EP264 - Reflections of 2025 with Ian Luckett & Stuart Warwick

IAN: In this episode of The IT Experts Podcast, Stuart and I reflect on 2025.

INTRO: Welcome to The IT Experts Podcast, the only podcast to help MSPs scale to 1 million, and if already there, get to five and go faster. At the end of the day, isn't it all about building a business that works for you rather than you for it? I hope you enjoy the show.

IAN: So good morning, good afternoon, good evening. Welcome to The IT Experts Podcast. We are nearly there at the end of the year, Stuart.

STUART: We are, amazingly surprisingly.

IAN: That was quick.

STUART: It flew by.

IAN: Today, in today's episode we're going to be a bit reflective, we're going to be a bit vulnerable, and we're going to share with the listeners some of the highs and lows, personal and business from myself and Stuart this year, and what we've learned in business and in life, which is, it's all about life, really, at the end of the day. We just bolt with businesses to us to enable to have life, isn't it? So, yeah, we're just going to, we're just going to reflect on what's happened, how the year's been for us personally, for us, the growth hub for our clients, for our families. So we don't really know where this show's going to go. We've got some words written down. We haven't got many words written down, have we? And...

STUART: You don't do the words,

IAN: I don't.

STUART: You haven't got any words.

IAN: I don't do the words. We just do the, we just do the speaking. So, Stuart, how's the year been for you? Let's start off by talking about professional wins.

STUART: Well, it's always, it's a really hard question, isn't it? Because suddenly in that moment, you've got to think across the whole year and you're like what was it? Was it good? Was it bad? And I guess it's neither one or the other, but yeah. It's been a big year.

IAN: It has been a big year.

STUART: A big year. And again culminating, I've spent the whole year in poised anticipation of moving house.

IAN: Yes.

STUART: And so.

IAN: Which just happened last week. I can assure you he's a wreck this morning.

STUART: And I do not want to do that anytime soon. Again, after 18 years in the last house and, it's amazing to be in the end result, is amazing. It has to be the high of the year, because we decided that we'd move in January. We found somewhere at the end of February. We thought we'd in by May. Then it was August, then it was September, then it was October, and it was then 4th of December. And it rained all day, moving house, and it's raining all day, but we're in, it's amazing. And yeah, it just reminds you of like the highs and lows, the ups and downs, the, you know, the positive expectation, elation, and then they're like, oh, well, it's all off. It's never going to happen. You know, we couldn't even get buildings insurance at one moment.

IAN: Yes.

STUART: It was like, oh.

IAN: I remember.

STUART: Computer says no and then, boom, we are in. And, do you know what, you just have to, you just have to stay with it if it feels right and...

IAN: Trust.

STUART: And it did. It did feel right. And we won an award. We won the award for the most boxes out of any house that this removal company ever moved of a similar type and the shortest move because it was a 60-second drive.

IAN: 60-second drive. Well, that's good that you always come out on top with a positive.

STUART: Always, always. What about you?

IAN: Yeah, I think even though you've just answered the wrong question, because we were doing professional wins first.

STUART: Oh. Was that professional? Well, it's just on my mind, in my face.

IAN: Let's just, let's just go, let's just keep it rolling. Okay. Let's do personal wins first, then we'll go back to the business. Why not? For me, I, again, another big year. You know, I think we've started this year with very, very clear roles and responsibilities for each of ourselves. I'm going to get the clients, you're going to keep them. And, that's been working really well. That's probably about 18 months now. But this year really, you know, you've done some amazing work on the scalability of the Growth Hub.

STUART: Why Thank you.

IAN: You are more than welcome, dear. And the sales and marketing, you know, I'm not going to, I'm not going to lie, it's been bloody hard work this year.

STUART: It has been twice.

