Inspiring Leadership with Jonathan Bowman-Perks MBE

Andy Milburn is a retired Marine Special Operations and Infantry officer – now keeping occupied as a military consultant, author, and student of modern war. Milburn was born in Hong Kong and grew up in the United Kingdom where he attended St Paul’s School, University College London. After university he enlisted in the US Marine Corps as a private. He was subsequently commissioned from the ranks, and as a Marine infantry and special operations officer, has commanded in combat at every grade. As the commanding officer of the Marine Corps’ special operations regiment, he was selected to lead a multinational task force given the mission of defeating ISIS in Iraq. He transitioned in 2019 as the chief of staff of Special Operations Command Central, the headquarters responsible for the conduct of all US special operations throughout the Middle East. Since retiring, he has written a critically acclaimed memoir When the Tempest Gathers, and a number of articles for national publications. He is on the adjunct faculty of the Joint Special Operations University, and teaches classes on leadership and ethics to mid-grade and senior officers at US, British and Canadian military schools. He also teaches courses overseas to officers from countries across Africa, the Middle East and Asia. He participates regularly in debates and forums concerning ethics, modern warfare and leadership. Most recently he was the CEO of the Mozart Group, a crowd sourced, donor funded private military organization operating in Ukraine. The Mozart Group’s mission was to provide front line training for Ukrainian soldiers and to evacuate civilians from areas under Russian bombardment. His Top Top:Self-reflection is key to good leadership. That means taking a moment, regularly, to assess yourself – your motives, your actions, and their effect -- to view your decisions from the perspective of those who must execute them. You need to make this a habit, without succumbing to paralysis. I tell newly commissioned officers that good leadership is a lifelong journey – and all of us, from the newly minted second lieutenant to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs – are perennial students. If you don’t have that mindset, then you can’t grow as a leader, and will ultimately fail. He tweets at @andymilburn8. LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmilburn2020 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Robin was Born in Farnham, Surrey, UK. Following a divorce from his birth father, his mother Hazel married his step-father, who adopted him and gave him the name Horsfall. A broken family life adversely affected his education, so he left school in 1972 at the age of fifteen and joined the army as a boy soldier.Despite a long period of isolation and bullying by his peers, he became a full member of the Parachute Regiment in 1974 and served three tours of Northern Ireland. In 1978 he volunteered for SAS selection and passed on his second attempt in March 1979. He went on to qualify as a Paramedic and Sniper.He was a member of the SAS counter terrorist team that assaulted the Iranian Embassy in London in 1980, helping to rescue the nineteen hostages who had been held for six days.Robin has had an extraordinary life and has been speaking about it at events both small and large for over 10 years. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr Alice Maynard CBEAlice has had a wide-ranging career. It began in the IT industry working in a range of roles in software development and localisation where she developed her approach to dovetailing outcomes between different stakeholders including customers and staff to get great results. In 1991, she took a year out at Ashridge Management College to do an MBA. On completion she set up a company with her sister, using her business skills, and her sister’s legal background and understanding of disability equality issues. She spent six years as a consultant before taking up a role in the rail industry with a brief to create a national accessibility strategy for stations.Following the stint in the rail industry, she founded her own business, Future Inclusion, to help leaders improve organisation performance through inclusive practice. Alice now has a portfolio of non-executive roles and is an executive coach/mentor. Through Future Inclusion, she also advises businesses on EDI.Alice is non-executive career began in the nonprofit sector in the late 90s. Initially with local organisations, but later on a national scale, she was a trustee and chairman of a number of charities, including latterly Scope (2008-2014), the disability charity, and Swanswell, a drug and alcohol addiction charity, successfully merging Swanswell with Cranstoun in 2016. Her nonprofit experience led her to join third sector colleagues in establishing the Association of Chairs, to improve performance through better chairing. In 2014 Alice won a Sunday Times Non-Executive Director of the Year award and received an honorary doctorate from the University of York. She received a CBE in the 2015 New Year Honours.She currently sits as NED for the Financial Conduct Authority and chairs the People Committee. She is Chair of Council and Pro-Chancellor at the University of York. She is a member of the Government Commercial Office Remuneration Committee, and stood down from HMRC, where she chaired the People Committee, in 2022, and was a Board member of Transport for London until 2021.Alice likes to work with organisations that are clear about the value they want to add to society, as well as focussing on their own success. She helps organisations increase their understanding of, and engagement with, their people in order to remove barriers in the way of fun, purposeful and rewarding work. She loves thinking about systems, the consequences of even small changes, and how we, as leaders, can best intervene to create change for social good. