After months of work (and a decade of learning the lessons I write about), I’d love to share my next book with you: Work Fame: Get the Projects, Perks and Promotions You Deserve.

This book was written for the 2016 version of me.

Back then, I worked in a large organisation. I was ambitious, but also a little lost. I believed that if I kept my head down and did great work, opportunities would eventually find me.

They didn’t and what I eventually realised was that great work alone isn’t enough. People need to know about it.

Over the years, I started experimenting with ways to become known for my work. Those ideas led to bigger projects, unexpected opportunities, incredible relationships and a career (and life) I could never have planned.

This book captures those lessons.

Work Fame is about becoming known for the right work, by the right people, before the right opportunities appear.

And now I’d love your help.

The mission: Making 1,001 people Work Famous

My goal is to make 1,001 people become work famous.

When the right people become work famous, good ideas spread faster, better leaders get noticed, and opportunities flow to those creating genuine impact, not just those making the most noise.

This book is my attempt to help make that happen.

When my publisher’s delightful marketing team told me it’s incredibly rare for an Australian business book to receive more than 1000 pre-orders, I saw an opportunity.

What if every pre-order represented one more person committed to becoming known for their work?

So I set a goal: 1,001 copies pre-ordered by 30 September 2026.

You can follow the journey in real time, too (scary!)

(A quick note for the aspiring authors reading: I have a call with the publisher's Sales team next week. Retailer shelf space is fiercely competitive, and strong pre-order numbers help prove a book has commercial legs. That's the practical reason behind pre-order campaigns)

As I write this, 139 stars have already been claimed on the Wall of Work Fame (thank you, thank you! I am so incredibly grateful for the support so far).

Every person who pre-orders the book gets their own star on the wall.

What’s in it for you?

Fame is about exclusivity, access, VIPs, the red carpet, perks and recognition.

I want to recognise YOU for being an early supporter of the book.

Every pre-order comes with a bonus, including:

⭐ VIP invitations to the Work Fame launch events (Just quietly… the Brisbane launch on 16 October will not be your typical book launch. Think Hollywood red carpet party vibes. You won’t want to miss it.)

⭐ Limited-edition Work Fame enamel star badges

⭐ Private coaching sessions

⭐ Team workshops, 1:1 VIP Days, and organisation-wide experiences

You can see all bonuses and claim your star here.

Pre-order Work Fame here

2 simple steps to claim your star + bonuses

1. Pre-order the book at www.getworkfame.com

2. Fill in the form on the page to claim your star. You need both steps for your star to appear on the wall.

And if you feel so inclined - share this on LinkedIn or wherever you hang out. The goal is to make this book Work Famous. Which, when you think about it, is exactly what it’s about…

Hit the blue heart 💙 if the concept of Work Fame resonates with you.

And so excited that next week, my event Con Con is on. It’s finally here! I’m bringing 50 brilliant consultants together down the Gold Coast to help reimagine what we do, connect, swap ideas and also? Have fun!

I’ll also be live-streaming with Alan Weiss for our next Talk the Walk episode live from Con Con, topic is “Nothing off limits” (Friday 19 June, 8am) - you can join in the banter virtually.

Will keep you posted on how the week goes!

🌴

Leanne “Only 863 stars to go” Hughes

P.S. TL;DR - check out my new book, limited bonus offers, and pre-order a copy to claim your star on the Wall of Work Fame → www.getworkfame.com

Actually, a few people were surprised to hear that, seven years in, I don’t have someone helping me with admin, inboxes, scheduling and content.

“You could do so much more if you had one,” she said.

Hmm…Maybe I could do so much more?

But more what? More posts, more comments (which means replying to all the comments), more tasks that need more checking and more “quick Looms” explaining how I like things done?

Omg, I’m tired just typing that.

Maybe I’m in my lazy era?

The trap of “you could do so much more”

There’s a strong narrative in business that growth = success.

Right now I’m in a sweet spot. I don’t have hundreds of clients moving through a complex machine at once. I can keep track of where everything’s up to - I use Google Calendar as my task manager and daily hand-written index cards to manage tasks. It’s not a perfect process but it works for me.

When I say I don’t have an assistant, people sometimes hear “I do everything myself” but that’s not the case.

I do outsource - just not always inside the business

I’ve worked with Jan (who I think is the world’s best Zoom producer) for seven years. He takes the cognitive load off me when I’m hosting webinars.

When I need specialist help, I bring in a contractor with specific expertise, who can hit the ground running, for example, I’ve hired an event specialist to help out with my event, Con Con in a couple of weeks.

If you believe that work and life aren’t separate (the “one life” idea my Talk the Walk co-host Alan Weiss talks about), then yes, I outsource quite a bit.

Here’s what I’d rather spend money on than a virtual assistant:

• A cleaner who visits regularly

• A landscaper for the edges and hedges

• A round of drinks for my friends

Today? I paid $26.78 to an Uber Courier driver to collect a personalised slogan t-shirt I’d had printed last minute for a photo shoot tomorrow.

Do I feel a flicker of guilt using a delivery service for that? A little bit.

Then I remembered that driving across town, finding parking, waiting around and driving back would have swallowed the exact window I needed to fit in some exercise today.

I’d rather hand off jobs around the house, or pay someone to run an errand, than pay someone to do work I can easily do myself.

Maybe I’m a control freak because I don’t have an assistant? I mean, I am a Virgo. My friend Sarah was shocked when I told her over lunch that I’ve never used cruise control while driving..!

Ask what help you need (not who you should hire)

There’s an assumption that the first hire should be someone inside the business, when often the smarter move is to outsource your life admin, or to really ask yourself this question - What help do you actually need?

If you lead a team, you might find a similar trap. Someone resigns, and the reflex is to repost the same job description that afternoon. Before you backfill on autopilot, sit with it for a day.

What result did that role actually deliver, and is an identical replacement the best way to get it?

(Also, side note: If I was in charge of a company, instead of offering someone more pay that is taxed at a higher rate to incentivise them; I would actually just pay a cleaning company to service my employees’ homes. Who doesn’t want that? What a total perk!).

Whether you run a tiny operation or a team, here are a few questions worth asking:

• Where are you doing things just because “that’s what we’ve always done”?

• What process are you feeding that no longer earns its keep?

• What result are your clients really buying from you?

If this gave you something to think about, share it with a friend who's designing their own version of success.

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Also, what are you up to Friday night?

Our full feature documentary from Nepal, Get Out Of Your Way is now available to stream. Stay in and tune in to watch me at my worst!

Tap the heart 💙 if this message helped and let me know in the comments - What do you outsource?

Leave a comment

🌴

Leanne “Lazy Era” Hughes

p.s. A big announcement next week about my next book, including how you can be involved and a slightly delusional challenge I’m setting myself.

p.p.s. Alan Weiss and I are back for the next Talk the Walk on LinkedIn Live and YouTube today (4 June 5pm ET / 5 June 7am). The topic: How to use words to increase your value, demand and influence.

Before I sat down, my client asked what I was doing this evening. I told her I had to take some time out to write this note to you.

She looked at me and asked, “Doesn’t that get tedious, writing it every week? What’s it for?”

I shared that this is actually less about audience growth (even though writing has attracted some amazing gigs and readers like you), and it’s more about my love for sharing ideas, and trying to improve my writing…As well as a fierce reluctance to break the weekly streak.

So, thanks for being part of the journey.

It’s been a fast week in the best of ways, with two big highlights that both taught me something worth sharing with you.

Highlight one: Appearing on the big screen

It’s one thing to go on an epic trek. It’s a whole other thing to have it captured by a talented filmmaker and turned into a 70-minute documentary that you watch with family and friends on a big screen in Brisbane.

The film is called Get Out Of Your Way. Once the doco is up on YouTube, I’ll share the link (here’s the trailer).

My friend messaged me after the screening saying, “I don’t think you realise how big a deal this is!” She was right. I didn’t. When you’re the one doing the thing, you just accept it as your reality. It doesn’t feel special until you step back/zoom out… and rewatch the experience in a cinema (very cool).

Matt Stewart, host of our ENFP experience, shared that “You can’t explain the bond you have with others when you do something like this,” and it’s so true. It was a delight to be reunited with my trekking buddies back ‘in the real world’. They all looked so fresh!

At the screening, Tim (the MC) asked about my self-talk during the hardest parts of the trek.

I shared that usually, my baseline internal monologue is pretty happy + positive. But four days into the hike, I was the opposite of a half-glass-full person. I was physically exhausted, in a mental trap, and convinced the entire trip was a massive mistake.

Three things helped to pull me out of that spiral:

1. Borrow other people’s optimism. Peer pressure gets a bad reputation because we associate it with bad influences. But when you’re surrounded by positive, fit, awesome people? Peer pressure lifts you. I was super slow on the trail, but borrowing the energy of the group’s pace got me through. The same is true at work. If your immediate circle is cynical or checked out, that definitely impacts you, too. Seek out the people who make hard things feel doable.

2. Just hold on for one more day (thanks Wilson Phillips). When I had my breakdown on the hike, unsure if I could physically continue, the best advice I got was to avoid making rash decisions and just see how things looked tomorrow. Don’t look too far ahead. Stop looking at the mountains ahead of you. Just take the next, unsteady step forward.

3. Ignore your thoughts. When your thoughts spiral, get out of your head and into your body. Your brain is trying to protect you and keep you safe but sometimes it’s too good at doing that, and can limit our growth. Going on trips like this, you learn how far you CAN really push yourself. I thought I knew that threshold, but Nepal showed me there's way more to dig into.

Question for you: What’s an achievement you’ve brushed off as “just normal” that actually deserves a bit more credit?

Highlight two: Facilitating an offsite at a winery

When my client told me we were having the planned offsite at a winery in Swan Valley, Western Australia, I inwardly squealed.

Off-sites like this work so well, and what I’d encourage you to think about if you’re ever in a position to influence where your team gathers.

A mistake I see often, is that strategy sessions happen on-site, at the office. People organise side quests with other colleagues, duck out for quick meetings, and you lose the magic of focused connection time. You miss the breakfasts and dinners where great conversation and banter happens.

One thing I shared with this team that I want to pass along to you is - the medium is the message.

Canadian communication theorist Marshall McLuhan coined this phrase back in 1964. He argued that the way we choose to send information (the medium) has a much bigger impact on people than the actual information itself (the message).

Leaders might say, “We need to bring people on the journey,” and then proceed to deliver a 90-minute Town Hall lecture where they talk at the room. The medium they chose is a heavy lecture but the message they intended was collaboration. These are incongruent.

Your delivery format/vehicle must reflect the intent of your message. A practical question to ask yourself before your next meeting or presentation is: Does the way I’m delivering this actually demonstrate the thing I’m trying to say?

Leave a comment

Okay, signing off from the hotel bar. Hope you’ve had a great week!

