Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level

Nick Sellers
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In Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level, we guide business leaders and entrepreneurs from overwhelm and “stuck” to new heights of success and achievement. Through insightful interviews, expert advice, and actionable strategies, this podcast is your go-to resource for breaking out of chaos and elevating your leadership. Whether you’re navigating tough decisions, managing fast growth, or striving for work-life balance, we help you unlock your potential and develop the mindset needed to excel. Join us as we share stories and insights from executive and business coaching, and learn how you can take your leadership to the next level.

  1. 2d ago

    What We See When We Step Away

    Sometimes the most valuable thing we can do isn't to work harder at solving a problem. It's to step away long enough to see it differently. Returning from a holiday, Nick Sellers reflects on the importance of creating distance from our everyday routines and responsibilities. He recalls a conversation from 40 years ago with a business owner who complained that taking two weeks off meant working twice as hard for two weeks before and two weeks afterwards. Was that simply the unavoidable price of taking a break? Or might stepping away have revealed something about how the business was operating? In this slightly shorter, reflective episode of Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level, Nick explores how changing our surroundings can help us notice things that become almost invisible when we're immersed in our normal routines. He considers what our absence can reveal about colleagues and teams, why time away from work deserves to be valued for its own sake, and why reflection doesn't always need to produce an immediate decision, answer or plan. In this episode: Why familiar situations can look different when we step away.What a holiday can reveal about the way we work and lead.The difference between simply not working and genuinely recharging.Why creating space to think shouldn't depend on taking a holiday.How reflection can help us recognise questions we hadn't previously considered. A question to consider: When did you last deliberately step away from your normal routine, not because you had somewhere else to be or something else to do, but simply to give yourself space to think? Sometimes better-quality thinking begins with noticing something we hadn't noticed before. Connect with Nick Website: https://www.nicksellers.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicksellerscoach If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with someone who might benefit from a little space to think. #LeadershipReflection #ExecutiveCoaching #LeadershipDevelopment #ThinkingTime #ScalingNewHeights

  2. Oct 12

    Episode 100: What 100 Episodes Have Taught Me About Leadership

    One hundred episodes of Scaling New Heights. In this milestone episode, Nick pauses to reflect not just on the podcast itself, but on what the process of creating 100 episodes has taught him about consistency, coaching and leadership. He explores why improvement comes through repetition, and how producing the podcast has sharpened his awareness of the questions, challenges and patterns that show up in conversations with leaders. Nick also reflects on how his own approach to coaching has evolved — particularly the importance of helping people think rather than rushing to provide answers. From there, the episode turns to leadership itself. Leadership is rarely as neat as the models, frameworks and courses suggest. Real leadership is messy. It involves incomplete information, competing stakeholders, difficult conversations and situations for which no training programme can fully prepare us. Nick explores two ideas that have become increasingly important to him: Clarity is not the same as certainty. And: Influence is often more valuable than control. He also reflects on why leadership is a journey rather than a destination, why there is no “finished version” of a leader, and what he wants the next phase of Scaling New Heights to become. Finally, Nick explains why, after 100 episodes, he is taking a short break before returning in November. The episode closes with three questions for listeners: What has the last couple of years taught you?What have you changed your mind about?What do you want the next part of your leadership journey to be about? Episode timings 00:00 Episode 100 Milestone 01:45 Consistency Builds Awareness 03:57 Coaching Without Answers 05:48 Leadership Is Messy 07:35 Clarity Without Certainty 08:42 Influence Over Control 11:25 Leadership As Journey 13:08 Next Phase Of Podcast 15:12 Taking A Short Break 16:56 Three Reflection Questions 17:34 Closing And Subscribe Important links 🌐 Website: https://nicksellers.com 📅 Book a discovery conversation: https://tidycal.com/nicksellers/discoverycall 🎙 The Applied Leader (Premium Podcast): https://feeds.captivate.fm/the-applied-leader/ 📰 Subscribe to my newsletter: https://www.nicksellers.com/newsletter 💼 Connect with me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicksellerscoach #ExecutiveCoaching #Coaching #ScalingNewHeights #SelfLeadership #Influence #Clarity

