What Would a Professional Do?: Recent Episodes
Richard Beal, Personal Professionalism
Professionalism is a mindset, a way of seeing the world while you do your job. In this series, we speak with senior, experienced people to understand how they would deal with work situations. Their stories and observations give us insights about professionalism which we can use to help us develop our own personal professionalism.
Deborah Feakins, CEO, Marlowe Consulting draws on a recent experience with a sales person to share her views on what professionalism really is, how it is perceived by others and why it's so very important.
In this episode, we speak with Pat Lynes, founder and CEO of Sullivan & Stanley, an outstanding change management consultancy.
The topic is 'Resilience'.
Pat has an amazing entrepreneurial spirit that he attributes in large part to his hard-working, community spirited parents. Setting out in a career in interim management placement, Pat was determined to succeed and be the best he could be.
Resilience can be thought of as putting your head down and ploughing on regardless - even unthinkingly.
In Pat's case however, he considered what success meant for him, which included financial success and being able to spend plenty of time with his family. He developed a network, asked questions, listened to advice and carefully planned how he would achieve his success.
And then he worked hard - very hard - to achieve that plan.
Resilience indeed; but informed and considered resilience.
A great story for young, aspiring professionals.
In this episode, we speak with Nadege Minois, an amazing culture and inclusion management consultant.
The topic is 'Professionalism, Societal Culture, Organisational Culture and Inclusion'.
This is an interesting and very modern topic and Nadege is THE perfect person with whom to discuss it. Societal and organisational culture are key influences on one's personal professionalism, especially when it comes to agreeing how to work together with people whose expectations are informed differently from our own - usually due to social cues. Nadege navigates us through this potentially tricky area. With her insight, we arrive at a fulfilling and valuable place where differences of perspective are respected and included in agreeing how to work together professionally.
In this episode, we speak with Mateusz Wiatkowski, who works as a Business Solutions Analyst in a global organisation.
The topic is 'Early Career and the Value of Networking'.
In a slight change of pace for this podcast, we were keen to speak with Mateusz who is still in the relatively early stages of his career. We have tracked him as his career has grown and grown because, as well as being extremely good at what he does, he has a wonderful knack of being able to network. As we've heard in previous episodes, networking is vital to aspiring professionals. Mateusz shares his tips and observations with us.
In this episode, we speak with Alex Lok, a Barrister and small business owner who lives and works in Hong Kong.
The topic is 'Professionalism and Ethics'.
Professionalism is grounded in ethics; without it, there can be no professionalism.
So who better to discuss this tricky issue than a Barrister business owner? Alex discusses the strict ethical guidelines of being a practising lawyer and contrasts them with the relatively less-clear situation of small business; he applies his considerable knowledge of law, specifically contract law, to real and hypothetical situations to help us understand how to recognise and deal with ethical issues.
In this episode, we speak with Deborah Feakins, Chief Executive Officer of Marlowe Consulting, an innovative and exciting consultancy that specialises in change management.
The topic is 'Professional Presence'.
Deborah had recently had a less-than-satisfactory interaction with a less-than-interested sales person. It caused to reflect on just how important it is to engage with people professionally, no matter your job. In this episode, we discuss the professional presence, what it is and what early careerists should consider when setting out on building their professional reputation.
In this episode, we speak with Jon O'Donnell, Managing Partner for EMEA Business Transformation and Hybrid Cloud Services Leader, IBM Consulting.
The topic is 'New Role, New Mindset'.
Jon shares his experience of changing roles throughout his career, and how each change has brought the opportunity and the responsibility to adjust to a new mindset.
And, of course, how he went about it!
In this episode, we speak with Professor Leigh Robinson, Pro Vice Chancellor (Student Outcomes) at the University of Roehampton, London, UK.
Professor Robinson shares her thoughts about how young professionals would ideally respond to a request to perform a work task that they have never done before.
It sounds simple - even obvious - and yet young professionals encounter this often. Not knowing what to do can cause anxiety and frustration and at worst, damage one's professional reputation. Professor Robinson's straightforward and sensible approach will help!