The Brave Next Step

In this episode, I’m exploring observation as a leadership skill, and why being too close to a team, habit or way of working can make important patterns almost impossible to see.

A recent conversation with a former boss reminded me how powerful it can be when someone reflects back something about us that we cannot currently see for ourselves.

I also look at what happens when observations are ignored, dismissed or acknowledged without anything changing. Because noticing a pattern is only the beginning.

Real leadership means creating enough safety for people to sp...

In this episode, I’m exploring the difference between pressure that drains us and pressure that actually helps us perform better.

It started with something as simple as swimming, where I noticed that the targets I was setting for myself were creating more stress and fatigue without improving my performance.

I’ll share what happened when I removed those targets completely, and what changed again when I allowed a different kind of pressure in.

We’ll look at the self-authored deadlines, expectations and internal countdowns we create at work, and why real accountability, visibi...

In this episode, I’m exploring the psychology underneath delegation and why it is about far more than giving someone a clear brief and trusting them to get on with it.

I’m looking at dependence, independence and interdependence, and what each one asks of us as leaders.

I’ll also share why some leaders accidentally create the very dependence they complain about, why other people struggle to receive responsibility, and what genuine interdependence can look like in practice.

This is really a conversation about trust, responsibility and being honest about what you are wi...

In this episode, I’m getting practical about upward influence and what actually helps an idea land with senior decision-makers.

Building on the last episode, I’m looking at Yukl and Tracey’s influence tactics and the difference between simply having a strong argument and creating the conditions for someone to support it.

I’ll talk through the tactics that tend to work best when influencing upwards, including rational persuasion, inspirational appeals, consultation and coalition building.

I also share the mistakes I used to make, why consultation became one of the biggest shifts in my ow...

I’ve had to learn this one the hard way: having a good idea does not automatically mean people will get behind it.

For years, I often went straight to the decision maker, trusted the quality of my thinking to do the work, and skipped the slower job of bringing people with me. Sometimes that was impatience. Sometimes it was confidence. And sometimes, if I’m honest, it was arrogance.

In this episode, I’m looking at the five bases of power and what they teach us about influencing upwards.

We’ll explore where yo...

In this episode, I’m exploring why effective leadership is not about finding one perfect style and sticking to it. The people we lead are constantly changing, so the way we show up needs to change too.

Someone who needed direction last month might need space today, while someone who seemed confident may suddenly need more support.

I bring together situational leadership and co-active leadership to explain four practical ways of leading: from the front, beside, behind, and within the wider field.

This is really about attentiveness, self-awareness, and asking one honest question: am...

I’m reflecting on one of the hardest questions in leadership: what do you do when there is no obvious right answer? After a decision in my own business did not work out as planned, I found myself asking not what I should do next, but what I actually want.

In this episode, I explore why ambiguity is not a problem to fix, but a condition to navigate. We’ll look at the tolerance, curiosity and courage it takes to stay with uncertainty, resist rushing into a comfortable answer and take the next step before you feel comp...

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been doing more things alone, from attending a wedding solo to driving across Germany and exploring Munich by myself. None of it felt completely comfortable, but that was exactly the point.

In this episode, I’m reflecting on the confidence that grows when there’s nobody else to lean on, navigate for you or absorb the social risk.

Sometimes being alone reveals just how capable you already are. It can also give you more freedom to trust your instincts, make different choices and connect more honestly with the pe...

In this episode, I’m exploring self-authorisation, what it really means, and why it matters so much in leadership and life.

I share one of the hardest decisions I made as a teenager, when I chose to protect my own wellbeing without anyone telling me I was allowed to.

We often wait to feel ready, senior enough or confident enough before we speak, act or set a boundary. But confidence comes and goes.

Self-authorisation is a choice. It is deciding to trust your judgement, act from your values and say the thing that ne...

What if the thing holding your message back is not what you are saying, but how you are breathing while you say it?

In this episode, I’m joined by Melissa Thom, founder of Brava, to explore what leaders can learn from the world of broadcasting, voice work and performance.

We talk about why public speaking fear is so common, how breath can change the way you sound and feel, and why confidence is not the absence of fear.

Melissa also shares how authenticity and performance can work together, plus some brilliantly practical ad...

