Stories of Success Podcast

In this week’s episode I welcome Cheryl Smith to my podcast. Cheryl leads talent management for Xerox, a public company with over 25,000 employees globally. She is a seasoned talent professional with over 25 years of success in talent assessment, succession planning, leadership development, employee engagement, organisational surveys and change programs for world-class, global organisations including Gartner, Legrand, Diageo, MetLife and AIG. Cheryl has a Ph.D. in Industrial /...

For 20 years, Tim Spiker, founder of The Aperio and author of The Only Leaders Worth Following has been helping individuals and organisations lead better, and find better leaders. He delivers keynote speeches and creates customised learning experiences to change the way people look at leadership, and he guides long-term developmental journeys as well. There is a lot more to his profile, and I encourage you to check out his website. What we discussed was: Leadership and how the Aperio...

In this first episode of 2021, it took me a while to understand what Csaba Toth was talking about. However, once I understood his ‘Uncommon Sense’ approach, I was sold! It makes so much sense! Csaba has a similar journey to myself, and we live very close to each other too; so we have met again, deepened my understanding and see what we can do to educate the world on uncommon sense. Since recording the episode, I already did the test, read part of the book and got some valuable insights....

This week's guest is Simon Squibb: a serial entrepreneur, angel investor, mentor, podcast host, founder and Chief Purpose Officer at the Purposeful Project. He retired at 40 but is now back. We recorded this episode a while back, with some friendly dogs barking in the background. He has started 17 businesses, invested in 66 and has mentored hundreds of founders. Having sold his award-winning insight-driven branding and digital agency, Fluid, to PwC, Simon now focuses on inspiring,...

I am very honoured to have Pascal Finette back for a second round. Pascal and I got introduced when I first launched my podcast in early 2018, and we recorded an episode then, which has been downloaded almost 300 times. He since has launched more things, became more famous, and I feel honoured he took some time to answer more of my questions. We ended up with an amazing chat over Zoom, and we jump straight into the episode, not worrying about the intro. A great conversation which I truly...

I interviewed Andy last year, just before Christmas 2019. He openly spoke to me about his illness, and his life limiting cancer. When I worked for Andy, I always enjoyed him as a manager, colleague and mentor. A family person, down to earth, giving sound advice. A father figure. Sadly, he passed away in October this year, and I wanted to show my respect by sharing his episode again, and raising awareness for cancer, and for life. Particularly now, in these uncertain times, it is an episode...

This week’s podcast is a panel discussion with four former guests. We took a long time to manage all our diaries and I was glad when we finally got together to discuss Covid19, personal development, and how it seems the positive things that came from lock down. An episode going deep. We are connecting more now, more intensely, and have less in-room tensions and emotions, going from one video call to another. Are we making the right connection? And what are we taking away from it, and how do...

In this episode of season 4 I welcome Marcel Daane. I am super excited to welcome Marcel as he has been prominent on my social media feeds for a long time. I admire the work he does as an executive and leadership coach, and his concept about body mind connection in a business world. Marcel and I actually recorded a live video cast and this podcast is a transcript of it - the audio form essentially. A fascinating conversation about mind body leadership, how we learn and how executives can...

Season Starter - I can’t believe we are in season 4 and I publish my 63rd podcast today. When I started the podcast it was all about ‘let’s see how it goes, I might do 10’, now it’s more like ‘let’s get to 100 and see how we can scale it’. So thank you for supporting me, and thank you to all my guests for giving up their time to be featured, answering my questions. This season is all about personal development, and about how you can improve as a person. I have some amazing guests lined...

For the last but not least episode of season 3 of my podcast, I welcome Lisa Ryan who is the Chief Appreciation Strategist at Grategy. As a Certified Speaking Professional, a Certified Virtual Speaker and the best-selling author of ten books including “The Upside of Down Times: Discovering the Power of Gratitude”, she shares a lot of information on how to become a professional speaker and what gratitude means in day to day life. Lisa also co-stars in two inspirational films with other...

