#101, Tech 101: Top Tips from Tech Leaders

28:16And on the last point, And BDigital have just developed a cutting-edge AI readiness assessment, which provides tech leaders with the platform they need to make well-informed decisions about AI adoption strategy in 2024 and beyond. Go to BDigitalUK.com to find out more and get in touch.

28:39We did this interview in person, which I always prefer to do that. It's just not always possible. but I have to say it's probably one of the only times I've actually been starstruck being a lifelong Welsh rugby fan David Buttress owns one of the professional teams and is highly influential within the Welsh rugby union but we didn't talk too much about that we talked about the organization which he built and which obviously launched him as a technology leader which is Just Eat I have to say his story of how they set up Just Eat and the graph they put in in the early days to just get that business going was just absolutely inspirational.

29:20Walking around East London in the pouring rain, walking into restaurants met with absolute skepticism and cynicism as to why this product, this notion that people would order food online was just probably alien to most people around this time. I thought it was just absolute gold. What else was gold was his answer to this question, which wasn't as upbeat as the other answers. I think it was a very personal answer. David has a lot of regrets in terms of the price he paid for success, the price he paid in terms of his family life. And it's just a stark reminder to remember what is really important and balance is crucial.

29:59This is David Buttress.

30:04Looking back over the course of your career, You've been there, you know, you obviously had a very successful exit from Just Eat. You're now doing investment involved in rugby, maybe going back to a 21-year-old David Buttress. What advice would you give that guy? I should have thought about that. That's an important question, isn't it? I would say probably two things. I would say the first thing is don't think that you can't have a successful career and a successful home life. The two things are connected. and I always felt like unless I was sacrificing everything to be successful professionally, including my home life, then I wasn't giving enough.

30:45So I think I would definitely say to that person, remember to take care of things at home in order for you to perform at work because I definitely in the end screwed that up. So I definitely give myself that advice because that caused a lot of pain for me personally. So I didn't say to anyone else, when your company building, yes, it's important. and yes it's your life it feels like it's it it does feel like it's the end of the world but the truth is it's not you know your partner your friends and family in the end that's what matters so you know and and they like you or dislike your whatever whether you're you know you fail or you succeed so so i think i'd say to myself just make sure you get the balance right because i definitely screwed that one up personally you know and i don't think that's difficult to do i just think i was naive probably got a little bit carried away with the level of focus and determination i had and and so i'd definitely say that and so the bit of probably personal points in that statement and then the second thing i'd i'd say is um is be confident to make and speak up about the changes that need to be made really quickly and clearly because there were times in my career i felt like you know i could have been probably bolder about things that i shouldn't that I knew could be better or different or should have not tolerated.

32:07And that's not about Welsh rugby, by the way, if anyone thinks I'm drawing a parallel, because I'm not. I'm talking about, you know, I think sometimes as a really proud Welsh person living in London, for example, I wish I'd pushed perhaps the office in Wales a bit more than I did. Sure. Because I didn't want to feel like people would think I was doing it for me. Yeah. So I let others guide where the decision... So there's things I felt strongly about that I didn't want to overstep what I would have felt would have been influencing others. But actually, I think that's okay sometimes. If you really care about something, then actually the engineering office in Wales, I wish I had just said, you know, guys, it's in Wales.

32:44I know you've done this independent study. You've engaged with all these development agencies and the report says that. But actually, do you know what? It really mattered to me to build an engineering office in Newport. So we're doing it. So I think that's an example. Sticking up for what you believe in a bit. Yeah, a little bit. I think I was a bit too, I didn't want to, what I felt overreach my, the power of my office. Is that, is that a, is that coming down to confidence, do you think? Cause at the time, obviously you don't, didn't know then what you know now, you know? I think so. Yeah. If I'm, if I'm blunt, you know, I, yeah, I was definitely came down to a little bit.

33:17I didn't, I never suffered from imposter syndrome when I, as a CEO and I definitely, cause I went on this organic journey to becoming one really. and when I became a CEO in 2014 I felt natural I felt ready for it I wasn't intimidated or worried about it it was I felt yeah okay I can do this I know what I'm doing so it wasn't like that but I definitely felt I think Welsh people are intrinsically humble I was just going to say that I think we're quite I think we're intrinsically humble so I would I didn't want anything I was getting too big for my boots I guess yes so we're intrinsically quite self-deprecating and and so I I, you know, I probably, there was one or two things I wish I'd forced through that I would have felt perhaps looking back on it, like that example I just gave you, I thought I should have done that really.

