 Welcome to the Leaders Room. My name is Peter Webb. I'm the Director of Research and Curriculum at the Ecliffe Leadership and Governance Centre. I'm here today with Janine Ellis, the Executive Director and Founder of Retail Zoo, the $2 billion holding company of Boost Juice. Janine, lovely to have you here. We've just heard you speak at the Leadership Energy Summit Asia 2016. And I have a particular question for you and it relates to success. People have assumptions about success and I notice from your story that your assumption of success and the public's assumption of success hasn't always matched. Can you tell me occasions when the public has thought you're successful and you haven't been sure you're successful? Or you think you're successful but the public doesn't think you're successful? I think through the whole journey, I think the external world have always thought that I'm more successful than I've thought myself is successful. Because quite often people go, wow, so now you're there, now you've achieved it, what are you doing next? And I'm like, mate, I just started. I've got such a long way to go. And I think perception and reality is really interesting because people think, and look, I suppose in some respects we have created this great business that has done really well. But I think that because you're constantly looking at yourself and knowing how you need to be better, you feel like you're not there yet. So sometimes I feel unworthy of the praise and sometimes I feel unworthy of the accolades that we get because I think, oh, but you have no idea. I get this wrong and that wrong and that wrong. And so it's a really interesting view on how you view yourself and how other people view. The imposter syndrome. Yeah, it is. It's really interesting because I'm just a girl from the Burbs in Melbourne who's worked really hard and who's risked things and it's just taken one step at a time. And yet we're here and I sometimes go, how do we get here? But you're in the grind and the journey. Quite often you're in a train and you don't realise how fast it's going because you're in the train and it's how it feels sometimes. And of course you referenced energy particularly in your talk today. And I'm just curious about where your energy comes from because you mentioned certain moments in your life when you felt that you could just push through anything and other moments in life when you weren't really sure. So I'm curious about, you know, that you talk about sheer determination, for example. Is that what energy is for you? Where do you get your energy from? Look, energy is a really powerful tool. I spoke to a guy, there's a business in Australia called Bakers Delight who there's a guy called Roger Gillespie who ran that. And I remember having a conversation with him and he said, his business was going poorly for, you know, the sales were going south. And I said, what's the problem? He goes, there's nothing problem. It's just, there's no problem. It's just the energy and the dynamics of the faith have actually spiralled downwards. And you just need to change people the way they feel because energy is really powerful. And that's when I spoke in the summit, because I spoke about positivity. And as a leader, even when things are dark, you need to come out and go, we have a solution. Now, and we're going this way, now that way might be a gopher cliff, but people want to follow, they want to be led by positivity. They don't want to be led by indecisiveness or confusion. They want to know the person who's leading them, you know, has that positivity that they're going to get there. And you know what? Sometimes it's faker to make it. And quite often that actually does manifest in success. That's interesting. I know you also said, you're talking about brands and you said brands exist holistically. And you said there's a lot of things that come together to make a brand successful. And the reason why boost use is successful and other competitors haven't been so successful. You say, is this magic something? And I wonder what creates that? What does bring that together to make a brand exist holistically? It's giving a, it's caring factor. It's actually the fact that I go in and the fact that the receptionist doesn't give that first call, the care it means. I go in and if I go into a store and the store isn't clean, I look at the marketing material and that's not on brand. Because it's every element that makes it that if I go and taste a smoothie, it's not perfect. So it's every element, but it's actually caring about every single element too. And if people just go, you know, let's not kid ourselves. I didn't invent juice and smoothies, but we've packaged it in a way and given it heart and soul and love that people believe. And people, you know, we have on the back of every t-shirt love life. And it's something that in nothing else that I didn't have any business experience, but I certainly had that view on I wanted to create a brand that really braces loving life. Wonderful. That's so important because a lot of leaders today are talking about getting the culture right. We have to have the right culture to drive performance and drive results. But actually you're talking about culture from the perspective of care. You're saying that's the essential element of a culture. It is, but that doesn't mean that care doesn't mean soft. You know, I'm also a firm believer in that, you know, I think that the culture of business needs to be a high performance culture. So I will give the support and I will give the love and everything that needs for the business to be successful. But if you're not the right person for the business, you're actually doing the wrong thing by the other people working in the business. You're doing the wrong thing by them because quite often there's never a time that someone's failing in a role. They don't know it. And so quite often, you know, sometimes also I've been at fault of hiring people, you know, setting some people up to fail. And you don't mean to set good people up to fail, but you go, ah, you're competent. I need someone in that role. You can do it. And then they go, oh my God, I can't do this role. So, you know, it's a learning journey. And that was something you said to about if you're leading and you're leading through trying to please or believe that you need to please others, then you're not really a leader. No, if you lead to be liked, you know, if you want to be liked by people, then you will be a poor leader. Because you won't make the decisions. You know, I actually really don't respect someone who they go. They'll say, ah, you know, I'll look, Julie, you're doing a great job. Julie walks out of the room and they go, oh my God, she's useless. I mean, it's not doing her any favours, not doing the business any favours. So I think that, you know, but they don't want Julie to not like them. You know, and I think that you, you know, it better be respected than liked. Exactly. So your appearance on the Shark Tank, the syndicated Australian TV program, leads you into a position of making advice, giving advice to other young entrepreneurs from your experience and from your appearance on that TV show. Is there advice that you could give to young entrepreneurs now, today, as a result of your journey, as a result of your experience? Yeah, I think one thing I did mention in the talk that I did, one of the things that I would say is make sure you surround yourself with great people. Or even surround yourself by support. You know, I was lucky enough to have, you know, a really supportive husband on the journey, but I also had a supportive mother to help me with my kids. And I couldn't have gone to South Korea and India and Australia and all over the world without that extra support. And it's pretty easy to say that you can do it on your own, but you can't. You do need those people around you. So I'd be saying to any of those people who want you to start their own business and they might have children or they might have other things that are difficult, is set yourself up to succeed. You know, get the people around you to go, how can I help you not be doom and gloomers? And then finally, how do you overcome resistance? How do you persist through opposition? Because you've certainly faced a lot of that in your career. How do you manage that kind of resistance? Look, at the end of the day, it's communication. And you know what? You don't actually get resistance if people have faith in you. If people like you and go, she has the answers, even though deep down you might not have the answers, but you're going, yet we will do this and I'll work it out, there's less resistance. And you know what? You also shouldn't be so dictatorship that you shouldn't be listening to others. A great leader is a listener. And a great leader is actually considering all angles. Because the amount of times I've gone, this is the answer. And then I'll go and speak to people and go, oh, actually, I don't even consider that. Actually, you're quite right. I didn't even consider that. But thank goodness that you're involved because I would have gone down this path and really, you're right answers this way. So it is a really important one that a leader actually gathers all the information from the right people, but they make the final call. And I think that at the end of the day, the buck stops with you when you're a leader. Excellent. Janine, thank you so much for spending some time with us today. My pleasure. Thank you very much. No, thank you.