"Effing Awesome": Dan Meredith on His Unfiltered Approach to Success

0:01So today's guest is Dan Meredith, a dynamic entrepreneur, bestselling author and business strategist known for helping teams and leaders unlock their full potential. Now with over a decade of experience spanning recruitment, marketing, personal training, business coaching and leadership development, Dan delivers practical, no-nonsense strategies that drive real results. He's the founder of Coffee with Dan, which is a thriving Facebook community for entrepreneurs, and the paid membership, Expresso with Dan, where he provides actionable insights to help businesses grow and thrive. Now, Dan also previously co-hosted the Spotify podcast, The Body and the Beast, with his good friend Jay Alderton, taking listeners through the ups and downs of mindset, social media, and navigating this crazy thing called life.

0:57and he's soon to launch his new solo Coffee with Dan podcast in September. Author of the best-selling books How to Be F 'ing Awesome and How to Be F 'ing Happy, Dan has sold over a million copies worldwide, inspiring thousands to break limits, boost confidence and of course achieve their goals. So his unique approach, it combines real-world experience with practical tools and really teaching people and teams how to maximise productivity, build resilience and create lasting success. So, whether you're an entrepreneur, a team leader or someone ready to take action in your personal or professional life, today's conversation with Dan Meredith promises unfiltered insights, strategies that work and the inspiration to stop overthinking and just start doing.

1:54Welcome to Brave Bob Brilliant. Thank you for inviting me. You are very welcome and of course you had a bit of an incident arriving. Yeah not me personally but I saw just as I parked up I witnessed a road traffic accident so just made sure everyone was okay before I said kind of felt bad in the way it's like are you all good I've got to go to a podcast but they were all no they were all as far as I'm aware all okay but it's lucky to be on hand to be able to help out. Well, life around you is certainly never boring. No, it's not. It's not at all. It's not at all. And then I want to start actually around your philosophy of life really, because you've had two books out which have been hugely successful.

2:34Thank you. In excess of a million copies, I think. I believe so. Across the breadth of them, yes. It's been a bit ridiculous, to be honest. It wasn't planned at all. Right. So we'll come back to that. But the first book, and I will say it nicely, How to Be F-ing Awesome. Correct. Second book, How to Be F-ing Happy. Correct. So how do you be F-ing awesome and then what F-ing happy? Talk us through the shortened version of how do you achieve those two positions in life then? So yeah, the title of the first book was not my plan. It was my publisher is when books with the word fuck were quite popular in by like Mark Manson and a few other people.

3:19And my philosophy for that book was just a case of I went from not nothing, wasn't a nobody, but like I kind of, you know, don't come from much money, not from a wealthy family. But I realized I wanted more from life. And I when I wrote that book, I was like, well, this is what I did to get me from where I was to where I am now. I didn't think I didn't say I was anything super special or anything, you know, wasn't swinging my digital dick around saying I'm fantastic or fucking awesome. And it was just literally my lessons, the thing that I'd invested money in, the things I'd done to get me from kind of nothing to something.

3:51And I decided to share that with the world. And people seemed to quite like it, which was quite lucky. So, yeah, the first book was the whole point of the first book was basically a kick up the ass for people to get shit done. that was the main thing is it doesn't matter you know what's going on what you're thinking what you're doing but you just need to do stuff you need to do things and you need to take action so that was the kind of main focus of the first book and that went wild I mean I said there was no plan for it to do that it was written in three and a half days there was no no logic behind it doing as well as it did apart from the fact people seem to like it second book so I had this first book out called how to be fucking awesome um still sells this day people still love it to this day and I had a challenging year which we can talk about now or come back to but I said 2020 wasn't spectacular and I remember being in that situation that I was in thinking I've got a book called Happy Fucking Awesome this is pretty far from fucking awesome so my next journey was well how can I maintain the business and the impact and the work that I do but be happier doing it so then the next evolution in the book was just kind of how to still be successful get shit done you know grow a business you know be successful but be happy doing it so that was kind of like the two philosophies around those books and there's another one in the middle which was uh my dad's book as well so that was it let's talk about your dad yeah so my dad he's affectionately known as the goat so the year where everything kind of went to shit i started off with and this sounds really boohoo but I don't come from money I like speed I like going fast and I had two racing jet skis I worked very hard to get so start of my year I got a call from the people that stored them to say my jet skis were stolen and I was like shit but I was on the way to hospital to see my dad at that point he's going in for an operation so I was kind of like do you know what fine it's stuff you know depending on my dad's more important dad told me at the hospital that he'd had cancer for two years and kept that to himself or him and mum had and then we had COVID kicking so we all had that then dad unfortunately his cancer came back it had been cleared and then it came back during COVID and then he passed away in the July and then a few other things happened and I remember getting to the end of that year so this is how the second book came about got the end of that year jokingly said to mother you know things can't get much worse and mum had we have a rule um call you know message me whenever you want but if it's urgent call me she called me in the middle of my coaching day so i told my client said gotta go everyone knows the rules if my mum calls me gotta grab it i've got a special needs sister and sometimes just in case you know i need to be there so she goes i don't need to worry you but we've been in a car accident today i've never been in a car accident they got t-boned so i hopped on my motorbike to go and see them um because my sister was panicking so a couple of years prior to that it seems so congoluted to say all this um my little sister broke her neck while she was waiting for surgery to have three quarters of the liver removed because she had a tumor on it so we've had it so we had to decide do we take the tumor out or do we get the neck fixed so they'd be able to tell things i mean my sister thinks her head's going to come off now she's special needs she doesn't understand so i say it's not going to happen go over and see her and we're just sat in the living room going this year has been an absolute shit show yeah my mum went to give me a christmas present this december the night and it looked like it was a golden Christmas tree that you twisted the bass and it played a little tune it also looked like a giant gold butt plug and I'm dressed in leather and I said imagine if I get run over on the way home and I've got what looks like the world's largest butt toy in my bag so I'll probably leave it here mum anyway eight minutes later I get to call my mother up and say I don't mean to worry you but I've been in a car accident so on the way back I was not speeding.

