Amplify with Purpose

For about four years, I thought I was bad at Australia.I was working as hard as everyone else and it kept not adding up to anything, so I assumed the problem was my business. It wasn't. I was short of one input, and because I'd never named it, I couldn't go and get it.This episode is about the most expensive mistake I see in small business: not being able to name what you're actually missing, and therefore buying the wrong thing to fix it. You feel invisible, so you buy reach — more posts, more ads, another website. But reach and proximity are different products, and only one of them is on sale.I look at what a five-year randomised experiment involving twenty million people found about which connections actually move you into new work (the answer is not the obvious one, and it is not a straight line), and I'm honest about what that study does and does not prove.What you'll take away: one number to count this week — how many people where you live could describe what you do accurately enough to refer you — and one conversation to have. If the number is low, you haven't found a marketing problem. You've found a proximity problem, and they need completely different answers.Research: Rajkumar, Saint-Jacques, Bojinov, Brynjolfsson & Aral, "A causal test of the strength of weak ties," Science, 2022. DOI: 10.1126/science.abl4476. The idea originates with Mark Granovetter's "The Strength of Weak Ties," American Journal of Sociology, 1973.If this put a name to something for you, SustainHer is a room of women building things who know each other well enough to think of one another. Details and upcoming gatherings: Join a roomIf one woman came to mind while you were listening — send it to her. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit odettedebeer.substack.com/subscribe

What is something you ask AI now that, two years ago, you would have worked out for yourself?Perhaps it is what to cook with the ingredients in your fridge. Perhaps it is how to word a difficult email, test a theological idea, plan a project, write a piece of code or make sense of a decision you have been circling for days.None of that feels dramatic. Convenience rarely announces itself as dependence. It enters quietly, one useful answer at a time. Then, somewhere along the way, you realise the tool has started framing the question, structuring the answer and shaping what you consider reasonable.The issue is not whether you use AI. It is whether you are still mentally present while you use it.THE CENTRAL QUESTIONAre you using AI to extend your thinking, or are you slowly outsourcing it?In this episode of Off Topic, On Point, Odette de Beer, Dr Janine Do Cabo and Christo Pretorius explore how AI is changing the way we think, work and make decisions. The conversation moves through cognitive offloading, critical thinking, organisational responsibility, originality, dependence, identity and the human abilities worth protecting.A fool with a toolYears ago, Odette attended training for a new process-mapping tool. During a discussion with the trainer, he offered a line she did not appreciate at the time: ‘A fool with a tool is still a fool.’The phrase sounded dismissive. With distance, its point became clearer. A tool can increase speed, range and output. It cannot supply judgement that the user has never developed. It can make a capable person more capable, and it can help a poorly directed person travel faster in the wrong direction.That story gives us a useful way into the AI conversation. The technology is impressive. The person using it still matters.AI magnifies what is already presentChristo compares AI with money: both tend to magnify what is already there. Curiosity becomes more questions. Avoidance becomes faster shortcuts. A habit of testing information can become sharper critical thinking. A habit of seeking easy approval can become a stream of plausible answers that are never properly examined.This is why access alone will not create a durable advantage. Every organisation can buy similar tools. Most people can open the same chatbot. The difference lies in what they bring to it: lived experience, a point of view, ethical boundaries, contextual judgement and a reputation people recognise.Janine argues that businesses will become recognisable through originality and trust, rather than through the sheer volume of content they can produce. If your logo disappeared, would people still know the work was yours? AI makes that question more important because it makes generic competence so easy to reproduce.What is cognitive offloading?Cognitive offloading means using an external aid to reduce the mental work a task requires. We have always done it: diaries hold dates, calculators hold arithmetic and maps hold routes. Generative AI extends that pattern because it can also draft arguments, synthesise information, propose decisions and generate ideas.The important distinction is how the thinking is allocated.Dependent offloading: AI performs the core reasoning, structure or decision, and the user largely accepts the result.Autonomous offloading: AI provides a scaffold—perspectives, questions, critique or options—while the user evaluates the material and retains final judgement.A 2026 three-wave study of 589 university students and early-career knowledge