Andy Coulson: Most powerful man in British Media to a national disgrace - Lessons in Reputation management

0:00Today on Secret Leaders, we're talking to Andy Coulson. Andy Coulson, editor of tabloid newspaper News of the World, has been appointed as an advisor to number 10. You all at that business were super powerful, I suppose. You think that the entire world revolves around you and what you're doing that way. As the former editor of the News of the World, he controlled Britain's most powerful tabloid, wielding the power to build or destroy reputations with a single headline. But what makes Andy's perspective truly unique is that he's experienced crisis from both sides, from being the person who created MediaStorms to weathering his very own, very public fall from grace, which ended with an 18-month prison sentence.

0:40A private detective hacked into her mobile phone. I was all over the newspapers. I was on TV. I deeply regret it. I suspect I always will. All this before rebuilding himself as the founder of Coulson Partners, where he now advises leaders through their darkest hours. I was being portrayed in the way that I was being portrayed. the news of the world was being portrayed as some sort of death star. And that isn't the full truth. This episode is a masterclass in crisis management, reputation building, and the art of the comeback. Andy Coulson, welcome to Secret Leaders. Thanks very much, guys. Great to be here.

1:15Thanks for coming on. So usually when someone steps into your office, they're going through a crisis. They're in the middle of a crisis. You know, that's not the... You walked into our office and we were eating lunch. so from a professional point of view it felt a bit like a crisis like god he's not going to be very impressed with us too is he oh good gave me a chance to go and get a sandwich yeah exactly exactly we solved each other's crisis of hunger um but so uh when someone does that you know what are the first steps that you do with that person you know do they come in a certain kind of frenetic energy or what how do you handle that first meeting with them i ask them how they are and on On a level, you'd say, well, that's platitude.

1:54But actually, it's the most important, useful, strategic question you can ask if you're going to be able to build the trust quick enough to get the honest answer. How are you? Because I can build you a plan. I can devise a strategy. I can come up with all sorts of smart ideas. And it might be if you are in the wrong place in terms of where your head is, where your health might be, mental and otherwise. that is all going to be useless. So, you know, I think there's a sort of misconception about crisis management in a way in that it's all about the output. It's all about the statement or it's all about the, you know, the clip that you give to the news if it's something very high profile or it's the, you know, I need to react, right?

2:37Which is a natural response when you're in crisis, right? It's almost chemical. But we try to look at it and start from the other end. And it's, for me, it's all about the individual and where they are, what their mindset is. And then the second question is, what is it that you're looking to achieve here? And if what you're looking to achieve is, you know, simply make it all go away, then that can often be an interesting and perhaps quite difficult conversation. Because if you take that sort of silver bullet approach to a problem, very, very few problems are solved with one silver bullet. It's just not how it is.

3:14And then, you know, where is it that we're trying to get to long term? You know, we take very much a long term view of crisis management. Who are you? Where are you? What is it that you want to achieve? What's in the way? Aside from this problem, actually, what is it that you want to be either as an individual or as a business? It's the same question. and then finally I think it's you know it's a culture question for me with a business in particular because I think that there is often not always I think if it's a health crisis right there's no opportunity there necessarily but serious illness aside I think there's invariably opportunity in crisis certainly was for me you know and I've had a bit of it in my life as I'm sure we'll discuss I think a crisis offers the opportunity for a proper audit on your life, a proper chance to stop, pause, analyze your values, really think about who you are and what it is you want in your life, define your purpose and then off you go.

