On this one I was delighted to be joined by Francesca Hodgson, MBA, the successful entrepreneur and Founder of We are Ambition, a business consultancy offering fractional leadership, growth services, mentoring and coaching.

This was a fascinating conversation with Francesca where we explored the need for clarity of mind, as it relates to the entrepreneurial journey.

🌟 Some of the most interesting parts of our conversation were:
✅The power of authenticity, how it helps build confidence, and acts like a rocket ship for motivation;
✅The work that Francesca has been doing around the promoting of mental resilience as a positive tool to achieve your goals.
✅How everything is fighting for our attention and clarity of mind allows you to engage and articulate what it is that you're doing;
✅That it all starts with values and taking time to understand what matters to you and in what order, can really help inform why we do what we do;
✅Why coaching and mentoring combined can be such a powerful way to help people understand what is important to them and what to prioritise to execute their vision;

Business Book Bonus:

Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of NIKE: https://amzn.eu/d/4l3ZZOM
Trillion Dollar Coach: https://amzn.eu/d/5WEHeVS

On this one I was very pleased to be joined by @Jon Reay and @Tim Seddon, the Co-Founders OF @Room 42, a start-up that facilitates effective change and innovation through the use of Design Thinking based programmes, to help businesses tackle the most challenging of live business problems.

I really enjoyed this conversation with Jon and Tim where we dived into how they went on the journey to start Room 42 and specifically how they have seen Design Thinking used to improve Financial Performance.

🌟 Some of my favourite parts of our conversation were:

✅ How, if you can break up and disrupt day to day thinking, it provides the opportunity to inspire different interactions that can be the key to unlocking new thinking and ideas;

✅ How, if you get the right direction of travel, with a small team, Design Thinking can offer opportunities for small businesses to leapfrog larger competitors;

✅ Having a CFO or Finance professional within any change management program from the outset is really critical to help projects succeed more quickly;

✅ Their experience of imposing change top down, leads to a demotivated business that's struggling to adapt to change, while engaging with everyone leads to a much more highly motivated and agile business;

✅ How one of my favourite books, Douglas Adams, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy helped inform both their company name and their approach to business.

On this one I was very pleased to be joined by Emilia De Stasio, CFA, the Founder & COO at Artscapy, the wealth management platform dedicated to art collecting.

I really enjoyed this conversation with Emilia where we explored her background in Finance, her love of Art and her journey over the past 4 years as she has co-founded Artscapy, a platform dedicated to the needs of art collectors.

🌟 A flavour of some of my favourite parts of our conversation:
✅ Emilia’s personal passion for art and its importance to her both in terms of its mental wellbeing effects and her desire and mission supporting this aspect of society;
✅ How, contemporary art provides both some of the best performing returns in the passion asset space along with real downside protection;
✅ How Emilia’s banking background has informed her approach to valuing art and the approach that they are taking at Artscapy;
✅ The marrying of the technology with the Advisory service that a higher value wealth management service demands;
✅ The benefits Emilia has found in having a strong network of mentors and peers to share ideas around the challenges in scaling the business.

Business Book Bonus Recommendation - Let My People Go Surfing by Yvonne Chouinard: https://amzn.eu/d/ivgkRRA