Eton Bridge Podcast: Recent Episodes
Eton Bridge Partners
Respect, care, and collaboration are at the heart of everything we do: our people-first culture prioritises building long term personal relationships with colleagues, clients, and candidates alike. We are “people people” and are passionate about bringing people together and making connections. That’s why we’ve introduced a series of podcasts to share stories, insights and experiences from across our network on a variety of different topics.
The theme for this year’s Inclusion Week is ‘Impact Matters’ which centres around understanding, identifying and measuring impact on marginalised groups and taking actions that make for genuine, sustainable change that matters. In this episode hosted by our Chief People Officer, CJ Bedford, talks to Michelle Boothroyd and Simon Fanshawe about their experiences of introducing ED&I strategies – the benefits, impact and lessons learned - and the critical importance of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I) in today’s world of work. CJ is personally involved in DE&I strategies at Eton Bridge Partners and is focussed on ensuring that we build an inclusive culture, have a diverse workforce whilst developing services for our clients that ensure that they are getting the diverse candidates that they need to bring the best talent into their business. This is linked to our purpose; to put talented people at the heart of business. Michelle, accomplished CHRO and FTSE leader, is currently the Chief People Officer at Grainger Plc. She brings a wealth of expertise in progressive HR leadership, underscored by her dedication to pioneering DE&I initiatives. Her focus on creating an inclusive workforce is driven by a belief in empowering individuals to express their ideas authentically and thrive as their true selves. Simon, Partner at Diversity by Design and experienced Chair and Non-Executive Director, was one of the six co-founders in 1989 of the lesbian and gay equality campaign Stonewall - a key influencer in the strategy to create legal equality for lesbians and gays, which was completed by the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act in 2014. He is also an author, and has recently been carrying out research exploring the disconnect between the original intentions of Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives and their current implementation; revealing how DEI efforts have shifted from creating inclusion, to becoming rigid and divisive, largely due to a lack of strategic guidance and accountability from senior leadership. Find out more about Inclusion Week here: https://www.inclusiveemployers.co.uk/
In this series, we dive deep into the world of business transformation and change, exploring the challenges and triumphs of real people who have worked on the front line of incredible transformations and achieved outstanding results, whilst learning many valuable lessons they learned along the way.
Episode 3: Delivering successful finance transformation
Our highly experienced Business Consulting team work closely with our clients as ‘one team’ to deliver better and more sustainable business results through transformation.
In our latest Q&A, Matt Dunn talks to Kunjal Haria and Mitul Patel, both part of Eton Bridge Partners’ Business Consulting team, about their extensive experience in delivering successful finance transformation, and some of the lessons learned along the way.
Kunjal Haria has been delivering Finance Transformation for over 20 years and has worked with Eton Bridge for 10 of those years. An ACA accountant, he spent the first half of his career at Ernst & Young, IBM and Accenture. He’s currently leading a global finance SSC/GBS and ERP programme for Eton Bridge Consulting.
Mitul Patel has over 20 years’ experience delivering Finance Transformation. A qualified Accountant he’s delivered complex finance transformation and ERP for global clients including Takeda, Westcon, and Cushman & Wakefield. He was an Executive Director at UBS and a Management Consultant at Ernst & Young.
Mitul has worked with Eton Bridge for 6 years, most recently leading an international GBS restructuring programme and implementing a Finance TOM for a global EB Consulting client.
Welcome to the very first episode of a new podcast series for Eton Bridge Partners, exploring the secrets behind successfully navigating leading the people side of significant change with Sarah Scannella, Partner within the Human Resources Search Practice at Eton Bridge Partners.
As an executive search, interim management and consulting firm, we very much put people at the heart of business, taking great care to build trusted long-term relationships with clients, candidates and our employees alike. Our passion for people means we are very fortunate to be able to work alongside some of the most inspiring business leaders who bring unique perspectives on the world of work. This presents us with a great opportunity to share their insights and learnings, to contribute to making the world of work even more human.
In this podcast series, we'll be chatting to a number of senior leaders from many walks of life who will be sharing the real secrets to successfully navigating big change and how they led the people side of it.
In this episode, we shine a spotlight on social mobility.
Helping to improve social mobility is hugely important. We believe that every person, irrespective of their background, should be able to achieve their full potential.
For those who are new to the subject, social mobility refers to change in a person's socio-economic situation, either in relation to their parents and wider family (inter-generational mobility) or throughout their lifetime (intra-generational mobility).
