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The Grown UP Business Podcast

The Grown UP Business Podcast

By: Paul Avins
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Summary
 The Grown Up Business Podcast is a scale-up podcast for entrepreneurs, founders, and CEOs who want proven strategies for scaling a business sustainably and building companies that work without them. Hosted by Paul Avins, Business Transformation Expert, this podcast draws on over 21 years of coaching experience, supporting 20,000+ entrepreneurs and helping facilitate £150m+ in business exits. Each episode Paul shares practical insights, disciplined leadership thinking, and real-world scale-up frameworks to help founder and CEOs find new levels of personal and professional performance. On the podcast, you’ll hear: Expert Interviews Candid conversations with successful founders, CEOs, investors, and subject-matter experts covering leadership, scaling, funding, operations, exits, wellbeing and personal development. Actionable Scale-Up Strategies Clear, practical frameworks built around Paul’s four pillars: Level UP (founder mindset and CEO identity) Team UP (building high-performing leadership teams) Scale UP (sales, systems, and operational discipline) Fire UP (harness the power and energy of mind, body, spirit connect) Real Business Stories Proven strategies and hard-won lessons from leaders who have scaled businesses, failed and rebuilt, in the real world — with clarity, structure, and purpose. This CEO podcast is for you if you want to: - Scale a founder-led business beyond day-to-day dependency - Build a high-performing leadership team - Create a scalable and sellable business - Move from operator to confident scale-up CEO - Invest in your self and your personal development You’ll learn how to scale a business without chaos, implement systems that support sustainable growth, and build a company that delivers results, with or without you at the centre. A sellable business is also a great business to run. The Grown Up Business Podcast shows you how to build both. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or your favourite platform and join thousands of ambitious founders already scaling with Paul and Team Purple. Level UP. Team UP. Scale UP. Fire UPCopyright 2025 Paul Avins Economics Leadership Management Management & Leadership Marketing Marketing & Sales
Episodes
  • Add $1M to Your Business Using The Profits Tap Framework with Stephen Jones

    Add $1M to Your Business Using The Profits Tap Framework with Stephen Jones
    Oct 2 2026
    What if there's a simple seven-letter framework hiding inside your business that could add a million pounds to your bottom line, and you're already sitting on most of the pieces? In this episode, Paul Avins sits down with Stephen Jones, an expert on people, performance and profitability who was part of the team that scaled Fitness First from one club to the largest independent health club business in the world in seven years. Stephen was also called on by the UK government to chair a task force on employee engagement, and is the author of Turning On Your Profits Tap, the model at the centre of this conversation. Stephen walks through the Profits Tap framework: Purpose, Relevance, Outclass the Crowd, Find, Inspire, Time and Service. He explains why most owners never define their personal vision before their business one, why relevance is under constant threat from AI, and why positioning means deliberately choosing where you sit on product, market, service and price, the way Fitness First combined David Lloyd's quality with leisure-centre affordability. Paul and Stephen dig into winning referral partners without paying for them, the five fears stopping a professional referring their best client, and the five benefits that get them to say yes. They cover a proven sales meeting structure, why "can you make a decision today" is one of the worst questions in sales, and why pressure selling signals a weak pipeline. Stephen shares how Fitness First recruited and trained whole teams before a club had even opened, and the study that first got him noticed, proving a corporate gym paid for itself three times over in reduced sickness. The conversation moves into culture and motivation: the nine drivers behind why people really show up to work, why money is only a short-term motivator, and the barrister who quietly retrained as a landscape gardener after realising he was working from resilience, not energy. They close on AI, why the IKEA case study turned an 8,500-person cost saving into a $1.3 billion opportunity by repurposing staff, and why the businesses that win will use AI to elevate people rather than replace them. What you'll learn: Why personal vision should come before business vision. Why relevance is a moving target with AI reshaping industries. How to use product, market, service, price to position deliberately. How to build referral partnerships without paying fees, using the five fears and five benefits that decide whether someone refers you their best client. A proven sales meeting structure: agenda, positioning, fact-find, presentation, close. Why pressure selling signals a weak pipeline, not strong closing skills. How Fitness First trained entire teams before a club had even finished being built. Why the best salesperson is usually the worst sales manager. The nine motivational drivers behind engagement, and why money rarely tops the list. Why performing from resilience instead of energy is a warning sign. How to build an employer-of-choice wheel around story, vision, engaged managers, coaching, employee voice and lived values. Why AI should follow your strategy, not set it. Apply this: Map your business against the Profits Tap and score each area to find your bottleneck. Before asking a referral partner for their best client, ask what their biggest fear is in giving it to you, then address it directly. Move high-stakes sales conversations to a two-meeting model: discovery first, tailored solution second. Audit what worked in your first year of winning clients that you've quietly stopped doing. Run a motivational assessment on your team rather than assuming everyone's driven by money. Before promoting your best salesperson into management, check whether they actually want to manage people. Use AI to free up capacity, then reinvest it in higher-value, more human work. About Stephen Jones Stephen Jones is an expert on people, performance and profitability, and author of three books including Turning On Your Profits Tap. He was part of the team that scaled Fitness First into the world's largest independent health club business within seven years, and was later invited by the UK government to co-chair a task force on employee engagement. He now helps businesses scale profitably through positioning, sales and genuinely engaged teams. Get Stephen’s book here: Turning on Your P.R.O.F.I.T.S. Tap in an AI Era Connect with Stephen: steve@skillsforbusinesstraining.co.uk (mailto:steve@skillsforbusinesstraining.co.uk) Scale with Paul Avins Connect: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulavins/ Book a call: https://www.paulavins.com/book-a-call Newsletter: https://www.paulavins.com/newsletter-opt-in Level Up. Team Up. Scale Up. Fire Up.
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    1 hr and 42 mins
  • Your North Star vs. Your Goals: The One Thing Missing From Your Business Plan - Will Polston

