Boss-it

In this podcast, Mark has an illuminating conversation with John Taylor of Action.ai, a company that offers the world's most advanced natural language technology, conceived by the best computational linguistics.Never one to shy away from a controversial question, Mark’s opening question, “Does AI really exist?”, doesn’t disappoint. Taking this in his stride, John says it does exist but the term is much misused. He agrees that "AI" is an extraordinarily broad term that has, unfortunately, been attached to just about everything in any context you can imagine.However, the current buzz is justified as the sector is at an extraordinary flexion point, where computational power and algorithms can be applied to use the tech in really useful ways - in healthcare, customer service etc.John notes that knowledge is building really rapidly - and its origins are in academia.Early Foray into EntrepreneurshipJohn started his entreprenuerial career early, setting up a small software company with a friend to pay

BOSS-it host, Mark Edwards has a wide-ranging chat with CTO and author, Mark Herschberg, who, it turns out, has been a guest on 180 podcasts. No pressure there then for our host to ask some decent questions :-)Brief Bio for Mark HerschbergBack in the 90s, during the .com era, Mark was a software developer. At the same time, he recognised the skills required to be successful were leadership, communication and networking. These were skills that were not taught in college, so he ended up teaching them at MIT - for the past 20 years.Mark has followed these two careers in parallel and is still a CTO.Best Lessons LearnedMark says the best lessons he has learned came from a book called "Peopleware", by Tom de Marco & Timothy Lister – The essence of the book is that most software projects fail not because of technological (software) issues but for sociological reasons – In other words, because your team didn’t talk to each other and plan and communicate well, they messed up the project.  He outlines the

Mark Edwards talks to Salt Lake City-based Joseph Wilkins of FunnySalesVideos.com, about how his company uses humorous videos to connect with audiences and drive massive sales. Background..In 2000, Joseph Wilkins founded ProCreative Studios, which produced infomercials for television & marketing videos for clients, including Google, Linkedin, McDonalds, Goldman Sachs, Chevrolet & Home Depot.As viewing habits shifted away from television, Joseph launched FunnySalesVideos.com where, after several evolutions, he now creates attention-grabbing "viral style" sales videos that get millions of views, converting cold traffic into sales.With 20 years' experience, hundreds of millions of views and over $250 MILLION in career sales, Joseph enjoys sharing 8 steps anyone can follow to drive sales on his podcast "How To Make A Video Go Viral."Switch to Humorous Video Proved a Huge SuccessMaking the switch to video was hugely successful - Joseph explains that the biggest video success they’d

Mark Edwards talks with Alex Gesell of Imagine Growth, a training institute, focused on the tech sector.A true digital nomad, Alex lives globally, spending 3-6 months in the most beautiful places from Europe to Latin America, US, Africa to Asia - He has employees on all 5 continents and clients mainly in Europe and the US.It’s a fully virtual company, which he founded 2 years ago and built from the start with the idea of having a truly global company. It’s a company that embraces the next level of working globally together with no borders and no distance is too far.To make this work in practical terms, Alex has made a conscious shift to scheduling his business meetings around where he currently chooses to live - whether that’s in Colombia, London or Silicon Valley. 100% of customer conversations are online - There’s literally no need to be face-to-face. Conversely, whenever he has the opportunity, Alex loves to have face-to-face meetings.Imagine Growth InstituteImagine Growth Institute is a training institute

Mark Edwards has a stimulating conversation with Matt Rosenthal, CEO at Mind Core. What Matt Finds Inspirational..Matt says he likes change and uncertainty, coupled with having to figure things out and not being quite sure what’s coming next. He also loves failure as it forces him to push himself and to learn and to see how far he can go and what he’s capable of - He’s often surprised by what he can do and inspired by seeing what he can do and how far he can go in his life and how many people he can impact.Matt has read the book, “The 5am Club” by Robin Sharmer about 10 times because there’s so much information in it about the brain and how it works. Matt habitually gets up early and meditates for 20 minutes, then reads - He feels this sets the tone for the day. The One Thing…Matt says the one thing he really aspires to is that feeling of happiness and joy - almost like constant sunlight that people around you can feel radiating from you.Money is, of course, great and it can make life fun but it can also disa

Mark Edwards  has an animated, all-encompassing chat with award-winning, published author, strategist and brand expert Minter DialBackgroundMinter is a welcome and lively guest on BOSS-it. He introduces himself as 56 years old, living in London, an American citizen with a French passport, married to a Spanish ladyHe's changed profession & moved country 15 times, worked at L’Oréal cosmetics company for 16 years and also at an investment bank. He started a travel agency for musicians, taught tennis, worked in a zoo and an aquarium.Minter has also written a novel, a biography and 3 business books and produced a World War II documentary.On Ageing and Staying CuriousChange things up - When you put on your trousers or underwear, change legs - 97% of what we do every day is the same every day. We are creatures of habit - Can we “unwire” ourselves?Locked away in the ivory tower that is HQ, leaders become isolated from reality, because nobody has the courage to tell the boss what’s going on.Leaders need to do

