Conscious Leaders with Ruth Farenga

Ruth Farenga | How to be a successful modern leader in 2024?

This episode is recorded webinar between host of this podcast, Ruth Farenga and Adam Lacey, Founder of Assemble You. It's a fireside chat talking about how to be a successful leader in 2024 illustrated through:

• Stories - from the best people leaders Ruth can find, many of whom are featured on the Conscious Leaders Podcast and in the Next Level Leadership book.
• Global research - pulling out key data and models from large studies.
• Ruth's own experience as a exec coach and facilitator - working with senior leaders in technology companies over the last nine years.

Expect a fun and deep conversation that cuts through the barrage of noise we hear around leadership and presents simple, actionable ways to step up and be a more conscious leader.

Marina Traversari | Maternal leadership

Marina brings an infectious level of vibrancy and dynamism with a successful background in television. But this is a world she stepped out of because she wanted to work in an environment with more safety. Something she focuses on building as a leader.

Everything Marina does as a leader is about communication and putting her metaphorical arm around others - creating those safe spaces. For her, open dialogue is the vital to connection, understanding and safety. This relates practically in terms of meetings, offsites, personality testing – she wants to tune in and read individuals and help bring them together.

This relates practically in terms of meetings, offsites, personality testing – she wants to tune in and read individuals and help bring them together.

Her kindness and care for others is quite palpable.

You will take away:

• Creating spaces where employees can be safe and open
• Vulnerability and the effect on others
• Dealing personally with imposter syndrome
• Balancing heart and backbone

Links & Info

You can find Marina Traversari on LinkedIn here.

Host of this podcast and Founder of Conscious Leaders, Ruth Farenga has written a bestselling book – ‘Next Level Leadership: nine lessons from conscious leaders’. It digests the top traits and behaviours of these exceptional people leaders interviewed on this podcast into simple, actionable lessons designed for leaders to use as a guide.

For more info on the book visit the website here.

For free content becoming a next level leader, subscribe to the Conscious Conversation www.subscribepage.com/consciousconversation

Ciaron Dunne | Make an impact, have fun and make money

This revisit episode brings back the impressive but understated, Ciaron Dunne who has elevated his role in his group of companies, Genie Ventures, to Executive Chair. He has brought in three CEOs and is setting up structures to allow good governance, giving them enough control. He puts this down to trust and, largely, giving up decision-making.

But things have not always been full of growth, three years ago Genie went through a period of contraction and had to navigate redundancy in a conscious way.

You will take away:

• Orientating around impact, fun and money
• Movement towards no longer making decisions
• A journey through contraction, redundancies and managing a conscious process
• His personal experience going through the adoption process to add a 4^th child to his family

 

Links & Info

Ciaron Dunne is CEO at Genie Ventures.

Host of this podcast and Founder of Conscious Leaders, Ruth Farenga has written a bestselling book – ‘Next Level Leadership: nine lessons from conscious leaders’. It digests the top traits and behaviours of these exceptional people leaders interviewed on this podcast into simple, actionable lessons.

For free content becoming a next level leader, subscribe to the Conscious Conversation www.subscribepage.com/consciousconversation

BONUS: The State of Leadership in Technology 2024

This special bonus episode gives you an enhanced short talk from the launch of the 2024 State of Leadership in Technology research.

For the research, Conscious Leaders set out to find out what leaders think of their own leadership capacity. We invited over 200 leaders in tech to self-assess against these vital leadership traits. Furthermore, we ran two leadership roundtables with participants in London and Bristol to digest the data further and provide commentary on the findings.

Listen for a revealing look about what leaders think of themselves compared to employees and we dive into subjects such as 

• tech failure
• attrition rates
• psychological safety
• leaders looking after themselves

You can download the research itself at www.consciousleaders.org.uk/research.

Jonathan Postans - Structures for Psychological Safety

Jonathan (or JP) is a clear leader in ways of working and structures that bring safety and enjoyment at work. They have clear frameworks at AND Digital which helps people use the same language and develop systems in meetings, for example, which allow for inclusion, productivity and belonging.

He discusses the agreements that need making in a team to make things clear e.g. when do we come into the office, how do we behave.

Tune in for a practical episode about day to day behaviours that make a massive difference to performance and wellbeing at work.

You will take away:

• Equal participation
• Their blended working model (f2f vs remote guidance)
• The ‘social capital’ of connected teams
• Habits, no alcohol and experiments to improve wellbeing

Links & Info

Jonathan Postans is MD for AND Digital Bristol.

Host of this podcast and Founder of Conscious Leaders, Ruth Farenga has written a book – ‘Next Level Leadership: nine lessons from conscious leaders’. It digests the top traits and behaviours of these exceptional people leaders interviewed on this podcast into simple, actionable lessons.

For more info on the book visit: www.consciousleaders.org.uk/book

For free content becoming a next level leader, subscribe to the Conscious Conversation www.subscribepage.com/consciousconversation

Darren Cassidy | Strength, warmth and focus

Darren has a background in sport which means he brings a rallying, motivational energy but one that is inclusive – he wants people to be involved and aligned so they can move as a team.

He shares about his successes as well as his own darker period out of which he developed a meditation practice (prompted by his wife who booked him on a course without his knowledge!) Mindset and mental wellness are now big themes for Darren and he is wisely attuned to helpful and less helpful mental states.

His energy is palpable and he is clearly a very determined and compassionate leader.

