About This Episode

In this episode I am delighted to be in conversation with Karen Wilkinson, inspiring and award winning Marketing Director. We delve together into:

1. The power of connecting with your Values & Purpose
2. How knowing your Strengths and not sweating your weaknesses is the best way to Focus and Fly
3. Why Courage & Belief and Stepping out of your comfort zone is all part of being Brave
4. Adventure Seeking - On seizing the day and going for it!

Karen’s three key encouragements to leaders looking to Be Brave, Fly and Focus

1. Unlock the power of maximising your strengths - Acknowledge what support you need to be at your best - people who compliment you, your support team. And be mindful of overusing your strengths!
2. Feel the fear and do it anyway - The immense power in self belief, power of possible, managed risks, seeking growth opportunities, believing in others. Accept not everything will go to plan...that's ok! Adapt, pivot, change if you need to…. That’s all part of a Marketing Leaders toolkit.
3. Stay curious, embrace adventure.. And smile - The world, our teams, our customers (next gen!)technology is all changing. Stay curious, we’ll never ‘know it all’, seek adventure and find enjoyment in all you do . After all, we work, love, live to find fulfilment, growth and connect with our values .. whilst having fun along the way!

About Karen

Karen is a passionate marketing leader - with over 25 years of experience working in consumer products and financial services & banking. Most recently Marketing Director for AkzoNobel, parent of Dulux for 9 years. Adding colour to lives and creating beautiful living spaces.

Currently with Evergreen Garden Care as Marketing Director UK&I, where she continues to connect with her passions for colour, growth and being outdoors.

She graduated from Dublin City University with BA in international marketing and languages, and has worked, lived and studied in Ireland, Spain, Germany, Austria and Slovenia.

Karen lives in Buckinghamshire with her husband and is a parent to two teens. Their 19yr old son is on a solo adventure in Japan, and 18yr old daughter is preparing for A levels. Together they teach Karen to have fun, be brave and practise what I preach (to them!).

She loves being outdoors and being active… running, cycling, hiking, swimming, skiing, walking! And never says no to a challenge with friends.

She is always seeking new learning, travel and adventures.. Ice skating, painting, and has climbed 2000m mountains, cycled through the Alps and Dolomites, enjoys kayaking and cold water swimming.

Connect with Karen

LinkedIn: Karen Wilkinson

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

About This Episode

In this episode I am delighted to be in conversation with Helen Stephenson, CEO of the Charity Commission for England and Wales

We delve together into:

1. How as a leader the main tool in your leadership is yourself, which means you need to understand how you work - your strengths and weaknesses
2. Why getting the right team is crucial and making sure you recruit people who are different from you, and who have the right skills and personality to fit with the organisation and its needs.
3. Why leadership is All about relationships
4. And how there is no perfect leader, and the importance of knowing when good is good enough rather than aspiring to be everything all at once!

Helen’s Three Key Encouragements to Leaders

• Know when you need to dive into the detail on an issue (you can’t/shouldn’t be across everything) and signal to your team that’s what you’re doing
• Being a leader is seeking to be a better version of yourself
• It can be lonely, have some support networks

To connect, follow and find out more about Helen:

LinkedIn: Helen Stephenson

Website: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/charity-commission

To find out more about Future Engage Deliver, www.futureengagedeliver.com

Buy the book by Steve Radcliffe ‘Leadership Plain and Simple’

https://www.pearson.com/en-gb/subject-catalog/p/leadership-plain-and-simple/

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend do go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

About Helen Stephenson

I was first introduced to Helen Stephenson by Steve Radcliffe, who thought we would partner well together in some Executive Team Coaching for Helen’s team. He was right! Helen and I have worked together with her leadership team over the past few years. We have introduced them to Future Engage Deliver, a leadership approach developed by Steve Radcliffe and wonderfully written about in his book Leadership Plain and Simple. And have gone on to share with my colleague Emily Court the Future Engage Deliver approach with the wider organisation of leaders, and their teams. It has been a privilege to work with Helen, and to be trusted by her to lead this programme - her commitment to developing people, and their leadership in particular has never wavered. On many occasions she has joined a development day, and been part of the welcoming and opening of the day sharing her leade

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

Welcome and welcome back to Leaders in Conversation with me, Anni Townend, the podcast that helps you to grow confidence, care and courage in your leadership.

