Episódios
-
Guest Celyn Jones brings to light how those human factors combine to create great performances, and we are looking forward to exploring these factors from his perspectives as an actor, a screenwriter and as a producer.
-
You are about to undertake a change. It might be a small change. It might be a major transformation. You have decided you will need some external help to support your own teams. How do you go about selecting a partner to help your organisation? How do you define what you are looking for? Where do you look and what characteristics are important?
-
Estão a faltar episódios?
-
“We need to change how work is done, or we need to recognise that our most important asset is our people” – these are statements that are made year in year out – yet, not much seems to change. So what is the secret – how do we actively engage our people, how do help them to thrive, to grow and be able to bring their best selves to work every day. A culture which is inclusive and built on trust, fairness and inclusivity.
In this episode we will explore this challenge in real detail with Will and delve into some of his tips on how he runs a successful and happy organisation at The Timpson Group. -
In this episode, we will be exploring how do we ensure that organisations are “fit for today, but also fit for the future”. We will explore this from an organisation perspective, but also from the provision of public services perspective. What is the importance of developing existing and new skills, enabled by technology advances, to drive the execution of processes and delivery of services to citizens and the workforce.
-
The Art of Communication is the information that builds the connection in so many ways.
-
In this conversation, Gethin provides a scene-setting overview of the well-being landscape post-pandemic. The discussion focuses on whether organisations are returning to pre-pandemic practices or embracing a new era of well-being. Gethin reflects on the changes in the workplace experience since the dramatic events of Covid, offering insights into emerging trends and shifts in how companies approach employee well-being now that the pandemic is receding into the past.
From a broader perspective, companies with incomplete well-being initiatives might face challenges in building a positive and inclusive workplace culture. A lack of diversity and inclusion efforts, for instance, could contribute to a less supportive and harmonious work environment. -
In this episode Eric Tinch will explore this challenge in real detail and delve into the complexity of not only influencing senior stakeholders on the critical priorities, but then making it happen across the organisation and establishing / sustaining momentum.
-
Sile Walsh talks about what is inclusive leadership? How is leadership in times of disruption and volatility and the role of leadership in creating psychological safety and empathy.
-
Michael Esau and Simon Humphreys discuss key highlights as the podcast enters its third year. Reflecting on our most recent episodes from 2023, exploring the key talking points and take aways from nine podcasts released so far in the year whilst looking forward to episodes to be released later in year.
-
As human beings – what do we set out to achieve every day? From a human psychology perspective we know that all humans want to have a productive day in a relative sense, need to have a feeling of achievement, attainment or a feeling of being appreciated. As we have said on a regular basis on the podcast – what needs to happen for a person to go home at the end of the day and say “I had a good day”.
Throughout our series – we have touched on this topic many times, but there is still much to learn. Many of us operate within a team structure. We discussed team dynamics with the wonderful Paul Gustard and how he aligns, connects and drives the performance of his teams. Damian Hughes very kindly shared his views on how a performance culture is created. But we want to dig deeper into something we believe to be absolutely fundamental and a question that persists – how is the overall climate created and sustained by leaders, but also by the team itself to ensure goals are met, standards are maintained and all parties feel they are operating in a equitable and inclusive environment?
The word culture has been front and centre over the last 3 years especially in a business context and culture is integral to achieving on a day to day basis. Climate however is different – climate describes what it “feels like” to be in that team, in that group/situation and how is that climate conducive to people achieving their goals? Its our view that building and sustaining standards requires a considerable effort, building a culture of continuous growth requires a commitment from everyone – so the question persists – how is that done, how is that achieved?
We will be exploring all this today with Maggie and tapping into her extensive experiences. -
In all walks of life, and one of the great natural feelings of being a human being is that gut instinct for something. That feeling about something, a feeling in the stomach, a nagging doubt or a natural intuition. It’s fair to say we will have all experienced it at some point in our life.
In the world of business or sport or any industry where decisions made purely on instinct can be extremely costly, turning instinct into hard fact is an absolute imperative. In the world of work, this is where reporting and analytics support the process in a very big way and this is where the importance of raw data surfaces its head again. Data pulled from multiple sources can be examined to support or reject hypotheses (those gut feelings).
In the world of sport, analytics has become more and more integral to successful performance across a multitude of processes and disciplines - providing insights into individual and team performance both on and off the field of play. For example – it is used to determine tactics to win a match, it is used to monitor and prevent injuries to players, it is used to assist decisions made on buying or selling players where huge sums of money are spent on talent. To support this, more and more data is captured and analysed than ever before.
How then can technology sift through all this data and provide insights that will lead to the promised land of successful performance outcomes.
