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The Impact Equation
Lord Michael Barber: Tony Blair's Head of Delivery
Season 1, Ep. 88
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Lord Michael Barber is the founder of the Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit under Sir Tony Blair, author of How to Run a Government, and the global pioneer of deliverology. Over the past three decades he has advised governments around the world on one of leadership’s hardest questions: not what to do, but how to get it done. In this episode, Lord Barber reflects on the experiences that shaped his approach to leadership, from his Quaker upbringing and early years as a teacher to building a delivery system at the heart of government. The conversation explores why execution so often fails, how leaders can create focus in complex organisations, and what it takes to sustain progress when priorities compete for attention. Michael explains the origins of the Prime Minister’s Delivery Unit, the importance of trajectories, data and accountability, and why effective delivery depends as much on relationships and culture as it does on process.He also shares lessons from applying delivery approaches internationally, including in Pakistan, discusses public value and the future of public services, and argues for stronger dialogue between government and innovators, entrepreneurs and business leaders.
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24:57||Season 1, Ep. 93Folake Owodunni is the co-founder and CEO of Emergency Response Africa. ERA is a healthcare technology company improving how medical emergencies are managed across Africa, starting in Nigeria. They operate the largest network of trained First Responders, ambulances, and verified emergency-ready hospitals. This network allows them to connect people experiencing medical emergencies to the help they need, anytime, day or night. Folake is a Mulago Fellow and this interview is the first in a series of three episodes with our friends at the Mulago Foundation https://www.mulagofoundation.org.92. Lord Maude: Fixing the State, from Thatcher to Cameron
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19:07||Season 1, Ep. 91.91Adam and Rafi review the last seven episodes in our regular wash up conversation
91. Dr Danny Sriskandarajah: Power to the People
42:50||Season 1, Ep. 91
90. Mark Bjornsgaard: £Billion plan to Heat Homes Using AI Data Centres
43:58||Season 1, Ep. 90Mark Bjornsgaard has scaled and exited seven businesses in healthcare, finance and music. As founder of Deep Green, Mark has worked out how to turn waste heat from AI data centres into heating local infrastructure and homes, with billions of investment. In this conversation, Mark talks through the long road to making that idea commercially viable, why earlier versions failed, and why the real breakthrough came from solving an economic problem rather than leading with a green one. He is refreshingly direct on what it takes to build: kill weak ideas early, stay obsessed with the customer problem, and make new systems real enough that people can trust what they are seeing.
89. Sherry Madera: Climate action is about data
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87. Roundtable: Investing in Nature and Biodiversity
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