wrong place
dreams are made here this is the
National Lottery in my local Sainsbury’s
and the odds are really against you by
the way it’s one in 14 million chance of
winning so look at that but let me tell
you a story about a boy born to
immigrant parents in the inner city of
Birmingham poverty all around him gun
crime drugs on his doorstep
his father had moved to the UK to work
he got a job our local steel factory he
worked all the shifts he could support
for children
that boy was an admitted child at school
teachers were like yeah he’s okay he
managed to get into college but then
eventually dropped out twice today that
boy is going to share a big idea with
you that was me at the age of 19 I
picked up my rucksack I got a single
virgin ticket to London and I got myself
a job in a digital super excited I
thought I read NightA defying my betting
a chance to make something of myself two
years into this job I was loving it
everybody enjoyed working with me I
learned new skills expertise and then
pop the bubble burst the dot-com bubble
had come hundreds of companies closed
down thousands of people lost their jobs
including me I thought like I was back
at square one so I thought hard what did
I learn over those two years 11 I built
up an expertise I learned about
marketing digital marketing so I went
out there and started contracting and
qui dancing with other companies I
hustled my way through
two opportunities that I didn’t see
before me before so I looked all over
the UK and I found opportunity leads in
Manchester included this process I
learned something about myself the good
times are the good times the bad times
what happens do not times looked inside
myself and I loved it I was driving me
and I always wanted to be successful and
I always want the people around me at
eventually I got back to London I
arrived in London the game and I decided
to do the career thing but what I was
doing the career thing I also had my
side results I was still doing side
projects are still building Internet
companies and fail and then climb my way
up and I eventually became the marketing
director a small scrappy start off in
Northwest London the strap line was all
to take away online everyone said to me
actually Matt whose water take away only
today don’t forget guys this was 2007
and the fullest iPhone was just being
released anyhow I sat down with my
senior management team and we thought to
ourselves we’re gonna make this company
big we giving so he thought 100 million
tomographic 100 million her company Wow
numbers beyond me then we said 400
million then we said 600 million three
years ago the company floated on the
stock market for 1.5 billion pounds can
you imagine the face my parents never
listen now I’m an investor I have
multiple startups I help entrepreneurs
hundreds of different entrepreneurs but
through this journey I learned something
I discovered something and I wonder if
other successful people also have it so
I looked at Mark Zuckerberg Warren
Buffett even speak the youngest
billionaire
Bandersnatch oh I looked at pop stars
movie stars sports stars and they knew
about this thing
they were very self-aware I looked up
people within my own network successful
people around me they also knew about it
I call it deep unfair advantage this is
something which you might have been
given acquired or something you might
have even ever gotten about let’s take a
look at some real-life example it so we
have Mary Jane and Sarah here talented
fashion designers all want to have
launched their own fashion Brandel
mary has a self help myself she’s read
all the books which is really motivated
to gorgeous fashion browser MJ whose
experience Jane has this experience of
working in a luxury brand and then we
have Sarah who has now I’ve got a
contact with a fashion edit I know Maxim
is most likely to succeed you’re
probably thinking to sea level while
actually potentially to all three of
them however you are right it is C
because that’s what I call people fair
advantage let’s take a look at another
example we all know somebody who wants a
large billion-dollar billion-dollar hat
I get plenty of proposals across my desk
somebody who wanted much this new app so
we have John and Apple over here John
has been an accountant for the last 15
years of his life but his mother has
suffered from disease and the app is to
help his mother then we have Abdullah
Abdullah here has 10 years of experience
in NHS his work with patients with the
specific disease he understands the
commercials he understands how patients
of death dealt with
he knows the nuances around the NHS if
these two people ask me for funding who
do you think is most likely to receive
me for they will have most likely be
however
you might be thinking that unfair what
about John
my advice to John will be to partner
with B because then he is more likely to
get the funding that he deserves because
once you understand what your unfair
advantage is you know how to work to
so I spent hours of time to
entrepreneurism by some people and I
noticed something a lot of people have
excuses for succeed my love excuses for
not succeeding multiple so I thought to
myself what do you guys need to help you
understand what your own favorite is
that so we created an auditing tool to
allow you to do that anything nicely
into the wilds regular bit let’s get
started with this so the first one money
look guys I had no money I had no money
so I was all mean on my project in fact
having limited money forced me to become
more creative and resourceful and become
that growth hacker and become that mean
start-up guy someone of the bootstrap
and start companies my disadvantage
became my advantage intelligence at
you’re not smart enough they used to say
I cheated the measurement of
intelligence can improve over your life
neuroscientists have agreed that our
brains are plastic
we have plasticity in our brains we can
improve our intelligence but more
importantly when I look at the
successful people around me and noticed
something else that’s called emotional
intelligence the ability to understand
other people’s emotions to work in the
team those were the traits that mostly
successful people had and if you can’t
improve intelligence just hang around
smart people like I do location oh look
everyone’s heard the phrase being the
right place at the right time
if my father mother didn’t move to the
you
I couldn’t be more in the village inbox
don’t know right now if I didn’t pick up
my rocks up and move to London I might
not be in the texting your location and
movement makes a difference to success
but also luck serendipity
meeting your life partner bumping into
the right person at that networking
meeting this is a part of the puzzle of
success if you really want to know how
successful people have become successful
ask them where were their lucky breaks
in their life because that will give you
a great insight into how love is part of
this puzzle of success education and
expertise
I had no degree and no qualifications in
fact I met a guy exhibition once and get
a car this is Colin after his name
what an awful tasting victory and I was
like okay that’s interesting we didn’t
do business in the end because we didn’t
really get one but interesting for me to
know that somebody who believes they
have educational degrees they feel
entitled to do this is with you or
entitle for a job you have to go into
this world and add value value comes not
from your degrees but from what you do
for other people and for the world
itself and expertise all the time when I
build my expertise over the years and
digital marketing getting the know-how
learning about my skills spending hours
and hours on my passion volunteering
working on projects that fail learning
from those build my expertise learn to
make mistakes and your expertise will be
built and finally status it’s the watch
you wear the car you have the house you
live in they carry anything the accent
it’s even the shoes you wear if you wait
for a job an investment back and you
wore brown shoes you are less likely to
get that job according to a BBC article
but you need to be aware of these
challenges and aware of these realities
of the world you see this program is a
very practical framework that you can
apply it’s not one of those theoretical
academic ones it’s something you can use
to broaden yourself but also more
importantly to empower you because it
gives you a lens to look up other
people’s success so whatever your
background whatever the agenda whatever
your race you all truly unique imagine
the dreams you go whether is to write
that novel start that Internet company
or land that dream job whatever your dreams are