IAN: It's been a real struggle. I mean, I've got to ask the MSPs out there. Did you all go on holiday together? In August and September? I, bet you did. Because everything just stops, the whole funnels dried up. The engagement dried up. It was absolutely bizarre. So personally, because now jumping around the questions you know, the big thing for me was, is it's been around not only, you know, the team and yourself and others in the Growth Hub that lift you up, really important. You become the average of the five people that you, that you hang around with. And our clients who are incredibly, motivational as well as good friends and you know, business people. But you know, some of them are all interested in what car have you bought? Where are you going on holiday? How's the family and all? And they genuinely mean it. It is lovely. And they kind of push you as well, which is great. And one of the things that came out of that was one of the visions that you may have heard about before which is to build an assisted living home for my son, my youngest son. And it really has started to come to life. I've realised that if I thought setting up an MSP Growth Hub, was easy. Man, this is hard. This is super hard and this is now like the part-time job. Which is absolutely fine. But I think through wanting to share the importance of vision with our clients, they've come up with some great contacts. I'm now in contact with people who's going to help me, bring this house to life for, you know, for Dan and, you know, and for us as well to help him build his independence. And it's incredible really. And it just goes to prove, just be careful what you wish for, because when you do, align the stars and you put out the thoughts and the things that you want to become, thoughts become things. Something I heard I learned very early on, if you start to think about things and visualise things, the world has a really weird way of moving the energy around. So it happens and then you go, oh, how did I end up with all this and how did I end up with that and how did my family end up with this? And all of this kind of great stuff works positively and negatively, so be careful what you wish for. But I think, that that was the highlight for me and it's a bit of reverse accountability actually, because went out, we did this keynote, the clients all, yeah, oh, that sounds great idea. Then it all went a bit flat like it does, and then I was like, shit, I need to give them an update at the next eight week alignment. It's like, what? I better have done something. So it's like now the clients are kind of coaching me, like going, oh, what's going on? What's going on? It's like, yeah, good point. So, so I kept that moving forwards now and you know, built a plan around that, which is really cool and exciting.

STUART: It is amazing how you shared that early in the year. In fact in January, it was in January, that it was like, you seem to have lost your.

IAN: Yes.

STUART: Mojo on, on the north...

IAN: Direction...

STUART: Of the on the North Star.

IAN: Yeah. Yeah.

STUART: You, it was a bit of a cloud gone across it and then boom, that came alive. And then in May you shared, and I think that's a really massive lesson, is sharing those hopes and dreams and, and vision that you might have with family, friends, colleagues, and you never know just who might go, do you know what?

IAN: No.

STUART: I'd love to help you with that. Or here's something I know would help you with it.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: And boom, in 16, literally 14, 16 weeks across the summer, you built out crazy it. You built out that business, that brand, and all the little pieces of the jigsaw landed on your table and it's like. I've got a whole picture here.

IAN: Well, a lot of it I already had.

STUART: And you didn't have, but you were missing key points of like real, real building blocks and suddenly boom, they came out and they, they underpinned your, your clarity and confidence and what you've now got on the cards.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: In the next year is incredible from a standing start.

IAN: And we always said, didn't we, when we got together, we just wanted to leave a legacy.

STUART: Yeah.

IAN: Didn't we? That's what we want to do.

STUART: We did.

IAN: It's... have some fun.

STUART: Help more people, change more lives and have more impact. And kind of, it's that cliche...

IAN: It's all, it's all kind of...

STUART: It boats rise as a result of it, doesn't it?

IAN: Exactly. So moving on to the professional side of things. I think for me on the, on the marketing, I think we found. Really nice sweet spot now with some of the events, try before you buy, come and check it out. See what it feels like. If you're interested in the Growth Hub, by the way, shameless plug and just hit the events page on the website and you'll see a new event coming up shortly. But I think there's, I think that, you know, the lesson in, in us surrounding ourselves, number one with world class marketeers, I think, and learning what's working because you built your business, you know, early before I'd even met you on direct messaging through LinkedIn. Very successful business. But over the pandemic, everybody seems to think now that's how you get work is you just spam people on direct message doesn't work anymore. Just, you know, it does work to a point, but it doesn't work as a method as it did then. Because it was very, very powerful. And when we got together the team would team were using that methodology and it was working really well. But over the years, it's just changed. And you've got to, as we say, with our clients, you've just constantly got to be rinsing and repeating, rinsing and repeating, but, but adding to rinsing and repeating, I'm going to add, I've got to listen as well. Which is not one of my greatest skills, or hadn't been previously but, you know, working on that. And it's listening to what the clients are saying in the Q and As, listening to what the clients are saying when they're having a coffee or a meal, or a beer or a, whatever it might be. And then what I think we're really good at doing is I'll say, I've got this idea for a, you know, masterclass or a piece of content or something like that. And then we'll sit down and crash it through. You'll apply, not more logic that makes sense, seems like that I've done bit a thick head, but it's but the tangible operational logic to it, put another word around that, Stuart. I'm sure you let, or you can, let me just waffle in my own words...