workers distinguished these two modes. Dependent offloading was associated with greater transfer of cognitive agency, lower intrinsic motivation and poorer perceived outcomes in creativity, deep processing and independent judgement. Autonomous offloading was associated with stronger intrinsic motivation and more favourable perceived outcomes.The study relied on participants’ perceptions and associations across time; it does not prove that one style directly caused a change in ability. Even so, the distinction is useful. The number of prompts matters less than the role you assign the tool.Mental presence changes the outcomeAI use does not automatically weaken critical thinking. Another 2026 study, this time involving 480 medical students, found that the use of AI-based educational technology was positively associated with critical thinking and self-regulated learning. Stronger self-regulation appeared to buffer some of the negative relationship between cognitive load and critical thinking.This was a correlational study, so it cannot establish cause and effect. Its practical contribution is still valuable: how actively people plan, monitor and evaluate their own learning may shape what happens when AI enters the process.Mental presence looks ordinary. You know why you opened the tool. You notice when an answer sounds confident without being well supported. You ask for counterarguments. You check references. You can explain the final position in your own words, and you are prepared to take responsibility for it.Odette often begins with a prompt that changes the role of the exchange: ‘Be my thinking partner. Challenge these assumptions. Test this idea. Show me where the gaps are.’ Janine calls it sparring. The aim is to create friction that improves the thought, then leave the conversation ready to act.“Promptcrastination is building ideas, systems and procedures through AI with no intention of implementing them.”— Dr Janine Do CaboOriginality becomes more valuable when sameness is cheapAI is exceptionally good at finding and reproducing patterns. That ability can save hours. It can also flood a market with work that is polished, familiar and difficult to distinguish from everything around it.There is a technical warning here too. Researchers have shown that models trained indiscriminately on recursively generated model output can experience ‘model collapse’, gradually losing contact with the underlying human data distribution. This finding concerns machine-learning systems; it is not proof that human beings collapse in the same way. It does, however, underline the value of original human material.The Nature study on model collapse strengthens a practical business lesson: recycled output cannot replace direct observation, lived experience, thoughtful disagreement and contact with the people you serve.The competitive advantage shifts from having the tool to bringing something worth magnifying. Your questions. Your standards. Your experience. Your willingness to say, ‘That answer does not fit this person, this context or this decision.’What must remain yours?Christo returns to purpose. Before using any tool, understand what you want it to do and why. Intelligence alone is rarely what people need from one another. They also need empathy, attention, relationship and the feeling that somebody is genuinely present.That makes situational judgement a capability worth protecting. Two situations can look identical in a dataset and require different human responses. Context, history, responsibility and consequence still have to be weighed by somebody who is willing to own the decision.The conversation also moves into identity. Romans 12:2 calls people to be transformed by the renewing of the mind rather than absorbed into the patterns around them. Janine connects that renewal to knowing who you are and whose you are. Odette is equally direct: she has worked hard to recover her capacity to think and her sense of identity, and she is unwilling to hand either away.There is no need to reject the efficiency AI offers. Odette is delighted to let it handle technical tasks she can do but would rather not spend her best energy on. The boundary is clearer when you know what the saved time is for: reading, learning, rumination, relationships and work that requires your full presence.The four checks that keep your thinking yoursA useful way to stay present is to move through four checks whenever AI is involved in meaningful work.P… This is a public episode. 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until January, but by then many of the decisions shaping the first quarter have already been made.In this episode, I explore why September may be a more useful time for annual strategic planning, particularly for women running businesses where capacity, revenue, clients and life all need to fit into the same plan. The work you agree to now can fill your January. The pipeline you build before Christmas can influence your revenue next year. And the opportunities you say yes to over the coming months can quietly determine how much room you actually have to pursue your priorities in 2027.I also look at the research behind the “fresh start effect” and why January feels so motivating, while asking a different strategic question: when are the decisions that shape your next