I created this series of candid conversations for leaders to share their inspirational personal leadership stories, weaving together the threads of their life - the people, places and experiences that have shaped them and made them the leader that they are today.

They offer valuable insights and rich experience to help and inspire you on your own unique leadership journey. If you are not already please do subscribe to the podcast, review and share it. Thank you!

About This Episode

In this episode I am delighted to be in conversation with Julian Roberts, Executive Business Coach, Podcast Host of Helping Organisations Thrive

We delve together into:

1. Why the need for resilience in leadership in today’s workplace is greater than ever.
2. How to create a resilient mindset to lead your team and organisation.
3. And how to create resilient teams that are better equipped to navigate challenges and thrive in an ever-changing environment.

Julian’s Three Key Encouragements to Leaders

1. Lead by example, through developing a resilient mindset and behaviours that inspire confidence in others, helping them to adapt to change; and as part of that foster a supportive work environment, one in which people are helped to navigate challenges and uncertainties effectively.
2. Create daily habits that build resilience as a leader all embedded within your purpose.
3. Focus on the 3 P’s of Purpose, Psychological Safety and Processes - Reduce, Regulate and Repair

Contact Julian:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/julesroberts/

Website: https://www.julianrobertsconsulting.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/julesroberts45/

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

About Julian Roberts

Julian Roberts, an Executive Business Coach with a background in commercial and sales, is passionate about people, resiliency, and business. He has held a number of senior strategic commercial positions for multinational corporations such as Heinz, Yoplait, and Johnson & Johnson, as well as for family-owned businesses.

In 2017, he launched his coaching practice, working with individual

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

About This Episode

In this episode I am delighted to be in conversation with John Edwards, Director General, Regions Group, at the Department for Education, UK.

John and I were invited to be in conversation by and for the annual Transform Applied Leadership Summit, held virtually this year on 8th March 2024. The title of our conversation Understanding Ourselves and Understanding Others - a leadership perspective is the title of the summit.

(For listeners who don’t know about Transform Applied Leadership I share their details at the end of the podcast, along with ways in which you can connect with John.)

John and I delve together into:

1. How becoming a leader is all about finding your own leadership
2. The alignment between who we are, how we lead and why we lead, and what it means to be an authentic leader
3. The importance of being aware of individual and collective leadership behaviour and the impact that it has on others
4. 360 degree leadership and measuring our leadership achievements through the successes of others

John’s three key encouragements for leaders looking to grow their leadership identity, build greater confidence and understanding in their leadership behaviours.

1. We never need to create our leadership approach, or copy it from others - we just need to find it, observe it and look after it
2. We don’t need to worry about making time for DOING leadership, only for THINKING ABOUT leadership - it’s not an extra job, it’s how we do the job we have
3. Listen to others but trust your instincts - there is no right answer

How to connect with John Edwards on LinkedIn

The Transform Applied Leadership Summit happens annually and is designed to stimulate new ways of thinking and behaving in our leadership. Delegates come from education and reflect upon their own leadership, have conversations with other leaders, and to hear speakers from different backgrounds.

