Leading Professionals

Guest: Dame Emily Lawson, formerly COO, NHS England, and Head of Number 10's Delivery UnitEmily has considerable experience of leading change in complex professional organisations, including leading the initial rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine programme across the UK. Laura asks: How do you manage to not be overwhelmed by complexity or discouraged by failure? How do you bring the right team together and deal with covert resistance?Website: https://www.lauraempson.com/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LeadingProfessionalsLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/professor-laura-empson-69820773/

Guest: Paul Lewis, Firmwide Managing Partner of LinklatersIf you do not fit the conventional image of an elite professional, how do you persuade others that you are, and how do you learn to feel like one? Paul and Laura discuss his own very personal experiences of “becoming professional”. What can be done to help people from non-professional backgrounds to thrive within elite professional organisations?Website: https://www.lauraempson.com/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LeadingProfessionalsLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/professor-laura-empson-69820773/

Guest: Michael Izza CBE, CEO (former) of ICAEWFor almost 20 years, Michael led the ICAEW, with more than 200,000 members in almost 150 countries. So he has a distinctively long-term and global perspective on the accounting profession. Focusing on the interrelated changes of Gen AI and PE ownership, Laura and Michael explore: What is already happening and what changes lie ahead?Website: https://www.lauraempson.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LeadingProfessionalsLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/professor-laura-empson-69820773/

Guest: Michael Ensser, Chair of Egon ZehnderLaura asks Michael: Why does a world leading firm of leadership consultants choose to elect their senior leaders, and how do their elections actually work? They discuss what really goes on behind the scenes of professional service firms’ carefully stage managed leadership elections.  Website: https://www.lauraempson.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LeadingProfessionalsLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/professor-laura-empson-69820773/

Guest: Georgia Dawson, Senior Partner of FreshfieldsIf you are a lawyer you may be able to guess why Laura asks Georgia to explore the challenging theme of professional ethics with her.In a complex commercial, social, and political environment, how do you balance the competing interests of multiple stakeholders?How do you decide, what is the 'right' thing? And then, how do you make sure you do it? Website: https://www.lauraempson.com/Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@LeadingProfessionalsLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/professor-laura-empson-69820773/

 Guest: Fabien Curto Millet, Chief Economist of Google. Fabien joins Laura to discuss how he and his team of economists anticipate, analyse, and understand the scale of change with which Google must contend. How does he lead his team of professionals, and manage himself, during these uncertain times? And what does he remember from when Laura taught him Strategy at Oxford 25 years ago?Website: https://www.lauraempson.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@LeadingProfessionalsLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/professor-laura-empson-69820773/

Professor Laura Empson introduces key topics and guests from the upcoming series.

What are the parallels between the worlds of espionage and professional services? Laura and Tony talk to David Bickford, previously General Counsel to MI5 and MI6, about his role as the agencies’ Legal Director and Under Secretary of State. They explore how to build trust when professionals are working remotely, how to collaborate when knowledge is shared on a need-to-know basis, and how to stop powerful professionals from going rogue.

Laura and Tony speak to Katherine White, the first Chief Talent Officer of global executive search firm, Spencer Stuart. They explore the challenges of being a senior leader when you are not a fee-earner, and of leading the so-called talent when the fee-earners themselves do not see you as the talent. Katherine explains how she built trust and influence, and how she learnt to add value quickly while working slowly and discretely to bring about change.