By | Published On: August 15, 2024 |

This week’s guest on The Executive Edge podcast – the podcast for skills in life and business – is Sean Johnson.

Sean JohnsonSean’s currently CEO of a marketing company called Madison , which specialises in helping professional services companies.

Prior to Madison, Sean spent 12 years building an innovation consulting advisory business called Manifold with two other partners,

“We had started off doing more product development strategy work for startups, but we … moved upstream to enterprise over the years,” says Sean.

He has also spent nine years teaching at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management in the Entrepreneurship and Innovation program.

Finding a different path

Like many business owners who dedicate years and years of intense work, Sean eventually went through a period of reflection prompted in part by the Covid pandemic.

“I sort of realized I was dealing with a tremendous amount of kind of stress and anxiety in that business, trying t0 keep all of those plates spinning,” admits Sean.

Upon reflection, Sean realised he wasn’t prepared to continue to invest so much time and energy growing a major company so he decided to step back from Manifold.

Although he felt he had been there for his kids, with the years passing he felt he needed to make a change.

“I think I did a fairly good job of being physically present,” he says. “I think [I wanted to be] more emotionally present though.”

Taking time to be there for his family and time to reflect, Sean eventually launched Madison at the start of this year.

The challenge of finding balance and success

Sean gives a candid insight into the emotional and professional challenges he went through – both as an executive but also as family father.

He also discusses his new business venture and how that was driven from his belief in finding new ways of working where the personal does not suffer at the hands of the professional side of things.

“I still love work. I still have ambition,” Sean confesses. “I want Madison to grow and when I am working on Madison, I want to be focused and intense and keep up the momentum.”

But as Sean explains, there are different ways of finding balance and success in business.

This is one of the driving forcing behind Madison – and Sean’s belief!

As he explains, the best way to market your business is to stand out from the crown by creating and communicating a compelling point of view.

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