4:17It's very common. What you've just described is almost the exact hero's journey, isn't it? You know, very commonly entrepreneurial journeys too, right? They start because of a low moment where you realized enough was enough of X thing and I had to find a different way. Yes, exactly. Exactly. Entrepreneurs are interesting when in crisis. We work with a lot of disruptors, if you like. And it's a difficult, often, not always, but often a difficult thing to come to terms with as an entrepreneur because invariably if you've been successful, you've done it your way. you've done it by doing things differently you've done it by just kind of you know running against uh uh you know sort of uh uh the sort of the the common the common approach your what's made you successful is being different right and so when you find yourself in a in a problem it might be a cult often is a cultural problem where you've raced ahead built your business but you've just not got that culture aligned behind you you're sort of slightly offended right you're kind of what what what you know i've built this amazing business and now suddenly people have got the audacity to ask me you know tough questions about my culture about me about my style of leadership we've seen this in some very big businesses right um you know some epic businesses and that's what it is it's a cultural lag between leader and uh in the team and you know that is interesting work trying to get those two things back aligned and that is a that requires counselling in a way and i do a lot of what we do is trying to get an entrepreneur in you know in those circumstances to appreciate that they've built an amazing business but the world has changed and their world has changed so the beginning of a crisis first 60 minutes the first couple of days like what are the big mistakes that people make i think they're rushing to you know which is a natural response right when you're in danger you want to do something about it especially entrepreneurs right keep them away from twitter yeah it's fight or flight and it's you know and it's and it's there's something i can do here and it's as i say particularly if you if you're a successful person who has you know had has got agency and has always had agency in a way that they've built their business they've got control trying to have that conversation which is the first conversation you know beyond how are you he's trying to work out you know with the client what do you have control of and what don't you have control of right you guys have talked about stoicism on this on this pod, I actually see that you've got Darren Brown's book, Happy Birthday.

6:44It's excellent, that book. It's an excellent book. Excellent, so good, yeah. Excellent introduction to stoicism. Yeah, it is. Not many people know about that book either. I always recommend it to people. No, it's terrific. I don't know, it's so good. Yeah. And it is a superb introduction to stoicism, which I'm a fan of. You know, that's the central tenet of stoicism, right, is work out what you've got control of and what you don't have control of, and then concentrate on the things that you have control of. It's often missed, I think, understood in that people people see stoicism quite often as being unemotional.

7:14Or detached. Or detached. I think it's the reverse. I think once you've worked out what you've got control of and what you don't, that's where you then put all your emotion. Yeah, anyway. Is that outcome focus at the beginning of the crisis? You're saying you can control X, you can control Y, this is where we want to get to, or is that too early? There's two things obviously are aligned. The way to get to your outcome, in my view, first and foremost, is about control and obviously about acceptance. You know, as I mentioned earlier, in terms of, you know, that often being a challenge with entrepreneurs is just, yes, it's real.

7:47It's real. And also sometimes, you know, is, you know, and I've found myself in this situation with clients, you know, quite often where I'm able to say pretty quickly, you're not in crisis. You've got a serious problem, right? And we need to navigate that and manage that, but you're not in crisis. Let's take the temperature down. And crisis, you know, is a word that's overused. I overuse it. twice twice in three words twice in three words of the titles also on brand exactly exactly so it is overused and uh you know i'm i'm part of that problem but what how would you define the difference between a crisis and a crisis for me is is if your life uh if the purpose of your life has been you've properly lost control of it right you've you've lost a grip of the direction of your life and I think also your values are being questioned fundamentally, then you're in crisis.

8:43There's a lot of stuff that sits under the current bracketing of crisis, I think. So a reputation, famously, takes years to build, minutes to lose. Obviously, you've had that context yourself in your own life. So for the audience that don't know, what do you know about reputation management and crisis, dealing with crisis? Well, I know it from a number of different angles. You know, poacher, gamekeeper, game. So, you know, poacher, you know, I was a newspaper editor for a number of years. That ended very badly. Gamekeeper, you know, I suppose describes my time as an advisor, you know, working with David Cameron, where, you know, my job really was to be the, you know, part of the Praetorian Guard, if you like, around his reputation and around the party's reputation.

