028: Brad Lomenick on Launching Catalyst, Scaling Success and Being the Right Kind of Leader
Subscribe:
Summary:
If you’ve heard of the massively successful conference called Catalyst, then you’ve probably heard of Brad Lomenick. Brad was on the ground floor of launching the innovative leadership event and today he’s sharing the wisdom he gained through his experience there.
In addition to Catalyst, we’re talking to Brad about his book H3 Leadership: Be Humble. Stay Hungry. Always Hustle. We left this conversation with Brad feeling completely inspired, and hope that you’ll feel the same.
Welcome to episode 28 of the Executive Minds Podcast.
Links + Resources:
Brad’s Website and Twitter and Instagram
H3 Leadership: Be Humble. Stay Hungry. Always Hustle. by Brad Lomenick
Three Takeaways:
1. Know who your audience is and invite them to the table.
The organizers of the Catalyst conference wanted to create a new type of event that reached next-generation leaders. So what did they do? They invited next-generation leaders to the table and spent time talking to them about their needs, ideas and goals for attending a conference. They didn’t ask conference veterans in their 40s and 50s what they thought would work. They hyper-targeted all of their research, planning and decision to the specific group of people that they wanted to serve.
2. What do you do after a successful launch? Go back to step one.
One of the reasons that Catalyst has scaled so well is because—even during their busiest, most successful seasons—they went back to step one in the Launch Loop: Understand. They never stopped trying to understand the problems they were solving and what their audience needed.
3. You honor people by asking for their help.
As launchers and leaders, we often tell ourselves that either: 1. We don’t need help, or 2. People are busy and will be bothered if you ask for help. Almost 90% of the time, you’re wrong about both. It takes wisdom and humility as a leader to know when you need another voice speaking into an idea or giving you honest feedback. Also, you’ll be surprised at how much other people are excited to help you. When you ask people for help, you are telling them that their opinion matters a lot to you, and by listening to them you honor them in the process.