You will take away:

• Inclusive leadership conversations
• The impact of meditation
• Refocussing based on priorities
• Thinking clearly under pressure

Links & Info

Darren Cassidy is MD for Xerox UK & Ireland.

Host of this podcast and Founder of Conscious Leaders, Ruth Farenga has written a book – ‘Next Level Leadership: nine lessons from conscious leaders’. It digests the top traits and behaviours of these exceptional people leaders interviewed on this podcast into simple, actionable lessons.

For more info on the book visit: www.consciousleaders.org.uk/book

For free content becoming a next level leader, subscribe to the Conscious Conversation www.subscribepage.com/consciousconversation

Harry Singer | A journey of stepping back

Quite often family businesses do not make big leaps but my interviewee Harry Singer bucks the trend with Singer Instruments. Harry grew up with business deeply in his upbringing as the 3^rd generation to run his business. His family holidays were usually centred around a scientific conference and he thrived being ale to take part in his father’s work from the age of 6.

What comes across strongly is how much Harry cares about the wider personal and professional lives of his employees.

He shares his journey of stepping back and taking ‘Surf’s up’ days to support his wellbeing so he can return to bringing a positive energy to the business.

You will take away:

• How a deep care for employees translates into day to day support
• How the senior team staged an ‘intervention’ with Harry and got him to step back into a CEO role and created a new MD position
• An effective decision-making framework
• ‘Surf’s up’ days and the effect on Harry’s wellbeing

 

_________________________

Harry Singer is CEO at Singer Instruments.

Host of this podcast and Founder of Conscious Leaders, Ruth Farenga has written a book – ‘Next Level Leadership: nine lessons from conscious leaders’. It digests the top traits and behaviours of these exceptional people leaders interviewed on this podcast into simple, actionable lessons.

For more info on the book visit: www.consciousleaders.org.uk/book

For free content becoming a next level leader, subscribe to the Conscious Conversation www.subscribepage.com/consciousconversation

Emily Hill | Leading sustainable lives for sustainable growth

Emily comes across as a very calm, measured, and humble CEO – one that does not feel that we need unnecessary pressure. She is committed to connecting with employees and organically growing their business in sustainable ways.

She attributes a lot of stability in her childhood to the resilience of her mother who always worked full time, did a PhD part-time and travelled around the world sharing her research. Consequently, Emily always had a strong belief in herself. She feels lucky that being a woman in tech never got in her way.

In the early days, Emily was very much a ‘number two’ – a supporter to her husband as they grew their software development business, Ghyston. She focused on bringing up their 3 children and worked part-time in the business. But a time came when her husband had an opportunity outside of Ghyston. Emily decided to step up to the CEO role but she was determined to do it her own way moving from 3-3.5 days a week!

Indeed, she wants her employees to have a sustainable lifestyle, one that enables sustainable growth in business too. She is now 4 days a week and I would say, it feels central to her success.

You will take away:

• How to run a ‘dinner forum’ to gain participation from employees
• How to balance as a part-time CEO
• The company holiday and blending work and life outside of work
• Leading with flexibility
• Profit-sharing with employees

2023 Highlights Episode

Welcome to the 2023 Conscious Leaders Podcast Highlights Episode. If you don’t know me already, I’m your host, Founder of Conscious Leaders, Ruth Farenga.

Quite apparently to us all, 2023 has been a year where all the implications have joined into a perfect storm. A year when we desperately need great leaders to look up to and help us navigate a path. And, leaders have continued to step up - and I have been there to hunt them down and hack into their brains so you can learn from their philosophy and practice.

Personally, 2023 has been the year I have been settling in Stroud near Bristol having moved here a year ago. It is not easy meeting people somewhere new but I am starting to feel a bit more at home having made a few friends, gone to some gigs and moved into a co-working space called Spacehoppers. If you’re in or near Stroud in the UK – come visit – it’s a great home from home as an office space.

Besides the usual coaching programmes for leaders, 2023 has been the year that we released the Next Level Leadership Scorecard – a free tool that accompanies the Next Level leadership book to allows you to benchmark yourself against the top nine traits and behaviours of great people leaders. The ones featured in the book. Go to our consciousleaders.org.uk and register for emails if you want to hear more.

We are also collecting data for a ‘State of Leadership in tech’ report to be released in 2024….so if you’re a senior leader in technology or you know one – help us by asking them to complete. Visit consciousleaders.org.uk for more info.

Right ok, enough of all of that - onto our podcast highlights for 2023!

Melanie Yencken | Living with balance as a leader

Melanie has always been an achiever. She rose through the ranks of young innovative companies and then to a big role at Google before arriving at LinkedIn as a Senior Product Director.

Her story is full of highs and lows. When COVID hit she went through her own burnout, realising that her own striving was a way of finding her own safety (having experienced a lack of safety for part of her childhood). Emerging from this low, she was able to get support and rebuild a robust structure for her wellbeing. She shares in detail how she protects her mental health through strong boundaries.

She has been on a journey of living her values which are; ‘live with balance’, ‘lift others up’ and ‘realise my visions’. When asked to present about herself and her strategy at interview for LinkedIn, she led with these values and how they support herself and those around her.

In terms of team support, she is keen that people she works with develop personalised plans around ‘what builds them up, drains them and their ultimate career aspirations’. All with the goal of creating meaning for what they are doing now (as opposed to always wishing you were promoted to the next level).

You will take away:

• Generating value and meaning beyond work
• Dealing with burnout
• Developing individualised plans for both performance and wellbeing with team members
• ‘Project Castle’ – her vision for a future outside of technology