Extraordinary Business Stories

Video Description

Change Award state winners The Man Cave and Hobart Exercise Physiology talk with Fear & Greed hosts Sean Aylmer and Michael Thompson about turning purpose into positive change, building sustainable organisations and making a lasting impact in their communities.

00:01 Introduction

00:01 – 00:05
Footage: illustration of a creature in a cloudy blue sky.
Text: Extraordinary Business Stories Hosted by Fear & Greed.
Audio: soft wind noises.

00:05 - 00:08
Footage: scene changes to two men sitting at a desk with microphones in front of them.
Text: Sean Aylmer, Fear & Greed
Audio - Sean Aylmer
Welcome to Fear & Greed Q&A: Extraordinary Business Stories, recorded on Gadigal land, part of the Eora Nation. I'm Sean Aylmer.

00:08 - 00:21
Text: Michael Thompson, Fear & Greed
Audio - Michael Thompson
And I'm Michael Thompson. This is a special four-part series brought to you by Telstra, celebrating some of the remarkable small and medium sized businesses recognised in the 2026 Telstra Best of Business Awards.

00:21 - 00:50
Audio - Sean Aylmer
Across the series, we're meeting eight State Winners, and finding out exactly how good their businesses are and why they’re extraordinary. Today we're looking at the Change Award, which recognises businesses making a positive difference to people, communities and the planet. We're joined by Lindsay Marchment from The Man Cave – Victorian Change Award winner, and Clare Lilley from Hobart Exercise Physiology – Tasmanian Change Award winner. Lindsay and Clare, congratulations and welcome to Fear & Greed.
Footage: scene changes to close ups of two guests sitting across from the hosts at the desk.
Text: Lindsay Marchment, The Man Cave – VIC State Winner
Text: Clare Lilley, Hobart Exercise Physiology – TAS State Winner

00:50 - 00:52
Audio - Lindsay Marchment and Clare Lilley
Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for having us. Great to be here.

00:52 The Man Cave’s purpose and beginnings

00:52 - 01:06
Audio - Sean Aylmer
Lindsay. We'll start with you. The Man Cave. Now, working with more than 120,000 teenage boys. That is extraordinary. Tell me about that first workshop, how it came about, and the story about the note that was left behind by one of the boys.

01:06 - 01:32
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
So The Man Cave is a preventative mental health charity working across Australia, primarily in Victoria and New South Wales. But our main aim is to create spaces for boys to become great men. It's a challenging time for teenage boys at the moment. I think it's a challenging time for a lot of us, but in particular they're receiving these messages around that script of masculinity where they've got to continue to be strong and stoic and tough and show no emotion at all costs.

01:32 - 02:04
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
And starting back in 2014, our co-founders ran a workshop in southern Melbourne, in Frankston. And in that workshop, they kind of realised that there are spaces is missing for boys. Spaces where they can connect with one another, where they can take emotional risks, and where they can start to challenge that script and masculinity and lean into the human side of being human, which is showing like the array of emotions and feelings and experiences that we all experience.

02:04 - 02:33
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
And a little note that was left at the end of the workshop that just really sunk that message in with, with Hunter, one of our co-founders was, hey, thanks for coming today. I didn't really want to say anything, but hearing from you guys has really changed the way I want to show up as a man. And, and that's the message that we really continuously get after our workshops, is that boys are really craving these spaces, and they're not there at the moment.

02:33 – 02:35
Audio - Sean Aylmer
Wow. Emotional.

02:35 – 03:14
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's powerful work. And I started as a facilitator. I now work as a partnerships manager. But in that role I've seen time and time again these boys, when you create that space where they feel safe enough to take an emotional risk, they realise that they're just one of many who were going through things, challenges as we all are, and they can start to feel supported by the people around them because they can see that it's that it's normal and that their mates are actually there wanting to be supportive. They just maybe not, don't exactly know how if they don't know what's going on.

03:15 Hobart Exercise Physiology’s purpose and vision

03:15 - 03:51
Audio - Michael Thompson
Now Clare, coming across to you, your business is, is very different. It is a, it's a different model, different structure, different cost structure. But it is still really hands on. And you're helping people kind of, of all ages across a huge range of medical conditions. And I think for me, the thing is that when you see someone in your in your waiting room, you know that they are there because they really need your help. Right. What was the opportunity that you saw here when you first started? And actually, if you take one step back just before that and just explain to us exactly what an exercise physiologist does.