7:50It was in a 30. I was doing 27. I got hit by a Mini Cooper and yeah, got run over. So that was my 2020. So that was where the second book came from. So I was in hospital thinking, this is pretty fucking far from awesome. So yeah, that was the next evolution. Wow. Wow. Well, I mean, isn't it sometimes how when you seem to be in a certain path, I mean, you know, they say the universe, you know, your attraction. The universe is having some fun with me. Yeah, but do you know what I mean? It's almost like if you're having a, I mean, that's to the extreme of having a bad day. That's more than having a bad day, isn't it?

8:22You know what I mean? It's a rough Thursday. That's awful. But when one thing, and then it seems to be another, and another, and another, and you can end up in this sort of spiral, I think, where you just seem to attract this stuff. And I'm not saying, you know, that was the case with you. But then when you're in that really difficult, dark place, how do you then go, right, enough's enough? You know, dad would want us to be happy. We've got to make the best of what we've got. and how do you find that inner strength or how did you find that inner strength to say actually no something's got to change yeah well when dad passed we sort of you know i was very fortunate that a few extra days just me and him where i stayed by his bedside and i made a promise to him that i would you know look after mum and anna who's my little sister and i would show up for them so i just remember lying i got home from hospital and i remember just sitting in the chair like stitched up and i just i checked myself out because i was just done i think i should have stayed in for a day or two but I was like no I'm going home and I just thought right this is a rock bottom you can either piss and moan about it yeah um and I said this in my first book it's like you're allowed to be upset you're allowed to be pissed off you're allowed to be unhappy I have a little 24-hour pity party rule so if life's shafted you you've got 24 hours to feel sorry for yourself and eat food have some drinks do whatever you need to do to make yourself feel better or whinge or moan or complain which doesn't get you anywhere but it feels good to get off your chest so i said right 24 hours i'm just gonna crack the fuck on and i did yeah and that was it yeah i mean that's for anyone listening because there might be people that are going through stuff right now and it is almost to say enough's enough isn't it you know i'm drawing a line and tomorrow or in the next hour or whatever it is and and i think it's taking that first step isn't it dan you know just you might not know exactly what that next phase looks like just start doing just start something Yeah, that's it.

10:11And I did this on a little video I recorded today before we recorded. And I just said, if you're sort of not where you want to be, just start doing things. And it might not be the right thing, but you'll start opening up other conversations and having other ideas. And I just, every time I start doing stuff, I've kind of got a vague direction of where I want to go, what the end result is. I have no idea what the steps are in the middle, but if I start taking them, I will eventually get there. and so many people want the perfect plan you know on the business side of things they do they want to know the step-by-step guide the blueprint it's like we can give you all that we've got to start doing stuff and honestly I found my best results have just come all the good things that I've done the big achievements I've come up with a vague idea of what I want no idea how to get there start doing stuff yeah yeah that's it yeah completely I mean one of my mentors who I Rob Moore who I think yeah you know Rob quite well you know his his one of his things he says is start now, get perfect later.

11:07I think that's absolutely right. In fact, if it wasn't for Rob, I'll give Rob a shout out, I wouldn't have this podcast. Really? Because it was Rob that said, you must start a podcast. And when I was in corporate life and standing up in front of the city presenting the annual results to the analysts and all that like I used to do in a FTSE 100, FTSE 250, would I have ever said I was going to be a bloody podcaster? Absolutely not for a chance. But actually, just started it. I never knew that 500 and odd episodes later, we'd still be going and would have had amazing conversations with people like you.

11:41You know, you just stop. Honestly, yeah. It is so simple and people get so caught up in their heads, but kind of touched on what happened. People did care. I had people that loved me and cared about me. Yeah. Obviously cared, but give or take, no one really gives a shit. Like people have got their own problems, their own stuff to deal with. And as soon as you realise that you're not that important, as in what I mean by you're obviously important to your loved ones and the people you serve and help, but everyone's got their own stuff to deal with. And as soon as you start realising no one's thinking about you as much as you think or you're not as big a player in people's lives, it's freeing.

12:13You just start doing stuff. I mean, I'm not naturally confident or outgoing or extroverted. This is all stuff I've just practised over years. But if you'd have said to me, God, even in my 30s, you're going to be an author. I'm like, no, I'm not. I'd say, you'd be a best-seller. I was like, I certainly am not. And here I am. Like, if I hadn't have written that book, my life would have been a totally different trajectory. And I just said, fuck it. Yeah. Let's do it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. And it's interesting, you talk about other people. And I think we spend so much time worrying, what will other people think?

12:46What will other people say? And you're right. Actually, in reality, no one cares. They're busy sorting out their own stuff. Oh, shit, yeah, exactly. And yet, all that wasted emotion or things that hold us back, the fear of judgment, fear of, you know. It's so right. And I think some of this comes a little bit with age as well, right? Yeah. A little bit of wisdom that comes along with experience. It does. You start real, I think, as you get, for me, as soon as I sort of got into my 40s, I was just like, oh, God, I just don't care. I'm just going to do whatever I want to do. And we were talking just before this.