STUART: Keep you, keep you keep scrolling, keep digging.

IAN: I'm alright. But, but then putting that together and what does that really mean? And what's in that message to the point of, you know, the content and the videos and we're just trying to resonate there. You know, as you say, help more people, but help the right people at the right time. You can go and join a peer group, one of the vendor peer groups, one of the other's communities, whatever you want, you know, as long as you're getting help. That's kind of level one. We are super happy with that. Obviously if it was with the Growth Hub, it's even better, but only if you're the right time and it's the right support for you. And, we're sitting here last week. During a growth planning session, and I said to the, the couple that were in how did you get here today? What was the thing? And basically she said to me, she goes, well, I needed to learn about MSP, how to grow my MSP, so I went onto LinkedIn and you were there, which was great content and it was all resonating. And she goes, some days it was, I was be watching a video, listening to a podcast, and one of your clients said this early on our clients Neil, many, many years ago. He said, it's like you've got a video camera in my office and you're listening to me, she said those exact words, it was so cool. I said, what do you mean? She goes, well, you were talking about marketing about how hard it is and that we try this, and we tried that and it was like, you're just behind me. It was really scary actually at one moment. But we've, you know, we kind of haven't, those problems are, you know, typical for MSP business owners and we know that, and we know how to fix it, and we have the frameworks to fix it. And you want to have to fix it as well. It's not just a pill that you just give and plug it in and it works. Like some people think you're just going to hire a salesperson that solves all your problems. I must have spoken to 15 MSPs this year who have either tried sales, brought salespeople in, or working or recruit salespeople. None of them worked out very successfully for various reasons. Because they just want the quick win. That's all it was. I just want the quick win. I just want you to bang that phone and get me some clients, and it doesn't work like that. So I think our marketing this year, I'm pretty proud of what we've achieved. Could we have done better? Definitely. Absolutely, definitely. And we'll cover off that in a minute, but I think from knowing the market, knowing what their pain points are and putting out useful, helpful, educating content, I think that's been a bit of a high, high vision.

STUART: And you love creating content, but the thing that's amazing about what you do and what we've done this year is just it's the consistency, which is one. And the secondly, it's the, it's the evolution of the strength of the message. And the targeting of the message that has just got better and better and better. And, you know, consistency with relevancy, you know, magnifies outcome, magnifies interest, and magnifies nurture. And so it's no surprise that we've perhaps had more, more inquiries and more interest than we've perhaps ever had and at the same time, combining that with kind of my professional high this year.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: Which, which has been building out the team.

IAN: Yeah. What a great job that's been.

STUART: And the beginning of the year it was like, right, we need to build out the team, to a, bring more variety, but also more resilience and more scalability into what we offer. And so building alongside with Claire and Julie, bringing in Peter, expanding the team in the Philippines.

IAN: Yes.

STUART: Amazing, amazing group there. And in fact, there was some, some restructure

IAN: Yes.

STUART: As well.

IAN: There was...

STUART: Was needed as well. And alongside that, building out our operational deliverables, which was expanding the kind of the done with you bits, we've got the, the core growth frameworks and that kind of just came out of some of that planning and thinking at the back end of last year. That, this year has just been amazing. It's been a lot of work. A lot of work. Thank you, Julie. Thank you Claire. Thank you, you Ian, because with the NCR, the TIPS program, the TPP program, the FLDP program and if you don't know what they are, then...

IAN: Give Stuart a call.

STUART: Have been amazing because they just take the core skills. That are growth orientated, you know, business owner needs and basically we wrap our arm around their shoulders and say, right. You know, if this is important to you, this is what you need to do. Step one, step two, step three, can't do it for you.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: However, we can really build on the frameworks and the knowledge and the concepts, wrap that around the accountability, and then actually say look, let's walk with you in your shoes doing it and the impact and the results and, and the growth in, I think the, the amazing thing for us as coaches is, is we can see the growth in our clients.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: These business owners who are great coming in, but the awareness that they didn't have of what they could become as leaders of themselves and their business as that, as the light went from that tiny sliver of light through the door to like a full, a full beam landing on them, it's like, wow. And as a result, there's the impact, the impact. And it shows up in their numbers.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: You know, the growth of the business, which is why they're here. But also as men and as women, you know, running, you know, important businesses, the fact that they are now more resilient, stronger, more profitable, employ more people, or using more systems instead of people depending on, you know, what they're automating. It's a lovely feeling.