Mark Edwards has a lively and engaging conversation with seasoned US entrepreneur and former NYPD detective, Greg Demitrou.BackgroundGreg is CEO of Lorraine Gregory Communications and Greg’s Corner Office. A retired NYC Detective, he rebranded himself in the marketing space, where he's been for almost 30 years.Greg says being a detective was an ‘interesting ride’ that gave him many skills, including ‘good ears’, so when he's talking to marketing clients those skills help him listen and understand what they really want.They started the business in a little shop back in 1992 with no fax machine, no computers - just 3 ladies stuffing envelopes. Fast forward 30 years and they’re a fully-integrated marketing company with 30 employees. The agency is front of house and they have a print & mail factory at the back of the house. They’ve recently added two television & film studios.Greg says his company takes customers on the complete marketing journey: all the necessary skillsets are in-house so they

This week, Mark Edwards talks to former Royal Marines Commando, Ben Williams.From taking drugs to being pinned down under Taliban fire, Ben took some hard knocks in his teenage years, which prompted him to decide that a life of crime wasn't for him - So, he joined the Marines to find out if he was part of the 0.1% who would make it through training.After a tour in Afghanistan at the height of the conflict, Ben returned to the UK and trained new recruits for 3 years, before being given a medical discharge.Having enjoyed the coaching aspect of military life, Ben set about utilising his experiences as a Marine to help those in the corporate world. Ben has also written a book - Commando Mindset - in which he writes about the "ARA model" of coping in adversity, explaining that it's based on principles he learned with the Marines, as follows:A - Accept: Think with clarityR - Remove: Remove unwanted emotionA - Adapt: What's changed? What do we do now? How can we now take the fight to the ene

Mark Edwards Talks with Gordon Ho, founder and Head Rainmaker at Rainmakerdots.The main problems Gordon sees with lead generation are lack of time and consistencyHe says, sales prospecting never sleeps – so therefore, you have to commit the time and be consistent with it – Otherwise the pipeline will fall off.Nobody likes to do prospecting but it has to be done.https://www.rainmakerdots.com/

Warning to Salespeople: This might hurt - just a bitIn this week's podcast, Mark Edwards talks to Ari Galper, the World No1 authority on "trust-based selling". Some 20 years ago, Ari was a sales manager in a software company, selling an innovative tracking solution. It was after an hour-long, online demo - which Ari describes as a "Lovefest on the phone" - that Ari had an epiphany that changed the way he saw and approached selling from that moment forward.After that demo, Ari realised that somewhere over the years, it had become socially acceptable to lie to salespeople; he realised that you need to remove pressure from sales conversations and replace it with trust or you'll never get to the truth of what they need - And you'll be forever chasing 'ghosts'.Ari explains the importance and the subtle nuances of the language you use - with a list of phrases and words to avoid. He also explains when and how the sale is lost - and it's not when and how you may think

In this highly entertaining, both serious and amusing podcast, David Angel talks to Mark Edwards about the gratitude he now has for his life. Starting life as a chef and 'accidentally' falling into sales, David went from door-to-door sales to in-office calling - 300 calls a day. As a saleman and manager of sales teams, his drink and substance abuse gradually increased to a point where he lost everything and found himself living in his car. From this rock bottom, David gradually rebuilt his life to the point that he became a sales coach and helped others work on their selling skills as well as their mindset. David describes his persistent anxiety as like living with a pet tiger. When the tiger behaves, he enjoys laser-like focus, drive and determination; when the tiger misbehaves, it's a totally different story. But David has now learned different, more positive coping mechanisms. Amongst the seriousness, David and Mark swap anecdotes of some hilarious - and not so hilarious - situations selling

A New Way to Succeed as a Software Tech EntrepreneurIn this episode of Boss-it, Uruguayan immigrant, Sandra Shpilberg tells her fascinating story, from landing in New York, aged just 16, with her family, through educating herself, to finding a mission to do work that would make an impact.Sandra is an author, tech entrepreneur as well as Top 40 Healthcare Transformer. She founded, built & sold Seeker Health, a digital platform that connects seriously ill patients with clinical trials.Sandra explains her practical approach to setting up a tech business in Silicon Valley – going against established mores – and gives actionable tips. Her book is both an inspiration and something of a route map for aspiring tech entrepreneurs who may feel they don’t quite fit the Silicon Valley mould.https://www.sandrashpilberg.com/Sandra's new book New Start Up Mindset

With a background as an M&A lawyer in Israel, and several successful start ups to his name, Dan Ziv is now CEO of TouchNote. Dan describes TouchNote as a creative platform for personal communication, where people upload their own images and send them as postcards, greetings cards etc. TouchNote's primary differentiator is that they are a “Mobile first” platform, optimised for ease of use, with a particular focus on personalisation.Amongst a range of topics, Dan explains how they have pivoted to rapidly scale the business by offering memberships.Links:@Danzivdan@touchnote.com