In this episode, Gavin sits down with Sabrina Guse, the 20-year-old founder of Enviromentoring, to unpack how a casual job in outside school hours care turned into a fast-growing environmental education business reaching thousands of kids across Australia.

Expect a candid, behind-the-scenes look at what it really takes to launch a purpose-driven education business from scratch - while still at uni and learning business fundamentals on the fly.

Got questions or topics you want us to cover? Email us at journey@sixsides.co

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a 5-star rating and a review on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us reach more people!

In this episode, we cover:

• Spotting a real problem inside school holiday programs
• Turning a passion project into a legitimate business
• Leaving a secure job to back yourself
• Learning business fundamentals the hard way
• Hiring a team before feeling ready
• Selling workshops face-to-face and overcoming fear
• Scaling through DIY kits and navigating biosecurity challenges
• Balancing uni, business, and endurance sport
• Redefining success around values and impact
• Why environmental education starts with kids

Gavin Tye is a sales strategist and the creator of Sales Market Fit (SMF) - a proven framework that helps B2B startups unlock predictable, scalable growth. He is also a co-founder of SixSides, a sales-led growth partner for B2B SaaS companies. At SixSides, Gavin and the team help founders move beyond hope-based selling by sharpening positioning, building repeatable sales systems, and creating go-to-market strategies that actually convert. With over 20 years of experience in high-value SaaS sales, Gavin works closely with founders to turn early traction into sustainable revenue growth.

Links:

Founder Collective: https://founderscollective.com.au/founders-collective
FC's Newsletter: https://founderscollectivecommunity.substack.com/
Book a call with Gavin: call.sixsides.co
Enviromentoring website: https://www.enviromentoring.com.au
Enviromentoring Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/enviromentoring
Enviromentoring Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/enviromentoring

Connect with us:
Roman Galikov on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/romangalikov/
Gavin on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gavintye/

Chapter markers

00:00 Intro
00:55 Meet Sabrina and Enviromentoring
01:18 How a school holiday problem sparked a business
03:35 From first workshop to a growing team
05:00 Realising this was never the plan
06:38 Journalism, science, and choosing a path
08:10 Life before becoming a founder
10:16 Curiosity, climate change, and early influences
13:26 The real leap - quitting her job
15:43 Fear, excitement, and backing herself
16:32 Balancing uni, business, and training
18:41 Hiring a team and creating systems
19:49 Scaling challenges and pricing realities
21:46 Turning workshops into DIY kits
23:15 Sustainability, burnout, and the Messi effect
24:41 How entrepreneurship changed her
26:27 Learning sales the hard way
29:18 Redefining success through values
30:40 What she’s most proud of
31:55 What will keep her going long-term
33:22 Lessons she wishes she knew earlier
35:02 Advice for first-time founders
37:22 Courage, responsibility, and looking ahead
38:13 Where to find Sabrina and Enviromentoring

In this episode, Gav sits down with Karren Jensen, co-founder and CEO of Conductor Software, to unpack the misunderstood world of psychological safety and why it might be the biggest lever for performance most organisations are missing.

Expect a candid, behind-the-scenes look at what it really takes to launch a B2B SaaS company from scratch - completely bootstrapped.

Got questions or topics you want us to cover? Email us at journey@sixsides.co

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a 5-star rating and a review on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us reach more people!

In this episode, we cover:

• What psychological safety really is - and what it isn’t
• The biggest misconceptions leaders have about “soft stuff” at work
• How fear, stress and silence quietly destroy performance
• Why organisations struggle with values, trust and accountability
• Karren’s career before Conductor and her grounding in neuroscience
• The personal experiences that shaped her obsession with psych safety
• The moment Conductor’s founders validated their hypothesis with a first client
• Bootstrapping the business and landing early wins
• How psychological safety translated into millions in revenue impact
• Leading through COVID, AI disruption, and constant uncertainty
• How Karren’s definition of success has evolved over time
• Why protecting our humanity matters more than ever
• Advice for founders standing on the edge of taking the leap
• Why community and champions matter, especially for female founders

Chapters:
00:00 Intro and what The Leap is really about
02:00 What Conductor does and why psych safety is misunderstood
05:30 Why psychological safety isn’t about being “nice”
11:00 What happens when teams don’t feel safe
16:00 Leadership pressure, COVID, and decision fatigue
18:30 Karren’s career before founding Conductor
21:00 Experiencing psychological safety first-hand
26:00 Values, boundaries, and accountability at work
30:40 Feeling unfulfilled and early signals of change
34:00 The moment Conductor took shape
37:00 Bootstrapping and early wins
39:10 Surprises and challenges in the early days
41:10 How founding changed Karren as a leader
44:00 Redefining success and protecting humanity
47:40 What Karren is most proud of
50:10 What keeps her going during tough moments
53:00 Habits that keep her grounded
56:00 What she wishes she knew before taking the leap
58:20 Advice for founders on the edge
01:02:30 Pride, resilience, and legacy
01:04:00 How to connect with Karren

Roman Galikov is a co-founder of Create Financial...they help founders and business owners take control of their money with smart, personalised financial advice. They specialise in wealth strategy, risk protection, and long-term planning - without the jargon. Think of them as the team that helps you build a financial engine strong enough to support your ambitions, not just your expenses.

