My Approach
WHAT IS MY APPROACH TO THE ROLE OF SPECIAL ADVISOR?
I work with brilliant people doing brilliant things - but they're also human. I take my clients from a 'playing not to lose' mindset to a 'playing to win' mindset. I do this in three steps - agitation, imagination and motivation:
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Agitation. I ask the difficult questions that take my clients out of their comfort zone, to break through the thinking they find themselves stuck in.
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Imagination. Then we put every idea on the table with a boundary-pushing brainstorm that arrives at bigger and bolder decisions.
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Motivation. Finally, if needed, I give my clients the confidence required - the shot in the arm - to go and execute on their new plans.
WHY ME?
I have worked in the City, launched and sold a start-up, sat on the Global Executive of an NYSE-listed brokerage, turned companies around, acted as a Special Advisor to C-level execs for over a decade and, during a brief spell in copper mining in Zambia, had two meetings with President Banda to (successfully) negotiate a mining licence. I understand the realities of business.
Also... I used to be funny. I was a comedy writer, briefly a stand-up, the writer on the Zoe Ball Radio 1 Breakfast Show, then, much later, had two thrillers published with Penguin. I have a creative mind and a creative outlook.
I have been a regular contributor to Bloomberg News and CNBC Europe, as well as heading up City roadshows and giving countless speeches over my lifetime. I have strong communication skills.
WHAT CAN I DO FOR YOU?
Too often I find myself in conversation with leaders who, exhausted by events, are more occupied with survival than growth. Too many leaders are growing their companies incrementally, cautiously - playing not to lose. And yet breakthroughs in every field of life come from thinking creatively, imagining leaps and taking them. That is my challenge to leaders: to think bigger and bolder - to play to win. My job is to help them do that.
Clients have called me a creative disruptor, somebody who holds them to account, but they would also all say this - and I know this is a very odd dimension to highlight: Everybody I work with says that I make them feel more confident, happier, even. One client recently said, “Why don't you write a book called, ‘You’ve Got This’?”
It's incredibly hard to run a business all by yourself and it's definitely lonely at the top. I truly believe leaders deserve to be happy. It is transformative both for them and their companies. In short, I am here to lift your thinking and, when necessary, your spirits.