Leadership development
Working with teams
How a leadership team relates matters. I work with boards and senior teams to understand the dynamics between them, how they communicate, where trust sits, what gets talked about and what doesn’t, and how individual relationships affect the effectiveness of the whole.
Navigating politics, power and influence
All organisations are political. People have different interests, perspectives, loyalties and sources of power. Senior leadership inevitably means navigating these dynamics particularly when the stakes are high and the authority alone isn’t enough.
I help leaders and teams think about the systems they’re operating within: where power really sits, the relationships that matter, what may be happening beneath the surface and how they can work with those dynamics without losing sight of who they are or what they’re trying to achieve.
When leadership and politics meet
I’ve spent much of my career working at the intersection of professional leadership and politics – from working alongside local politicians to working directly with senior government ministers. I understand the pressures on both sides, and what it takes to build relationships that are trusted, honest and effective.
I work with senior officers and elected politicians, individually or together, to understand their different roles and responsibilities, navigate disagreement and build effective working relationships. This can be particularly valuable for newly elected politicians taking on leadership responsibilities, senior officers working with a new administration, or councils going through significant political change.