Jules Lund - business, balance and being the boss

Jules: Wait a minute!

Tommy: Crossface!

Jules: The Daily Talk Show, a conversation sometimes worth recording with Josh Janson and Tommy Jackett.

Josh: The Daily Talk Show, everyone. Oh, Jules Lund, what's going on?

Jules: How come you're the only one with headphones on?

Josh: Uh, because I'm the only one trusted to to monitor this shit.

Tommy: Yeah, and I don't care enough. I was having drinks with your wife the other day, Jewel.

Jules: Whoa!

Tommy: There was other people there, kids involved, my wife.

Jules: Hang on a second, this sounds—

Josh: Outrageous.

Tommy: And you were nowhere to be seen, you were in New York, we were sending you photos. But on that day, I worked out something.

Jules: Finally.

Tommy: Well, I joined some dots. Anna told me that when her waters broke and she was in labor, that you were on the phone to Josh Janson.

Jules: Yep.

Tommy: Josh Janson was on the phone to me when Amy's waters broke.

Jules: You are an inducer.

Josh: It's true.

Jules: JJ the inducer. So what happens is when you're well overdue, you just get on the phone to Josh Janson and your waters break.

Josh: Don't even have to be there in person. It's pretty amazing.

Jules: You just get the partner to get on the phone and just you, all of a sudden, Humans are so excited to meet this person, Josh Janson. They just come flying out of—

Josh: It's true, flying out of what? Well, out of wherever.

Jules: I'll Google it.

Josh: No, 'cause even Tommy called, went to, so he said, "Mate, I've gotta go. Amy's water's just broken." Hung up, but then was nice enough to call me back on the way to the hospital.

Tommy: We were in the car.

Jules: And see, I was the same. I mean, as you know, I micromanaged you for years. And even through my wife's labor, I was saying, just cut another— just a second out of that edit. Just cut a second out of it.

Tommy: So there's a connection to you, Jules, through Josh working at the radio station together.

Josh: Yeah.

Tommy: And then you and I, we've had our connections over the years. Yeah, working together.

Josh: The way you're saying it sounds seedy.

Jules: Yeah, it's more like friendship. I think they call it friendship. Yeah, I know.

Tommy: I've been trying leverage for you. Yeah, exactly.

Josh: Classic sort of leverage. It's a Friday. I feel like blood sugar's low. Need to pump it up, get a bit of energy.

Tommy: Like after 4 o'clock on a Friday. And I know ABC—

Jules: How much energy do you usually have?

Josh: More.

Jules: Really?

Josh: Yeah, absolutely.

Jules: But you haven't had sugar for 4 years.

Josh: No, as I said, I've been zigging and zagging. I had a little bit of chocolate just before.

Jules: And are you about to drop? Are you falling into a coma?

Josh: Exactly. But we had some delicious uh, Guzman and Gomez. Yeah, yeah, which was, uh, had the enchilada.

Jules: Are you hoping to get a sponsor?

Tommy: I've been hoping for 100 and something episodes.

Josh: We did it. We didn't tell Hamish, but during his episode we mentioned Nando's a lot, and then I sent it to Nando's. Yeah, no, uh, you got a good plug.

Tommy: No bite. But we're sitting here in the boardroom of the office of the company you founded.

Jules: Yep.

Tommy: Which, um, we're just, we're just talking about the growth of the office spaces. You started out in this little, in a little corner, then you went to a bigger one down an alleyway.

Josh: Yeah.

Tommy: And then you've come back and taken the whole floor of a building in South Melbourne.

Jules: Yeah. And ironically, where we started was in the corner of this very floor, but it was tiny. And then, yeah, we came back. It was an exciting day actually, because we grew so quickly. I think we were here for a few months and then we went up the road for about a year. But in that year, I think we must have been hiring 2 people a week, and it just grew so quick. And so we didn't realize, we thought that that was going to be our office. It was sort of 3 stories, and there was one toilet. We're like, ah, come on, there's only 15 of us. And then all of a sudden it just started to get up to 35, and it was horrendous. Like, by the end, the noise, because you've got salespeople, you know, the echo. And we were, it was, and so then We sort of, yeah, we redesigned here and then we came back in here. I mean, you look at this, it's my favourite part of—

Josh: Is it Albert Park? Is that technically where we are?

Jules: Well, it's South Melbourne, but on one side we're overlooking Albert Park Lake and it looks beautiful. And then on the other side, you're looking at the cityscape and you've got light on both sides.

Tommy: Or as you would've said on Getaway, it doesn't get any better than this.

Jules: G'day guys, after the break, Katrina takes us to family-friendly Fiji.

Josh: You do it really well. I guess it was, it really was you.

Jules: Yeah, it was, mate.

Josh: Yeah. The funny thing about, it's interesting to hear what people bring up when they talk about, you know, starting a company. Tribe is the name of the business. Do you get uncomfortable when people look at certain metrics? Say for instance, the amount of employees you have or the size of the space?

Tommy: Or the money you've raised?

Jules: Um, I'll look, to be honest, it's, I mean, it's, where do you start? As I say to Tommy often, I mean, it's a real frightening experience. You know, like I open the kimono often, like I was at a HubSpot event yesterday talking and everyone's like, you know, congratulations. And I'm like, man, we're in survival mode. No matter how good it goes in a startup world, you're in a survival mode and it can just, you know, there's not much margin for error. And we, I actually think we're doing everything right and it's really intense. It's like a pressure cooker. So you're absolutely right. I mean, you know, we, everyone picks at one edge of it. So VCs will pick at certain things, the media will pick at others. And like, I'm pretty clear on my vision, but I'm never really comfortable with where we're at. So I feel vulnerable. You know, you have a huge sense of doubt, you know, at every sort of stage. And it's really, I mean, I've learned a lot and I've grown a lot. Like it's completely transformed everything in between my ears over the last 3 years. I've had to mature a lot. I mean, like you guys knew, like I have genuinely changed so much because like I used to think I'd work hard you know, in radio, but it was all just shock value. It was all attention-seeking, whereas that quality is so destructive in a company. Yeah, like, I can't shock value. At what point, like, I'll just be sued? Yeah, like, you know, like, and, and as a leader, you realize, wow, like, you go, oh, this would be great, I'm, I'm leaving the, the pressure of 9 to 5, and then you go, oh, this is 24/7. And then you go, I don't have to work for the man, the boss. And then you work for 60.

Josh: Yeah.

Jules: Because every one of your employees, you're responsible for. And you know what, how the mood you're in, how you articulate things. And as you guys know, I've never been a great leader like that because I'm so task orientated and I've got OCD that I can, you know, I've had to unpick so much of my, horrendous management skills, which is, you know, but has been the biggest part of this journey, which is being so aware of my influence. And when you're a part of a business, if you don't get it right, you can't just sort of hump, you know, huff and puff.

Tommy: As a leader, are you shielding your employees?

Jules: No.

Tommy: From any of this stuff?

Jules: Nah, tell them.

Josh: Well, because the thing is, because if you shield them —then I've seen it within businesses where if people don't have a sense of the success and the metric and sales, like if people don't know that like, oh, if we don't get enough sales, we're not going to be a business for much longer, like bringing that stuff forward. Do you have dashboards and shit?

Jules: Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's all up there on the— I mean, we're incredibly transparent, like Adam Ferrier, you know, Adam, who's a consumer psychologist, great author, and he's got Thinkable, which is one of the leading creative agencies. In the country, but he's on our board. And when he first came in here, he just couldn't believe it. We'd all be sitting around, he'd come to one of our sessions and we'd have 25, 30 staff and he'd be sitting there and me and Ant, our CEO, would just be sitting there and just going, this is where we're struggling and this. And we would literally tell him every step of the journey. And he just couldn't believe that we were being so open and honest. And I think in the startup world, that's a real positive thing because Everyone knows the impact and I tell people it's fragile. Like, you know, I go, guys, this is the journey. Like it could stop at any point, give it your best. And I, yeah, I think that's a more valuable process to go through. 'Cause I want all of those people to understand how businesses work. I don't want them to just go, I know how to be a graphic designer. And I want everyone to be exposed to different departments. 'Cause my view is I'd love them to go out there and start their own business or grow or scare themselves. And what great value to be exposed exposed to the inner workings.

Josh: Yeah. Is that, do you have like a, you know, people talk about runways and shit like that. Like how can you, how do you measure how worried to be on a given day?

Jules: Well, yeah, your runway. Yeah. Yeah. When you're running out of money.

Josh: And is it sick, like in this sort of business, is it 6 months? Is it 12 months? Is it, we know we can pay salaries for 18 months?

Jules: Yeah, it's like 12 months. Yeah. You know, like, But it's a sickening feeling because you have, it's this strange conundrum where, how's the best way to explain it? So you raise money by saying, we're gonna hit these targets by this time. And they go, that's awesome. Well, if you're gonna hit those targets, we're gonna give you money. Then you take the money and then you go, right, we're gonna hit those targets. And you start to work towards those targets.. But then you start to realize, hang on a sec, we're, um, uh, it's— we're not, we're not either meeting them or we're not, um, exceeding them.

