Brave Bold Brilliant: September Rise - The Power of the Comeback

0:00So in this special September episode, we speak to three remarkable guests who absolutely embody resilience, courage and the art of starting again. Now, each of them has faced extraordinary challenges, be it from financial ruin and betrayal to a near fatal accident to one of the most infamous business blunders in history. And yet, you know, they've each come back stronger, proving that, you know, no matter what life throws at us, it's never too late to rise again. So first we hear from Sir Marco Robinson, who overcame betrayal, financial ruin and even a life-threatening heart attack to rebuild his life and career.

0:48And then next, we speak to Mick Ruddock, who survived a near fatal climbing accident and shows what true resilience really does look like. And then finally, we speak to Gerald Ratner, who bounced back from one of the most infamous business blunders to rebuild his career and reputation. so together their stories show us how setbacks can absolutely become opportunities and how it's never too late to rise again stronger absolutely so let's hear from marco robinson welcome to brave old brilliant i'm here today with sir marco robinson now marco you have got a lot going on in your world you're a business coach you're a social media coach you're a top netflix producer number one best-selling author so marco you ended up going to malaysia and at this point you're in a much more senior position right you're you're running the business are you you're actually leading the business you went to be the boss essentially yeah how did how did that transition from being essentially a worker a great worker but you know top salesperson all of that to in the shop because that is a leap isn't it for for a lot of people to be fully It was a leap because I was managing 20 people and going into a public company with thousands of people.

2:17Now, when I got there, my job was to run the hotel division and the timeshare division because they'd only just started that. But when I went there in 97, a lot of people won't remember this, but there was an Asian economic crisis caused by George Soros in 1997 where he devalued all the Asian currencies. I remember it very well as an economist. Yes. Yeah, well, there you go. So I was paid in Malaysian ringgit and the Malaysian ringgit went to like 15 to the US dollar. It was three. So they didn't have the money to actually pay me my salary. And I'm in this position with my six month old baby and my wife thinking they can't pay me.

2:52And I'm in a 6 ,000 miles away, right? Right. But there was an intuition. There was a gut feeling that there was a huge opportunity in this place because it was beginning of a business evolution in this particular industry. So what I did, I thought, right, I innovated the product from a week's timeshare into a points product so people could buy points and go away for one or two days instead of having to commit to a whole week. once I did that the price reduced so it made it affordable and then I started getting sales I built a small sales team and within a year I had 3 000 sales people working for me telemarketers and sales people and we were doing a hundred million in a year in sales and I was making although I was an employee I was making a million a year then in 1997 its own.

3:42So, you know, it was amazing. But the other thing I didn't understand was the value of money. So when I was getting paid all this money, I spent it on crap, sports cars, going out, holidays. I didn't really invest it in the right way. I gave it to a financial advisor. That was the biggest mistake I made. So I had all this money coming in, but then I didn't have the investments to invest in because I didn't understand how to do that. So I did that for three years I did a billion dollar in sales I broke the world record in the industry and then three things happened to me one I was giving a seminar in the office and I collapsed and I had a heart attack which I was taken to hospital right and they said listen you're okay but you've got you basically this is because stress because I was so focused on success that I sacrificed a lot of other things, like my family time, spare time, a lot.

4:36And when I was in hospital, I found out my wife was having an affair with my best friend. And I'd known my wife 10 years and my best friend 10 years. And I got him a job in the company that I was working at. And I just found out. And that was more painful than the heart attack because it was a double betrayal. And quite honestly, I didn't know. I lost my identity because I thought I wasn't worth anything. How could two people betray me like that after what I'd done for them? That took a long time to process and eventually overcome. And because I had two small children, you know, my son was one, my daughter was three years old.

5:15She asked me to come back every single week. And I said, no, no, I left. And after, I think it was about eight months, I went back to that relationship only because of the children. But it was one of the biggest mistakes I made. because I went back into a relationship where I was emotionally divorced. Couldn't trust her ever again. But I was there for the kids and that was great, but the kids don't even remember those times. So it's like, why in the hell did I do it? And then after that, I bought shares and the company I was working for, they did like an employee share offer. And I bought them for$3 and they came down to 10 cents.