13:13Some of you may have a concept of what I'm talking about. Others may not, but I'm obsessed with this world, this fictional world called Warhammer 40 ,000. It's by a company called Games Workshop. There's a game I play called Space Marine. I just got myself a replica helmet made the other day with light-up eyes. I don't care. And someone said, you're a 45-year-old man. and it's like, do you actually want someone to have sex with you? I'm like, yeah, it'd be nice from time to time, but I'm still going to buy my fucking hat. Like, I like my little hat and it makes me happy. So I don't care. It's unleashing the inner child.

13:45It is. All that playfulness that we lose as life becomes very serious or stuff takes over. And I think we lose that, don't we? So maybe that's the way to reconnect for you. For me, it was, and I recommend whenever I'm working with clients and stuff, obviously we do the business stuff and we're growing the business and the marketing and doing all that kind of good stuff. But I worked with a person as well. I was like, what did you used to enjoy before life got into you and fucked you over? And, you know, a lot of the times it's going back to the things we used to do in childhood and when we were younger that brought us a great deal of joy.

14:16I love just going to the seaside, the British seaside. It was my happy place, my mum, dad and sister. So I'd go there every year, just go down to Wallachum and play on the beach, go on the arcades. I'm like, you might think, yeah, you're a grown man. Why are you doing that? It's like, well, because I can. And that's it. and it's just like fun is a big part of what I do. And we've got this euphemism, for those of you who know what FAP means, trying for those of you who don't, feel free to Google it, but it stands in our business for fun and profit. So I want to have fun and make profit. I want my clients to have fun and make profit.

14:47And if someone is like super serious, probably not going to be their sort of person. No. And that's fine because there are people who are really serious. It doesn't mean I don't do a good job. I don't know how to grow their business and all that kind of stuff. but for me I want to enjoy my time with someone I want them to enjoy their time I want it to be an enjoyable experience as we grow together yeah so yeah fun is a big part of what I try and put into my job yeah and life it's too short you're gonna die one day you might as well enjoy it well exactly and we don't know how long we got exactly it's not wishing to be morbid but it's a bit of a reality check and I think when you when you do get to a certain age and when you've lost people close to you like you have and I have as well or when you're dealing with a day-to-day situation where you adore your sister and I know she's a big part of what drives you to do what you do as well and take care of her and your lovely mum etc that actually it's just so important to kind of remember who we are but don't take life too seriously but at the same time be respectful of the time because it is going to expire it's perishable and you're not going to get a day back are you so make the most really of every day i think it's really important i mean so many people in by me i'm a big fan of wasting time like i factor in nothing and time wasting into my days weeks months oh god yeah there's there's a huge space i remember talking to a female friend of mine and she was talking with her partner and she didn't grasp the concept and this is just me as my perspective as a man if i say to you know female in my life i'm doing nothing on this particular time they'll want to fill it and I don't know I've booked nothing nothing is the plan I plan to do nothing you don't have to fill it with stuff all the time but you know I enjoy downtime and relaxing but you can enjoy doing stuff and I've this year I've just decided to say yes to lots of things it's been great fun and it's open I wouldn't know you if it wasn't for saying yes to things and this is it the more yes you say stuff the more things you go to and put yourself out for honestly I just found that business and life just gets better yeah that was it that is a great piece of advice actually blocking time for doing nothing um because i'm terribly poor at that you know i i think and i think if you're a driven person if you're ambitious and if you if you have um sometimes i think we always i feel oh you know i'm kind of probably looking the inner child is looking for that approval of well done you know congratulations you all want to be loved you all want to pat on the head yeah yeah exactly so then that drives you and it drives you but can be to the extreme you know and certainly i've suffered with some health stuff this year as well ended up in hospital blah de blah anyway all good but stress pushing constantly and i want to i want to loop back around about happiness right because i think we're happy when we're making progress and we are moving forward assuming beings right you're like plants either growing or dying but if we're always focused on the destination and where we're going when we get there we'll achieve something and then it'd be like you know you might glow in that moment for a while but then the next it's gone quite quick very quick and you're on to the next thing so if you've not enjoyed the ride along the way you're never going to be happy because when you achieve what you think you want then you want something else yeah i've experienced it myself and i say this people i said it in the last book anchoring your happiness value self-worth whatever it may be on achieving a milestone I've done it is a recipe for failure because you get it I remember my first first ever client self-employed but first I remember my first sort of 10 grand a month my first six figure year my first six figure month my first seven figure all these milestones yeah I'd said when I reach this and beyond yeah when I achieve that I'll be happy and I achieved it and I remember thinking oh I'm proud proud you know I was really pleased with it and I was you know the results were great but I was kind of like well now what and it was just a zero-sum game it was always more more and more and I'm all for growth and I do agree with you you have to keep growing but it's that constant if you're constantly going towards the future and you forget to be present and I know this I was not present I was always looking to the future of what next I'm going to do and when I just slowed down a bit so I didn't stop just slowed down a bit and took time out and I the big thing I teach my clients is is to put time in to do the the things that you love and with the people you love.

19:13It's a big part. So when I plan all my diary, even today, for example, come in here, well, I have some serious non-negotiables. I always have the first two hours of the day to myself. I have date nights if I'm seeing someone. I have time with my mum, my sister, with my friends, gym, boxing, all this kind of stuff, nothing. I've literally nothing blocked out in my diary. And all the stuff that makes me happy goes in first. Everything else goes in after. And that's been something I've done for a long time, and that works very, very well for me. and a lot of people choose to use it. Yeah, well, obviously you're making a big difference to the clients you've got, right?

