Geoff, Author at Geoff Blades

Goldman Doesn’t Need Rainmaking Bankers

Top bankers are born, not made…

He didn’t use those words, but that’s what one of Goldman’s top execs implied.

We talked about if Tiger was born to play.

Or did honing his craft from 6 months old make him a champion of the game?

That said, he was right, Goldman doesn’t need this.

It’s Too Easy To Win…

When you’re the market leader.

The business card pulls the sale.

You attract top talent.

Long, deep relationships.

Enormous resources.

Market dominance.

Some celebrity execs.

Talking up recent deals.

It’s a winning formula, but no top franchise endures that way.

Continue

“Bankers Aren’t Valued For Efforts”

Back in San Francisco I worked with a rockstar associate.

This guy would crank all night.

Be in all the details.

Leave rapid fire, all over it sounding voicemails.

15 years later he’s a middling senior-ish banker.

Bullet Points Aren’t The Job

When I was the Business Unit Manager (yes, BUM, aka staffer) at Goldman…

I got the inside scoop on what the business is really about.

In that one year by far I learned more about the banking business than the rest combined.

Stepping back from the day-to-day of being a banker…

I was responsible for managing bankers seeing clearly what was valued.

Continue

They’re The Same Fisherman

A teacher told me a tale about two fisherman.

One was just a lowly fisherman.

He grew up by sea, his father was a fisherman, so too was he.

The other was a successful merchant.

One of the richest and most respected men in the kingdom.

Through a twist of fate he lost it all.

His business collapsed.

Wife left.

Friends jumped ship.

Desperate. Broken. Nowhere to turn.

He turned to sea.

Oh, that’s tragic, one might think.

How awful it must be to lose it all.

Yet, as the storyteller, perhaps Seneca, was pointing out…

Continue

Massive Shame In Banking

At Goldman it’s called the Junior Banker Problem.

Specifically, junior bankers lives get destroyed.

Banks have tried plenty things to solve it.

It’s all pig lipstick…

Because the root cause of the Junior Banker Problem is…

The Senior Banker Problem

Because few senior bankers get their job is selling.

They fail to build winning processes and skills.

The best they know is to wind up the printing press producing those awfully big, boring banker books.

Burning down forests and junior banker lives…

They run around having “Great Meetings.”

Mostly failing to drive results.

They produce too little value for the firm.

Too little success for themselves.

And after all those years in the business, still fail to succeed.

Continue

Wake Up. Get Up

That’s the second step in the Ultimate Days System.

It’s real leading edge, isn’t it?

Life-saving…

A Game Of Seconds

I mock myself, but I’m also being semi-semi-serious.

Wake up. Get up.

Is a real basic tool for getting your day started right.

Yet many of us also know how hard it can be, right?

Laying there hitting snooze.

Thinking about all the things you’ve got to do today.

Claws reaching for that device we cradle at night.

Those precious few seconds, those few bad moves, our day is already shot.

Continue

Many Bankers Don’t Get Their Job

I didn’t get it.

For years at Goldman I still didn’t get the job.

I was good at doing it.

But I still didn’t get what the business was really about.

Making Money…

In some ways I’m naive.

And I may have been a total dimwit starting at Goldman.

But my sense from 20+ years around the business is that many bankers still fail to get their job is selling.

A great aspect of working at Goldman and some shops is it’s a team culture.

At least up until the senior ranks, it’s all about what we’re doing together in best serving our clients.

That’s a powerful mindset for delivering your best service…

But it leaves many bankers confused what the business is actually about.

Continue

“Take It To The Limit”

“You need to think smaller,” her boss said.

5 minutes later my friend was typing into google, When do you apply to business school?

3 years later she graduated HBS.

Today she’s building big.

There’s Nothing Easy

About dreaming big.

Waking up every day eye on the prize.

Taking actions that keep breathing it life.

Plenty of people pretend to encourage thinking big, but few do.

Even fewer teach you how.

All alone at the end of the evening when the bright lights have faded to blue…

Continue

Most Bankers MASSIVELY Underpaid

After the credit crisis there was lots of noise about banker compensation.

For good reason, people questioned bankers’ role and how much they’d been paid.

There’s certainly lots wrong with compensation in our society, including…

How Many Bankers Are Underpaid

Fact is…

Most bankers didn’t join the industry expecting little reward.

If you’d told them decades ago, give your life to this and one day you’ll be making 0.25X, many would have chosen a different path.