year actually being made?We’ll explore three practical questions to help you think beyond the end of this year, including what you want to be true by June 2027, what you’ve already committed to in the first quarter, and what you may need to stop saying yes to now.If you’re a business owner who wants greater clarity about your priorities, capacity, pipeline and direction for the next 12 months, this episode will help you start the planning conversation before January arrives.I’m also hosting a Strategic Planning Session for women in business who want structured time to work through these decisions and build a practical plan for the next 12 months.Book your place in the Strategic Planning Session: https://link.fastpaydirect.com/payment-link/6a9668b5d6768df0544490b2 This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit odettedebeer.substack.com/subscribe

At what point can you honestly call yourself an expert?Is it after a certain number of years? A qualification? A track record of results? Repetition? Recognition? Or is expertise something deeper?In this episode of Off Topic But On Point, Dr Janine is joined by Odette de Beer and Ps Christo Pretorius for a candid conversation about what genuine expertise looks like, how it develops, and why some highly capable people still struggle to own the authority they have already earned.They explore the difference between experience and expertise, why time alone is not enough, how pattern recognition and feedback shape judgement, and why genuine experts are often far more comfortable with uncertainty than people expect.Odette also shares the five things she looks for when assessing whether someone has real expertise: clarity, consistency, character, curiosity and contribution.The conversation moves beyond credentials and titles into something more important: trust.Can you make complex things simple?Can you create reliable outcomes over time?Can you recognise when someone else needs to be brought into the room?Are you still willing to learn?Has what you know genuinely helped people?Odette also reflects on her own experience of sitting quietly in rooms filled with highly credentialled people, believing she had not yet earned the right to speak, and what she eventually learnt about authority, humility and knowing when to use your voice.This episode is for leaders, consultants, coaches, professionals and anyone who has ever wondered whether they are genuinely ready to step into the authority their experience has formed.Because expertise is not about knowing everything.It is about integrating knowledge, experience, judgement, character and contribution deeply enough that people can trust you with the problem.Listen and consider this question:What do people consistently come to you for help with?Your answer may reveal where you have already earned more authority than you realise.Topics include:expertise, leadership, professional credibility, thought leadership, experience, qualifications, humility, confidence, trust, authority, personal development, leadership development and professional growth. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit odettedebeer.substack.com/subscribe

You know you want to say no. Then you hear yourself say yes — and spend the rest of the week carrying a commitment you did not mean to make.In this episode of Amplify with Purpose, Odette de Beer explores why assertiveness can feel like aggression, how explanations become permission seeking, and why loving meaningful work does not protect us from overcommitment.You will hear four practical truths about the word no, the role of purpose and schedule in protecting capacity, and a two-second ritual called “the full stop”: say, “I can’t this week”, then count to three before offering anything else.The episode closes with one question: What is the one yes you are carrying that you do not actually mean?Read The Catalytic Code: https://amzn.asia/d/00QgpTOLRead the full research-led Substack: https://odettedebeer.substack.comLearn about Growth Collective: https://sustainher.com.au/growth-collective This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit odettedebeer.substack.com/subscribe

You Have Grown. Why Hasn’t Your Business Caught Up?There is a particular kind of frustration I hear from capable women in business.They can see the personal growth. They are clearer than they were. Their boundaries are stronger. They are having conversations they once avoided, making decisions with greater discernment and carrying themselves with more confidence.Then they look at the business and feel confused.The calendar is still crowded. Important work still waits for spare capacity. The same ideas are circling without consistent execution. Revenue, reach or team movement may not yet reflect the growth they know has taken place.It can feel as though the inner work has failed to produce anything tangible.I do not believe that is the most useful conclusion.Across years of working with women who are building and leading real businesses, I have seen a recurring pattern: the woman has grown, but the way the business operates has not yet caught up.The personal growth is genuine, and the missing piece is translating it into tangible business results.I call that the translation gapA translation gap appears when a new level of clarity, courage