🌴

Leanne “Nothing beats a Western Australian sunset” Hughes

p.s. Tap the heart 💙 button to let me know if any of these ideas hit the mark for you. That little signal helps to keep this weekly writing streak alive.

She grabbed a ticket straight away (because she’s cool + spontaneous, everyone needs a friend like Amy in their lives).

Then she asked, “Wait. Who is this guy?”

So I sent her a voice note, explaining.

I discovered Ken back in 2021.

He was a surgeon who started tweeting about a fictional AFL team called Queensland Football Club (it doesn’t exist… Ken made it up).

During COVID, posting random updates about fake player trades and match results became Ken’s way to unwind after hospital shifts.

Then, his Twitter followers decided they wanted merchandise to support his fake team.

He designed a t-shirt with his face on it and sold $2000 worth of shirts in a week. The AFL sent a cease-and-desist because the design used Gold Coast Suns branding, so the shirt was redesigned to say “Queensland Football Club.”

His merchandise drops kept selling out, even when he only had about 800 Instagram followers.

I found him in time for the second merchandise drop, and bought a QFC hoodie (which sold out in a couple hours).

That hoodie worked in a couple of magical ways I didn’t expect…

I wore it to a cafe and the barista exclaimed, “Oh you’re a fan of Queensland Football Club!” It’s like we had some secret handshake going/immediate rapport, “We like each other because we both enjoy the absurd idea of supporting a fake football team.”

Then, there was journalist Sophie Venz. We followed each other because of our shared QFC fandom (she also bought a hoodie). One conversation later, she published my article in SmartCompany: Write a Musk-like manifesto to dramatically bring your business’ mission to life. A very strange route to press coverage.

Fast forward to today.

Ken is now based in Tokyo with 810K Instagram followers and Queensland Football Club has evolved into Front Office, a design-led luxury clothing brand, where he makes deeply researched garments inspired by workwear, tailoring, military clothing and sportswear, while collaborating with brands including Percival and Umbro.

Oh, and Ken was also lucky enough to meet my friend Amy in London :)

What I love about Ken’s story is that he didn’t start his Twitter account with any intention of selling merchandise, or designing menswear (I mean, the guy was a surgeon!).

He started something ridiculous, saw the response, made the next thing, and learned the next skill.

He lived my favourite quote, “That which you can plan, is too small for you to live” - David Whyte.

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Turning nothing into something (my favourite hobby)

Ken’s story matters to me because I’m deeply attached to the idea of turning nothing into something. I even wrote an article about it: How to turn nothing into something, 2025 style.

Which is exactly what I've been doing this week.

I'm finalising the program for Con Con, my first event for consultants at Kirra Beach House on the Gold Coast.

50 tickets sold out in 8 days last year. The whole thing started as its own "Queensland Football Club" moment: if 15 people bought tickets in the first 24 hours, I'd run it. If not, I'd ditch the idea. 15 sold in 21 minutes.

Right now I'm playing program Tetris, fitting all the good stuff into the schedule. I've designed the event I would want to go to. And it's looking amazing - but most importantly? The people (affectionately labelled the “Con Conners”) joining me are all amazing, too.

We're sold out, but between now and 17 June, circumstances change. If a spot opens up, I'll go straight to the waitlist. Jump on here if you want first dibs (event details here).

You can just make things up

You can just… dramatically change your life the second you make something up.

A fake football club, a dinner series, a newsletter, an event, reaching out to someone… And if you keep following the response, that tiny idea can change who you meet, what you build, and the trajectory of your life.

Steve Jobs shared this, “Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it. You can influence it. You can build your own things that other people can use.”

Remember that you have that power.

What’s an interesting thing you could create for absolutely no sensible reason?

Leave a comment

Hit the heart 💙 below if you enjoyed reading Ken’s story. It takes two seconds and helps more people find my ideas online.

🌴

Leanne “QFC for life!” Hughes

P.S. Alan Weiss are back for our next instalment of ‘Talk the Walk’ in a few weeks, the topic? How to use words to increase your value, demand and influence. RSVP here so you don’t miss it.

I’ve officially become the older person giving career advice.

Which is weird, because in my head, I’m still 27. But somewhere between bad jobs, terrific leaders, career risks, workshops, and building a business… I’ve learnt a few things.

I loved the graduates’ questions on communication, careers, and workplace ‘etiquette’ and wanted to share some of the conversations we had this week with you.

So, here’s the career advice I’d give my 25-year-old self.

1. Say yes to everything

At this stage of your career, breadth matters.

Seek out exposure, experiences and embarrassment.

(As you know, I love alliteration and ‘embarrassment’ is also a proxy word for rejection/failure).

If someone:

• Invites you to something and your first thought is, “Oh, that’s not really in my wheelhouse,” say yes.

• Gives you a project and you think, “I don’t know if I can do this,” say yes.

• Asks, “Would you like another rum and coke?”… (well, 25 yo version Leanne would say yes, current version: Absolutely not…well, maybe you could twist my arm).

If someone has confidence in you before you have that confidence in yourself, borrow their belief for a bit (here’s something I wrote about getting your confidence back).

Worry about being discerning later in life. Don’t worry about it in your twenties.

Learn what energises you, and what absolutely drains the life out of you.

When you’re younger you have more time to recover (and less people/dependents that rely on you). Take risks and collect stories.

2. The org chart is not an intelligence chart

I used to think seniority = smarter.

Now, as an elder millenial, I can say this with confidence - someone’s position on the org chart does not necessarily correlate with how intelligent they are (this also applies in the political world, too).

If you see poor decisions being made, if something feels clunky, inefficient, or painfully bureaucratic… you might not be the crazy one...

Also, if you’re a leader reading this: Some of the best ideas in your organisation are sitting with the people closest to the actual work. They often spot what’s clunky, what’s broken, and what customers are really asking for.

If you want innovation, start by listening to your people closest to the action.

3. Use your beginner label while you still have it

We spoke a lot about the word “graduate” this week. There’s baggage attached to it - you’re junior, inexperienced and your colleagues might underestimate you.

But there’s also a huge upside, too. You can ask any question and get away with it.

Those questions get harder to ask the longer you’ve been around because people expect you to already know. So ask them now. Approach everything with curiosity, even if you frame it as “help me understand how...”

Fresh eyes are a gift.

Subscribe now

4. Want to be interesting? Do interesting things

Part of our time together focused on networking, and I shared this corny line: “Your network determines your net worth.”

I also shared two approaches.

Curate your connections first. We overlook the people already in our lives. You know more great people than you think, from university, old jobs, travel, dog parks. These are people who already know, like and trust you. Take a stocktake, triage the list, and invest in those relationships before chasing new ones.

Then expand. Look, I don’t love networking events. Yes, I’m an extrovert, but who genuinely loves walking into a room alone and chatting to strangers?

I love this quote from Michael Bungay Stanier, ‘No one likes to be the person who approaches other people, but everyone loves to be approached’.

Be the approacher. Walk up to someone, smile, and say hi.

I was also asked, “How do I have more interesting conversations?”

Two parts to that.

First, be interested in others. I’m in my comfort zone as the question-asker, and it’s genuinely fun to learn about people rather than rattling off stuff about myself. What’s wild is that some nights I’ll go to an event, talk to strangers, and no one asks me a single question. I recorded a podcast episode about that…

Secondly, to be interesting? Just do interesting things! Live a full life, travel, get new experiences, exposure to different industries, ideas, explore cultures, hobbies and read widely. Aim to be social versatility/have enough 101 general knowledge so that you can talk about any topic, to anyone, in any room.

5. Work harder on yourself than you do on your job

I wish I said that quote, but it’s from the master, Jim Rohn. I was 25 when my boss, John gave me Jim Rohn’s 12-CD pack. One line completely changed how I thought about work, “Work harder on yourself than you do on your job”.

You need to hear this…(video below). Honestly, if I end up being even 33% as good a speaker as Jim Rohn, I’ll be very happy #lifegoals.

6. Find your friendtors

Finally, find your friendtors (love this phrase from ).

When I was younger, I thought learning happened with mentors - people more senior and experienced that I was.

And look they’re great, but I think we overemphasise them sometimes.

When I’m around a mentor, I can feel this pressure to say smart things. I want to impress them, so I don’t always tell them the full truth.

With peers, it’s different. You’re in a place where you’re all just trying to figure things out. You can confess about having no idea about what’s next. You can talk about money, decisions, weird work moments, ambition, uncertainty - all the stuff you might polish up before saying it to someone more senior.

I was part of a self-formed Quarter-Life Crisis (QLS) group with my friends Camilla and Jason. We’d meet every other month and talk through what we were thinking. We’d find really great cafes and make a thing of it.

It was fantastic.

And unlike some formal mentoring relationships, peer groups can last because you’re growing alongside each other. We still have a QLC Whatsapp group!

Leanne’s career advice, in short

Take risks, and let experience teach you.

Don’t assume hierarchy equals wisdom.

Embrace your beginner era, use it as a superpower.

Don’t overlook the people already in your world.

Approach first - most people are relieved when someone else starts the conversation.

Build a life that gives you something to talk about and learn from.

Work hard on yourself

You can’t beat sharing the journey with your mates.

Oh and this isn’t career advice, but if you’re in Australia I highly recommend watching The Piano on ABC iView. It’s incredible (grab tissues for Season 2, Ep 4).

And if even one of these six points landed for you, tap the heart 💙 below. It takes two seconds and helps more people find this.

🌴

Leanne “Exposure, experiences + embarrassment” Hughes

P.S. What’s the career advice you’d give your younger self? Let me know in the comments.

On finding your thing

If you've ever finished a project and immediately felt the pressure of what's next?, I hear you. What will the next book be about? What's a new offer I can bring to the market? I like to think I’ll just wait and miraculously wake up with the answer.

Recently I heard something that reframed this for me. During an episode of This American Life with Ira Glass, he shared

We all want that lightning bolt, the idea that hits us, the ‘instant clarity’. But Ira Glass, one of the most celebrated storytellers alive, is telling you: that’s not how it works.

Finding the idea to work on is the work.

You can watch his full speech here (it’s great).

On excuses

My IG feed is full of Jimmy Carr videos right now, and I loved this one where he finds a guy in the audience who is a stand-up comedian. But the twist is, this guy (@comedybrent27) has cerebral palsy and has never uttered a word in his life.

He uses voice notes to share his jokes. If that isn’t inspiration, I don’t know what is.

The number of times I’ve caught myself thinking, “Oh, I can’t do x because of y”... is something I need to stamp out of my life.

I mean, this guy can’t talk and he does STAND-UP COMEDY. Incredible.

On the best ‘office’ in the world?

Surrey County Cricket Club in London has started offering “Work From Oval”. They upgraded the wi-fi, desks, power points, at the stadium, all with a clear view of the cricket.

You can access this ‘co-working space’ for only £15 a day and have your laptop open, while watching the match. Their tagline is, “We won’t tell your boss.”

