Why Great Leaders Stop Asking “How” | Damien Gooden

sterclass in human-first leadership, honest business building, and why caring is not a soft skill — it’s a strategic advantage.

Aleyx Ward sits down with Damien Gooden, CEO of HR Central, to unpack what it really takes to build a business where people stay, trust grows, and leadership doesn’t hide behind titles. From accidentally becoming a CEO to navigating COVID, firing customers, and building deep loyalty inside teams, Damien shares real stories from two decades in business.

The conversation moves beyond textbook leadership and into the messy, human reality of running companies. Damien explains why subscription revenue nearly stalled growth, why referrals beat control, and why focusing on outcomes — not micromanagement — is the only way to scale without burning out.

There are powerful reflections on parenting, culture, authenticity, and mental health, including phone-free dinners, getting teenagers to talk, and why men need spaces where it’s safe to open up. Damien also breaks down Radical Candour with real-world examples that every leader will recognise.

If you’re building a business, leading a team, or trying to be a better human while doing both — this episode is for you.

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Transcript

Aleyx 0:05

Hello and welcome to Naked at the Top. Today's guest is someone who describes himself as a human first operator. Over the past 24 years, he's gone from software dev to marketing company co founder, Thanks To the CEO of HR Central, which he's been running for the past decade. But what really stood out is how he's managed to build a life where Friday morning basketball games, beers with mates, and raising twin girls fits in with running a company. Damien, welcome to Welcome at the Top.

Damien Gooden 0:36

Thank you, Yeah, human first operator, I can't believe I said that, but I love humans, what can I say?

Aleyx 0:43

Damo or Damien? Which one are we going with?

Damien Gooden 0:47

it's very interesting. I was talking to one of my colleagues about this yesterday, someone who's been working with us just for a week, and I asked her if an abbreviated version of her name would be appropriate, and she was like, yes, very much and she said, I noticed lots of people call you Damo, as in, in, the team, and, it's very much my preference, Aleyxa, please, Damo, from now on, but, there are still some people who refer to me as Damo, Colleagues who refer to me as Damien and when I write to them, I refer to myself as Damien.

Aleyx 1:16

Yeah,

Damien Gooden 1:17

it does happen a little bit. I go with other people's preference. It doesn't matter to me. My mother doesn't even call me Damien unless I'm in trouble, which doesn't happen that often anymore. but, yeah, some people like to be, I don't know, a little bit more formal or traditional. But I'm pretty, pretty free flowing. I've been called a lot worse. Yeah,

Aleyx 1:35

I noticed that when I spoke to a few people ahead of the interview, they all referred to you as Damo, and there were parts where everyone had a nickname, but given, so I'm obviously not originally from here, and one thing I have noticed is Australians do like to shorten everything, and usually, throw an O at the end. So

Damien Gooden 1:55

yeah, an O or a Y even. sometimes elongate things so John becomes Johnny Or Johno.

Aleyx 2:01

Yeah,

Damien Gooden 2:01

But that, yeah. Anyway, yeah. love nickname.

Aleyx 2:04

So could you just tell us a little bit about HR Central what you guys do?

Damien Gooden 2:09

Sure, we are an outsourced HR partner for mostly small business, but also some bigger business, we do some overflow work for them, and large franchise groups. Basically, we help assist businesses to make sure they're compliant with the, career planning has been a complicated, industrial relations system within which business operates in Australia. We've started with a cloud based HR system that we've built, updated, and continued to update over the last decade but the core of our business really is the, support and advice, and the, resources and documentation that we provide to help make HR something that's not As much of a struggle, for small business people. funnily enough, you said in the intro, I was IT originally, got lucky enough to get pulled into the starting of a marketing company, in that marketing company we had a HR problem. and the guy I was working for at the time, who's now the chairman of HR Central, said we should build a HR solution for us, for ourselves, an IT platform to solve some HR record keeping things. anyway, fast forward, we got a good exit out of that, a marketing company, and, Part of that was that the CEO and I were not required by the purchases. And that's how HR Central started. He said, you've got no job now, but how about you start, we start this company with another guy, Michael, who helped us with our HR matter, and you could be the CEO and I'll mentor you. yeah, that was 10 years ago. yeah, it's been a great journey.

Aleyx 3:37

So it really started with, you actually having a problem yourself and solving that problem, which I think many great businesses start with, right? Just solve a problem that you're going through yourself. Yeah, and

Damien Gooden 3:48

Yeah, and the cool thing was, Aleyx, at that time in our marketing business, most of our marketing clients were small businesses. So we had a really good market. have question to just to talk to say, hey, if we did this, would you buy it, or would you pay for it? Or even the simple question we asked, what do you do for your HR? As the Chairman often says, he recalls these stories, and people just go, Oh, that's what I do with my HR. So it was a really good opportunity to Try something totally different, but also, like you said, the genesis of this was actually a problem that we then did some market research and said, other people have this problem, I find it fascinating for people to come up with new things that they go, hopefully people will want this, but we have no idea, no one's ever done it before, but what we were doing is a different take on what had been done before and, a different market that probably hadn't been tapped into as much. at that time.

