Brendan McGurgan – Transforming and Scaling Businesses through Visionary Leadership

In this episode of Doing the Opposite: Business Disruptors, Jeff Dewing speaks to Executive Coach Brendan McGurgan. Brendan spent 16 years as Group MD of CDE where he steered the business through the financial crisis of 2008 and scaled the business at the same time. In 2020, co-founded Simple Scaling with the sole purpose of inspiring and enabling millions of ambitious leaders to scale with purpose. Brendan reflects on the successes he enjoyed at CDE and how they inspired the next chapter in his career – helping SMEs to scale. Brendan admits ‘I had no CEO experience. You don't go to CEO scaling school. Scaling actually wasn't even a thing back then. It wasn't in our business lexicon. But we were just innately wired to grow.’Brendan talks through the importance of understanding cashflow. ‘Sales is vanity, profit is sanity and cash is reality’. Brendan makes the case that without understanding cash, it’s impossible for a business to effectively scale. He also shares an example of a business he was consulting, that were sceptical of him when he tried to extend the overdraft. He quickly dug the company out of its overdraft and the financial progress meant they then took Brendan seriously when he attempted to address other areas, such as purpose and vision. Jeff and Brendan discuss the misconceptions around service cost and remuneration; for example when a business may charge £40/hour for a worker who is paid £15/hour. That worker can become disillusioned but taking them through the cost journey and explaining the overheads can enhance their understanding and reduce anxiety or frustration that may come from that.  You can buy Brendan’s book ‘Simple Scaling’ now, and listen to the ScaleX Insider Podcast.  Hosted by Jeff Dewing Watch the podcast on YouTube Discover Cloudfm GroupWebsite  |  Facebook  |  Twitter  |  LinkedInFind the best-selling book Doing The Opposite by Jeff Dewing HERE