Failed Dashdot founder reinvents himself as business coach

Through their new enterprise, McGrath and Billing offer coaching and advisory for high-performing company owners who have reached a stalemate and build a “business that serves life, instead of consuming it”.

“If you’re a 7- or 8-figure business owner… you’ve probably already felt it: past a certain size, working harder stops being the thing that moves the needle. What you need is sharper insights and clearer thinking,” McGrath said on the website.

“My superpower is the synthesis of strategic, first principles and root cause thinking, with practical ‘do this next’ know-how.”

“Whether it’s Leadership, Strategy, Marketing, Sales, Ops, Hiring, Pricing or Positioning, I’ve done all of it, so you get the practical answer you need exactly when you need it.”

This time, McGrath does not limit himself to real estate, offering his experience across a range of industries including financial services, technology, manufacturing, financial planning, agriculture, investment services, and more.

McGrath said that across all industries, his approach combines strategic thinking with practical, hands-on advice tailored to each business.

“Over the last few years, founders and CEOs have come to me for help, not because I went looking, but because they saw what I was building and the scale of the problems I was solving. I’ve helped them optimise their businesses and unlock more freedom and fulfilment.”

Using the collapse as a sales strategy

On his new website, McGrath uses Dashdot’s collapse as part of his sales pitch, encouraging business owners to use his services because he has “done it all”.

He said that through his experience of building a business to more than $64 million in revenue before seeing it collapse, he could help CEOs identify bottlenecks, improve profitability, and build businesses that support their lives.

“I started my last company with $5,000 and no safety net. Over seven years it generated more than $64 million in revenue and grew to a team of over 130 people.

“We won awards for technology, culture and innovation, and made the nation’s fastest-growing companies lists three years running.

“Then, over about three months, it all came apart.”

McGrath said the Dashdot collapse had provided lessons on scaling a business, mentioning that rapid growth had exposed weaknesses that ultimately contributed to its downfall.

“That’s a depth of real, practical experience most people will never have,” McGrath said on the website.

However, McGrath does not mention that 96 per cent of Dashdot shares were transferred to the British Virgin Islands about 24 months prior for a symbolic $100.

The share transfer left hundreds of Australian customers stranded, unable to recover their funds.

McGrath also does not mention the former customers and creditors left behind, with a report from Teneo Financial Advisory Australia showing liabilities of $16.5 million before liquidation costs.

In total, 695 buyers were listed as creditors for “prepaid services & refunds”, with claims accounting for $10,594,079, or 64 per cent of the total owed to creditors.

REB had revealed that the week of the insolvency announcement, Dashdot was still recruiting new customers, pushing them to pay a fee between $6,000 and $22,000.

The creditor list also included $1.1 million in employee entitlements owed to 43 employees, $915,995 owed to the Australian Taxation Office, $413,735 owed to American Express, $134,671 owed to Meta, and $1.5 million owed to Mighty Partners.

While McGrath acknowledged the Dashdot downfall, he also turned the experience into a selling point for his new training business.

While continuing to blame changing conditions for Dashdot’s collapse, McGrath’s latest account placed greater focus on whether he and Billing had scaled the former business too quickly.

“We said: we should stop trying to grow bigger. We should grow better,” he said on the website.

“Whilst the market turned, adverse conditions piled up against us, and macroeconomic storms wailed against the walls…The walls were only breached because the enemies were already inside the gate. And they didn’t arrive there in 2026.”

“They had been living inside the walls since that fork in the road back in 2022, quietly drawing fault lines through the foundations with every single choice we made to chase more instead of better, to defer the life instead of living it.”

While Dashdot 's collapse has left customers and creditors facing millions in unpaid claims, it has now become the central story behind McGrath’s new business offering, with his personal experience positioned as the value proposition for prospective clients.

“We got the scars for it. And we learned, at the most expensive price there is, the one lesson I most want to leave in your hands.”

“The company can be taken. The income can vanish in a quarter. The number, however enormous, can be dragged back to zero by forces you will never control.”

“But the body you kept strong, the person you stayed close to, the meaning you refused to defer, the mind you finally learned to quiet: that is the only wealth that cannot be repossessed.”

Right after the collapse, leading industry experts and peak bodies questioned Dashdot’s use of upfront fees, performance guarantees, and aggressive growth strategies.

“There’s a lot of question marks around the ethics of the business owners and directors, and they would’ve known for quite a while that they were facing some tough headwinds, Property Investment Professionals of Australia (PIPA) chair Cate Bakos told REB.

“They got obviously very excited by their own growth and all of their marketing, and their website’s still up now telling everyone how amazing they are.”

“I think there was a degree of complete naivety and greed, which is a dangerous combination,” Bakos said.