Aleyx 4:39

And is there, have you seen similarities, obviously running, this is the second business you've run now. Is there similarities in how you run it as well

Damien Gooden 4:48

I didn't, I was head of ops in the last one, I didn't actually run it, but I was very close to the CEO. I think, probably the one constant is learning. The three major sort of careers I've had over my time is, software development, where a lot of it was project based. The marketing thing, which was a cloud based marketing tool for SMS and MMS and things like that. Which was more subscription based and, online and Very different from the project based stuff, and then, when we started HR Central, some of the mistakes that we made early on in the marketing business, we knew not to make when we started HR Central, even simple things like billing systems, and being, building for a thousand customers, rather than just building for today, and, a friend of mine just introduced me to a book, ten times, don't try and make your company twice as good, try and think about planning to make it ten times as good, what do you need to put in place, and then you've got an opportunity to be that big. Rather than constricting yourself, but we had, some learnings from our past history that we were very conscious of and we spent a lot of time building processes and systems and investing in technology before we even had the customers to make sure that the flow of information was good and that it was really clear and easy and simple. yeah, that was a big win. That investment actually has held, us really in good stead over the last 10 years.

Aleyx 6:10

Yeah, that's a good take to be able, if you're able to do that, cause most people will just start and be like, ok, I'll figure it out as we go.

Damien Gooden 6:18

and we were lucky in that way because it it came from a, we know when this business is going to be sold and we know when we're going to start, but we've got a runway and we've got some time. We've got these learnings, we're mad if we don't. Put in place things to make it that we don't have those problems again. and that's been good. And we've continued to do that along the way as we've learnt. Take time to reinvest, go back, change, take a hit. Maybe in some area, whether it's cost or time or whatever or both, and then ramp back up and keep building underneath and, if you keep putting on top and you don't address what's underneath, it's not going to last too long.

Aleyx 6:56

So was there a moment in time, at the, near the start of the journey of HR Central, where you thought, oh, this could really be something, or, even, a time where you thought, oh, this isn't working, any kind of, those types of moments?

Damien Gooden 7:15

it was interesting being in a situation where, At that time we were a fully subscription based business and everything was based on subscribing revenue. and we had zero subscribers. that means we had zero revenue. But what we had was the capability to do some HR projects. So we started doing some HR projects and a fee for service works of generating some revenue, which is good to not burn as much because we're still employing people and building all these systems and paying for all these systems, et cetera. what we realised after a while is that those two things are actually. non congruent. You can't be doing work on a fee per service basis whilst trying to build a customer base that is on a subscription basis, because the work that you do and you get them to pay for by the project should be encapsulated by the, subscription service, largely. So it came to a point after a while where actually this is, this revenue that is good because we're not burning as much cash is actually limiting our growth from our subscription base, which is actually the value in the business and what's going to hold us in good stead down the track. So we needed to make a conscious decision to say, what's actually important? Is it really important to slow the burn rate? Or is it really important to build a subscription core to build and build and build so that was one of the big, one of the big ones where it was ah, this is just not working. We thought we were doing something that was good, and it was good if you looked at it from one lens, but it's actually not good in the value of the business for the shareholders overall. So yeah, that was probably one of those big inflection points. And when we basically said, we're not doing any consulting or projects unless it's for someone who is a subscriber. And they need something that's outside of the subscription. That's the only time we're going to do that sort of work.

Aleyx 8:55

that quite a scary move for you?

Damien Gooden 8:57

Yeah, it it was, and it was reiterated five years ago with COVID when A lot of those HR services and projects, people just stopped doing them,

Aleyx 9:05

because

Damien Gooden 9:05

people were barely even working, let alone, were people investing in training and, upskilling HR and things like that. So that was the real tipping point probably five years ago, where we were really like, that's it, we're not doing it anymore. Since then we've been lucky enough to actually acquire a few different businesses and we have a few different arms and we have a consulting arm now, but it's a different offering compared to the subscription model. So it's not, it's, people who want that, who don't want subscription, so we now can offer it. If that makes sense.

Aleyx 9:32

So did you have to turn a lot of business away when you first made those changes?

Damien Gooden 9:38

luckily enough, there's a lot of good HR practitioners who work in that way around, and I've met, couldn't, been lucky enough to meet a few of them, it was referrals, so I look at it as a positive, because sometimes people, it goes the other way, people go, I want a HR solution that has technology, and those people who do consulting don't have that necessarily, and they might go, oh, Go and talk to HR Central. So yeah, we turned some stuff away and it's but it was with a positive outcome in mind. So yeah, look, we can't help you with this, but here's someone we know and trust, go and, go and work with them, and we wish you the best. And people like that, right? If you can't do the best for someone, and we actually had this problem a bit early on as well. We would try to do whatever we could for anyone. we had that lady who was not a bad recruiter, recruitment wasn't really our thing, but if someone was going to pay for it, when we were first starting, it was like, great, let's get some revenue. What we should have done is refer them to people that are gun recruiters instead, because those people are really happy with you. And that builds good vibes, positive, referrals, that sort of stuff, which all comes around, I believe. so rather than trying to do things, cause you want to help, you don't actually have to do it. But you can ask, who, instead of how do I do it, you can ask who can help me do it. And at the end of the day, your customer or the person that you're talking to, just wants the best result for them. So you doing it at 60%, as opposed to giving them someone who's 100%, they'll be much happier if you do that, rather than the other.

Aleyx 11:13

and you're, giving them that value, and people remember that, and they'll come back when the time comes, and it's, that's all about having that right referral network there. to, help do that as well, I do that too, I kind of stick in my lane of marketing, but then I've got partners that can help, and then we just get the best outcome for the client, rather than you trying to stretch yourself in and try and do everything

Damien Gooden 11:38

Yeah, that's right, and people know, they love that you treat them, that you care, but if you really care, be bold enough to say, you know what, I care so much, I'm going to give you something else.