Hundreds of people have already taken them up on it. Read more here.

What's your version of 'Work From Oval'? How could you repackage something you already offer to fit into a different part of someone's day?

On why meetings are still broken in 2026

I find it fascinating that in 2026 meetings are still draining the life out of people. They’re too long, too bloated, too frequent, and too full of people who don’t need to be there.

I shared this Tim Ferriss quote in a leadership program recently, “A person’s success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have.”

I think this quote accurately captures the problems with meetings.

Good meeting habits, like starting on time when not everyone’s arrived, interrupting to keep things on track, excluding people who don’t need to be there - all require a moment of discomfort.

While these feel a little awkward/uncomfortable at the beginning, these are precisely the things you need to do to lead effectively.

On random recommendations

• Tactful Pettiness podcast with Cody Rigsby (my fav Peloton instructor) and Andrew Chapelle - funny banter + keeps me current with pop culture .

• Good Work (YouTube Channel), the host Dan Toomey is hilarious, here’s a recent story he covered on Silicon Valley’s new miracle drug.

• Wispr Flow. It’s a voice transcription app - but the real magic is that it formats your emails and notes as you speak, rather than just lump it as one big piece of text. Super accurate. I use it for a lot of things now, capturing notes, sending emails, writing this…

• Mulga Bills cafe. This is such a lovely spot to have an early morning coffee in Brisbane, it’s right near the Kangaroo Bridge. A great location for a halfway walk-and talk stop.

On the post that surprised me

My LinkedIn post about moving to Broome went a little viral this week.

I think it landed because it offered something different to the usual cost-of-living conversation.

Every media outlet is telling you to fuel up at off-peak hours and audit your subscriptions, I shared the best financial decision I ever made: which was moving somewhere remote, immediately getting a $30k pay rise, where the package paid for housing, electricity, gave me seven weeks of annual leave, and an annual travel allowance to fly anywhere in the world.

I had no idea jobs like that existed.

But they do because it’s genuinely hard to attract talent to remote places (oh, and the ironic thing? I felt more connected and involved in community life in an isolated town, than I do living in the city).

The insight here is - maybe the answer is for you (literally, or metaphorically) is to go somewhere no one else is willing to go.

Happy anniversary to us 🥂

Yesterday was our 10th wedding anniversary. Fun fact: Our wedding dance was to Percy Sledge’s When a Man Loves a Woman - wait, no. It was actually You Really Got a Hold on Me (sung live in Broome by Miss Behave and the School of Funk)

Which, if you read the lyrics, is objectively a questionable choice for a wedding song:

• “I don’t like you, but I love you…”

• “I want to leave you, don’t want to stay here…”

And yet, I love these lines:

“I can’t quit now / You really got a hold on me.”

I think that’s what marriage really is - where two people keep choosing each other through different versions of themselves. Plus, lyrics aside, it’s just a fantastic soulful song, super easy to slow dance to, and loooove the piano.

On AI referrals (I’m Copilot famous!)

I asked a prospect this week how she found me.

She said CoPilot AI recommended me, “Your work was presented as someone who is Australian based, understands organisational change, workplace culture and communication. Specifically, what interested me is that you were pitched as highly practical and interactive, with usable tools…”

I mean. I’ll take it (by the way, paid subscribers can find out how I created AI-friendly pages for my website here: The Exact Process I Use to Turn a Framework Into a GEO-Optimised Page).

It got me thinking about a trap many of us consultants and solopreneurs fall into: the content wheel. We post, we create, we show up - and we assume that’s what’s driving the business.

However, when I look at my actual data (AKA sales), my two biggest contracts this year came from people who aren’t even connected to me on LinkedIn. They found me through personal recommendations.

Yes, content matters. But it’s worth asking honestly - what’s actually moving the needle for you? This question came up a lot in last week’s marketing session - part of a three-part series I’ve been hosting this month on workshop design, marketing, and systems. I’ve genuinely loved it. Meeting everyone, answering questions, and realising: hey, I actually have learnt and tried a LOT over seven years.

Today I’m hosting the final session - seven years of solo business systems. Join us live and bring your questions (9am AEST), or grab all three recordings to listen back at your own pace.

Leave a comment

🌴

Leanne “Hey Siri, play Percy Sledge on Spotify” Hughes

P.S. Hit the heart 💙 if any of these landed for you this week - and tell me in the comments which one stood out for you.

He was sitting at a regional airport in Central Queensland, waiting for his flight home after night shift (not envious about that bit).

But guess who happens to walk past him?

Jimmy Carr.

Omg…Jimmy Carr is THE GUY that would be #2 on my list if you were to ask me, “Leanne, if you could have dinner with 5 people in the world, who would they be?” (feel free to guess my #1 in the comments).

I love everything Jimmy does - his book, Before & Laughter is in my top 3 memoirs, I love his life philosophy (here’s a terrific interview he did on Diary of a CEO), so of course we’re booked in for his Brisbane gig this weekend.

Ever since Chris has arrived home, I’ve asked him to replay the interaction about 17 times: Was Jimmy tall? Was he wearing his suit? Was he smiling? What EXACTLY did he say?

Here’s exactly what Jimmy said…

Chris waved at him + said, “Hey! How are you?”

Jimmy replied, “Hey mate. I’m great - you know, rich and famous!”

Ahahaha. This line is SO Jimmy Carr.

It’s precisely on-brand. It signals his entire worldview in two words - self-aware, unapologetic, comic.

Which is what I wanted to talk to you about today: Go-to lines.

Jimmy needs a go-to line because he gets waves and random hellos every day of his life.

It’s a cognitive shortcut that he can rely on.

And he's not the only one. Peloton instructors have made an art form of it with their one-liners, here are some of my fave go-to lines:

• “Grab water. Grab a towel. Get your life together.” - Cody Rigsby

• "I am. I can. I will. I do." - Christine D’Ercole

• "If you don't squeeze your glutes, no one else will” (LOL) - Adrian Williams

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You don’t need to be rich and famous to have a go-to line

There’s value in all of us having go-to lines.

On my podcast, Leanne on Demand, 95% of my solo episodes start with, “Hey! Thanks for tuning in to Leanne on Demand today”.

While it’s unoriginal, I find it helpful to start with this consistent line as it eases me into my monologue. When I host workshops or step on stages, I really just focus in on those first few lines to reduce the nerves.

It just acts as a nice little settler.

Getting started is genuinely the hardest part.

There’s a well-documented concept in psychology called task initiation inertia, which is the idea that the moment before you begin is the highest-friction point of any task.

Once you’re in, momentum takes over.

A go-to lines moves you off the Hesitation Station

A go-to line is essentially a launch sequence that bypasses your hesitation loop entirely.

There’s a Harvard, Columbia, and Wharton study I love on this - “Don’t stop believing: Rituals improve performance by decreasing anxiety” (Brooks et al., 2016). Researchers found that performing a ritual before a stressful task lowers heart rate, reduces self-reported anxiety, and improves performance.

You see this all the time when watching pro tennis players’ before they serve… Oh, and Alan Weiss and I also have a fun ‘toasting’ ritual before our Talk the Walk live-steam (here’s a replay of last week’s episode: How to design high-end client experiences) before our go-to lines, “Good morning, Alan! Good evening, Leanne!” makes kicking off the call a little bit easier.

The great news is that the ritual doesn’t need to be meaningful to anyone else. It just needs to feel meaningful to you.

For me, a go-to line is just a small, repeatable phrase that helps me move from yet-to-start to started.

It’s a small thing but something to consider as you go about your day - what could your one-liner be, either to start a meeting, or respond to a request.

Or maybe it could be something a little different from the default “Good, thanks!” when someone asks how you’re going.

Hit the heart 💙 and tell me in the comments what your line could be..!

Leave a comment

🌴

Leanne “But Was He Wearing A Suit” Hughes

P.S. Final roll call: We start in 180 minutes. In today’s virtual masterclass, I’m distilling seven years of MARKETING lessons into a 90-minute session on how to build a personal brand that wins premium consulting work. If you can’t make it live at 9:00 am AEST, the recording is included, all for US$100. 👉 Grab your spot before we kickoff

Today, I’ll share the EXACT email sequence that scored me a dream gig at Suncorp Stadium last weekend.

More on that below.

But first, a countdown: We start Session 1 of my masterclass series (Workshop Design) in three hours. If you want the frameworks I’ve used to build this business, grab your spot now.

(…And a quick shout-out to everyone joining from Stevie’s recommendation - welcome! And if you don’t know , you’ll absolutely LOVE reading about her latest adventure: I’ve Moved to a Greek Island With My Two Young Kids and I (Finally) Feel Alive Again 🇬🇷)

I Just... Asked

The anticlimactic story behind hosting a panel at Suncorp Stadium

Last weekend, I hosted the Brisbane Roar in Business event at Suncorp Stadium. It’s the second year I’ve hosted this event, this time sharing the stage with Michael Zullo (former Socceroo), Mari Seidl (Roar Midfielder), and Matthew Heath (Swyftx).

We talked about leadership, high performance, and navigating uncertainty. Afterward, my DMs blew up with one question, “How did you get THAT gig?”

People assume there’s a secret handshake or a high-level agent involved. Unfortunately, the truth is so boring it almost doesn’t feel worth sharing.

That’s exactly why I’m sharing it.

The email trail

Let’s rewind to June 21, 2024.

I was browsing the Brisbane Roar website and noticed they had photos from a corporate event I’d missed. So I emailed the generic contact address.

“Happy Friday! I was wondering if you could send me details on the Roar in Business network?”

She replied: “We’re looking at hosting a few more. Would you like me to reach out with information once these have been finalised?”

I responded on June 28: “Yes please! Would love to stay up to date with the events.”

If this were a movie, the story would end there. Leanne signs up for the mailing list. Leanne attends the next event. Leanne eats a sausage roll in the corporate box and goes home happy.

But a couple of days later, I had an idea….

I was probably making a coffee or walking Quincey when I realised - I’d just signed up as an attendee, but I run panels and host events for a living.

Why was I sitting on that?

Now, my first instinct wasn’t to fire off a bold pitch, it was to talk myself out of it.

I sat on it for a couple of days. Then I decided the cost of sending a slightly awkward email was a lot lower than the cost of wondering what would have happened if I had.

So on July 1, 2024, I sent this:

“Sorry, just adding to my previous email. I’m a business speaker/consultant, as well as an OG Roar Supporter (I helped set up The Den way back in 2005!).

If you need someone to help host panel conversations, MC, or speak in any way, I would be delighted to help out at a Roar event.

Happy to chat more! No problem at all if not interested, just thought I’d throw the idea out there.”

That’s was it.

She reached out last year, inviting me to host the panel. Then again this year.

