Luke Tobin

Founder of Unusualgroup.com | Follow for posts on Business, Marketing, Investing & AI

Commercial and speaking: sponsorship@luketobin.com

3 exits, different industries, each one bigger than the last. Turned a £100 investment, into an eight-figure agency exit in 5 years. 

I help founders turn self-doubt into leverage, and leverage into exits.

My last business started with £100 and a lot of imposter syndrome. No funding. No safety net. Just a laptop, a tiny runway and lots of grit. Five years later, we sold for eight figures. It was one of the fastest growth-to-exit stories in the UK at that level.

That was exit number three. Before that, I built and sold a hospitality business and an e-commerce brand. Different industries, same scale-to-exit playbook. Build lean. Price for profit. Systemise delivery. Think like a buyer long before you ever meet one.

Now I back other founders and work on fixing what is broken in the agency world.

Current work:

Unusual Group (Founder)
We take minority stakes in agencies and plug them into the capital, infrastructure and operator support they need to grow margins and become exit-ready.

Tobin Capital (Owner) 
I invest in more than 25 brands, including SpaceX, Atom Bank, and Honest Mobile. When I invest, you do not just get capital. You get an operator in your corner on pricing, operations, hiring and exits.

A-Frame Venture Studio (Partner)
We build consumer brands from scratch. Our first brand, Mirth Water, is now live in the United States at drinkmirth.com.

The Success Method Newsletter
Every week, more than 100,000 founders get my breakdown of how to turn self-doubt into an advantage in their business. I share how I structure deals and exits, the pricing moves and margin levers that work in practice.

Book (Q2 2026)
My first book, on how founders can turn doubt into an asset rather than a drag on growth, is coming in Q2 2026 from a major publisher.

In total, I have started seven businesses. Two failed. Three exited. Two, I am still building. The failures taught me more than the exits. Self-doubt never went away. I learned how to use it as a filter to make better decisions in hiring, pricing, partners, and exits. That is what I teach and invest around now.

Today, I share what actually works with more than 800,000 founders across my channels. The playbooks, the red flags, the live deals and the parts of the mental game most people never talk about.

If you are an agency owner or founder who wants to raise, exit or fix your margins in the next 12 to 36 months, send me a DM.

Newsletter (100K plus subscribers): www.luketobin.com/newsletter

DM me about: investments, agency exits, speaking

Investor

The next‑generation personalization AI for e‑commerce.

Success that burns through your mental bandwidth isn’t success.

It’s mismanagement disguised as commitment.

Early in my career, I thought being available meant being valuable.
Every ping got a reply.
Every meeting got a “yes.”
Every spare minute became a catch-up slot.

On paper, it looked like momentum.
In reality, it was erosion.

High performance isn’t about being always on.
It’s about knowing when to switch off so your decisions stay sharp.

These are the boundaries that keep my focus intact:

1. Control inputs.
No phone before strategy, no Slack before thinking.

2. Batch reactions.
Email and messages twice a day, everything else waits.

3. Protect transitions.
Five minutes between calls to reset the brain.

4. Create unreachable hours.
Evenings or weekends when nobody gets access.

5. Guard energy like capital.
Spend it where it compounds, not where it’s wasted.

This isn’t self-care.
It’s self-leadership.

Because success that costs your sanity will eventually cost your results.

Which boundary protects your focus the most?

♻️ Repost to help more leaders build sustainable success.
🔔 Follow Luke Tobin for more personal growth insights.

cc Dr. Carolyn Frost (shout out for the image and powerful message)

We are often told to "play it safe".

But, safety doesn't help you grow.

Here's what does:
1. Taking chances on the dreams that scare you.
2. Betting on yourself when no one else will.
3. Choosing courage over comfort, every single time.
4. Believing in the vision only you can see.
5. Acting on what feels like destiny, even if you're unsure.

The truth is:
Every bold move looks unrealistic until someone makes it real.

Why? 
Because the world has always been shaped by people who were willing to look a little “crazy” in pursuit of something bigger.

The innovators. 
The builders. 
The dreamers.

Fear will tell you to wait.
Doubt will tell you you’re not ready.
But growth only happens when you decide to move anyway.

Reminders when chasing your dreams:
If it feels impossible → it’s probably worth the risk.
If people doubt you → you’re likely onto something powerful.
If it feels like destiny → that’s your sign to leap.

At the end of the day, I've learnt that regret weighs heavier than failure.

And the world needs more people who are brave enough,
to follow the dream that feels like destiny.

♻️Repost to help inspire someone in your network.
🔔Follow Luke Tobin for more personal growth tips.

cc Codie A. Sanchez (shout out for the image and powerful reminder!)

Most people overestimate what they can achieve in a month

and underestimate what they can build in a year.

Progress rarely looks exciting while it’s happening.

It’s not dramatic.
It’s repetition, refined.

The truth is, nothing meaningful scales overnight.
It compounds quietly, in systems, skills, and relationships.

In business and in life, I’ve learned:
Momentum isn’t a spark.
It’s friction mastered.

The days that feel slow, repetitive, or unnoticed are usually the ones where foundations are forming.

When growth stalls, I don’t double the effort, I double the focus.

I look for the one action that will compound over time,
not the ten that just make me feel busy.

Because high performance isn’t about speed.

It’s about stamina.
Anyone can start fast.

