Leading Through Uncertainty

Karen Walker is President of OneTeam and author of the book No Dumbing Down. She’s no stranger to uncertainty. She explains how she had the courage to leave a well-paid job in her early twenties to help set up Compaq, a company that grew exponentially in the 14 years she was there. She is a strong advocate for the development of people and teams to grow business. She has a wealth of wisdom and exp...

Chris Thurling talks about the importance of vulnerability and failure as a key part of the process of creativity and innovation. As the Executive Chairman of a creative marketing agency and the Chair of Bristol Media, you might expect Chris to be naturally creative but he explains creativity as being pertinent to every business and why we need to engage both head and heart in decision making.

Theo Millward, MD of Swimtime has all the passion and enthusiasm of a young entrepreneur but there’s no naivety in his business. It’s based on a vision for the future of humanity, pushing the boundaries of what is possible and grounded in the hard graft of execution. There is so much in this podcast to take away for every leader in business about challenging the status quo.

Transforming company culture is always challenging, especially when going from a family culture to a commercial one. Lynda Moore, Head of Talent and Development at the Bradfords group, explains how communication was key and has improved collaboration. She talks openly about the challenges of attracting a younger and more diverse employee and the impact that has on the business and the managers wit...

Alison Jones is the owner of Practical Inspiration Publishing and the host of her own highly successful and engaging podcast series called The Extraordinary Business Book club. Alison has a wealth of experience in publishing from being Director of Innovation Strategy at Macmillan to now running her own niche publishing company specialising in publishing business books.

Donna Warr is Head of Colleague Experience at Curo Housing Group, a Sunday Times Top 100 organisation based in Bath who provides housing in the Southwest of England. Donna talks about her experience of going through a restructuring programme in her previous company and how difficult it was due to the lack of communication throughout the process at a time of personal uncertainty shortly before goin...

Laura Shuckburgh is the Associate Director of Ricketts Architects in Leamington Spa. Laura embraces uncertainty with ease. Knowing little about architecture when she joined the business, Laura has used her creativity in other ways and developed her role to include business development as well as the development of the people in the business. She admits to being an ideas person and recognises that...

There is no interview this week. Instead, I share my experience of leading through uncertainty at my book launch, as well as explaining the background to the book that was published in May 2018. In the last 6 years working with horses, I’ve become comfortable with high levels of uncertainty. In parallel, as the pace of change has been accelerating, my clients have been learning to be more resilien...

Elinor Perry-Hall is the MD of Pentlands Accountants and Advisors. Elinor turns accountancy on its head by putting people at the heart of everything they do. She talks about the uncertainty created by a substantial brand development that her business has recently gone through and how it affected everything they do in the business.

Colin D. Smith is known as The Listener and specialises in teaching people to listen. Colin explains how we are taught to communicate through the forms of reading, writing and speaking which are ways that allow us to express ourselves. However, we are rarely taught to listen which is an essential skill for understanding and relating to the person doing the expressing! Learning to listen shifts the...

Will Deane is a highly successful entrepreneur and the founder of a digital marketing agency called Unstoppable. The name says all you need to know about Will. It was wonderful to talk to him and experience his unstoppable energy. He is an entrepreneur through and through. His passion shines through for his customers and his work and he really understands the value of a team – not just his own int...

Vicki Wentworth is the Chief Customer Officer at Wesleyan Assurance. She’s had an outstanding career so far. Having started in the military, she developed her leadership skills early on in critical war situations and has brought all of those leadership skills into the financial services industry. It gives her a true, grounded self-confidence that you rarely see. In this interview, she shares some...

Mark Underwood is the MD of Staffline Recruitment, the largest recruiter in the UK with an employee base of 50,000 people. In this interview, we covered just about everything – from entrepreneurialism, innovation and creativity, to LEAN and process and procedures to psychological safety, communication, resilience and everything in between. Mark’s not just smart, he’s genuine, humble, honest and li...