Why it worked (and why it almost didn’t)

Looking back, the email passed a test that I now think about whenever I’m reaching out cold. Two criteria:

1. Find a task or skill that nobody else wants to do.

Hosting a live panel in front of a room full of corporate guests is something that gives a lot of people a physical stress response. For me, it’s super fun. When you offer to host, facilitate, or speak, you’re solving a massive headache for an organiser. You’re removing a problem from their to-do list.

2. Make sure that task is tremendously helpful to the person in charge.

I wasn’t pitching a keynote about my book. I was offering to make their existing event run better. That’s very different. It also helped that I could prove alignment - I’d been a supporter since 2005. I helped set up the original supporters club which made the ask feel natural.

By the way…

I’ve sent versions of this email many times - to organisations I admire, to events I wanted to be part of, to people whose work I follow. A lot of the time, I don’t hear back.

I’m not sharing the Roar story because it always works. I’m sharing it because it worked this time, and the only difference between this one and the ones that didn’t land, is that I kept sending them.

And yes, I know. It’s the Brisbane Roar. They’re not Liverpool FC. But hey, Suncorp Stadium is my Anfield.

You probably have your own version of this. A club, a brand, an association, a company you’ve followed for years. That kind of genuine affinity is rare, and look, we have one life, so why not reach out?

Don’t be scared to dream about working with, or for your a company, person, association or sporting team you admire.

Do your research - have a look at their website, events, strategy, connect with employees at the organisation on LinkedIn and see what they’re up to…

Then ask yourself: is there a gap I could fill? Is there a problem I could solve?

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Tell me - have you reached out to someone you admire and offered to help out? Who, or what companies would be on your dream list? Let me know in the comments.

Catch what you can with Leanne (upcoming development opportunities)

1. How to design high-end client experiences (free live-stream)

Alan Weiss, the rockstar of consulting, and and I are BACK for martini + coffee time, coming to you LIVE on LinkedIn, where you can jump in, comment, ask your questions + enjoy the banter!

If you want to command premium fees, you need to deliver a premium experience.
We’re going to talk about the psychology of premium buyers, how to position your value from the very first interaction, and why your fees should reflect the transformation you provide, not the hours you work.

🍸 Martini Time (US): Thursday, 23 April @ 5:00 PM ET
☕ Coffee Time (AUS): Friday, 24 April @ 7:00 AM AEST

Join our LinkedIn Live (or catch the replay here).

2. Last Call: The "Best Of" Series starts at 9am

I’m kicking off Session 1 of 3 in Leanne Hughes - The Best Of (7 Years Distilled) series in three hours.

If you want the shortcuts, the templates, and the hard-won lessons from 7 years in the trenches, you need to be on the Zoom (okay, it’s being recorded, too).

• Session 1: 90 Minutes to Masterful Workshop Design Friday 24 April

• Session 2: 1 Idea → Infinite Opportunities Friday 1 May

• Session 3: 7 Years of Solo Business Systems Friday 8 May

You can grab individual sessions for US$100 + tax, or the Full Bundle for US$180 + tax (saving you $120).

See you next week,

🌴

Leanne “Put your hand up“ Hughes

P.S. If this "no-luck-involved" breakdown made you think, hit the heart 💙 button. It helps more people find the strategy behind the "luck."

I INSTANTLY regretted saying that the moment it left my mouth.

During a client meeting for a new project requiring a full change plan, I did the Gantt chart planning in my head. I knew this work would take serious Leanne brain bandwidth.

My final book manuscript was also due the following Monday morning - so aiming to submit a client deliverable after that made a lot of sense.

Instead, I declared, “I’ll have that to you this Friday!”

Whyyyyy?

If you've ever said something similar and immediately regretted it, you're not alone.

For me, it comes down to a toxic combination of people-pleasing tendencies and a genuine addiction to pressure. Nothing mobilises me more than the stress of a looming task. If there was no pressure, I’d literally just bed-rot all day with my sausage dog.

Btw, the etymology of the word ‘deadline’ is pretty horrific. It originated in American Civil War prisons, where the “deadline” was a physical boundary. If a prisoner crossed it, the guards were ordered to shoot.

If you crossed the line, you died.

(On an aside, have you noticed how aggressive business language is? We have bullet points, target markets, headhunting, we ‘tackle’ tasks, ‘trigger’ workflows, have ‘frontline’ leaders, and we’re all just ‘killing it’?)

My Friday commitment isn’t life-or-death, but I act as if it is, because what do you have to lose?

Oh, you know, just trust, the single-most important commodity in a service-based business.

Anyway, I’d like to think one day I’ll change my behaviour and not set ambitious timeframes. But I don’t think I’ll ever change.

I got the change plan done, went on a boat + 6-hour champagne blitz for my friend’s b’day, and also submitted my book manuscript on time (here’s my post-celebratory LinkedIn post).

Yup, it sucked a little, but even after going through all that, have I learnt anything?

Nope! And it’s because - I adamantly believe there’s upside to setting a tough time-frame for yourself.

Example:

I recently looked up a guy I follow on LinkedIn to see if he had a regular Substack newsletter.

He does, but his bio reads: “I only share posts on Substack when they’re worth posting.”

His last post was back in January.

This can be a bit of a trap and there are two ways of looking at it:

1. Be like this bloke and wait for a “great idea” before sharing it. If I lived this way, you’d never get an email from me, because what does a ‘great idea’ actually look like? Who decides? Then, let’s say you wait 3 months before sharing something with your audience… It better be an absolute belter of an idea - they’ve been waiting MONTHS to read it. I find this approach creates more pressure.

2. Set a hard, specific deadline, like 5:50 am every Friday (the deadline for this weekly letter to you), and share what’s top of mind. This reminds me of my favourite Seth Godin quote: “Saturday Night Live doesn’t go on at 11:30 p.m. because it’s ready. It goes on because it’s 11:30 p.m.”

The other week, I almost skipped writing to you.

What was most top of mind was my Achilles injury ( boring). However, this Achilles post became one of my most “hearted” articles (thank you!). I got phone calls from lovely people checking in, very kind emails, and even an invite to speak at a national podiatry conference.

The magic of a deadline is that it helps to mobilise you.

Disclaimer: I’m not endorsing burnout hustle culture type commitment, where you lose sleep over what’s ahead of you and are frazzled 24/7…But just giving you a different perspective to consider when planning out your time, and asking a new question: Do you REALLY need an extra few days, or weeks… What would it look like to produce and ship something right now? And using that feedback to improve whwat you do?

Here are three ideas on how you can use deadlines to your advantage

1. Use pressure to say goodbye to perfectionism: A tight timeframe is the ultimate antidote to tinkering. When you only have until Friday, you are forced out of “perfect” mode and into “good enough” mode - which, most of the time, is exactly where you need to be. The next time you’re tempted to push a deadline back, ask yourself honestly, How much better will this actually be if I take an extra two days? The answer is usually “not dramatically better.” An aggressive deadline forces you to deliver the 80% that matters, drop the 20% that doesn’t, and move on to the next thing.

2. Own your calendar before you commit (ha! This lesson is written for me) Before you agree to any deadline, open your calendar, and make sure it’s one calendar that holds both work and life. I throw everything into a single Google Calendar: car servicing, appointments, dog walks, social events, all of it. Once you’ve committed, work backwards. Block out the actual time to do the thing. If I’m speaking at a conference on 21 July, I’ll add at a minimum two hours on 21 June to map the idea, two hours on 7 July to develop it, and two hours the day before to pack, practise, and rehearse. I share more on that in this episode 🌴55. Leanne’s (boring) way to manage overwhelm

3. Manufacture the pressure. If you don’t have a deadline, make one up. I mean, aren’t all deadlines simply made up anyway? I think this is why there are so many meetings - a meeting is usually a manufactured deadline to force us to produce something before we walk into the room. It’s the same principle that mobilises you to clean your house before the cleaners arrive. If you’re procrastinating on something, make it public. Book a meeting to review the work, or send an email saying, “I’ll have this to you by Thursday at 3 pm.” Always share a specific time.

What’s a ‘fake’ deadline you’ve set for yourself that actually worked? Let me know in the comments.

Leave a comment

Which brings me to my own manufactured deadline.

It’s my 7-year biz-aversary, and I’ve been meaning to consolidate everything I’ve learned about workshop design, marketing, and solo business systems into one place. If I didn’t set a deadline, I’d be tinkering with this idea until 2028.

So, I did what I always do: I over-committed, made it public, and put it on the calendar.

I’m calling it The Best Of (7 Years Distilled) - three live virtual sessions across three consecutive Fridays (April 24, May 1, and May 8), starting at 9am AEST.

I’m going to share the exact frameworks that built my business, saved my sanity, and generated real ROI.

Grab the full bundle of 3 sessions for US$180 + tax, or individual sessions for US$100 + tax.

→ Grab the 3-Session Bundle

Or pick the single session that excites you most right now:

• → Session 1: 90 Minutes to Design High-Ticket Workshops - April 24

• → Session 2: 1 Idea → High-Paying Opportunities - May 1

• → Session 3: 7 Years of Profitable Solo Business System - May 8

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What’s a fake deadline you’ve set for yourself that actually worked? Let me know in the comments.

And do you also over-commit in the moment, or is it just me…?

🌴

Leanne “Chronic over-committer” Hughes

P.S. If this lands for you today, tap the heart 💙. That little click helps my ideas reach the next person who needs it.

Craig’s sitting directly across from me in a crisp white shirt.

I was in the middle of a story, using my hands for big, sweeping gestures to drive home a point, when my left hand clipped my glass of red wine.

Time seemed to slow down as I watched a full glass of Shiraz begin its trajectory toward his chest. I could see the horror in Craig’s eyes.

In that split second, my career arc felt like it was bending in the wrong direction.

Then, in some lizard-brain survival instinct, I caught the glass mid-air before a single drop landed on him.

All of us at the table paused and burst into laughter.

Career Limiting Moment (CLM)?

Avoided…Phew.

But I’ve had many CLMs over my career.

A few weeks into a marketing role for a multi-million dollar maritime simulator, I sent a strategy document to the Managing Director. I had spent two weeks researching demographics and buying patterns to ensure the project was commercially viable.

I ended my note with, “You’ll find this is a very effluent market.”

Her reply landed minutes later - and I thought, Oh wow, she must be so impressed already!

But she wrote just one line: “I think you mean affluent. Look up effluent.”

I did.

Effluent is liquid waste or sewage discharged into the sea.

I had just told the person who hired me that our multi-million dollar target market was quite literally full of crap.

Blush

Oh, and there was that very first time I visited a mine site, when this CLM occurred (video snippet below).

These moments feel terminal when they happen.

Your blood rushes to your face and you wish, in Cher’s words, you could simply “Turn back time”.

But these are the stories not only serve as Career Limiting Moments, but Career Laughing Moments…and more importantly, Career Learning Moments… the kind of stories people actually want to hear.