  3. Oct 5

    When the Job Ends, Who Are You Next? — with Victoria Georgalakis

    What happens when a career you have enjoyed comes to an end — particularly when the timing isn't entirely your choice? In this episode of Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level, I’m joined by Victoria Georgalakis, former senior corporate executive, executive coach, trustee and — as it happens — my former boss. Victoria reflects on her own transition from running the EMEA division of a global outsourcing business to building a very different portfolio of coaching, voluntary work and other interests. We talk about the initial pleasure of stepping away from a demanding corporate role, and what happens when the novelty of having more time begins to wear off. We explore the emotions that can accompany an unexpected career change, particularly the loss of control when a carefully imagined future suddenly disappears. But our conversation goes further than simply asking, “What job should I do next?” What did your career actually give you? Was it money, status, identity, purpose, relationships, stimulation, a sense of success — or something else? And do you need another full-time role to replace those things? Victoria describes how, after leaving corporate life, she initially introduced herself by explaining what she had done “until recently”. Over time, she decided she no longer needed her previous job to define who she was. We also explore how decades of corporate experience can transfer into very different environments, the importance of communication and being open to feedback, and why an unexpected change can sometimes create opportunities that would otherwise never have appeared. Finally, Victoria offers some practical questions for anyone facing or considering a significant career transition: understand what your career has meant to you, what you will miss, and what you actually need from whatever comes next. Perhaps the next chapter doesn't have to look anything like the last one. In this episode: 00:00 Welcome and Introductions 01:13 Why Transition Matters 02:39 Post-Corporate Decompression 03:19 Finding Coaching and Purpose 04:44 Emotions and Losing Control 06:55 Choosing a New Direction 13:12 Identity Beyond the Job 15:30 Volunteering and Transferable Skills 19:16 Communication, Feedback and Change 23:53 Joy, Balance and Silver Linings 27:40 Practical Advice and Closing Connect with Victoria: Find Victoria Georgalakis on LinkedIn. https://uk.linkedin.com/in/victoria-georgalakis-8a4044a My Important links 🌐 Website: https://nicksellers.com 📅 Book a discovery conversation: https://tidycal.com/nicksellers/discoverycall 📰 Subscribe to my newsletter: https://www.nicksellers.com/newsletter 💼 Connect with me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicksellerscoach #Leadership #CareerTransition #ExecutiveCoaching #Purpose #ScalingNewHeights

    When the Job Ends, Who Are You Next? — with Victoria Georgalakis

  4. Sep 28

    You Don’t Start Again From Zero

    What happens when you have decades of experience behind you... and suddenly find yourself feeling like a beginner again? In this episode of Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level, Nick Sellers reflects on what happened when he moved from a long corporate career into full-time coaching and mentoring. While the systems, technology and context changed, much of what he had learned about people remained remarkably transferable: adapting communication to different personalities, building relationships before they are needed, influencing without authority, and using stories to help people understand complex situations. Nick also explores how experience can be used in coaching without becoming advice. Rather than assuming that having seen something before means knowing the answer, experience can provide different perspectives, patterns to recognise, and better questions to ask. But experience carries a risk too. The more accustomed we become to being the person who knows, the harder it can be to admit that we do not know, or to become a beginner again. The episode closes with three questions for anyone moving into a new role, changing direction or entering unfamiliar territory: Which parts of your experience are genuinely transferable, and which are you simply assuming will transfer?What are you currently avoiding because you do not like feeling like a beginner?Are you using your experience to broaden your perspective, or simply to reinforce the one you already have? You do not start again from zero. But neither do you get to stop learning. Timeline 00:00 Welcome and Topic 00:11 Starting Over as Expert 01:49 Transferable People Skills 03:21 Influence and Relationships 04:42 Power of Storytelling 05:36 Coaching Without Advising 06:51 Beginner Mindset Benefits 08:13 Redefining Work You Want 09:47 Three Reflection Questions 10:44 Closing and Subscribe Important links 🌐 Website: https://nicksellers.com 📅 Book a discovery conversation: https://tidycal.com/nicksellers/discoverycall 🎙 The Applied Leader (Premium Podcast): https://feeds.captivate.fm/the-applied-leader/ 📰 Subscribe to my newsletter: https://www.nicksellers.com/newsletter 💼 Connect with me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicksellerscoach #Leadership #ExecutiveCoaching #LeadershipDevelopment #CareerTransition #ContinuousLearning #Influence #PersonalDevelopment #ScalingNewHeights