9:32And then game is, you know, the five years I spent dealing with my own issues, which were very high profile, you know, front and center of the media for long periods of time. You know, a spell in prison. And then actually coming out of prison and going into another trial, which fortunately I was acquitted in. And then the rebuild, which is, you know, I'm now seven years into. I actually came out of prison almost exactly 10 years ago. but as I say I had that other issue to deal with first and so you know my business now is seven years old and my life now actually is you know this is interesting I think you'll be the judge around reputation I think when you've failed you know or particularly if you've if you've done so publicly which was the case for me you've got a decision to make you know you can either try and put that in a box and you know reinvent and sort of that happened let's just push it to one side find a new way forward or and this is you know where I am on it I think that's unhealthy I think what you should do is confront your failures accept them don't be defined by them I don't think I am defined by my and I certainly don't live my life on the basis that I'm defined by my failures but I'll never forget them I mean I mean in my cases I suppose you know did I have much choice you know it's a fair question because it was so public but i think i did i think i could have not called my business calls and partners i could have named it after a london square like most consultancies but i didn't want to do that i wanted my name over the door because i wanted everyone to know it's me it's probably quite good marketing at that point well it's binary it either is or it isn't but i'll tell you what it is is efficient you know it's super efficient And, you know, more than that, I've really, you know, in a very front foot way, because I believe it to be true, I put my experience to good use.

11:31You know, I think if you've got a problem or if you've got an unrealized opportunity, which is actually what we spend most of our time doing rather than crisis management. Crisis management is a part of what we do. We are, you know, we're positive reputation builders. Right. And having someone who's lost one in the room can be really useful. yeah right if you're from a positive perspective let alone oh we must know how to avoid these problems you know which i which i i have some views on well so that's the professional bit but also the the other bit of my life is you know is if you'll forgive the plug is my podcast right where i talk to people who've been through crisis and those are my little arrows out in the world for free it's all there go find it it's all yours uh if you if you want it where you know people have been through far worse than me by the way are giving their lessons on how to get through crisis and I love that yeah it's interesting I love that that is meaningful and that is useful I think I'll be and I'll do it for as long as it's useful um and so to have a life now you know having had some bumps in the road uh where I can put all of my experience to good use you know commercially in my business and then in the way that I am my pod it's just delightful you know I've never been happier what do you think your reputation is for people that's a brilliant question that is a brilliant question i do not know the answer to that really i'd really because that's an interesting that's an interesting thing because you you know and i it's funny because it just came to me as we were talking and i wonder what it broadly is no it's a great it's a great question because what's the measure of it you know and i suppose the of course i am concerned about my reputation from a commercial point of view and i think we're we've got a growing because my business is not just about me by the way i've got brilliant partners john stiefel katie sell These are very, very experienced people as well as a good team.

13:13So, you know, I hesitate to associate only myself with the reputation of my business because I'm lucky enough to work with brilliant people who are contributing to that. And I think we've got a very good reputation in the marketplace now. Yeah, as a company. I've done it for seven years as a company. My personal reputation, I think, thanks to the, you know, the joys of the Google algorithm, I suspect still remain pretty mixed. one of the things about the google algorithm is that it will take something from a piece of coverage from 2010 and stick it in the first page of your your you know your news search as if it happened yesterday i am not the poster boy to start complaining about that by the way but it is like having a newspaper posted through your front door you know 10 years after a after a court case yeah you know as if it's as if it's real so that i think is an element i suppose on my my digital reputation um but i what sits below it for me and this is another this is linked to control this is definitely linked to stoicism is that i have also worked out and it took me a while uh that the only if the only opinions really that are uh that are my business are are the opinions of my family my wife first and foremost of my three sons of my friends that i care about and of the clients that you know who choose for which i'm incredibly grateful to work with us those are the opinions i care about anyone else's opinion of me and i don't want this to sound arrogant is none of my business it is for whoever has that opinion and i know that there are will always be people have a certain opinion about me and there's nothing i can do about it control and actually it's for you and that is a very freeing position to find yourself in and you know and if i can get you know in a process that we go through with our clients if i can get my clients to that place as well um that is a that's a very useful thing to be able to to be able to get to can you tell us about what it really feels like when you're being cancelled well for me give us some flavor on that Yeah, it was wretched, you know, and, you know, I use the word unraveling and that's what it felt like for me.