Keeping your work receipts

In my next book, I write about keeping your Work Receipts. Building a file of evidence - screenshots of great emails, recognition you’ve received, and comments that remind you that you’re actually good at what you do.

I started keeping mine when I was employed, just by moving nice emails into a sub-folder in my inbox.

These days, I take screenshots on my phone and save them into an album.

Here’s an example of a lovely client email I screenshot last week.

I don’t look at this folder every day.

I look at it on the days when I need a bit of a pep in my step. On those days, I open the folder and scroll through, and it reminds me that I’ve done good work before and I’ll do it again. The evidence is right there.

But the brag file is only half the picture.

Your CLMs belong in that file, too.

They’re relatable, bring people together, show that you’re willing to take risks (sometimes unintentionally), and own the fallout.

Too often, we’re scared to try new things, or we’re wary of being innovative because of the fear of failure. But what if you could celebrate failed attempts, or at least normalise it by talking about it more?

Think about the last few roles you’ve held - where did you properly stuff things up? When did you walk away from a meeting thinking, “Oh dear, well, that’s going to follow me around for a while”? What did you learn?

Sure, these moments are not the best at the time - that’s the point.

But they serve as brilliant reminders of how much you’ve grown (I have the correct spelling of ‘AFFLUENT’ seared into my brain), and they’re connective tissue - stories you can share to help build trust and pull people in.

SIFT these stories with your team

One way to capture these moments is to start asking people to share them. A neat framework I learnt from reading The Story Cookbook, is to run an activity called SIFT (shared by Lisa Evans).

SIFT stands for:

• Stuff Ups (or, if you’re in the US, “screw ups”)

• Insights

• First Times

• Transformations

You can use the SIFT framework to build a collective “cringe folder” with your team. Instead of the standard status update where everyone pretends to be crushing their KPIs, go around the room and ask for one story from the last 90 days based on a Stuff-up, an Insight, a First Time, or a Transformation.

This surfaces the actual texture of the work - the friction, the experiments, and the accidental wins…and also gets laughs, too.

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Announcing: A brand new masterclass series: The Best Of (7 Years Distilled) with Leanne Hughes’

I have spent the last few weeks SIFTing through my own work, as it’s my seven year biz-aversary.

To celebrate, I’ve decided to take the best of what I have learnt across workshops, marketing, and systems and distill them into three live virtual sessions.

You’re invited!

The series runs across three Fridays (April 24, May 1, and May 8), starting at 9am AEST. That’s 11am NZST and 7am AWST/SGT. For North America, it’s Thursday evening: 7pm EDT / 4pm PDT.

All sessions are recorded, with the full bundle of 3 sessions available for US$150 (for 72 hours only), or individual sessions for US$100.

Paid Work Fame Substack subscribers get access to one complimentary session - hit reply and let me know which session (1, 2 or 3) you’d like to attend.

Session details below.

Alternatively, pick the specific session that suits you:

Session 1: The Best Of…Workshop Stream

Friday 24 April · 9am AEST | US$100

Seven years of workshop design distilled into 90 minutes - my all-time favourite/impactful activities, run sheets, and facilitation moves that reliably work across different contexts and group sizes.

👉Book The Workshop Stream

Session 2: The Best Of… Marketing

Friday 1 May · 9am AEST | US$100

The best lessons from writing books, articles (like this one), podcasting, LinkedIn, and live events - how to develop a clear point of view, turn one idea into many, and build an online presence that drives fun opportunities.

👉Book the Marketing Stream

Session 3: The Best Of…Running a Solo Business

Friday 8 May · 9am AEST | US$100

The tech, workflows, and decisions behind seven years of solo business - how to capture ideas, use AI day-to-day, and run things without overcomplicating them, or burning out.

👉Book the System Stream

I’d love to hear your story - leave a comment and tell me the most ridiculous thing currently sitting in your "Cringe Folder."

Or, if you simply enjoyed reading this, and have also survived a Career Limiting Moment, click the Heart 💙 button.

🌴

Leanne “Sifting 7 Years” Hughes

P.S. If you’re undecided on which stream to pick, the bundle cures your FOMO + includes all the recordings on a private podcast, so you can listen on the go. Grab the bundle here.

I thought it was healed after Everest Base Camp, so I stopped doing strength exercises and jumped right back into running.

That was a terrible idea.

This year has been tough. Not being able to run, which is where I do my best thinking, has knocked me around more than I expected. I didn’t realise how intrinsically linked it was to my identity. My sleep has been patchy, energy a little flat (NOTHING in the world beats a post-runners high!), and I know other people have far tougher health challenges, but it’s definitely a downer from time to time.

So, I’m throwing it all into recovery - from physios and alternative therapies to massage, shockwave therapy (painful), frequency patches, drinking collagen, and taking Chinese peptides (okay, I lie about the peptides, here’s a funny scoop on that).

There have been a couple of practitioners I regularly return to, and for a while, I assumed it was because their methods were better.

On reflection, though, I see their approaches aren’t all that different.

So, why do I keep returning to these two people?

They genuinely believe I can recover.

It’s not like they offer fake encouragement like, “You’ll be fine, babe,” but more like, “Leanne, this will take time, but yes, you can get back to where you were, and you will be stronger, too.”

They’ve said it with so much conviction that I’m starting to believe it myself.

We outsource belief more than we realise

When I think about why people come to me for consulting or coaching, it’s often the same dynamic. While they think they’ve signed up for specific expertise, advice and strategies, I think the most valuable thing they gain is the belief that they have it within them, to do x, too,

We all want someone in our corner who genuinely believes we can pull it off. Someone who tells you, “You can do it!” (love this video compilation below, warning: strong language).

We’re human. Of course, the aspiration is 24/7 bullet-proof self-belief, but the reality is that yes, it can run low at times.

The most helpful thing someone can give is borrowed belief - someone who looks at your situation and says, “Yes, this is tough. But you can handle tough.”

Think about the best leader you’ve worked with, the best coach, the best teacher. Chances are, they made you feel like you had the force within you to make things happen, when you were feeling a little unsure.

Belief as a tool

I recently read Nir Eyal’s () new book Beyond Belief, and I really like the idea that beliefs are tools, not absolute truths.

A useful question he shares is to ask yourself is, “Is the belief you’re holding helping you progress?”

Personally, I like having a bit of constructive delusion. Maybe I see things more positively than they really are, but that optimism helps me try new things, experiment, and get involved.

I care less about whether a belief is perfectly “correct” or backed by hard data, and more about whether it helps me see new possibilities, take action, and live with enthusiasm.

Any belief that helps you take better care of yourself, so you can help others, is worth keeping.

So if you lead, coach, or consult, keep this in mind

It might sound obvious, but no one will follow through on a strategy they don’t believe will work.

If you’re running a team, coaching a client, or leading a group, ask yourself: are you giving people hope that it’s possible?

Your belief audit

One of my fav practical ideas from Nir’s book is to do a belief audit. I liked playing this tune in the background when I did mine.

Step 1: Write down your current beliefs about a situation you’re in (for example, this war/fuel crisis we’re experiencing).

Step 2: Review each belief and ask:

• Which of these beliefs are opening doors?

• Which ones are closing them?

Treat your beliefs as upgradeable tools that you can swap out when they stop serving you. The good news is our beliefs are malleable!

If you’re going through a time when your self-belief is low, seek out the people who believe in you.

And if you’re in a position to lend that belief to someone else? Don’t underestimate what that’s worth.

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Pop-up podcast: The Campfire Method with Jan Keck

This week, I jumped back into the host seat of the First Time Facilitator podcast, to chat with Jan Keck about his soon-to-be-released book, The Campfire Method, and how to build real connection in groups (without awkward icebreakers).

We talk Risk Ramps, choice, quieter participants, TEDx lessons, and why the small moments before a session starts matter more than most facilitators realise.

Sign up to hear about his new book here: https://campfiremethodbook.com/

Watch the interview on YouTube or listen on the First Time Facilitator podcast.

🌴

If you’re celebrating Good Friday and the Easter weekend, may it bring you peace, reflection, and forgiveness.

Leanne “Constructively delusional” Hughes

P.S. If this lands for you today, tap the heart 💙. That little click helps my ideas reach the next person who needs it.

Leave a comment

Whatever your answer, it’s a reminder that the stuff we can’t control (wars, supply chains, global oil markets) makes the stuff we can control even more important.

Which is exactly what this week’s edition is about.

1. The grass isn’t greener

A journalist got in touch with me recently to comment on this line I shared with her, and instead of letting my response sit in my Sent Items, it’s here for you today.

Leanne, what do you mean by, “The grass isn’t greener… It’s just another shade of brown?”

A senior engineer once said this to me early in my career while I was looking for other jobs. His point was simple - we assume other organisations have it all together. They don’t. The line sounds cynical upfront, but it’s empowering. It shifts the question from “Will another organisation make me happier?” to “What am I not taking ownership of here?”

We romanticise the next role - better culture, better leadership, better balance, better pay with less stress. But what usually happens is we trade one set of problems for another. Every workplace has pressure, politics and imperfect humans. When people change jobs expecting emotional relief, they’re often disappointed because they take their own patterns with them.

We also forget the green patches we already have.

We fixate on what’s frustrating and assume the next organisation will fix all of that while keeping everything we currently take for granted. Often, the next place has its own brown patches in exactly the spots you assumed would be green.

When I first heard that quote, I was spending every commute home scrolling job ads. Instead of quitting my job, I started volunteering for cross-functional projects, hosting internal sessions, and building relationships outside my reporting line.

The environment didn’t change, but my reputation + influence did. Within eighteen months I was leading cross-functional projects, running workshops globally, and absolutely loving the job I’d previously wanted to quit.

Leanne, why are professionals expecting their organisation to “fix” their career?
There’s a growing narrative that organisations are failing employees. Sometimes that’s true. But in many cases, the individual has more agency than they’re using, because it’s comfortable to outsource responsibility.

Employers owe you pay and a safe workplace, that’s the baseline. Purpose, meaning and progression aren’t guaranteed perks. They’re outcomes you help create.

It’s easier to say “there’s no pathway” or “my manager doesn’t develop me” than to ask - Have I clearly stated what I want? Have I invested in myself without waiting for approval? Have I demonstrated capability beyond my job description?

No one is thinking about your career as much as you are. That sounds harsh. It is actually freeing, because it puts you back in control.

What are some practical tips for starting?

I think most professionals over-invest in doing good work and under-invest in being known for it. One quick point: Protecting your energy is sensible. But coasting in third gear long-term isn’t neutral (I am SO over the quiet quitting movement). It chips away at your confidence, your momentum, and how much you enjoy your day-to-day.

A few practical ideas:

• Check for FoML before you act on FOMO: People often leave a manager, not an organisation. FoML is Fear of My Leader. Ask: if this were the same job under a different leader, would I stay? If yes, explore internal moves first. Sideways moves can build skills, relationships and leverage fast.