For this episode we will be diving back into the world of football and are super excited to be joined by someone who is leveraging analytics in a VERY big way to support the organisation and performance of his club TSG Hoffenheim in the German Bundesliga – the highest football league in Germany. -
Over the last 15 to 20 years as the age of consumerisation and digital has taken hold – the fabric of how we live our lives has changed beyond recognition. We now have the capability to curate and design the experiences that help us to live our life the way we wish – how we communicate, how we learn, how we connect, how we shop, how we transact, how we consume music, entertainment. This has then led to a broader decision about how the different elements are connected together – so I can surface data in one location, access all records at any one time, connect different devices around a home or with my car and much more.
Organisations in the last 20 years and this very much links into the future of work, have needed to understand this changing context and replicate the experiences people are having at home. For many this has required a reimagination of data, process, insights, roles, operating models, permission models and much more – but it has presented an amazing opportunity for organisations to enhance how they execute their strategy, drive efficiencies when possible and be even more effective with all decision taken related to people.
We welcome the opportunity to discuss this enormous topic with Marc Starfield who has been championing and creating integrated and connected platforms and experiences over the last 15 to 20 years, most recently as the Group Head of HR Programmes and Systems at Vodafone. -
Originally composed of 20 street performers in 1984, Cirque du Soleil Entertainment Group completely reinvented circus arts and has become a world leader in live entertainment. Established in Montreal, the Canadian organization has brought wonder and delight to over 180 million spectators with productions presented in 450 cities in 60 countries. Cirque du Soleil Entertainment Group currently employs 4,000 people, including 1,300 artists, who originate from nearly 50 countries.
The key question however – how do they do it??. As spectators, we marvel at the skill, the daring, the execution of acts we can only dream about, but it doesn’t happen by accident. Creating the culture and conditions for this amazing talent to grow and prosper takes real commitment and real focus. This begins by finding the right talent, bringing them into the organisation and then preparing them to participate in amazing shows. These can be complex processes that require time, patience, structure, leadership and much more.
In this episode – we will be exploring with Marie Noelle what happens behind the curtain every day to help create the greatest show on earth. -
Inclusivity, parity, acceptance, fairness, equality, diversity – these are common descriptive labels that we hear and see every day. As we begin 2023 a question that needs to be asked – are we making enough progress?
Last summer the England womens football team, known as the Lionesses, won the European Championship for the first time. It was an amazing tournament and one that will hopefully inspire younger generations to break through glass ceilings everywhere. But where do we go from here. The title of the episode today, “They think its all over, its only just begun” was an amazing way to summarise the success of the Lionesses, but also the tournament as a whole and what it could mean for womens football. Nearly 12 months on and the women’s game has gone from strength to strength with games taking place in landmark stadiums and achieving record crowds but the question still persists – why has it been so hard to achieve?Achieving parity has been an issue for many years, but creating the climate and conditions where people are treated equally and inclusively remains a perennial challenge.
In addition we have the ongoing debate surrounding generational shifts and the significance of the England women’s team winning the Euros and its ability to inspire the next generation should not be lost, But rather than just focus on the younger generations, we should also consider the transition from younger generation to middle age and how does age change our mindset. Do our life goals and priorities change when we reach mid-life? Is enough done to support people through the mid-life stage to enable it to be more productive and less disrupted.
We will be discussing these important topics and more with Gabby today and delving into her experiences of growing up in a sporting family and observing first hand her own experiences relating to inclusivity, achieving parity and also what it means for people when they approach mid-life. -
Throughout our podcast series we have touched on the areas of performance and personal growth. A common thread throughout many of the conversations has been the importance of doing the basics brilliantly as part of our daily performance.
What we haven’t perhaps discussed so far what “performance” actually means and how do we influence it, improve it and benefit from it. Over the last couple of years the term “high performance” has been coined and used extensively and I believe that has perhaps created a perception that only a small percentage can actually achieve “high performance” and can act as an inhibitor. So what is the bedrock of performance???
I love the quote from James March (Professor at Stanford University) “Neither Success nor Change requires dramatic action. The conventional, routine activities that produce most organisational change require ordinary people to do ordinary things in a competent way” which reinforces the theory that the execution of the basic fundamentals are the bedrock and foundation of our performance every day.