Of course relative to the average worker bankers are ridiculously paid.

But relative to others providing such massive value to our society as reading lines or catching balls, not so much.

Nor relative to what bankers give to get paid.

Continue

Technology Setting Free Boobs

You may have seen an article on the app DeepNude.

Another massive leap in technology the app uses an artificial neural network…

To remove the clothing in any photo of a woman.

Turns Out They All Have Boobs

It doesn’t take artificial intelligence to see women have boobs.

But with enough computing power you can better imagine what they look like.

No longer do we have to so desperately await the next iPhone hack to see celebrity boobs.

Or go to strip clubs.

With 50 bucks and the press of a button, all boobs are free.

Boobs, Promised So Much

Push up bras ruined boobs.

Promising so much, revealing less than.

Technology ruined them more.

Fake boobs.

Sexdoll boobs.

Insta “model” boobs.

Porn infested, boob injected Internet.

Technology promised so much, yet what boobs we’ve become.

Continue

“Why Don’t I Feel I’ve Made It?”

I see it time and time again.

No matter what success we achieve it’s hard to feel like we’ve made it.

There’s Always Something

We are yet to do.

Or make happen.

A problem that first needs to be resolved.

We might be like Atlas having hoisted the world on our shoulders.

But maybe we shrugged a little on the way up.

Still not good enough.

When I Get Rid Of The Shrug…

Then I’ll be happy.

When we’re no longer bothered by this.

Worried about that.

Concerned for what else might happen.

There’s too often something that stands in our way.

Continue

Can Ambitious Leaders Afford So-So At This?

There are lots of ways leaders quickly fall.

When you’re standing on the pedestal it’s easy to lose your footing.

People are constantly analyzing you.

Looking for cracks, figuring out if you’re really who you stand to be.

All Eyes On You

In the presidential debates just one question can end a candidate.

And the stakes can often be this high in business too.

A CEO speaking poorly on a shareholder call.

Failing communicating to the Board.

Delivering the wrong message to employees.

Sometimes leaders mess up badly and fail quickly.

But most the time we fail by leaving opportunities on the table.

Continue

Another Glorious Fakebook Birthday

My Fakebook birthday is always a nice surprise.

It’s like some of us men on our anniversary.

We completely forget until we wake up to the well in that case less pleasant surprise.

Just Like Any Other Day

I’m getting on with my day.

Making it ultimate.

And then it starts…

With a text message, “Happy birthday!”

Then I remember, ha, of course it’s my Fakebook birthday.

I punch the air.

Celebrate

After all these years you’d think I might remember my Fakebook birthday.

Maybe even do something about it, like change it.

But I let it go on.

As I wrote about on my last Fakebook birthday I gave up telling people, “No it’s just my Fakebook birthday.”

Birthday wishes bring so much joy to people.

And of course I love people celebrating every day.

Continue

Sun’s Out. Guns Out

Working from home I’m often wearing a gun belt loaded with two pistols.

Glock 17 on my right.

M&P left.

Spare clips in front.

Neither shoot brass.

Just a laser I’m constantly drawing and painting targets left and right.

Practice How You Play

When I first started shooting with these retired SEALs I was surprised they carry hot.

Not just a holstered gun.

A round in the chamber; ready to draw and kick.

Back then I didn’t know anything about guns, nor get why someone would carry at home.

I still know jack about guns.

But I’ve quickly got skilled at shooting because I practice how I play.

Continue

Free!!

I’m not yet American.

But I feel it through and through.

There is much wrong with this country, but no other place on Earth stands for what we do.

Kiss The Ground

When my Dad first visited America he dropped to his knees and kissed the ground.

Born in England, having migrated to Australia, he felt he was meant to be born here.

Since I landed nearly 20 years ago I haven’t imagined living anywhere else.

It’s easy for others to find fault with America.

Easy for those of us living here to imagine better ways it could be.

But there’s still no place on Earth that stands for more of what it means to be free.

Metrics Aren’t Free

There are plenty of studies that show America is far from the most free.

Upward mobility. Infant mortality. Education rates. Incarceration. Standard of living, etc.

You can tick down a list of the things that are wrong with this place.

But still no other country in the world is more free.

With more diversity of thinking, and being.

Continue

Try [Try, Try]

Pink sings—

Where there is desire, there is gonna be a flame

Where there is a flame, someone’s bound to get burned

But just because it burns, doesn’t mean you’re gonna die

You gotta get up and try, and try, and try

She Might Be Singing About A Man

But we all know she’s talking about something more.