15:32The first year in particular was just terrible because everything, you know, sort of fell in, you know, I was unemployable, you know, the kind of economic impact on that on me and my family was pretty immediate. I was you know all over the newspapers I was on TV being you know portrayed as someone that I didn't think and don't think I was or that I am you know and that is a very difficult thing to live with and then there's your relationships you know thankfully the important relationships in my life most importantly with my wife were rock solid but you know it's a real test of friendship it's a real test of your professional relationships you know there were I have to say ultimately over the longer term massively net positive for me far more people ran towards me who owed me nothing than people who I felt perhaps did owe me a bit at least some loyalty ran in the opposite direction but I also learned that you know my situation was a scandal right And scandal can really twist a lot of things out of shape.

16:47It can twist friendships out of shape. It can twist professional relationships. It bends things out of shape. And if you can accept that as well and just sort of see it for what it is, that really helps with the anger. And most importantly, the bitterness. So I was pretty bitter for about a year, and then I worked it out. and bitterness is you know is the is the end is the truth the coverage was like very significant very regular yeah were you seeing that oh can i say by the way i do not want any of this to come over as well as me right a i just don't believe that right i think it's a fight i think i think there is nothing more useless in life than a self-appointed victim and you know i'm not that and i'm and i'm not looking for a round of applause or any or you know i but i

17:40particularly when it comes to the media coverage I think it would be grossly hypocritical of me to whinge in my own but more like how regular did it feel to you in the moment? Well at times it was there were periods of my life where it was every day and it's a different problem because it was so multifaceted and the difficult thing obviously is not just the impact on me it's the impact on the kids and Eloise and having to move and all the kind of impact that it had on our life that obviously was very painful and very difficult and bear in mind I was in a period of my life I was in my early 40s I was firing on all cylinders that's the period of your life when you should be at your most productive and so I was kind of removed It's probably made you now right?

18:21As in like your success now is the kind of the end that you said his hero journey as in you're now probably viewed as the reputation specialist because of this arc that you've gone through Well I hesitate to say it's made me I mean, the interesting thing is, you know, would I, I'm definitely happier for it. I'm definitely a better advisor. Much more importantly, I'm a better husband, I'm a better father, I'm a better friend as a result of it, without any shadow of a doubt on all of that. But I can't honestly sit here and say I'm glad it happened. I wouldn't wish it on anybody. You know, I do not wish it happened.

18:55Do you feel like going through that experience? Well, different, actually, going through that experience. did that help you reflect on your time as editor at news of the world where ultimately you were responsible for doing that to other people not in necessarily the obvious malicious way but that is essentially the job of the editor of the news of the world whoever takes that role it's part of the job part of the job yeah not the only job yeah i'm sure there's other aspects to it but you know like you know did it make you reflective at the time of course it of course it did you know and It's an interesting thing for me because, of course, it was so negative.

19:31All of it was so negative. I was being portrayed in the way that I was being portrayed. The news of the world was being portrayed as some sort of death star. And that isn't the full truth. Lots of mistakes made. I was the boss. That's why I absolutely feel a sense of responsibility over what happened. And I feel very sorry about it and why I will now take this opportunity to apologize that anyone is listening who was impacted by it. But it's not the full truth, the entire truth of the news of the world. The entire truth of the news of the world is quite different. And I know that because I was there.