    Your North Star vs. Your Goals: The One Thing Missing From Your Business Plan - Will Polston
    Sep 18 2026
    What if the biggest thing missing from your business plan isn't a strategy, a funnel, or a hire, but a clear answer to where you're actually trying to go? In this episode, Paul Avins sits down with Will Polston, best-selling author of North Star Thinking, entrepreneur, NLP practitioner and one of the UK's top business strategy and performance coaches. Will shares his journey from believing money equalled happiness, chasing it hard through a career as a city broker, to the moment at a Tony Robbins event that revealed his real driver had nothing to do with cash. Will and Paul unpack what a North Star actually is: not a purpose, but a life mission you'll never fully achieve but keep working towards, the business equivalent of trying to empty the sea with a spoon. They explore why entrepreneurs hit a scale-up ceiling between £500k and £1.5m, why beliefs like "I don't have the time or money" get baked in during underfunded start-up years, and how to break a limiting belief by introducing doubt through other people's references. The conversation goes deep on identity: why exited business owners often spiral into feelings of depression from losing the "business owner" identity without a life-after-exit plan, why peak performance is potential minus interference, and why "it needs to be done, but I don't need to do it" was the belief that kept Will stuck longest even after success. They also cover recovery, why sleep quality now trumps everything else in his routine, his self-love list for staying recharged, and 22, the mushroom supplement business he built to run on one to two hours a week. What you'll learn: Why a North Star differs from a purpose, and why most businesses have a vision and values while most people never define their own. Why the money-equals-happiness belief gets embedded early. Why entrepreneurs hit a scale-up ceiling around £500k to £1.5m, and why hustle gets you there but framework gets you further. How to break any limiting belief by introducing doubt through other people's references. Why exiting without a life-after-exit plan often triggers depression through identity loss. Why peak performance is a subtraction game, not addition. The difference between guilt and shame, and why "work guilt" keeps founders chained to their desks. Why multiple identities protect you through major transitions. Why sleep quality became Will's single biggest performance lever. What a self-love list is and how it drives active accountability. Why Will built 22 to prove a company can grow on one to two hours a week. Why reviewing your net worth, including your business valuation, quarterly changes how you treat the business. Apply this: Get clarity on your North Star before your next goal. Ask what you're actually doing this for, long term. Interrogate your beliefs about time and money. Find people who've proven them wrong. Build a life-after-exit plan before you exit, not after the deal closes. Treat recovery as part of performance. Track sleep quality and build in genuine off-season time. Get your business valued every quarter. Treating it as an asset, not just income, changes your decisions. Create a self-love list of things that recharge you, and use it to check in on yourself weekly. Ask "how can I do this and have fun?" instead of forcing yourself through what you resent. About Will Polston Will Polston is a best-selling author, entrepreneur and one of the UK's top business strategy and performance coaches. A former city broker turned NLP practitioner and psychologist, he's the author of North Star Thinking: Master Your Mindset and Live a Life You Love. He's also built 22, a functional mushroom supplement company, and is working to build a 6,000-seater ice arena and develop the junior academy of the ice hockey club he played for over 23 years. Find out more: https://willpolston.com Scale with Paul Avins Connect: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulavins/ Book a call: https://www.paulavins.com/book-a-call Newsletter: https://www.paulavins.com/newsletter-opt-in Level Up. Team Up. Scale Up. Fire Up.
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    1 hr and 34 mins
  • Purpose, People, Profit: How to Scale Without Selling Your Soul - Andy Green