34:03Could have done it. No one would have cared. But I didn't want people to think, oh, Dave's been a bit pushy about the Welsh thing. Yeah, sure. I agree with you. Because we're a global company. Well, here do I start with Flavilla in terms of big personalities. Flavilla is right at the top of the pile. If you don't believe me, just follow her LinkedIn page and listen to the episode. is absolutely both are brilliant. The founder of Black Women in Tech and a super successful entrepreneur in her own right. The Flavilla is an absolute whirlwind of a personality who is responsible for some of the most memorable moments of the Tech Leaders podcast.

34:37Yeah, if you want to listen to that one, I suggest you download that episode. But yeah, absolutely another inspirational, ambitious woman who experienced being underestimated in her career. and I think she just talks about don't wait to be recognized. Go out and get it. Be confident. Go and get what you want. Okay, which sums up Flavilla. She is an absolute go-getter and another inspirational female tech leader is Flavilla Fongang.

35:09What key pieces of advice do you typically give to young female black tech entrepreneurs? Yeah, I love what you said because actually I was talking to a young girl and she was asking me and she's at the beginning of the marching career and she's like oh i've heard you speak with um katherine from accenture during the you know on the fire chat for the voice in the shadow i said to you say i said i'm going to be honest with you you're going to have to navigate as being the only black woman in the room you're not going to bring that change tomorrow i want you to be realistic but use your power to change the game yes and i said to her like be really good at what you do before you bring those conversation on the table because when you're seen as a villain, as one that, you know, who are not supporting the business.

35:49So then they will listen to what you have to say. Be comfortable navigating as a single woman, as a single black woman in a world that is dominated by men. And that's what you're going to have to do. And I wanted her to give a bit of a reality check, not saying, hey, tomorrow you're going to have diversity everywhere. That's not going to happen. And I think the change is happening slowly, but it is happening, but everything that we can do, and I think it's important that she understands as well that diversity and inclusion issue is not a female or black woman or whatever, it's a us problem. So we need this male advocate to, you know, male advocate to talk to us when we're not in those rooms.

36:28So find those people who can speak to you and be the voice and talk to those white men so you don't have to be confrontational and you just focus on the other thing. And that's very important because otherwise, you know, you stand limbo and hoping that people are going to wait to see to be recognized. So don't wait. I guess something that I advise to women in general is that don't wait to be recognized. Go and say it. Brag about you, you know. Man, I really good at this. So do exactly the same thing. Brag about how good you are and ask for it. You know, if you don't ask, you don't get that. Someone will always tell me, like, if you want that cookie, I'm not going to read in your mind if you want that cookie.

37:00Just ask me and I'll give it to you. And do you have any tips about confidence? Like, do you, if people are talking to you and looking up to you and they they hear you say that and it sounds so wonderful and i can imagine people thinking yep i'm going to do it and then actually coming to do it it's actually really hard so what do you say would you make practical tips how you reach into that inner strength okay i get tips specifically for women but don't like to me and i'll explain in a minute okay so the first tip i would say to women is that wear something that you know you know a great dress and i was about to actually things I was about to say, wear some sexy underwear, yes?

37:38Because when you wear some sexy I swear to God, you're laughing but actually it's very serious, like, wear some sexy underwear, it will feel very powerful, only you can see it, but actually it makes you very powerful powerful woman that feel, you look at yourself and the more you feel great and after that it comes back to my experience as a personal shopper dress well, power dress open doors, when you dress well people respect you, when you go in your tracks at bottom at Asda, trust me you don't have a sexy when you go at the net in your power suit. So dress well. It doesn't have to be super dress well because there's something about how you see yourself really just help you project the best version of yourself and how you represent.

38:15And the second thing I would say is that when I'm on stage, so when I do massive speaking gigs and I'm about to get on stage, I visualize myself delivering that talk very well. Because what happens, anxiety is quite often born of imagining the worst that can happen and therefore, you probably can go crazy. but as soon as you have that, recognize it. Everybody deals with imposter syndrome. We talked about that last, this month on Chile Black Women Tech. Everybody deals with imposter syndrome. The question is that, recognize it and then control it. Okay, I'm having a moment right now. I recognize it.

38:47Breathe in, do inhale, exhale and then go into your mind where you visualize you're doing something how you want it to happen. And you will see how much it calms your nerves and it changes again. But yeah, so for women, Oh yeah, wear some sexy socks.

39:05British Army veteran, CEO and founder of software development agency Animus Bytes. Sometimes you meet guests who are just on the same wavelength as you. And Tom and I could have absolutely spoken for hours. He's an ex-military guy and is guided by the principles of stoic philosophy, something which I pay a lot of attention to. uh tom typifies what i would regard as an authentic leader who strives to do things for the right reasons and they were there were a litany of lessons in this episode that would support that and and just generally were gold okay but this question really stood out as well his answer to this question was was was certainly an example of that and the reason why we selected it he talks about just doing things for yourself and i remember the quote we were after all just all monkeys in shoes which i thought was brilliant but look i don't want to butcher it or anything so yeah i'll let tom explain tom o'sullivan sitting in your armchair now looking back and i knew you're still a relatively young man you've got a long way to go but looking back over the course of your career i want to talk i want to basically maybe try and talk to tune into that guy uh early 2006 who joined the army okay that that sort of fresh-faced youngster who didn't really know what was in front of him, but he wanted to do something purposeful, as you said, okay?

40:28Yeah. What advice would you give to that guy right now, knowing what you know now? I would, after slapping him about a bit, I would say love more and laugh more and get out of your own way and take more risk because do it early before you've had children and before you get intertwined with responsibilities. Yeah, sure. But yeah, get out of your own way and to a point, do it for yourself, not everyone else. No one knows the inner workings of one another. Everybody's scared. And as I said, we're monkeys in shoes. I'd like him in a sort of parental way. I'd like to give him some freedom and take some weight of both obligation and conformity off his shoulders and just go, just live your life.

41:23be who you are and love a bit more. I love that.

41:30So I was in awe of this next guest. And just as the Olympics has started, it's quite apt to have Jazz Carling on. A fantastic guest. Obviously, Jazz was an Olympic silver medalist and Commonwealth Games gold medalist swimmer, now working in the tech sector for a SaaS company. And Jazz talks about the transition from Olympian to working for a SaaS company in the customer success side of things. This is a really fantastic episode on every single level. So many memorable responses, such as her incredible life experience. But it was another example of the power of curiosity. Jazz emphasizes how she has been guided by her curiosity and has always been enamored and curious as to the tech sector and is really living that transition from Olympian to getting a traditional job.

42:19is not easy for many people, but she's obviously found that less difficult. And Jazz was an absolutely lovely lady and I just enjoyed speaking to her so much. This is Jazz Carling.

42:35Looking back now then, Jazz, if you could give yourself at the beginning of your career, you know, a single piece of advice, what would you say? Oh, it's a tricky one. There's probably a few things. I know I mentioned around the confidence. yeah always believe in yourself and being able to you know you can only do your best always give your best 100 and i think probably from like a career perspective it's you know learning to always ask questions never be afraid to ask a question no matter how small or you know if something doesn't make sense i always just encourage people to ask questions i'd rather you ask questions because either that means like it's not maybe been explained as well or you know there's not been an understanding of it so asking questions like sure I love I love just being able to ask questions and explore and understand so yeah do you know do you know what jazz that is something that holds so many people back is having childlike curiosity you know sort of basically having the bravery to just ask essentially stupid questions they're not stupid questions because you know most most of the time they find questions but asking questions which could be perceived as and stupid questions, it kind of paralyzes some people and they never ask the questions.

43:44So therefore they never fully understand things. Do you see what I mean? Yeah, that's exactly what I mean. And for me, I always ask questions and I always try to understand it as deep as possible and just being able to ask as many questions and not be afraid is you never look silly. You know, it's better to actually develop yourself and understand it further than, you know, go in the unknown and not really quite know. So asking questions, I'd say, is definitely a powerful one. Yeah, for sure. Greg Jackson is the CEO of Octopus Energy and was one of the most dynamic leaders we've ever spoken to.

44:22It's no surprise this guy is an entrepreneur. He just typifies everything that you would expect. High energy, unsurpassed knowledge of his industry, and so much advice and nuggets of wisdom in every single answer. It was unbelievable. Google. But he emphasized something which I think was quite unique and was very different to the other answers to this question. Follow the path least trodden. It's probably a typical entrepreneur answer. But yeah, but he did really emphasize the bravery to do what others haven't done, okay, and experiment to get what you want. So it's a bit more through a lens of entrepreneur, but it's a fantastic answer.

44:57I'll let Greg explain.

45:02okay so let me ask you this one then greg okay what would you what advice would you give to your 21 year old self there's real merit and follow the path least trodden so um you take what we've done as a company on so many big questions uh we've had to do the opposite of what industry experts would have said. And I think that goes for any innovative business. By definition, you're innovative because you're doing what others didn't. And that means by definition, everyone you speak to says like, oh, here's some advice. There's an expert. Speak to them. And actually, they're as likely to send you the wrong way as the right way.

45:43So I have tremendous confidence in your own ability to analyze the situation. Look at the first principles and then do it even if no one else has, it's a pretty good start point. Great advice, I think, and totally agree. Joe Bagley is the CTO of one of the most renowned tech companies in the world, VMware. Again, a really passionate, knowledgeable individual, certainly within the domains of technology and business, but also motor racing, which was responsible for a couple of tangents that we went down. But this really stood out for me as something we had to include. So just a quick side note, I've suffered from burnout recently a couple of times in the last couple of years.

46:27I actually thought burnout was a conspiracy theory by lazy people. When I was in my far less wise, less experienced self some time ago, obviously I had a rude awakening on that front. burnout is very, very real. And there's a strong possibility you will experience it at some point in your life, especially if you're a very driven, motivated individual. It's very difficult to switch off. It was really enlightening to listen to Joe talk about how he navigates this matter and prioritizes his mental well-being by taking breaks, blocking out time in his diary to have some downtime and how he navigates and manages this.

47:07I mean, I thought it was just absolute gold. really nice guy super super super brilliant really nice guy great guest it's joe bagley

47:18one thing that i'm really keen to get your thoughts on is what career advice would you give to your 21 year old self looking back now again in the armchair what would you say to that guy joe i've thought about this before actually i've been asked it and there's a few things i'd add and it's very simple so the first thing is there's no such thing as being grown up everyone, no matter how old, is being that age for the first time and you're kind of working out how to deal with it and what to do next. I'm nearly 50. I've never been nearly 50 before. I'm trying to work out what happens now. My daughter's just got engaged.

47:45I've never done that before. So I'm discovering that for the first time. You never finish. No one turns up at some point and goes, well done. You're a grown-up now. You've completed everything. You've reached the boss level and it doesn't happen that way. I think the other thing that I would add is don't try and fit yourself into other people's molds. Some of the mistakes I think I've made in my past is where I've tried to change myself to fit in with things that maybe I shouldn't have tried to fit in with. So that dare-to-be thing, I think, was probably the most releasing thing for me at VMware that we did, and I think that's it.

48:16And the other thing is don't be afraid to take some time out. I think there's times in your life when you can't. So when you can, take that opportunity with both hands. There's times when I'm maxed out with things going on in my personal life and public life and things like that, and I'm just like, you know what? I could just take a month out right now, and it would be brilliant. So if you do get a chance to overdo that, whether it's when you're 18 before you go to university year when you graduate and you haven't got dependencies or kids or house or any of that kind of stuff and you could just go and travel around the world for three years go do it right you live for a very long time right so to go and do that and um and the other thing i suppose is don't think that what you're going to do when you're 18 or what you want to do when you're 18 is anything like what you want to do when you're 30 or 40 so be flexible in your outlook don't stick yourself in a path so yeah those those are probably the ones um that i'd highlight most brilliant advice just a quick bolt on question how do you avoid burnout joe a couple of things i block large sections in my diary out that's one thing i literally do i realized that before when i was traveling all the time when i was traveling that time was when i had time to myself literally to sit there think just do nothing no one no distractions no one attracting me just literally just chill when you jump into the zoom world of bang bang bang call call call bang bang bang etc etc on demand all the time so yeah i yeah i freely admit i have sections in my diary just blanked out like four hours at a time right and it's got it's either marked out as kf for keep free or drw which stands for do real work um so yes i love that otherwise you never get stuff done so i think that that's it and i think for me the other thing is i've always been an adrenaline junkie you know if you look back through all my hobbies i've listed some of them here you know mountain biking clay vision shooting special stage rallying driving around tracks all that kind of stuff.

49:57It's because how I chill out, I realize is by focusing entirely on something else. So my brain doesn't stop. And I've got, obviously, I've got some kind of condition in that way. I've never been diagnosed. You know, my brain never switches off. But what I do is I go and point that very active brain at something completely different for a while. That means I don't think about other things. I was really inspired by this guest. Amelia Mollin-Parkis is a PhD, TED Talk speaker, entrepreneur and founder of FIMIA. Her insight on how we diagnose mental health conditions really shocked me, to be honest with you.

50:32I couldn't believe how primitive it is or was at least a year ago. I don't know if it's changed since, but her product that she has developed, the whole vision is to fill this gap. FIMIA create, use gamification to better psychoanalyze people for mental health conditions. And the way Amelia explained it was nothing short of incredible. I really felt inspired by this entrepreneur. I still can't believe their product is not more lauded and used by the NHS. But the last time I checked anyway, I don't know if that's changed since. But in terms of her answer to this question, Emilia reflected upon being a self-proclaimed recovering perfectionist, which I thought was brilliant.

51:11But what really stood out for me was Emilia's emphasis and drawing attention to this notion that sometimes done does indeed beat perfect. I let her explain it to you far better than I can. It's Emilia Mollin-Parkis.

51:30So look, looking back now to the beginning, to that young, ambitious person growing up in Crete, or maybe student in London, let's say a 21-year-old self, what advice would you give to your 21-year-old self? I'm a recovering perfectionist. So I would definitely say to myself... self recovering that's great i am yes as a ceo like in the beginning you're just like it's perfect perfect no perfect goes out the window yeah really quickly i would say learning that 70 is good enough that's something like 70 done is is more than good enough and just go with it don't obsess over perfection that's something i should have learned really early done beats perfect sometimes doesn't it you know done beats perfect but also if you have a dream of helping people or you have a certain thing that you really want to do don't let anyone talk you out of it i let my parents talk me out of neuroscience i still somehow find my way back into neuroscience i wanted to do this thing with games i didn't like i didn't listen to people saying oh let's not do that it's not commercial it's not this it's not lucrative i i wanted to do it i wanted to help people and i'm doing it and whether this succeeds or not i would not change that for the world yeah so it would be kind of just just if you want to do this do it and if you are an academic consider leaving it like consider leaving academia if you want to bridge the gap yeah between research and any kind of industry academics should be more um we should see more examples of people leaving like i never saw anyone uh leave ucl in neuroscience to go do something better let's say i would have loved to have seen that it would have been so inspirational so picking just 15 answers for this was absolutely impossible there were so many brilliant episodes and answers to this question that we could have chosen from although some of the earlier episodes we didn't have this question so we obviously had to rule those out which is a shame because we had some great guests back then however we are really proud of this compilation and i hope that you enjoyed it too thank you so much for joining us please don't forget to follow us on twitter i'm LinkedIn.

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54:06so reflecting on our journey to 100 episodes over the last four and a half years it feels like both a blur and also a monumental leap from recording our first episode on a phone back in 2019 right through to where we are now looking back we've evolved so much you know we've become an an established podcast, which is reflected in the amount of inbound interest we get from PR companies and people wanting to come on as guests. Ultimately, our goal is to give real people a platform to share their story unfiltered. Whilst we invariably don't have the marketing budget and the production budget of the larger podcast productions, our goal has always been very simple, is to share authentic stories that inspire people.

54:54And hopefully, we've managed to do that. We have so much more fantastic content to come your way, including some of the UKs and international top CTOs, CIOs, and other tech leaders, entrepreneurs, authors, journalists, and those with a great story to tell in relation to leadership and technology and this incredible sector that we're all involved in. Thank you so much for your support. I look forward to delivering more great content to you in the years to come. Thank you so much for your support. Please share and try to amplify the message. We're always looking for new listeners and we're open to spread our reach as wide as we possibly can.

55:36I look forward to delivering more great content to you in the years to come.

55:52"...to be a pandemic helpful. I'm going toleh فتح protocols."ned