5:50I lost everything in the share market. So I had about 50 grand in the bank left out of all of that, right? But that was good because it made me do the things I'm doing now. If I'd not have been through that, I would have gone back to corporate, even though I hated it, right? I still would have gone back there. And I decided in that moment, when those three things happened to me, there is no way that I'm ever going to have a boss again in my entire life. And like you just said before, I wanted to take my power back. And I felt I'd given everything and given so much to the company. I turned the company around, but I didn't get rewarded for it.

6:28So I quit the job. And then I set up a shop on my own as a consultant. I got a few consulting jobs. It wasn't easy because obviously because when you go from an employee to getting a big salary to having no salary, you know what this is like. I think, shit, am I going to pay the mortgage here, right? Am I going to pay the bills, lab, and the school fees? Because the school fees were like thousands a month, private schools and all that. And yeah, it was really difficult. And I was consulting. I had another job on the side and started another business. And my wife wasn't supporting me. She was like moaning there wasn't enough money.

7:05She wouldn't reduce the bill. She wouldn't take the kids out of private school. So I'm like really going into this thing all in and getting some success. And I started doing motivational seminars. And my first event, I sold a thousand tickets and did a motor like Tony Robbins thing and thought shit this is amazing so I thought I better do this more often so I did and then in 2008 I'm the unhappiest man I thought in the world and I'm thinking to myself how can I leave my wife how long did you've been back with her then six years yeah six years yeah it's a long time yeah yeah yeah and to be fair to be quite frank I had an affair with a girl and that was a good thing because it made me feel great about myself.

7:49It made me feel wanted. Do you know what I mean? Yeah. I had no regrets about that because of what happened and that was a good thing. I'm actually still friends with that girl now. She's married and we're still friends. It's amazing, right? So 2008 came and as you know, what happened in 2008? Do you remember that, Jeanette? 2008. There were well done. It was a crash, right? Subprime crisis happened. Oh, it went all style out of the world, right? Financially, all from the US. So I'm asking the universe, how can I leave this marriage? And the universe told me, Marco, write a book. So I sat down at 5am for six months and wrote my first book called Close the Deal and Suddenly Grow Rich, which has been updated.

8:29And it became a number one bestselling book. It basically became a sales classic, like a legend book all salespeople read. And I was like, wow, this is amazing. I know in the bookstore signing the books going, wow, this is amazing. Because there's a queue of people waiting to sign it. But the book didn't make a lot of money. So I thought to myself, how can I make a million dollars from this book? And another idea from the universe came to me as a marker. What you need to do is look at the recession. Look at your network. Look at the hotel rooms that are not being used. Ask a hotel if they can give you a free room.

9:08if you send someone there for lunch. Because as you know, hotels make money more on the food and beverage. So I got like 500 free rooms from hotels. I put them in a voucher, we call a vacation voucher, and called it a five-day, four-night break, combination only. And I sold it to companies for$50, but they had to buy 100. And I started selling these vouchers to like Shell Oil, Patronus, BMW, Rolex, Ikea. and I'd made$12 million in a year doing this. Because you asked the right question. So I did that for a few years, left my wife, met someone else, but I was so happy. When I left my wife, I was dating.

9:53It was an amazing time. And I eventually sold that company. And I got into property by accident, really, because I had all this cash. I thought, right, I don't want to make the same mistake as before, right? So I started buying Subprime Crisis 2010, houses in America for 20 grand and flipping them for 50 as a hobby. And my friend started saying, Marco, how the hell do you do that? Can you teach me? So then I thought, okay. So I started teaching people and made more money than I did with the other business, right? So I'm doing all these seminars all over the world. And I wrote my second book, The Financial Freedom Guarantee, which became another number one bestseller in 2016.