Josh: Well, the focus can be wrong too. Like, the thing, it's that classic thing of— and this happens within relationships too with Bree. Like, I was one— at one point I'm like, let's—

Tommy: you've used these relationships as a startup. Exactly. Let's, let's—

Jules: how much longer you got?

Josh: Exactly. I've got to run away of probably 3 months. No, but it's It's that thing of I'll say, I think we should pack everything up. We don't need a house. We don't need, let's fucking go nomad. Let's do all that sort of thing. And then it's probably Bree invests in this idea and then 6 months' time I've worked out some other thing. I'm like, actually, I think a house could be good, but maybe it should be an investment property. Is it a little bit of that vibe? Do you sort of?

Jules: Nah. No. No, only because we've, I'm so clear on the vision of this that we haven't— the, the app and the model that I designed before we even got Tommy Jacket to film some screen grabs on an iPhone to make it look like an app. Yeah. For the first round of investment has not changed. I'm so clear on it, and I don't care about all the distraction. I don't care what the rest of the world is doing. I, I'm so convinced that what I'm working towards— the trick is when you don't reach those targets, right? You go, right, no worries, we have to grow more and work harder, which costs more money. And so now you're racing faster towards the edge of a cliff, but you have to, to be able to get a launchpad to say, we've hit those targets. So next time you go out to raise money, they say, we raised this money 'cause we said we're gonna do it. Guess what? We did it. Now we want this amount of money 'cause now we're gonna go here. And so it's a really, interesting, um, uh, strategy there because you can't slow down, you have to speed up. And so that, that gives me, that gives me sleepless nights.

Tommy: Well, I mean, I'm sure a lot of people are, and I've even asked you this, what's it valued at now, the company? And not that you have to answer it, but I've seen you kind of like, oh, it's like you don't even want to go there because you're focusing on getting ahead, you know, that 12-month period. And you've seen how volatile the startup world is.

Jules: Yeah, yeah, like there's— I mean, it's really, it's really fragile. And you know, you're not— like, I was speaking to a friend this morning who's, you know, building a marketplace, and you know, I was— I don't know if I would have chosen it had I known the day-to-day I mean, I get— I— because it's a very different business. Like, I can be passionate about content and I want to change the face of advertising, but I'm in the business world and I wasn't born necessarily for that. And, you know, I've spent a lot of time doing raising and having conversations that isn't actually my superpower. So it's sort of, you know, there's 3 parts to it. There is the vision, the strategy, and what you're building. And I'm really excited by that. I love doing that and how you communicate that. That's me. Second one is operationally how you build the teams and then, you know, you'll train people and they'll be awesome and then they'll want to move on to the next adventure and then you have to replace them. And so you got to get the culture right. So that's the second pillar. And the third pillar is just the fuel, like it's all of the funding. So you've got to raise capital and sometimes they can be out of balance. But, you know, I wanted the first one, but yet you can't get to it unless you get all these other things right.

Tommy: And And so if you're looking at where you are now, and I know you said that to me the other week, if I knew it was going to be this hard, maybe I wouldn't have put my foot in.

Jules: Well, I think I would have. I just, you know, I just feel tortured by the sacrifice.

Tommy: But if you look back on Getaway and the radio and all of those things, do you think— is there a similarity in the early days?

Josh: Your memoir could be just entitled Tortured. Self-tortured. But because that's part of the journey, like, you probably wouldn't have it any other way. You're just moving from Yeah, different versions of torture, which is actually where you get off, where you get excited.

Jules: I must, because I— no matter what I do, I find the tension. Like, I just put myself on the other side of the comfort circle, the comfort zone, and I just, I just exist in this sense. It's so strange, it's so fucked up.

Tommy: Did it start somewhere as a conscious thing to go, I'm going to put my hand up first, or I'm going to— yeah, be it the first.

Jules: No, I think it was Jim Steinz's fault. 'Cause, you know, Jimbo as a mentor was always like, you can be better than this, you can do more. And he'd sort of push me out of my comfort zone and he'd go, you know, enough times where I go, wow, I actually can do that. And he'd say, yeah. And then I'd be comfortable that, you know, that breadth. So, you know, you step out of your comfort zone, do it enough times, and then you're comfortable doing it, which means the circle grows. And so it was always that stepping out and I just continue to do it. And I think I'm an opportunist. I get excited. I have an idea like you guys. You know, packing up your house and living like a nomad. We get off, we get intoxicated, and the feeling of excitement and, you know, those thoughts in your brain where you go, that's an amazing thought and I can do that. Like, I have the gifts or the talents to actually make that happen, and I'm excited by that. Once you see that, it takes a very disciplined person to say no. And because you're so— it just drags you in. Um, and that's happened all through my life. Like, I was like, you know, I was doing graphic design, and then I was like, life coach, that looks awesome. And I did that for a while. Then I was like, I'll travel overseas. When I was traveling, I saw Jerry Springer, Ricky Lake, and all those guys doing TV, and I was like, ah, that looks fun. And then I did that for 10 years, and I was like, radio looks fun, I'll do that. And then in radio, I was like 'Yeah, maybe I'll create an app.' And you just— that— I just follow, I just follow the things that tickle my fancy.

Tommy: Well, like, he had that idea while you're doing radio because— exactly.

Josh: Yeah. Is it long-term thinking?

Jules: Yes, because, um, it takes a long time to reach what I want to do in it. So it is like— it's not like, 'I reckon I could do that,' because every goal is so ambitious that it takes me a while to get there. So it is long-term thinking, yeah.

Josh: And I guess the other interesting thing is with, say, Getaway, with the radio, you're getting the rewards then and there. You get a nice salary, you get to do— and the lifestyle is great. This is an interesting one because what you're sort of describing is the lifestyle is a little bit fucked, the monetary reward isn't necessarily there. So you've gotta have a long-term approach.

Jules: Yeah, it's like an all or nothing. Like you're literally, it is, you're banking up 3 or 4 or 5 years and you either get something massive or nothing. Like genuinely.

Josh: How will you feel if you get nothing?

Jules: I think a couple of things. I'd be pissed because I'd be pissed because if I get some money, I've bought myself some rest and actually quality of life, do you know what I mean? So, which I feel like I deserve and I don't need a lot of money, but I just, I would be pissed if I was like, oh shit, I've got less money now than when I started. So, and then I'd go, I've gotta now get back up and dust myself off quicker. Whereas if I do okay, I've bought myself some freedom. Right, so, um, I will have been transformed as a human. And, and, and I actually, strangely enough, even though I've, um, had to sacrifice a lot of time as a father and a husband and a friend and a son and a brother, um, I actually think I'm a better husband, father, brother, son because of, um, what this process has taught me. And, you know, as I've always said, it's not what you you get from it, it's who you become. And I'd be— I'm already very happy of who I've become, but the problem is I've learned so much, I've got such a great education, but the best thing that I could do with all of that learning is fucking never use it again. Because if it succeeded, I'm gonna throw my phone in a lake, I'm gonna have a bit of coin, I'm gonna do some passion projects, and I'm gonna be busy as hell but doing stuff with no pressure. And I reckon that that would be awesome. And so that's what I'm banking on. That's what I'm aiming for. I'd love to live in North Bondi around the sunshine, and I'd love to live a really good life, and I'd love to travel a lot each year.

Josh: And could you have not have done that with the sort of coin you made at Wim Radio?

Jules: I would have been close. I would have been— I probably couldn't have bought property necessarily in Bondi, but yeah, yeah, I could have been close.

Josh: 'Cause I wonder if it's that old case of you're never gonna arrive.

Jules: Yeah, I ask that question a lot to myself. I think I'm at the age, I don't know. I think I could manage it. When I started it, I thought, nah, I'd probably back it up with something else. But I don't know. I mean, Haim, I remember Haim. Haimish Blake, who was on your 100th episode. He talks about that as the greatest radio experience of his life, by the way.

Tommy: That's good. I mean, most people do when they come on the show.

Jules: Yeah, it's, um, this is my least favourite because I'm talking about work at work. It's great. Next time you come around here, could we just have beers and talk shit? Anyway, um, he, he— I remember, and you know, he's always, uh, wise beyond his years, but he was only about fucking 18, 19, and he remembered this storey that he rolled out to me at his house in Sydney, and it was like I might get this wrong, but it was like a shoeshiner, and the businessman's getting his shoes shiny. He said to the shoeshiner, you know, um, you know, what are you doing for the rest of the afternoon? And the guy goes, I'm gonna lie on the beach, just relax, enjoy life. And the businessman was like, man, you got to work hard. And the shoeshiner's like, why? Well, you work hard, you save some money. If you can save some money, you can start to buy some other kits, then you can hire some younger people. If you hire some younger people, then you build up a bit of a business, you know. And then all of a sudden, one day, you just, you know, you're up 'Are you able to just—' And the shoeshiner goes, 'What, sit on the beach, relax in the sun all day?' And the businessman goes, 'Yeah, yeah, what do you think I'm about to do?' Well, Hamish said on our show—

Tommy: I know you listen, so I'm just repeating it for you, Jules— that this is the year for him to do not much. Yeah. And I don't know how you'd go doing not much because you're a busy dude.

