The High Flyers Podcast with Vidit Agarwal
00:59:32 · Robert Nason, Vidit Agarwal, Neil Plumridge
[00:59:32] S2: Yeah, great for jet lag too. You wake up at 3AM and you need to go back to sleep. You just have to breathe and you fall asleep. [00:59:40] S0: Yeah. Yeah. It's a lot better to do that than go on emails or LinkedIn or Yes. Exactly. [00:59:46] S2: Turn you the buy song. [00:59:48] S0: Yeah. Is there one thing you'd wanna learn in the next six months? This could be in a work context or outside work. Neil? [00:59:56] S1: Yes, I do. I want to learn how I can restart a physical exercise routine. I've dropped that away in the last twelve, eighteen months. I used to run. I used to keep fit. This book and program or business has taken my life away. I'm going to learn at my age what is right. And it might be yoga, but I think there's got to be some cardio there. I think there's got to be some other things. That's what I've got to learn how to do. [01:00:27] S0: Well, you've put that on the record now, you better do it. Yeah.
01:00:27 · Vidit Agarwal, Robert Nason
[01:00:27] S0: Well, you've put that on the record now, you better do it. Yeah. [01:00:33] S2: Robert? Yeah. I've sort of got two. I think Neil and I are in a privileged position here because we're getting into doors that others don't get into to have discussions that others don't have. So we're at the forefront of what's changing in the AI world and how people are organizations are dealing with it. We're getting information thrown at us. We're working with an AI developer ourselves for our own content. So we've got an obligation to share that, I think, because we've established that position. We're looking at ways and means of of doing that. So that's one where I think we've opened Pandora's box, but we're here now and we should make the most of sharing perspectives and helping the world transition to this new place. And secondly, something Neil's raised all along is you know, we're getting on in our careers. It's time to have some fun. And while we're doing this and exploring different parts of the world and visiting different countries and meeting different people, we should have some fun while we're doing it and making sure we're reserving that time while we're also running our business to enjoy what we're doing.
01:01:57 · Vidit Agarwal, Robert Nason, Neil Plumridge
[01:01:57] S0: Please teach me how to do that Robert. I was just having this chat with my wife the other day. I travel for work like you do and I do not do any like touristy things. I'm just either in the or hotel in meeting rooms or on the airport. And she said to me the other day, she's like, you're going to all these cool cities, why don't you like take out a couple hours and go to the museum or go to a nice restaurant? And I'm like, no. I'm just running from one meeting to the next. [01:02:20] S2: No. But Neil's very good for me on that. Like, it's where you... Like, I've learned, you know, you don't have to stay at the hotel the client suggests, which is around the corner from their office in the boring part of town. You can actually go and stay in the cool district where all the restaurants and bars are and have some fun at night. Neil's teaching me all of these things that I haven't adopted in my career. [01:02:45] S0: I like it. [01:02:46] S1: It's called Gemini. Google Gemini, Robert. [01:02:52] S0: Very good. Last two, is there one consulting practice you'd happily see disappear? Robert?
01:02:52 · Vidit Agarwal, Robert Nason
[01:02:52] S0: Very good. Last two, is there one consulting practice you'd happily see disappear? Robert? [01:03:01] S2: Well, I've covered a few of them today. Well, those that have I've worked that have worked with me over the years, the word mumbo jumbo, they mentioned quite a lot. So I'm very anti fluffy consulting ease language and spending a page to write what you could write in two sentences. So concise, simplified actions, that's what I would like to see disappear. The future of consulting is achieving results for clients, not proving how smart you are and how complicated an issue is that only the consultant understands. That does not work, doesn't cut mustard any longer. So writing concise reports or doing in five pages what you're doing and relying on explaining to the client what changes you need. [01:04:03] S0: I would actually say one of my pet peeves, Robert and Neil is we live in a world that is too concise now because of AI. I think everyone is now distilling everything into a two sentence summary and we've lost a lot of the nuance that used to exist when humans had to use their brain to summarise something. We talked earlier about boards. I hear this all the time with boards where they're like, yep, we put the board pack into AI and we got the summary. And it's like, you might have missed some of the nuance in the board pack cause you just summarized it using AI.
01:04:03 · Vidit Agarwal, Robert Nason
[01:04:03] S0: I would actually say one of my pet peeves, Robert and Neil is we live in a world that is too concise now because of AI. I think everyone is now distilling everything into a two sentence summary and we've lost a lot of the nuance that used to exist when humans had to use their brain to summarise something. We talked earlier about boards. I hear this all the time with boards where they're like, yep, we put the board pack into AI and we got the summary. And it's like, you might have missed some of the nuance in the board pack cause you just summarized it using AI. [01:04:33] S2: Well, yeah and I'm happy that's your view but gee, I got tired as a CEO of having 50 page PowerPoint decks to explain a simple issue of WhatsApp campaign for the next mobile phone device. And there were really only three things they were saying but you had to dig them out. It's just unnecessary. It's fluff. And it doesn't make you look smart to have, you don't measure things by weight, measure them by content. Businesses are just not that complex to me. It's a telephone company runs a big network, sells time and use of that network and extracts a fee. That's all they do. It's pretty straightforward. I noticed that Telstra particularly when I'm there, can complicate things, the cows come home, you can use jargon. It just slows down decision making and those that simplify make progress in those sorts of organisations.
01:04:33 · Robert Nason, Vidit Agarwal
[01:04:33] S2: Well, yeah and I'm happy that's your view but gee, I got tired as a CEO of having 50 page PowerPoint decks to explain a simple issue of WhatsApp campaign for the next mobile phone device. And there were really only three things they were saying but you had to dig them out. It's just unnecessary. It's fluff. And it doesn't make you look smart to have, you don't measure things by weight, measure them by content. Businesses are just not that complex to me. It's a telephone company runs a big network, sells time and use of that network and extracts a fee. That's all they do. It's pretty straightforward. I noticed that Telstra particularly when I'm there, can complicate things, the cows come home, you can use jargon. It just slows down decision making and those that simplify make progress in those sorts of organisations. [01:05:43] S0: Yeah, yeah, that is true. And last one for you, Neil. For anyone looking to buy the book or read the book, is there a particular chapter you would encourage them to definitely read?