To find out more about the Summit, and Leadership Applied the leadership study and research; the leadership experts and about the Future Engage Deliver approach to leadership developed by Steve Radcliffe do go to the website:

https://www.transformapplied.co.uk/leadership-applied

Contact Anni Townend
anni@annitownend.com
www.annitownend.com

About John Edwards

Having started out as a secondary school maths teacher, I’ve had the privilege to work in schools, local government and now central government - but still, when asked what I do, the word ‘teacher’ is the first word that comes to mind. 11 years in three schools was followed by 14 years working in three different local authorities, responsible for the full range of education and skills functions in largely urban settings. I now head up the Department for Education’s Regions Group, covering improvement, intervention and capacity-building for schools, children’s

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

About This Episode

In this episode I am delighted to be in conversation with Tanya Shadrick - author of The Cure for Sleep: her memoir of a late waking life, a story of breaking free, and making a more creative life; Tanya is founder of the Selkie Press; editor of the Wainwright Prize-listed Wild Woman Swimming. She is a community builder of writers and storytellers through Substack where she writes, and invites you to share your stories.

We delve together into:

What it takes - and costs - to build an authentic life of one’s own, while continuing to honour our roles within families, workplaces, and communities.

And explore four key themes:

1. The voices around us - and the beliefs that we form about ourselves and our abilities because of what is praised or punished.
2. Our Size and Shape - and how related to beliefs about ourselves, and our abilities, we (perhaps) make ourselves smaller
3. Work - and how writing about work is central to Tanya’s storytelling
4. The importance of service, of finding the best in ourselves, and each other, for the good of others, and to deliver use and meaning to others

Three key encouragements

1. Look how far you’ve come… We can forget how hard we once found things that are now a core part of our senior roles - public speaking, say, or preparing a visual presentation for stakeholders or investors. Write 500 words from the you of now to the twenty-something you once were, starting out. Be in dialogue. Remember the vivid details. It releases a kind of energy that helps us be better mentors and encouragers to our graduate staff and our career returners.
2. A list of what you love… spend an hour making a list of 100 things you love about your work life. It will seem impossible to get anywhere near that number. Your first few items might seem so simple, so insufficient - just a list of obvious things: the salary, the pension, the status, the holiday allowance. But as you persist, the process starts to yield surprising results - by the time you get to around sixty, or eighty, most people find themselves remembering their deepest values, their fiercest ambitions and so on.
3. How do you talk about your job to those you don’t work with? This is a very different exercise from crafting ‘an elevator pitch’ and its purpose is deeper, broader. Having a simple, authentic way to speak with quiet pride about what you do is one of the most useful ways to connect with other people - it extends to them the possibility of sharing what matters to them too: whether that’s their paid work, their passion, or an unpaid voluntary role.

Contact Tanya via her website, for writing resources, and podcasts:

www.thecureforsleep.com
https://tanyashadrick.substack.com/

To contact Anni Townend
anni@annitownend.com
www.annitownend.com

About Tanya Shadrick

I first heard of Tanya through a friend that I met som

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

Welcome and welcome back to Leaders in Conversation with me, Anni Townend, the podcast that helps you to grow confidence and courage your leadership.

I created this series of candid conversations for leaders to share their inspirational leadership stories, weaving together the threads of their life - the people, places and experiences that have shaped them and made them the leader that they are today.

They offer valuable insights and rich experience to help and inspire you on your own unique leadership journey. If you are not already please do subscribe to the podcast, review and share it. Thank you!

About This Episode

In this episode I am delighted to be in conversation with Moses Tai Founder and CEO African Development Choices (ADC), Author of ‘There Is Shade’ and Speaker.

We delve together into the working culture of African Development Choices, in particular how they encourage community and reflect who they are in what they do:

• Seeking and giving input, raising awareness of choice
• Showing and taking initiative as part of sustainable change
• Commitment to the organisation and its purpose through building belief and hope, and working together

Moses’ Three Key Encouragements to Leaders

1. Develop a strong vision
2. Recruit and retain talented people
3. Build well structured teams

Connect with Moses Tai, and find out more about African Development Choices

www.linkedin.com/in/mosestai

https://mybook.to/TISHADE

https://africandevelopmentchoices.org/

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

About Moses

My mission with the podcast is to be in conversation with people who have a passion and purpose (no matter how small or large), and, who want to make a difference through their leadership, and to give them a way of sharing their story to inspire, confidence, care and courage in you the listener - far and wide. So when Taryn Weeks of Sparks Marketing suggested that Moses would be a great guest I contacted him, and bought a copy of his book ‘There Is Shade’. Moses is an inspiring leader, a passionate voice for sustainable change.