IAN: It is. And you've done a, you have done a brilliant job on building that scalability with that team. But more importantly you know, where we, we had the, you know what that, that acronym BLAST, that Stuart just vomited down the microphone was all around basically helping you apply the framework. So it's really easy to go, here's a framework, go and fill it out and build it yourself. From a sales and marketing point of view, leadership, you know, your future leaders coming up through the program, you know, you and Julie built that amazing program that's basically the same as an ILM level five, but just for MSP leaders, and also the finances that we've identified that our clients could be going faster, you know.

STUART: How do we make the program better?

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: And have more impact faster and quicker.

IAN: Yeah. But also how can you help more people without burning out kind of own, not needed. Not really. So I don't think we'll ever get to that point. Because we love it so much, but it, it, it's like how do we, how do we do that? And those frameworks have helped to do that. And then you've got like these little splinter, , you know, peer groups now coming off at sales and marketing and leadership and that sort of thing. And that's really super powerful, because I think all in all. You know, it must be, it must be coming up to nearly 90 people that we have an impact on coaching on.

STUART: Yeah.

IAN: You know, within the organisation that we.

STUART: We get together.

IAN: Yeah. And that's great. And the fact that we are not in, you know, we are not the bottlenecks anymore, are we?

STUART: No.

IAN: In that. We're only the bottlenecks in our own thoughts, which is another interesting one. But, what about kind of like frustrations and what could have done better or, you know, kind of like some lows. What, from a professional point of view, what's, what have you got kind of in there?

STUART: I think for me it's, it's, it's like we got together four and a half years ago, only four and a half years ago, is I'd like to have been helping more people by now.

IAN: Yeah. Yeah.

STUART: I know we're helping a stack load. But it was like in the time that we have, how can we help as many people have more impact, change, you know, all that kind of, all that kind of good stuff and we have that, video slide of...

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: You know, that ripple effect. You know, and that's why we're doing this.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: And I'd like to be helping, I'd like to have been, had been helping more this year than last year. Obviously the community's grown, the client base has grown and we are doing that, but I, would've liked to have helped, I guess every year I'll say this.

IAN: Yeah. Yeah.

STUART: It would've been nice to have been helping more this year. Because it is a privilege to help these MSPs, and it's a delight to see. And here the stories of the impact of that when they, when you talk to them, Yeah. How they're, you know, suddenly paying off the balance sheet debts, that they might have accrued in the past. They're paying their VAT on time. Corporation tax is just an, an annoyance, because the money's all there in the bank. They're hiring people that they'd never have thought of, you know, from a salary perspective because of that...

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: Confidence to hire ahead of the curve and to hire people, you know, with more experience in different areas than them. But they've now got the mental strength and confidence to hire, hire and step up and step out. And even, and even consider selling where appropriate and consider the exit word, whereas perhaps they were just thinking, I'll just stick along and do this forever. Not believing that they could build something of, of value that, that if they exited, would be worth something sufficient to them to consider. Do you know what, that was a result and I can now not retire, but move on to the next thing with confidence having built something of value. Yeah, that's, I...

IAN: I think it's really important. I think it's, I'm absolutely the same, same as you. It's, it's frustration around that. And just while you were talking then it's, it's, you know, what we're, what I think we're, we are good at identifying is when, you know, if you look at the landscape in the last couple of years every mother and the dog have now got a podcast competition. You know, with this must be 260, 200, 270 shows. I heard the other day the average podcast gets to episode four.

STUART: Oh, does it really?

IAN: Yeah. So you know...

STUART: So they set it all up?

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: And they get four episode...