or capacity remains within the leader but has not yet changed the decisions, commitments, systems and behaviours around her.You may have become more discerning, while your calendar still gives equal weight to everything.You may have grown in confidence, while visibility still depends on whether you feel ready that week.You may know which offer matters the most, while your team and your operating rhythm still treat five priorities as equally urgent.You may have learned to honour your capacity, while the promises you make to clients, colleagues and your community still belong to an earlier season.This is why growth can feel real and invisible at the same time. Your identity may have moved ahead of your behaviour. Your purpose may have deepened while your priorities remain unchanged. Your vision may be clearer, yet execution is still running through familiar habits.The issue beneath the issue is unlikely to be a lack of ambition. More often, the growth has not yet been translated into the way the business operates.Research cannot give us a formula for business growth, but it can help us understand how intention becomes action.Across fields such as exercise, leadership and habit formation, the evidence points to a consistent pattern. Wanting to change does not automatically create change. Planning matters, and so does what researchers call action control: actively tracking, monitoring and adjusting what you are doing as you go.Leadership research shows a similar pattern. Training creates greater value when the daily environment gives people repeated opportunities to apply a specific behaviour. Practical cues, clear goals and regular conversations help insight become part of how leadership is practised and experienced.Research on habit formation also reminds us that consistency develops over time. Some habits take hold relatively quickly, while others require much longer. Context, environment and repetition all influence how a new behaviour becomes established.Clarity is essential. Growth becomes visible in the business when intention is translated into a specific behaviour, supported by a rhythm and reviewed through evidence.How growth becomes visible in the businessOnce you recognise the gap, the next question is practical: what needs to change in the way the business is being run?If you have grown in confidence, that growth may need to change how regularly you share your thinking or how clearly you communicate your value.If you have become more honest about your capacity, a client promise, boundary or recurring commitment may need to be redesigned.If your priorities are clearer, your calendar should begin to reflect them.The translation happens through four practical elements:* A clear decision about what will change* An owner who is responsible for carrying it forward* A consistent place for the action to happen* A simple way to review whether it is workingWhen one of these elements is missing, the new insight remains vulnerable to an old pattern. You can understand what needs to happen and still find yourself carrying the business in the same familiar way.Your growth becomes visible when it begins to shape your choices, calendar, systems, conversations and the experience you create for other people.Where translation usually breaks1. Clarity remains privateYou know what needs to change, but the insight has not become an explicit decision. It lives in a journal, a coaching conversation or the back of your mind. Because it has not been named clearly, the old commitment keeps its place.A useful test is simple: what decision changed because of what you now know?If there is no answer yet, the growth may still be waiting for translation.2. The decision has nowhere practical to liveA clear decision still needs a place to happen.If greater visibility matters, where is the creation time in the calendar? If client experience needs to improve, which moment in the journey is being redesigned and who owns it? If an offer needs consistent attention, what weekly rhythm protects it?The business begins to catch up when the new decision can be found in a diary, a workflow, a conversation, a responsibility or a measure.3. The action has no reinforcementMany women do take action. The challenge is that the action relies on memory, emotion or spare energy.Reinforcement gives the behaviour a fair chance to become part of the way the business works. It may be a calendar cue, a weekly review, a conversation with an accountability partner or a simple measure that makes progress visible.The purpose is to give an important decision enough structure to survive a busy week while keeping the approach simple and human.If these ideas are useful in your work & leadership, becoming a free or paid subscriber is one way you can support me to keep creating and sharing them.The Catalytic Alignment-to-Movement ReviewSet aside fifteen quiet minutes and work through these four questions.1. What has become clearer or stronger within me?Name the growth without minimising it. Perhaps you are more willing to be visible, clearer about the work you want to be known for, more honest about your capacity or stronger in a conversation that previously felt difficult.2. Where is that change already visible in the business?Look for evidence. A clearer boundary. A stronger proposal. A conversation