of you he’s my small miracle you see all
my life I’ve had a real phobia about
public speaking a proper full-on phobia
with all the symptoms now this isn’t a
good thing but when you’re supposed to
be making your living as a
communications professional that will be
me it’s a very bad thing very awkward
and actually very often very
embarrassing the good news is that a few
years ago I met some people and had some
experiences that are just changed
everything now I’ve got to tell you that
I am the luckiest bloke because that you
know without any question of it out I
had a great upbringing I’ve got a
wonderful family
laughter love good health great fans
loads of opportunities and I’ve got to
be born Dutch I had the most amazing
career as a journalist and editor and
what a job that was and then I got to
start my own public relations agency
which is just a massive privilege I got
to build a brand I got to build a
reputation I got to create a fantastic
team and I got to work for some amazing
clients on some equally amazing projects
the best bit of luck I’ve ever had
though is finally to discover what my
purpose is in life why I’m here they’re
saying that the two most important days
in your life are the day you’re born and
then the day you find out why now I had
to wait and I was 60 to find out my why
and that was five years ago some of the
less charitable amongst you might be
thinking to yourselves well you left
that a bit late oh gee um well
perhaps you’re right and perhaps I did
but you know what that’s actually the
beauty of it now despite all this great
stuff I’ve been sharing with you I have
to say that throughout my life I always
had a sense that there was something not
quite right
couldn’t really put my finger on it it
was just that niggle up here that there
was something missing
you might recognize that niggle it’s
that niggle that won’t go away
it’s that niggle that keeps you awake at
night it’s a nickel that makes you
anxious but you don’t quite know why but
what you do know is that there should be
more to your life than there is now I’ve
admired an awful lot of people in my
life I’ve only ever envied one and he’s
my best made John now my best mate John
knew from the age of ten what his
destiny was and that was to be a doctor
and that’s exactly what he became I was
always in all of this I mean just
imagine getting up every morning and
going out to do something that you know
you’re supposed to be doing with your
life that’s what I wanted my life to
feel like desperately but as the years
went by I slowly came to terms with the
fact that that probably wasn’t going to
happen to me happily I was wrong I was
about twenty years into running my
business when another friend of mine
suggested out of the blue that it might
be a good idea if I met his mentor I was
really surprised by that he was a bloke
I really admired for being clever for
being really successful and for being an
amazing public speaker and I’ll find out
that he’s got a mentor that was a
surprise and why did he think that then
was a good time to raise it after all I
was in my late 50s by then and probably
a bit too old as I saw it to be changing
my ways or learning any new tricks the
name of that mentor was Alan mullet Alan
was just one of the most amazing people
I’ve ever met and as a journalist I got
to meet an awful lot of amazing people
everything that I have become all the
success that my business is achieved the
difficult decisions I made the life I
now lead the fact that I’m actually
stood here in front of you today
entirely down to my mate Allen mullet to
be fair when I met Alan I already
thought that I had it all I had the
house I had the business I had a great
family I had the things but Alan with
his amazing perception it only took him
about five minutes to make me see the
real picture of my life and what my life
had really become I had actually lost
sight of who I was my life had become a
performance I lost all my authenticity I
was making a life a living but I wasn’t
really making a life I had actually
created a life that I thought others
expected of me rather than a life that
was true to myself I’d been watching the
kids but not really seeing them I’d been
listening to the people I loved
but actually not really hearing them I
was too distracted you see I’d spent
years at home pacing the floor at night
often and for hours on end I’d be
worrying about the mortgage they’ll be
worrying about the kids worrying about
where the next piece of work was coming
from and in the next the next morning
I’d often find myself sat in front of a
potential client thinking now what can I
do or say to make you give me your
business that right there is what
grasping for short-term commercial gain
actually looks like now I was regularly
at the office seven days a week often
till the early hours I thought I had to
be I thought that that was my duty to
get the work to do the work to invoice
the work and then to make the mortgage
payment and then endlessly repeat that
cycle that right there was the life that
became my normal and I actually believed
I was happy living it it is particularly
frightening to think how easy it is that
we can all get so very lost so very
Allen came on to the scene and Allen
showed me what was real and what wasn’t
real he made me understand what my life
and thinking had become and he showed me
what they could be and I think right
there is when for me the penny actually
dropped I kind of got it for all those
years it had been about grasping for
short-term commercial gain it was about
business and not about people actually
that wasn’t making anybody happy wasn’t
making the clients happy wasn’t making
us happy and it certainly wasn’t making
our families happy so I got to thinking
what if we did this completely
differently what if we stopped grasping
at the office what if we actually
started looking at our clients just as
people people like us people with hopes
people with fears people with challenges
looking at them in that way instead of
looking at them as sources of income
what if we made it our mission to
actually help those people to add value
to those people to make a difference to
their lives if we did that with real
commitment and real authenticity would
we still have a business would we still