20:05And it was actually a place populated by very professional people in the main who would turn up to work to produce a brilliant product that was loved by its readers and that was as much about humour and sport and campaigning and sort of journalistic brilliance that does not fit with the caricature of the paper now. And I feel terribly sorry for those people because, of course, the paper was closed. Not my decision, but it was closed. So where I am on it now, it's taken me a long while, is that I'm now able to say that to you in a way that doesn't kind of cause me to think, oh, my God, I'm trying to defend the news of the world.

20:47It's just the truth of the place. and it also is kind of the truth of me right i'm someone who's made loads of mistakes in my life loads of mistakes professional and personal i am you know but i am i am i really do believe as a result of i think what i went through that um that i've got something to contribute and uh and i've got something that's useful and uh and that's how i'm going to focus the rest of my life on is trying to is trying to do something productive try and build a brilliant business of people I've always admired in life, of people who've got off their backside, people like yourselves who've gone out and built something.

21:23You know, I was only ever an employee until I wasn't. And so, you know, that's what I'm going to do with the business. And if I can also, as I say, fire a few of those arrows out through the pod, happy days. I suppose in that role and in that life, you all at that business were super powerful, I suppose, as in like your power over the media. Influential. Influential, yeah. Do you think at any point with the mistakes that were made, that was because you all felt so influential and I suppose powerful? Yeah, definitely an element of it. Definitely an element of that. Does it go to your head whether you like it or not?

21:58Yeah, I don't know whether it's like it or not. I mean, I've sort of mentioned this previously, but there's a condition called editoritis, which is little known. Editor? Editoritis. Right. I was definitely a sufferer of editoritis. And the main symptom is that you think that the entire world revolves around you and what you're doing that week. And there was definitely a bit of that. And that's my responsibility, right? Because I was the boss. But it wasn't the only thing that was going on at the end of the world. There was also an awful lot of humor. There was an awful lot of kind of, you know, we were very self-effacing in lots of ways as well.

22:36But, yeah, I wouldn't use the word. I don't think I'd strutted around believing myself to be powerful. Yeah, yeah. I don't think I would use that word. But I think I would use the word strutting around thinking we're influential. And to an extent we were, right? But I think there was too much of that. On reflection, too much of that. So on reflection, what are, I suppose, the biggest regret from that period of time? The biggest regret is my failure of leadership, you know. With the team. And also that I didn't really, you know, what a thing to be the editor of a newspaper like the News of the World, right?

23:09at that time with its influence, with its ability to kind of, you know, change, whether it's policy change or whether it's impacting, you know, other areas that we were interested in. And we did some good work on that, you know. We didn't, you know, it wasn't all scandal and doom and gloom. By any measure, you know, we did some things that were quite different as well. You know, I got William Hague as a columnist for the News of the World. Quite unusual. A lot of people, what was that about? well William Hayes turned out to be a pretty good newspaper columnist we you know the way we approached the sports coverage was very different to a lot of other newspapers we were pretty innovative but not innovative enough and that's one of my regrets is that I didn't put it to work more positively you know I could have done so much more with it I now realise but you know I was quite young you know and this is not an excuse it's just the truth I'm not sure I was ready for it certainly wasn't trained there's no training going on and i don't think i was if you'd asked me then that you read of course raring to go if you asked me in any you two are you too immature to be the editor of the news of the world i would have been mortally offended yeah editor writers would have set in told editor writers would have set in i told you to jog on but now i can see actually in lots of ways i don't think i was i don't think i was ready for it you manage communications obviously for news of the world and also the government at downing street so what are your top three tips for uh managing a reputation well i think the first one we've already talked about is is you know work out what you mean by reputation right because if what you mean by reputation is fame that's the wrong approach and i'm certainly not the man to advise you if however you're super clear that i want a reputation for this purpose either to build a brilliant business or to get into power in the context of politics because I want to do these things,

25:07then that's got to be the first point to arrive to, right? Really work hard at defining where it is you want to be and who it is you want to be, number one. And then number two, I think you've got to, it comes back to the control piece again, right? The second thing is, right, what have I got control of to make that happen? We've talked about control in the context of crisis, But control is very important from a positive point of view when you're trying to frame your reputation or build your reputation. What if I got control of that will affect that and impact that? And what don't I? And I think people often go running off into directions thinking this is going to somehow support, drive, help build my reputation is the wrong place to be.