10:40Right. And I'm buying property. And my cousin, one of my family members said, come into business, we'll buy properties together. And then 18 months later, something very bad happened to me. We bought a building in Manchester, 50 apartments. And the building was condemned because the fire cleaning was falling off. it was like Grenfell yeah and my cousin started embezzling money out of the company and his mum and basically the bank tried to take all the assets and the loan was costing 50k a month he was trying to embezzle everything from me it was a nightmare and pretty much I lost everything that I've worked for let me pause there yeah right because there's a you've had you've had now two major major betrayals right from people that are closest to well three actually yeah at that point are you thinking oh my god what am i are you ever thinking what what am i doing is it down to me that i'm these these people that are close to me are betraying me stealing from me taking my good nature and just sticking two fingers up to me and, you know, really ruining me when trying to be a good person that's, you know, doing the right thing.

12:05Was there a part around, is it me? Yeah, there was definitely a massive part of that. And I'll tell you what happened. It got to such a degree where the bank sent a letter of repossession to my mum's house in 2018. Now, that was the most painful to me because of what we'd been through. So she could be homeless and I could be homeless again. So it came to such a degree that I'd lost everything. I'd have betrayed again. My mom was going to lose her house. So I bought loads of pills and I swallowed them.

12:41The beginning of 2019 and tried to kill myself, right?

12:49and what happened then was because it was so emotional and everything I'd worked for I thought what's the fucking point right so I took the pills I was staying at my mum's house it was just the pandemic coming blah blah blah and she came in with the letter of repossession and she said to me it was about an hour after taking the pill pills she said to me we can fight these bastards and she completely inspired me I went to the toilet put my fingers down my throat luckily they came back up again just in time and then what I did is I basically fought the bank I went on social media and called them out for the mistakes they made and the victimization and they got a lot of support and they tried to get I think it was about seven million pounds from me.

13:46And I went to court and I won the case. And the bank lost. And I got all my assets back. Wow. Yeah, that was probably the, I'm obviously feeling emotional now, tearing up a bit, because that was the end of my life, I thought. And I thought to myself, why do I always get into this situation, right? and of course obviously trust issues and i was like well they're my fucking family and they do this to me but when i actually analyzed it in the cold light of day do you know what it really was that was causing this it was jealousy so my cousin who'd known me all my life i'd realized was always trying to be better than me and one-upper me and when i was getting above him like the Channel 4 TV show was 2017 at the peak of what I was on my journey.

14:45He was jealous. So he would do everything he could to sabotage and derail me, even if it meant that I'd fucking try and kill myself. So I learned he was a complete narcissist. And I didn't know what that was until then. And secondly, let's hear from Nick Ruddock. I am here today with an incredible guest from the world of gymnastics. and so I've got Nick Ruddock with me here today you've obviously spent so much of your life helping other people right and you've got a lot of you know you know when you said you were 33 I was gutted actually I thought bloody hell it's making me feel really old but um but no I mean you've got a lot you've got very a very wise head on your shoulders may I say you know which has clearly come from all of the you know effort and focus you've put into this but if you think about your kind of own personal situation, you know, with your family and kind of how life started for you and where you were brought up.

15:40What parts of that have helped or hindered you in what you do now, do you think? Oh, gosh, that's a tough question. That one does take me by surprise. I would say I had a very stable, supportive, loving home life. And I think that that was amazingly important. My parents have always supported my decisions. and I think everyone needs a support network. Where I've been able to scale the business to its point now, and the business, let's say it's been trading for kind of six years, if you like, or five years. I've only been able to do that with the support from my fiance, Leonie, as well. And in an average month, over the last few years, obviously not for the last period because of the pandemic, but I could be in five countries a month, two countries a week easily.