Why do people resist change, even when the change is positive?

In this episode, I’m exploring how the brain’s bias towards threat detection can shape behaviour at work, and why resistance, disengagement or conflict may not be an attitude problem at all.

I introduce the SCARF model and its five domains: status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness and fairness.

I also share practical examples of how leaders can unintentionally trigger threat responses, and how small changes in communication and behaviour can help people feel safer, more collaborative and more open to what comes next...

When we talk about breaking a habit, we often make change feel like a battle. In this episode, I’m exploring why words such as stopping, removing and giving something up can create resistance before we have even begun.

I share a simpler approach: swap the old pattern for something that moves you towards the person or leader you want to become.

With a real example of replacing one high-intensity activity with a more restorative option, I show how a small change in language can make new behaviour feel lighter, more achievable and far less li...

In this episode, I’m continuing what has accidentally become a three-part mini series on psychological safety, trust, and what leaders can do when something in the team feels off.

I talk through why it is so important to diagnose first, rather than rushing straight into action with a generic fix that might miss the real issue.

We explore the difference between trust and psychological safety, the questions that help you work out what is really happening, and a simple four-quadrant map leaders can return to again and again.

This is about noticing pa...

In this episode, I’m talking about trust, and honestly, how have we got to episode 60 without giving it its own moment? After last week’s reflections on psychological safety, I wanted to pull apart the difference between feeling safe in a group and deciding whether we trust another person.

I look at why trust is really about prediction and risk, how it builds over time, and why leaders need to know whether they are dealing with a trust issue or a psychological safety issue.

I also share two helpful models, the trust equation and Bren...

In this episode, I’m sharing a reflective learning moment from one of my most extreme leadership testing grounds, supporting my son in his ambitions as an athlete.

It has had me thinking deeply about psychological safety, what it really means to create it, and how easy it is for good intentions to land as pressure instead of support.

I’m talking about the fine line between helping and over-engineering, why leaders need their own support structures, and how high performance is rarely as simple as the shiny moment we see at the end.

Re...

In this episode, I’m talking about accountability, one of those words we use all the time in business, but often mean very different things by it.

Rather than seeing accountability as something reactive, something we only drag out when things go wrong, I’m exploring how we can think about it as a proactive relationship with a commitment.

I unpack the difference between responsibility and accountability, why psychological safety matters so much, and how leaders can accidentally kill accountability through micromanaging, vague expectations or punishing mistakes.

This is a practical look at how...

In this episode, I’m joined by Leah Boxell, CEO and founder of Enable Lists, for a conversation about legacy, impact and the people who shape us often without realising just how much they have done.

Leah begins with a powerful letter to her first boss, David, the person who saw something in her at 16 and gave her something that changed everything: hope.

Leah shares part of her personal story, from a difficult and traumatic childhood to building a successful career and founding her own business.

We talk about leadership, kindness, change, the im...

In this reflective episode, I’m talking about failure, or more specifically, whether we are sometimes too quick to call something a failure before we have actually understood what it came to teach us.

After a recent experience where the outcome was not what I had hoped for, I found myself thinking deeply about labels, judgement, shame and the way we respond when things feel messy.

I explore the difference between failure, error, mistake and unintended outcome, and how each word changes the way we think, feel and act. For leaders, this matters.

Th...

In this episode, I’m taking a slightly lighter route, inspired by a book that made me laugh, made me feel a little bit seen, and reminded me how easy it is to question what success is supposed to look like.

It also got me thinking about gratitude, and why we have not really talked about it here before.

I’m sharing why noticing the positives matters, especially when life and leadership feel busy, messy or heavy. From a clearer-than-expected commute to a kind voice note from a colleague, the small things can genuinely shift your...

In this episode, I’m talking about change, and why it can feel so much harder than we expect, even when we genuinely want it.

Whether you’re trying to shift something in yourself, your team, or a whole organisation, there’s usually an existing system quietly trying to pull everything back to how it was.

I revisit Kurt Lewin’s three-step change model, unfreeze, change, refreeze, but focus on the part that often gets overlooked: community. Because change is rarely just about process.

It’s about people, support, shared experience, and not feeling li...

In this episode, I’m exploring a simple but powerful tool that can help us understand how we’re really doing as leaders.

