In this Business Blast podcast episode, host Tyler Wagner interviews Csaba Toth, founder of ICQ Global and creator of the award‑winning Global DISC model. Toth recounts his most instructive personal story—a failed joint‑venture restaurant‑booking startup that exposed the limits of academic theory when applied to real‑world intercultural collaboration. The experience drove him to certify in numerous psychological and intercultural frameworks, culminating in the Global DISC system that helps people understand why others think, feel, and behave differently. He likens the human mindset to a supercomputer with 95% of its capacity untapped, urging people to license their mental models. Toth shares business wisdom: focus on core strengths, avoid trying to do everything, and form strategic partnerships for synergy. He offers a paradoxical personal mantra—"be blissfully dissatisfied and playfully disciplined"—and explains that progress, not fleeting pleasure, is the true source of happiness. His favorite book, Becoming Supernatural by Joe Dispenza, taught him to communicate ideas at the audience’s level and simplify complex concepts. Toth also reflects on a Native American quote about waking the unaware, emphasizing respect for others’ cognitive defenses. The episode concludes with his online contact points: LinkedIn and icq.global.
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Thank you for listening to the Business Blast podcast. So for all my listeners out there that have been wanting to do your own podcast, I'd like to introduce to you Anchor. Anchor is a one-stop shop for recording, hosting, distributing, and monetizing your podcast. So before I found Anchor, I had never actually done a podcast because all the research that I had gathered made it seem very complex. Then I found Anchor, and Anchor makes podcasting extremely simple. So if you want to do your own podcast, go to anchor.fm/start. I can't wait to hear your podcast. All right everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today I have Csaba Toth with us. He is the founder of ICQ Global who developed the multi-award-winning Global DISC Model to help others get ahead professionally and get along personally by making sense of why people think, feel, and behave so differently. So welcome to the show, man.
Hi, nice to meet you.
You too, man. Pumped to have you here. The first one we got for you is what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?
Spanish? Right, okay. Well, I lost my first business because I thought speaking the same language, having common sense, lots of qualifications, and good intentions were enough to lead and serve people. My best story is probably my worst experience. I've graduated from the number one university in my field, and my dissertation was about how to create synergy and avoid problems in Eastern and Western European joint ventures. My research revealed a big gap in what they taught us at the uni, but I didn't pay too much attention to it because, you know, we are not supposed to question scientific models that have been around for 40 years. So I just started my own company, a restaurant booking site. We started with 35 restaurants here in Brighton in the UK, and in one year we had 5,500. We had the fastest growing website with the biggest listing, and it also became a joint venture with a software company. It sounds like a success story, but I couldn't work with the other CEO who was French, and we had to sell the shares and we got out of the business. And that is when I decided to get certified in a lot of different psychologic and intercultural models to find out what went wrong. How come I had years of experience and even my dissertation was about the same topic, but I couldn't put that theory into practice? And the result of that is the framework I've developed called old global disk. So, you know, just because something seems to be logical when people need to work together, that's not that easy. It's not logical at all.
Hmm. And then what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?
Okay. I think this is the place for a big mission statement or something nice, but that's not really true here because for very long I was frustrated with myself and others. I just wanted to get ahead professionally and get along personally. I used to run into the same problems over and over again, knowing what I wanted, what I should do, but for some reason I got only a tiny fraction of the results I was capable of. Then I realized that a lot of people were struggling with the same challenges, and they also wanted to understand why people act, think, and feel so differently. Because most people use their mindset like my granny uses her smartphone. They use a few basic functions really well, never realizing that it's a supercomputer and 95% of its potential is untapped. We need to get a license for so many things in our life, but not our mindset, even though we use it 24/7. And that can be our greatest asset or liability. So we should learn about it.
Yes, dude, I agree. Um, and then what is your best, uh, piece of overall business advice, so not necessarily industry-specific?
Well, the lesson I learned in my previous company was that I was capable of doing anything, but not everything. I burnt out. If we really want to scale up our business, then we need to triple down our strengths and find complementary partners instead of trying to do everything and become mediocre. So I do believe in strategic partnerships where we can create synergy by combining our skills. That's my advice.
And then if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?
Okay, that's going to be a difficult one. The advice is be blissfully dissatisfied and playfully disciplined. It sounds like a paradox because it is, just like everything we do. But, you know, we have to be grateful for everything that we have, but at the same time we have to push on hard for making dreams come true. And that's possible only if you are disciplined, but not in a rigid, uptight way, but in a playful way. You know, when I hit 30, my girlfriend invited everybody from my Facebook profile, and only one person showed up. And that was a slap in the face, but a good one. They were right. You know, I kept saying no to every invite to go out, have a coffee, and people learned that I have different priorities. It doesn't matter what we say, what matters is what we do. And we always find some time for things we really want. Always.
And then, in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?
To me, it's progress. When I work on something I'm passionate about, it doesn't always mean that I'm smiling and bubbly and definitely happy. Even the word passion comes from a Latin word meaning to suffer. But once we find a topic or vision we are willing to endure suffering, then Progress becomes happiness because we are one step closer to our goal.
And then what is the best book that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from that?
Then it's probably Becoming Supernatural from Joe Dispenza. He's an American researcher who bridges the gap between spirituality and science. He uses neuroscience to prove what people have known for hundreds and thousands of years. Everybody is fascinated by mindset, and they are right, it's capable of so much more than we are brave enough to believe. He puts a lot of effort into learning about the topic and making it accessible and practical to people so they can actually apply that knowledge. So the lesson I learned is that we need to connect with people at their level, speaking the language they understand, otherwise we lose them. If you really want to have a serious impact, then we need to uncomplicate our topic. And present it in a way that people can use it to unlock their own potential and inspire others.
And then what is your favorite quote and why?
That would be, "You cannot wake up somebody who is not asleep." I think it's a Native American saying, but I'm not entirely sure. But I find the message really profound because often when we hear something inspiring or we truly believe in something, we run around and we try to convince and convert people and we want to wake up those poor little souls to see the light and the truth we see, but that approach usually backfires. Would we want other people to hassle us with their worldview? Would it help us? Not really, indeed. You know, being right is part of our identity. If somebody questions our decisions and opinions, then it feels they are questioning us as a person, and it puts most of us in survival mode, which immediately triggers the reptilian brain, so we shut down, freeze, or attack. And that is not very constructive, is it?
No, dude, I love it, man. Thank you so much for coming on. Um, the last one I got for you, I'm sure audience wants to know, is where can they find you online?
Well, the best option is to connect with me on LinkedIn, and I think you've got the link, or the website icq.global.