Jules: No, but that's where I have the fail-safe. As I said, I'm going to be very busy. See, I've got to be very busy. That's what I've got to do. I'll go mad. But it's— there's being busy and there's being stressed. See, for instance, if I was doing photo books, you know, of all of our adventures, if I was going on photo travelling trips, you know, if I was doing artwork, if I was mentoring younger people, if I was doing guest spots, that's being really busy, but none of that is stressful. You know, I would really enjoy that. And there would be expressions. I'd read a lot of books. I would try to get balanced. I'd probably learn how to do Photoshop and Final Cut Pro. And so I would definitely fill it with all those things, but I'd go at my own pace. And at the moment, I don't own my own time because I've chosen this ridiculous, ambitious project.

Tommy: Do you get sucked into the— it almost becomes the drug, the stress, the driver for you? Yeah, well, that's a question.

Jules: Like, I would definitely have to be conscious of that. Yeah, yeah. But there would be no— like, I would start to do the photo books and go, I reckon I could do an app for this. You know, I'm frustrated, I reckon there's an easy way. And then before you know it, like, like even just today I was thinking, man, if I wasn't doing this, I reckon I'd be out there creating swivels for TVs now that IGTV has just launched, Instagram TV. I said, this, you know, there's going to be so much content vertical. I said, the TVs in the house are going to want to swivel.

Tommy: Oh, I see. Yeah, I get it.

Jules: Yeah, if you get onto that early, you would be—

Josh: I could imagine you pivoting to that. Hey, it's Mr. Swivel here. G'day guys, swivelling jewels, eh?

Tommy: It doesn't get any better than this. We had Geoff Jowett on who grew his company Body Trim to $35 million rev per year and then lost it all. And he said, but one of the things he said was he's a drug addict Sex addiction. Sex addiction. He told you all this?

Josh: Yeah, he told us all this.

Tommy: He's done a full U-turn and he's broke and he has no money in his bank account, but he's happy.

Jules: But I don't blame him, he would have had a ball. He's saying he had a sex addiction. No, my point being, on drugs with heaps of cash.

Tommy: He said success came easy to me when I was young. And you could look at your success. You got— what age would you get on Getaway? 22, 23. And I mean, that's so young. Do you think stuff came easy to you? Do you think success— you do think you were around success quite early, and did it come easy to you, do you think?

Jules: Yes. Yeah, yeah, I attracted it. I was— it was amazing. Like, it was mind-blowing. There was a period there in my life where it was like I couldn't believe it. Like, I could not believe it.

Josh: Do you think you're a bit manic depressive? I know I am.

Jules: Oh yeah, um, without question, um, completely manic. But I remember at that period, like, even, even in the, the height of— even at the height of, um, adventure I remember being so depressed. My serotonin levels— like, I did— I was doing 2 travel shows at one stage. I think I did a— I did like 120 days of shooting in like every continent on the planet with 8 days off. So I was like, I'd be in the Luxor in Egypt, um, in a hot air balloon. 2 days later I'm hosting the red carpet of Logies, and then 3 days later I'm in a shark cage in Cape Town, Africa. And then I'd be off and I just travelled around the world doing that stuff. I remember at the end of it, I was, I was so depressed, insecure, couldn't remember half of it. It was, it was mad. But back to that, that early days of success, I think, yeah, I just— there was a universe thing that was happening, and it was, it was, it was uncanny. But the good thing is it was contagious too, because I was doing that. I obviously had got into a universal zone or something of belief around reach that it, it had— there was a group of us that were able to genuinely say, why not? And so it was really cool to see, see what happened off the back of that.

Tommy: Well, half the people who are in the radio industry, TV, you either grew up with them or best friends with them. Do you think— have you had that conversation around Hamish and Whipper and all those dudes going How the fuck did we all do this?

Jules: Well, I think we just looked at each other and went, easy, and why can't I? No, but it was, and it was, it was, it was belief, and it was unreal. And also, you know, there's plenty of talented— you know, you go out to pubs and you'll be sitting with someone laughing your head off, and there's plenty of talented people out there. It's just honestly, we just somehow— I won a comp, got the foot in the door. Um, everyone was talented, doing their own thing, ambitious like you guys are, doing all the exact same thing, and it just You know, at that time in, in the industry, it just— they needed a whole wave of, um, young blood. And then those guys trigger other people, and it's been awesome. It's great to sort of see that, um, that big posse in traditional media. How do you hire people?

Josh: How do you work out what a— because I guess there's a big difference between what you are in regards to doing your own thing versus if you might not necessarily make a great employee. So how do you work out what sort of people to bring into Tribe?

Tommy: Um, as he looks out to his employees.

Jules: Yeah, I mean, I don't know, I don't have to do a lot of the hiring.

Josh: Um, is it some of those belief sort of systems that you have, or this, this idea of you know, those things that you attribute to your success when you were younger, are there things that you can actually bring into this team? Are there active things that you bring in from Reach?

Jules: Yeah, not nearly enough. Like, I sometimes, I feel pretty guilty that there's not enough heart in the business because we're so frantic. But I always believed that I would have a company with a bit more depth and, you know, I don't feel like I've brought enough of that here. Luckily, they all love each other and they're investing in each other, but I reckon I could help influence a bit more of that. Um, but, um, you know, I think, I think, I think there's certain qualities that they see me express, um, that I think has a— well, what they tell me is it has a good influence over their perspective of the world. So the first one being, you know, being comfortable with being uncomfortable. Like, they understand that all of the growth, all of the gold dust in life comes from discomfort. You know, everything from Lucas looking opposite, you know, your partner, and, and for the first time telling them you love them. You know, that's, that's really vulnerable and uncomfortable, but that's the only way forward. And so, and that, that's for me. Having said that, as I said to you before, there's a lot of tension in that, but I, I love when my team I say to my team, right, what's your challenge for the next couple of months? 'Cause personal growth is such a big part of this company. Like we've got people that are moving on to other opportunities and we just cheer them because as long as they're scaring themselves, we're sad to see them leave. But you know, for people to come through here for a couple of years and then go and do something overseas or start their own business is really satisfying. And so Um, yeah, I love it when they— when I say, what's your challenge? And they say— and I, you know, often I'll say to some of the young guys, I want to see you on stage in front of 200 people. I want you to do this presentation on there, and I want you to be yourself and, and do what Jim did to me, which is just push myself a little bit, give you, give you, give you the, the belief, the faith that you can't fuck up, and, and the opportunity alone will, will help you develop into a better person. And so those things are good.

Josh: There seems to be a bit of a shift in the sense of maybe it's gone from you can't fuck up to you will fuck up and that's okay. Do you think that is that sort of a shift that you're seeing, or is that always the whole fail fast thing? Is this nothing new?

Jules: I was talking about this yesterday at this event, the fail fast. I mean, you guys know me. I don't— I don't— not only do I not want to fail, but I don't want anyone around me to fail. Like, I fucking hate it. My ego You know, I have a standard of what I want, and I don't care if anyone's watching it or not. Like, I want it to be good. I think if you don't do it good, what's the point in doing it? I'm trying to reconcile where I sit within that fail fast because we push hard, but I like to be considered. Like, I like to think things through rather than just throwing ourselves out there. I suppose maybe there's levels of it, but you know, you You know, like I said to the Toola team, we do this EDM, this email to all the content creators in Australia and the UK. And I just said to the sales directors in both those markets, you know, impressive young women. I'm like, "Man, you gotta just talk into a camera and send that." Like, "Don't do all this design. Just tell 'em you are so amazing, enthralling. They would love access to someone as, you know, such positive role models like you two women." So they're doing that and they're just talking to the camera. You know me, a few years ago I would have been too shaky, too this, too that and whatever. And I just look at it now and go, look at that, that is amazing, that's brilliant. We can polish it up in different ways, but give them no, they don't have to hit any benchmarks, do your best, put it out there. And because I now know that that's the growth for them and also that's my own personal growth, which is let's just get shit done. So I don't want them to fail in doing that. Um, but my idea of what failure was has definitely relaxed. What was it?

Tommy: What was the thought of failure for you?

Jules: Well, you got— I mean, like, micromanaging, and I still do it, but, you know, micromanaging things to, you know, dotting the i, crossing the t, and just being like— it's, it's not a— I have a different standard and I whip myself if I don't reach it. So, you know, I feel, feel for the people that are around me.

Tommy: I mean, you're pretty hard on yourself. When we went up to Sydney a couple of months ago, it was so interesting seeing you talk about what you're about to do, which was a talk in front of a bunch of people, and, oh, I haven't looked, I'm not over the script, and you nailed it. And I saw how hard on yourself you were And I was just like, that's a fucking joke. You aren't seeing what is reality. And I guess it maybe keeps you to a standard and allows you to go out and do that.

Jules: I, to be honest, I nailed it because of that. Well, that's my belief. So, but ironically, the way to trick me is to go, right, you're not allowed to do any prep and go up there and see how you go. And in times of that, like, I've nailed those too. So, but I don't feel confident, which is I don't trigger that the magic in me unless I feel, um, I feel prepared. And so the preparation is where I sap all my energy.