Aleyx 11:48

Yeah, alright, so I wanna take you back a little bit, or quite a bit, depending on how you look at it. So you, you grew up in the country of Victoria. so what was it like growing up Country life, and what kind of kid were you? Let us uh, let us meet little Damien. Little

Damien Gooden 12:09

Little Damien was a tearaway, I've got two younger sisters, born quite close together, so my sister that's next oldest is 16 months younger than me, and my sister after that is 14 months, maybe not even, anyway, we're only three years apart. And so we were very close as kids. this sounds like I'm very old and I can't believe I'm saying it, but it was pretty simple life. Like we, I just go to footy training, ride my bike, go to basketball training, ride my bike there, ride around until dark, come home. And, I think when I was really little, I was a tear away and a bit of a menace. and then when I got into sort of teenage years, it was just sleep, play sport, Go to school, repeat. That was pretty simple. so yeah, it was, a pretty easy, pretty enjoyable childhood, to be honest. I could walk everywhere, or ride my bike everywhere. There wasn't much going on Had good mates, had good family friends. and I think, both my folks were teachers. So we lived in the country, but we were in the town, so we weren't, I'm definitely not a farm operator at all. although I went on farms with my mates and stuff, but, some of them could drive cars, and we were mechanics when I was 12. one mate, we had a car that had no doors and no bonnet and stuff, but we would drive around in his paddock when we were 12, 13 years old. And he could fix it himself. He went on to become a mechanic, no surprise. But, that was pretty cool for me, but I was very much, gonna go down the academic path rather than the handy, with the hands, path.

Aleyx 13:55

Yeah, grew up in country town as well, but, in Scotland, and like what you say, they, when you you just go down and play in the park, ride your bike, and you would just know it was time to go home when the street lights came on, and, and half the time parents didn't know, where you, were, and, but we're fine.

Damien Gooden 14:14

Yeah, I've got 16 year old daughters, and I worry about where they are, or where they're not, because you get so much exposure to some of the things that are pretty awful in the world and I would hate to think that might happen

Aleyx 14:31

Yeah. yeah, it's it's a completely different, way of life, no? your friend Damien said that, you're very close with your parents, and you're all very, close knit family. Was there anything that, your parents, taught you that, that kind of still sticks in your mind today?

Damien Gooden 14:53

actually, I got different lessons from both my parents. my mum is a massive extrovert. And is really good at remembering people's names, and The kids names and what they did for a job 15 years ago, she's incredible like that. My dad is very much an observer. He will sit back in a new crowd, he will sit back and observe and won't say much. but when he's with his people, he's quite vocal and he's very funny. but when they would go out, dad was a teacher and then he became a principal and then he worked for the government. And so he had to go to a lot of work events. And he would not remember people's names, and mum would be like, oh, hI I'm Jo, your name, and so she would shield him through the social stuff, in, in the I don't know, small talk world, where she dominates. but dad worked a lot, so dad had a travelled a lot for work, trying to better himself, work his way up through the rank. So Mum did a lot of the heavy lifting from the day to day operational side for kids that sort of thing. and sort of socialisation part of me comes very much from her. and then yeah, that the work ethic and the idea of supporting everyone being there from a financial point of view. and from a, you've got to work hard and you've got to do something. That's a really strong part of my sort of, I learnt my core behaviour. and the cool thing was we always had dinner. Almost always had dinner and we'd go around table and say, How was your day? And it always started with, today? that was a running joke. Dad often wasn't there cause he was travelling for work and stuff, but it would happen anyway. I that's one of the traditions that I've tried to keep going with my kids. get around the table, or the bench, or whatever, doesn't really matter where, but talk about your day, and actually share some of the things, cause. yeah, my 16 year olds, the phone is like an appendage to them, so trying to get the phone tucked away and just talk and share and that sort of stuff is even more important I think now than it was when I was a kid.

Aleyx 16:59

Do you manage to get them to to to leave the phone at dinner?

Damien Gooden 17:03

Yeah, so I bought, I actually bought a device, that's about that big, that's got slots on it. And on the side, it's got six different charging things, so you can put iPads or phones or whatever and stack them all next to each other. I put it in my office, so before, you put the phones in there, myself is included. that, that goes away. We actually just get to talk. Unfortunately, usually you have to get your phone out to remember, we're talking, planning about what's going to happen next week, Oh, I need to look at my calendar, We're so, dependent on the, which is frightening. I actually read an article in The Age about a lady who went three days, and she tried to go to the cinema, she tried to go to the, for all these different things, she's it's really hard without a phone, catching the bus, and all this sort of stuff, anyway. I digress. but yeah, we, try and do that.

Aleyx 17:51

Yeah, And, and has always been easy to get them to to tell you about their day? I've got a 4-year-old and a 2-year-old, and I and we do something similar, we always have dinner together, which means I eat dinner like half past five, but no phones, and I always try and be like, what did you do at daycare, Just nothing, I'm like, oh ok, did you go through different ages where they just didn't want to share? Very

Damien Gooden 18:16

Very much How's your day? Good. Any, can you give me any info, what was your, what was the favourite thing you did? Recess. like drawing, but now I've got one daughter in particular. I'm like, all right, we got to wrap it up. We've been at dinner for two hours. Going into all this detail, talking about her friends, which is great. Like I'm very thankful to be in the know. I'm, not naive enough to think that. I'm totally in the know. I'm sure that there's what dad knows, and there's what mum knows, which is slightly bigger, and then there's the facts, around that, but that's, that's what, that's life.

