Engaging People, Powering Companies - The Leadership Podcast

Fiona Lambert is one of the UK’s leading business women with senior roles at Next, Asda, Dunelm and River Island. Fiona worked alongside George’s founder George Davies to set up and launch George as the first fashion supermarket brand in 1990.Fiona has built a hugely successful career in the fashion industry over the last 30 years, running the design, buying, sourcing and quality of clothes that have been worn by many in the nation. Her focus on innovation and customer needs saw her launch the George Home brand and more recently a new women’s brand Harpenne. Fiona’s vision and desire to nurture the next generation of British fashion talent led to her championing Graduate Fashion Week for 5 years.Developing great,inspired teams and coaching and mentoring individuals to be the best they can be is part of her passion.She has won awards for mentoring, innovation and inspiring others . This week Fiona joins our podcast as a guest to share insights about the things she's been most passionate about, and how we need to drive greater diversity and inclusion on boardrooms, if we want to be ready for the future that awaits.

Join Amrit as he explores what's left of our workplace cultures as so many of us are now working from home. We have realised who the real heroes are and the real value they add to the lives of so many. What then does this do to our views of organisational purpose/ mission statements? What value do values now have when behaviours and how people interact is through a digital interface?

The pressure to deliver more with less each year, has meant that many organisations were focused on profits and sales, as opposed to the human impact of driving greater cost reductions each year. With the world having a chance to stop and pause, we now have a chance to start again and work in a different way. The Mental Health Foundation has identified the need for kindness for this year's focus. How can leaders help create a kinder workplace that doesn't impact on the mental health of employees? This requires us to step away from this 'race to the bottom' approach, that many organisations had engaged with pre-COVID, and focus on how we can create a truly compassionate and caring workplace where kindness matters.

Join Amrit as he shares his thoughts on using reflective practice to overcome stress and anxiety, allowing us to open our minds to possibilities. With the pace of work slowing down with so many people working from home, it means rather than being tied up in meetings all day, we finally have a chance to think..think about creative and innovative ways to solve problems we never got time to do previously.

Join Amrit as he explores the impact loneliness may be having on our mental wellbeing, knowing how an important factor it is to increased mortality in elderly. He also explores how organisations can overcome the fear of missing out, whilst working from home means so much of what we do, mat not be visible to others. Simple steps leaders and managers can take to mitigate this, will help colleagues through this period of uncertainty.

Stress and anxiety is something we all experience in our lives, and more so now during the COVID pandemic. Whilst much of the stress we experience will be driven from external events, there are simple acts we can take to reduce the impact of these, allowing us to make better decisions.