Josh: But the interesting thing about preparation, like, if you use the analogy of skateboarding, it's like, uh, if we know that you— if you're gonna do difficult tricks— I should— I'm the least fucking per— like, I shouldn't be talking about it. It's the only time I've been on a skateboard. But anyway, skate— using the skateboarding analogy, as if I was to skateboard— if you have had the— if you know what it feels like to fall and you can accept that, then all of a sudden you can go hard on the trick knowing that falling isn't actually going to be the worst thing ever. And so it's almost having that acceptance. I mean, I would find it interesting to get your take on entering the startup world, the technology world, this idea of minimum viable product, because it's probably everything that you're against in regards to perfectionism. Perfectionism and stuff like that. You know, do you, do you believe in the MVP? Do you do it here?

Jules: Yeah, absolutely. And it kills me. It's just so against my grain. And it is the constant disgust. I fucking hate it.

Josh: Well, the thing I think that it's the— what I've begun to learn or understand is that there's multiple realities and multiple truths. So The idea that what we think is good is different to another person. It's like when we think we have a shit episode of the podcast, we'll have someone write in saying how they're really connected with it. And so— Is that Lynn? Exactly. Mum's never written in, actually. I don't think she's— She doesn't know the password on her iPad, because that's my fault. But that's her own mistake. But the— Yeah, it's interesting because it's a good way, it's the best way to test assumptions. If you have everything perfect out, how are you ever going to test your assumptions on something?

Jules: Yeah, it's from the outset, it is broken. And like, if ever there was something that was going to test my pursuit of perfection, yeah, it's MVP. Yeah, because I just, I just have to accept where we're at, not where I want us to be. I cannot will it any faster. Yeah, technology is like, it is so slow. It's impressive, but you know, all you see on the outset is a few buttons, etc. But these poor bastards, have you seen their screens? Yeah, like I've got, you know, 15 developers out there, black screens with little writing. Like the amount of code, like our app must be like if you were to print it on paper.

Josh: Don't, don't do that. That's what you do every Monday, cheque in the code, print it out. Yeah, I told you. Going through the code. Going through the code.

Jules: And then, but if you were to do like the amount of effort and that's, that's the reality. Like, so I, yeah, I can't, Yeah, it's really full on.

Josh: What about looking back at old work? Do you look at stuff that you did and thought at the time, this is the bomb, this is amazing, you look back and say this is shit?

Jules: No, no. Often when I look back, I see it objectively as an audience member and I go, that was good.

Josh: Yeah. Whereas at the time— Yeah. And nothing's changed. The thing is that nothing has changed within the content, just your reality. Yeah, yeah.

Jules: I just was able to step back. I could see the wood from the trees. Um, yeah, no, it's— I mean, yeah, there's stuff I go, that's amateur, like that's early on, but, um, I'm pretty forgiving of that. And to be honest, I don't have time to look back.

Josh: Like, I mean, I mean, you're not watching the Getaway showreel, sort of. You don't do a Donald Trump, you don't go back.

Jules: I would hate to see how fit I was. And I remember at the time I was probably sucking my gut in, feeling fat, but fuck, I'd swap that body.

Tommy: How do you, um, you have, you, how, you know, you are hard on yourself. Do you know that you're hard on yourself?

Jules: Yeah, but I'm hard on everyone. I know. Yeah, I'm not very pleasant like that.

Tommy: It's funny, the stress stuff. I know you've, you've encouraged me to get in these stressful moments and it definitely does work, like getting the comfortable, getting comfortable in that stress.

Josh: Yeah, but you can get inspired through anger and frustration. And like, that's a technique. It's probably not necessarily one that you want to—

Jules: what I struggle with most, and you guys will appreciate, is that a good leader lights a fire within his team. A good manager lights a fire under them. Yeah.

Josh: And you know, light the whole building on fire.

Jules: I'm burning this motherfucker down. So I I, I really struggle there. Like, I think that's like, I can inspire people, but it feels so much more effective if I put a rocket under them, you know? Like, I— but yet it doesn't work. Like, it's— I'm too— I'm not disciplined or measured enough to be able to give them this, you know, and within reason. I'm being hard on myself here, but when there's pressure, I just revert to do it like this, let's get it done, you know, as opposed to in those moments of pressure. In when there's no moments of pressure, I can inspire people and I can talk from the front. But the rest of the time, you know, I feel like when they're— when it's happening, I don't have the discipline to just go, have faith, it's going to be okay. Instead, I'm like, I'm the guy at the back with the machine gun over people's heads.

Josh: You gotta move! Why weren't you Why did you decide to hire a CEO?

Jules: 'Cause I couldn't do it. You know, I—

Tommy: I've seen what Ant does and I know you couldn't do it.

Josh: Oh my gosh. 'Cause he has to pick up things from high places. Yeah, exactly.

Jules: He's 7 foot 8. But no, I just, look, you know, when I started this, I was 34, 35. Like I'm no, I knew, I knew, It— look, it took me all your life. You know what your strengths are, right? Because you're sort of drawn to those and you work your ass off. But it was, it was very apparent to me with a mature conversation with myself that I had to acknowledge my weaknesses. And my weaknesses were I didn't know anything about business, you know. I had no— I didn't have a business brain. I had no idea. And if I was to get this thing off the ground, I needed someone far smarter and more experience than me. So, and to be honest, that's been the biggest gift of the process, you know, working with Ant and the partnership that we have. We are so similar and so different, and but yet we're so close, and we call each other on our shit, we pick each other up.

Josh: What's your shit?

Jules: Um, most of what I've just laid out in this therapy session. Um, no, yeah, I mean the same shit. It's like impatience, wanting things to be right, wanting to be having moments of creative— wanting more space for creativity but really being stuck in the business side of things. Um, how's having that relationship?

Tommy: How do you approach it? Have you struggled with what forces you connect with?

Josh: Yeah, what's that?

Jules: Say that again. Have you— the relationship you've formed with—

Tommy: yeah, how have you approached that? Has it been painful at times? How do you make a successful relationship? Because I think it is now successful.

Jules: Like, um, no ego. So you just got— you can't fucking have any ego, none of it. Like, literally, like, we— you know, he smashed me in San Fran about 10 days ago, and I deserved it. A few days later I smashed him and you just stop thinking.

Josh: No, it's just funny. I just love that. It's just like, yeah, we just go out. No, you just have a blowout, like just tough love punching up.

Tommy: No, no, just bay.

Jules: Absolute. Just, just is that, is that like, it seems extreme.

Josh: There's an extreme element to it, right?

Jules: Well, because we're under pressure and those sort of things and we're traveling, you know, we've spent half the year together travelling out of, you know, like, so we spent a lot, we've spent a lot of time together and so you know, you start to— when, you know, you spend a lot of time, you hear each other's patterns, and, you know, you're just triggered by all this. Yeah, it's amplified. Yeah, I suppose it's just amplified, as simple as that. And, um, but we just gave each other really good feedback on stuff we both needed to hear, and we both thank each other. Even though you feel like you're cut into bits and you're deflated, and the last thing you can afford to lose is confidence, and yet the other person is they're saying, come on. And it's really— you've got to be really mature. And that's so new for me. So in terms of what my shit is with Ant, Ant's like, mate, you can't say that, or you can't be like that, or you can't— you know, like, I'm like 3 years ago compared to who I am now. Ant thinks I'm pretty loose and I'm like, you have no idea. Like, there is like 5% left.

Tommy: Yeah, I miss that guy.

Jules: That is fun. Yeah, right. But, you know, 3 or 4 years ago, he— him and I wouldn't even have a conversation together. Like, he would be frightened by a person like me. And to be honest, inappropriate. And, and, and not, um, to be honest, really just immature. Like, just not cool.

Tommy: Has your emotional intelligence grown?

Jules: Yeah, yeah, um, absolutely. Empathy, um Tolerance. But mostly the conversations with myself, you know, like it's, you know, like having empathy for my own, you know, like, you know, you can be really like, as I was saying before, you'd be really hard on yourself. I'm like all of us, you know, we can always be really hard on ourselves. But in this process, mate, just doing your best is pretty bloody good. You know, you've got to every now and then you just got to go, 'You know, you can obsess over that for the next couple of days. How about you don't?' And that's, that's been hard to do. I don't think—

Tommy: you think the jobs you were in, radio and TV, that they didn't allow you to, or they didn't push you to have to work on that emotional intelligence?

Jules: They rewarded you for being a fuckwit. Okay, yeah. Oh, except for TV, but radio was just mad. Like, don't forget, like Radio was all about drama and shock and things going wrong and tension and all this weird stuff. It, it was almost like you were just looking for, um, uh, drama in everything. Like, you know, like a friction.

Josh: It's— there's a friction to it that's, uh— but I— that's the thing. I think that the interesting thing with you, Jules, is there's you play in light and darkness. So you're the, uh, the ultimate friend and the biggest bully all at the same time. I think that that's a really interesting sort of— and that's— and I think that, you know, our relationship when we were working together versus after the fact, it's one of those ones where it's like you can cut people down, but at the same time you're the first person to give the best reference in the world. I think that it's I think that it's all of this stuff isn't black and white. Like, it's— I don't think you can say it's good or bad. It's a, it's a perspective type of thing.