be able to make a living well right
there I was absolutely convinced that we
would I had absolutely no doubt every
fiber of my body told me that this was
the right thing to do this was not
idealism people at all I had bills to
pay like everybody else this was about a
fundamental decision about how we wanted
to work how we wanted to feel and how he
wanted to live as a team these weren’t
just values that we talked about we
weren’t playing at it these weren’t
clever words in fancy frames on the
office wall they’re just to impress our
visitors and our clients we lived and
breathed every minute of this so the
point at which we would decline work if
we didn’t feel right to us and we parted
company with some massive lucrative
clients who we’d always realized had
never been right for us or we for them
but we’d never been honest enough
the other thing we decided to do is
never to work for any clients that we
didn’t respect and like as people people
who at some level shared our value set
and for whom we knew we could deliver
proper results now I grant you that
these were fairly risky strategies on
the face of it and what you’re probably
wanting to know now is where we totally
deluded was this folly were we just
talking self-indulgent nonsense or did
we have something did any of this
actually work actually it did work we
did still make a living we did still
have a business we didn’t did win a lot
of work our existing clients actually
increased their spend with us they
trusted us in a way that they’ve never
trusted us before they actually referred
us to a lot of other clients we want
some more rewards and we were inundated
with applications from new people who
actually wanted to be part of the way
that we were doing things now it was
interesting that our clients felt
differently about it they were actually
buying into something more than the
service that they were paying for it was
no longer a commercial relationship it
actually became an emotional
relationship and they tend to be the
ones that actually last keeping a
business going and growing is absolutely
everything we absolutely believed the
total conviction the way we were doing
things could actually achieve those aims
in fact we believed this was really the
only way of delivering the level of
sustainability for a business that a
business really needs to survive so I
just loved what we were doing I love the
buzz we were creating internally and
externally and I just wanted to tell
people about it but here was the bloke
who couldn’t stand up in front of more
than two strangers at a time so that
wasn’t going to happen anytime soon
think about phobias it’s easier to
embrace them and work around them than
it is to deal with them and mine was so
engrained and had been for so very long
that I wasn’t really in a hurry to want
to do anything
I think what changed it for me was just
the sheer depth of conviction and
passion I had for doing what we were
doing it was seeing the changes in the
people around me was seeing the changes
in me the reactions from my family and
the reactions from the clients as well
so I had a word with myself I came to an
arrangement with myself and I set my
intentions to tackle my demon I am a big
believer in setting intentions and I
don’t believe in coincidence and guess
what a couple of months later out of the
blue or maybe not I get an invitation to
go and talk to 40 University business
graduates about what it was like to run
a business
happy days prayers answered
what an opportunity great obviously I
said no because I didn’t because I
didn’t do that kind of thing did I that
was just not me because I had a phobia
but hang on a minute isn’t that what I
set my intentions to do so I said yes
and I said thank you and I began to feel
very very queasy much as I do now when
I’m just thinking about the story few
weeks later the day of the talk arrived
I parked up in the carpark and every
step from the carpark to the venue was
this epic struggle against the almost
overwhelming urge to want to turn around
and run and I haven’t done that I have
done that I’ll spare you the rest of the
symptoms suffice it to say that it was
the longest 10 minute walk of my life
Green Mile but I didn’t run away I
didn’t run away I got to the venue
signed in lift I got to the lecture
theater walked in saw a sea of faces and
prepared to die I didn’t die
the two most important days of your life
the day that you’re born and the day
that you’ll find out why that was the
day that I found my why the energy the
atmosphere with the feedback the
engagement the comments from the
lecturers the emails I got the following
morning I indescribable nothing that had
ever happened to me before and saying
that I’ve just had loads of highlights
of course professionally in my life I
have loved every minute of every year
that I have run my agency but I’ve got
to tell you that I went home that night
feeling for the first time in years that
I’d actually made a difference to other
people and I can’t tell you what that
looked like I knew then that that was
how I wanted the rest of my life to look
like and that’s what I set out to do so
I think it was about 18 months ago that
I actually left my agency I lifted in
extremely good hands and I went out
there to go and fulfill my passion and
my purpose and I now spend my time
sharing what I’ve learned and
experienced with business people and
teams who find themselves in that same
place where I found myself lives get
changed in the process and what an
absolute privilege it is for me to do
what I do
so as I said to you I really am the
luckiest bloke that you know here’s some
of the stuff that I’ve learned I’ve
learned that it really isn’t ever too
late to learn a new trick I’ve learned
that it really isn’t ever too late to
find a true passion or purpose in life
I’ve learned that it really is possible
to run a sustainable successful and
profitable business when you put putting
a difference above making money and I’ve
also learned that real passion can
overcome even the greatest fear but I’ll
tell you what probably the best lesson
of all has been for me
that we have each others in us the
immense capacity to make a difference to
the lives of other people so how many
lives are you going to make a difference to thank you