• Host things: The quickest way to build visibility is to convene something: run a lunch-and-learn, facilitate 10 minutes of a meeting, or share a short project debrief with three takeaways. Hosting puts you in rooms you’d never normally be in, with people who wouldn’t normally see your work.

• Build relationships before you need them: Opportunities move through conversations long before they hit job boards. Pick five people whose work you respect and reach out with curiosity: “I’ve been noticing what your team’s doing on X. I’d love to understand it better.” I also recommend “friendtoring”: a regular catch-up with a peer in another part of the business to swap context, share what’s shifting, and learn how to get the best out of where you work.

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What career advice would you add? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

2. The goal to be second best

Last week I went to a Minerva Network event sponsored by Golf Australia at Golf X. Quick context: I’m a mentor with the Minerva Network, which supports professional female athletes. It’s brilliant.

They gave us Callaway high ponytail caps (finally, a cap that works), there was a putting competition to win a full set of clubs (I was out first round), it was a ton of fun.

Golf Australia’s mission is that every woman has golf as their second sport. Such smart positioning - they’re not there to compete with netball, tennis, hockey or WAFL. What they’re saying is whatever your main sport is, just add golf.

I used to play on and off a few years ago. I have clubs. I just… stopped going. And one of the reasons why is that I don’t have any girlfriends who like to play… so I’m ALL IN on Golf Australia’s new mission (who’s up for a hit sometime?!)

Question for you:

Where in your work or career could you stop competing for first place, and start positioning yourself as the perfect complement?

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3. Getting unprofessional with Miriam Hadness

I jumped on the Unprofessional podcast with Miriam Hadnes recently and we got into how being unprofessional changed my life (for the better!).

In this episode: why tight deadlines are a gift, what happens when you fuse your identity with your work, and why disliking failure and fearing it are two very different things.

See you next week!

🌴

Leanne “Karrie Webb-Wannabe” Hughes

p.s. Nodding along? Click the Heart button. Bonus points if you drop a comment.

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Your logo is on the bibs, on the banners, on the merch. Tens of thousands of runners with disposable income, all seeing your brand at one of the most iconic races in the world.

What a coup!

Then, while your colleague is on the ferry heading to the start line, they send you this video (see below).

If you can’t see the video, here’s what’s happening - runners are crammed onto the ferry, all looking towards the Statue of Liberty, while across the harbour a decommissioned Staten Island Ferry, wrapped in bright red, cuts into the scene with a giant Nike message: “NYC won’t carry you. It pushes you.”

Before the marathon had even begun, Nike was part of the experience, and the scene was all over the socials. Honestly, I would have loved to be a fly on the wall when that stunt got pitched.

Btw, it wasn’t just the ferry - Nike ads were perfectly placed all along the marathon route and across New York City, plus they wrote a 6-page love letter to runners in the New York Times the following day.

They weren’t the official sponsor, but that didn’t stop them from making a HUGE impact. I think people loved them even more because it was so brazen.

If you were New Balance, you’d feel a little heartbroken.

Of course, Nike has a budget most of us can only dream of. But the main idea here is something everyone can use - you don’t need an official title to make an impact.

Nike could have just accepted that New Balance got the sponsorship and thought there was nothing they could do. Instead, they found another way in and took it.

I once worked for a company that did things the same way.

Wicked Campers. I get it - people often groan when they hear the name. But hear me out, because back then, they were truly great at this.

Think about what you expect from a campervan rental. You return the van with a full tank and worry about every scratch or dent because of the deposit. It’s all very strict, like Britz or Maui.

Wicked Campers couldn’t compete in that way because their vans were older and rougher.

So they decided to stop competing on those features and benefits, and made them an advantage.

Return the van without fuel? No problem. Scratches and dents? They just painted over them, often with the next wild design. They turned every weakness into part of the experience. What should have been drawbacks became the reasons people picked them.

What joins these two examples together?

Both Nike and Wicked Campers refused to let the absence of something stop them. Nike didn’t have the sponsorship; Wicked Campers didn’t have the fleet.

In both cases, they looked at what they were missing and asked a better question: “What can we do instead?”

We can all ask ourselves that question.

Maybe the thing you think is holding you back is actually the thing you can use to stand out.

For example, I’m a solopreneur. Some people hear that and think smaller. But the advantage is that clients deal directly with me, not a chain of intermediaries. There’s no handover to graduates, no passing the work down the line, and no inflated overheads built into the price. I’m also faster and more responsive.

Reflect: If you had to turn one limitation into a talking point, what would you choose and how would you frame it?

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Here’s some helpful resources to encourage you to think along these lines:

• Just Enough Evil by Alistair Croll and Emily Ross (book).

• The Nike story on Acquired (a brilliant, brilliant listen).

ASAP needs a rebrand

Here’s a poll I asked on LinkedIn, and there seems to be mixed messages on what ASAP actually means.

There’s no correct answer, it’s all subjective, and that’s why I think the lesson here is - remove ASAP from your vocab, and just give people a precise date and time.

One interesting point from the comments was that ASAP lands differently depending on the channel. A phone call feels more “urgent” while an email can feel passive, abrupt, or easy to ignore. It just reminds me of that quote, ‘the medium is the message’.

Interview of the week

Thanks to Joeri from The Solo Sauce Podcast for this interview. We recorded it a few days before I flew to Nepal last year, and I remember being extremely busy/flat out from trying to cram too much in my week, so he got a nice unfiltered version in this interview(!). It's a brilliant chat around my podcast journey, building a community, writing my book, the illusion of 'busy' and so much more!

Also, welcome new readers!

Finally, great to have a bunch of new readers, thanks for joining us. Here’s some links to some of the most reader-loved articles:

As always, click the Heart 💙 if anything in this article resonated and I’ll check in with you next week.

🌴 Leanne “ASAP(ish)” Hughes

p.s. Are we connected on LinkedIn? If not, change that by sending me a connection request. Or, follow more off-the-cuff stuff over on Instagram.

And if you’re feeling like everyone else has figured it out, you’re not the only one. Today, I thought I’d share how I try not to feel extinct, even as a 42-year-old elder millennial.

I jumped on a LinkedIn Live yesterday with Lisa Mulligan to talk about this exact thing (watch the replay here).

Here are five ideas that emerged from our conversation.

1. Resilience? So 2025. This is the other ‘R’ skill that matters.

I think the critical skill right now is resourcefulness. Resourcefulness puts you on the front foot, it’s proactive and it means you go out and find the thing before someone hands it to you. You teach yourself and you solve problems with whatever you have available.

(The anti-resourceful person gets sent to this website).

Almost everything you need to learn is free - all of the tools have free tier, tutorials are on YouTube, communities are open. The barrier to entry has never been lower.

2. Focus on “what” not “how”

I mean, this isn’t new - Covey wrote about it “Begin with the end in mind”.

Begin with what you want to achieve, then work backwards and use AI to help you get there. We’re in the no-code era. You don’t need to understand how AI works under the hood. That’s the best part. Don’t tell AI exactly how to do something. Tell it what you’re trying to achieve and let it work out the route.

If you go in dictating the method, you might end up recreating an old process when a better one already exists, especially as LLM models keep improving. Ask AI to recommend tools, suggest a sequence, or map out the steps.

3. Make it lighter (without the laptop)

One mistake I made was thinking I had to be on my laptop to use AI properly.

I associated it with sitting down at a desk, opening tabs, and doing serious work, which meant it started to feel a bit boring, like homework. And boring is a barrier.

What’s worked better for me is using AI on my phone, in real life, while I’m out and about, for example:

Yesterday morning, I printed out my book manuscript and instantly felt overwhelmed. Then I thought, hang on.

I opened ChatGPT on my phone and said, “I’ve got this manuscript, it’s due Monday morning, today’s Thursday. How do I get this right?” Within minutes, I had a project plan, a colour-coding system, and clear steps for each day.

Lower the friction. Don’t make AI a formal event. Make it something you can reach for in the moment you need it.

4. Give yourself credit - you’re probably using more AI than you think

Many of us don’t realise we’re already using AI with our existing tools.

Lisa shared research from PwC, Harvard Business Review, Stanford, and Berkeley that share the same pattern - women’s adoption of AI tools sits around 25% lower than men on average. Women are more likely to report never using AI tools at all.

I saw those stats and wanted to explore them.

If you have an iPhone and you’ve ever typed “dog” into your photo search bar, the technology that finds all your cute photos is AI. It’s already embedded in the tools you use every day, we just don’t always call it that. A lot of your favourite apps are quietly embedding AI into how they work.

You’re already in the game, way to go!

5. My three-pronged approach to staying in the loop.

If you’re wondering where to practically start, here are three things that have worked for me. I call them the three Ps (quick video below)

1. People. Find your people and let the algorithm do the rest. If you go onto YouTube and search for AI content, there are creators out there who will completely repel you. It can be very bro-ish. But within that same algorithm, there are people where you’ll think, oh, I resonate with this person and their approach.

   Once you find that one person whose style clicks with you, then the algorithm starts serving up more of that kind of content, and before you know it, you’ve built yourself a curated feed.

   Also, organise AI Jams with your friends colleagues / jump on calls and share what you’re doing behind the scenes (my friend Andy Storch did this recently with his community and raved about it).

2. Podcasts. Podcasts are your secret weapon here, and not for the reason you’d expect. Yes, you can listen on the go. But the real value is what happens when something lands and you hit Pause (another P word!). When you hear an idea, stop. Ask yourself: how would I apply what I just heard to a challenge I’m already facing?

   A lot of tech creators share examples that won’t be relevant to your world. So the skill is translating that to your own context. I find I’m pretty good at this when I’m out walking. I recommend listening to Greg Isenberg, even one episode of “The Startup Ideas Podcast” will get your wheels turning.

3. Play! Subscribe, cancel, and play. Jump in and try to break the tool (hard to do!) but just give it a go, have fun, experiment.

   One practical tip: when you find a new tool you want to try, pay for the subscription and cancel it immediately. You’ll still have access for the full 30 days, but you won’t get charged again if you forget about it.

Okay, that’s a bit of a summary of what we shared during the call.

I’d love to know which Point (1 → 5) you like to use the most when you approach new tech / a new thing?

Leave a comment

ONE MORE LIVESTREAM THIS WEEK:

Jump in and join Alan Weiss and me for our latest Talk the Walk LinkedIn livestream. It’s on Thursday 12 March 4pm ET (US), and Friday 13 March 6am AEST (Australia).

🌴

Leanne “Elder Millenial” Hughes

p.s. If any of this was useful, hit the heart 💙 (or get your AI agent to do it - no judgment here).

But first - a random quick poll. I’m curious to see how many of my fellow left-handers are reading this…

Okay, let’s get back to original programming…

1. Your name is the subject line

The best piece of real estate I ever bought cost me $11.99.