Jules: Um, I think it, it's what it comes down to is usually, um, um, pressure. So I'm at my worst under pressure. I'm at my best when there's no pressure. Yeah. And so, you know, like, I am a bully when there's pressure, you know, like I need— I—

Josh: yeah, we fought on the London subway about what candid meant. Yes. And who won? Well, I think that Jules had a great point. I was taking candid style photos, but I was asking him to smile and he said, well, if you want them to fucking be candid, I'm not in a good mood, so I don't want to smile. I said, how about we do the style of candid, but you smile.

Jules: And I said, do you want that long lens up your ass or down your throat?

Josh: They weren't candid photos.

Tommy: Well, I mean, Jules not wanting to smile, that's candid.

Josh: Yeah, it's the— I mean, that's the— it's the pressure. And it was the— you put the pressure on yourself and you put it on the others around you.

Jules: Yeah, I mean, it's unhealthy, isn't it? You know, it's quite toxic, which, funnily enough, it works better when you're the boss, you know, because um, there's less resistance in a strange way.

Josh: Like, um, you know, there's also the power there, so you're respectful of the— because you are the boss. Yeah. You also realise that you can say these things, and it's where it's— we're playing in this interesting game where it's like I had 4 different bosses.

Jules: So I had— yeah, and I wasn't one of them. Yeah. But yet I was the biggest. So that's— it's actually a really good point. Like when I was, when I was like, I would drive you like a boss, but yet from your perspective, I wasn't your line manager. Yeah. And so it was doomed to begin with, but, and same with Blake who was before you and then Oscar.

Josh: So this was the weirdness of it. And this is what like the thing that I learned through all of this is you can't have multiple, multiple managers just is is doomed. Like, what I find, if I have a single person that I know that as long as they're happy, it's all good, then it's very easy for me to understand. So when I was working in Varto, the best times was when I was reporting into the CEO, because I could— I knew that if I had an idea, I could come to him. No one was gonna— no middle manager was gonna fuck it up and undersell it and all that sort of thing. And I could answer all the questions in regards to, here's a return on investment, And yeah, it was definitely during radio at the beginning, it's sort of— they saw content and digital as these two separate entities, and they had two different bosses. And it was, um, but at the same time, they knew that you loved video, you loved digital, you were doing all of this stuff, but you were trying to do it in a way that wasn't the status quo, um, within radio. At the beginning, it was about, okay, let's, let's re— let's, uh reinterpret what's already out there online in regards to celebrity news and write about that. And what I loved about what Jules was doing, and what I, you know, what we were aligned on, was creating original content that was personality-driven, that was story-driven. And it's taken— it's been amazing seeing how long it takes for companies to come around.

Jules: Yeah, well, what, what was interesting is that which is what we discovered, was that digital wasn't there to support radio, that digital was its own channel, and that you had to treat those that were engaging with your brand in digital as if they weren't radio listeners. Yeah. And yet no one could even comprehend that. We're saying, no, these— this is a different audience. This isn't the same audience. This is a different audience that may never have heard the radio show and that's how we're going to talk to them. And so we were able to create brands online that weren't— wasn't dependent, um, and was able to, you know, because everything up until that point was dependent on them being listeners. You know, here's, you know, tune in at 4 o'clock today, we're doing this phoner, have you got any examples? Yeah, call up, you know, or it was like, hey, you know, jump onto our Facebook and see the chewing gum in Fifi's hair that we're talking about. It was the tease.

Josh: It was the hilarious thing that I learned was that, uh, It was a great lesson. I remember we were— we did a video and we're like, oh, let's create a little tease video for it. And someone on Facebook said, just tell us when the video's up. Yeah, it's a— and yeah, it's a classic example of in radio, you know, you tease to something. It's the exact same thing. And it's the same thing that you're doing with, uh, Tribe and everything like that. It's like, be native to the fucking platform and, and realise that it's not about pushing You know, radio was the ultimate push to somewhere else. Yeah, the arbitrage.

Jules: I was trying to keep you in there, you know, it's trying to keep you on that channel. Time spent listening.

Tommy: Yeah, that, that someone hooked for a news storey coming up and I pulled over and Googled it. I literally did that just because I was like, I don't want to wait 15 minutes to hear what you're about to say about—

Jules: that's amazing. And I pulled over and— fuck, that's amazing. That is actually a really That's a real—

Tommy: so why not any time that you have a connection deliver something that's worth—

Jules: yeah, I just thought if you're going to tap them on the shoulder, especially in social, yeah, like if you're going to tap them on the shoulder and you're going to get their attention, satisfy them. Like beginning, middle, and end. Give them what they need then, you know. There's no, there's no after the break in social.

Josh: What happens with the, this idea that, um, honesty, right? So around honesty, I feel like within the, the different industries, there's— people get upset when you tell the truth, when you say like, hey, this is what we actually think. Like, how going from a different industry and doing transitioning, how have you reconciled honesty? How do you know when to speak what you believe to be true and when you just should shut up because you're going to rock a few boats or upset a few people?

Jules: I don't think you can comment on any issues Like, I wouldn't have the courage to these days.

Tommy: It's not the game you're in.

Jules: No, not now. But, you know, as a white middle-aged bloke, it is dangerous. You just can't— you just literally, you can't do it. Like, it's frightening, which is, you know, we've had it pretty good for a long time. So I think we deserve to cop it and be vulnerable. I'm totally fine with that. But I, you know, it's a frightening— it's a frightening prospect. But in my business, I've never been more honest. And I actually, in my industry, I really enjoy it. I get to, like, if I was in radio, I'd have, I think, a tough time because most of the stuff we're pumping up, right? Because you're trying to sensationalise it to engage. Like, it has to be a certain thing. Otherwise it'd just be pretty, like, it'd be a bit, it wouldn't, like, you have to be larger than life. That's what I'm saying. None of it's lies, but you definitely have to, you have to inflate some things.

Josh: Who does that? But who, who is forcing that? That's what I've been trying to work out lately. So with the Daily Talk Show, it's, you know, are we eventually going to get to a point where people will, you know, save smart car, you know, with smarter cars, 4G connectivity, being able to listen to the podcast at the exact same experience that you would get on radio, potentially listen to us live You know, at the end of the day, it's the audio medium. So it's really interesting that we create all of these boundaries around what radio should be.

Jules: So there's so much breadth left in radio. And yet it— every, every show sounds quite similar except for a couple of themes. You know, they fit. When I went in there, I was like, right, let's, you know, broaden it out and I mean, Heyman Andy brought it out even more, but, but still, it's like, it's, it's so similar, right? Yet you could do something completely different. And then on the other end of the spectrum, every podcast sort of sounds the same. Yeah, because it's a conversation. So yeah, it's a really good question. Do I think you ever have to sensationalise stuff to engage people? Absolutely not. You know, you know, they wouldn't tune in. You don't move there. It's just that people are in their car for 10, 5 minutes 15 and you need to set off some fireworks.

Tommy: Well, if you look at the radio industry as a business, now that you're a business owner, like Josh and I think about the overheads of a station. Oh yeah, to keep these things afloat. My God. Yeah, it's a good point.

Jules: Not like your shit equipment. Yeah, but would you get this on friggin Alibaba?

Josh: The amazing thing, what I love about this is that you made it. No, this is actually what, uh, this is what Marci uses. To record Hamish and Andy when they're out and about, right? And so the idea that there's all of these extra expenses, like, so Tommy and my new business is called Big Media Company.

Tommy: I haven't even told you about this stuff, have I, Jules?

Jules: I should have consulted with you first.

Josh: I didn't invest in your last one. So we've— Well, did I? So we're going into, to business together, but it's Big Media Company. We've got the domain, you know, I get off on domain names.

Jules: Yeah, I mean, I do too. I've got thousands of dollars worth. I need an intervention on my—

Josh: bigmediacompany.com. We've got Big Media Company Proprietary Limited. We've got Big Media Company on Instagram, on Twitter. It's amazing. So the idea— we haven't started trading yet. We haven't, we registered, we've got the entity. We don't start trading until I get home. But essentially the awesome thing that we've been talking about is having, you know, people talk about scale. It's funny what people default to, it's the scale of how many square meterage you've got or how many employees. But what we're talking about is big impact, you know, big scale in that regard, but actually a small team. So you think about the Louis Theroux, the Michael, you know, the Michael Moores, all of the, there's— and even within radio, if you actually take the core team, yeah, yeah, you're talking fuck all people.

Tommy: Nimble in approach, the creativity that can come from being nimble versus, uh, you know, 1,000 square meters. Here's the question: Clarendon Street.

Jules: If you— how do you compete with the volume of competition? So what I mean is, like, if you're disrupting how it was done 5 or 10 years ago you win the race. But now that you're disrupting millions of people also doing the same who have seen that opportunity, because, you know, Instagram TV, right? So launch this week, IGTV, and I look in there and I go, wow, here's an opportunity for a young guy to know and have seen how you can build empires by being first, early, and investing heaps in content. And so I sort of looked at that, I thought, like, you could literally create your IGTV channel and go bananas. And I went, but the sad reality is you don't own it. No, no. Yes, that, but everyone else is capable of that. And I was flicking through all these videos of people talking to the camera and I was like, every one of these people can present better than I used to present. Yeah. Like they are, you know, you're a good presenter, Tommy. And I was like, mate, people like you and I, when you look now into everyone's Instagram channel They are laughing, they are casual, they are eating. What I used to do—

Josh: they're fucking candid, which is why I'm being sat in London the whole time. He couldn't do it.

