Ep.86 - Malcolm McPhail: Changing lives with sport and fitness

Humble despite his achievements, the guest on this episode of the Escape Your Limits podcast has a passion for performance not only in business, but in sport, community spirit and improving health across the nation. Malcolm McPhail has taken turnover from £3.5 million to a staggering £12 million as group CEO at Life Leisure. Living fitness, he's also competed at an international level in athletics and the award-winning business is changing people's lives for the better time after time. Malcolm McPhail was a PE teacher before immersing himself in the fitness industry on another level. In his own words he's embraced opportunities where, despite not being au fait with how to do a job in the early days, said yes and excelled when faced with any responsibility. His paralleled athletics career saw him become Scottish 400m hurdles champion, and professionally in both the public and private sector he's driven business, playing a key role in the growth of Next Generation Clubs, now merged with David Lloyd Leisure. Winning honors for his physical and professional success, Life Leisure has most recently received the ukactive Uprising Transformational Leadership Award, commending efforts in staff development across the business.  Life Leisure runs an extensive mix of sports and leisure facilities, ranging from small community recreation centres to large multi-use state of the art sport and leisure facilities. In addition Life Leisure delivers sporting activities and health programmes of the highest quality to those people who for one reason or another cannot access a local facility. Working to change the lives of the local community through a leisure trust, CEO Malcolm McPhail is increasing activity across the region, making it accessible for anyone to improve their health and fitness.    Episode Highlights - Understanding leisure trusts and their relationship with local authorities, and how they're a more financially efficient way of delivering health and fitness in many communities. Why the former days of giving the customers everything whether they wanted it or not can teach us a lot about business approaches today. The difference between motivation and determination, and why one can lead you to disappointment while the other always keeps you on the road to success. Mindset and grit, and how being mentally able to beat the competition no matter what the cost can give you strength in anything from business to athletic performance. How we can work together to get children moving and overcome the obesity epidemic, even through simply using research that has been available since the '80s.   Join Matthew Januszek in conversation with Malcolm McPhail…