I’m talking about the energy emotion matrix, how our energy and emotions work together, and what they reveal about whether we’re performing, renewing, surviving or heading towards burnout.

This is a practical conversation, but it’s also a deeply human one. If you’ve been feeling stretched, flat or just slightly off, this framework can help you make sense of it and decide what you need next, with more honesty, self-awarene...

In this episode, I’m talking about something easy to forget and impossible to escape as a leader, people are always watching. Not in a dramatic way, but in the everyday moments that quietly shape how others respond to you, trust you, and decide what feels safe around you.

I explore why leadership is never just about what we say, it is also about what our behaviour teaches people over time.

I also get into the habits leaders create without meaning to, from rushed decision making to cancelled one-to-ones and the signals we send about wo...

In this episode, I’m reflecting on a few milestones that stopped me in my tracks, ten years since leaving corporate employment, the end of the first quarter of 2026, and the realisation that both have stirred up more reflection than I expected.

I talk about burnout, identity, purpose and what I have learned about myself through stepping away from employment and building something of my own.

I also share what this last quarter has brought up for me, from emotional heaviness and pressure to the reminder that pushing through is not always the answer.

...

In this episode, I’m talking about something so many leaders wrestle with, challenging conversations. The ones we know we need to have, but would often rather avoid.

I explore why we so often frame these moments as a choice between honesty and kindness, when actually the most effective leadership asks for both.

I also get into what really makes these conversations feel hard, from fear of conflict to worrying how the other person will respond, and why better preparation can change everything.

This one is practical, thoughtful and a really useful reminder th...

In this episode, I’m reflecting on resilience from a deeply personal angle, after a sudden change of plans gave me an unexpected week back.

I talk about the pressure so many of us feel to fill every spare moment with work, and the quiet but important choice to do something different instead. It became a real test of boundaries, self-trust and what resilience actually asks of us.

I also unpack why I no longer think resilience is about bouncing back. As human beings, we do not return to some original state after pressure or di...

In this episode, I’m talking about something that can feel surprisingly uncomfortable, silence. Not the awkward kind we rush to fill, but the kind that creates space for better thinking, deeper reflection and more honest conversations.

I explore why so many of us treat silence like something has gone wrong, when actually it can be one of the most useful tools we have as leaders.

I also share how silence supports coaching, delegation, trust and problem solving, especially when the temptation is to jump in too quickly with answers.

This one is a...

In this episode, I’m joined by Steve Hoblyn for a thoughtful, honest conversation about leadership, mental health, and what happens when life forces us to stop pretending we’re fine.

We talk about burnout, identity, recovery, and why so many workplaces still reach for surface-level fixes when what people actually need is real human connection.

We also get into the power of slowing down, asking better questions, and leading with more courage and less performance.

Steve shares his own story with so much generosity, and this one really stayed with me. It’s the...

Changing your boundaries at work can feel surprisingly uncomfortable, not just for you but for the entire organisation around you.

In this episode, I explore what actually happens when a leader shifts their boundaries and why systems often resist that change.

Using ideas from open systems theory, we look at how organisations instinctively try to restore their previous equilibrium when behaviour changes.

From guilt and escalation to subtle pressure to revert to old habits, I unpack why resistance is part of the process and how holding your nerve can ultimately create healthier teams...

Last week, I explored boundaries from a personal perspective. This time, I’m widening the lens and looking at what boundaries really mean when you’re leading a team or a function.

Because whether we realise it or not, we are always standing at an interface. Between teams. Between expectations. Between pressure and performance.

In this episode, I talk about input gates, output gates, scope creep, and the uncomfortable but necessary negotiations that define great leadership.

If we do not manage the boundary, someone else will, and it is usually the loudest voice in t...

I realised, slightly to my surprise, that we had never recorded a dedicated episode on boundaries.

Considering how often this shows up in my work with leaders and HR professionals, it felt well overdue. So this is part one of a deeper exploration into how boundaries shape the way we lead, grow, and protect what really matters.

In this episode, I share a simple systems theory lens to help you think about rigid boundaries, overly permeable ones, and what a healthy, semi permeable boundary looks like in practice.

If you have ever found...