Jules: And so, but what I mean is like, you look and you go, fuck, you know what, what I was selling, you know, 5 or 6 years ago that was really expensive on TV was that I could look natural and muck around with big cameras, and yet there's a billion of them doing it now.

Tommy: So if you watch your stuff back, it was the least natural thing on earth. Yeah, when you look at people Really now, but is that the obvious play when people are looking? Okay, first to the new platform.

Jules: Yeah, well, yeah, it should be, but the problem is now that everyone knows it, like, you know, if you were building YouTube and no one gave a shit about it, you've got a huge— when you were doing travel photography when no one knew there was a value in it, then now you've got something of value.

Tommy: I mean, it's kind of a short game jumping on a platform and riding it, this thing. And I know like there's companies that gain success.

Jules: You can build empires in that gold rush and that slipstream. What I'm saying is, back to what we're talking about before, is— and you'll have an answer for it, but I'm pumped.

Josh: Yeah, uh, because you're itching in your seat.

Jules: But my point is that when it feels like there's a flood of that same, uh, minimalist approach to what a big media company did, it feels like the world has already gone there. Now how do you differentiate?

Josh: So I think there's a few elements to the point around, you know, Josh just got out the business plan specifically around, I, you know, the Instagram TV. I remember that there was a guy, uh, who I worked with who decided that he was going to go out and he was getting his drone license. And because drones were getting big, he's like, I'm going to do drone photography. And at the time I was like, this is the worst fucking idea ever because What he was recognising was the democratisation of the technology. The problem being, and what people struggle to understand, is that if drones are starting to cost less so that you can start your business, that's happening across the board. So what— no one is going to spend $1,500 in getting you out to do some sort of photo for real estate thing. They'll just go out and buy a drone. So there is, there is that element of it. I think that what it comes down to is you need to start working out what is the differentiating— what is your point of difference? And so for what Tommy and I are doing is we realise that the, the actual only thing that we have that no one else has is us, our experience, our lens. And so what does that actually— if you're to put a filter through it, what does it mean? It means that we're not just another guest podcast. We don't actually— it's about, uh, short, uh, it's about growth over a long period of time rather than hockey stick growth. So we could get— say, we could have had you on episode 1 and got a big influx of traffic about it, but what would it— what would have that— what would have that really done, right? Where the way that we're going at the moment, every episode we do, we get 2 new listeners. We've you know, we've done, uh, at the time of recording this, we've done over 115 episodes. So we get over 200 listeners every single episode. And so that slow growth, yeah, what it comes down to—

Jules: but that's, that's what I mean. That's doing it when it's a mad idea and slowly building equity in your offering is awesome.

Josh: Yeah. And it's the— and I think it's the thing that, uh,— it's the work that we also think that that is the point of difference, is the showing up every day too. So there's— it's the mix of showing up every day, providing a unique offering. And the other thing too is we recognize— well, Tommy and I were having this discussion today. We put out an episode with a guest, and I didn't lead with the guest's name. And the conversation— would love to get your take on it. The, the conversation we're having was, should we be leading with the guest's name? And so, uh, our thoughts behind— or my sort of thought behind it was, if, if we lead with a guest's name, uh, we're, we're inviting people that are fans of that specific person to listen in. And in that— in the specific case that I'm talking about, I felt that it was the in should be the topic, the specific topic they were talking about, and then it's about the guest, and then they'll hopefully enjoy what we're doing. So I think it's about having those filters and being deliberate and not just, I think when I interviewed you 5 years ago, 4 years ago, whatever it was for Josh Speaking, I did a total of 10 episodes over fucking 4 years, right? It worked out to be one every 6 months, But the thing is that it's, there are a lot of people because the barrier to entry is low. There are a lot of people giving it a crack. And I think that there's the voice in our head, especially after seeing over 10 years of podcasting where it's like, it's too late, we've missed the boat and not another fucking podcast.

Jules: Yeah, I don't, and I certainly wasn't meaning the podcast. I meant more the big media company in terms of, is, you know, like in terms of the offering of, you know, doing something minimal and building it big, but you, You've got to, and as I said before, it's not what you get from it, it's who you become. And if you keep crafting and building, you know, you're sharpening your skills and that's the value of it.

Josh: Yeah, I think with Big Media Company specifically, the difference as well is around an original content offering. So what we realise is that yes, we can charge $15,000, $20,000 for a client video, Um, but you know, and if you, if you type in video production company, my business will be, you know, one or two on the, the listings on Google. Uh, but the thing is that as we go on, as this democratisation happens and younger people come in, that's going to become more and more a commodity. You don't want to be a commodity. And so what we end up only having, um is ourselves and the creativity and the artistry. No, you just got to lead. No, I'm going to lead with this.

Jules: What I love about that is, and I absolutely back you guys 100%, it's— I actually also don't think you have to be very different to be very different. And I think that your unique combination of expertise and view of the world allows you to sit in a very different position than the masses. And you know, being commercially friendly, being, uh, understanding the media landscape, uh, the brand needs, all the way through to understanding how to craft, uh, quality content at speed. And so, you know, like, that, that can be everything. And don't forget, all the masses won't be accessing the networks that you guys will be. So there's—

Tommy: if we're controlling the value that we're bringing, because we're in charge of that, then that's where the difference lies. Because someone can, like you said, Josh, buy the camera, point it at something, and shoot. And we're also scratching an itch.

Josh: I think that there is a— it's that classic case of you saw through your experiences, you know, doing influencer marketing, that there was this huge hole, and you, you filled it with Tribe and You can sell every day on the fact that you saw this problem and you've come in and you've fixed it.

Jules: So here's the real question. So how are you guys gonna go with each other? We've done 150. So was this your engagement? This is the onboarding.

Tommy: Well, Josh and I have run simultaneous businesses in the same field and found ourselves coming together to talk about them. Yeah. And to bounce off each other. So we've basically primed ourselves for the last 2 or 3 years.

Jules: Are you guys smashing each other with tough love every now and then?

Tommy: Man, we have really difficult conversations. Do you? Yeah. And if you can't live through them, I don't think you'd even entertain the idea of doing business together.

Jules: What are each other's blind spots?

Tommy: That's a whole episode. I think we have very different views on the world, and I think it's— I think Josh helps me with some of my narrow thinking on topics and empathy towards things. And then I think I help Josh simplify some of his wide, broad, complex—

Josh: I think I'm an overthinker and Tommy oversimplifies things.

Jules: So yeah, what you wanted to say was you're an overthinker, he's an underthinker. There's one thing I know about Tommy, he doesn't I don't think at all.

Josh: Well, there's definitely been the arguments where I'm like, Tommy, you wouldn't— I'm complex thinking right now, so you just don't fucking understand what I'm saying.

Jules: Because you don't have to bother, you're about to walk into a tree.

Josh: Yeah, it's the, um, it's, it's definitely about being able to have those hard conversations, but, but I think where it comes down to is we're aligned in the vision, and the vision for us with this podcast was we want to we want to scale our friendship in this. And it sounds like very fucking weasel-wordy and startup-y, but what it means is, uh, I know that when I was, you know, working for myself, it can be a very, very lonely journey. And Tommy and I having conversations regularly, we realised that, uh, mateship, uh, having just having a conversation, you can take something that was very difficult in your head and really be able to reconcile and understand it.

Jules: Yeah, I couldn't do what I'm doing had I not had Anthony. Yeah, like there's no way. But also just know that the, um, the, the, you know, invest in each other's growth, you know, and the best way to do that is to call each other on each other's bullshit. It's that's— that will be the best. That'll be the biggest reward that you get through it. Yeah, I think that you, you're sort of able to find, um, and, and help the other person become aware of, um, things that they can be better on. And you've got to trust in the other one cares about you, that it's not a game of ego.

Tommy: Yeah, you said their trust. You've hired Ant with the intention to build trust and a relationship, whereas Josh and I, over the last couple years, we've actually been building trust. And then I know that he's always looking at me thinking ahead for what they'll look like for me, or will that service best?

Josh: We can sell each other, you know, better than we can sell ourselves. But also it means that we can, you know, we've had, you know, early days, the first, you know, 2 years ago, we were on a client job. I was a subcontractor for Tommy. The shoot didn't go as planned, and the client said, hey guys, you know, this was a retainer job, and they said, guys, we're gonna have to sort this out next time. And I said to them at the time, I'm like, well, you're not gonna have to worry because I'm not coming on board again. You burnt the building down and walked out. I burnt the building down and walked out. And you know, it's classic Josh. It's a classic JJ move. See ya, fuckers! You know, you sent me an email and I quit. The SEA. So it's, you know, it's a pattern. I know that it's a pattern. What happened?

Jules: What happened at the retirement?