25:49So be super sort of strategic about where you're going to put your reputation effort. and then the third thing I think is all about sort of preparation for when it might go wrong and a lot of the work that I do is frustrating in a way because you're sitting with a client and you think if only you'd sat and had this conversation with me a year ago, if only you'd sort of just taken the time to put reputation is not so often, it's just not in the boardroom, right? No. It's not at the table. It's kind of, it's PR. Well, you sort of feel like it'll just sort itself out as long as you just do the right things, which is probably a bit casual.

26:33Not a problem, so that's a problem, right? Yeah, some firms have gone as far as having a sort of chief reputation officer. Really? There are a few, but it's very, very rare. It's normally in the, it might be in the public affairs bucket, it might be in, depending on what kind of business you are, it might be in the comms bucket, it might even be in the sort of, you know, internal comms bucket. I see that all the time when internal and external content mix that. But reputation as a word is so rarely brought into the conversation at board level. And I think it's partly because of this that, or it partly speaks to the problem that we have a reputation, is that it is invariably seen through a negative prism.

27:09It is invariably seen as sort of dark arts or spin or PR in its broader sense, or it's manipulative, or it's slightly deceitful. That's where reputation lives. And I think that's entirely the wrong place for it. I think trying to carve out, drive, maintain, protect your reputation is a wholly positive enterprise. It should be embraced. Leaders should talk about it. But no one must talk about their reputation because they feel like they're spinning. You've been at the centre of some of the biggest media storms in the UK, both professionally and then politically as well. What are the patterns you see from good leaders at managing that?

27:54What are the things that you're seeing from people who are brilliant at managing crisis? Well, they get the control thing, first and foremost. They are quick enough to appreciate and understand and accept that there's a proper problem or a crisis that they need to deal with. And obviously they're able to take teams with them through crisis, which is, you know, not always a given with a leader. And that is about getting the right people in the room, making sure the wrong people are out of the room, which is often quite tricky. That's tricky in politics, certainly tricky in business, because quite often the people that are, you know, I think causing problems in those situations in those rooms, because in the end, that's what it comes down to.

28:36A bunch of people in a room, right, trying to work through a problem. quite often it's people with you know with the skin in the game who are raising the temperature who are causing division with their views who are steering you off in a different direction and that's where the value without wishing to you know promote the the value of independent advisors but that is that's why you want independent advisors because i go in a room i've got no skin in the game whatsoever i will i will just tell you what i think you need to know and i do it on the basis this is that this is the premise of the way that we engage with clients i do it on the basis that i am not telling you that i am always going to get it right because by the way i'm a human being but i will be right more than i'm wrong that's my approach and i think a good leader will allow their team whether it involves independence or not to have that space to get things wrong that's how you work through a problem that's how you get to a solution so those are the leaders i think who do a good job david cameron who i worked for as you know He was good in a crisis precisely for that reason.

29:35He was a very, very good communicator. Good communicator, but good communicator with his team. And he gave us room to make mistakes. But we all knew as a result that, you know, what the mission was, what it was we were trying to achieve. And he set, you know, I was thinking about this the other day. He set a very modest kind of mission really in a way. But one of the reasons he had so much loyalty around him was because it was seemingly modest, but very, very effective. And there was an argument. I didn't see him lose his temper much, but he lost his temper once when we were having a conversation.

30:12Others in the team felt that we needed to define what Cameron-ism was. And he lost his rag. He said, I don't want an ism. I'm not an ism. This is not about an ism. This is just about leaving the country in a better state than we found it. That's what we're doing here. It's a great moment, actually. It's very early on in my relationship with him. And I just thought, yeah, I like that. That will do for me. That was a terrific bit of leadership. What would you say are the three things that can destroy a reputation?