We all have dreams.

Things we burn for.

It’s better to have loved and lost, they say.

But the fear of loss can be so scary that we never try.

Are You Just Getting By, By, By?

Ever worry that it might be ruined

And does it make you wanna cry

When you’re out there doing what you’re doing

Are you just getting by

Tell me are you just getting by, by, by…

You gotta get up and try, and try, and try

Continue

“I Can Have Any Man I Want…”

“With my phat house and cool car,” my gay buddy said.

“You might be right,” I responded, “But why?”

“Obviously because we’re attracted to rich and successful people.”

“Perhaps, yet, why?” I pushed him deeper.

What REALLY Drives Attraction?

Why does rich and successful attract men and women alike?

Well, first of all, it doesn’t always.

Plenty of rich and successful people are bad at attracting men or women.

But when it does work, why?

“Rich and successful is a criteria, like red paint on a car,” I said to him.

It tells you nothing about why it stimulates our biology.

And when you get to the heart of why it works, to the principles of attracting, you see many ways to create attraction.

The Laws Of Attracting

Rich and successful works because of what it connotes.

“One you might call positive,” I said to him, “It implies you are a person of high status, or high value.”

This is principle number one, the first Law of Attracting in my Meeting Wonder Woman Masterclass.

“Ah, which is why waving around your Ferrari keys fails,” he quickly grokked.

Because as soon as you are broadcasting high status, well, you’re no longer high status.

“And, so what’s the potentially negative reason it attracts?” he asked.

Continue

Die In The Arena

“I want to die on the field,” my client said.

“Like a quarterback unable to move in the end I want to know I gave it all.”

“When I exit this game of life,” looking at me with steely resolve he said, “Every ounce of me I leave here, in the field.”

He’s an intense fellow, but we all get where he’s coming from, don’t we?

Who Wants To Leave This Game…

Knowing we could have done more.

Given more.

Tried harder.

Stretched further.

Overcome more fears.

Unleashed our potential.

Obliterated those things that held us back.

In his words, “Become who I was destined to be.”

Continue

Substance Doesn’t Win Elections

Combating Trump

During the debate last night my friend texted me…

“Interestingly the women have more substance in what they are saying but the evangelic and passionate speaking style is what captures attention…

Media training is everything!”

She’s Right and Wrong

She might be right, “The women have more substance…”

And it’s irrelevant.

That should have been obvious after Hillary vs. Bernie vs. Trump.

The Dems should have learned from Barack that policy and 7 point plans are a losing strategy. (come on, Elizabeth, you’re a smart woman)

My friend is right.

But she’s wrong, this isn’t about media training…

This Is A Game Of Influence

Media training is what the talking heads do.

They seem personable while reading like a parrot.

They sit right.

Wear the right colors.

Speak eloquently.

Media training is for looking and sounding just right…

But that’s hardly how you’d describe Bernie, is it?

Or how Donald won.

Continue

Not Hypnosis For Winning Every Meeting

I’m into hypnosis hours a day.

Not because I think it’s cool.

Or as socially acceptable as say Ritalin or strip clubs…

But because it is by far the most powerful tool I’ve discovered for quickly transforming how you think, feel, be.

And for driving top performance.

Not Hypnosis In Every Masterclass

Most the Masterclasses finish with a Deep Learning Track.

This is similar to hypnosis, but different for legal and socially acceptable reasons.

The tracks before, the Training Tracks, we learn together the typical way.

Listening to ideas, taking notes, using the Workbook, doing the practices you work through the Training Tracks learning what you need, fast.

The Deep Learning Tracks on the other hand require zero work, as you sit back, close your eyes, and allow these tracks to deeply work on you…

Continue

This Dying Hollywood Titan Tells You To Live Now

You spend your life driving success.

Are a massive winner in Hollywood.

Live in a 13,000 square foot mansion in Bel Air.

You end up living your final days forgetting your life in a 500 square foot bedroom in a nursing home.

Terry Semel’s ending might not be yours or mine, but we can be sure…

We’re Driving To A Dead End

No matter how you exit this world, assume it will be a worse day than this one.

If you go fast, well, you’ll never know when that is.

Here today, gone tomorrow.

And if you go slow, no matter how you exit, your body and mind likely go first.

You can’t live your life like you’ll get hit by a bus today, but you also can’t live like you won’t.

Continue