16:27and for me to be away from home that much to be spending time with other people all to build the business to get to a point where you know we're financially more stable you know we can build a better future and obviously the business can can start to go from a job to an actual business we're employing people it's taken an awful lot of graft an awful lot of hard work and without leone being there for me going it's it's fine it's fine it's fine it's fine and being that supportive partner I wouldn't have been able to do it. And that has been incredibly important. And I do empathize for, you know, for others that don't have that same relationship.

17:03You know, they're trying to achieve something, whether it's through their business, you know, or following a new passion and they don't have the support of their partners. That's a really tricky place to be is, you know, it creates conflict at home and you need harmony, of course, because business is messy. you'll know that business is really messy you know it never goes to plan it's it's challenging there's a lot of good that comes from it but boy is it tough running a business and if you don't have a bit of stability in your life as well in my case coming from my partner and my family then I think I would have really struggled with it yeah and you're so right you know that who you spend time with and the people that are in your life can make such a difference in terms of how you can progress or push push you know be brave and push those boundaries like you say it's not easy building a business from scratch even if you're following your passion and you love what you do it's still tough isn't it you know it is very tough and I think sometimes when people see the external nick you know because you are very front-facing you know you're out there as a as a well-known professional in your field and you're the strong one you know you're the one that's front of house and focusing on other people a lot of the time probably what people don't see so much are the struggles along the way and the difficulties and you know obviously you said six years that the business has been kind of up and running which is brilliant so massive congratulations on that and what would you say has been the biggest challenge for you during that time oh this is this is an easier one because there's been so many no really there is there are so many challenges with running a business and particularly in my path.

18:47Because let's be honest, I started as a gymnastics coach, which I still am, that's still my bread and butter, you know, with no formal training of, you know, how do you start a business? And so you make, you just make mistakes on the way. And again, you've got to just understand that that's going to be part of the process. My first stab at a business, you know, I threw about 50 grand into an app, which never even launched. So if you're enjoying this conversation, make sure to subscribe to Brave Bold Brilliant. And it is by joining our community that you'll gain access to powerful conversations with leaders, innovators and entrepreneurs who they don't just talk about success, they absolutely live it.

19:24So subscribe now and keep learning how to lead with courage, clarity and confidence. That was my first step into the world of, OK, let's try and do something on your own. And that failed miserably. It couldn't have been worse. It put me into debt. It didn't even launch. There was a bit of pride there because obviously I told everyone this app was launching and, you know, I had to carry the burden of that debt through the business moving forwards. That wasn't pleasant. But rather than giving up then, it was a case of, okay, well, how can I resolve this? You know, I always knew that I wanted to have a business.

19:57And essentially, I think that what was interesting there was the ownership that you have of something like the business is my baby, right? It's mine. It belongs to me. I can make it work or not. So, you know, that led into new avenues with what I'm doing now. But financial difficulties, like running large national conferences, again, which have never been run before in the UK, like a gymnastics conference in a conference venue, as opposed to a gymnastics club, right? Now, hugely successful in terms of the participation, the profile, I guess, that came from that event, and all the positive PR. And one of my most important things is impact and contribution.

20:36It ticked all of those boxes, but it certainly didn't tick the financial box. It puts an even more into debt. So there's these challenges on the way that you kind of learn through experience and putting those events on, understanding how they haven't worked, replanning and re-strategizing the next time around, you know. And so I think a lot of the challenges on the way have been financial. I think the ongoing one is that my industry is a non-sexy one really is education. You know, a lot of people, unfortunately, don't feel like they either need to engage with that, you know, in terms of, you know, how many gymnastics coaches out there want to spend money for education.

21:13Not many, I'll be honest. And it's probably a quite price-sensitive audience because it's low disposable income, you know, coaches aren't on big salaries typically. So, you know, trying to get people to understand what they need rather than what they want is an ongoing challenge, I think, within the education space. And that is something that is constantly quite difficult. Yeah, no, that's a really fascinating perspective, actually, because I think you're right. You know, there's well, there's a lot of free stuff online as well, isn't there? Which is great because you can really sort of, you know, gen up far more than certainly in my day back in the day.