Aleyx 18:50

Well, I'm a big believer in genuine conversations, which is good segway that, and everyone that I spoke to, ahead of this interview, they use the word genuine, when they, talked about you, they just said he's a really genuine guy, um, where does that where does that come from and what are your feelings around that, just showing up and being genuine and having decent conversations with everyone? Um, I think, I

Damien Gooden 19:21

that's pretty cool that people said that. I think, two things. One, I think it must be really hard for people who feel like they need to not be themselves.

Aleyx 19:30

people,

Damien Gooden 19:30

In whatever sphere that is, whether it's socially, at work, or whatever. I I've, I imagine, for me, what I find, I don't, I find it pretty easy to be me. I feel like that comes from a lot of support when I was young, being told that if you do these things, then people are going to want to be interested in what, they'll be interested in what you've got to say, and they'll be interested in, your input, and those sorts of things. And, part of that is listening, part of that is being present. Present, where you are. I think, they're two big things. I also think that, sometimes people get carried away trying to be something for someone or for some reason. And I just, it just feels like a lot of hard work. I think that if you don't like me, that's fine. Fine. Not that I'm walking around saying, don't like me, but, what, what have I done to not, I'm very much a believer of, when I meet someone, you have to do something wrong to be out of my good books, as opposed to other people who have the view where you've got to earn your spot into my good books. yeah, I don't know, I just think, it doesn't make sense to me that people have that, but I understand that there could be reasons why. that I just don't know, and I'm interested in that, and I say that to people and I have done for a long time. There's some people that we see in podcasts and magazines, they've got these life stories of these journeys and overcoming these terrible things and all this sort of stuff, but I'm a genuine believer that everyone's got a great story. Some people just don't know that they do, or they don't think that they do, and it might seem boring or it's but that's just my life. everyone's is just their life, right? Until someone extracts in a book or puts it in a podcast, whatever, but no one really knows. that was a and you don't know what someone might look at what you've done and how they might look at it. Whatever you yeah, I don't know. It's probably not a great answer, Aleyx. Sorry, but yeah, to me it's, being genuinely simple. I am me. This is how I am. and I also think that like my sister worked in the business for a bit. if I had been someone that I wasn't, at work, she would be like, what are you doing? not that was a plant, but and what happens when your worlds collide? I've a number of friends, in business, or prenatal networking events, and things like that, what hat do you wear if you're? Like this in business, and you're like this in networking, and you're like this with your mates, like, how, what do you do if they all collide? yeah, I think, keep it simple. Whatever you are, yeah, you'll find your own people.

Aleyx 22:12

Yeah, and, and it happens a lot, right? I think, the, one of the reasons I wanted to start this is cause I I used to say I felt like a chameleon. There was like, work Aleyx, there was, Home Aleyx, there was friend Aleyx, and, when I started my business, I was like, I don't even know, how am I supposed to show up, who am I again? And I think that's, it's really common, and I I reckon, I'm not a psychologist, but I reckon a lot of it comes down to self awareness and being confident, and so you, sounds like from your upbringing you've you've been instilled with a lot of self confidence in who you are, if I were to psychoanalyse you. Yeah,

Damien Gooden 22:51

I think that's probably right. Maybe some people would say too much. but I'm an overly positive person, like I to, to a detriment to some people, just, just calm down. Everything's not going to be fine all the time. But, yeah, I'm very grateful for all the influences in my life, my folks, my extended family, both my, dad's parents came from, 12 and 13 kid families, so there's been lots of family influence around, over the journey, so I've got really great mates that are my second cousins that are my age because of all the So many generations, which I'm very grateful for, and I've had, the great fortune of great mates that I've had since when I was a little kid, great mates that I've made at unI great mates that I've made in business, and I feel very lucky to be supported by amazing people around me, and that's, what makes it really, it's the people around

Aleyx 23:49

Absolutely. Is there ever a time, or, that you feel like you can't show up as yourself, or? you, feel a bit guarded, or? not at all?

Damien Gooden 23:59

not so far, Aleyx, no, I don't think so, nothing comes to mind, I certainly feel sometimes when you do presentations, if you're talking at a conference or whatever, if you get put on the spot for a topic that you're not well versed about, I'm a bit hesitant then, but if I'm talking about something that I know a lot about, I'm very confident. That, most likely, I'm the person in the room who knows the most about that, if someone's coming to learn about it, they probably don't know as much as I do, if I've already studied it, and I've learnt it, and I've lived it, that sort of thing. that may be one, I'm a little bit hesitant when I feel underprepared, or feel put on the spot, but that doesn't happen very often, cause mostly, I'm working in the HR realm, so I get asked HR stuff, and mostly it's ok. time, yeah.

Aleyx 24:43

are you pretty comfortable admitting that you don't know? I don't know, but I can get you the answer.

