The Merri-Cast

Many dream about starting a business. Far fewer understand what it takes to succeed.   This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m excited to be joined by Dan Dunn , Co-founder and CEO of Paperplanes , a business that’s helping reinvent direct mail by combining traditional marketing with modern technology and data.  Dan’s journey is striking. Like many others, he took the leap into entrepreneurship with cour...

Some entrepreneurs build businesses around products. Others build them around problems they can’t stop thinking about.  This week on The Merri-Cast podcast, I’m joined by Steve Dineen – Founder and Chief Storyteller at Fuse Universal, and a pioneer of digital learning.  From the early days of e-learning to launching fuseschool and Fuse Universal, Steve has spent decades exploring one central quest...

A common challenge founders face isn’t strategy, sales or even growth. It’s learning how to stop doing everything themselves. On this week’s episode, I’m joined by the brilliant Kate Davis – founder of Meraki People , leadership advisor and champion of building businesses where people genuinely thrive. Kate’s journey into entrepreneurship was anything but straightforward. From starting her career...

Most businesses talk about creativity. But the real question is – who is creativity actually for? On this week’s episode of The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by Robert Edmonds - founder of NRG Studios , a creative agency helping organisations bring their stories to life through content, events and campaigns. Robert’s career began in broadcast television, working on major productions and building his craf...

Most businesses don’t lose their culture overnight… they lose it as they grow. On this week’s episode of The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by David Liddle – Founder and CEO of The TCM Group and the People & Culture Institute . He’s a leading UK voice on people, culture and leadership. His latest book, “ People and Culture ” explores many of the ideas we discuss in this episode - you can find it here...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by Chris Mole - founder of FounderON and former Founder & CEO of Molzi by Brainlabs .  Chris started his first business days after finishing his A-levels. What followed was a journey fuelled by curiosity, commercial instinct and what he calls the superpower of naivety.  After building and selling his Amazon agency Molzi, Chris found himself facing a chal...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by the fantastic Alison Jones — entrepreneur, publisher, author and coach.  Alison built her career in senior roles at Oxford University Press and Palgrave Macmillan before stepping away from corporate life to create Practical Inspiration Publishing – a business that deliberately broke the traditional publishing rulebook.  In this honest and wide-ranging con...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m kicking off 2026 with an inspiring and forward-looking conversation with Jonathan Bowman-Perks MBE – leadership coach, former British Army Officer, author and host of the Inspiring Leadership podcast .  Jonathan’s career spans 20 years in the British Army, senior roles at PwC, IBM and Penna, and decades working with CEOs and leadership teams at the very top of glob...

This end-of-year episode is a moment to pause and reflect on some of our brilliant guest insights from the past 12 months – completely honest conversations about the entrepreneurial and leadership journey. So many great insights – and we wish we had the room to include everyone. For this round-up episode, thank you to Bobby Dutton , Assim Ishaque , Zareen Roohi Ahmed , Emily Gill , Richard Barkey...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by the inspiring David B. Horne – founder of Add Then Multiply and Funding Focus .  In this episode, we explore his career, one that spans global finance, corporate leadership, and a mission to level the playing field for underrepresented founders.  From collecting newspaper payments as a boy in Canada to raising £60 million in funding for AIM-listed compani...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m delighted to be joined by Suvianna Grecu – Founder of AI for Change Foundation and DevCraft Agency , and a passionate advocate for ethical, inclusive and human-centred AI.  Suvianna’s career story is an interesting one. A law graduate turned serial entrepreneur, she first built DevCraft, creating custom AI chatbots, before realising that the conversation around AI...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by the brilliant Steve Ramona , host of Doing Business with a Servant’s Heart podcast .  Steve is all about the network – he describes himself as a “super connector” specialising in impactful partnerships through personalised introductions. That doesn’t really cover it though. He specialises in the energy industry and is involved in $5bn dollar worth of proj...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m delighted to be joined by Charles Skinner – CEO of Restore plc . I first met Charles 30 years ago and I have a lot to thank him for. He was the man who gave me my first job in journalism at Management Today magazine.  Charles’s own career and entrepreneur journey is as fascinating as it is varied. From an early career in investment banking and private equity, then...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by the fantastic Jenny Garrett OBE – an award-winning Author, Speaker, Thought Leader and Founder of Jenny Garrett Global .  Jenny’s entrepreneurial journey didn’t begin with a grand plan. It started cautiously, carving out one day a week to test her new coaching path. Now, it’s a thriving business that is 20 years strong.  Along the way, Jenny has become a...