03:52 - 04:17
Audio - Clare Lilley
Absolutely. So, an exercise physiologist. Our role is basically to prescribe exercise as medicine. So, we're giving people individualised programs to help manage a huge range of different health conditions. Ageing from, you know, four years old, someone might have cerebral palsy or a gross developmental delay all the way through to someone who might be 90 plus years old managing chronic pain or osteoporosis, maybe with some underlying, you know, diabetes or heart disease as well.

04:17 - 04:40
Audio - Clare Lilley
So, at the forefront, we are prescribing exercise that is our key role in in all of the management of all the clients we see. Every person that sits in our waiting room, we treat exactly the same. They're coming in for a reason. They're coming in because they want to get help. Sometimes that might have been encouraged by family or friends or a referral from a GP or a specialist, but either way, they're there for us to help them.

04:40 - 04:57
Audio - Clare Lilley
And that, I think, is the most powerful thing that we do, is that when they come through the doors where we're helping them, and the vision for that started when both Rob and I and my business partner went through university and did our degrees, and we fell in love with exercise physiology as a profession because it was about helping people.

04:57 - 05:24
Audio - Clare Lilley
And that is our goal is we want to help people. So, when we started, we both, you know, navigated through worked in private practice, and then we had this idea of starting the business and keeping it solely exercise physiology. So, a lot of other allied health clinics ended up going into a multidisciplinary space. So, having your exercise physiologists work alongside with other allied health professionals as well. But at Hobart Exercise Physiology, we are sole exercise physiology led and run through and through.

05:25 The Man Cave’s funding model and business realities

05:25 - 05:34
Audio - Sean Aylmer
Okay, you both have great purposes, there’s no doubt about it. But you're still running a business, so I'm interested. Lindsay, we'll start with you. How do you actually pay the bills?

05:35 - 06:09
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
Hard. It's hard to pay the bills, especially at this time. But our approach is one: our workshops are funded by schools, so schools pay for us to come and deliver a workshop. But we also know that schools budgets are, like, really tight at the moment and especially for underprivileged schools, low socio-economic schools, rural and regional schools. So, we source funding through philanthropic means. It's about, I guess, sharing our message and bringing on partnerships that can really see that positive benefit that we're trying to create.

06:10 - 06:41
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
And then we have a little bit of, of government and we're still looking for more government funding. We really see a space for government to come in and fund part of our work, especially in that space of subsidy funding for schools to be able to access our programs. But it's a constant challenge, and that's part of my role at the moment, is continuously having conversations with those out there that we and the young people we serve really need more funding to come through, so we can continue to build and scale and meet more young people.

06:42 Hobart Exercise Physiology’s funding model and business realities

06:42 - 06:51
Audio - Sean Aylmer
And Clare, your funding model is obviously very different. How difficult is it given the range of services you provide, and you've got 20, 22 people, to actually make a profit?

06:52 – 07:15
Audio - Clare Lilley
Yeah. And it's taken time. I think the last few years, since starting in 2019, have really focused on building our team and maturing our culture. And that, in turn, has meant that our revenue and profit over the last couple of years has really started to increase, and we've been able to see those benefits happen after we've spent the time really, you know, nurturing our relationships with our team, within our team and then also nurturing our referral pathways as well.

07:15 - 07:29
Audio - Clare Lilley
We do get third party, you know, in terms of our payment systems and looking at Medicare, DVA, NDIS, we service those kind of populations, as well as just general private patients who can claim with their private health as well, or just people paying, normal as well.

07:30 How The Man Cave measures their impact on communities and people

07:30 – 07:50
Audio - Michael Thompson
Lindsay, I want to pick up on something that you just said there about the positive benefit that you were trying to create, because a lot of organisations want to have an impact. They want to create this positive benefit for the people who are using them. 120,000 young people that you've worked with, how do you measure the impact that you're actually having?

07:51 - 08:26
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
Great question. It's something that we've definitely built over time. There's something profound about actually being in that room and seeing the impact firsthand, but that's not necessarily something we can also, we can always rely on to get us further funding. So, we've built an evaluation system around our programs, one beginning before the workshop, one directly after and then three months after. And initially we really started to capture the impact it was having on the boy in the workshop. And that has stayed consistent at about 93% of a positive impact across ten years of our workshops, or nearly 12 now.