Damien Gooden 24:49

Yeah, and I say that to my team all the time. That is absolutely an appropriate answer. Giving a, here's an answer because I have to sound impressive is not right. no one knows everything. And if a customer or a client expects you to know everything about their specific circumstance, every time, that's an unreasonable expectation I would say. But it's more than reasonable to say, I'm pretty sure I know the answer, let me go and check, I'll call you back within X time, is that ok? And if they say no, I need an answer right now, you say, ok, I can give you a guess, but I can't give you, this is all care, no responsibility, because without checking, I can't give you something you can bank on. What would you like to do?

Aleyx 25:36

Yeah. Yeah.

Damien Gooden 25:37

I think that's more than reasonable. cards

Aleyx 25:38

out on the

Damien Gooden 25:39

Yeah. Again, if you're up front with people, generally they accept, they might not like it. they probably want the answer right then, cause that's why they're asking it, If you are genuine, it's up to them to take from that what they will.

Aleyx 25:54

Hmm. Um, and then you've also got, now, it was a while since I spoke to these people because this is our second recording, but you've got people that you've worked with for, between 10 and 17 years, is that right?

Damien Gooden 26:10

Yeah. lucky to have, I've got two team members. That's great. I've got one about to clock up 10 years, next month. Yeah, very fortunate to have, again, it's the people around you that make it. you can't, there's no way this business is anything without the great humans that we have here. And unfortunately over 10 years, people come and go, some people grow too big for the business, some people have different interests and those sorts of things. We had someone leave the company. last year I was here for 7 years and, switched careers, went to something else. So there's all different reasons people come and go but to have a core of people who have stayed and, really invested in what we're doing and who have a great rapport with and after 17 years, 12 years, 10 years, you know what each other's going to do before it happens and it's really easy to get things done, day to day. Plus, you get in a position where people are really comfortable to challenge, which is great. Sometimes when you bring new people in, they don't speak up because they're too worried about losing their job, or, they don't want to be seen to be a troublemaker. Even though I tell everyone, if you can make the place better, let's make it better. but also, those people, that have been around for a long time, when it gets really tough, that's when they, Everyone goes, let's stick together and let's get through this, it's a great day today, but it's even better when the chips are really down, Yeah. it's really cool, I'm very grateful, and very, very fortunate, yeah, some very good people.

Aleyx 27:49

Has there been a has there been a time where it did get really tough, when you had to all kind of band together? Yeah,

Damien Gooden 27:55

Yeah, COVID, like everyone, I suppose it's probably a formative time in business, but we had a, support service running out of an office. So if people were looking for HR support, it would ring and we'd go to our office. We weren't allowed To send our staff to the office, everyone had to work from home, right? So we had to quickly change our systems to allow us to do support from wherever anyone was. So we actually implemented a multI an omni channel. support system, and rolled it out in four days, over a weekend, and set up all of our team with. promote, access, to be able to continue to run our service. that was pretty, it was alright, we just have to go for it, because the people need to help. That time, we had people in tears ringing, I'm going to lose my business, I'm going to lose my house, because my house is tied to my business. It was, a really difficult time, as I'm sure everyone knows, but to band together and come up with a solution, Make it work, be able to support, cause it's not about us, it's about supporting the clients, and to support them, and to get them through, and a lot of them got through, even though we had a lot of travel agents, a lot of gyms, two really impacted, different business, streams, we were able to support a lot of them, and a lot of them got through, which was so cool, I feel really grateful, and some of the phone calls we got, People ringing me saying your team's amazing, and what you've done has changed our lives, and it was incredible. So from this pressure cooker time, we're like, what are we going to do? Put up a list, bang. we've got no time, we've just got to make decisions. yep, good, great. We just, yeah, we were able to be there for our clients, which was really cool. And support our team through a, like a, what would normally be a change management exercise over six weeks or more. over, a week.

Aleyx 29:51

incredible.

Damien Gooden 29:52

it was a, hectic time. But, as I said, very grateful for the support and the team. And, they're like, we, want to get to a solution. not why can't we do it, how can we do it, if that makes

Aleyx 30:05

Yeah, like coming together and figuring it out. And you can see, you can see as you were talking about that, that there was emotion there, cause it was, it must have been, really hard, but then really rewarding as well, when you get those phone calls from your clients too.

Damien Gooden 30:21

Very much Very much Yeah. I still, remember where I was when I took the phone call of a person crying. I was working out of my garage actually, at that time, because we had to work from home. yeah, I remember it well. I don't think I'll ever forget that, actually.

Aleyx 30:37

yeah. and then with all those, the team members stayed that long and things, what, do you think it takes to build that kind of loyalty and that kind of culture? Because I'm sure there's going to be businesses listening that, have that, those struggles of keeping staff. And given that you're in HR, I'm sure you've got some lessons and ideas of what works.

Damien Gooden 31:02

Oh, if I knew that, Aleyx, I would be retired, I think.