    Purpose, People, Profit: How to Scale Without Selling Your Soul - Andy Green
    Oct 31 2026
    What if the way you protect your culture decides how far your business can scale? In this episode, Paul Avins sits down with Andy Green, TEDx speaker, NLP master practitioner and former People Director at Pennard Vets, a Kent practice with over 100 years of history. During his time on the board, Pennard grew from £2.5 million to £12 million in revenue, from four to eight sites and from 45 to 180 people, completing three acquisitions and building a £3.5 million flagship animal hospital. In 2021 Andy and his fellow directors moved the business into one of the largest employee ownership trusts in the UK veterinary sector. Andy shares how a Tony Robbins programme took him from no job on a Sunday to a signed contract by Thursday, and why failing to get into vet school first time became one of the greatest gifts of his life. He explains how changing environment helped him drop the labels he’d carried from school, and why you should love your family but choose your peer group. Paul and Andy dig into what it means to be custodians of a century-old brand. Andy walks through his client from heaven and client from hell exercise for building values that stick, and why values only work when they’re translated into everyday behaviours. He explains how breaking down a £100 bill helped the whole team understand margin, and why hiring leaders from outside the industry brought fresh challenge. They cover why culture reflects what leaders expect, encourage and tolerate, how to handle resistance by assuming positive intent, and why some people need to be happy somewhere else. Andy shares the power of team profiling, having debriefed over 400 Contribution Compass profiles, and a moment where one person’s whole sense of self shifted in the room. The conversation moves to the employee ownership decision: why Pennard chose an EOT over a corporate sale, why the directors stayed on to keep running the business, and how it became a competitive advantage for recruitment and acquisitions. Paul shares his concept of aligned ambition for boards. They close on AI in veterinary practice, and Andy’s definition of a Grown-Up Business: purpose, people, profit. What you’ll learn: Why setbacks can become the turning point that redefines your identity. Why changing environment helps you shed old labels. How to build values your team actually lives by. How the client from heaven and client from hell exercise clarifies who you need to be. How to educate your team on margin so pricing conversations get easier. Why hiring from outside your industry drives innovation. Why your team will perform one level below how you lead. How to handle cultural resistance with empathy and clarity. Why scaling in a market you already know builds more value than chasing new ones. How an employee ownership trust can secure legacy without forcing an exit. Why boards need aligned ambition. How AI frees people to do the work only humans can do. Apply this: Run the client from heaven and client from hell exercise with your team, then define three behaviours for each value. Break down where £100 of revenue goes and share it with your whole team. Ask your team one question regularly: what am I missing? Once a year, ask each director where they want to be personally in five years before setting strategy. Profile your team and debrief them together, not just one to one. Before adding more sites or services, make sure what you already do is running brilliantly. About Andy Green Andy Green is a vet, TEDx speaker and NLP master practitioner who spent over a decade as a director of Pennard Vets, helping scale it into one of the UK’s leading independent practice groups and leading its move into employee ownership. He now serves as a non-executive director at Pennard and works with businesses through Andy Green Consulting, helping leaders build curious, high-performing teams and cultures. Watch Andy’s TEDx talk on curiosity: TEDx Warrington Connect with Andy: andygreenconsulting.co.uk Scale with Paul Avins Connect: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulavins/ Book a call: https://www.paulavins.com/book-a-call Newsletter: https://www.paulavins.com/newsletter-opt-in Level Up. Team Up. Scale Up. Fire Up.
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    1 hr and 38 mins
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Loved the conversations with amazing speakers - great things you can apply in your business as it grows, about recruitment, your past and present etc

Awesome learnings from a range of speakers !

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Absolutely love Paul’s podcast. Such a range of amazing guests with brilliant stories. Paul really knows how to interview and ask the questions other podcasts don’t. I feel like each episode brings you on a journey of the guest, to not only see how they got where they are now, but giving really insight and learnings into how to build a successful business. Thanks for always bringing great pods Paul!

Amazing podcast, great to hear so many stories and learn how to build a successful business

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