19:45So I think that's great advice to someone that's, you know, are you a busy fool? Yeah. Is your diary full of stuff and psychologically you're kind of going, oh, great, I'm being productive and you're probably not actually, less is more. Yeah. And as I say, I'm guilty as charged over the years but I think that's really good advice to really have a look at how you're spending your time, right? What are you spending it on and creating that space for creativity. We often, I see loads of people who think they're doing useful or productive work and it's like it feels like it because you're doing stuff but it's not actually things that are moving the needle and it's often and it's always the stuff that you're putting off avoiding don't want to do that's generally the stuff that will make a difference for you so yeah I mean everyone is different I mean some people are just crazy driven and they can just get up and just go for 12 hours straight without but most people are just normal so factoring in the things that you need to do should do want to do and are avoiding that's a big part of what do.

20:39Often my day-to-day job is I jokingly call myself a professional bully with a heart. So I just tend to be like, right, you need to do this thing. Go and fucking do it. Here's the things you need to do to grow your business or get that back on track or improve your marketing or get the sales process sorted, whatever. And it's always, they often know what it is they need to do and they've just been avoiding it and they need someone to almost tell them what to do. So a lot of my day is spent telling people what to do and just go, go and do the thing, get it done, come back to me when you finished it.

21:10Well, it's the accountability, isn't it? You know, that you provide. So with the client, so talk a bit about the type of clients and type of people that you help and you're spending a lot of time on at the moment. Yeah, it's a real, I'm really lucky. It's a real mix of people. So I'd probably say 50-50 down the middle, online and offline. I've got, you know, my offline businesses go up to sort of nine figures and ones I'm consulting for. So it's like construction, manufacturing, heavy goods. I've got e-commerce. I've got digital products I've got physical products there's not really because I've done so much of this over the years and I think I've done 6 ,000 individual businesses I think between 15 minute and one hour calls are different I kept a trap so there's not really anything I haven't seen and business principles are kind of the same so if I'm working with more we call traditional businesses bricks and what one is oftentimes bringing them in some of the stuff we've learned from the online space so you know some of the digital marketing and systems and processes and often team stuff as well so I've managed companies and stuff before so often like helping them with their teams and their processes for the online people it's helping them turn that into a proper business with you know staff and structure and so on and so forth so I just solve problems that's that's what I do I figure out where your problems are and tell you what to do to solve it and if you choose not to do it that's fine but then why would I give you bad advice?

22:33Well, exactly. Well, and this can be the thing, right? Cause I do business mentoring as well. In fact, I was, I was on a call with a client this morning and obviously client confidentiality, you know, with Paramount, but you know, the gist of the conversation was, you know, this, you know, this, right? You know, this yourself. All I'm doing is holding the mirror up so you can reflect on that. I would love to be able to do this for you but I can't you're you have to take the action you have to make this I'm here to support you I'm here to you know encourage you I'm here to call you out when you're you're not moving forward but ultimately I can't do it for you yeah and and that's the thing isn't it you know and so when you're working with a client um it's so important that you can have those like you say kind of compassionate kick-up-the-ars conversations isn't it really I also understand that they're people as well so I say to my clients they'll be like what we're doing this month, I'll have a plan or a structure, a strategy that we're working to, but I'm dealing with a person.

23:31So one day, I mean, we all have days of this, you feel top of the world, feel awesome. Some days you wake up, you're like, I hate everyone. I hate everything. I don't want to do this. Everyone's pissing me off. You can't put your finger on why, but you're just in a foul mood. So I have to deal with the person and their life and their health and their mindset. And it's all these things come together. I had someone recently who's just phenomenally talented, but their head was just up their ass. So it took us months to get them believing in themselves and doing the things and you know having the confidence to get back to who they were sometimes it's a case of right write these posts do that thing send that off you'll make money yeah use that but it's fun I never know what I am going to get as soon as I press call I never know what person I'm going to get and that's part of the fun of the job there's a lot of variety so if Dan's raw and refreshing insights are sparking ideas for your own journey, make sure you subscribe to Brave Bold Brilliant.

24:26Remember, it's by joining our community that you'll gain access to powerful conversations with leaders, innovators, and entrepreneurs who don't just talk about success, they absolutely live it. So subscribe now and keep learning how to lead with courage, clarity, and confidence.

24:47And one thing that you've started quite recently, because we met, we met probably what, two, three months two months ago yeah about two months ago i think yeah um and this was a daddy bear grills launch event so shout out to mr wayne smith daddy daddy bear grills my business partner um but it was a really fun day wicked i had the best day i had the best day i had the best day and and then we met there along with jay allerton and you know you met jill and you know so it was like some really cool people in that in that woodland it was a wicked day um but uh i think also the the other thing was there was your energy is magnetic oh thank god for that i didn't know where you go with that one then i was like you took a pregnant pause power of the pause no but your energy is magnetic oh thank you very much because and i think so important right because when we how we walk into a room how we feel you were saying some mornings you just don't feel yeah and you're not not on you know you're not feeling the best etc but how you actually kind of get your head in the game and you focus on your energy you're breathing what you're putting out to the world is what you're going to attract back isn't it 100 i remember chatting to you going oh god dan's really cool yeah i thought the same we had a really good day it was such good fun yeah i was being a big kid i was just having fun running around the woods with meat lighting fire it's awesome um so anyone that wants to book an experience with daddy bear girls please check out the website um but no so that's what attracted me to you and thought you've got to on the podcast because you've got such great energy great knowledge great experience and you just call the spade a spade right thank you so go on then with that in mind you're i want to talk about a bit about personal brand okay cool and how you you kind of put yourself out to the world because you don't dress it up right and i'm a northerner i'm also you know quite what you see is what you get kind of person you know um and I love that about real people that keep it real so for you you know with your your style of communication how you come across on social media the name of your book you know it's quite out there in your face it is a little bit unapologetically yeah so was that a conscious choice for you uh okay so I remember I'll give you a little bit of a sort of study back when I was younger so I'm naturally quite quite shy introverted and I was a late bloomer with the ladies this is not going to go inappropriate but i remember seeing so do you remember a safe way remember to say so in town where i come from i was walking past the safe way when i was in my teens right and i i think i tried to chat up a girl at this point i was in my and i was awful absolutely terrible and i remember seeing this guy and i he was rugby player like quite a big guy well built sort of quite muscular with this beautiful other half and i'm not going to be like he had a face like a bag of smash crabs and i didn't think i was particularly good looking And I thought, right, I can't do anything about my face, but maybe I can just get jacked and just get big and tattooed and bearded, which is my which was then what I did.