Few stay consistent long enough for the results to catch up.

💭 What’s one thing you’re quietly building that will pay off next year?

♻️ Repost to remind someone that slow isn’t failure, it’s formation.
🔔 Follow Luke Tobin for more insights on focus and sustainable growth.

cc Justin Wright (shout out for the image and essential reminder!)

The action you're most scared to take is usually the right one.

Deep down, you know what you need to do.

You've been thinking about it for weeks. 

Trying to convince yourself that you need more time, maybe more information, or just a better moment to make that particular move.

But that moment isn't coming.

Some of the best things I've done in business felt completely wrong at the time. 

And there was always a reason; it was too early or felt too risky.  

That feeling of unease is just part of it.

So whatever you've been putting off, make the move.

♻️ Repost if you needed to hear this today. 
🔔 Follow Luke Tobin for more.

cc Justin Welsh (Shout out for the powerful reminder!)

Most founders start the sale process in the wrong place.

Before you think about valuation, you need to answer three questions. 

1. Can someone quickly understand your business? 
2. Are your clients likely to stick around?
3. And if you stepped back, would it still run without you?

If any of those questions make you feel uncomfortable, it's worth paying more attention to that area.

Succeed helps founders get ready, find the right buyer, and manage the whole process, without getting messed around.

Take our free exit assessment:
https://lnkd.in/ey8-zd9G

♻️Repost and save to help other founders in your network.
🔔Follow Luke Tobin for more on agency growth and exit planning.

Founder of MTD Training & Skillshub | Trusted by 9,000+ Companies to Build Leaders & Drive Sales | Award-Winning L&D Partner | Author & Speaker

After more than 20 years building businesses in learning and performance, one thing is clear: training only matters if it makes an impact.

I’ve seen too much learning that looks good on paper but disappears once normal work resumes. Courses get completed. Boxes get ticked. Very little changes.

I’m the Founder and CEO of MTD Training and Skillshub. Together, we help organisations improve performance through stronger leadership, management and sales capability, supported by a practical learning ecosystem designed to be applied, not just consumed.

Over the years, my teams and I have worked with more than 9,000 organisations. That scale gives you perspective. You start to see what sticks, what fades, and why most training fails to deliver lasting impact.

The biggest issue I see is focus. Too much training is built around activity rather than outcomes. Our approach is simple: impact over attendance. 

Everything we do is designed to shift behaviour, build habits and improve performance in the real world.

The results matter. One FTSE 250 organisation saw a 27% increase in leadership capability within three months. Another generated over £1.5m in additional sales within six months of a programme going live.

We work with multinationals, fast-growing teams and SMEs. The size varies, but the expectation doesn’t. They all want learning that delivers measurable change, not just good feedback scores.

Alongside leading the businesses, I’m also the author of several practical books on leadership, sales, performance and coaching, and I speak regularly at conferences, on podcasts and in the media. I focus on what works when things are busy, complex and under pressure.

Recognition includes industry awards for L&D and HR impact, and being named the UK’s #1 Sales Influencer in the Top 100 Sales Index.

This profile is where I share thinking from running and scaling learning businesses, and from seeing how performance really changes inside organisations.

Sean McPheat

Most meetings don’t move work forward.

They just consume time.

Agendas drift, discussions wander, decisions get delayed, and people leave feeling drained rather than focused. 

I bet this sounds familiar to you! (And yes, I’m guilty as charged too.)

Over time, meetings can become a habit instead of a tool.

I’ve sat through hundreds of them. The worst ones all have the same thing in common — nobody can tell you why the meeting actually exists.

That’s the starting point for this exercise.
It’s designed for learning professionals to use directly, share with their managers, or for managers to work through on their own. 

It works best when meetings regularly overrun, participation is low, or decisions aren’t followed through. New managers often get the most from it because it gives them a clear structure to lead with confidence.

Here’s the core of it.

Pick one meeting that clearly isn’t working. (Some that I used to attend were just moan fests!)

Step back and ask what it’s truly meant to achieve. Most managers have never actually defined that — they inherited the meeting and kept running it.

Once the purpose is clear, write down the desired outcomes so everyone knows what success looks like before the meeting starts.

Then look at the invite list. Fewer people almost always leads to better discussion and faster decisions. 

Clarify who’s deciding, who’s contributing, and who’s just there to stay informed. That one change alone removes a huge amount of frustration.

Build a simple structure with time limits for each section. Summarise decisions before the meeting ends. Confirm who’s responsible for what. And close with a quick “was this useful?” — not as a box-ticking exercise, but to break the habit of repeating the same format week after week because nobody questioned it.

For L&D teams, this exercise is gold dust. 

It surfaces facilitation gaps, planning issues, and team habits that drain productivity. Those insights feed straight into coaching conversations and future development work.
For managers, the impact is immediate. 

Meetings get shorter. Energy improves. Accountability goes up. And the meetings that didn’t need to exist? 

Gone. Off the calendar!

Great managers don’t run more meetings. They run better ones.

Please use this exercise any way you like.

------------------------

For more valuable content, follow me,
Sean McPheat and then hit the 🔔 button
to stay updated on my future posts.

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Founder & CEO, MTD Training & Skillshub | Leadership & Management Development | Trusted by L&D Leaders in 9,000+ Organisations

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The Battle

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