In this episode, I’m joined by Jenny Burns, CEO of Magnetic, for an honest and energising conversation about what it really means to “accidentally” step into the CEO role.

Jenny shares her journey from big corporates to running a design and innovation business, and why she never actually set out to become a CEO.

We talk about the myth of readiness, why avoidance quietly sabotages leaders, and how energy, not authority, often defines great leadership.

This is a conversation about confidence, feedback, AI, identity, and what it takes to lead in heavy, uncert...

This is part two of my exploration into dependency, and this time I’m approaching it through a psychodynamic lens.

I reflect on how our earliest experiences of care and survival shape the way we relate to dependency as adults, and how those patterns quietly show up in leadership, teams, and organisations.

I also share some personal reflections on how dependency can surface under pressure, why some leaders lean into counter dependency, and how stress can pull us back into old relational patterns.

This episode is an invitation to notice where dependency may be...

This episode came straight from real life. As I watched my son move from dependence to independence, it made me pause and reflect on how dependency shows up in leadership and in the workplace.

What we expect from others, what we take on ourselves, and how easily those patterns shift without us really noticing.

I explore dependency through an emotional intelligence lens and look at why interdependence, not total independence or reliance, is where the strongest leadership sits.

This is a reflective, honest episode for leaders who want to understand how their behaviour...

I sat down with Gabe Winn, founder of Blakeney, and honestly, his career path is a full plot twist marathon.

Actor dreams, Accenture, game ranger training in Zimbabwe, then yes, a BBC show that involved being trained like a spy, and somehow it all makes sense once you hear how he thinks about people, purpose, and influence.

We get into the courage it takes to call out what’s wrong (especially when it makes you unpopular), why vulnerability is a leadership strength, and what it really looks like to build a business when the buck st...

This week I noticed something fascinating, I had several client conversations that all circled the same frustration: “My people just aren’t doing what I need them to do.” And I get it, that feeling can turn into pure exhaustion, and then resignation.

So today I’m talking about the part we usually skip, the connection between what you do and how others respond. If you want new behaviours in your team, you have to be the stimulus, consistently.

We’ll look at why empowerment fails when you’re still deep diving, how habit change really works...

I’m back with a more personal episode, sharing the self-reflection I’ve been doing over the last few months and the question that’s been steering it all: what do I need in place to do my best work?

After an intense stretch of travel and back-to-back client weeks, I realised I was running on fumes, and that’s not the energy I want to bring into the room.

I talk about why reflection builds resilience and emotional intelligence, plus the practical shifts that have helped me re-energise: protecting thinking time, planning so I feel in...

As we step into a new year, I wanted to pause and challenge the way we think about New Year’s resolutions. I share why I am not a huge fan of big, dramatic goals set in January, and why so many of them quietly fall away by the end of the month.

This episode is about reframing resolutions as habits, and giving yourself permission to start, stop, adjust and recommit without judgement.

I also reflect on the goals that have actually worked for me, and the common thread between them. Small steps, realistic expectations an...

As we close out 2025, I wanted to slow things down and talk about gratitude, not in a cliched end of year way, but as a real, everyday leadership practice. 

I share research that shaped my own thinking, showing how much more weight negative thoughts and interactions hold compared to positive ones. Understanding this has changed the way I speak to myself and the way I show up for others.

In this episode I walk through my own weekly gratitude habits, the tiny moments that keep me grounded and the impact they have had on my m...

This episode is a little different, because instead of sharing my reflections, I am handing the space over to you.

As we reach the end of the year, it is the perfect moment to pause, look back and make sense of what shaped you as a leader in 2025. Reflection is one of the strongest predictors of leadership growth, yet it is the habit most people skip when the pace picks up.

Across twelve thoughtful questions, I guide you through the moments that tested you, surprised you and changed you. You will explore what worked, what...

I loved recording this one because it is such a classic leadership trap. We rush straight into the topic, full of energy and opinions, but skip the one thing that would actually help us reach a decision. 

This episode came from a real moment on a rugby club committee where an innocent line in a terms of reference opened up a bigger question about what collective decision making truly means.

I talk through the simple shifts that help groups make decisions with far less friction. Whether you prefer consensus, majority rule or delegated accountability, the c...