Social mobility is linked to equality of opportunity: the extent to which people have the same chances to do well in life regardless of the socio-economic background of their parents, their gender, age, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, birthplace, or other circumstances beyond their control.
Research has shown that people from disadvantaged backgrounds have fewer opportunities to climb the socio-economic ladder. In European OECD countries, children with the greatest socio-economic disadvantage grow up to earn as much as 20% less as adults than those with more favourable childhoods. Across OECD countries, it takes nearly five generations for children from low-income families to approach the average income in their country.
In addition, round 65% of working-age OECD citizens worry they won't be as financially secure as their parents; an almost equal share fear their children will be even less secure. We also know that people who are most concerned about their chances in life are also less happy and feel less represented in politics.
Which brings us to the podcast; Olivia Sharp, Partner within the Executive Search, Human Resources Practice at Eton Bridge Partners, talks with Daniel Kasmir and Rob Bray, to discuss how the corporate world can promote and secure equality of opportunity.
Daniel Kasmir is Chief People and Procurement Officer at TalkTalk and has been with the company since 2019. Before that, he gained extensive experience in HR at a number of organisations including Shell, Manpower, FNZ, Xchanging and BDO. He’s worked in Private Equity as both an adviser and within portfolio companies for General Atlantic, JC Flowers and Bain Capital. He currently sits on the Board of Trustees at Lowry Arts Centre and is Chairman Remuneration Committee at YouView TV Limited as well as the Chairman of Employment Board at HMP (His Majesty's Prison service).
We are also joined by Rob Bray. Having worked in HR for 20+ years, including for some of the world’s best known consumer brands, most recently as Chief People Officer for Nandos in UK&I, A member of the board of directors at Nando’s, Rob led the people and social impact strategy across their UK& I restaurants and head office for more than 22k people. Since he joined Nando’s, they have been regularly voted one of the best places to work in the private sector and the number one employer in the hospitality industry. Rob is hugely passionate about growing people and organisations, and has a particular interest in inclusion and environment, as well as youth employment.
In this series, we dive deep into the world of business transformation and change, exploring the challenges and triumphs of real people who have worked on the front line of incredible transformations and achieved outstanding results, whilst learning many valuable lessons they learned along the way.
Episode 2: How can we really influence culture and people to deliver truly transformative outcomes?
In this episode, Matt Dunn, Business Consulting Partner at Eton Bridge Partners, talks to Brad Skinner and Kevin Paterson and who are part of our Business Consulting team, about their extensive experience in delivering successful transformation and some of the lessons learned along the way.
Kevin Paterson has worked with Eton Bridge for over 10 years. Having spent the early part of his career in Senior HR roles, he went on to run large scale transformation for Vodafone, Dixons Carphone and Costa Coffee. He’s currently leading a complex integration for a European retailer as part of EBP’s Business Consulting team.
Brad Skinner is a long standing partner of Eton Bridge. He’s currently Group HR Director of BMI Group. He has over 20 years’ experience of driving large scale transformation for businesses including Barclays and SAB Miller.
In this second episode of Transformation from the front line, we'll be discussing our experiences and thoughts on how to really energise your people and use your culture to deliver long lasting transformation outcomes.
Here’s a quick taster of the topics we’ll be talking through:
- How do we really leverage people to transform businesses?
- What are the first things transformation leaders should do to engage people when we’re mobilise a transformation programme?
- How do we keep people engaged, energised and really wanting to drive outcomes?
- How do you think the CPO/HRD role will evolve in the coming years?
- What’s the future for the Chief Transformation Officer role.
- How can people become truly successful transformation leaders and really motivate their own teams to keep going and deliver through adversity?
Matt Dunn talks to some of the Business Consulting team about their extensive experience in delivering successful transformation and some of the lessons learned along the way.
Kevin Paterson has worked with Eton Bridge for over 10 years. Having spent the early part of his career in Senior HR roles, he went on to run large scale transformation for Vodafone, Dixons Carphone and Costa Coffee. He’s currently leading a complex integration for a European retailer as part of EBP’s Business Consulting team.
Tracy Kingswood has spent over 30 years leading retail transformation with 18 years in Asda 14 years with Dixons/ DSG. She’s currently building and leading the Transformation Management Office for one of EBP Business Consulting’s retail clients.
Kat Stewart, Partner within the HR Practice at Eton Bridge Partners is joined by Cecilie Sondergaard Nielson, executive coach and founder of the leadership consultancy CN8, to promote confidence in the workplace for women, and to discuss a few of the main issues female leaders encounter in their rise to more senior positions in the workplace.
