How I Work

Trust doesn’t rebuild with one big apology. It grows back quietly - through small, consistent moments that prove you mean what you say.
In this Quick Win episode, my teammate Aly Solly and I share how we rebuilt trust after one of Inventium’s toughest years. Together, we discovered that trust isn’t restored overnight - it’s rebuilt in small, deliberate ways that show care, honesty, and vulnerability.
Aly and I discuss:
The moment a leadership wellbeing survey sparked real vulnerability
Why openness - when it feels uncomfortable - can transform a relationship
How showing up consistently matters more than grand gestures
The “ugly cry” call that turned a breaking point into a rebuild
What to do when you’re trying to repair trust at work

KEY QUOTES
“Trust doesn’t hinge on one big apology or grand gesture. It’s built through the small stuff - the check-ins, the honesty, the willingness to be vulnerable.”
“You don’t wait for the perfect moment. You just start showing up consistently and with care.”

Connect with Aly Solly on LinkedIn.
Listen to the full conversation with Aly here.

My latest book The Health Habit is out now. You can order a copy here: https://www.amantha.com/the-health-habit/
Connect with me on the socials:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amanthaimber
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/amanthai
If you are looking for more tips to improve the way you work and live, I write a weekly newsletter where I share practical and simple to apply tips to improve your life. You can sign up for that at https://amantha-imber.ck.page/subscribe
Visit https://www.amantha.com/podcast for full show notes from all episodes.
Get in touch at amantha@inventium.com.au
Credits:
Host: Amantha Imber
Sound Engineer: The Podcast Butler
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Every productivity guru will tell you the same thing: set realistic goals, or you're setting yourself up to fail. Jia Jiang did the opposite. He told the internet he'd sell 10,000 copies of his new book in 100 days, sold about 3,000, and is now going around calling it one of the best things he's ever done.
He's not being delusional about it either. He'll tell you straight up that part of him wishes he'd hit the number. He just thinks failing loudly beats succeeding quietly, which might explain why only 9% of people who make a New Year's resolution actually stick to it. Most of us are setting goals to feel good for five minutes, not because we've figured out how to actually get there.
In this episode, I sit down with Jia Jiang, the entrepreneur and speaker behind 100 Days of Rejection, a YouTube experiment that became a TED Talk with more than 10 million views. We talk about his new book, Easy Discipline, and how he turns huge, terrifying goals into something he can actually control day to day.
If you have ever downgraded a goal so you wouldn't have to feel bad about missing it, Jia is about to make you rethink that entirely.
Jia and I discuss:
Why Jia deliberately sets goals so ambitious he is likely to miss them, and why a public near miss beats a comfortable target
The one action goal: how to turn a big, uncontrollable ambition into a daily input you can fully control
The inspiration index, the two numbers Jia tracks on every project, and why you need both the outcome and the input
The Mover's Manual, and how changing his physical environment lets Jia get three to ten times more done in an afternoon
Reverse AI: what happened when Jia started deliberately training himself the way AI models are trained
The letter he wrote to Steven Bartlett after being turned down for Diary of a CEO, and why he published it anyway
Key quotes
"I'd rather fail my ambition publicly than letting it die inside privately."
"When you are already rejected, you have nothing to lose. When you have nothing to lose, you have nothing to fear."
Connect with Jia Jiang on Instagram, X (Twitter), LinkedIn and his website, read his newsletter on Substack, and check out his latest book Easy Discipline.

If you enjoyed this episode, check out my chat with Google's Executive Productivity Advisor, Laura Mae Martin, on the practical strategies she uses to get more done in less time: https://www.amantha.com/podcasts/ruthless-prioritization-with-googles-executive-productivity-advisor-laura-mae-martin

My latest book The Energy Game is out now. You can order a copy here: https://amzn.to/48ID29M
Connect with me on the socials: Linkedin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/amanthaimber)
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/amanthai)
If you are looking for more tips to improve the way you work and live, I write a weekly newsletter where I share practical and simple to apply tips to improve your life. You can sign up for that at https://amantha.substack.com/
Visit https://www.amantha.com/podcast for full show notes from all episodes.
Get in touch at amantha@inventium.com.au
Credits:
Host: Amantha Imber
Sound Engineer: The Podcast Butler
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

AI might be saving you time, but if you don’t know what to do with that time, it’s not worth much. In this Quick Win, I’m joined by Dom Price, who spent 12 years as the Work Futurist at Atlassian. Dom shares a powerful reminder: saving time with AI is meaningless unless you know how to reinvest that time intentionally. After watching organisations roll out sophisticated AI tools without upgrading the human system around them, Dom explains why people often use their newfound hours poorly - and how a single, deliberate question can transform the return you get from AI.
Dom and I discuss:
Why organisations focus on AI tools but forget the human system that actually uses them
The surprising behaviour Dom saw when teams became “35 percent more productive” - including a huge spike in meetings
What happens when people gain time but aren’t guided on how to use it
The small mindset shift that helps you reinvest saved time more wisely
The reflection question that turns AI gains into genuine value: What’s the most valuable thing I can do with this time?
KEY QUOTES
“I don’t care what you saved. I care what you did with it.”
“Take a moment before filling that space. Ask yourself: what’s the most valuable thing I can do with this time?”
Connect with Dom Price on Instagram, LinkedIn and his website.
Listen to the full conversation with Dom here.

