free of those gatekeepers.Some useful links from this episode:The Surrender Experiment by Michael A. SingerEmergent Strategy: Shaping change, changing worldsKendra's websiteKendra's podcast - Stepping off now

Are you a company of one?From Paul Jarvis’ book of the same name a company of one is a founder who does not believe in growth for growth’s sake.Their goal is to build a company that is focused on being better rather than bigger.In this episode of the podcast I talk to one of our Happy Startup members who’s taken the company of one mission to heart.From this conversation you’ll hear about why Francois decided to work for himself, what he’s learned about authenticity in business and why he’s valued being part of a business community that doesn’t just offer support at the business level but also at a personal one.If you’re on the Company of One journey and currently finding it a lonely and challenging path then this episode is for you.Francois Souyri is the founder of Paperblade. He empowers businesses who use Office 365 to use the technology to operate and grow more effectively. Rather than waste time trying to solve IT problems he’ll free you up to work on the more important things.If you want his help and support go to 365coach.me for immediate Office 365 support or paperblade.com for strategic IT consultancy.

How can we challenge the idea that in business only the unkind and ruthless rise to the top while the caring and compassionate get overlooked.In this beautiful conversation with Christina Kisley and Graham Allcott we explore why we need to find more kindness in business and why we’re less likely to hear about kind leaders than unkind ones.In actual fact there are more kind leaders than we think and we need to make people more aware that kindness is compatible with business success.While being kind may not immediately increase your profits it will make your business more sustainable and resilient.We talk about the difference between being kind and being nice and we also discuss what it means to be compassionate at work.This conversation is about the soft, yet powerful, aspect of business that few people are good at but more of us need to learn. How we can be strong leaders yet sit with people who are struggling?Christina is a leadership coach helping purpose driven organisations work more effectively.Graham, as well as founder of Think Productive, is also author of Productivity Ninja and is helping transform the productivity and wellbeing of people and organisations.

This episode of the podcast is a recording from our Friday Fireside way back in November last year.We were joined by our good friend Ole Kassow, an inspiration to us ever since we started The Happy Startup School back in 2012.He’s the founder of Cycling Without Age, a movement on a mission to create a world where the elderly remain an active part of society and the local community.Since 2012 it’s grown from a single cargo bike in Copenhagen to 2000 chapters in 50 countries, serving over 1.5 million people worldwide.But when Ole first started it wasn’t meant to turn into a movement. It was just an experiment to see if he could put a smile on the face of an elderly gentleman by getting him on a bike.Retrofitting a cargo bike with a seat he took the man out for a spin which not only put a smile on the old man’s face, but also on Ole’s.The rest is now history.Listen to this episode to learn what it really takes to be a changemaker.You don’t always need big plans to create systemic change. Think big, but start small. In Ole’s experience most stories of systemic change have started with an individual trying to solve a very specific problem with a simple solution.Also, it isn’t just about creating impact for others but also about finding joy in the work. You’re then more likely to keep doing it and also recruit others easily.Find a solution that inspires people.Ole encourages budding change makers to connect their personal story to their story of change. This makes the work feel more meaningful and it also makes it easier to connect with others.You can find out more about Ole and his work here - https://cyclingwithoutage.org/

Eiji Han Shimizu is a purpose driven filmmaker and creative entrepreneur who discovered the many different ways we find happiness by making the movie Happy.During this conversation we find out about his pursuit of happiness and how he got greedy for it.Having ticked off all the different paths to happiness the last one on his bucket list was to find meaning.He says that we all have different elements to our lives that seem like a set of senseless dots but when you’re able to connect them that’s when we find meaning and purpose and achieve the focus to make the impossible happen.His latest movie is True North, a manga style animation about the plight of political prisoners in North Korean concentration camps. Animated movies are expensive to make and having been unsuccessful in finding a backer he had to bootstrap its production. While the budget required was still beyond his savings he found a way.It was his calling and it helped him “make sense of his silly life”.He shares many pearls of wisdom during this episode one of them being that when things get hard the secret to keeping going is to play the theme tune to the Indiana Jones movie in your head. That’s the soundtrack to success.