🎙️ Startup Scaleup People shares real stories of how founders, execs, advisors, NEDs & fractional leaders build companies, careers & lives — from startup to scaleup to enterprise.We go deep on leadership, growth, funding, strategy, resilience, operations, exits, the human side of business and more.📈 Topics: business growth, scaleup journeys, innovation, leadership, entrepreneurship, executive insights, human stories, resilience, failure, success, finance, operations, and more. 🎧 New episodes every Sunday at 4PM UK.🔗 Join us: linktr.ee/startupscaleuppeople
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Startup Scaleup People is a business podcast hosted by Mario Rivas, with 42 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.
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Mario Rivas hosts Startup Scaleup People, a business show with 42 episodes published.
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Episode #36
While Everyone Chased SaaS and AI, He Built a £25M Business Nobody Talked About | Amrit Daliwal
Jul 28, 202637 min
Amrit Dhaliwal, founder of Walfinch, left hospitality, bought a franchise and spotted what most entrepreneurs completely overlooked: a £68 billion UK home care market with almost no one thinking seriously about scale, quality or wellness. Six years later, Walfinch operates across 40 locations nationwide, serves over 1,000 clients and is on track for £25M in network revenue in 2025. In this startup and scaleup masterclass, Amrit breaks down the franchise model that is taking him to £100M, why boring businesses outperform sexy ones, and the leadership principles that work in restaurants, retail and healthcare alike.Walfinch is not just a care business. Amrit is actively rebranding how the UK thinks about aging, building proprietary AI tools alongside third party platforms, and running a franchise support system that graduates operators from zero to £80K a month. He reveals what separates top performers from average franchisees, how he attracts and retains carers in the most talent-starved sector in the country, and why the future of home care looks a lot more like a wellness brand than a traditional care agency. 00:00 Introduction to Home Care and Franchising 01:51 Transition from Hospitality to Home Care 06:32 Understanding the Home Care Business Model 10:52 Challenges and Opportunities in Home Care 18:14 The Role of AI in Home Care 27:45 Building a High-Impact Care Business 33:11 Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs
How to Challenge a CEO Without Getting Fired as a NED | Alessandro Hatami
Jul 23, 202640 min
Alessandro Hatami has spent 25 years at the heart of global fintech and banking, holding senior leadership roles at PayPal Europe, Lloyds Banking Group and GE Capital before founding Pacemakers and serving nearly a decade as an FCA regulated non-executive director. In this fintech and board governance masterclass, he breaks down why incumbents have proven far more resilient than anyone predicted, what boards are getting dangerously wrong about AI liability, and why the NED role is fundamentally misunderstood by most executives who transition into it. Alessandro argues that board governance is quietly becoming one of the most significant challengers of AI implementation inside financial institutions, not because boards are obstructive, but because they carry personal legal liability for technology decisions that most of them are not yet equipped to evaluate. He also unpacks how Pacemakers operates as an executive search firm for fintech partnerships and why the adapt, evolve, transform framework determines which banks survive the next wave of disruption. Chapters: 00:00 Introduction: Alessandro Hatami and 25 Years Across PayPal, Lloyds and GE Capital 01:58 What Has Fundamentally Changed in Banking Over 25 Years 03:08 The Innovators Dilemma: Why Incumbents Struggle to Move at Fintech Speed 05:21 Why Nobody Is Actually Closing Their Lloyds Account for Revolut 09:46 When Will Challengers Truly Overtake Incumbent Banks 12:21 How Pacemakers Matches Banks With the Right Fintech Partners 19:28 The Biggest Challenges Boards Face as AI Enters Financial Services 25:52 What Most Executives Get Wrong When They Become a Non-Executive Director 27:11 How to Challenge a CEO Without Overstepping as a NED 29:02 What Separates a High Performance Board from One That Just Meets 33:08 Key Questions Boards Are Asking About AI Governance Right Now 37:38 The Toughest Board Decision Alessandro Has Ever Faced New episodes every Tuesday at 11:00 UK https://execdna.com Available on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Amazon Music. Join the ExecDNA Community on LinkedIn and WhatsApp. Music licensed through Soundstripe.Code: MB11LKLDVUWQOLI0