27:43And that stuck with me. And I realized so my brain just went. So if there's 100 potential partners and say 10 percent, so 10 ladies liked big, burly dudes within that 10 is going to be something I'm going to find appealing. So I always thought to myself, instead of trying to appeal to everyone, appeal to the niche. I had no knowledge of marketing or sales. This was when I was like 15 or 16, I think, when I remember walking past the Safeway. And when I went online, it was an accident. It wasn't a plan. You know, obviously, you can accidentally join a fucking Facebook site. But there was no plan for this to be my business.

28:17And I held myself back. I didn't swear. Not that swearing is big or clever, but I did. And I was quite tame back in the early days. And then what I realized is there's an inner you and there's an outer you. and I've realised as the inner you gets closer to the outer you, when you put that out there, if you just go straight into what's in, I mean, we all have some fucked up thoughts, if you just straight up post that, it'll be like, whoa, what are you doing? But I realised the more me that I was, the more I attracted the right people and other people didn't like me and that's okay. And I like to think my heart is good.

28:52I never, ever, ever on my mother's life want to upset anyone, make anyone feel bad, offend them. that's never my plan at all and if I do that I'm always you know I will apologize I'm not trying to I'm not going to not be me yeah I have no intention to hurt anyone or offend anyone or do anything that's all I want to make people smile my dad used to do this as well so when I used to go around my dad because when my sister wasn't well I'd sometimes go with my dad in the car and go on his rounds and he was a phenomenal salesman and I used to watch him he's always making people laugh and taking the piss out of people and playing little jokes on people and I just kind of clearly modeled that from him so I just like making people smile and it's like well I had a mentor once who said if you can master the art of infotainment so if you can share your knowledge on marketing on sales on growing businesses on copywriting on launches whatever it may be and make it fun then you'll do well and I just decided to have more fun with it and that was it I mean there's a video of me early days when I started off in my consultancy business I've got a side part in I've got a baby blue jumper on i'm so corporate and i'm like who are you who are you you little idiot so it's absolutely shocking this is an old youtube video from about 12 years ago gotta check it out no don't obviously there's some howlers on there but yeah i just it wasn't a conscious decision but now i look back i realize that's done me nothing but the world of good so the people that like me tend to quite like me and want to get involved what i'm doing and if they don't that's fine because the beautiful thing is there's so many people who do business coaching mentoring mindset work all this kind of stuff you can find your excuse me you can find your person yeah there's someone out there for everyone and I might be too much for someone or too little don't know but that's the beautiful thing you just it's like who do you like who lives the life you want who does what you want to do will work with that person then yeah and shared values right yeah it's really important I think isn't it when you're working with people but I love that you know because I certainly in my life but most my career in corporate right and i remember in my earlier career just i was always the only woman in the boardroom really as with a pnl um you'd have hr and no disrespect to hr you play a very important role um my nemesis in my corporate career i don't mind sharing that when i was in corporate hr and me when we were always having chats because i was i constantly leave arch files on down i was i never did bad i was always mischievous i never understood the point of certain rules yes and i was just like but it doesn't make sense but yeah hr and me uh we were we were quote friends yeah yeah exactly exactly but you know i remember in my earlier career just sort of almost and i mean this is back you know this is 20 years ago right and um i remember me me sort of dressing being quite alpha female now i am quite i'm a confident confident female but i was even more so you know it was almost like yeah you know you've been sort of the the suit, the trouser suit and all that kind of stuff and I remember and I still think it was me but I was definitely a version of me let's say and we have to adapt to our environment and that's fine but I got this feedback from a coach and they'd done like a 360 you know peers, boss staff, team and all the rest of it and one of the comments that came back, there's loads of good stuff in there but it was one right quite scary, always in a suit and it really it really stood out for me because I remember thinking to myself well actually yes I'm in the corporate world but I don't wear a gray I don't wear gray at home I don't wear black too much you know I wear a lot of colors and I'm you know I'm quite feminine as well you know why am I then putting on a totally different armor because that's what I think I need to do to fit in and be successful in the boardroom so I did gently start changing my style but the point being I think you need to be yourself, right?

32:47In whatever environment. And you're right, not everyone's going to like you. And it makes you unreplicatable. There we go. So it makes life a lot easier for you. So if you are yourself, no one else can be you. No. That is it. So if they like you and your business and your style and your attitude and your ethos, the right people will want to work with you or spend time with you or see you without pants on. Whatever it may be. We all know people who be someone else. like relationships that people try and be someone they expect to be for the first few months and then the mask slips or they go back to the eye and that's what they're actually really like as a person whereas I think it's just easy just be yourself from the off and if they don't like you that's fine because you can find someone else they do yeah and actually social media as well because you know you've got a big social media following you're you're pretty prolific on social media you've embraced it uh to the max and did you have to get out of your own way with social media when you were first getting going because again some people might be thinking oh I'm a little bit cautious I'm not quite sure if I want to do social media I was very cynical about social media and now I do quite a bit but not as much as you um but I had to get out of my own head out of my own way and it took me quite a quite a monumental effort to do that and now I'm like whatever I do I don't really care I don't I care I want to I want to I want to put good stuff out yeah in the right way I don't want to hurt anyone but I don't really care about the judgment so I don't really care what people think.

