PROFESSIONAL PROFESSIONALS feat. Gaz Williams

*Welcome to PROFESSIONAL PROFESSIONALS, a new curated content stream where I interview people who are extremely good at what they do, so that people building businesses who need some niche specialists to come in and help them grow, can find them easier. Started by interviewing myself lol. Enjoy! - Gaz

Gaz:

So Gaz, thanks for joining the chit-chat today

Gaz:

No worries Gaz. And may I say: PROFESSIONAL PROFESSIONALS… great name for this content.

Gaz:

Actually, it was you who gave me the idea for it Gaz.

Gaz:

Oh really? Well, glad I could help out, it’s a banger.

Gaz:

So Gaz, where are you professionally placed, these days?

Gaz:

Well, as you know Gaz, I’m running GROUP GROUP as a bit of a hybrid entity, doing a mix of brand-building advisory work with scaling tech companies, coupled with growing my own content streams.

There’s GROUPED, which I launched out a short while ago now, which is firmly focused on an educational element by telling a raft of stories of people who have built insanely good businesses and projects, through ingenuity and a massive dose of creative flair.

Very focused on those that reside to the right of stage, if you will, so whether it’s a bootstrapped company, or someone finely attuned to a culture-meets-tech overlap, whatever… if it fits, I’ll curate it.

By pushing out curated streams of content, I would imagine it will become this messy mix of companies and people profiled that have approached the market with something fresh, something considered, and something unique, in their challenger style pursuits.

One of the streams I start with is PROFESSIONAL PROFESSIONALS and I’ll curate a new person to profile for that each week now. I’m on an audience-led growth journey, and am barely worried about defining it for others neatly. Certain people resonate with the content, and more will come their way to me if I simply just keep going.

Gaz:

Nice work Gaz. I tuned out there and barely understand what’s going on right now. So what ‘work work’ are you specifically doing these days?

Gaz:

Well Gaz, thanks again for taking an interest. I’ve had a pretty enjoyable time operating in the tech world over the last decade or so, and the journey has included scaling international brands locally like General Assembly (tech school) to then working in a research commercialisation/brand-building capacity with University of Melbourne when leading the activation strategy of their innovation precinct Melbourne Connect.

As part of my Melbourne Uni work, I was based from the Science Gallery Melbourne office, and that was a wild time. I had a sex robot and about 5000 mealworms as desk buddies. Never a dull day!

And then in recent times was employee numero uno with Tractor Ventures, being intimately involved on the tech-company-funding side and scaling that brand heavily to a leading position in market.

I get involved to help founders smash through to their next milestone, and often some of my work includes setting them up for the key hires they need for their next stages of scaling their business.

Here for a good and impactful time, not necessarily a long time.

Gaz:

Ok, so that’s a mouthful Gaz - how have you landed on positioning yourself this way, and what’s your perspective on what the market needs at this point of time?

Gaz:

Well Gaz, I’ve long loathed bad advisory for tech company founders. I’ve seen it many times: someone parachuted in to ‘help’ advise a founder on scaling their business, with barely a consideration for some of the very nuanced particulars that need to be considered here.

And I’ve sort of progressed to rejecting a lot of that internally, and have been motivated to ensure that I can provide founders with the very best people to help them with their business growth.

That might be me, that might be someone I know has that niche specialisation, but it is always a curated approach. There are many, many specialists out there that can help a founder achieve what they need to, whether by execution or just advisory coaching, and many of them wouldn’t have a profile. But I know who they are.

Yep, many of these people fly under the radar, so I’m not very prone to making recommendations only based on their presence on linkedin or whatever as an example. And that’s why curation is so important.

To ensure founders don’t waste their time on the wrong type of advice. And I think the approach needs a shake-up to be perfectly honest, in this nepotism-meets-availability-heuristics-fuelled industry I call home.

Gaz:

Ok, well, let it rip I guess Gaz! So, what’s the best example of how you would best work with a founder? Or more specifically, how a founder would best work with you?

Gaz:

I think for me it sort of comes down to, on both sides, asking the right questions honestly. I love to riff in the moment like the best of them, but when it comes to liaising with a founder from the outset to potentially work together, the importance of questions in advance to truly know their business, cannot be understated.