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr Andy Wood OBE DLAndy Wood is Chief Executive of Adnams plc. He joined Adnams in 1994, joined the Board in 2000 as Sales and Marketing Director becoming Managing Director in 2006 and Chief Executive in 2010. He has a DBA from Cranfield University and Honorary doctorates; in Business from Anglia Ruskin University, in Science from Cranfield University and Civil Law from the University of East Anglia. He was also awarded an OBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours 2013 and between 2014 to 2016 was HRH The Prince of Wales’ Ambassador for Responsible business in the East of England. In 2010 Andy founded and was Chairman of the New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership, he has co-authored a book on Lean and Green Business Systems which was awarded the Shingo prize for Operational Excellence in 2013. Andy is Chair of Norse Group Ltd a large FM company and is a Non-Executive Director of companies operating in the retail and financial services sectors. He is also a member of the Council at the University of East Anglia, Governor of Norwich School, a Board Member to the VisitEngland Advisory Board and Chairman of Visit East of England. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Bob Judson served for 34½ years in the military, rising from front-line fast-jet pilot to being a member of the Royal Air Force’s Senior Leadership Team and an Air Vice-Marshal. He flew the Jaguar, Phantom, and Typhoon, and had the privilege of displaying the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight Spitfires & Hurricanes for 2 years whilst he was the Station Commander of RAF Coningsby. In a military career that saw him shift from being on Quick Reaction Alert as a 21 year old in the Cold War with an atomic bomb on the bottom of his Jaguar, through serving on a German squadron as an exchange pilot when the Berlin wall fell, to being the Director of Joint Warfare in his final role, Bob saw a vast amount of change in the RAF and across the world more generally. He flew 120 operational missions over Iraq and Bosnia-Herzegovina, served in the Pentagon as the Chief of Defence Staff’s Liaison Officer, commanded the NATO airbase in Kandahar (25,000 people from more than 20 nations, 170 aircraft and lots of hostile incoming rockets!), and led the MOD support to the London Olympic & Paralympic Games in 2012.Beyond the military, Bob has built a very successful second career in the private sector. Having initially moved to Deloitte as a director in their resilience and crisis management business, he set up his own consulting and leadership development business in 2019.A qualified coach and neuro-linguistic programming practitioner, Bob now focuses mostly on leadership development for private sector clients and, with his Leading 4 Life brand, he runs workshops, facilitates training courses, and coaches individual senior leaders across a range of industries. His recently launched podcast, Leading 4 Life “Stories”, provides a source of leadership tips and experiences from Bob and his guests.Bob went to school at Christ’s Hospital, Horsham and has never forgotten the great start in life that the school gave him. For the past 8 years (he finished in July), he has been a non-executive director on the Christ’s Hospital Council, which looks after not only the school but also the multi-million £ charitable endowment that enabled them to fund £21 million in bursaries last year, more than 3 times the amount of the next nearest school.Away from the world of work, Bob lives in East Sussex with his wife Saab and their 2 dogs (Shadow & Skye). He is a keen motorcyclist, having taken up riding after leaving the RAF to provide an adrenaline replacement! He also enjoys skiing, scuba diving (especially with sharks) and the occasional round of not very good golf!Bob’s top leadership tip is for leaders to remember that they have 2 ears and one mouth and that they should use them in proportion! Too many leaders talk much more than they listen and, consequently, they too often fail to capitalise on much of the value that they could derive from those around them. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Rob Metcalfe’s guiding principle is that leadership is not just an individual pastime; rather it needs to be embedded at all levels within and across organisations so those closest to the need can meet it in an aligned and autonomous way. This belief stems from his career in the military where alignment between Headquarters, Operations Rooms and the person on the ground is so vital, whether on conventional or alternate activities. The strength of this belief was forged in both peacetime activities and operational theatres that included the Falklands War and various roles in Northern Ireland.Since then, he has dedicated his career to enabling leadership at every level through consulting, facilitation, training and coaching. He encourages people to think and respond through the lens of self, others and the system, proactively and consciously choosing where their focus should be. This is achieved by creating clear goals alongside simple habits and routines that enable consistency between a person, team or organisation’s inner and outer games.This experience includes 14 years as CEO of LIW, expanding the organisation from start up to global leadership consultancy, preceded by 14 years as an officer in the Royal Marines Commandos. More recently he spent 3 years as a Partner with Denali Venture Partners and he now operates as an associate and investor to his previous organisations, as well as an independent consultant to a small number of other purposeful organisations across sectors and throughout the world. He is motivated by organisations that have a positive impact and has recently concentrated on working with the UN World Food Program across Africa and the Middle East including working with leadership teams and operational leaders in Yemen, Iraq, Sudan, Syria and Somalia. He also works with the Kids Cancer Project in Australia who are dedicated to saving childrens’ lives though investment in cancer research.Rob and his team held the world building abseil record in 1992 for scaling to, and abseiling from, the upper deck of the CN Tower in Toronto, alongside a team from the Canadian School of Rescue Training. He was also “Mentioned in Dispatches” during his service, acknowledging that this was due to the efforts of the leaders and the people he had the good fortune to command.Rob sees how neuroscience is proving what was previously only a belief about good leadership practice. Many of his top tips are based on this truth. His top tip for your reflection is to “do whatever you want but know what you are doing”. He picked this quote up from someone else and has since observed that it is often not the case! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Stuart Tootal spent twenty years in the British Army, serving in Northern Ireland, the 1991 Gulf War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq. He also held strategic planning appointments in the MOD, where he was awarded an OBE for leading a major structural change programme in 2005. In 2006, Stuart was the commanding officer of the 3rd Battalion the Parachute Regiment and led the first UK combat unit into Afghanistan, for which he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order (DSO). He resigned from the Army in 2008 having been promoted to full colonel. A major reason for leaving the Army was the poor treatment of his wounded soldiers.Stuart joined Barclays later that year, where he spent a decade holding MD global leadership positions, which included heading the bank’s security and global travel departments, as well as running a retail banking customer initiative. During this period, he specialised in building a global team and delivering strategic change programmes across six different business units spanning fifty-five countries. He also played a key role in numerous crisis management situations, including leading the bank’s response to the Arab Spring in Egypt in 2011. While at Barclays, he founded and ran the AFTER ex-military employment programme, which hired 650 former service personnel into Barclays. Stuart also founded the Parachute Regiment Afghanistan Trust charity, as CEO and chairman, which raised £3.7M for wounded soldiers. In 2019, Stuart set up Matero Consulting as a founding partner. Establishing a new approach to change management, based on providing clients with disciplined critical thinking decision-making, agile planning, and empowerment execution tools and skills. Matero’s clients have included HSBC, LSEG, Centrica, One Technology, and Metro Bank, as well as a number of startup companies. Typical projects have centred on supporting the design, build, and delivery of major change initiatives where servant leadership development, creating a team culture of accountability, and harnessing diversity to resolve complex issues has been key.Over a fifteen-year period, Stuart has been engaged by over fifty FTSE and Fortune companies on the subject of speaking about empowered leadership and creating a mission purposed culture. Clients have included RBS, Kraft, the Daily Mail group, Babcock, Invesco, Virgin Atlantic, Accenture, Fidelity, and Grant Thornton. Stuart is a history graduate of London and Cambridge universities and part-time author. His first book, Danger Close – Leading 3 PARA in Afghanistan became a Sunday Times best seller and his fourth book, about the SAS in the Falklands War, entered the Sunday Times best seller list in 2022. He is currently writing his fifth book for Penguin. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Tim is CEO of Vorboss Limited, a technically led internet service provider with one of the UK’s largest networks. Experienced Chief Executive Officer with deep understanding of technology and processes, creating value with a clear strategic vision. Background in engineering, numerous skills within technical software and IT, extensive knowledge across fibre, infrastructure, telecoms, cloud and connectivity verticals. Demonstrated history of building an organisation from the ground up, leading and growing a high performing team to deliver best-in-class connectivity services to businesses across the UK and Europe. Vorboss is currently deploying London’s newest business-only fibre network, providing the first real alternative to BT Openreach that networks and businesses can rely on. Our network is built to meet the future demands of 5G networks and 100Gbps connectivity. Vorboss is the first provider in London to connect enterprise buildings at 100Gbps, with end-to-end ownership of the fibre path. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Oscar Trimboli is an award-winning author, host of the Apple award-winning podcast Deep Listening and a sought-after keynote speaker.Along with the Deep Listening Ambassador Community, he is on a quest to create 100 million deep listeners in the workplace.Through his work with chairs, boards of directors, and executive teams, Oscar has experienced first-hand the transformational impact leaders can have when they listen beyond words. He believes that when leadership teams focus their attention and listening, they will build organizations that create powerful legacies for the people they serve – today and more importantly, for future generations.Oscar is a marketing and technology industry veteran working for Microsoft, PeopleSoft, Polycom, and Vodafone. He consults with organizations including American Express, AstraZeneca, Cisco, Google, HSBC, IAG, Montblanc, PwC, Salesforce, Sanofi, SAP, and Siemens.He is the author of how to listen – discover the hidden key to better communication – the most comprehensive book about listening in the workplace, Deep Listening – Impact beyond words and Breakthroughs: How to Confront Assumptions. Oscar loves his afternoon walks with his wife, Jennie, and their dog Kilimanjaro. On the weekends, you will find him playing Lego with one or all his four grandchildren. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jon Macaskill (pronounced Muh-KAS-kill) is a retired Navy SEAL Commander turned mindfulness teacher and leadership coach. During his 24-year Navy career, he served in multiple highly dynamic leadership positions, from the battlefield to the operations center and the board room. Jon's unconventional yet highly effective style of teaching leadership is fueled by his passion for helping people and organizations become the best versions of themselves. He takes what helped him excel in his professional life and heal in his personal life and now shares this through mindfulness coaching, grit and resilience training, and keynote speaking, all in the pursuit of helping others achieve their full potential.Top tip: Masters are never done learning - learning something new every single day! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.