Stephen Maddock OBE is the CEO of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. After 19 years as the CEO, you’d think there’s not much Stephen hasn’t seen but he explains the uncertainty of leading a world-class orchestra that relies on a mix of government funding (which has been slashed in the last few years), charitable donations and commercial income.

Kevin Watson is the MD of Amadeus, a catering company providing food to venues throughout the UK, with a strong base in the West Midlands, including the NEC and other arenas. Kevin was pushed into the deep end of uncertainty when only 3 weeks into joining Amadeus as the MD, he found himself leading through a crisis management situation. It probably helped him get off to a fast start in terms of ge...

Tim Kay is Lead for KPMG’s Tech and media practice in the Midlands (UK). Tim was tasked with exploring how KPMG could work more closely with tech startups in London several years ago and he shares some of the challenges that large organisations face in working with fast-paced entrepreneurial businesses. He’s honest about how uncomfortable it is when we don’t have all the answers and he openly admi...

Gareth Parry is the CEO of Remploy, the UK’s leading disability specialist. Gareth talks about the benefits of inclusive workplaces, both physically and mentally and openly shares his personal experience of depression. His depression didn’t stop him becoming a CEO and he’s an inspiration to all of us that we can develop business and careers that are life-enhancing for individuals, businesses and c...

Neil Henderson the CEO of Safeline, a charity that provides both support for sexual abuse victims as well as education to prevent it. Formerly on the board at Royal Mail, Neil talks candidly about the challenges of communicating change and taking responsibility to ensure everyone is aligned. Neil argues that running a charity is much like running a commercial organisation - you need to focus on ke...

While some people thrive on uncertainty, for others it can lead to stress and overwhelm. Everyone’s limit is different based on how comfortable they are operating out of the comfort zone. It is also dependent on the volume of workload in any given moment. We have a psychological need for safety and uncertainty threatens that. Consideration must be given to what is a reasonable and acceptable amoun...

Jane Austin is the Head of HR for Wave, a start-up business in the utility industry. Jane has experienced huge uncertainty in the last 18 months as the business has undergone massive change. She shares her passion for engaging people emotionally, the importance of communication and how to do it when you legally can’t! I was inspired by Jane’s ability to balance her enthusiasm for change with the u...

Paul is the former CEO of Birmingham international airport and is now a Non-executive director of five different organisations. Paul has such a breadth and depth of business knowledge, not just limited to the aviation industry. We covered so many topics from running an airport to Brexit and democracy, novel-writing, risk management, business growth, the importance of having a professional team in...

In this podcast, Jude talks about the importance of emotions in business. She explores why we suppress them and how we can start to use them more skillfully as a source of information. We are emotional and intellectual beings. We have the capacity to both think and feel, and we are at our most effective when we bridge the gap between the two. Most people have developed the muscle of one over the o...

Martin Yardley is the Deputy Chief Executive of Coventry City Council and is Head of Place which covers anything from bins and potholes to strategic regeneration of the city. In the 9 years Martin has been in post, Coventry has seen massive change and business growth, and is unrecognisable from the concrete jungle that it once was. It may be down to him but he makes it clear that it’s a team effor...

Paul Faulkner is the CEO of Greater Birmingham Chamber of Commerce. As the UK’s second city, the Birmingham Chamber covers a huge area with 10 sub-divisions. With major business growth and the recently announced Commonwealth games coming to Birmingham in 2022, there is certainly a lot of change and uncertainty in the region. Paul seems to navigate it with apparent ease and talks about the resilien...

Sue Grindrod is the CEO of Albert Dock in Liverpool. Sue is an advocate of being kind to yourself in the context of being realistic about what you can achieve. I think that’s laudable in a world of fast-paced change. It’s so easy to put ourselves under inordinate pressure. She talks a lot about balance – the balance between being a CEO and having a home life and interests outside of work, the para...