  5. Sep 21

    Decisive Doesn’t Have to Mean Fast

    We tend to admire decisive leaders. They make the call, choose a direction and move. But decisiveness and speed aren't the same thing. In this episode, Nick Sellers explores why experienced leaders may sometimes take longer to decide, not because they lack confidence, but because they are more aware of consequences, assumptions, competing priorities and the people affected by their decisions. He looks at the important difference between thoughtful delay and avoidance, and why good judgement means knowing which decisions deserve five minutes and which deserve five days. Nick also considers the danger of senior leaders becoming isolated from challenge, the pressure to appear certain, and why seeking wise counsel does not mean giving away accountability. The episode closes with four practical questions to help leaders improve the quality of their thinking before making an important decision. In this episode 00:00 – Welcome and Setup 00:11 – Decisive vs Fast 01:31 – When Hesitation Helps 02:50 – Delay or Avoidance 03:57 – Match Decision to Risk 04:53 – Seek Counsel, Not Isolation 06:29 – Coaching for Clarity 07:35 – Pressure to Seem Certain 08:41 – Four Questions, Then Decide 10:03 – Weekly Reflection and Close 10:26 – Subscribe and Release Info Four questions to ask before an important decision What am I currently assuming to be true?What would challenge the conclusion I am leaning towards?Who could help me see something I am currently missing?Do I genuinely need more thinking, or do I simply need to decide? If you want a space to think something through properly, challenge your assumptions and get clearer on the decision in front of you, you can book a conversation with Nick. Important links 🌐 Website: https://nicksellers.com 📅 Book a discovery conversation: https://tidycal.com/nicksellers/discoverycall 📰 Subscribe to my newsletter: https://www.nicksellers.com/newsletter 💼 Connect with me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicksellerscoach #Leadership #ExecutiveLeadership #DecisionMaking #LeadershipDevelopment #ExecutiveCoaching #Management #LeadershipSkills #ScalingNewHeights

  6. Sep 14

    The Leader Who Got You Here May Hold You Back

    What made you successful so far still matters. But as your responsibilities grow, the demands of leadership change — and the capabilities you need have to change with them. In this episode of Scaling New Heights, Nick Sellers explores why leadership progression is not simply about becoming better at what you already do well. It often means broadening your competence, becoming comfortable with being inexperienced again, and letting go of parts of your leadership identity that previously brought you success. Nick reflects on Marshall Goldsmith’s well-known phrase, “What got you here won’t get you there,” and considers what that means in practice for leaders whose roles are becoming broader, less certain and more complex. He explores why senior leaders can retreat towards familiar work when under pressure, why discomfort does not necessarily mean you are incapable, and how leadership increasingly involves working without a ready-made playbook. The episode closes with three questions to help you consider what the next stage of your own leadership might require. In this episode: 00:00 Welcome to Scaling New Heights 00:22 What Got You Here 01:50 When the Job Changes 03:10 Discomfort Means Growth 04:41 The Familiarity Trap 05:42 Letting Go of Identity 06:22 Leading Without a Playbook 07:45 Three Reflection Questions 08:38 Next Level Invitation 08:57 Subscribe and Release Schedule Three questions to reflect on: What does the next version of my role require from me that I have not yet had to develop?Where am I retreating to familiar work because it makes me feel competent?What discomfort am I currently treating as a problem that might actually be a valuable part of my development? If you are at a transition point where what worked before no longer feels quite enough, having somewhere to think it through properly can help. You can find details of how to have that conversation with Nick in the links below. Follow or subscribe to Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level for new episodes each week. Important links 🌐 Website: https://nicksellers.com 📅 Book a discovery conversation: https://tidycal.com/nicksellers/discoverycall 🎙 The Applied Leader (Premium Podcast): https://feeds.captivate.fm/the-applied-leader/ 📰 Subscribe to my newsletter: https://www.nicksellers.com/newsletter 💼 Connect with me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicksellerscoach

  7. Sep 7

    Have the Conversation You’re Avoiding — with Susan Maitland

    What looks like a strategy, operational or performance problem in a business is often something rather different underneath. It may be a communication problem. An assumption. A conversation that hasn't happened. A founder struggling to let go. Or a boundary that has gradually disappeared. In this episode of Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level, Nick Sellers talks with Susan Maitland, founder of SupportAct and a business mentor specialising in stretched founders and family business leaders. Susan brings an unusual perspective. She spent 15 years working within her own family business before spending another 15 years leading within two other family businesses. Together, Nick and Susan explore the human behaviour behind many familiar business challenges. They discuss how easily assumptions replace genuine communication, particularly when people have worked or lived together for many years. A founder may know the business intimately and unconsciously expect everyone else to share the same knowledge, priorities and perspective. They also explore what happens as a family business moves from one generation to another. Values that were instinctively lived by the founder can gradually become diluted if they have never been properly identified, discussed and communicated. The conversation moves into succession and one of the hardest challenges for many founders: genuinely letting go. Developing a successor is one thing. Allowing them to lead differently is another. Nick and Susan also discuss boundaries between work and home, the gradual normalisation of excessive working hours, and why consciously protecting time away from work matters for relationships, health and long-term performance. Susan closes with two particularly powerful challenges. First: have the conversation you're avoiding. Second: ask whether your business can genuinely function without you. Because if everything stops when the founder disappears, Susan suggests you may not have built an independent business at all. You may have built a hostage situation. In this episode 00:00 Welcome and Intro 00:17 Meet Susan Maitland 02:51 Why People Behave 04:44 Communication and Assumptions 08:26 Generations and Values 12:12 Succession and Letting Go 15:44 Susan's Family Story 17:50 Boundaries and Trade-offs 23:23 Workload and Reflection 28:43 Rest for Performance 32:45 Key Takeaways 36:09 Contact and Wrap Up Connect with Susan Maitland Susan is the founder of SupportAct and works with stretched founders and family business leaders. Website: www.thesupportact.co.uk You can also find Susan Maitland and SupportAct on LinkedIn. Important links 🌐 Website: https://nicksellers.com 📅 Book a discovery conversation: https://tidycal.com/nicksellers/discoverycall 📰 Subscribe to my newsletter: https://www.nicksellers.com/newsletter 💼 Connect with me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicksellerscoach About Scaling New Heights Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level explores the realities of leadership, personal development, professional change and business growth. New episodes are released every Monday. Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts so each new episode arrives automatically in your podcast feed. #Leadership #FamilyBusiness #BusinessLeadership #ExecutiveCoaching #BusinessMentoring #SuccessionPlanning #LeadershipDevelopment

    Have the Conversation You’re Avoiding — with Susan Maitland

  8. Aug 31

    Are You Winning at Work and Losing at Life?

    Senior leaders and business owners tend to be very intentional about work. There are targets, budgets, objectives, performance measures and career ambitions. We know what success looks like, and we regularly check whether we are making progress towards it. But are we equally deliberate about the rest of our lives? In this episode of Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level, Nick Sellers explores the hidden trade-offs that can sit behind professional success. There is nothing wrong with ambition, working hard or choosing to make sacrifices for something that matters. The problem comes when temporary trade-offs quietly become permanent, or when we stop noticing the choices we are making. Nick looks at why conventional ideas of “work-life balance” can be unhelpful and suggests a better alternative: intentionality. He also introduces a simple life-audit exercise designed to help you consider what outcomes you actually want across areas such as work, money, health, relationships, personal growth and enjoyment. And he poses one particularly uncomfortable question: Which part of my life is currently paying the price for success somewhere else? The objective isn’t to tell you what your priorities should be. It is to create better-quality thinking and better-informed choices. In this episode 00:00 Welcome and Setup 00:50 Winning at Work 03:12 The Hidden Tradeoffs 04:43 Goals Versus Outcomes 06:33 Beyond Work Life Balance 07:43 Life Audit Exercise 09:02 The Uncomfortable Question 10:14 Choose Consciously 10:43 Weekly Reflection Questions 11:47 Coaching and Wrap Up Questions to consider What does a successful life actually look like for me?Am I genuinely progressing towards it, or am I simply very busy?Are the goals I’m pursuing creating the outcomes I actually want?Which part of my life is currently paying the price for success somewhere else?What am I neglecting simply because it isn’t on my scorecard? If you would value some space to think these questions through properly, you can book a conversation with Nick to explore whether coaching might help. Important links 🌐 Website: https://nicksellers.com 📅 Book a discovery conversation: https://tidycal.com/nicksellers/discoverycall 🎙 The Applied Leader (Premium Podcast): https://feeds.captivate.fm/the-applied-leader/ 📰 Subscribe to my newsletter: https://www.nicksellers.com/newsletter 💼 Connect with me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicksellerscoach This episode builds on several recent conversations about comparison, progress and goals versus outcomes. If you haven’t heard Episodes 91–93, they provide useful additional context: Episode 91: Comparison Is Not a Leadership Strategy Episode 92: Busy Isn’t Progress Episode 93: Goals vs Outcomes #Leadership #ExecutiveCoaching #LeadershipDevelopment #BusinessLeadership #WorkLifeBalance #IntentionalLeadership #PersonalLeadership #Success #ExecutiveLeadership #ScalingNewHeights

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In Scaling New Heights: Leadership at the Next Level, we guide business leaders and entrepreneurs from overwhelm and “stuck” to new heights of success and achievement. Through insightful interviews, expert advice, and actionable strategies, this podcast is your go-to resource for breaking out of chaos and elevating your leadership. Whether you’re navigating tough decisions, managing fast growth, or striving for work-life balance, we help you unlock your potential and develop the mindset needed to excel. Join us as we share stories and insights from executive and business coaching, and learn how you can take your leadership to the next level.

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