34:14Don't pay your bills. Yeah, exactly. So I'll just try and be a good person and put good stuff out. But it took me ages to get to that place. But with social media, was it difficult for you getting going or did you naturally... What's some tips for people? I loved it. So I remember going on Facebook when I was, I'm 45 now and I would have been, trying to think what the job was, I'd have been 25. So I was like one of the early, early adopters of Facebook. I loved social media. I was on chat rooms and all sorts of stuff. I loved the internet. So for me... Look at your little face. It was, but I used to have great fun.

34:43I used to go in all these chat rooms and stuff, and I had a blast on it. I just thought it was brilliant. And for me, I never planned to use it for my business. It was not. And I still teach and advocate a lot of more old-school networking, marketing sales, so I will teach people how to cold call, how to cold pitch, cold email, how to reach out to people, how to network. The older method still works. Social media is just a tool. and if you take it seriously as in really get granular on what's working you can blow up your business doing it if you're smart for me I don't take it as seriously I write and post and video what I want to and hope it resonates with the people on the other end of the screen and the more I do the things that I want to do the better it seems to work out for me in terms of results and impact and influence and connections and all that stuff but the key thing is is to just have some fun with it it's not serious it's it's if you look at most people's social most no just they're sharing what they want to share it's their highlights you've heard the highlight real thing but you're not showing you lying in bed looking like a sack of dog shit first thing in the morning are you you just isn't a nice picture of you with good lighting on holiday where you've got the anger right and it's your seventh phone it's not real and it's just as soon as you understand it yes there's a real person on the other side of the screen you got to be nice to that person but it's just fun and it's gone within seconds and that's it so the more you start doing it and again you've got to learn how to take good photos do good videos you got to learn how to practice speaking to camera if you want to do it how to position yourself what to write how this all takes this nuance it takes time but just start having to play with it and that's it just play literally i've mentioned this a few times i had fun with social media i don't take it too seriously yeah and i think that that you know that approach of fun and fap you know fun and profit you can you can google that afterwards

36:48fun and profit yes and profit and and as an entrepreneur because you've done lots of different things right you've had multiple careers you've reinvented yourself multiple times so very sure described the journey and your first job you were telling me was paper round where you got your poor sister not my poor sister she didn't she i basically doubled her pocket money so i had to put so i had a paper i had to put leaflets in the paper and then obviously deliver them now i was one of those people that oh it was the free paper yeah a lot of people just chucked them in the bin i never did that i was always delivered but i realized i could pay my little sister 50p and I got five quid for the day so she'd do that for me and then I would go and do it and then I realized my other friends wanted to do this so I would get so Anna was earning all these 50ps I was getting them so it was worked out quite well so yeah first job was a paper round and then I worked in what I do I worked in a sort of picking up skills and stuff and I worked in a DIY store and then my first process I was supposed to be supposed to uh go to Loughborough University to do a master's degree in aerospace engineering so I was supposed to be designing planes so my levels are in double maths physics and design so that's what I was doing but I overheard a conversation between mum and dad and just a little bit difficult financially and I thought you know what it's a chance for me to help out here so a friend of mine had got a job in recruitment so he said to me look if you can get a job here they'll even just pay for your train ticket to come in and I thought well fuck it I'll go along just to get a free day out on them.

38:28I turned out to be quite good at it. So by the time I was 19 at this point, before my 20th birthday, there were 6 ,000 consultants and I was second in the whole company, only to a director who'd been there since day one. So in recruitment, did very well. I opened up, I think, six new vertical markets. I was the top villa in the country. So I was all right at it. But I did it in a very different way, so they were going to sack me. but everyone else did hammering the phones and I built relationships so all my work suddenly kicked in in month three after I'd spent time getting to know people and finding out their problems and then I just skyrocketed so yeah I did very very well in recruitment went into personal training when I was at uni ended up being the top PT in LA fitness as in the busiest one whilst I was part-time and then I basically flip-flopped between fitness and recruitment for many years culminating in peak fitness was I was a director for a large fitness chain and that was yeah that was that and then I was co-director of a big recruitment company and then I just decided to not do that anymore came back home I was like all right don't do this anymore so I came back home um set up a gym on a whim maxed out some credit cards thought I would I've always worked my own gym.