21:50But the flip side of that is that, you know, people sometimes think they don't need education. They don't need coaching. But, you know, I always say the best investment you can ever make is in yourself. and that that can be investment in terms of financial investment or it could be investment in time you know effort mindset you know whatever but but investment in yourself is what's going to make the big difference I think um field yeah and and how different is it Nick when obviously you're you work directly with um you know elite athletes or athletes at any level but elite athletes where you're one-to-one um as you were doing yesterday with your sessions I believe um versus you know i guess teaching teaching the teacher almost you know coaching the coach so so they're quite i would imagine they're quite different approaches that you need to take what do you want to just talk us through that and how you how you you manage those two two sides of your business really yeah um and fortunately they all weave under the same umbrella which is good and i think that's part of the the um the good in what i've done it's i've got loads of different services but ultimately it all comes down to connecting to gymnastics you know which is great so it doesn't matter if you listen to a podcast you go into an event you're watching one of my online courses you're a part of my subscription ultimately it's all just talking about the same topic you know so it's multiple revenue streams for the same industry but um yeah ultimately dealing with an athlete dealing with a coach there are there's probably more common themes there than you'd imagine again because it comes down to you can you share a message and i and i I picked this up from, it was John, wasn't it from your previous BBC podcast?

23:27It was a fantastic episode and it was all about, you know, brevity. Can you be clear? Can you be concise? Can you be compelling? You know, can you take people along with you on the journey? It doesn't matter if that's an athlete. It doesn't matter if that's a coach. You need to get a message to them that they understand, that they believe in, that they can repeat if it's a behavior. So there's actually a lot of commonalities there. Now, yeah, the athlete I was working with yesterday is pushing the limit of upper 20 now. But if you're working with a nine-year-old, of course, you've got to simplify that even more.

23:58You've got to take complex topics and break them down into something which is super, super simple. But again, I would do that with coaches. Because if you've got an inexperienced coach that doesn't understand the terminology, they might not have the technical eye to see mistakes. You've got to be able to take complex topics and make them sticky for people so they can retain that information and really own it and learn from it ultimately. That's brilliant and I'm delighted that you actually listened to John Young's episode as well he's an inspiring guy and again from a very different field you know media BBC journalism etc but it just shows doesn't it how we can really pick up nuggets from each other and sort of think oh yeah actually that resonates with me so I think you're absolutely right keeping it simple doesn't matter what field you're in, sometimes we can overcomplicate it.

24:48I mean, I do advisory work with businesses. Very often I look at the business and I think, my gosh, there's so much complexity and layering on of stuff, processes, data. Actually, let's cut to the chase. What is it that we're trying to achieve? And just being able to communicate that I think is a real skill. So I mean, it's obviously something you do very, very successfully. I just wanted to pick up on something slightly different if I mean it because I just have a genuine interest in this myself so I'm being slightly selfish by this but I I love the fact that you work internationally um and through my career I've worked internationally as well you know I spent a lot of time in China, India, Russia buying and running businesses very different environment but you know I noticed that you spent a lot of time away I mean I think you know Japan, Germany, Brazil, Romania I'm sure there's like an endless list of countries and nationalities that you've worked with in the gymnastics world so how how important um have you found the appreciation of the cultural differences and and what sort of adaptations do you personally make when you're dealing with a different culture um because i think it's quite an interesting area yeah absolutely and um again some like europe a A lot of Europe is pretty similar in the approach.

26:08But Japan for me was definitely the biggest cultural shift, you know, being in that environment and understanding. And it threw me off quite a lot. And, you know, there's not a lot of, you know, I remember doing a lecture in front of the Japanese coaches and I didn't get any form of response from them, whether that was a clap or a smile or anything. It was very serious. And I thought, oh, that must have been an absolutely terrible presentation. and then and then the the person that was facilitating the the session for me and translating said after said I've just spoken to the coaches they thought your session was absolutely fantastic thank you so much and I was like really because and and so yes there are differences absolutely in in approach and understanding the culture um and it's important that you connect with that but also recognizing that if you're being if you're a consultant you're stepping into those environments, then they want something from you.