Aleyx 31:06

do, know you've had people there for 10, 17 years. Yeah,

Damien Gooden 31:10

I don't know, I think it's, mostly luck, to be honest. I think you're, you've got to invest in people and you've got to genuinely care. I think, I was actually speaking at the National Franchising Convention last week and I was asked, what do you think the number one thing is business owners should do? And I said, just care, because if you care, you'll know, and if know you'll act. And even if you don't quite know everything or you don't quite act correctly, if you're coming from a place of care, you're going to be pretty close and you'll know if it doesn't feel right. but if you don't care, you're lost already, I think. and there's simple ways of this, if you think about, say, underpayments, which is a big matter now in our world, if you actually care about people, you'll pay them the right amount, and you'll know what the right amount is, and you'll act and make sure they get the right amount, and you'll check to make sure you've done that. If you don't care, you won't. That's one example. Think about things like leave. There's leave that everyone gets as a part of the National Employment Standards in Australia. You have to give that. That's the law. But also, The people that work for you are humans, if they are putting in, how can you help them, can you give them a bit more lead, can you give them some flexibility, like, how can you make that human who comes to do some stuff for you, their whole world better, and you're a good part of it. Not a part that people dread, But can do small things for people, which is easy in a small business, I know it's harder for bigger businesses, and it's actually really hard for micro businesses, cause if you've only got one staff member, they're really important. But the fact that they're so important means you should be trying your best to make sure you can keep them. and there's so many stats that get thrown around about recruitment costs, if you recruit, how much does it cost, if you use a recruiter, there's a fee, there's time, effort, ads, all that sort of stuff, training, induction, there's all these costs, whether they're financial or just time, opportunity costs, whatever. But we rarely set ourselves up for success when we bring someone on. you don't, we, specifically in small business, we hire when it's too late, when Like, when we're desperate, we take someone who maybe is not the best candidate because we're desperate, and then we bring them in, we give them, welcome, here's your laptop, here's your polo, here's your cap, put it on, off you go, have a great time, or we'll have a beer on Friday, and, that, if you don't invest the time, how does someone bed down and feel part of it? How do they know what success looks like? And how do you show them how to get to success? And if you don't do that, it's going to be hard for them to, they're going to be like, Just working at another place.

Aleyx 33:54

Yeah.

Damien Gooden 33:54

Doing the thing that I'm good at, which I could do at other places. that's, it's all about the start, I think.

Aleyx 33:59

Yeah. and it's, the way you've described it there is, it's not black and white. I've, I've, had the experience before when you go to hr, it's like a, black or white answer, but the way you explained it there, it really isn't. It's, looking at it from the, the The human perspective, which is called human resources, and what they need, and and caring from that for them.

Damien Gooden 34:24

Yeah, I feel like too many times people are focusing on the resources part as opposed to the human part. I think, again, easier in small business, but, if you've got someone who's got elderly parents for example, that they're caring for, and they have an appointment at 3 o'clock on a Thursday to go to the, I don't know, eye specialist, let them start early on a Thursday and finish early so they can go to that without worrying about, if you can do that's something that is not necessarily going to be able to be, stop. I'm given to them at the next role or something else, They're like, oh, I like, this is something that's actually caring about me. Yes, I still have to do my job, and there's still, KPIs and all that sort of stuff. But, small things like that can make a really big difference to people's lives. Same with flexibility around working in the office or working with teams. I really believe that working together in person is better for a lot of roles and a lot of tasks and a lot of teams. But, that doesn't mean that getting everyone in the office on a Tuesday is a good idea. You hear stories of people who come into the office and they all spend the whole day on Teams meetings because they've got people in other states or in other offices. what's the value? And all of this is adding back to a 30 minute, 1 hour commute, or whatever it is. You've got to think about the practicality, and I think, for me, we've an office, but it's not really mandated to come in, other than, your group needs to meet to do this thing. which is done better in person. at no point will I say to everyone, you have to come in for no reason. coming in for coming in sake is, to me, logically, illogical. if you've got smart people working for you, they're going to go, what are we coming in for? What's the value? That's just my, yeah, my view.

Aleyx 36:04

yeah, and I think that comes down to culture as well though, right? Because if you want People to come into the office, if you've got that great culture where people actually want to be there, then it doesn't become such a big thing. Like my husband's work, they, they, they're recruiters, so they, they have to talk on the phone, and they, they they do need to go in, but they're, they don't mind going in because they all get along and it's a great culture, so I think it comes back to the the atmosphere and the sense of belonging that you're creating for for teams as Well

Damien Gooden 36:36

it's funny you say that cause we had a small office we share with one of our investors and we actually just extended it because more people were coming into the office than we had room for. agree with you, it's what you, build and what you make of it is,

Aleyx 36:48

exactly. when you care as well for your staff, like what you were saying, if need to go to an appointment at 3 o'clock, they're gonna value that, and they're gonna care more about the work they do, and they're gonna care about giving back to the business too. I think it, works both ways.

Damien Gooden 37:04

I I hope so. Yeah. One of the things that I'm looking for when I try and bring people into the team is, do you care? you can be good, you can be skilful, you can be intelligent, you can be well read, but it's so much more than that, what's your purpose, what do you get a kick out of, do you get a kick out of solving a complex problem for someone, that's gonna save them hours, or anguish, or money, or whatever, that to me is a dopamine hit, we've just saved that person 5 hours, we've saved them 50 grand, we've saved, there's so many, little wins throughout the day. Don't get me wrong, there's challenges as well, but like for many of the people that are in our support service, I'm like, that's, if that floats your boat, then you're halfway there. Because if you want to get that and achieve that often.