08:26 - 08:44
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
And then we've started to build in behaviour and attitude change into that sort of three month post workshop where we're starting to track other tools that we're offering these young people. Is that something they can continue to use and rely on? And we're seeing some really positive outcomes there as well.

08:45 About Hobart Exercise Physiology’s mission and growth goals

08:45 - 08:57
Audio - Sean Aylmer
Now I'm sort of asking the same question in a different way, like because in your world you've built your business, quality of care is everything. Personal connection is everything. When you're growing, how do you keep that to the standard you want it to be?

08:58 - 09:32
Audio - Clare Lilley
Yeah, it's definitely a challenge sometimes, but it's our key mission. Our mission statement that we have across the clinic is that we, you know, give people that connection and we have genuine connection with quality service that we're providing. So that is a key thing that we ensure that all our staff have ingrained in them in terms of the services that they're delivering. And then in terms of measuring that quality, it's looking at the individual client and doing their pre and post session assessments. So, they come in and we've got some, you know, subjective but also objective measures that we do as a standard for everyone coming into the clinic. So it's part of our process and the experience that they get when they walk through the door.

09:33 - 09:51
Audio - Clare Lilley
And then we're looking at that in a three month, six months, 12 months post outcome measure type situation. So we're actually seeing that progress that the individual is making, as well as then having self-reflection on us. So sending out feedback forms for all our clients to fill out so that then they're giving us that, that feedback as well from their appointment.

09:51 - 10:01
Audio - Sean Aylmer
What's really interesting is both your business is totally different but process driven. So, to actually achieve where you want to get to, you need a process. And you've got to stick to it.

10.01 - 10:02
Audio - Clare Lilley
Yeah. Yeah definitely

10:02 What success means to Hobart Exercise Physiology as a business

10:02 – 10:21
Audio - Michael Thompson
Both of you. Right. You're both State Winners right. And your businesses are both really successful. Do you, do you feel like a success? What is that for you? And I suppose if you look to the future what is the finish line? Is there even one? I'll start with you, Clare.

10:22 - 11:24
Audio - Clare Lilley
Yeah, sure. I think success is a great thing to strive towards. And what is success? I think success for us at, at Hobart Exercise Physiology is making sure that our team and our culture is really strong and building communities, so building a thriving community is huge for us. Also, one of our key values within the business, that's a community in our team, but then also the community in Hobart. Hobart is very community driven. In general, we're a small population right at the bottom of Australia, and building those communities is huge for us. So, seeing that happen in our space and going and talking to someone on the street who's coming in and a friend down the road who's come in and seen us and has had a positive change in their life, whether it's they can go to the groceries on their on their own now and they've built that independence back, or a child going to the park has been able to improve their gross motor development and be included in participation is huge. And then the other thing that I think is going to be a huge part of determining success for us is me being able to say I'm an exercise physiologist and someone knowing what that means, that is my goal.

11:26 - 11:30
Audio - Sean Aylmer
We won't mention that off air, we actually asked exactly what a physiologist was, so that's fine.

11:31 What success means to The Man Cave as a business

11:31 – 11:32
Audio - Michael Thompson
What about you, Lindsay?

11:33 – 12.34
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
Yeah. So look, I guess for me, starting out as a facilitator, I felt so much success just witnessing boys challenging that script that they'd been dealt, where opening up was just not part of their reality. So when they have opened up, and I guess an example of this I think about is this one day, this workshop, we had a group of boys. It was a country town, so I'm from the country. I can really connect with those country boys, but they often walk into a space, these country boys, thinking that they know each other pretty well, like everyone kind of knows everyone in the town that I'm from, for example. But there was this one boy who just was a little bit reluctant, a little bit resistant. And over the course of the day, we build in steps for them to just gently take bigger emotional risks. And that might start with us kind of asking questions without them responding with their voice, but responding with their body. They might move around the room. And, and he again kind of was keeping his head down a little bit unsure.

12:34 – 13:38
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
And then we get into a check-in circle in the middle of the day, which is we're sitting in a circle, we've built the trust and safety to be able to create that circle for them to potentially step in and share what they want. Now everything's challenged by choice in our workshops. They can choose to step in or not. Part of the benefit is also just listening to what's happening in the room. And this young boy – we’ll call him Josh – he had his head in his hands and he's like, hey, I want to check in. And he checked in that his parents are going through a divorce at the moment, and he's really been struggling with that. And we asked the room, hey, does anyone know this has been happening for Josh? And not one hand goes up. And we asked the room again, hey, if you know, if you had have known this or now that you know this, who's really willing to be there for Josh if he just wants someone to listen to and everybody puts their hand up. And it's moments like that that we really see the success of our workshops. And part of us moving forward at The Man Cave is making sure that that impact stays as strong as it is while we scale to more young people.