This week on The Merri-Cast podcast, we had the pleasure of speaking with Mindy Gibbins-Klein – Founder of The Book Midwife and Giving 1% .  Mindy describes herself as an “accidental entrepreneur”, but what an accident it turned out to be! Redundancy pushed her into building a career that’s empowered thousands of authors, leaders and entrepreneurs to share their stories with the world.  In our con...

This week on The Merri-Cast podcast, I had the pleasure of speaking with Richard Barkey – Founder and CEO of Imparta .  I first met Richard almost 20 years ago, when his sharp questions about PR effectiveness left a lasting impression on me. Since then, he’s gone on to build and scale a business in a sector that is notoriously difficult to grow.  How has he done it? With curiosity, resilience and...

After a short Summer break, we’re back with a very special episode of The Merri-Cast. We depart from our usual format to pay tribute to the late, great Charles Handy – social philosopher, visionary thinker and one of the most influential voices in leadership and management.  Charles’s insights heavily shaped my own journalistic and entrepreneurial journey. And his books including The Age of Unreas...

What do you do when the career you worked so hard for no longer feels right? And how do you build something new that’s driven by purpose, not pressure? This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by Emily Gill – Co-Founder of human skills platform Levra and a qualified coach.  In this episode, Emily shares her fascinating career journey from lawyer to Oxford MBA student, to entrepreneurs. It’s full of...

We love guests who challenge the status quo – and our latest one does exactly that. This week, I’m joined by Dani Dufresne – Emmy Award Winning Executive Producer and Founder of The Auxiliary .  Dani’s journey from film school in LA to reinventing how creative production works is inspiring and refreshingly honest. With over 20 years’ production experience across Film, TV, Commercials and Events, D...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by Melitta Campbell , otherwise known as ‘The Value Whisperer’. She is a business and leadership coach, TEDx Speaker, best-selling author and an unapologetic introvert. In this episode, Melitta shares how she went from being a shy child, who believed that no one wanted to hear her voice, to coaching female founders to sell themselves and their services with...

This week on The Merri-Cast, we pick up where we left off with part 2 of our conversation with Dr. Zareen Roohi Ahmed . In this episode, Zareen shares how she launched Gift Wellness without any business background, but with a powerful mission and drive.  In part 2 of our conversation, Zareen also discusses:  • Realising that period poverty wasn’t just abroad, but everywhere, including on her doors...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by Zareen Roohi , Founder & CEO of Gift Wellness , an inspiring voice in purpose-led entrepreneurship. In the first of a powerful two-parter, Zareen shares her remarkable life and career journey – from growing up as the daughter of Pakistani immigrants in the West Midlands to navigating early life challenges, building a remarkable and diverse career and...

This week on The Merri-Cast, I’m joined by the brilliant Karl Pontau – entrepreneur and host of The Human Connection Podcast .  Karl’s journey is nothing short of inspiring - from teenage brain tumour survivor to a purpose-driven entrepreneur, podcast host and soon-to-be author.  In this episode, Karl dives into the importance of having a network and forging real human connections, especially in a...

In this episode, I discuss a topic frequently misunderstood and undervalued: creativity. The everyday creativity that fuels problem-solving, drives innovation and unlocks confidence.  I explore three common barriers that hold people back in their creativity: ⏳ “I don’t have time to be creative” – Time constraints aren’t a barrier. It’s what can light your creativity in the first place. 🤔 “I’m no...

Joining me on The Merri-Cast this week is the fantastic Liz Sebag-Montefiore – co-founder of career and talent management consultancy 10Eighty .  Along with current CEO Michael Moran, the pair have steered the growth of the business for over 13 years now. And in June, Liz takes over as CEO, so it seemed like a great moment to talk to her about her entrepreneurial past, present and future.   In thi...