Aleyx 37:55

and then outside of work as well, build, and I may have this wrong, but you build communities in terms of, you've got your dad's basketball team, is that Well,

Damien Gooden 38:06

full credit for that. I helped. that, build it, but Damien, my friend, and a couple of us came up with the idea. but yeah, so 6 o'clock on a Friday morning, for an hour, basketball, a few drills, and then a bit of scrimmage. And it started out just with local dads, that's a handful, and now I think there's about 22 on the list. Not everyone comes every week, cause people travel for work, and, Illness and a lot of soft tissue injuries.'cause we're all, of the age group where those are quite prominent, it's a really cool, it's a really cool thing. and I'm lucky enough also, I played basketball on a Thursday night with a group of guys who, I got introduced there because my daughters played basketball with one of their daughter. and, it's, basketball is the reason, but everyone's actually there for the, basically the men's health club that happens afterwards, which is, people that have got marital issues, financial issues, work issues, whatever. just sitting around and chatting about those and sharing history and experiences and mateship and all that sort of cool stuff, so it's another great sort of community that I'm part of and, very grateful for that and very, mindful of the fact that it's probably not, there's probably a lot of people that don't have that and I feel really, lucky that, I am lucky enough to have that because I've Life could be very hard if you don't have a network to support you when you're facing those challenges. I'd say in business as well, you talk to your colleagues, excuse me, sorry, not your colleagues. You don't want to talk to your colleagues about challenges that you have in the business, so you talk to other business people, and that can be really helpful. but there's people that don't have those networks to support them, or they don't have someone to turn to. I imagine that must be very difficult.

Aleyx 39:56

Yeah, I think community and having those networks is, is so important and I mean you hear a lot, especially with, with men, that it, it can be harder to open up so the fact that you've got that, that men's mental health and you, you talk about it, do, does, does everyone feel comfortable opening up or is there, some that it's it's still a bit tricky?

Damien Gooden 40:17

the group's been together since 2001, so some of these guys have, yeah, some of these guys have been going for sort of 20, just over 20 years, so they know each other really well. Now, I'm a ring in, I've only been there for 6 years, and we've got new people that have joined this season, friends, usually friends of someone who's in there, and they come in, Everyone's different, Aleyx, some people are over sharing the job of a hat to people they don't know, other people are a bit, cautious and hold on to it, or they might find one person that they like talking to more, there's also a couple of guys in there that are excellent at extracting things from people, so if they recognise, or if a couple of us recognise that someone's, we might direct a couple of the blokes to try and get in their ear And extract things from them, which they're quite good at, yeah. yeah, it ebbs and flows. It ebbs and flows.

Aleyx 41:10

Yeah.

Damien Gooden 41:10

Just knowing that someone cares sometimes is a big boost.

Aleyx 41:15

Yeah, yeah, we're coming towards the end of the episode, but I always do, and you might remember this from the last time, I always do a bit of a, a quick fire round, for you, just first thing that that, that comes to you, so what was the last book that you read?

Damien Gooden 41:33

Last book that I read? I don't read a lot, Aleyx. Oh, Radical Candor, I re read, which is a really cool book about, how to communicate in a way that is both, forward enough to make sure your message gets across, but caring enough about the human at the other end to make sure that it is not offensive. So this lady, Kim Scott, she's got this great book. To, two axis sort of theory about being, direct, on one axis, and caring personally is the other axis. if you're direct and you care personally, it's, you've got the courage to speak up, but you're doing it in a way that is very much with the other person's, wellbeing I suppose, in, in mind. the great example of this, and this actually happened to me, I went to a, how much time we got left?

Aleyx 42:24

Oh, you're fine.

Damien Gooden 42:26

Ok, I went to a networking event at a golf course in winter. and it was early, it was breakfast, and it was early, it was dark when I got there. And I was one of the first people there, cause I had not been in that area, so I left myself plenty of time, and got there in a really quick time. got in there, made myself a cup of tea, and then a guy comes in, and I'm like, G'day, I'm Damien, G'day, can't remember his name. I looked at him, and, I lent in, I said, mate, I think you've got your jumper on inside out. Cause the guy had his jumper on, I didn't think he had, but he definitely had it on inside out. But anyway, Anyway, he looked down, looked at me, face goes red, didn't say anything, went, To the toilet. And this breakfast was an awards breakfast, for a, local area government, yeah, local government area. and, I didn't see that guy again for the whole thing. I was there for two hours, I think. and the concept of this care personally and, but directly, some people would never have the confidence to say that to someone. they would be caring a lot, but not being direct enough to actually inform the person. whilst you care, you actually don't want to be direct, maybe because you don't want to be embarrassed or you don't want them to be embarrassed. Then there's other people who would be direct, but not care very much, right? So they might get up on a chair. And go, hey everyone, look at this clown, he's got his jumper on inside out, right? And then there And then there'll be people that don't care, and they're not direct. And they would sit at their table, when that person goes to the bathroom, and tell everyone, hey, did you notice that guy's got their jumper on so there's this quadrant of communication. and it applies to life, that's just a life example, if you've got spinach in your teeth, or your fly's down, or whatever, like, all these sorts of things, it applies to all those things, but it also applies in business. Someone who you employ, or someone who's got a task, and they don't complete the task properly, what you do about it, right? Some people, they get a submission back from one of their team, and it's not up to scratch. They fix it, and they send it to the client. Right? So they care about Bob, who did the report, they don't want to hurt his feelings, so they just fix it, and they send it Or then they give it to their other team, and they're like, they can't fix it, so they give it to someone else. Can you fix Bob's report and send it to the client? Then, after six weeks, you've got to sack Bob, because Bob's reports are no good. And you sit down with Bob, we've got to let you go. What do you mean? Oh, your reports are no good. What do you mean? I've given you 10 reports over the last 6 weeks, you've never told me there's anything wrong. So if you're not in that box where you're actually sharing and being direct enough whilst caring, A, you're going to annoy your people that are doing Bob's reports for him, they might walk. When you let Bob go, cause he's never been told, he's going to be upset, and that's going to be not as good as it could be. So if you can adopt some of those things and care, but also be direct. You're probably going to get a better outcome.