Tommy: It was a job that sort of was always a bit funny, and there was things that weren't communicated, and it just kind of— the scope got bigger, and I hadn't set it up properly. And Josh was on just helping shoot it, and so there was a lot going on. And Josh saw the writing on the wall, and in the moment he saw his moment on the shoot to tell him that he's not coming back. Well, so the thing was, and so we've been through that, I was like, dude, that was not the right decision to say that then. I could have just emailed them after. Well, the thing is, it's an agent.

Josh: I fucking wanted them to know. I fucking hate middlemen. I hate agencies, right? And so the thing was that what I was annoyed at was we were getting a small piece of a pie to produce a piece of content. And the thing was that the agency wanted to write the script and that was their contribution. But they were doing a shit house job of it. And so, and the thing was they couldn't tell. And so what happened in the moment was they added on an extra bit of the script that wasn't priced out. And Tommy in the moment said, they flung it on us, said, "Hey, we just gotta do this extra bit." And so Tommy in the moment said, "Hey mate, that wasn't sort of in our run sheet. We don't have that." And I bit my tongue and the guy cracked it and said, "Yeah, we'll talk about this later." And then he sat us down and said, 'You can't be doing that on set.' I said, 'Well, you need to be communicating upfront what we're doing.' And he said, 'Well, we can't be having this.' And I said, 'Well, you're not gonna have to worry about— I don't know what Tommy's gonna do, but I'm speaking for myself right now. I don't need to work like this.' And so, and you know, I've had those moments, but it's been a growth thing.

Jules: How did he respond?

Josh: He responded where I could see Tommy sort of being like, 'Okay,' like trying to understand it in his head.. But I am still happy with that response in a lot of ways, in the sense of I wish that— and Tommy and I being on the journey together, we can help each other make these decisions together. But at the same time, I have done that where, you know, within your business and all that sort of thing, you are your own boss. Yes, you do have bosses, but you also have a standard in which you work.. And so for me, I have ended retainers with agents. I just don't fucking work with agencies anymore, but I've ended retainers with agencies where it's like, you know what, like they'll see someone who is an individual working. It's like, we give Josh Janson $18,000 a month. He's not gonna walk away. And I gotta say there's something so liberating with being like, you've called me every single evening and this has gone over an extra week and I'm gonna walk away. And so it's interesting. I think it will be interesting for Tommy and I to be able to be a team and not have to do that alone. And the learning for me has been in communicating upfront. I tend to go above and beyond and then it just becomes the new norm. And then you wait until you're in a corner and then you end up saying, it's not for me, rather than telling him 2 weeks earlier.

Jules: Yeah, yeah, well, it takes assertiveness, especially with your own business. I mean, I've noticed Tommy being stronger and stronger with that. You've got to find that balance, don't you? Figure it out, you know, like, because you can't just be doing your apprenticeship forever, otherwise you're just getting underpaid and undervalued.

Josh: So it's, it's, I think it's a respect thing as well, and a self-respect, and, um, realising that, like, what is the metric in which we're using to measure our success?

Tommy: Square meterage of an office. Exactly.

Jules: Well, what is it? Is it hourly? Or, you know, like, is— what's even beyond that?

Josh: It's even beyond that for, you know, so that's obviously there's, uh, you know, different ways that you can quote out a job and all that sort of thing, but I'm even talking bigger picture sort of stuff, which is like Is this work? So the, the reason that these things I'm happy to walk away from, which is like, you know, you got to ask yourself some questions. Is this showreel worthy? Is this good for my bank account? Or are these great people to work with? And if it's not ticking a couple of those boxes, if they're assholes to work with, you don't want to put it on the, on the showreel. And the money is really good, you know, I'll take it. You might take it. And that's, and that's the call.

Tommy: And this is like, I think, uh Well, we can't play the hourly rate game 'cause there's someone that will come in cheaper. And so, and then if they're seeing our value as the hour, then they're gonna find someone that's less of value, but that's valuable to them. So they'll go with that.

Jules: And so what's the long game? So you've got a kid, Josh and Bree, you're gonna have kids one day possibly. Well, I mean, that's—

Josh: Kids are hard.

Jules: I mean, this is the issue. Not with each other. Bree's lasted longer. That I gave her.

Josh: I think it's interesting. I think that's been one of the things, and Rob Ward of Quad Lock spoke about it, which is like, there isn't, there's, it's easier when business partners are completely aligned in regards to lifestyle and all that sort of thing. Bree and I aren't planning on having kids, but it's actually perfect in the sense of Tommy, like I love that I sort of feel responsible for Tommy and his family, and he feels the same.

Tommy: He pulls me up more about working in the times where I probably should be spending time with my family. Mate, is that going to be okay for the family? I'm like, yeah, fucking oath.

Josh: Well, it's just that thing of like, I want to create—

Jules: that's beautiful—

Josh: I want to create, you know, the point of Big Media Company is not that we hustle so hard that we become fat and sick. The, the idea is that we actually where we're creating a business that's a lifestyle business, not in the sense that we can— we've got some muse that we're making a bunch of money off, but that we're actually doing the shit that we want to do every single day. Yeah. And so when you're using that as the filter, the, the truth is that I've— I have made, you know, uh, when I first started, you know, $15,000 in a year as a freelancer, and I've done much more than that. And Actually, the thing that changed, like the money thing starts becoming less and less of a factor. And it's more the question of, are we doing the stuff that we want to do? And so, and it's also what are we prioritising? If for Tommy, it's about if Bodhi and Amy is a big priority, then it means that maybe we only work within the hours that we give ourselves. And we don't, we say, you know, we pay an extra, few hundred bucks to get the photographer on the Tuesday instead of the Sunday, even though the Sunday might be cheaper because we have to pay for the studio, because that's the time that's valuable. So it's, it's a different, it's a different way of filtering stuff.

Tommy: You might like this, Jules. Josh and I have talked about everyone sort of waiting for that big break. And we, you know, see this as choosing to have our big break. This is the big break because everyone's waiting for this and it probably won't come.

Josh: And it's also realising that it's not, uh, we're not like that. We're not creating a YouTube channel to be on TV. We're not creating a podcast to be on radio. And it's so liberating. And it's the thing of, this is the equivalent— what we're doing right now is the equivalent of when you got your drive time slot in radio. We— the thing is, we are on the exact same platform as Hamish and Andy is, you know, within iTunes. And so when you think about that, it's like, okay, then all we need to do is keep going. We don't need to be waiting to be picked or anything like that. We're building this thing. And so that's like really powerful.

Tommy: Yeah. You'd have a lot of talkers come at you, as in people just, I'm an entrepreneur, I've got a startup, and then you'd see them slip away.

Jules: I don't know. I mean, I've been chipping in your ear for years and I haven't got anything. What I love about that is you guys are the shoe shiner. You know, that's— it's— you're like, you're like, you're gonna do what you love and then you're gonna enjoy your life. And I wish I didn't have, um, yeah, I hope I can get there. You know, I'll be going the long way around. Uh, I'm certainly in the tunnel at the moment where it doesn't feel like I can stop or go back. So I'm gonna put my head down. But I love it. I think it's really admirable. And, um, and more importantly, it's enjoyable. And so the develop—

Josh: I think the other thing too is it's development. It's like changing. The only thing that's going to remain the same in all of this is we're like, we're going to be like with ourselves, we're going to have ourselves. So, uh, anything that we do, we like— as long as we're developing and getting better, then it's like, even if tribe isn't the thing, like it could be something like— something else could be the thing. Oh God.

Jules: I don't want to do anything else.

Tommy: Mate, it's just like your radio show when you were asleep.

Josh: But this is the thing, you might realise that, uh, like, you'll, through Tribe, doing all of this stuff, you'll be able to call bullshit so quickly on the default thinking. So the default thing, the funny thing was when we start, when we decided to do big media company, the first thing Tommy and I did was we, um, or one of the first things we, uh, got credit cards. Yeah, we're maxing out. No, we actually, we went and started looking at properties, right? Like lease for leases. And then we had this discussion where we're like, actually, this is the exact fucking default thinking of a big media company that we're trying to avoid. And we don't like the future of work and where all of this stuff's going. Why would we like that? Submit ourselves. That's the pacifier from actually making progress. If we're spending $40,000 a year on a fucking lease, let's spend $40K on a travel budget. Let's do it.

Tommy: Because the big media company will be looking and going, fuck those guys in that caravan that just drive around the country doing podcasts and making videos. That's the life. Yeah, exactly. But that comes without those cementing factors.

Josh: We have to say no to some of these norms and all that stuff.

Tommy: Do you think it's okay going, okay, what's the norm? What's the opposite? Or what's the norm? Can we go that way?

