Rich Longley, Chief Finance Officer at Legal & General Retail, joins Michael to reflect on the career choices and leadership lessons that shaped his path across consulting, retail, food manufacturing, and financial services.

Rich shares how early mentors, competitive sport, and a willingness to step into unfamiliar challenges helped build his approach to leadership. The conversation explores navigating high-stakes decisions, handling imposter syndrome, creating psychologically safe teams, and choosing roles that bring new skills, trusted leaders, and meaningful challenge.

You’ll discover:

• How to build a career around curiosity, challenge, and opportunities to learn, not just job titles.
• Why its important to treat every role as a chance to develop new skills, broaden your perspective, and test yourself.
• How to prepare thoroughly and stay open to challenge when working with senior stakeholders.
• Recognise imposter syndrome without letting it prevent you from contributing or taking opportunities.
• A formula of how to create high-performing teams through psychological safety, respect, and honest communication.
• Look for leaders you can learn from, and invest in relationships across industries.
• For finance professionals, his formula to being a successful finance professional

Rich also opens up about the career path that shaped him, from chemistry student and GB kayaker to KPMG M&A, Morrisons, Greencore, and now the boardroom at Legal and General Retail. Along the way, he explains how early role models, high-performing teams, and psychological safety helped him build confidence in rooms full of senior executives.

This episode is especially useful if you work in finance, lead a business through results season, or want to understand how great leaders balance hard numbers with human judgment.

From cocktail bars to racing circuits and boardrooms, Ian Halshall’s journey proves resilience is the secret to an extraordinary career. When faced with rejection, uncertainty, or a daunting challenge, most hesitate. Ian, however, leveraged every “no” and setback into fuel for his explosive rise, from being a trained cocktail bartender to engineering supercars at McLaren, and leading innovative electric vehicle startups. Now, he reveals how adopting a fearless mindset, relentless adaptability, and smart systems transformed chaos into success, and how YOU can do the same.

You’ll discover:

• How to turn early failures into lifelong lessons that set you apart.
• The importance of building resilience through diverse experiences, from bars in Bournemouth to Le Mans winners.
• The key frameworks Ian uses to streamline teams, manage change, and drive innovation in fast-paced environments.
• Why moving roles every 2-3 years isn’t risky but essential for continuous growth.
• Real talk about leadership, consistency, emotional intelligence, and why “getting back up” matters most.

Ian's eclectic career showcases that success isn’t linear. It’s crafted through strategic risks, resilient mindsets, and systems that keep you moving forward, even when the road gets tough. This episode is perfect for aspiring leaders, engineers, entrepreneurs, or anyone feeling lost or stuck, who needs a reminder that your next breakthrough is often just a brave step away.

Don’t miss Ian’s behind-the-scenes stories from working with Hollywood stars, launching award-winning cars, and leading startups through failures, each lesson more valuable than the last. If you're ready to challenge your limits and build a career with impact, this episode is your blueprint.

Unlock the secret to leadership that truly gets results, not just talk. When influence, agility, and culture collide, your team can achieve extraordinary outcomes, but only if you master the art of knowing yourself and others.

In this episode, Steve Bloomer, a seasoned finance director with over 25 years of experience, shares how grounded values like accountability and curiosity shaped his leadership style, and the importance of getting stuff done. From fighting fires during his early career at Fujitsu to steering complex transformations across Europe, he reveals the critical lessons learned from climbing the corporate ladder and stepping into diverse roles.

• How finance leaders can build influence beyond technical expertise
• Why self-awareness and understanding personal blind spots matter in leadership
• Steve’s career journey from graduate roles to senior finance transformation leadership
• The role of mentors, sponsorship, and stepping outside your comfort zone
• Moving from “firefighting” to enabling others and sustaining change
• Balancing ambition, career progression, and family priorities
• Turning data into insight that drives practical business change
• Lessons from working across cultures and adapting leadership style
• Why failure, feedback, and continuous development build stronger teams
• The human skills finance professionals need as automation and AI reshape the function

You'll discover why technical expertise alone isn’t enough in today’s fast-changing landscape. Steve breaks down the power of influence over technical accuracy, and how understanding different personalities (like the insights from Thomas Erikson’s Surrounded by Idiots) can transform your ability to lead, communicate, and inspire change. Learn how to navigate ambiguity, influence stakeholders, and foster a culture where failure becomes a stepping stone rather than a setback.

Perfect for finance professionals, new managers, or anyone committed to making a lasting difference, this is your guide to leadership that moves beyond the technical, towards influence, empathy, and culture.