Cecilie has an impressive track record of working with senior leaders to identify and change the dynamics that stand in the way of delivery and progress. With a special interest in supporting women in senior leadership positions, Cecilie is an advocate for diversity in leadership, and has extensive experience with issues surrounding female leadership in traditionally male-dominated industries.
As an executive search, interim management and consulting firm, we are in a privileged position of being able to meet many senior leaders across lots of different organisations in the UK, as well as internationally. Through these conversations, we have identified that women in leadership roles struggle to change themselves to fit a ‘mould’ of what they feel is expected of them, often questioning themselves, pushing themselves harder and often never quite feeling ‘enough’. Despite the progress made in recent years, with females in senior leadership roles, there’s still work to do. We’re back with episode 3 on the topic of ‘authority’.
An introduction to neurodiversity with FTSE Chair and founder of the Institute of Neurodiversity, Charlotte Valeur.
Neurodiversity is the concept that all humans vary in terms of their neurocognitive ability. Everyone has both talents and things they struggle with. However, for some people, the variation between those strengths and challenges is more pronounced.
Perhaps it is not enough to simply accept these differences where instead, we could be doing more to celebrate these cognitive differences to truly harness the power of neurodiversity in the workplace.
Charlotte Valeur joins Josh Emmerson, Associate Partner at Eton Bridge Partners for this episode talking about her own experience of being diagnosed with autism and ADHD as an adult, whilst working within Non-Executive Director and FTSE Chair roles, and more about launching the Institute of Neurodiversity (ION) in 2021 to give a voice to all neurodiverse individuals and campaign for inclusion.
Charlotte is a former merchant banker, corporate governance expert, and a former chair of the UK's Institute of Directors. She has chaired three international companies and has non-executive directorships at private and public companies.
Since being diagnosed with autism in later life – Charlotte has been called "a boardroom diversity champion" for all of the awareness and support she has provided for neurodiverse community.
Kat Stewart, Partner within the HR Practice at Eton Bridge Partners is joined by Cecilie Sondergaard Nielson, executive coach and founder of the leadership consultancy CN8, to promote confidence in the workplace for women, and to discuss a few of the main issues female leaders encounter in their rise to more senior positions in the workplace.
Cecilie has an impressive track record of working with senior leaders to identify and change the dynamics that stand in the way of delivery and progress. With a special interest in supporting women in senior leadership positions, Cecilie is an advocate for diversity in leadership, and has extensive experience with issues surrounding female leadership in traditionally male-dominated industries.
As an executive search, interim management and consulting firm, we are in a privileged position of being able to meet many senior leaders across lots of different organisations in the UK, as well as internationally. Through these conversations, we have identified that women in leadership roles struggle to change themselves to fit a ‘mould’ of what they feel is expected of them, often questioning themselves, pushing themselves harder and often never quite feeling ‘enough’. Despite the progress made in recent years, with females in senior leadership roles, there’s still work to do.
We’re back with episode 2 on the topic of ‘perfectionism’
Marcus Shah, Partner within the Private Equity Practice at Eton Bridge Partners, had the pleasure of being joined by Keith Browner, Group CFO at Elysium Healthcare.
Eton Bridge Partners successfully helped Keith secure this initial engagement, and subsequently built out his management team capability with a number of strategic hires.
Keith took the time to talk us through his journey from interim to permanent, and then how he went on to complete a successful business sale for Elysium Healthcare and their backers, BC Partners. He also provides advice to aspiring CFO’s and outlines his approach to success.
Kat Stewart, Partner within the HR Practice at Eton Bridge Partners is joined by Cecilie Sondergaard Nielson, executive coach and founder of the leadership consultancy CN8, to promote confidence in the workplace for women, and to discuss a few of the main issues female leaders encounter in their rise to more senior positions in the workplace.
Cecilie has an impressive track record of working with senior leaders to identify and change the dynamics that stand in the way of delivery and progress. With a special interest in supporting women in senior leadership positions, Cecilie is an advocate for diversity in leadership, and has extensive experience with issues surrounding female leadership in traditionally male-dominated industries.
As an executive search, interim management and consulting firm, we are in a privileged position of being able to meet many senior leaders across lots of different organisations in the UK, as well as internationally. Through these conversations, we have identified that women in leadership roles struggle to change themselves to fit a ‘mould’ of what they feel is expected of them, often questioning themselves, pushing themselves harder and often never quite feeling ‘enough’. Despite the progress made in recent years, with females in senior leadership roles, there’s still work to do.