Jules: I was saying that to a person this morning as I was using an example of someone who was creating a marketplace, an app. And, um, yeah, I was like, you know, you— there's a startup norm and you get stuck in it, right? So you go, all right, I've— I want to, you know, create some technology. Well, that's expensive, so I'll raise money. As soon as you raise money, you're on the hook. Yeah. And so then you raise money and then you've got to say, we're going to hit these targets so we can give you back more money. And then you've got to hit the targets, and then it just— and then you've got to raise more money. And it Like, and so I was just saying to her, hey, what if you actually just stopped for a second and said, that's the norm, but you just said, how is there another way that you can express your passion, live your purpose, change the landscape of which you're trying to disrupt, to, um, maintain balance? Which, you know, I was saying you won't be able to do once you go down that, that path, um, you know, what does that look like? And she was like, oh, it's really interesting, you know, because I said there's another option or another way of doing it. And then we were sort of like, there's levels of what you bite off, whereas, you know, the norm is biting off a massive amount and you don't even realise how big you've bitten off until you, you're chewing on it. So that— and that's how I feel with me sometimes, you know, it's like once you're on, you're, you're on. And you know, there's sacrifices within that and they feel like they're costly. Whereas the reality is what you're talking about is expressing those things, being rewarded, but you're not having to give up ridiculous amounts for things you don't value. And like a lease and, you know, all these other things that, you know, you're conditioned to purchase because real estate companies and other businesses have been suckered into it. Yeah. Stay outside the system as long as you can with this thing.

Tommy: There's a lot of successful people reflecting on the success they had and how it nearly killed them, and then they're selling in, finding that true purpose and passion to not have that. Do you think there's a level— do you think you can get to that level of success without slogging yourself and putting yourself down the hole or into the, into the tunnel, into the train tunnel that you're currently in?

Jules: I don't know anyone who's had it, you know. I, even people that are born with unbelievable gifts, like Haim is a great example of just, you know, but even he's, you know, he's worked his ass off to even with that gift, you know, that gift alone, he could stand on a stage before he even worked his ass off and but yet he still worked really hard. So outside of that, then you might have people that have lucked out. I doubt it. I don't know, but I certainly don't think they're— because then, you know, I sometimes wonder, people that, you know, that have got tonnes of money, I think they probably have low self, you know, like low self-esteem. What's their purpose there if they didn't earn the money, if it was inherited, or if it was one. So that's luck, right, in some capacity. But I don't know anyone that's had— I mean, that's how you— then you've got to question what is success, you know? Like, what's success to certain people? You know, working 4 days a week is probably success.

Tommy: Do you think you got into Tribe without understanding what success is for you?

Josh: Yeah.

Tommy: I don't think it's a bad thing. I think it's a human thing.

Jules: Yeah, I mean, I, I've— I'm passionate, you know. As I said before, like, I wasn't thinking about success. I was thinking about, fuck, wouldn't that be awesome? You know, what if— I'm just intoxicated by what if, you know. And then I see something, I go, let's just make that a reality. And then I start to move towards it, and I'm bloody good in enrolling people. I'm like, how fucking good is 'What is this?' You'd want to join the team.

Josh: Everyone joins the team and then you raise some money and then you look around and you go, 'Fuck, you're responsible for all these people.' The interesting thing you say, 'What if?' One of the things that we've been talking, Tommy and I have been talking about a lot is 'as if.' So rather than fake it till you make it, we had a guest on, Peter Shepherd, who coaches for Alt MBA, which is Seth Godin's program. As if is around, okay, well, what would happen if we would do this podcast as if it had a million listeners? Yeah. And that's what we're doing. We're not faking it too. We'll tell you, you know, as recording this, we have 200 listeners, but we are treating this—

Jules: I don't reckon you'd have them right now. We've been talking for 6 hours. If they're still listening, I'll be fucking amazed. If you are still listening, tweet me @juleslund. I'll be fascinated.

Josh: And this is the thing. And so the as if stuff for us was really empowering. It changed the narrative from— Love it.

Tommy: Fake it till you make it, which is this, this, you know, it's an early day mindset giving you confidence to even think you can exist.

Josh: But what fake it till you make it is, this implication that there's a fraudulent— What? And there's a misalignment between, uh, your values and who you are versus what you're projecting to be. Where we're just saying like, we're doing this as if, um, yeah, I really like that.

Jules: So how can I use that in my life? So, um, I tell you how I could use it. I could probably say to myself, why don't you enjoy your weekends as if you've already made it?

Tommy: You've sold the business.

Jules: No, that, that is if it's going to— see, one thing I ask myself is like, like, because, you know, the journey, not the destination. I'm not good at that. Like, I'm so focused on the destination, right? So I waste that. I waste the good parts of the journey. But it's funny, like, if it all went— like, when I look back on Getaway, like, I used to take that so seriously. Like, you know, everyone would be going out on the town, right? You know, being some amazing place, it'd be a summer's night in Africa, and there'd be all these people dancing in the street, people drinking, and I'll be like, nah, got to get up early in the morning, got to do a present— yeah, I got to present to camera. And I took it so friggin seriously that I just missed out on so many good things. I look back and I go, what was the What's the point of that? And, you know, even celebrations and stuff that I've cut short, you know, things that I would actually remember, but I can't remember why I sacrificed that for the work, right? And so, yeah, I just wonder, with this process, if I knew I couldn't fail, how would I live differently? And what that basically says is, if this was going to be an absolute winner or if it was going to fail, either way, if it was going to fail, I should be enjoying my weekends. If it's going to win, I, and I know it's going to win. Yeah, I should be enjoying my life.

Josh: And there's also very little control. Like, once you know that destination, there's not— you're not going to really change your journey.

Jules: I think I can't. This is the bit— that's where I— it comes unstuck. And I'm like, because I'm like, mate, look after the little things and big things happen. And that's the curse of a perfectionist, that you actually believe that every 0.01%, 10 of those adds up to 1%, and then, you know, 10 of those is 10%. And if you just keep— which is an absurd reality because I'm the only one who's seeing the percents. Yeah, well, I think that there's—

Josh: it's like that thing of I've caught myself getting a text message or an email, it's something I've got to do, and I get a bit of anxiety about it.

Jules: But if you didn't see it—

Josh: if I didn't see it, I wouldn't fucking know it existed and nothing would have changed. And so— and it happens in so many cases where it's like you get— you'll, you know, the little, you know, think about when you open up your phone and you're refreshing the email, your email, what's the, what is your body doing? What is your mind doing? I know that I think of the 4 people who I don't want me to email because I can't be fucked dealing with that project at that time. And so it's amazing how much all of these things weigh. And then so like one of the things that I've been doing of late is it's like, It's that sort of as if, it's I care so much about what all, how my clients, if my clients are happy and all that sort of thing. But there's actually moments that I'm going through at the moment where I'm like, actually, that's not the priority right now. And so, I'm going to act during this time, right at this moment, I'm not gonna worry about, I wonder if they've gotten the revisions. I'm gonna work as if I don't care I don't care about that stuff now. I'll pick it up tomorrow morning and I'll be fine. And it's been amazing where it's like, acting as if this person's opinion of you doesn't matter has been—

Jules: It's actually a really good device to shift and reframe the narrative. It's a really good one to do.

Tommy: Can we thank Seth Godin?

Josh: No, I think Peter Shepherd on his, what's his blog?

Jules: It's above the— Can you send it to me?

Josh: Yeah, he's doing some amazing stuff. A Melbourne dude killing it in sort of the new age coaching, creative coaching, you know, asking questions, getting the best out of people.

Jules: Yeah, this, I saw him in your feed. Yeah. I mean, you were looking happy. He was looking happy.

Josh: Tommy? Tommy was too busy.

Tommy: You know, here's the thing, right?

Jules: Why were you not smiling?

Tommy: I had food in my teeth and I did smile, but I think Josh chose the photo that he's hair looked the best in. Which is that true?

Josh: I don't know, but my hair looks shit in all of them.

Tommy: No, he was saying on the day, oh, my hair's shit. I've gone, he's fucking joking.

Jules: You look like you didn't like the interview, and that's how I read it. Be very careful on your food and your teeth because all of a sudden I'm like, I don't know if I'll listen to him. Only one of the guys liked it.

Tommy: Very true, but I took one for the team. Josh put the photo that he looked the best in.

Josh: It's the Daily Talk Show. The thing that I want to just end this with is, you know, Jules, uh, You're always so open and show that level of vulnerability. I think that the interesting thing is there's a lot of people who won't do it because they're not at the— you could look at what you're saying and being like, oh man, there needs to be some self-awareness here or there. But the reality is the fact that you can have that bird's eye approach and recognise that like we're all a bit fucking broken and trying to work it out and doing this sort of stuff is hard. I think that that's admirable. It's something that I think is inspiring and something that I take from what you do is it's being, even if you don't have all the answers, it's saying, hey, I don't have them. And I think people, there's probably a bunch of people who get a bit uncomfortable and probably say, can you believe?

Jules: Especially my investors. I hope they're not listening to this.

Josh: It's all gonna be, it's as if it's been great.

Jules: As if they want to invest more.

Josh: It's a daily talk show. Jules Lund, thank you for being on the podcast and deconstructing a bunch of things, including the business, which is the first time we've spoken about it.

Jules: So thank you for being two very enlightened friends of mine, because you do inspire me, both of you. Your hunger, but also your uniqueness in how you approach it. It's different to how I would do it, which is really refreshing. Thanks, buddy. The Daily Talk Show, everyone.

Josh: hi@thedailytalkshow.com if you want to send us an email, any complaints in regards to this.

Jules: And here's Jesse J with fucking cheap shit podcast equipment.