Episodes

April 13, 2024

Dr Lixing Sun on Natural Lying

Why do we lie and cheat and why might it not always be a bad thing? On this episode, I’m speaking to a research professor who has studied lying and cheating in the natural world and what we can learn about it in the human world.    My guest, Dr...
April 6, 2024

Zelda Perkins on Can't Buy My Silence

What prompted a courageous former employee of Harvey Weinstein to break her Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA)?   On this episode I'm speaking to a campaigner who came to prominence as the individual who broke the silence surrounding the misconduct of...
March 30, 2024

Professor Magda Osman on Risk Prioritisation

How, in a world of limited resources, can we prioritise risk? Which ones should we focus on more than others? This isn't just something we need to think about in a work context.  It also applies to our personal lives; where should we spend our money,...
March 24, 2024

Nuala Walsh on Tuning In

How can we make better decisions?  By paying attention to good advice or information and ignoring the opposite.  In a world where we're overloaded with data and opinions, it can be hard to determine what is good and what is bad advice. My guest Nuala...
March 17, 2024

Preethi Nair on Storytelling

What does storytelling have to do with managing risk? On this episode, I’m speaking to novelist, playwright, and screenwriter Preethi Nair.  She also helps people who want to tell their stories to identify the one that will resonate and tell them in...
March 10, 2024

Heather Urquhart on Improvisation Part Two

What can business learn from improvisation? If you listened to the previous episode of the shwo, you'll know the answer. If you haven't yet done so, then I recommend dojgn that before listening to this. Because this is Part Two of my discussion with...
March 3, 2024

Heather Urquhart on Improvisation Part One

What can business learn from improvisation? On the face of it, a form of entertainment that involves making things up as you go along, seems to be filled with human risk and not at all helpful in the business world. But actually, the skills that...
Feb. 26, 2024

Sabrina Ahmed on Burnout

What is burnout, and how can we prevent it? We're increasingly hearing about the idea of 'burnout', which the World Health Organisation has defined as a condition "resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed"....
Feb. 18, 2024

Dr Ollie Hart on Healthcare Coaching

What is Healthcare Coaching? If I say the word ‘doctor’ to you — in a medical, not academic, sense— you’ll probably think of someone in a white coat with a stethoscope who makes medical assessments and prescribes treatments and drugs to patients....
Feb. 12, 2024

Alison Taylor on Doing The Right Thing

How can businesses do the right thing? What does that even mean and why does or should it matter? What is Business Ethics? Business ethics used to be a case of dealing with things like bribery and fraud, which companies tried to — and often did —...
Feb. 3, 2024

Niall Downey on Mistakes

What happens when a surgeon decides to become an airline pilot? You get some amazing insights into mistakes, how they happen and what we can do to mitigate them. That surgeon and now pilot is my guest Niall Downey. He’s also the author of a book...
Jan. 28, 2024

Solène Clément on Pragmatic Compliance

What happens when companies outside financial services are required to comply with regulations such as AML (Anti-Money Laundering)? As we all know from our personal experiences of banks that want to verify who we are and where money is coming from or...
Jan. 21, 2024

Carina Maggar on Coming Out

Authenticity is often praised, and inauthenticity is criticised. We want people to be themselves. But what happens if the society we’re in isn’t supportive or even hostile toward who we really are? Or we don’t yet know. That’s the challenge facing...
Jan. 15, 2024

Sarah Armstrong-Smith on The Cyber Attacker Mindset

What’s the most effective way to manage cyber risk? The obvious answer is to have more sophisticated security systems. My guest on this episode thinks the answer is humans. That’s because behind every cyber attack, there is a human, and the biggest...
Jan. 8, 2024

Melina Palmer on The Truth About Pricing

What determines the price of an item or service? How can we price things so that people want to buy them but also so that we feel it’s fair? Whether (like me) you’re in business and have to sell, or you’re negotiating a salary or looking to buy or...
Dec. 31, 2023

Richard Shotton on Choice

What drives the choices we make, and how can we influence the choices that others make? On this episode, I’m speaking to an expert in human decision-making. Richard Shotton is a behavioural science practitioner who has written two best-selling books,...
Dec. 16, 2023

David Meikle on Creative Control

How can we manage people who are doing creative work? On the one hand, letting someone do what they want feels incredibly risky. On the other hand, creativity requires a degree of freedom, experimentation and agency. That’s a particular problem in...
Dec. 4, 2023

Vishal George on Money Mindsets

Why do we sometimes make bad decisions in relation to money and what can we do about it? My guest, Vishal George, is a Behavioural Scientist who has recently published a book called ‘Money Mindsets: Science-Based Stories to Rewire your Money Beliefs,...
Nov. 27, 2023

Dr Jake Mazulewicz on Human Reliability

What do you think of when you hear the word 'error'? It's highly likely you'll think of it negatively as a defect. The obvious way to manage defects, particularly in safety-critical industries, is to have detailed procedures, strict compliance, and...
Nov. 20, 2023

Dr Freddie Mason on the Future of Museums

What are museums, and what purpose do they serve? As a regular museum-goer — both when I’m travelling and also at home when I need distraction or creative inspiration — I’m always intrigued, both by what they show and how they show it. If you’ve...
Nov. 12, 2023

Katja Hoyer on Beyond The Wall

What is it like to grow up in a country that no longer exists? That's the challenge faced by my guest Katja Hoyer. She grew up in the GDR, the German Democratic Republic. Or as most of us think of it, East Germany. While most histories of the...
Oct. 31, 2023

David Mansfield on The Monday Revolution

What is the Monday Revolution, and why do we need it? On this episode, I'm speaking to someone who used to run a company that grabbed a lot of my attention during my teenage and younger years. That company was Capital Radio — at the time, London's...
Oct. 21, 2023

Robert Kerbeck on making a career out of lying

How can lying earn you millions? If you’re an actor and good at impersonating people, then the answer is that you become a corporate spy. That’s the unexpected career path followed by my guest Robert Kerbeck, whose memoir ‘Ruse: Lying the American...
Oct. 13, 2023

Dr Constance Dierickx on Meta Leadership

Why can senior leaders — usually in post as a result of experience and expertise — often make mistakes? The answer might seem counterintuitive; it’s precisely because of their experience and expertise that this can happen. How that happens and what we...