IAN: Get it already, and then they get bored and then they're just kind of like they, because there's no purpose, but they're just chatting shit. A bit like today's show. But anyway, if you're listening to this, then there's at least 400 of you every week are listening to this, and we thank you for that. There's competition for our ears. You know, there's only so many dog walks you can go on. There's only so many commutes you can go on. There's only so much you can do there. I think the community and the vendor landscape has changed dramatically in the last 18 months. It feels like, there's more, I'm just interested in the MQLs at the minute. I'm not really caring about, you know, the long-term relationships like, you know, maybe they did, you know, four or five years ago. I think it feels like that dynamics changing. You know, I hear more and more from people talking about companies that have got, you know, VC funding. They have very different ways of doing business and in targeting...

STUART: Values.

IAN: Values and all of that kind of great stuff.

STUART: Culture. Yeah.

IAN: And yet we know that the MSP, you know, you know who, who comes and, you know, looks for support, is a lot of the time they're scared and there's nothing frustrates me more than when you talk to a prospect and you have a really great conversation and they're just about to say, yeah, can you help me? Let's just go on with this. And then they go quiet and you don't hear from them and you think, what did I do to upset you? What did I say? And they just got busy. So, you know, measuring what matters. And I think the key thing here about. About that is, is that consistency. You know, and it's like MSPs, when you start with the marketing, they get it up and running and they've got six to eight weeks, nine weeks, you know, a couple of months they're in and everything like that. And then something happens and they stop it all and they plug the, you know, they turn the tap off and put the plug in and away they go. And then they got to pick it up again. And we've, I've had experience of that this week, not this year, not for like, probably for six to eight weeks maybe when we pulled an event that wasn't resonating. But that left a hole in that consistency.

STUART: Oh, did, yeah.

IAN: And you felt it.

STUART: Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

IAN: You felt it, you know, the, the energy of, of what was coming back in the sales and marketing. So, looking at the communities, looking at how people are buying, constantly having that feedback with our clients about why did you join? What are the results you're getting, and all of that kind of stuff. It's really, really important for us to do that. But don't worry we've got some plans for next year. So, for all those who are not listening to this podcast. Who are now listening to it. because you've probably found it. We're coming for you. We're going to come, we're going to come and help you. And that's, you know, that's, you know, that's why we got together and it next year is exciting, is very exciting. Some of the plans that we've got for that. What about on a personal point? What did, what have you kind of got on the, what, the learnings or low points for...

STUART: Well, apart from my learnings over buying a house, over moving a house, which everybody has...

IAN: Twenty thousand steps without leaving the door.

STUART: I did, did you think? That's amazing three days in a row. 20,000 steps and never leaving the house in three days.

IAN: See, you can all do it everyone.

STUART: God, body ache after that. I think maybe the learning from that is, don't listen to your wife and hire, hire someone to pack your house.

IAN: Yes.

STUART: But the thing is, yeah, had it done before though. Lost stuff, stuff got stolen. Didn't like that anyway.

IAN: Or your memoirs or my memo, been lucky in Warwick Towers.

STUART: Yes.

IAN: Now you've got a courtyard and all of this moat.

STUART: Don't ask about the dungeon.

IAN: No.

STUART: Anyway personal learnings. Personal learnings was I think that the thing for me was, a cold ran over from last year, because last year was quite challenging, was my mom again learning. You know, my mom was, still in hospital in January and that's lingered across this whole year. And her resilience, her vision of when she went in, because she was intubated for nine weeks.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: When an operation didn't go well in terms of recovery. And, then you have to learn to walk again and, you lose masses of muscle mass when you're older. And so just watching that journey a out of respect. Because I think Mom, most would've given up.

IAN: Yeah. Yeah.

STUART: I think she wishes she might have at times now, because it's been a hard road to recovery. And the consultants don't tell you, they, you go, oh.

IAN: Nope.

STUART: You are a bit frail, but I think you'll be all right. And you say, oh, I'll be all right then. But, you know, do prepared for six months.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: Which means 12 months of recovery. But just the, that's been a challenge. And, you don't think it, it is affecting you. Yeah. And the logistics of support. Even I'm lucky I've got two siblings. And at the same time, her, her husband was hospitalised as well.

IAN: You had it all. We had had some layers.