The Three Valuation Drivers Every Acquirer Looks for Every Single Time| Steven Pivnik
Jul 15, 202636 min
Steven Pivnik failed his first two startups, built his third into a $40M revenue business operating across 20 countries, and sold it in 2020 completing due diligence in just 30 days. Now, as an exit advisor and author of Built to Finish, he has helped founders generate over $1.1 billion in exit value across 38 transactions. In this startup and scaleup masterclass, Steven breaks down exactly what founders must fix before approaching any acquirer and why most exit processes fail before they even begin.The mistakes that cost founders millions at the table are almost always avoidable: founder dependency, customer concentration, weak recurring revenue, and an underprepared finance function. Steven reveals his three-part exit readiness assessment covering psychological, financial, and enterprise value drivers, and explains why average exit preparation takes three years and why AI is already reshaping how acquirers evaluate differentiation and IP. Hosted by Mario Rivas About Startup Scaleup People Real stories from startup, scaleup & enterprise leaders. From boardrooms to founder garages, we cover growth, leadership, funding, exits, governance, AI, fintech, SaaS, and business transformation. New episodes every Sunday at 4PM UK time. Chapters 00:00 Introduction: Steven Pivnik and $1.1B in Founder Exit Value 01:30 Failing Twice: What Steven Did Differently on Startup Number Three 02:41 Building to $40M Revenue Across 12 Countries 03:07 Three Valuation Drivers Acquirers Look for Every Time 05:39 How Long a Proper Exit Process Really Takes 08:21 Earning the Trust of Microsoft, IBM and Google as a Startup 10:40 The Valuation Killers Founders Almost Always Overlook 12:37 Negotiation Tactics: When the Seller Has the Leverage 15:33 Exit Readiness Assessment: Three Angles Every Founder Needs 20:40 Why Endurance Sports and Business Success Feed Each Other 24:48 How AI Is Changing Due Diligence and Company Valuation 27:44 Replacing Yourself as Founder: The COO to CEO Move
The Skill That Gets You Promoted Will Also Get You Fired | Navid Nazemian
Jul 6, 202637 min
40% of Executive Transitions Fail, Navid Nazemian on the Leadership Gap. Navid Nazemian, executive transition coach and author of Mastering Executive Transitions, has coached 350+ senior leaders across 7 industries over 26 years and the data is stark: 4 in 10 executive transitions fail. In this startup and scaleup leadership masterclass, he reveals why technical skills get you promoted into the C-suite and why the lack of soft skills gets you fired, and how leaders can use his Double Diamond Framework to onboard successfully before costly mistakes derail the transition. With only 1% of leaders reporting confidence in deploying AI and CEOs saying the role has changed more in the past year than in the previous 25, Navid breaks down the leadership paradox at the heart of today's organisations. He also reveals the world's first executive transition intelligence LLM, built on 12 years of coaching transcripts, book citations, and 116 podcast episodes, designed to give every executive access to world-class transition coaching at scale. Chapters: 00:35 Introduction to Leadership and Coaching 08:48 Executive Transition Challenges 15:04 Qualities of Exceptional Leaders 20:31 Understanding Executive Presence 25:01 The Impact of AI on Leadership34:45 Cultural Differences in Leadership
Your Business Should Run Without You (Here's Why) | Cory Blumenfeld
Jun 30, 202636 min
In this episode of Startup Scaleup People, Mario speaks with Cory Blumenfeld, serial entrepreneur, founder, investor-backed startup builder, and entrepreneur with multiple successful exits. Cory shares lessons learned from launching businesses in industries where he had no prior experience, raising millions in funding, building startups from scratch, and eventually creating systems that allow founders to delegate, automate, and scale. The conversation explores founder psychology, leadership, documentation, hiring, virtual assistants, delegation, and why building a business that runs without you is one of the most valuable assets you can create. Whether you're launching your first startup or leading a growing company, this episode offers practical advice on building systems that free your time while helping your business grow faster. Chapters: 00:00 Introduction to Entrepreneurship and Background 04:45 Key Lessons from Exiting Businesses 09:05 Recognizing Bottlenecks in Business 18:41 Overview of Blue Mosso and Virtual Assistance 24:16 AI and Virtual Assistants: A Symbiotic Relationship 31:01 Empowering Business Owners: Taking Back Time
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