The 50k Question: Why Most People Never Ask
And What Happened When I Finally Did
There’s a reason most businesses fail that nobody talks about.
It’s not poor products, positioning, personal brand, bad timing, or a lack of hustle and hard work.
It’s simpler. More devastating. And way more stupid.
We never ask.
On Friday I sat down with my son on my knee and a microphone in my hand.
Because time was (and always is) in short supply, I’d decided to dictate my latest update and fix my greatest problem as an entrepreneur: inviting people to work with me.
24 hours later and I had £50,000 worth of enquiries in my inbox.
Most would-be-entrepreneurs are actually privateers. They create offers in private, maybe talk about it once, and hope someone notices. When they don’t, they assume the market has spoken.
But the market can’t speak if you never start the conversation.
I’d spent 18 months building The Authority Lab - first by accident, then by design. Through my podcast and events, people found me. They’d ask me to help bring their business ideas to life, and I’d simply say yes.
The conversations created flow. Ideas emerged. Money followed.
Then I made a mistake.
I decided the offer needed to be “ready” before I could really invite people in. So I rebranded. Refined the methodology. Polished the language. And waited.
For what? Another insight? The perfect positioning? A sign from the universe?
My offer sat there. Complete. Powerful. Gathering mental dust.
Until Friday, when my son settled on my knee and I realised something stupidly simple:
There was nothing left to do except ask.
What I didn’t realise: I wasn’t protecting the work. I was protecting myself from the answer.
Because here’s what asking really means - it means making the world respond to you. And once the world responds, you can no longer hide in the safety of “someday.”
Everything is possible in the planning phase. That’s why we love it. But possibility only becomes real when you ask.
And honestly, there’s an ocean of new possibilities waiting just beyond the horizon for people brave enough to do so.
The artist creates and invites. The amateur creates and waits.
I stumbled on a video of Jim Rohn speaking on the power of asking. He said that asking starts a process you don’t even need to understand. “Push the button and machinery you can’t see begins working. All you need to know is: it works”.
If you want something to happen, you need to invite it to happen. You need to ask for it.
And that simple action could change everything.
But there’s a nuance here: how we ask is a catalyst for transformation.
Because asking isn’t magic. It’s archaeology.
You’re not extracting what you want from the world. You’re discovering what wants to happen through genuine dialogue. And in that discovery, all manner of things can happen - to you, through you, and for you.
This is what it means to think like an artist. To price like an artist. To ask like an artist.
The artist doesn’t pitch. The artist invites.
The artist doesn’t manipulate outcomes. The artist creates space for response.
The artist doesn’t ask “How do I get what I want?” The artist asks “What’s actually possible here?”
When I finally pressed record on Friday, my son wasn’t settled, my voice wasn’t steady, and that didn’t matter. Because I wasn’t selling. I was inviting.
I described The Authority Lab honestly. Who it’s for. Why it matters.
No tactics. No countdown timers. No manufactured urgency.
Just clear invitation: “This exists. If it’s for you, let’s talk.”
Within 24 hours: £50,000 in enquiries.
Not because I finally decided to sell. Because I finally decided to ask.
And asking, it turns out, is the beginning of everything.
Rohn said there are two ways to ask:
First, ask with intelligence. Be clear. Be specific. Don’t mumble. Define what you want.
Second, ask with faith. Believe like a child whilst planning like an adult.
Both are true. But there’s a third way he didn’t mention:
Ask with curiosity.
Ask without predetermined outcomes. Ask to discover, not extract. Ask to start a conversation, not close a transaction.
Because here’s what I’ve learned: the artist’s ask isn’t about getting. It’s about revealing.
You’re not asking the canvas to become what you’ve already decided. You’re asking it to show you what it wants to be.
This isn’t just philosophy. The stakes are real: Around 94% of coaching businesses fail within the first three years. I wonder how many of those people approach each day with a spirit of genuine enquiry versus a need to make what they’d already decided on work.
Me? I’m right at the end of year two, right in the middle of the dead zone. Here’s why I might just make the 6%: because by serving the work I discovered what the world was asking from me.
Anthem led to my podcast, Culture Crush. Culture Crush replaced my income, and as I leant into what my community was telling me, The Unremarkable Entrepreneur became the obvious next step.
My curiosity created dialogue, and dialogue illuminated a path worth following, and so I followed it. I evolved, I allowed, I welcomed. I didn’t shut down the answers I was getting because they didn’t align with things I’d already decided.
I found my best work, I didn’t choose it.
I want X, how do I get it?
Most treat asking like a transaction, but artists treat asking like a conversation: I’m curious about X, what’s actually here?
The difference isn’t semantic. It’s fundamental.
Transaction requires control. You need the outcome you’ve predetermined or you’ve failed.
Conversation requires courage. You need to be willing to be surprised by what emerges.
One keeps you safe and stuck. The other sets you free.
This is the practice: Ask without attachment. Invite without manipulation. Create space for what wants to happen.
The world doesn’t respond to those just working away. It responds to those who speak up, ask questions, and invite answers.
Because genuine dialogue starts with a question.
And dialogue is where discovery lives.
You will find what you’re looking for, the question: what are you asking?
And that’s not some daft platitude, it’s reality. Look at your life. To gossip at work is to ask for gossip, to be impatient with people is to welcome impatience. You won’t be generous when you’re successful if you’re not generous when you’re not.
I am asking for a measure of success in my business. I want options for my son, for me. I’m now getting some of the answers I want because, like any practice, any muscle, becoming a good asker takes time. Learning how to invite and be open is a mental work of years.
But you could start today by simply noticing what you want, and asking for it.
My invitation to you
What would you ask for if you weren’t afraid of the answer?
Who would you reach out to if rejection didn’t sting?
What conversation would you start if you didn’t need to control where it went?
Here’s what I know: Success isn’t rationed. Authority isn’t in short supply. The people who need your work are already looking for it.
It’s like the tide, sometimes it rolls in, sometimes it rolls out. But the ocean is always there.
Abundant. Endless.
And your questions are like the moon’s gravity.
Powerful. Influential. They direct the ocean’s movement.
When most start building, the tide is out. Distant. They see others playing in the surf and that’s where they get stuck, voyeurs of other people’s success. They don’t realise that they have power over the tides, can bring the ocean near, and accept its abundance.
Not because they lack ambition, but because they lack practice asking.
The amateur? They mumble. They hedge. They qualify. They plan what to say instead of using their voice.
The artist? They rise in the night’s sky. They influence the waves. They challenge the ocean to respond.
They create, articulate, and invite, without fear.
The artist trusts that asking - real asking, honest asking, curious asking - starts a process that doesn’t need their understanding to work.
All you need to do is push the button.
Your 30 day challenge
Make one clear ask every day. Not a sales pitch. An invitation.
Ask a question you’re genuinely curious about.
Ask for feedback on something you’ve created.
Ask someone if they’d like to work together.
Ask what’s actually needed here.
Don’t predetermine the outcome. Don’t measure success by whether you “got” what you wanted.
Measure it by what you discovered.
Document what actually happens - not what you hoped would happen, but what emerged from the conversation.
Watch what reveals itself when you stop trying to extract and start trying to discover.
Because asking isn’t about getting whatever you want.
It’s about learning what wants to happen through you.
And once you start that conversation, all manner of things become possible as the tide rolls in.
The question isn’t whether the work is ready.
The question is whether you’re ready to ask.