30:45Well, what three things that are more likely to mean when a problem comes, you're going to destroy your reputation? Or do you mean a specific problem that is undoable or unsolvable? Probably the former. Well, actually, they're both interesting, frankly. I think that there are I think if you're on the wrong end Of a You know A certain type of criminal offence It's very difficult Depending on who you were What you were What it is you wanted to do The rest of your life You know that's very difficult I think I think if you're It's a good question I think Politically You know We're now We're seeing it with Donald Trump We've just touched on it not much that seems to have kind of undone him at all.

31:34And there are a number of things that he's dealt with, which if we were having this conversation, you know, three years ago, you'd have said, well, that would do for him. All of it, yeah. How many people said, well, that would do for him? He can't possibly survive that. So many of those. He can't possibly survive that. So that does send a signal to you that actually there's not much that you can't find some sort of solution to. sounds absurd to say these words but the grab the pussy moment was probably the defining moment of like nothing is ever ever going to stop this guy do you remember it was actually i'm not saying i agree with it but the rebrand of that statement was genius do you remember no what was that they managed to rebrand it in the press as it's locker room talk and the whole fan base was like yeah it's just locker room talk and i remember being like fucking hell is that amazing political spin that someone's been like we have to take the weight out of it we have to take the weight out of the statement and we have to you know make people understand that any of us could have said that he's obviously genius he's obviously probably done and said worse things like actually being convicted of stuff you know that's pretty uh that's more significant yes it is it is but i think from that moment you realized that nothing was going to stop his voters from voting for him it's more that right I'll tell you the other thing that's sort of changed I think in terms of there's a lot of disadvantages with the way that the media has now worked from a reputation point of view there are some advantages right one of those advantages is sort of short memory syndrome we do move on very quickly now so if I would ask you to remember the name of the person who tried to assassinate Ronald Reagan right John Hinckley Jr is pretty fixed particularly people in my generation I'm older than you guys right that's that name is that name's fixed how many of us can remember immediately and recall the name of the guy who was laid out on that roof with a rifle who tried to kill Donald Trump great point it's gone right great point Thomas Matthews Crooks I think his name was that's right yeah Thomas Matthew Crooks yeah gone and that these are two people who try to kill a try to kill a president of the united states and probably the most famous of all lee harvey oswald because it's the furthest back but it's this stuff just kind of fritters fritters away in a way that it didn't used to so that would tell that could tell you if you find yourself in a truly tricky situation those two things well donald trump ended up as president no one can remember the person who tried to who try to kill him that could point you in a direction to say actually there's nothing that's unsolvable there's nothing that's undoable i'm not sure i can't i come but i do however come back to you and you know we we you know we discuss this idea of whether donald trump's happy he's undeniably thrilled but you know the clients that i'm working with you know aren't seeking to be the president of the united states they're just trying to lead productive successful lives and so the happy question is a very important question it's a really important question and what do you want to end up with you know um at the at the end of all this and it's a question i asked myself when i was in the in the middle of my stuff that's when i have my that's when i sort of had my little mini epiphany about how i was going to handle it you know sat on a mattress in a cell in a glasgow police station totally lost control of my life my life had become completely absurd and I just right you've lost control and so you know breathe in breathe out and just keep doing those two things and one day you'll be doing it somewhere an awful lot better with your family and with the people that you love and then you'll be in a position to work out who you want to be what you want the rest of your life to be for the sake of like our audience and for advice for our audience so you had obviously the news jack and scandal you had prison you had this effective comeback journey and i think a huge part of that is rebuilding your trust with companies and individuals so yes if someone is going through a crisis has had a crisis how do they begin the trust build because for you like you just said like you did hit rock bottom and you did acknowledge the problems and you said you did say sorry so you knew on that mattress in that moment you were like well there's a rebuild coming like how does it start it's really difficult it was really difficult because i'm going out into the world uh uh understanding that for the previous five years you know there was a particular view of me that was pretty well fixed right and so i'm walking into rooms with people trying to convince them that they need my help with all that still you know i always just sort of see it as kind of you know rocks in my rucksack you know still feeling the weight of that in every in every conversation but you know i was able to even in those early days of building a business i i knew i was valuable i knew i had something of use i didn't know how far i'd get with it and i didn't know whether or not people would agree with me but I knew enough uh I had enough confidence about that to you know to to be able to walk through the door and have those conversations and then you win one right so I you know I don't talk about my clients but I do talk about uh this this guy he's a former client now but but a friend of mine a guy called John Roberts who's the founder of a business called ao.com and John and I met and I went up to go and see him in his uh in Bolton where ao is based and uh we had a we had a conversation we've been introduced and he said I'm going back to London why don't you jump on the train with me and as we got on the train he said right you've got the time of this journey to convince me why I need you in my life great challenge but also terrifying right this was a quite a big deal for me right this is a proper business publicly listed firm fantastic business that John had built and I was pitching to to give them advice and we got to the end of the journey and he said great we're on it's a great story good job and that was and that was a that was a big step for me right and then and then each time each time you you know you you win a piece of business and someone says yeah i need you it's it's it's an it's more wind in your sails and off and off you go again but i'm not gonna tell you it's been a straight road because it hasn't right because it's also been pretty tricky at times but on a practical level though how do you advise people to rebuild trust because Obviously, you've done it yourself, and you're still in the process of it always, every day, every pitch.