STUART: We had it all for not the first time. There was one in one A and E and over here and another in a and e over here in different parts of two different counties. But, I think you learn from it. And one is, guys, you know, we get this message in many shapes and sizes as in for all of us. But look after yourself, you know, treat every day as not your last.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: But make the most of it.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: Tell people you love them. Spend time with the people you care about, because anything can change. Book another holiday. As my mum would say, you time to book another holiday.

IAN: You don't need to book any more holidays.

STUART: I don't need to do, you're, I could book a few more holidays.

IAN: You're doing, you're doing just fine. I'm not sure you've booked any holidays this year. You just never turned up something.

STUART: And, yeah, just crack on with life while you've got it. And I think also more importantly, look after your health. Because, the thing I learned, you know, watching mum's journey who was fit but wasn't bulky in muscle. Yeah. And size, I think as you, as you get older is you need that, not bulk, but muscle. Yeah, muscle to cope with...

IAN: Bone as well, isn't it?

STUART: Bone, bone strength and, and the more you dig into it, and we're blessed in this modern age to be able to go deep on like the science, the real science behind, strength and fitness is, if you want to, if you want to be strong till the end, as opposed to week to the end, you know, at the end.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: Look after your health and keep muscle, keep strong.

IAN: Apart from this next week coming up, because this is going to be Christmas week, so this is when you...

STUART: Oh, it goes out the window...

IAN: next out the window. Starting next Monday. Starting next Monday. So I start next Monday, not.

STUART: But the, but the real lesson there though is the incremental gains. It's like, you know, you go to the gym and you work out consistently for a number of years. It, you know, those muscle power lifters and stuff, you don't become a power lifter in six months.

IAN: No.

STUART: It takes years of incremental gain of, of gaining that strength. And so if you want to be strong, you know, in the future, you're not going to get it overnight. And it takes years to build it up, but you can lose it very quickly. So start now consistently do it consistent, that word consistent again. And, and incrementally add the weight, you know, and the depth of content that we were talking about marketing a moment ago, you know, the same rules apply to every part of your life. So yes, it's been quite a learning this year.

IAN: Yes. Has indeed. It has.

STUART: What about you?

IAN: Yeah, I think for me it was when I started this journey back in 2016 oh my God. That was 10 years ago. It was 10 years ago, it was all, it was...

STUART: Still got less hair.

IAN: It was, thanks dear. It's just maybe shorter. It was all kind of spawn after you know, losing my mum and the thoughts of what she would, you know, what she would she be saying to me about now and the future and that sort of stuff. And then I surrounded myself with some really motivational people and got into, you know, self development, personal development and all of that. And I think, I think the learnings or the, not necessarily the lows. I think to your point about look after yourself, look after your health. You know, we've done the best we can with what we've got and we've got a really great kind of like garage, gym, whatever you want to call it. But, you know, as my wife said, goes, I'm not having somebody helping me go to the toilet when I'm 89 years old. I want to be doing this on my own. And you see some of these people who are, you know, got great strength and got great, you know, muscle mass and all of that sort of stuff. And that's resilience. And when you've got, you know, sunlight, Dan, you've got, you've got to be careful. You've got someone like that having thrown themselves around and you've got to try and catch him. You've got to be strong and you pull your back out. You're, you're in trouble. So, done that and kind of learnt to, to look after myself. Probably could do a little bit better on that. But I think about, you know, a couple of months ago. Probably when we come out, can we come out the summer? And it was like, ah, why is this, why are we not moving as fast as we want to move forwards? And then, you know, and I'm not a, you know, I love LinkedIn because it's great because it's, it's how you connect through business and I'm not a great person on Facebook or any of that sort of, I'm certainly not someone who sit there and doom scroll for hours because I just go, ah, this is wasting my time. I could be doing something more productive. Yeah, that's probably a bit of ADHD kicking in there as well. Going, hang on a minute. This is not serving me, but I think I got to a point where I just went is. Where am I spending my time? And I can't remember who it was, who challenged me on it, but somebody, it probably was probably a client to be fair. Where are you spending your time? You know, a half hour here, an hour here, you know, you see what we can create in an hour when we are together is unbelievable. And an hour is a really short period of time when you sit there and you are on the bloody phone or you are watching something on Netflix or something. I'm not saying you've got to be working all the time, but I literally went into my phone and I just went out of all of the groups and all of the notifications that didn't serve me and went and found new groups and now there's a whole new set of, you know, icons on my home screen of the iPhone on, whether it be educational, whether it be motivational, you know, audible books, you know, music, you know, whatever it might be, Headspace, any of that sort of stuff. And that was a really interesting decluttering exercise I think that went through. And it helps, helps you realise you can actually achieve absolutely anything you want and literally tons and tons of stuff that can mean either memories or money or cars or whatever it, whatever it is that, that you want to create, you know, for your family with very little effort.

