RadEO

James Perly built a $5-million government advisory firm, watched a policy change wipe out 95% of his revenue overnight, survived a physical breakdown he almost didn’t come back from, and spent 35 years doing the kind of personal work most entrepreneurs find reasons to avoid. In this episode, he talks about what he learned going through all of it: why the tools that heal you are the same tools that upgrade you, and what he would say to the 22-year-old version of himself standing at the edge of everything falling apart.Key takeaways:The negative voice isn’t permanent and it’s not yoursThe breakdown is a door, not just a storyGrowing too fast can kill you as surely as failingMental infrastructure supports everything elseBelief is a business toolMore about James PerlyJames Perly is a Canadian entrepreneur with 25 years of experience advising founders and executives. He contributed to the business book Scaling Up and was the earliest mentor to Jayson Gaignard, founder of MastermindTalks. He trained at MIT and West Point, ran the government consulting firm Perly Consulting for over two decades, and now coaches highly successful founders on how to actually live well. He’s based in Muskoka, Ontario.Links:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesperly/Company website: https://www.perlyconsulting.com/

When did the work stop being fun? You’re still showing up, still delivering, still telling everyone you're fine, while something underneath has already gone. Ross sits down with Dr Manuel (Manny) Astruc, a board-certified psychiatrist, EO member, and the founder of Your Next Act, to talk about what burnout actually looks like before it looks like burnout. Manny has lived this. He crashed in 2008, at the end of a decade of twelve-hour days, in the month after his twin sister died of brain cancer. What he found on the other side changed how he thinks about performance and recovery. Ross and Manny spend the episode inside that gap: the distance between where you are and where you're capable of being.KEY TAKEAWAYS1. Fun is the first thing burnout takes, and the last thing you notice is gone.2. The “I'm fine entrepreneur” is not okay. They're just not broken yet.3. Scrolling, drinking, or binge-watching isn’t recovery. Recovery is active and it's small.4. Burnout steals your ability to see options. The tunnel vision is a symptom. 5. Three questions track where you are: energy, curiosity, patience. Check them weekly.More about Manuel Astruc, MDDr Manuel Astruc is a board-certified general adult psychiatrist with over 50,000 hours of clinical experience. He is the founder of Your Next Act, a coaching practice for entrepreneurs navigating burnout, and an EO Albany Capital Region member and Accelerator graduate. He is the author of Happiness Rules and a provider of TMS therapy for treatment-resistant depression.LINKSLinkedInInstagramWebsite

Sometimes, you hit a ceiling in your business, and it’s got nothing to do with the market, the team, or the model. And everything to do with you. Talie Smith has spent 25 years leading organisations through complex change. When COVID hit, her business came close to going under, and the personal work she did first is what turned it around.We got into her Design Therapy methodology, which surfaces the misalignment sitting inside an organisation before any brand work can begin. We covered where partnership ends and transaction starts, and what scarcity cost Talie in 2020 against what possibility has opened up since. At one point I brought a live client dispute into the conversation, one I'm working through right now, and we unpacked it together in real time.This is a forum-level conversation about the real work of building something that matters.Key takeaways:A business can’t outgrow the person running it. Growing yourself is the growth strategy.Connecting your personal purpose to your business is a structural, commercial advantage large competitors can’t replicate.There’s a line between a partnership and a transaction. The best revenue comes from knowing which side you’re on before you sign anything.The mindset you bring to disruption determines whether you ride the wave or watch it from the shore.The gold is almost always already inside the organisation. An outside perspective trained to find it is the difference.More about Talie SmithTalie is co-founder and CEO of Smith & Connors. She is an EO Portland member and serves on the EO Regional Council as Director. Find her at http://www.smithandconnors.com/Links:LinkedInInstagramWebsiteAll RadEO episodes

Don Hache has started, scaled, acquired, and exited eight companies across North America over three decades. Long before AI was a talking point, he was building industrial automation systems with fuzzy logic and robotic vision. The question driving all of it has never changed: why is it done that way?In this conversation, Don and Ross explore the framework at the centre of Don's work. Founder. Architect. Steward. Three roles. Three phases. Most businesses never leave the first one, and it’s got nothing to do with talent. The business was built around one person's capacity rather than a structure that can run without them. They also get into AI, critical thinking, and what it actually takes to apply automation well inside a real business. Don's view is clear: AI works best in the hands of people who already go deep in their domain. The barrier to execution has dropped. The value of knowing your domain has not.One of the best conversations this season. If you are building something that’s supposed to outlast you, start here.Don Hache is a serial entrepreneur, CEO advisor, and business growth strategist. His work focuses on helping founder-led companies evolve into healthier, more scalable organisations through better architecture, clearer execution, and the disciplined application of AI in real business environments. He has facilitated CEO and leadership-team cohorts since 2007 and is writing a series of books on the evolution from founder to architect to steward. At the centre of his work: enterprise value is a decision, made early and deliberately.

Most founders don't have a growth problem. They have a clarity problem.Dan Grech is a serial entrepreneur who has built six startups, from selling candy at 14 to a $15 million exit. He was part of a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalism team, created and sold Miami's first podcast company, testified before Congress on AI and small business, and had a company recognised as a Minority-Owned Business of the Year in 2023. He is the founder of YBYS and creator of the Story-Driven Growth framework. His book, Your Business Is Your Story: The Growth Strategy Your Competitors Cannot Copy, is out with BenBella in 2027.In this episode, we talk about why your story is the one thing AI can't copy, what founder drift actually costs you before it shows up in the numbers, and why the gap between "I understand this" and "I'm ready to act" is where most founders get stuck.Key takeaways:Your personal story is a strategic growth asset, not a warm-upFounder energy is the most under-measured metric in any businessThe 'not yet' objection is a first-use problem, not a timing problemBeing human is the only competitive advantage that compoundsSmall business is the most trusted institution in the world right now. Most small businesses don't know how to use thatWant to turn your story into a growth engine? Get free resources on the Story-Driven Growth framework and book a call with Dan at: https://ybys.comLinks:Website LinkedIn Instagram YouTube XTikTok