39:45So I did that. That's been going now for 12 years. Runs without me. And then I started, well, I thought to myself, right, well, I've got time in between my sessions. What else can I do? I saw a job opportunity to be an email copywriter. And I was like,$30 ,000. I was like,$30 ,000 to write an email a day. So I pitched myself for that. Now, bear in mind, I've been learning copywriting and marketing for about two months at this point. and this was one of like the bigger names in the industry a guy called ryan levec um who's still a very good friend of mine today pitched myself in i didn't make the cut but i sent him some lumpy mail got an american friend to post him a letter and he put me in as a wild card and he said you're either the best or the worst on the copy but he gave me a shot and i think he i think he offered me like 500 so we had this two-week challenge to get the job and i didn't get it and it's the first job I've not got so it kind of was a bit of a blow so I said well how much of your time does that get so I said well don't pay me the money give me like 22 and a half minutes or whatever it was and then I had my time pitched myself in did all right there I think I did 2 ,000 client calls for people who bought his software and I used to do that so I'd work in the gym then I'd work on my marketing business then I would do the calls from eight nine o 'clock till two in the morning up again at half five and I did that for a long time and then ended up becoming one of his coaches then become on his team then I helped him set up the agency did that very well I think we scaled it sort of quarter of a million a month-ish so I did quite well and then I realized I wanted to kind of go my own way and at the time I was uh I didn't notice how the term but I don't drink now but I was a functional alcoholic so I would drink every night never caused me any problems never had any hangovers never missed a meeting never did anything but looking back it's probably a bottle of vodka a day probably not healthy and um so I set up a little accountability group called coffee with Dan I said look I will show up at nine and two every day I'll teach you all the stuff that I've learned from all these worldwide experts and all the stuff that I've done in return just hold me accountable to doing it and then it all took off from there and that was my start of my online adventures so coffee with us so thank you for that i mean the point is the reason i wanted to to counter through that is yeah you've done a lot and you've had lots of different twists and turns and you've taken chances and you've grafted right i mean you have put the hard way i don't remember my 30s no wonder you need your quiet space now of nothing you know you're just catching up from all of those years where you were absolutely grinding it out right but but it's interesting because the entrepreneurial entrepreneurial journey you know it's never a straight path and yeah you have lows you know you've got lots of success which is great and and then the coffee with Dan how long has that been going now decade yeah so that's just it was just a free Facebook group honestly I remember reading a book I think it was called the coffee shop entrepreneur this was consuming books like nobody's business and he was talking about how he ran his business from a coffee shop and I went down to the coffee shop underneath where I lived at the time and I just couldn't see anyone like me so I saw you know nothing wrong with this I saw some lovely retired people some mums having chats together I don't really see any like business or anyone doing any work stuff and this was 11 years ago and I was like well if I can't find my own well I'll just set up a virtual one I thought it's not perfect but it'll do and yeah I just posted it on a whim I said look this is my group I literally at the time my girlfriend at the time took a photo of me having a coffee on my balcony I was just like I call it coffee we're done and I think 500 people joined within two days and wow all right people like this then and then it's all just and then that that has become so this free Facebook group to just help people be accountable me share that was it has become my brand and yes been 10 years strong now amazing and that's it a brand can start in all sorts of places of inspiration can't it you know I mean it's like Brave Bold Brilliant, which obviously the name of my podcast is also now the name of one of my businesses, you know, so we do all strategy and leadership development, high performing teams at board level, right the way down an organization through to sort of junior, junior leaders and stuff.

44:00And there, but what started was the name of a podcast and now it's a whole business. It's not, you never know where things go. Like I did not, you know, do I, the Facebook group, as far as I'm concerned, will run as long as it can, but it's more than that now it's like my ethos my brand it's just become synonymous with me so and the starting point was giving up the booze yeah yeah giving up the booze so there's a very personal kind of you know reason behind the brand as well right yeah and it's like you know i've nothing against drinking you know i have alcohol in my house i make drinks for people all the time doesn't bother me but for me i just realized it wasn't causing me any problems really looking back it probably was but I just thought this is not a good way to live your life so I just decided you know if I can people can help me be accountable and I just just decided to stop one day and that was it yeah yeah yeah no and and never look back really by the sounds of it yeah that has been it's been a fun adventure ever since yeah fantastic so so coffee with Dan obviously you've got all of the you know the business side the online all of the mentoring and everything that you're doing helping business leaders um new podcast yeah so we are fellow podcasters together so tell me about the new podcast yeah so i wanted to do so i had a podcast with a friend jay who you met body and the beast it was called so one of my best friends we met in my group nine and a half years ago and we've been friends ever since and yeah so i wanted to do something slightly different so i wanted kind of like this with guests but i also wanted regular co-hosts so it's called the coffee with an podcast jay's coming on it so there's ones which is body and the beast episodes got my friend laura we're gonna be talking about life dating relationships friendships and kind of more funny stuff that's gonna be called beauty and the beast i've got a co-host as co-host sean with producer leanne who comes in on it and there's going to be a little collective of people that i'm bringing together so i want it to be so i like different things so i want to be every week there's going to be something different it might be a guest it might be just me it might be me and my co-host it might be me and one of the regulars it might be me and the crew i just want to notice is i just want to have fun as soon as something starts becoming fun it's a grind i don't want to do it so i found a way to make this enjoyable so every week i'm having different conversations i can reach out to really successful people i'm on reach out to my pals i've got really interesting friends like it's good i'm just looking forward to it and again i don't care how well it does.

46:29I will do my best, you know, good production, good guests, good content, good concepts, but I just want to do it. So I'm going to do it. Can't wait. So you've started or it's going to come in? As of recording this, I've got 10 episodes in the bank so far. So it should be out September 2025. Perfect time to launch when everyone's back from summer and wanting a bit of bababooom to kind of get into Q4 as businesses will be going into if you've got a calendar financial year. Excellent. Can't wait. so we will put that link in the show notes and everything so people can check check out that and if you've got a youtube you can have youtube as well yeah oh yeah i forgot about that so i started a new youtube channel so i think remember i think it's just called coffee with dan but i don't actually yeah it's a real simple it's the same thing so i've got a new youtube channel starting as well i've got events got a new book i just i started this year life threw me a few curveballs as it does and the thing is i'm very good at understanding as long as you keep going you'll go through the other side and when we met was on the start of my kind of upswing again everything was okay but just got kicking a dick from a few things so I threw myself into doing stuff I walk my talk I thought right this isn't going so great start doing things again start putting yourself out there putting yourself forward to stuff and surprise surprise within a matter of weeks everything keeps back to where it was before yeah have my little pity party and cracked on well life is never straightforward and I make bad life choices well we can do that as well we're odd human beings, we don't always get it right do we?