This week I welcome Chris Hyland to my podcast. Chris is a tech entrepreneur that believes technology can be used for good and can dramatically impact the world in a positive way. He is lucky enough that his personal vision matches up with his company's vision at The Happiness Index. The reason I asked Chris to be on the podcast is to discuss happiness. What does happiness mean? Now in times of Covid19 and beyond? Does happiness equal success? Their vision is #FreedomToBeHuman -...

This week’s podcast is with Lizzy Hodcroft. She is an inspiration to talk to, on how to overcome mental health issues and becoming successful, selling a business and now launching a new business called Myndr. Lizzy has been a winner of North East Entrepreneur for two years in a row. Her honestly about her struggles with mental health and how entrepreneurship aided in her recovery is a breath of fresh air within a competitive and at times, draining business environment. In this podcast...

This week’s podcast is with a fellow German coach Stephanie Schaffner. After a corporate career in sales and business development, she changed direction to become a trainer for stress management and a coach for burnout prevention. The reason for that was because that she was suffering from stress herself, was close to a burnout, and a few of her colleagues had burnouts at work. Recorded during the lockdown, we talk about stress, and what burnout actually means. How is it defined? I...

On this episode I welcome Marek Zmysłowski. Marek is a Polish-born entrepreneur and executive, focused on online businesses in Frontier and Emerging Markets. At time of recording we are both in lockdown due to Covid-19. He is in Barcelona and I am in the UK. We discuss the impact Covid-19 might have on Africa as well. Marek is the author of a bestselling book called “Chasing Black Unicorns. How building the Amazon of Africa put me on Interpol Most Wanted list.” A story we will be...

This was a great recording with an industry friend around various topics. Not only did we discuss media, but we more-though spoke about what it means to have a burn-out and to live with anxiety, not only during the Covid19 crisis. Meet Sean Betts who is the Managing Director of Annalect in the UK and has worked in the media industry for 16 years. He has lived with depression and anxiety all his life and in 2017 experienced burn out. Since then he has been openly talking about his...

I enjoyed meeting Gian Power ACA on my podcast who set up his first business aged 13 and later worked at Deutsche Bank and PwC and witnessed first-hand some of the wellbeing & inclusion issues that need to be tackled in the corporate world. In 2015, an unexpected family tragedy changed Gian’s life forever, when his dad was murdered on a trip to India. When returning back to work, Gian saw the power of being able to share his emotions and being his full self at work. We are discussing...

This is a solo episode. First time I record on my iPad, and I hope the quality is ok. Just a few thoughts I have in these unprecedented and uncertain times. Let me know what you think! Stay positive! I also answer some questions around my passion and routines, and if you have any questions or comments, please reach out to me! Stay home, stay safe and be in touch!

In this week’s podcast I welcome Al Gerrie who is the Founder and CEO of ZigZag Global, a software solution to help e-commerce retailers manage returns domestically and globally. We recorded this at the peak internet time during the first week of national office closures due to the Corona virus, and unfortunately the connection dropped a few time. We speak about Corona/Covid-19 and how it impacts his business and the supply chain. ZigZag Global is connecting a global network of over 200...

My podcast this week is with a former colleague and friend Luis Esteban (LinkedIn). Not often do I ask colleagues to be on the podcast, but after meeting Luis Esteban last year, we just hit it off and have so many things in common. Luis is now CEO of Initiative Spain, and I moved on too. His Twitter handle is @lesteban In wake of the Corona Virus, we actually recorded this episode only last week. It hangs over us, yet we are focusing on leadership in unprecedented times as well as his...

When recording this amazing episode with Wasim Benharch I was buzzing - and it wasn't only because of the caffeine I had that day. Meeting Wasim opened my eyes to Learning and Development in organisations and the role it plays for retaining the right talent. Wasim introduced an onboarding programme at Methods Business and Digital Technology that has seen attrition reduced from almost 30% to single digits in the space of 12 months! So that’s clearly a success, and a story I wanted to hear...