held sooner. A decision made with less apology. A promise delivered more consistently. Recognising evidence builds trust in your own leadership.3. Which priority, commitment, habit or system is still operating from an earlier season?This is where you reveal the hidden friction. Your diary may still be carrying a version of you who said yes too quickly. Your offer suite may reflect an earlier strategy. Your follow-up may still depend on memory. Your client experience may contain a promise that no longer fits your available capacity.4. What one decision, action and measure will bring the business into greater alignment?Choose the decision that matters most. Give it an owner, even if that owner is you. Put the action into a stable rhythm. Select one measure that will show whether the promise is being kept.What this can look likeImagine you have grown in confidence and want your thinking to be more visible.The vague version is: I need to post more.The translated version is: My priority is one thoughtful leadership post each week. I own the first draft. A protected creation block gives it a place in the week. The measure is one published post and the quality conversations it creates.The translated decision is still human. It leaves room for judgement and creativity. It simply removes the hidden negotiation that otherwise happens every week.The same method can be applied to sales follow-up, client onboarding, team communication, boundaries, offer development or community leadership.Touch th… This is a public episode. 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There is a particular kind of frustration that comes from working hard and still feeling as though nothing is moving.You can account for the hours. You can list the pages you rebuilt, the content you published, the product you refined and the problems you solved long after you should have closed the laptop.You have been productive.Yet when someone asks what all that work is building towards, the answer becomes harder to articulate.I have seen this pattern many times in coaching rooms, client conversations and, if I am honest, in my own business.The work itself is often good. The person doing it is capable, disciplined and deeply committed. The difficulty is that the work is scattered across too many disconnected goals.The offer sits in one place. The content speaks about something else. The website is being rebuilt around another idea. Each individual piece may be strong, but they are not strengthening one another.Every piece is competent. Nothing is compounding.This matters because effort does not automatically produce momentum.Effort accumulates when we continue showing up. It compounds when the work we do today makes tomorrow’s work easier, clearer or more valuable.That requires alignment.The research I share in this week’s episode explains that disconnected goals do more than divide our attention. They actively compete with one another. When our priorities are connected, they begin to cooperate. When they are disconnected, each one fights to become the thing that receives our time, energy and focus.That is why working harder often fails to solve the problem.You may not need another product, platform or plan. You may need the architecture beneath the work: a clear understanding of what you are building, what you want to be known for and how each part of your business contributes to that direction.In the episode, I share a simple practice I call One Build, One Sell.Before planning your week, write down the one thing you are building this quarter.Use one sentence.If you need a comma, there is probably more than one goal hiding inside it.Then choose one activity that helps you build it and one activity that helps you sell it. Everything else goes onto a separate list for later.This does not mean the other work is unimportant. It means you are no longer allowing every worthy idea to compete for equal attention at the same time.Perhaps you have reached the end of a full month or quarter and wondered where all your effort went. Perhaps you have created something valuable, launched it and heard very little in response. Perhaps your work is spread across several platforms, offers and ideas that have never been properly connected.This conversation will help you identify what is creating the friction and begin bringing the pieces back into alignment.Listen to the episode, then answer this question:What is the one thing you are building this quarter?One sentence. No sub-clauses. Preferably no commas.Send it to me. If it contains three goals dressed as one, I may send it back to you — kindly.The deeper alignment framework behind this conversation is found in The Catalytic Code. The book will help you recognise what is shaping your decisions and bring your head, heart, hands, spirit and schedule into alignment.For those who already understand the ideas but need support applying them to their own leadership, business or career, applications are also open for The Catalytic Leadership Programme. Send me a message, click the button below, and I’ll send you the details.Your hard work deserves a direction strong enough to carry it.Because once the work begins pointing towards the same thing, the effort you are already making can start producing a very different result. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit odettedebeer.substack.com/subscribe