Before you start following me for investment advice, let me reveal the “property”, it’s my domain name: leannehughes.com.

I bought it in 2009, back when I was a faithful employee with zero business aspirations. I just saw the way the wind was blowing and thought, “That’s my name. I should probably own the virtual home of it”.

And even now, when new social media platforms emerge, I always jump on to register my name. ln a world of AI, changing algorithms and deep fakes, your name is becoming one of the few things you actually control.

Owning your virtual real estate is step one. Making your name worth clicking on? That’s the bigger challenge.

My Talk the Walk co-host, Alan Weiss, sends a Monday Morning Memo. I don’t read the subject line. I see “Alan Weiss” and I open it immediately. I do the same with Jenny Blake’s newsletters. These people (among others) have achieved ‘Default Open’ status.

For me, their name is the subject line. I know the value they bring, whether it’s insight, helpful tips, a laugh, or just a good story. The content is almost secondary to the promise of the sender.

50% of you see my name appear in your inbox and open it (thank you for reading!), the other 50% it’s a “Naahhh”, “Maybe later”, “Too many emails”, or a “Leanne who?” - I haven’t yet achieved Default Open status.

All of it adds up to one thing: when someone sees your name, they have an idea of what they’ll be getting. Yes, this is ‘brand’ and it’s more important than ever in a world of overwhelming inboxes.

However, this doesn’t just apply to newsletters. Think about your own inbox at work. Whose emails do you open first? Whose meeting invites do you accept without hesitation? Those people have earned Default Open status with you.

The question is - have you earned it with anyone else?

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2. The geeky bit

It’s been a big week of hosting virtual calls for various clients. I’m typing this after jumping off a call with education leaders. They wanted to know how I was pasting all my text so quickly for instructions into Chat.

I showed them how I did it (without using a StreamDeck), and they LOVED seeing behind the scenes, so thought I’d share my back-stage with you today.

In my book The 2-Hour Workshop Blueprint, we create what I call a SPARK sheet, which is my version of a run sheet. I usually have three columns: Timing, Topic and Tools. But for virtual sessions, I change the third column from Tools to Tech.

Here’s a screenshot of what that looks like (if you can’t see the image in your email, scroll above and click the ‘View on browser’ link.

I developed a colour system that hasn’t changed since 2020. Orange highlight is directional (what to do). Yellow highlight is the text that I, or my Tech DJ can paste directly in as a chat prompt. I have this doc open on the side of my Zoom screen when I’m hosting calls.

What’s a Tech DJ? I’ve worked with Jan, my Tech DJ, since 2020, when he helped me roll out hours upon hours of leadership workshops for clients around Asia and the Middle East that year.

Since then, he’s been my wingman on calls, organising breakout rooms, screen shares, music, chat prompts, waiting rooms, tech support for people on the call. Sometimes I’ve been thrown out of my own Zoom room and he’s taken over until I get back. So good.

If you run virtual sessions, I can’t recommend this setup enough. Having a Tech DJ frees you up to actually be present, instead of fumbling around with keyboard shortcuts and buttons. It’s hands free facilitation.

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3. Next week! Join me on two LinkedIn livestreams

AI is the age of women (Thursday 12 March)

You know I’m obsessed with tech (here’s an article I wrote about my $11,899 tech stack) and when Lisa Mulligan from The Culture Ministry called about running an AI/tech live-stream, I said yes!

Here’s Lisa’s event write-up: I’ll be talking to (and learning lots) from tech-loving, early-adopting, super-energetic Leanne Hughes about:
• How she stays up to date with technology,
• Her successes and fails in being an early tech adopter, and
• Why she thinks it’s important for women in particular, to be part of the technology change we are seeing.

She also told me she will bring some of her tech toys along (squeal!).

→ RSVP on LinkedIn.

Talk the Walk with Alan Weiss (Friday 13 March)

Talk the Walk is a 30-minute variety show I co-host with the rockstar of consulting. I suggested we talk about work and travel, Alan replied with: “What about The Whole Life?”

So this one’s about everything that isn’t work. The cities we love, TV shows we recommend, and the random hobbies and experiences that make you interesting at dinner. Because if you’re working this hard and not building a life you actually love, what’s the point?

Bring your martini (ET) or your coffee (AEST).

We’re on:

• USA time: Thursday 12 March, 4:00pm ET

• Aussie time: Friday 13 March, 7:00am AEST

RSVP on LinkedIn.

If any messages here resonated with you, tap the heart 💙

🌴

Leanne “Loves buying website domains” Hughes

p.s. A bunch of new people have joined my world lately, so here’s a quick hello. And yes, while I love virtual work, you can’t beat in-person. Here’s a 60 second sample of my speaking work/vibes (warning: this is not your typical speaker reel).

(Asking for a friend).

We’re drowning in high-performance culture.

My feed is currently a graveyard of everyone 23x-ing their output using Clawdbot and optimising their morning coffee for maximum neuro-impact.

Or worse, drinking matcha… (sorry, not sorry).

Anyway, back to my original question.

The reason I’m pitching ‘Average Performance Coach” as something aspirational is that I believe the (usually self-imposed) pressure to be extraordinary slows us down.

Here’s what prompted that thought this week.

On a whim, I flew to Sydney yesterday for a lunch curated by Suzi Dafnis of Her Business. I’d planned to spend the day writing my book, but the temptation of hanging out with smart women in real life tipped me over the line.

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We went around the table doing intros. A bunch of women shared creative projects they do outside of business. Ceramics, painting, leather work. Beautiful, slow stuff.

I ended up in a group conversation with Valerie Khoo, host of the podcast So You Want To Be A Writer. She was encouraging another lunch guest to get back into writing. Her advice was simple:

“Just buy a journal and start writing your thoughts over coffee.”

Then she added this cracker caveat:

“Oh, and buy yourself an average journal. Don’t get anything too fancy, otherwise you’ll feel like you have to write something amazing.”

That is the whole problem, isn’t it? We make the container too precious, so the content has to be precious, too.

And suddenly… we don’t start.

Lower the stakes

This is why deadlines help - specifically, deadlines that feel slightly too soon.

Back in 2018, I flew to Singapore for a 2-day workshop hosted by Sean D’Souza on how to write a sales page. After the session, he said to our group: “Please send me what you have before my flight tomorrow morning so I can review it on the plane.”

If he’d given me two weeks, I would’ve agonised over every sentence and built a masterpiece in my head that never saw daylight. Because I only had until “tomorrow,” I felt fine sending something average.

He gave me feedback fast. I improved it. The momentum continued and I got the sales page online. Done.

Whatever deadline you think you need, cut it in half. The tighter the deadline, the less room there is for perfectionism to show up and start redecorating.

Be “Barely Adequate”

One of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever received came from author of The Coaching Habit, Michael Bungay Stanier. When I asked him what advice he had for first-time facilitators he surprised me by sharing this phrase , “Be barely adequate.”

Watch the clip here (or, the full interview if you like).

Leanne’s tips for lowering the stakes

Here’s what I like to do to reduce the pressure on myself.

1. Buy the average journal

This is more of a metaphor than a shopping trip. Every project comes with a set of heavy assumptions that slow us down. When I launched my daily podcast last year, Leanne on Demand, people were stunned. They assumed a podcast had to be a 45-minute polished interview.

Who says?

I did 3-to-10 minute voice notes. By lowering the production bar to average, I actually got the thing out the door every single day.

Look at the project you’re avoiding. What rules are you following that are actually just roadblocks? If the “standard” version of your project feels too heavy, change the format until it feels average enough to start.

Oh but if you do want to take this advice literally, I’d recommend getting a notebook from Muji or even Kaisercraft.

2. Set a “Micro-Deadline”

Whatever time you think you need, you’re probably overestimating. Speed is the best filter for perfectionism, set harder deadlines.

3. Define the “Floor”

Before you start a task, ask: What does a ‘3 out of 5’ look like here? We usually aim for a 6 out of 5.

4. Use the “placeholder” method

If you get stuck on a specific word, a title, or a piece of data, don’t stop. Type [TK] (journalism speak for ‘To Come’) and keep moving. You can go back and fix the “average” parts later, but only if you have a draft to work with.

Hope this helps get you started!

Tell me: What would “average” look like for you, in a good way, this week?

Leave a comment

🌴

Leanne “Your Average Performance Coach” Hughes

p.s. If you thought this was an average article, hit the Heart 💙 and let me know (it’ll warm my heart!)

Here’s the site I created to make my ideas more “easily” searchable by AI tools.

Here is the full process I follow for every framework page, from raw idea to published page with schema markup.

Where the frameworks start

Most of my frameworks start…

Read more

1. Why the future of selling belongs to hosts

2. How to stay visible when AI becomes the search engine

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1. Why the future of selling belongs to hosts

Have you heard about live social selling? Live commerce is already worth around US$1 trillion globally. By 2030, it’s projected to hit US$3.7 trillion, growing at 24% annually.

And in China, their live streaming e-commerce market hit nearly 5 trillion yuan in 2023 (that’s around US$695 billion). “Going to the shops” in China increasingly means opening a livestream with your favourite host, not walking to the shops.

Buying behaviour is shifting.

It’s so weird because growing up as a kid in Australia in the 1980s, I remember the famous Tim Shaw Demtel Home Shopping infomercials (“But there’s still more!”). That’s basically what live social selling is, only this time watching it on TV and phoning a 1800 number, you watch live hosts on social media (like TikTok or WhatNot) and click the ‘Buy Now’ button directly from your phone.

I’ve been watching TikTok live sellers for the past few weeks and what they’re doing is exactly what we do as hosts in a room.

And I keep thinking... I already know how to do this!

For example, these hosts run a show, they have great segments, product demos, stories, Q&As. They co-create with the audience. Viewers ask questions, request demos, challenge claims.

In China, those billions in sales are driven by charismatic hosts and key opinion leaders. Your ability to hold a room, build trust in real time, and make complex things feel simple. The best live sellers behave more like TV presenters or workshop facilitators, than traditional sales reps.

Anyway, something to consider if you have this skill set. You don’t even need to store products, you can dropship items, sell through affiliate marketing, etc.

The key question of course is, "What would I sell?”

I’m thinking something along the lines of endorsing my favourite travel products or tech tools. Anyway, watch this space, I might run a mini experiment with it (after I’ve submitted my book manuscript!).

2. How to stay visible when AI becomes the search engine

This week while I was meant to be at a solo writing retreat shaping up my manuscript, I got slightly distracted.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve made a ton of progress on the book (progress = deleting 11,000+ words which is a good thing. You do NOT want to read the early version, it was terrible).

Anyway, while I was away, I ended up spending about 30 mins each day quietly rebuilding parts of my website.

I actually enjoy tinkering with websites. I built my first site when I was 14. It was a fan website dedicated to my favourite Socceroo, Harry Kewell. Total Football UK ended up reviewing it, too, which was kinda kewell…

Anyway, let’s get back on topic:

This post is about why I’m renovating my website a little, and the shift in how people find expertise online.