13:39 Lindsay from The Man Cave shares what they’ve learnt about making their business succeed

13:39 – 13:51
Audio - Sean Aylmer
How do you do a follow up question to that particular story? Unfair? Tell me. I want to bring it back to business. What's the one thing – and we'll start with you – what's the one thing that you've learned about business that makes it work?

13:52 - 14:14
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
I think for us it's really about balancing that impact with sustainability. And something we've had to do at The Man Cave is, you know, we lead with heart. We've had a lot of heart sort of focus in the development of our mission and vision. But just leading with the heart doesn't necessarily always mean that money is going to come in to fund the impact that we want to make.

14:14 - 14:44
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
So we've had to really balance that sustainable business model with the impact that we're trying to create. And I guess what that looks like is making sure that we build our HQ team at the same rate. We kind of build our facilitation team. We put the energy into training and development for them, while we also put the energy into sourcing new revenue streams, whether that be through corporate partnerships, through government advocacy and engagement. Yeah.

14:44 Clare from Hobart Exercise Physiology shares why culture is key to their business’s success

14:44 - 14:45
Audio - Sean Aylmer
Clare?

14:45 – 15:20
Audio - Clare Lilley
I think again, similar to what Lindsay was saying, developing that culture and finding the balance between it not always just being money driven, but also the why and making sure that we're really clear on our mission. And our goal has been really, really important. Lots of reflection, reflection during that time, I would say, is a key point that we really focus on, because we can be going really well for a couple of years and then kind of hit a bit of a crossroads and go, what is it that we need to change? So, I think reflecting on what we're doing as business owners, but then also what we're doing as a team and then how we can then change that in this never ending, changing environment that we're all going in.

15:20 Both businesses speak to what makes their businesses extraordinary

15:20 – 15:33
Audio - Michael Thompson
To wrap things up. I mean, this is all about celebrating extraordinary business stories. We obviously think your businesses are extraordinary. Why do you think your business is extraordinary?

15:34 – 15:52
Audio - Clare Lilley
I think our business is extraordinary because of the people that we have in our team. The facilitating we do in-house to ensure that they're delivering the best services as possible and the impact that we create in our community. We're helping people every day, changing lives every day. And that's something that we're really proud of.

15:52 – 15:53
Audio - Michael Thompson
Lindsay?

15:54 – 16:47
Audio - Lindsay Marchment
Yeah, I guess for us at The Man Cave, as a team, we try to practise what we preach. We can't ask boys to meet an edge and make them feel uncomfortable in that edge without us really understanding what that edge feels like in the context of, of our lives professionally and personally. So, we've built in practices within our culture where we are open and honest with one another. When things become challenging and get in the way, we have what we call a clearing where it's like, hey, I'm feeling a certain way. This is what's happened. I just want to understand it from your lens. And, and that's one way that we work really powerfully together with an amazing group of people, I must say. And we can then role model to the boys that, hey, this is how relationships work. They're hard, they're challenging. But these are some of the practices that we implement to, to make them as flourishing as they can be.

16:48 Conclusion

16:48 - 17:03
Audio - Sean Aylmer
Both of you, inspirational. Lindsay Marchment from The Man Cave. Clare Lilley from Hobart Exercise Physiology. Congratulations again on being recognised in the Change Award category for the 2026 Telstra Best of Business Awards. Thanks for coming in.

17:02 – 17:04
Audio - Lindsay Marchment and Clare Lilley
Thank you so much. Thanks for having us.

17:04 – 17:16
Audio - Michael Thompson
And good luck to you both, as well, for the National Awards, they are taking place in Hobart at the end of November. You can find out more about the State Winners and the Awards at Telstra.com.au/awards. I'm Michael Thompson.

17:14 – 17:20
Audio - Sean Aylmer
And I'm Sean Aylmer. This has been Fear & Greed Q&A: Extraordinary Business Stories, brought to you by Telstra.

17:20 – 17:26
Footage: text appears on screen and along with animation of creature in clouds.
Audio: Soft wind noises.

Transcript ends.