Gavin Tye is a sales strategist and the creator of DealBuddi and co-founder of SixSides. With over 20 years of experience in high-value SaaS sales, Gavin has cracked the code on why businesses struggle to close deals and how they can transform their approach. Sales Market Fit aligns positioning, go-to-market strategies, and sales execution into a repeatable process that wins more clients with less friction. Learn how to stop relying on hope and start winning with a deliberate, proven sales strategy at salesmarketfit.co.

Links:
Founder Collective: https://founderscollective.com.au/founders-collective
FC's Newsletter: https://founderscollectivecommunity.substack.com/
Book a call with Gavin:
Conductor Software: https://www.conductorsoftware.com/

Connect with us:
Karren Jensen on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karren-jensen-ceo/
Gavin on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gavintye/

In this episode, Gav sits down with long-time Brisbane ecosystem mainstay and Inductive founder, Peter Laurie, to unpack his journey from Y2K software engineer to helping founders become genuinely investor ready, not just pitch-deck ready. They talk about why a technically perfect project still collapsed, how VCs actually make decisions, the traits of coachable founders, and why you should chase effective, then efficient, then elegant when building product.

Expect a candid, behind-the-scenes look at what it really takes to launch a B2B SaaS company from scratch - completely bootstrapped.

Got questions or topics you want us to cover? Email us at journey@sixsides.co

If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a 5-star rating and a review on your favourite podcast app. It really helps us reach more people!

In this episode, we cover:

• Why Inductive exists and what "investor ready" actually means
• The types of founders and teams Inductive is designed for
• How VC theses really work and why a good business can still get a no
• The danger of the slow no in fundraising and how to spot it
• Coachability, curiosity and the traits Peter looks for in early stage founders
• Peter's early career in engineering and software through the Y2K era
• The technically perfect project that still failed and what it taught him
• Why he went back to do an MBA to understand what he "did wrong"
• Starting a bespoke software business and the mistakes that came with it
• Service-led product vs pure product-led growth
• Building from first principles instead of cargo cult startup theatre
• The startup industrial complex and "Veblen entrepreneurs"
• Why founders should chase effective, then efficient, then elegant
• Habits, longevity and how to stay in the game as a founder
• Peter's advice for anyone standing on the edge of their own leap

Chapters

00:00 No edits, no filter
00:36 Welcome to The Leap and Peter intro
01:29 Who is Peter Laurie and what is Inductive
03:36 What "investor ready" really means
06:29 How VC funds actually work and why they say "you’re not ready"
10:37 Slow nos, fast nos and dating VCs
12:46 Life before founding - engineering and Y2K software days
16:47 Realising tech isn’t the real problem
20:25 The technically perfect project that still failed
23:17 Burnout, taking time off and starting an MBA
25:03 Starting a new consulting business with Dean
31:57 Early surprises and mistakes building software for others
34:20 Turning hard lessons into simple, pragmatic models
39:01 How entrepreneurship has changed Peter
42:42 Unlearning perfection - effective, then efficient, then elegant
47:31 Building Inductive and finding the real players
52:05 The startup industrial complex and Veblen entrepreneurs
55:15 Habits, longevity and staying in the game
59:31 What Peter wishes he knew before taking the leap
63:12 Advice for founders standing on the edge and where to find Peter

Links:
Founder Collective: https://founderscollective.com.au/founders-collective
FC's Newsletter: https://founderscollectivecommunity.substack.com/
Book a call with Gavin: https://call.sixsides.co

Inductive accelerator: https://inductive.au

Peter’s links:
Towards an Untrepreneurial Economy? The Entrepreneurship Industry and the Rise of the Veblenian Entrepreneur:https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3479042

Peter’s tweet thread while reading it:
https://x.com/pjlaurie/status/1274180626782945281

Peter on LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/pjlaurie
Peter’s video posts on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pjlaurie/recent-activity/videos/

Connect with us:
Roman Galkov on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/romangalikov/
Gavin on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gavintye/

In this episode of The Leap, Gavin sits down with Heroly, founder of Busable “an intelligent software platform built for bus and coach operators to bring control and clarity to their operations”

After years in government helping design programs for small businesses, Heroly saw the same pain points over and over: founders drowning in red tape, not knowing what support was actually out there. Instead of just writing another policy, he decided to fix the problem directly.