We will be exploring all this today with Danny and tapping into his work over the last 25 years working with an array of organisations, leaders, and individuals to drive their best level of performance and unblocking the myriad of barriers that often get in the way. -
A question - “how well do you know yourself?” Not at a superficial level, but really know yourself. Is understanding oneself something we need to do consciously, is it something that we discover across our lifetime – some may even ask “why is understanding self so important in the first place”? Aristotle once said – “Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom”. The author Doris Mortman stated “until you make peace with who you are, you will never be content with who you are”
We believe that understanding self is indeed the route to helping us fulfil potential, to realise goals and to achieve a degree of acceptance in relation to who we are. When I was younger, I would have given my right arm to be quicker like my brother, I wanted the confidence of my friends and at times I was envious they could do things I couldn’t and it had a significant impact on my esteem and confidence.
In recent times the term “imposter syndrome” has become much more common and I believe this is a direct correlation of how well we understand self, our capabilities, capacity and impact on others.
We will be exploring all this today with Glenn and tapping into his work over the last 25 years working with an array of organisations, leaders, individual contributors and helping them to fully achieve their potential and goals and to truly get a grasp on self and why they do what they do. -
In 2017, Googles DeepMind AlphaGo artificial intelligence defeated the worlds number one Go player Ke Jie. This was considered significant as Go is one of the worlds most complex games and this capability was thought to be another 20 years or so away. The AI built its capability by studying historical matches and playing thousands of games against itself to learn strategies. This felt like a tipping point for technology, finally beating its human creator with more than just brute force techniques. Five years on, the debate is less about what AI can do, and more about the ethics and morality of AI and Robotics. As organisations seek to embrace productivity savings and improvements from use of this technology, there are a number of talking points about the direction of travel that we will look to explore in this podcast. Questions such as should you say please and thank you to a chatbot, why are people outraged when we kick a robot dog, how can we build trust in AI rather than suspicion and doubt.
-
Through the pandemic and coming out the other side, there were so many column inches on what happened through that time, what it meant for the future and coined the now massively evolved term “The Great Resignation”. There is no doubt that things are different, that period of time arguably “shined a light” on changing expectations, preferences, perceptions towards work – but arguably, it has been a long time coming and maybe we need to take a fresh look at what it actually means to operate in this new era.
Throughout our series we have discussed and explored many of the topics that influence the human being in the workplace and we have discussed & debated the convergence of business, HR, people and technology on a few occasions. As we move into this new era, there is real merit in exploring this further and question whether it is time to change the narrative a little in terms of how organisations drive change, how technology is underpinning and enabling that change and what it means to the individual in terms of adoption and consumption.
We will be exploring this today with David and through the lens of his work as the Director of Research at the Fosway Group and how they advise organisations who are navigating their way through this ever-changing world that we live and work in. -
The first definition of culture comes from 19th-century British anthropologist Edward Tylor: Culture...”is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society”.
Culture has been called “the way of life for an entire society” In addition to its intrinsic value, culture provides important social and economic benefits. With improved learning and health, increased tolerance, and opportunities to come together with others, culture enhances our quality of life and increases overall well-being for both individuals and communities.
A question however – how is it really created and how is it created at scale? As the world around us evolves at a rate of knots, we have discussed many times on the podcast the changing preferences and expectations of the modern workforce, so how do organisation build, shape and retain a progressive culture that reflects the organisation and results in a successful organisation, happy employees but crucially happy customers.
We will be exploring this today with Sue and through the lens of a family business of multiple generations, where values and culture are absolutely central to their longevity and success. -
It has been over one hundred years since the job interview was started by the inventor of the alkaline storage battery, movie camera and the lightbulb – that person was Thomas Edison.
In 1921, Edison was a genius and frustrated with the university graduates who would ask him for a job, and so he developed a general knowledge test. The questions were a mix of literature, history, geography, with some related directly to the job available. The Smithsonian Institute reports only 7 percent of applicants could pass the 146 question quiz. Newspapers of the time reported Edison’s new method of eliminating candidates, which led to more companies using questionnaires. Eventually, the process evolved into the system most firms use today.
As we head further into this decade, I’m sure aspects of what Edison did 100 years ago will still exist in some processes today, but the whole process of sourcing, attracting and actually recruiting someone is very different today and much debate centres on who actually is in control of the process today – the candidate or the employer.
The attraction and retention of talent has always been a perennial challenge, but data is telling us that it is getting harder. Taking into account demographic changes, an aging workforce, the impact of Brexit, there are more open positions today than required candidates. When we also consider more people are choosing to work for themselves, we can see why attraction and retention is getting harder. Is it more than that? Has consumerisation also changed how we look at the process, expecting a seamless, frictionless process, not a long, drawn-out clunky process. It’s clear there is much to debate.
We are delighted to be joined by our guest today who has metaphorically and literally brought “A Fresh Perspective” to the world of attraction and recruitment and will be sharing her thoughts and insights on what has changed, what is working and what needs to be different in the future of the most competitive marketplace in the world. - Mostrar mais