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Q: What key moments or choices have most shaped your professional journey?

There have been several key moments in my professional journey: 

• My decision to go into consulting after graduating from university. I wanted to help companies make the most of (what many call their greatest asset) their people.

• While in consulting I realised that there were few women at the top of the organisation and that women faced significant barriers compared to men in developing their careers.

• So I helped set up and supported the introduction of a women’s network at this consultancy (Mercer UK). However, in order to attract and involve men, I advised that we should adopt a “gender neutral” name for it: we called it The Vine. We ensured we incorporated into Vine meetings and event agendas, aspects which would attract men as well as women, eg career development, leadership, personal growth.

• We also created events to help foster understanding between men and women. For example we hosted one event called “Shattering Stereotypes” where we divided the audience into women and men to discuss the stereotypes and barriers each faced. We then asked the women to share their barriers with the men and discuss how men could help remove some of these barriers. We did the same for men, and there was quite some surprise at the barriers the men faced, especially around balancing career and family responsibilities.

• As a result of my involvement with The Vine, I was asked by a leading European women’s network (PWN Global) to become their first ever man on their Board, as VP Engaging Men. My subsequent involvement with women’s organisations like UN Women UK, European Women on Boards and EWMD (Every Woman Makes a Difference) directly resulted from this.

• My experience with women’s networks led to a broader interest in and passion for diversity, equity and inclusion. When I got a chance to lead the DEI consulting practice for the International Region at Mercer, I jumped at the opportunity. I had an enjoyable and impactful time in that role before leaving Mercer in January 2020 to set up my own business in inclusion and leadership. I have taken on many interesting assignments since then, focussing particularly on engaging male leaders, managers and colleagues to become allies to women and others in the workplace.

Q: Did mentoring play a role in those moments, if so how?

• I have always used my experience to mentor women and advance their careers. My initial mentoring experience was with the Cherie Blair Foundation, mentoring women in India, but I have subsequently been involved with Global Thinkers Forum in their excellent mentoring programme and have had the honour and pleasure of mentoring women from Middle East and Africa, notably Jordan, the Gambia, Kenya and more recently Mozambique.

• I also benefited hugely from being “reverse mentored” by a younger woman and a woman of colour. Their diverse perspectives on my work have been very interesting, different and ultimately very helpful.

Q: Can you share an experience when you had to make difficult choices in your professional life and how you handled it?

• Probably the most difficult choices I had to make in my professional life involved being offered new positions outside the company. Some of these new positions came with very attractive remuneration packages, but the cultures in the organisations I would have joined did not always seem to me to be the most inclusive or welcoming.

•  In making my decision, I focussed on the fact that I already had a very enjoyable and stretching series of roles in my current company and I valued hugely the collegiate culture.

• Together with being promoted, ultimately into a senior partner role, while still being able to manage my work-life balance as a single parent meant that I had huge job satisfaction. I didn’t feel the need to chase a job that would pay more and yet demand much greater sacrifices of my personal life.

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Q: What’s the most surprising or transformative lesson you've learned from mentoring someone, or being mentored yourself?

• The first point to make is that mentoring is incredibly valuable for both the mentor and the mentee, because we both learn and grow from the experience.

• As a mentor, I have learned so much about the challenges others, particularly women, face and how they overcome those challenges. This has been and continues to be very inspiring for me.

• As I mentioned previously, I have mentored women from India and Africa and I’ve learned a lot about their culture. Helping them to value themselves and realise their full potential has been hugely satisfying.

• As a “reverse mentee”, I have also benefitted from the insights that someone from a younger generation and a different gender or culture bring and these new perspectives have been incredibly valuable and energising.

Q: How do you tailor your mentorship approach to support individuals from other cultures, or underrepresented genders and backgrounds?

• It’s important to be flexible when mentoring individuals from different cultures, genders or backgrounds. This flexibility enables me to adapt my mentoring style and approach to the individual concerned: how formal or informal and how direct to be etc.

• Especially in the early sessions it is important for me to listen actively to my mentee and learn about their family, upbringing, culture and their expectations of the mentoring relationship.

• I’m always keen to connect my mentees with someone from my network who can support or help them. This has been particularly useful for my recent mentee from Jordan who went on to develop a learning programme with one of my LinkedIn connections.

Q: Looking back, what mindset or habit most contributed to your long-term success and resilience?