27:03They want something from your culture as well, from your philosophies. There's no point stepping into someone else's world. And of course, we have to respect their culture, but there's no point just sharing ideas that they're already familiar with and the things that they're already doing. What they need is something different. And so it's getting that balance right between, okay, what value can I add here? And how can I be super respectful, but also learn from the environment that I've seen? And again, Japan, what an amazing learning opportunity for me. and finally but by no means least let's hear from Gerald Ratner I am here today with a very famous person he's incredibly well known on the speaking gigs that he does but also really for his experience and knowledge as a businessman but in particular for a certain event that happened in his career which made him even more famous so it is the wonderful Gerald Ratner in a million years there was not one day that I wasn't in at the crack of dawn looking at the figures straight away and having the screen up what the share price was and a phone call and this and that um so yeah although we were very very successful and I'm not under undermining that in any way it's a wonderful period of success it does come with a price yeah absolutely and you're passionate about mental health and you you kind of said you had that seven year period when you know after after the speech and when you kind of you know were in that that period between where you are now and there that seven years must have been horrific for you Gerald and you know a lot of people I think it's good that we talk about mental mental health issues and and stress and the impact it can have but do you want can you just share a little bit about that Gerald because I think it's important for someone else that might be feeling similar things at the moment Yeah, and I was told that I was unemployable after I lost the job, and I basically gave up.

29:06I didn't want to play anymore, and spent a lot of time watching daytime television. Countdown was my favourite. It's a bit like if you're in a room with a smell, you're not aware of that smell unless you open a window or go out into the fridge. Are you kidding yourself that everything's fine? Because you don't want to face the reality that things are terrible. And that went on for seven years, as you said. And meanwhile, bills were stacking up. When you actually, and in my case, I was threatened to be thrown out of the house, which is ironic because my first wife threw me out because I was never at home.

29:46But anyway, I was being thrown out because I was always at home. So I went to, and when I went out into this big wide world, went back into it, started, you know, doing things. It wasn't any, it was much easier to face the problems than have hired from the problems. The most difficult thing in business or in life is to avoid the issues, not look at your bank statement, not looking at your credit card bills, not trying to go out and make money to try and avoid and think it will be all right that is actually very painful but actually when you actually go out put yourself about a bit try and start a business it's great you start you know but i didn't i need sometimes you need somebody give you a kick up the ass and say well unless you do that you're out because you you're in your comfort zone so you know I can thank my wife and as I said I never looked back after after going out again and I now I never there's never a dull moment I'm doing something all the time now because I'd retired for seven years so I'm not going to retire now

31:02there's a lot more a lot more um to give isn't there Gerald a lot more to do in life and um I think it's fantastic, the stuff you're doing now. It's really inspirational. And, you know, when you look back through your career, can you think of the best piece of advice that you've been given? Well, it's very important that you do incorporate some exercise into your day. I think I read somewhere that in America, 80 % of the population spends something like 90 % of the time in office blocks with fluorescent lighting in front of the screen. Now, that is an absolute disaster. It's going to make you feel sick.

31:45It's going to make you feel unhappy. It's going to make you fat. It's going to make you unhealthy. It's going to make you irritable. So I think it's very, very... I know everybody says benefits of exercise, but the reason that they say all that is because it is great. It turns a bad day into a good day, and we all have bad days for no reason at all. You know, you wake up, something goes wrong. I have today, in the Financial Times, there's a piece about it. Stuff on Twitter, which is rather unpleasant. I get that. So I go out for a second. It doesn't last forever. But you feel great. And the world, you put the world up right.

