After recently launching its brand new podcast, MyAffiliates breaks down the first two installments of Tracking the Truth. Designed to set the tone, the opening episodes address patterns most people in the industry recognize, yet rarely pause to question.
Episode 1 – Untold Truths
Guest: Phil Pearson
The first episode establishes the framework. Untold Truths is not about a single issue, but about a set of behaviours that quietly shape how the industry operates and presents itself.
The conversation touches on ego, visibility, and how personal branding can sometimes overtake substance. From LinkedIn narratives to awards culture, it questions how success is framed publicly, and how far that framing can drift from operational reality.
Leadership is examined not as a role, but as conduct. Decisions made under pressure, accountability diluted by growth, and norms reinforced through repetition rather than intent. Many of the standards the industry now works by were never consciously designed; they emerged because they were convenient, familiar, and rarely challenged.
The episode does not attempt to resolve these tensions. Its purpose is simpler: to acknowledge them honestly, and to establish that this series will not default to safe or performative answers.
Episode 2 – Conference Overload
Guest: Pierre Lindh
If Episode 1 looks inward, Conference Overload turns outward, toward one of the industry’s most visible rituals.
The conversation with Pierre Lindh starts from a contradiction. Conferences remain well attended, yet confidence in their value is clearly eroding. Too many events, recycled content, declining networking quality, and rising costs are widely acknowledged.Yet, the circuit continues.
The problem is not confusion, but momentum without direction.
As agendas converge around the same themes, AI, compliance, and growth, the distinction between events becomes harder to justify. The question raised is not whether these topics matter, but whether repeating them across continents adds anything meaningful. Hearing the same narrative in Brazil or Sydney rarely deepens understanding when nuance gives way to scale.
The discussion also challenges content choices. Familiar speakers and safe panels dominate main stages, while more difficult or uncomfortable subjects are avoided. This is framed not as a lack of awareness, but as risk aversion, commercial comfort taking precedence over challenge.
Regulation becomes a telling example. Repeated attempts to involve regulators in open discussions have failed, raising an uncomfortable question: why does the very group shaping the industry so often avoid engaging with it publicly? The absence is described not as hostility, but as a missed opportunity for accountability and trust.
As the episode progresses, the focus shifts to psychology. Many companies attend conferences not because value is clear, but because absence feels risky. Fear of missing out, visibility pressure, and status anxiety quietly influence decisions. Conferences become less about connection, and more about signalling relevance.
One conversation, two angles
Taken together, the first two episodes make a single point.
Many of the industry’s practices persist not because they are effective, but because they are familiar. Whether it is how success is displayed, how leadership is performed, or how conferences are justified, repetition has replaced reflection.
Tracking the Truth does not aim to dismantle these systems. It aims to question them, calmly, openly, and without defensiveness.
Because familiarity may feel comfortable, but comfort, as these conversations make clear, is not the same as progress.
Subscribe to Tracking the Truth’s YouTube Channel, or follow and listen to the podcast on Spotify.