STUART: Well, you've done a lot of that issue.

IAN: I have done a lot of that. I've got a healthy obsession as well now.

STUART: But oddly, you've reminded me of, the importance of reading. Good books.

IAN: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

STUART: And so you, you don't do reading and you don't do words, you joke, but you've gone away on holiday and read a book, each time. And you've come back inspired. I use a different word. I use Reminded, because I think the inspiration we get is because we've been reminded of kind of universal truths.

IAN: Yes.

STUART: Which are obvious, like spend, you know, make every day your best day.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: You know, everything that we talked about in the reflections in this podcast. But that's something I learned from you, you reminded me to, and I, and, and moving house made me look at all the books in my library and go, oh, I remember reading that one. Wow. Why don't I read it again?

IAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

STUART: Because there are some universal truths out there that we just need reminding of to, to consistently, do something with them because the impact and with your damn well living, that came out of reading. Didn't it?

IAN: Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely.

STUART: You know, this business came out of reading. Ultimately.

IAN: Cars have come out of reading.

STUART: Cars have come out of reading. Problem with that. Now getting expired, asking, you know, in complicated.

IAN: Yeah.

STUART: But we forget, and that's our job as coaches is to build that awareness in ourselves and then our clients and those around us to help them lift themselves up every day, every week to reconnect with whatever their North Star is. And isn't it fun?

IAN: Yeah. Oh, absolutely.

STUART: Isn't it a last?

IAN: Absolutely. Absolutely. That was brilliant. What a great year partner has been. Great. I can't wait for next year. We say that every year.

STUART: We do, we do.

IAN: As we skip into the new year on Christmas. I just want to, you know, personally thank everybody who's listened and bent their ears over this podcast.

STUART: We get lovely feedback and it's great. We, it's a privilege to hear that people listen.

IAN: It takes a lot to put this together. It does. I've seen the time sheets, however...

STUART: I've seen the bills.

IAN: It's something that a, you know, people get massive value from and if it helps them and if it helps them to do something and if it helps them to help us, then, you know, it's amazing. Wishing you all and your families a great week this week. Go in moderation, spend that time. Remember that those loved ones are there for, you know, they're there for a reason and that's your, your kind of vision. So if we spend that time to reconnect over a glass of red wine then do so and, and cheers from us, or even mold wine.

So yes, mold, no, I don't want any of that. Just been in Frankfurt for the weekend. I do not want to see any more glue vine for a long, long time. But, yeah, next week you've got a really exciting show coming up, talking about what we think is going to be happening in 2025 and how to help you build your...

STUART: Even 2026.

IAN: It's coming up in 2026. Oh yeah. It's 26, isn't it? It's, isn't it?

STUART: Jesus. Get with...

IAN: Is it Late?

STUART: Get with the program.

IAN: What time is it?

STUART: Good...

IAN: Anyway

STUART: It's for his bedtime.

IAN: That's bedtime.

STUART: Anyway, Merry Christmas everybody.

IAN: Yes. Merry Christmas, you all. Thanks again, and we look forward to catching up with you real soon.

STUART: Take care.

IAN: Take care now.

STUART: Bye-bye.

OUTRO: Just before you go, and if you're curious about how this episode links with the ability to scale your MSP to a million or, or if you are already there, accelerate to five, then we want to invite you to come and take the MSP Mastery quiz, and in just three minutes, you're going to get a 360 degree scan of your business where you can identify the one or two tactics that can help you find more time, engage in, align your people and help generate more leads in your MSP. It's really simple. Just click on the link in the show notes and if you have enjoyed this episode, we'd love to get some feedback from you by means of a rating review on Spotify or iTunes, or your podcast platform of choice. We really appreciate every single one of them. Now, you can go and enjoy the rest of your day and we look forward to catching up and connecting with you soon. All the best.