For paid subscribers, I’m sharing the exact step-by-step process to build each page.

But first, some context

The way people access information has changed. When you want an answer to something, you do not always go to Google and click through ten blue links anymore. You might ask ChatGPT.

Or you might still use Google, but the answer appears at the top of the page in an AI-generated summary before you click anything. How does it know what to post in the summary?

In an ideal world, my work is referred in conversations, or someone hears me speak, reads my book, listens to the podcast, reads this newsletter, etc. I still want that to happen (Plan A).

But making sure I’ve optimised my online presence means I need to renovate HOW my content is delivered online (Plan B).

Two concepts worth knowing

I’m not jumping on the “I’m an AI guru” bandwagon but I do recommend getting familiar with these two terms:

1. GEO (Generative Engine Optimisation) is about making your content visible to AI tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude so they reference you when someone asks a question in your area.

2. AEO (Answer Engine Optimisation) is about structuring your content so it gets pulled as a direct answer in Google’s AI Overviews and featured snippets.

You create content that is specific, authoritative, and genuinely useful because AI systems favour that kind of content because it is easy to extract, cite, and trust.

Often, you already have the information on your site, it’s just about restructuring it in a way that is AI-friendly.

A page that says “Hi, I’m Leanne, book me” is not going to get cited by anyone. A page that thoroughly answers “how do I design a two-hour workshop?” with a named framework, clear steps, and practical examples? That has a real shot.

Why am I telling you this?

1. If you read my stuff often, you know that I love being the guinea pig and trying out new things…But also?

2. Because this applies to more people than you might think.

If you run your own business (consulting, facilitation, coaching, speaking), your ideas probably live in scattered places right now. The fix is to get your frameworks onto properly structured pages on your website.

If you are a founder/leader inside an organisation, think about your product or service.

When someone asks AI “what is the best tool for [the problem you solve]?”, does your product show up in the answer? If your team has a genuine methodology, a unique process, or a framework that your best customers already use to get results, that is your content.

👉 Explore my new frameworks page here.

If you are a paid subscriber, I’ll send a second email to you shortly, sharing exactly how I built each framework page, step by step, including the process, the tools, and the prompts I used.

Have you heard about GEO and AEO? What are you doing differently?

Leave a comment

🌴

Leanne “Add to Cart” Hughes

p.s. Hey, a quick thank you. I just discovered that my podcast, First Time Facilitator was voted in the Top 5 global facilitation podcasts in the 2026 Session Lab Facilitation Impact report.

p.p.s. If you learnt something new while reading this, click the Heart 💙 to let me know!

How on earth does that happen?

Well, it was quite simple. They decided to send a wedding invitation to Bad Bunny, Spotify’s most-streamed artist in the world (2025).

I love this story.

I mean, how many of us have flippantly mentioned to our mates, “Oh, how amazing would it be if Tom Cruise came along to my book launch?”

… Just me?

Anyway, I bet this couple were the same! They probably said, “Wouldn’t it be incredible if Bad Bunny sung at our wedding?”

But they actually took the next step and sent the invite.

Total wildcard move. No doubt they said: there’s NO WAY he’ll respond.

But whaddyknow? They were invited onto a Zoom call where they learned Bad Bunny wanted them to get married during his halftime performance.

Life can be cool like this. But it takes a bit of audacity to dream up that wildcard experience, and the courageous follow-through to send an invite.

I sent a wildcard invite to someone this week

I can’t imagine they’ll get back to me. And that’s okay.

But actually doing it felt great.

I mean, the chances of getting a response if I DON’T reach out? 0%. But if I reach out, surely that increases to at least 1%. Which is better, right?

→ What invitation are you keeping in the drawer because you’ve already decided the answer is no?

(Oh and Tom Cruise, if you are reading this, send me a reply).

Further reading on this:

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12 resources from seven years of facilitating

Last week was International Facilitation Week. To celebrate, I dug through my shelves and shared the 12 resources that moved the needle for me from my first workshop to a global consulting business.

The books (pictured below) aren’t all “facilitation” books.

Some are about the business side. Others, like Jonah Berger’s work on social psychology, don’t get talked about enough in our world. But understanding what influences how people behave in groups? 11/10 recommend.

Beyond the books:

• Workshops Work podcast by Myriam Hadnes (now called Unprofessionalism) has a brilliant back catalogue.

• A Facilitator’s Journey podcast by Kirsty Lewis covers the business side.

• The First Time Facilitator podcast (mine!) has 250+ episodes tracking the journey from newbie to business owner.

If you enjoy this list, you might enjoy this article too: Don’t Read These 21 Books.

A 60-second reminder to get out of your own way

There were a million reasons why I shouldn’t have been trekking in Nepal last November.

It feels like ages ago now, but we’re lucky because the extraordinarily talented Brisbane filmmaker Ben Taylor recorded the epic trip.

Here’s the 60-second doco trailer. The theme of our trip, and the full-length documentary, is: Get Out of Your Own Way and is out at the end of May.

→ Watch the trailer

The ultimate life skill I believe is having trust in backing yourself - giving things a shot. The biggest competition is not external, it's the belief and self-talk going on inside.

Unfortunately, there’s no shortcut or ‘hack’ to building this. It’s just consistently putting yourself in the ring, getting used to falling down, facing rejection, and welcoming that experience over and over again.

The good news? You also get to experience the incredible upside. And that’s what keeps you getting back in the ring.

I learnt a lot about that in November. Here’s what I wrote on the experience: The Average Person’s Guide to Getting High.

Join us on LinkedIn Live

“No guilt, no fear, no peer.” I heard Alan Weiss say this at a workshop in Las Vegas years ago. Someone in the room added “you’re lucky I’m here” and it stuck.

I’ve asked Alan to dig into it with me on our next Talk the Walk livestream. We’re exploring the difference between ego and actual esteem, and what can change in your business (and life) with a fearless approach.

BYO coffee, your martini, or your questions on Thursday 12 Feb, 4pm ET / Friday 13 Feb, 7am AEST

→ Join us live, or watch the replay on LinkedIn.

A small number of 1:1 spots are opening

Most of my work is group programs, workshops and keynotes. A few times each year I work privately with a handful of people who are already doing well and want to move faster.

Because it’s personalised, there’s no set curriculum. It’s based on where you’re at and what you most need help with. This is a PAYG month-to-month offer, no lock in, with a combination of calls and on-demand support.

If any of the above sounds like where you're at, reply with "1:1" and I'll send you the details.

🌴

Thanks for reading!

If any of these ideas resonated with you this week, I invite you to click the heart 💙 .

Leanne “Wildcard for the Win” Hughes

P.S. Curious what this would look like for you? Drop a “1:1” reply.

My request got denied.

I worked in organisational development and had become obsessed with podcasts as a learning medium. The conference felt like a chance to understand the craft from the inside.

But fair enough. I guess it wasn’t immediately transferrable to my role.

However, I was still keen to go.

So I requested annual leave. I paid for my own ticket and I went anyway.

That decision changed my life.

You gotta be in it to win it

At the conference, there was a raffle to win a book by author Andrew Griffiths. To enter, you had to write your podcast name on a piece of paper and drop it in a hat.

Slight issue:

• I wanted to win the book.

• …But I didn’t have a podcast.

Because I really wanted that book, I sat there thinking about some advice I had learnt at the conference: If you want to start a podcast, make it about something you want to learn more about. That way you’ll keep going, even if no one listens to it.

At the time, I was running workshops and figuring it out as I went.

So I wrote “First Time Facilitator” on a blue Post-it note and dropped it in the hat.

I made myself a deal: if my note gets pulled, I’m creating the show.

A few minutes later, Andrew was on stage. He reached into the hat and it was like slow motion.

He pulls out a blue Post-it note.

“Congratulations Leanne Hughes, podcast host of First Time Facilitator, come down and tell us what your show is all about!”

WHAT THE..!

I had thirty seconds to scramble, get to the front of the room and explain a podcast that didn’t exist.

I can’t even remember what I said.

But I played along and explained the premise of my fake show.

I turned that lie into the truth a few months later, releasing the First Time Facilitator on Apple Podcasts.

The wrong question everyone asks

Before committing to any event, conference, or training program, someone always asks: “What’s the Return On Investment (ROI)?”

It’s a totally fair question.

I ask myself the same thing.

But it’s also the wrong question.

Sure you can read the event, training or session outcomes and say, “Okay, as a result of attending this event, I’m going to 10x my income!"or, “I’ll learn how to use AI to slash my working hours to 2 hrs/day and retire next month!”

But that’s all false because the ROI of any event is something you create - what you will do, who you will meet, what you will personally extract from the experience.

Two people can attend the exact same conference:

• One leaves with a handful of new LinkedIn connections and some great travel footage for Instagram Stories.

• The other leaves with a powerful new identity.

The event is raw material/stimulus.

The ROI of any room you walk into is determined by you.

A quick caveat: I'm not saying sign up to everything. Obviously, do your homework first. Check who's running it, who's speaking, whether the content actually aligns with where you're headed. The point isn't blind enthusiasm. It's that once you've decided something is worth attending, don't outsource your ROI to the organisers. That part's on you.

How do you extract value from attending an event?

Here are some things that I’ve done in the past:

• Do some prep. Look up speakers and fellow guests, send a connection request that includes that you’re attending the conference.

• Organise your own side quest. Think about dinners, coffees or walk and talks you could host outside of the official learning times. Or, host a little thing for contacts in that city that aren’t going to the event.

• Stay a little longer: If you’re travelling even staying an extra day helps you consolidate/commit to action before arriving back in the real world. But even if it’s on your ‘home ground’, you can put this buffer in your calendar, too.

• Decide the output before you attend… or maybe not even that. Block time in your calendar over 30 days post-event for taking action, so you’re committing to implementing something.

• Volunteer at the event. Offer to introduce a speaker, host a table discussion, or summarise key takeaways for the group. Hosting gives you access.

• Really listen to the other questions people are asking and how they’re describing their challenges/opportunities. It gives you good intelligence as to what’s going on around you, and potential content or business ideas.

• Follow up within 48 hours. Send a voice note or short message to the people you connected with while the energy is still fresh.

• Debrief with someone who wasn’t there. Explaining what you learned to a colleague or friend forces you to distil your key learnings. Or, scale that by writing an article like this!

What would you add to the list?

Leave a comment

One more thing

I hear people occasionally say, “Oh, I’d really love to build these skills and do that PD but my company won’t pay for it”.

Nooooo. If I’d waited for my company to approve that conference, I wouldn’t be writing to you right now.

I love this quote from Jim Rohn

You are the only person who will advocate for your growth with the intensity it deserves.

Back yourself to extract the ROI.

🌴

Leanne “Mining for ROI” Hughes