My latest book The Health Habit is out now. You can order a copy here: https://www.amantha.com/the-health-habit/
Connect with me on the socials: Linkedin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/amanthaimber)
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/amanthai)
If you are looking for more tips to improve the way you work and live, I write a weekly newsletter where I share practical and simple to apply tips to improve your life. You can sign up for that at https://amantha-imber.ck.page/subscribe
Visit https://www.amantha.com/podcast for full show notes from all episodes.
Get in touch at amantha@inventium.com.au
Credits:
Host: Amantha Imber
Sound Engineer: The Podcast Butler
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hiring feels like the obvious next move when a business starts doing well. More people, more capacity, more revenue. The logic is so clean it barely needs questioning.
But the businesses with the smallest teams are sometimes the ones making the most money.
This episode is part of The Work Edit, a format where I sit down with someone facing a real professional challenge and we work through it together. My guest is Lisa, who has spent four years building The Culture Ministry, a diversity and inclusion consulting business. She came to me with a question I hear constantly: how do I scale?
What followed was a conversation about why growth doesn't have to mean hiring, what a proposal win rate above 60% is really telling you, and why a well-designed experiment beats any polished strategy framework.
If you run your own business, or you're thinking about going out on your own, this one will give you plenty of tips to apply.
Lisa and I discuss:
Why hiring more people often grows revenue but not profit, and how Inventium is having its highest-profit year ever with a smaller team
The single line in your profit and loss statement that signals when it's genuinely time to hire
How AI has reshaped businesses, and the surprising place it creates new bottlenecks rather than removing them
What a high proposal win rate is actually telling you about your pricing
The Inventium ROI guarantee, and the slightly awkward question worth asking past clients about what you should have charged
How to treat a market shift as an experiment to learn from, rather than a personal failure
Key quotes
"If you are getting the majority of your proposals accepted, I would say you're not charging enough."

My latest book The Energy Game is out on July 7, 2026. You can order a copy here: https://amzn.to/48ID29M
Connect with me on the socials: Linkedin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/amanthaimber)
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/amanthai)
If you are looking for more tips to improve the way you work and live, I write a weekly newsletter where I share practical and simple to apply tips to improve your life. You can sign up for that at https://amantha.substack.com/
Visit https://www.amantha.com/podcast for full show notes from all episodes.
Get in touch at amantha@inventium.com.au
Credits:
Host: Amantha Imber
Sound Engineer: The Podcast Butler
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

How much of your week goes into fixing what AI just handed you? Not writing from scratch, just cleaning up, correcting, and nudging a draft that looked fine for about ten seconds before you actually needed it to work.
That endless back and forth has a name. We call it slop fixing, and there is research suggesting it is quietly eating close to a full day of our working week.
In this How I AI episode, Neo and I get into why this happens and the two very different ways of working with AI that decide whether it does. You will hear the difference between gunslinging and architecting, what a proper brief actually sounds like, and how to have a conversation with AI before you ask it to build anything. By the end, you will be getting version one at 90 percent instead of 20.
What you'll learn:
What actually separates AI slop from work that lands
The difference between gunslinging and architecting with AI
What a proper brief for AI actually sounds like
How to have a real conversation with AI before asking it to build anything
Why version one can land at 90 percent instead of 20
Practical AI tools for productivity and focus
Real-world AI workflows used by high performers
How to use AI at work without burning out
Smart shortcuts for managing time and mental load

Connect with Neo Aplin on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/neoaplin/) and via inventium.ai (https://inventium.ai), where he leads Inventium's AI training and upskilling work with organisations and teams.
How I AI is a special series within How I Work where Neo and I explore how high performers are using AI at work to boost productivity, make better decisions and reduce overwhelm.

My latest book The Energy Game is out now. You can order a copy here: https://amzn.to/48ID29M
Connect with me on the socials: Linkedin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/amanthaimber)
Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/amanthai)
If you are looking for more tips to improve the way you work and live, I write a weekly newsletter where I share practical and simple to apply tips to improve your life. You can sign up for that at https://amantha.substack.com/
Visit https://www.amantha.com/podcast for full show notes from all episodes.
Get in touch at amantha@inventium.com.au
Credits:
Host: Amantha Imber
Sound Engineer: Martin Imber
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.