48:03Sometimes we choose the wrong people to have in our life I like them, you think I'd learn by now but I've also come to the point where I don't think I want to learn so I'll just enjoy it maybe don't overthink it I don't let my conscious mind override my subconscious ignore the red flags everything's fine but at least you own it yeah that's it you own your shit i do good and bad i do yeah which is amazing so over the all this wonderful journey of life you've had dan there'll be loads of advice that you've received and given and you've given loads of amazing nuggets of advice on this um hope you still got listeners after this absolutely it will have shot through the roof dan so best piece of advice that you've received show up every day whether you want to or not that's it like something my dad used to say um and you know if i put a brackets with that be useful when it's a lovely sad Arnold Schwarzenegger book kind of called that but that's what my dad said if you can be always be useful you'll be fine so a combination of the two if you show up every day whether you want to or not you'll get ahead and just find a way to be useful i've always just found a way to be useful take jobs off people's hands help people out where they need help that's what's got me a lot of places where i maybe shouldn't have got or got myself into because i've just been useful so yeah show up every day and be useful i love it yeah both amazing pieces and super simple right it really is it's not the thing is getting ahead is not that complicated if you can show up every day whether or not you want to you'll be ahead of the majority of people because most people when they don't feel like it don't show up and that's okay but you can't expect the results from the work you didn't do absolutely yeah and the be useful thing is just again just be useful like I don't really have an ego I don't think I'm special I've always just tried to add value and be useful and help people where I can and that's got me pretty far yeah I love that I love that and you know I always think as well you know do what you say you're gonna do yeah keep your word honestly that's a big thing you know what I mean so many people don't follow up oh yeah we'll do this oh yeah welcome and then you don't you just go don't say it then but if you say you're gonna do something do it it's really simple you know I've got a little fix for that if somebody asks you to do something and you're not quite sure and I do this to people who reach out for me as I say can you remind me tomorrow or can I get back to you that I give myself time because thing is I've we've all done it we've said yes and oh fuck I've got to do the thing so I don't allow myself to say yes or no to things I do what I'm going to do without a little bit of thought because I'm probably a little bit too fast-paced sometimes like I said yeah I'll do it and I'm like I don't want to do it yeah I shouldn't do it or whatever yeah or or you know I'm not saying this is you, but certainly this is what I've been guilt of in the past.

50:50I think I'm a bit of a people pleaser. Yeah, you just say yes. And it's great, say yes to stuff, you know, and then opportunity will come and yes, absolutely. But you've also got to say no sometimes and say no in the right way. But yeah, for me, I think it's just, you know, it's not difficult, is it? No, it's not. We overcomplicate things. We overcomplicate business. We overcomplicate life. We really do. We strip it back. And people who kind of do the sort of jobs we do try and make it overcomplicated to sell their service or product or solution. It's like simplicity often gets you far, but it doesn't sell as hard as some fancy funnel or really complicated system.

51:25It's like it is the basics repeated over time. You'll get far. Absolutely. No, that's great advice. I love that. See, your lovely dad, he left you with an amazing approach to life. He's a good man. Yeah, fantastic. So this year, a lot going on, Dan? if you could describe this year in one word and you can only have one so don't be greedy what would it be and why i would go with dynamic and that's probably the most corporate word i'm going to say on this whole podcast but it has been it's just been i didn't want to use pivot because i hate that word from 20 i had that word so many times during covid years but it's just been it's been a wild year like lots of changes things have happened things have gone right things have gone wrong and I've just learned to just go cool whatever it is now I just I my attitude is just cool if it's great cool if it's shit cool it's just something that has happened and I will deal with it whatever it is good or bad so yeah dynamic is my word love it love it I'm going to be asking you next year what the word is so we'll see what happens next year um so music yep you love your music I do um you're a bit of a metal head I am believe from previous conversations we've had that doesn't have to be your choice of song but we are bringing together our break or brilliant playlist okay so what would be your standout song and artist it's pretty simple it's firestarter by prodigy so that was the band i loved in my teenage years that has been my walkout song for over 12 years now obviously keith who's sadly no longer with us um big fan of him and his his attitude towards life and the prodigy is that there was just that was a soundtrack to like my teenage summer they were obviously you know a bit rebellious at the time and so yeah prodigy fire starter is my go-to song without doubt fantastic what a great addition to the to the playlist i love it i love it so final question from me dan brave bold brilliant what does it mean to you sure this is the hardest one because you and you let me know what these three were i remember having a little ponder on this one and it kind of loops back into a little bit of the advice I gave that that's the whole showing up whether you want to or not and I will say if you remember the sort of no fear stuff from when we're younger stuff but it is literally understand that you're going to sometimes be afraid or fearful or worried or anxious your head's going to try and sabotage you there's all these negative thoughts and feelings and to just do it anyway even if you are scared or anxious or worried or concerned or you're in a bad spot or your health's not great or money's tight just doing it anyway knowing that there is shit going on and saying you know what I can't necessarily do anything about that right now or how my heart is feeling or how my head is feeling or whatever but I'm gonna put myself out there regardless too so in a short version that is what those phrases mean to me is feeling all those negative thoughts and feelings and fears and worries and anxiousness and saying, do you know what?

54:28I'm going to put myself out there anyway. So that's what it means to me. I love it. Thank you, Dan. You're welcome. So Dan, a huge thank you for bringing your energy, your honesty and your absolute no-nonsense wisdom to today's conversation. You know, your journey from building communities like Coffee with Dan to writing bestsellers and helping businesses scale, it really does show us that success is less about perfection and more about consistent, bold action. So to our listeners, remember, the biggest breakthroughs often come when you stop overthinking and you start doing. So whether it's building your business, leading your team or simply living life on your terms, don't wait for perfect, just take the next step.