32:26Which is not very much else you can do that. I mean, you can drink a bottle of wine, but then you're okay for only about 10 minutes, and then you feel shit. So exercises are great. medicine uh and i think that we all need it even if it's just a walk balance our lives out so that wasn't particularly um something that anybody's told me as advice as far as advice is concerned my father you know used to be really good with stuff and he had a you know if anybody came to him with a problem he would lend them money or he had a scheme where people could buy their own homes and he was just genuine and that was a sadness because he became ill and then he became the opposite but for a long time I looked up to him because he knew how to treat staff and that is not only a good thing to do but it's actually good business because you've got tremendous morale and you get tremendous loyalty somebody coming in and you know his wife had run off and he took him to lunch and stuff like that and sorted him out you know which he's a busy day and he did all that and Beaverbrooks my competitors I I they closed the shop in Nottingham and now most people close a shop do what P &O didn't send an email or something like that what Beaverbrooks did they all four directors went down to the shop took the guy out explained to him why they had to close the shop gave them a really good package as they left they didn't need to do all that because they never see him again and he wasn't going to be working but that's what they did because they are they know how to look after staff and they know that that's good business and that's just the way they are so yeah that was nobody actually gave me that advice because i but i could see and marks and spencers incidentally built their business on that business now that model doesn't exist in Mars expenses as far as I know but in the olden days it did and they had a fantastic reputation for looking after staff yeah no you're absolutely right and that's it isn't it people want to feel be treated like individuals even if it's bad news yeah you know do it in a respectful way give people the best send-off you possibly can and and and just you know just be honest um and I think that's that's absolutely spot on yeah that's why I get upset when I get compared to people like P &O because I ran my business totally the opposite way to that but I get, you know, P &O, the Joe Ratner, the fairy thing and all that sort of stuff.

35:04But yeah, it's very important to look after your staff. You'll be rewarded. Not that you do it for that reason but you'll be rewarded for doing that. Yeah, absolutely. No, that's fantastic. And Gerald, I've got one last question because this podcast called Brave Bold Brilliant and I think you've given loads of examples of where you've done exactly that um what does that mean to you when you think about that phrase or those three words what does what springs to mind for you well I think if you're brave you have to take a risk now I don't want to knock the public sector but they don't they're not in the risk business the private sector is in the risk business and the just like when I went in the betting shop instead of going to school and put all my money on a horse and it came last or got beaten at the post and the photo finish there's something unbelievably exciting there is nothing more exciting in life than taking a risk and then it coming off you get a great feeling it's gambling but you know like with the health club I make sure the odds are in my favor when I do things uh i like to succeed so but but you're not guaranteed that so brave is is taking risks and business is all about risks and these people that are train drivers and stuff like that who are going on strike they're not actually taking a lot of risk they're driving their train and they're getting their salary and they're going home and to me that isn't business business is is being innovative and uh being bold uh which is your other catchphrase um because you're not going to be you're not going to achieve anything by being a wallflower and just doing the same thing every day um you have to be out there and what was the other word brilliant and brilliant brilliant well I do think that um a lot of people say well what how did you achieve what you did um and they and a lot of people's answer is well I work very hard well I would I don't work very hard but I like to make smart decisions when I am working I don't think it is about working shoe leather and getting up at six o 'clock in the morning all that sort of stuff um because you can make all the wrong decisions so you do have to be a bit brilliant you have to make when you are working you have to make smart decisions rather than wrong decision when we went to america we were accused of being impulsive in decent haste the financial times described it as when we went and bought the business on the first day yet other businesses have spent a year opening up one shop a mock shop to see what america was like there were notes of analysis you know spending huge amount of time it's not about that it's about making the right decision which i would call which was you would call brilliant i don't know but yeah there's nothing to be ashamed of in terms of saying that no absolutely oh honestly gerald i could chat to you for hours and i owe you dinner of course as we agree forward to that you're going to choose somewhere really expensive we're going to have a lovely bottle of wine and something nice to eat it's going to be fabulous but i really honestly genuinely i've been looking forward to this and i really appreciate it because i know how how busy you are and um yeah we'll definitely get together.