So, here we are with episode 1 on the topic of Imposter Syndrome.
Over the last five years, this panel series has focused on driving the mental health conversation forwards. We specifically focus on workplace and employer culture, rather than on reactive crisis response in the workplace. This year’s panellists will explore the relationship between mental wellbeing, performance and employment.
- Karen Jackson, Chair of our panel discussion and Managing Director at didlaw
- Tom Cross, Chartered Performance Psychologist experienced in Private Equity, Foreign Office, Olympic & Professional Sport and FTSE 100/250
- Jay Muthu, Director of Organisation and People Capability at Entain Group
- Jen Smith,Director of Inclusion for the British Film Institute (BFI)
- Nathan Clements, Chief People Officer at SSP Group
- Lauren Chiren, Founder of Women of a Certain Stage, specialising in Menstruation & Menopause at Work training, executive coaching and speaking
Topics include:
- Individual and organisational resilience
- The connection between mental wellbeing and future workplaces
Naturally, the challenges of the pandemic will be a thread throughout, as will the concepts of kindness, humanity and the importance of human conversations.
Seema Talwar is a Senior Operational Executive with 20 years of global team leadership across all aspects of both a physical and digital business focused on supply chain through planning, procurement, manufacturing, logistics, vendor managed inventory, demand planning, P&L management and driving cost efficiencies.
Most recently, Seema was Senior Vice President International Operations for Twentieth Century Fox, a division of The Walt Disney Company. She started her career as a temporary administrator at Twentieth Century Fox and worked her way up to become the Global Lead for Operations and was a key sponsor and change agent, guiding the business through the acquisition by Walt Disney, and the subsequent merger.
Here she shares her journey with Ross Dawson, Partner within Operations, Procurement & Supply Chain at Eton Bridge Partners; from her family background to her impressive career spanning over 20 years as an Operational Executive and how her husband and family have enabled her to have the career and experience she has today.
Eton Bridge Partners is a leading Executive Search, Interim Management and Consulting firm covering the breadth of corporate leadership. Our purpose is to build great teams that drive business performance.
Respect, care, and collaboration are at the heart of everything we do: our people-first culture prioritises building long term personal relationships with colleagues, clients, and candidates alike.
As an executive search, interim management and consulting firm, Eton Bridge Partners are in a genuinely privileged position, meeting people from all walks of life, across lots of different organisations.
Through these conversations, we constantly hear the importance of inclusivity and the distinct lack of diverse role models at the C-Suite level. So, we’ve invited people from our network to share their story and experiences in the workplace, how they became a C-Suite executive and what can we all do to help create more inclusive work places.
Elaine Grell, Global HR Director and Chief People Officer, has worked in HR for over 20 years in organisations such as British Airways, InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) and The Collective.
Elaine is passionate about people and is a Trustee for The Springboard Charity - helping young people achieve their potential. She is a mentor for aspiring HRDs at the CIPD, as well as a mentor for WiHTL - Women in Hospitality, Travel and Leisure.
Elaine shares her experiences with Gavita Phull, Associate Partner within our Executive Search Finance practice, of growing up in Preston, Lancashire to parents who came over from the Caribbean in the 1950s who were often in the ethnic minority. Elaine and her 4 siblings were raised solely by her mother, who shaped who she is today and is a huge inspiration to her. Elaine started her career at 16 in a Travel Agency straight from high school, then when she was 18, when British Airways offered her a job in London which laid the foundation of her impressive career as a senior HR professional and mother of two.
Since the recording of this interview, very sadly The Collective have gone into administration citing reduced occupancy levels caused by the pandemic.
Nimesh is first generation born in the U.K. and the first in his family to have a career in finance and investment banking. His parents immigrated from India and East Africa and he grew up in Croydon with a modest upbringing where attitudes to open discrimination weren’t as rare as they are today.
Nimesh is an experienced Chief Financial Officer, currently at Spirax-Sarco Engineering plc. Before joining the Group in 2020, he was Chief Financial Officer of the De Beers Group and prior to that, he was Group Head of Corporate Finance at Anglo American plc, leading a team based in London and Johannesburg. Previously, Nimesh spent 14 years in investment banking at both JP Morgan and as a Managing Director at UBS.
He is also a Trustee at ReachOut UK, a charity which supports and mentors young people.