• A key aspect in my success and resilience has been my “growth mindset”. I first read Mindset, a fantastic book by Professor Carol Dweck some years ago and I have valued learning and focussed on developing my potential since then. I have found it important not to be overly deterred by things that go wrong or by failures, but to learn from them and ask what I can do better or different next time.

• The habit that has been particularly important in my resilience has been movement and exercise. While I enjoy stillness and meditation, I find moving my body, whether in the gym, or outdoors hiking in the countryside is calming and de-stressing. It is also important to me to stretch my body as well, so over the years my yoga practice and more recently Pilates have been an important counterpoint to the exercise and movement.

Q: What’s a common misconception about our societies or systems that you often find yourself challenging?

• The most important misconception I challenge is that of the barriers that we and others face. In my work with men for example, I have often found that they are unaware of the barriers that women and underrepresented groups face in the workplace. Many men don’t see the power and privilege they enjoy as they have been socialised to expect it. 

• One of the most powerful exercises I use in my workshops for men is to invite them to ask their female colleagues about their experiences in the workplace and in combining work and home responsibilities.  Men are often shocked to hear about the barriers and challenges women face, as they have often never thought about it or realised just how problematic this is for equal opportunity.

• One of the other common misconceptions is around bias, particularly unconscious bias. So many men have remarked to me “I don’t see gender or colour: I treat everyone the same.” When we then go through some exercises that reveal their unconscious biases, they are often shocked and humbled.

Q: What new trends or shifts are you seeing in workplace culture or leadership?

• One of the major issues in the workplace right now is employee engagement. A recent Gallup Global Workplace report showed shockingly low levels of engagement at 21% globally in 2024: a level that had fallen from 2023. A key element in that fall had been a worsening in engagement by managers, especially women, who face pressure from executive leaders to perform, but who are not being sufficiently supported in their roles.

• Furthermore, despite workplaces being more diverse these days (one of my clients has over 65 different nationalities working for them) there are often significant portions of the workforce who do not feel fully included in the current culture in their workplace.

• The key trend I am working to encourage, therefore, is for leaders and managers to develop their emotional, cultural and spiritual intelligence to build psychological safety, fairness of treatment and respect for all, as key elements of an inclusive culture.

Q: In the age of hybrid work and AI, what is one piece of career advice you would give younger professionals or professionals who are looking to pivot?

• Focus on roles that utilise your “uniquely human” characteristics, as AI and technology will take over many routine, technical and analytical tasks. 

• These kinds of “uniquely human” roles involve using emotional, cultural and spiritual intelligence to be creative and to build relationships based on trust. Building your human network will continue to be vital to your success.

• However, AI and technology will become increasingly important as productivity tools in all roles, so ensure you stay in step with developments in these fields.

• Finally, change is a constant, so expect to have to continue to learn and pivot regularly throughout your career: flexibility and adaptability of skills are going to be critically important.

Q: Tell us about your society/country, what social shifts do you observe? Are tech and innovation being harnessed for good?

• I live in the UK and work extensively in Europe and one societal shift that concerns me is our seemingly diminishing understanding of, and tolerance for, difference.

• Technology, in particularly social media platforms, while connecting us more easily, have done a lot to increase polarisation, as many people narrow their sources of information and they become more partisan.

• Overall, technology and innovation are making people’s lives in my region easier and more productive. However, we have to work hard together to ensure that guardrails are in place to protect the most vulnerable and that the benefits are fairly distributed.

Q: How can we support entrepreneurial thinking among young people and women?

• It is particularly important to start early in encouraging new ideas, risk taking and experimentation in schools and communities. We need parents to recognise that all children need to be encouraged in this, particularly girls.

• We need to encourage the growth mindset where learning from partial success or failure is seen as a critical component of development.

• We need to highlight role models and success stories so that young people and women can see similar opportunities for themselves.

• Mentoring is particularly important as a way of supporting the development of young people and women.

• Finally, we need to become aware of and overcome the biases and stereotypes about who can succeed as an entrepreneur. One of my mentees in her 20s in India has developed her own Kashmiri handicraft business and it is so inspiring to see her passion and commitment to success. 

Q: A motto you live by? 

I’m ultimately an optimist, so my motto would be: “I grow through challenge, give with love and work towards better, for all of us!”