That decision kicked off the leap from the safety of the public sector into the chaos of startup life.

This episode digs deep into what it really takes to leave a stable job, deal with imposter syndrome, build something from scratch — and stay true to your purpose when the uncertainty hits hard.

💬 In This Episode:

• How Heroly went from government strategist to founder
• The moment he knew he had to build Busable
• Rewiring from public-sector process to startup pace
• How to deal with losing your safety net
• The early mistakes that shaped Busable’s direction
• Building trust with customers when you’re brand new
• The power of community and transparency in business support
• How to lead when you don’t have all the answers
• Why clarity of purpose matters more than confidence
• The real cost (and freedom) of taking the leap

🕒 Chapters

00:00 Welcome to The Leap
01:10 Meet Heroly and the story behind Busable
03:05 From Government to Startup — the transition
05:45 The idea that sparked Busable
08:20 Early lessons in risk and resilience
10:52 What leaving a safe job really feels like
13:30 Learning to move fast and break things
16:05 Bootstrapping Busable and building trust
19:40 Reconnecting with purpose when things get hard
22:55 Lessons learned from government life
26:00 Staying grounded and avoiding burnout
29:18 What Heroly wishes he knew before taking the leap
32:40 Advice for anyone thinking about making the jump

🔗 Links

• Busable: https://busable.app/
• Busable's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/busable.app/
• Heroly on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/herolychour/

About Founders Collective

Founders Collective is a community built to connect like-minded founders, creators, and builders who believe in sharing the real stories behind the journey, not just the highlight reel. Our mission is to spark honest conversations, build meaningful connections, and help founders grow through collaboration, courage, and shared experience.

- Substack: founderscollectivecommunity.substack.com
- Gavin Tye on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/gavintye

In this episode, we dive into the raw and unfiltered story of Mark Sowerby, founder of Blue Sky Alternative Investments, once one of Australia’s most ambitious investment firms, and the devastating collapse that followed a brutal short-seller attack.

Mark opens up about how that loss shattered his identity, left him sitting on a bench in Burleigh contemplating walking into the ocean, and what it took to rebuild from the ground up.

He shares how the Ocean Seven swims became his lifeline, teaching him how to master fear, accept uncertainty, and rebuild his courage one stroke at a time. We talk about survival, justice, and what it really means to rebuild when everything you’ve worked for has been taken from you.

If you’ve ever questioned whether you can come back from your lowest point, this episode is proof that you can — but only if you’re willing to do the work.

💡 In this episode, we cover:

• How Mark built Blue Sky from scratch into a billion-dollar fund
• The short-seller attack that brought the company down
• Surviving seven near-death business moments
• Hitting rock bottom and finding hope again through endurance
• How the Ocean Seven swims helped him rebuild mentally and physically
• The mindset shift from victim to fighter
• Why survival is entrepreneurship’s real skill
• Finding purpose through justice and accountability
• The lessons founders can learn about preparation and resilience
• How to rebuild your courage when all your fears come true

🕒 Chapters:

00:00 Welcome to The Leap
01:09 Meet Mark Sowerby
03:12 Building Blue Sky and early ambitions
07:10 The short-seller attack and collapse
10:24 Facing public scrutiny and burnout
13:48 The lowest point — sitting at Burleigh
16:42 Rebuilding through the Ocean Seven swims
20:30 Lessons on fear, resilience, and control
25:45 Standing up for what’s right — the class action
31:10 Redefining success and survival
36:24 Rebuilding courage and mental endurance
40:55 Preparation, judgment, and the founder’s mindset
45:03 What Mark wishes he knew earlier
49:40 The meaning behind “Don’t Be Pre-Film”
52:20 Closing thoughts and takeaways

Follow Mark's movie journey below;

🎥 Don't Be Prey: https://www.dontbeprey.film/

About Founders Collective

Founders Collective is a community built to connect like-minded founders, creators, and builders who believe in sharing the real stories behind the journey — not just the highlight reel. Our mission is to spark honest conversations, build meaningful connections, and help founders grow through collaboration, courage, and shared experience.

👉 Subscribe to Founders Collective on Substack: https://founderscollective.substack.com
🚀 Explore DealBuddi: https://www.dealbuddi.com/
💼 Learn more about Create Financial: https://createfinancial.com.au