Aleyx 45:18

Sounds like a great book that I definitely need to read because it's, As you were explaining all that, it's a really fine balance, and depending on the situation, like I've been told in the past that I'm quite direct with emails, and sometimes people would be like, I once got told somebody was scared, they'd never met me, but they were scared of me just from my emails, and I was like, oh no, but I'm lovely! so I actually so I actually now, I'll Sometimes I'll put my email into GPT I'm like, can you fluff this up a little bit? Because sometimes in it just

Damien Gooden 45:55

I'm going back to read all my emails that I've got from you.

Aleyx 46:01

but then in other times, like I would, if I saw something in your teeth now, I would absolutely tell you, but, oh, you've got, so it's yeah, it's finding that balance, that right balance, but especially in a work setting, it can be, yeah, it can be difficult, so it sounds like a great

Damien Gooden 46:18

It's very difficult, but it's much less difficult if you implement it from the start, when you bring someone in, I find trying to bring things in when you've got to change behaviour is much more difficult than setting expectations at the start. This is how I expect operations to happen. I expect this from you and I expect that you expect that from me. it's quite if you have that from the start, it's quite easy. It's harder sometimes resetting expectations because people go, we've been doing it this way for so long. Why do we want to change it? Yeah. That can be difficult.

Aleyx 46:47

one. Oh yeah, yeah, Yeah, Mm hmm. sorry, it took a bit long. PodCast Audio or Music?.

Damien Gooden 46:58

definitely podcasts. I'm a big Howie Games listener. Which, Howie Games is a, Mark Howie, who's a sports commentator. And he interviews mostly sports people, but he's also got a, I think it's all famous people in here. It started with musicians I think, who had some link to sport. So that's one, and there's another one called Victory which is, there's a show that was on a little while back called Entourage, if you know that. And There's a podcast with the writer or the guy who created it, and two of the actors, talking about episodes and what was happening in that episode and how they came up with it, what was happening around it at that time, and a whole bunch of other stuff, which is a bit of fun.

Aleyx 47:42

Cool. basketball or gym?

Damien Gooden 47:45

Oh, both. Yeah, so I do BFT, try to get there six days a week, and basketball I play Thursdays, as I mentioned. Friday morning sometimes. If I don't go to the gym, and, Sunday nights I'm lucky enough to play in a mixed team with my daughters.

Aleyx 47:58

Oh, that's cute.

Damien Gooden 47:59

Yeah, it's very cool. It's actually three of us, and then there's a, one of their friends, a guy they went to primary school with who's 16 or so, he's got two older sisters that are 19 and 21, and their dad and their uncle. the five of them all have the same surname, the three of us have the same surname, on the team sheet, there's three good and five coils, it's pretty cool.

Aleyx 48:22

Are you all pretty tall, you and your daughter?

Damien Gooden 48:25

Yeah, they're not quite as tall as me, but yeah, they're tall.

Aleyx 48:28

Might be a terrible basketball player after

Damien Gooden 48:31

you.

Aleyx 48:32

Basketball,

Damien Gooden 48:33

there was a guy who played NBA, he was five foot three.

Aleyx 48:36

Oh, really? Was he any good? Yeah.

Damien Gooden 48:38

Yeah. Yeah. Mugsy Bugs, yeah, look him up, he played, I think, 10 seasons, 10

Aleyx 48:42

or 11 seasons.

Damien Gooden 48:43

Yeah.

Aleyx 48:44

Maybe that'll be my next career move. You

Damien Gooden 48:47

never know. You never know.

Aleyx 48:51

Alright Damien, this has been a really good, recording, we get out this time, but really appreciate it. So I always just, um, uh, on for all the listeners, um, So What would you say to a leader out there, a business owner that's You know, just trying to you know, control everything and it feels stuck in that belief that they've got to do it all. would your advice be?

Damien Gooden 49:18

a, I had a really big challenge with this and some would say still do. but when we were really small, I tried to be on top of everything and do everything. And as we've grown 25 staff. You have to, focus on the outcome, not the process. might do something, or how you might approach something, or the method you would use, or whatever. achieves the same outcome, what methods they use, you can step away from that part, and say, ok, I'll brief you in on what we need, here's what we need at the end. If it goes into a black box and you don't think about it, you don't look at it, and you get what you want at the end, does it really matter what happened in there? frame, and it meets your budget, and it meets the, whatever the constraints are, does it really matter? And the answer is, probably not. one. The other thing that I'll say is, there's a great quote by former US president, Calvin Coolidge, about persistence. I can't remember it off the top of my head, but it's, and it's not in this office, it's in my office at home, it's stuck on the wall. But to paraphrase, it basically says persistence will get you through. stories of, educated people who are derelicts and it's, all these wasted talent, people that are not successful, that have all these, whether they're wealthy or whatever, but you don't lose until you give up.

Aleyx 50:40

Love it. That's great, positive note to end on. Thank you so much Damien for joining me on Naked at the Top.

Damien Gooden 50:47

Thank you for having me Aleyx, appreciate it, it's been fun.