Phillip Di Bella is a Director at the Di Bella Group of Companies

Phillip Di Bella is a highly respected business entrepreneur with a unique ability to visualise and commercialise what many others never see. Though initially known for the establishment of Di Bella Coffee, which became Australia’s largest specialty coffee company, Phillip’s entrepreneurial spirit has brought success to other businesses such as International Coffee Traders, Abbotsford Road Specialty Coffee in New York, and more recently The Coffee Commune.

Not satisfied with simply focusing on building his own successful businesses, Phillip has dedicated much time to supporting the growth and development of other businesses. Often referred to as an “Entrepreneur in Residence”, Phillip regularly lends his strategic thinking to businesses such as BDO Consulting, helping their clients overcome challenges, see new opportunities, and then supporting the commercialisation of these solutions.

01.50 - Phil’s journey with his weight

“Health is first, it’s the foundation. You don’t go building 10-storey buildings without laying solid foundations”.

“It’s me first so that I can give my best to my family and give more energy to work.”

“My philosophies are templates, and a lot of them apply, and they have for me, personally, professionally, and family. Same thing in business, you can have all the theories in the world, you can go to all the workshopping events and build your knowledge base in your library, but if you don't execute, it just doesn't happen.”

Shaun - “If you put the work in and have that desire, intent and willpower and you execute, you can go from here to here, and that could be finance, it could be career, it could be relationships. It could be anything, but it's having a plan. It's executing that plan, drawing on the resources around you, but being disciplined in that regard. And that's the transformation.”

7.45 - What are the daily rituals that you do to optimise yourself?

12.30 -

• It’s not about weight loss it’s about being healthy.
• We are all works in progress and we need to understand that
• Our mindset is the secret sauce in everything, it starts and finishes with the mindset

16.00 - Other rituals that bind Phil and his wife

20.15 - “Life is simple, humans just complicate it”

20.46 - Managing Priorities

• It starts with a vision.
• Work life harmony. You need to get all 3 areas of your life working in harmony.
• Chase harmony, not balance.

27.30 -

• Not every day is a happy day but every day is a day to learn
• Life is measured in moments

30 - Core philosophies in business

1 - You have to be solving a problem

2 - You have to be so relevant that if your business can’t be replicated

3 - When you get 1 and 2 right, tell the story. Marketing is the art of telling the story.

32.30 - Where people go wrong in business often comes down to poor planning

36.30 - What are you focusing on for work in 2024?

Phil is working on trying to make sure that before governments make decisions that impact people’s lives.

“I'm getting stuck into 2024 and we kick off with the release of our small business paper that we took six months to commission and we kick that off on the 19th of February to go to market. I want to see this industry sustainable.”

43.00 - Core philosophies in life

1. Health: Meaningful relationships and purpose won’t happen if you don’t have your health
2. Time
3. Money

Enough time and money to do what you want when you want.

48.00 - Shaun - “Be intentional about where you want to be and what you want to achieve then surround yourself with the right people to get there.”

50.40 - If you can’t improve the silence don’t speak

“The wealthiest place in the world is the cemetery”

03.51 - Sandy’s journey to starting Traction

“Why not start something that makes a direct impact on young people”

8.00 - CEO Bike Build

Young people growing into their potential and meeting expectations that might be held of them in workplaces.

It is so much more than the bike. Make the situation at Traction relevant to their outside life.

10.05 - Core fundamentals taught at Traction

“We know isolation and loneliness are felt through the neural pathways in much the same way as physical pain. So the health impact of being isolated and lonely is as deleterious as smoking a packet of cigarettes a day over a long period. So for our young people, when they say that they just want to make friends, we take that seriously because quite often they haven't had many role models in how to build good relationships.”

Traction allows providing young people with role models they have never had and teaches them confidence. It’s a wellbeing framework

12.00 - Elements of wellbeing

1. Be engaged in learning
2. Being active
3. Being connected
4. Being influential (we are all leaders)

13.32 - Tangible benefits of Traction’s program

Sometimes the most tangible benefit is just for these kids to have one day a week where they feel safe and are learning not just surviving.

It’s not a program you are sent to do, it’s an opportunity.

17.04 - The 2 things you need in life

1- Love and connection

2 - Meaning and purpose

19.00 - What has Sandy learnt in the corporate world and the Traction world

Ordinary people working together can create extraordinary things

Having a vision and team built around a shared purpose

The challenge in not-for-profit space compared to the corporate arena is just the uncertainty around, or it's difficult to plan for the long term because of the pipeline of funding that's required to invest in, whether it be program delivery or developing the capacity as an organisation or investing in the infrastructure needed like without.

22.30 -

“The energy comes from seeing the results and the difference we're making and we're about prevention. So there's a lot of attention being paid to youth crime in our community at the moment. And to me, there's work that has to be done on that. If we get in early and reach young people before they slip through the cracks in the system and get them on.

Positive and trajectories to their potential and possibility, then it's a much smarter investment upfront than having to deal with the knock-on effects later.”

23.45 - The cost of incarceration on society/community

A massive trigger for youth crime is exclusion from school. As soon as you fall out of, or are excluded from the schooling system, who are you going to hang out with?

28.20 - What do kids fundamentally need to have a positive/good/great life?

- Care and love

- Recognise that every young person has unique gifts, and brings different strengths, and try to understand what they are

- Encourage them to participate and have a go

- Education is key and there are so many ways to learn

- Have a community around the young people

30.30 - What stands in the way of the grander vision you have?

“It's about fuel in the tank. We've got a great model. We've, we know the attributes of powerful mentors and we are ready to scale up the program and reach more young people.

We're ready to recruit, train and develop.”

34.00 - What is your purpose and your why?

● It’s about making a difference, something each day. Ordinary people working together can do extraordinary things

● Be present within the community to find what is possible

● Sense of belonging around a shared purpose/cause

● We are not here for a long time so it’s about who is around you