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

Welcome and welcome back to Leaders in Conversation with me, Anni Townend, the podcast that helps you to grow confidence, care and courage in your leadership.

I created this series of candid conversations for leaders to share their inspirational personal leadership stories, weaving together the threads of their life - the people, places and experiences that have shaped them and made them the leader that they are today.

They offer valuable insights and rich experience to help and inspire you on your own unique leadership journey. If you are not already please do subscribe to the podcast, review and share it. Thank you!

About This Episode

In this episode I am delighted to be in conversation with Roger Mortlock, Chief Executive Officer, CPRE, the countryside charity.

Together we delve into what it means to lead:

• A heritage organisation, being open
• In a federated structure, being humble
• A campaigning organisation, being brave

ROGER’S THREE ENCOURAGEMENTS TO LEADERS

1. Do it your way - learn from the leaders who help you grow as a person as well as a leader
2. Find and honour that which gives you joy at work, what you love - give yourself space to flourish as well as face into the challenge
3. Keep making the time and space to imagine the future

To contact Roger

LinkedIn: Roger Mortlock

Website: www.cpre.org.uk


About Roger Mortlock

I first met Roger some twenty years ago and have had the privilege of partnering with him, and the teams he has led and been part of over the years.

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.

Welcome and welcome back to Leaders in Conversation with me, Anni Townend, the podcast that helps you to grow confidence and courage your leadership.

I created this series of candid conversations for leaders to share their inspirational leadership stories, weaving together the threads of their life - the people, places and experiences that have shaped them and made them the leader that they are today.

Together we delve into what they really care about, their values and beliefs, their passion and purpose and how they live and weave these through their leadership every day, in all that they do.

They offer valuable insights and rich experience to help and inspire you on your own unique leadership journey. If you are not already please do subscribe to the podcast, review and share it. Thank you!

About This Episode

In this episode I am delighted to be in conversation with Febronia Ruocco, Strategic Insights Professional, Executive Coach and Mentor

We delve and explore together leadership values and skills, and the importance of these in Febronia’s life, leadership, insights and mentoring work. In particular the values of:

1. Integrity
2. Collaboration
3. Honesty
4. Empathy

Febronia’s three encouragement to leaders:

1. Bear in mind that people have gone through very difficult times: the pandemic, the economic crisis.
2. Be kind with your feedback, with your encouragement, with your guidance, be supportive, have empathy for your teams, and try to instil in them a sense of safety so that they can come and they can share their views and perceptions freely.
3. And also, if you have time, please do some mentoring. There are lots of young people out there at universities and schools, at the beginning of their jobs, who really could do with a guiding hand.

How to contact Febronia

LinkedIn: Febronia Ruocco

About Febronia

I first met Febronia through LinkedIn - she not only liked my podcast, but also commented, and messaged me personally. Febronia has her own podcast weekly roundup of the best listens, and it is a huge honour to have been chosen by her more than once! She is a Strategic Insights Professional and Executive Coach. And she is also a Leadership and Career Mentor for Undergraduates at Durham and Lancaster University. After several exchanges via LinkedIn we arranged a call and discovered that we shared similar passions, and had some shared experiences. I am delighted that she agreed to be my guest, and to share her leadership story.


To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website:
www.annitownend.com/podcast

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on

To listen to other Leaders in Conversation with me Anni Townend go to my website, www.annitownend.com

A big thank you to my support team at the Conscious Marketing Group for helping me with all the marketing of the podcast, to Coco O’Brien for the wonderful intro and outro music, for the lovely design, and for the excellent editing and sound production.

To contact me Anni Townend do email me on anni@annitownend.com visit my website www.annitownend.com, subscribe to my newsletter and follow me on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting with you, thank you for listening.