38:17Yeah. But what about the advice you give to other people or to entrepreneurs? Yeah, to entrepreneurs that are listening that have lost the trust of their team, maybe their investors. What is the advice you give to them? Integrity is the best armory. It all starts with that. So work out who you are and make sure you communicate that clearly and stay true, stay consistent, stay authentic. I think authentic is a word that gets warped left, right and center. or I hear people talking about Trump as being authentic. I mean, he's authentically inauthentic, but it's definitely worked for him. But you know what I mean?

38:49It's kind of got walked. The single most important thing comes back, who are you? What is it you're trying to achieve? And then communicate it. And from a staffing point of view, you've just got to have that. You've got to stay consistent. You cannot waver from it, in my view, with your team. I certainly aim for that with mine. This is what we're trying to achieve. and this is how we're going to do it. But sometimes the trust has been lost to because you have come across inauthentic to your integrity, to your values, to the things that you think that you are and that other people do. So when that happens, then what?

39:25Because yeah, I agree with you. The easiest Teflon here is to not be a prick and to be a great person, have integrity in all the things. But in business, sometimes sadly, you forget those things. Funnily enough, the kind of not being a prick bit. There's lots of versions of that, right? Because being a prick could also be that you're... Being authentic, yeah. Well, it can be authentic. It can be quite useful. It's the truth of you. Yeah. And that's what I mean about those conversations with clients where you're trying to work out, get that trust bit working. But for the ones where that has actually wavered, that baseline, whatever it is, you're right.

39:57Whatever the actual authentic integrity bit is, if you've made a mistake with that core piece, yeah then what well then you work to see how you can repair that and that might well involve a moment right whether that is a statement if it's a public situation or whether it is a kind of you know part may a culprit to your team if it's an internal issue or whether it's you having to change you know change your behaviors and and to find ways of demonstrating that you just got to you know you you got to get to the truth of the person to even begin to be able to kind of repair it So whenever I get asked, I would definitely not say I'm a Christ specialist at all, but whenever I get asked that question by other entrepreneurs, I always have said, and I've been sitting here thinking about it, I've always said, like, the first thing you should probably try and do is acknowledge where you've gone wrong, apologize for the part of it that you've got wrong, and lay out a plan of how you're going to get back to a version that is good.