There’s a reason I’m asking, and I want to make sure that I’m not wasting anyones time, and that would include my own tbh (I love hearing about performance marketing opportunities, but I’ve got someone for that. That ain’t me)

You know, I was asked recently what I enjoy seeing in a founder, in terms of who I might potentially work with (or even fund with some angel investment in various scenarios)

For me, finding an independent path to revenue is one, especially if that has been in some incredibly novel and unique ways. But more and more I’m also loving seeing founders who change and adapt their business to capitalise on opportunities. Just like the many agency owners who developed a product internally and created new revenue streams in their business, not reliant on services any longer. We funded a LOT of those at Tractor Ventures, and that approach is very attractive to me.

Gaz:

So, where’s this all leading to Gaz? What’s the professional work timeline look for you in the future?

Gaz:

I’ll continue on my merry way for a while longer working with a few clients on the advisory and execution side, helping them grow in market. If they are challenger-esque, I’m likely attracted to it. I created an INSTRUCTION MANUAL when I first leapt out with GROUP GROUP, on the way I work across a number of different types of projects, and people seemed to like that. A very novel way of promoting yourself I guess haha

But, crystal-ball gazing it into the future, I’m working on an education-meets-venture-studio offering in the Australian market, and this is exciting to me. Something new and very unique, that operates both as a tech school offering, but also creating products and growing companies from the outset.

I saw this type of operation with my own eyes in my travels recently (SXSW Austin 2025) and I know it works well in Europe and USA. It just needs to be well financially modelled, and funded, locally here in Aus, and I have some unique ways to get to that point. To invest in some excellent companies’ growth, many of whom wouldn’t necessarily confirm whole-heartedly/entirely to the traditional VC model of growth that we have become accustomed to previously.

Over and above that, I will still prioritise my project work involvement in other ecosystems throughout APAC, including WA, TAS, SA and my beloved VIC of course. And a little bit of Singapore. And some USA, why not.

Gaz:

Events? I know you did a mountain of events in the past, is that a key part of the strategy?

Gaz:

Not entirely… Back’s fucked, have to take it easy these days haha But there is always room for some activations, and on that educational front, I still believe heavily in an IRL tech education focus, being that I have seen it work so well in the past, and it’s missing now, so I intend to create something to bring a bit of that back. And the occasional wild showcase event, naturally.

Gaz:

Well, Gaz, enlightening chat, any last pieces of advice you want to get out there before we move on with the rest of the day and you prepare the next profile pieces for GROUPED, and PROFESSIONAL PROFESSIONALS?

Gaz:

Absolutely. Question everything if someone recommends someone else to come into your business and tell you how to grow it. You’ve already done the hard work in creating it, and it is very easy for someone to just riff off the top of their dome and throw a bunch of scenarios at you to try out.

If they’re asking the right questions and are prepared in knowing more of your business from the outset, then they are probably legit.

Or, you can just ask me, and I’ll tell you whether they’re any good!

I’ll not soon forget the tale of a very well-known entrepreneurial figure in the Australian tech world seeking to claim 35% in equity of a company (that I know well) just for a co-founder title and a couple of hours advisory work per week. I reject anything that smells like that, every day of the week.

Oh, and take the vanity metrics with a grain of salt. Good for your health. The true payoff is in consistency and execution, with a considered approach to coordinating the stakeholders and partners at your fingertips.

It is unglamorous work, but that’s proper curation at play, and it can be transformational if coordinated as strategically as possible.

Lastly, NIN new album and tour when?

Follow Gaz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/garrycwilliams/ 

ANNOUNCING: GRO UP

GROUP GROUP is a specialist advisory and storytelling curation hybrid, focussed on the overlap between technology, culture and capital.

Having launched GROUPED (this very publication) first, the next thing to roll off the line was GRO UP, a specialist advisory offering for scaling tech companies and founders.

Curation is a gift. So, sourcing professional talent that can properly help companies scale is a valuable offering for the industry. This begins small (just myself) and then grows a roster of people, which, surprise surprise, will include a number of people profiled in PROFESSIONAL PROFESSIONALS, heading towards further *future plans*

Need a little help to GRO UP? Fill out THIS form, I’ll be in touch.

Read the post announcing GRO UP here: LinkedIn

MORE GROUPED: