Staying where you are is not a safe position. It is a growth, resilience and organisational risk. At scale, the consequence of getting this wrong is structural, resulting in brand equity eroding slowly, the best people leaving, and the organisation producing work it knows isn't right, but can't change of the system that runs it.
I call that system The Corporate Algorithm - inherited processes built for the product-led 20th century that reward caution, familiarity, and replication over judgement, instinct, and cultural truth. Now combined with AI-influenced decisions, fragmented media, and audiences who see through brands in seconds, the result is big brands becoming more formulaic by the year and homogeneity now the default.
And it's not just hurting the bottom line - it's burning out the people inside who know something is wrong, but can't get breakthrough work through the system.
I work upstream - before the brief, before the agency, before the campaign or product innovation - to build Cultural Agility. This is the ability to read multiple cultural contexts, act on them with speed and conviction, and embed that capability into how your organisation thinks and operates.
I work with senior leaders on the systems and decisions that determine what's possible downstream. And with brand practitioners inside those organisations as a Culture Advisor before and on the brief itself, at the point where The Corporate Algorithm either allows the work or dilutes it.
LEADERSHIP AND THEIR TEAMS
BRAND PRACTITIONERS AND AGENCIES
This has led to ongoing commentary, profiles and thought leadership in global industry and trend publications such as WARC, Business of Fashion, Digiday, Adweek, Highsnobiety, The Drum and Campaign. I’ve delivered main-stage keynotes at D&AD, Apple Today, Eurobest and Hyper Island, appeared as a challenger voice at Cannes Lions and Advertising Week, and served as a judge for D&AD New Blood and multiple industry awards.
In 2025 I published Culture-Led Brands (Kogan Page) - a blueprint for senior leaders and brand practitioners on how to drive growth, build resilience and cultivate resonance in a landscape that has fundamentally changed. Thirty years of experience, distilled into something practical for the people making the decisions that matter.
"The MUST READ of 2025 for all CEOs, CMOs and growth leaders. THE comprehensive guide to what, why and how to build Culture-Led Brands." Julie Bramham, Managing Director, Diageo Luxury Group
"This book holds the key to unlock how to credibly use culture to your financial benefit inside and outside the boardroom." Rachel Muscat, Co-Founder Humanrace with Pharrell, formerly adidas
2025 also saw the launch of my POD on Youtube, Cultural Voices: conversations with people who have built careers at the intersection of culture, business and creativity and lived to tell the truth about what that actually takes.