She finished 30% of her checklist every day for a week — and the world kept moving. In this solo episode, Odette de Beer unpacks why your Sunday-night list was never achievable (the planning fallacy — one of psychology's most replicated findings), what the perfectionism research says actually damages wellbeing (hint: it's the gap, not the standard), and the two-minute Circle Three ritual that changes who gets to grade your day. With the glass-balls frame and the Performance movement from Odette's book The Catalytic Code.You'll learn:The planning fallacy (Kahneman & Tversky; Buehler et al.): why we underestimate every task, and why experience doesn't cure it — only ~30% of people finish by their own predicted deadlineStriving vs discrepancy: recent perfectionism research showing the felt gap between plan and performance — not high standards — is the strongest predictor of low wellbeingWhy "I don't celebrate my wins because the list is incomplete" is a mechanism, not a moodThe Circle Three ritual: write the list, circle the three load-bearing items, grade only the circlesFrom The Catalytic Code: Performance as consistency (not heroics) and the schedule as the most commonly betrayed of the five elementsMentioned in this episode:The Catalytic Code by Odette de Beer — https://www.amazon.com.au/Catalytic-Code-Women-Ready-Actually-ebook/dp/B0GYJ44BKNThe planning fallacy — Kahneman & Tversky; Buehler, Griffin & Ross, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (thesis-completion studies)Perfectionism, discrepancy and wellbeing — recent findings incl. Frontiers in Psychiatry (2025), "The distinct link of perfectionism with positive and negative mental health outcomes"; related work on self-compassion as buffer (Frontiers in Psychology, 2025)Perfect for: women in business whose Sunday-night lists assume a week that never arrives; consultants in delivery seasons; anyone who cancels real wins because the list wasn't finished.Your next step: Circle three items on tomorrow's list — the load-bearing ones — and grade only those. Then DM Odette the word GROWTH on LinkedIn or Instagram for details on the Growth Collective.Connect with Odette:Instagram: @odette_de_beer_amplify_purposeLinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/odettedebeerThe Catalytic Code: https://www.amazon.com.au/Catalytic-Code-Women-Ready-Actually-ebook/dp/B0GYJ44BKN This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit odettedebeer.substack.com/subscribe

You didn’t just “overreact.”You repeated something you were taught…and most people never stop long enough to question it.So the real question is:Who taught you to respond like that — and do you want to keep living from it?Most of what you call “personality” is actually a pattern.In this conversation, we unpack where your reactions come from — and how to move from automatic responses to intentional ones.Have you ever reacted in a way that made you stop and think, “Why did I do that?”The truth is — your reactions didn’t come from nowhere.They were learned. Inherited. Conditioned.In this episode, we explore how our responses are shaped by upbringing, environment, trauma, and the people we’ve observed — often without realising it. What feels like “just who I am” is often a pattern that once protected you, but may no longer serve you.We unpack:* The difference between reacting and responding* How triggers reveal what’s happening beneath the surface* Why certain behaviours keep repeating (even when we know better)* The hidden ways our identity gets tied to performance, control, or protection* And how to pause, reframe, and choose differentlyThis is not about blame — it’s about awareness.Because the moment you become aware, you become powerful.If your reactions are telling a story, the question is:Do you want them to keep writing your future — or are you ready to choose a different response? This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit odettedebeer.substack.com/subscribe

In this solo episode, leadership strategist Odette de Beer unpacks one of the most powerful and misleading drivers of behaviour: fear as a filter.Rather than reacting to reality, most leaders respond to their perception of it. Fear narrows perspective, amplifies urgency, and quietly shapes decisions in leadership, work, and relationships, often while sounding like “being realistic” or “taking responsibility.”This episode explores:* Why perception always comes before behaviour* How fear disguises itself as urgency, control, scarcity, or people-pleasing* The hidden cost of reacting instead of responding* How clarity creates space for aligned leadership decisions* Three practical steps to interrupt fear-based reactions without shameThis is a human conversation for leaders who want to lead with clarity, consistency, and trust, even under pressure.If you’ve ever over-explained, rushed a decision, withdrawn, or felt regret after reacting, this episode will give you language for what’s really happening and help you choose a better response next time.Fear is not failure.But confusing fear with truth is expensive.🎧 Available on podcast | 📺 Watch on YouTube | ✍️ Read/watch on Substack This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit odettedebeer.substack.com/subscribe