On The Balcony
with Simon Lamb

In this inaugural episode, the tables are turned.

Jaroslav interviews Simon. He has worked with Simon on and off for fifteen years, so there was not a great deal of room to hide, and what comes out is an origin story rather than an introduction.

Simon talks about three moments that forced him to reinvent himself, and that eventually led to the birth of Purposeful Change. None of them felt like growth at the time. Each one taught him the same thing in a different way: identity is not fixed, we are always in choice about how we show up, and real change starts when we are willing to name our deepest assumptions and step through them.

The conversation also covers Simon's work now, being alongside organisations developing leaders, shaping cultures and making room for innovation, and about what's next - his first book and where he wants to take Purposeful Change.

All of it in service of one question. How do we help more people shape their identity through their purpose, and author what comes next?

Simon's first guest is his good friend Jo Whitfield, a retail executive he has worked with for nearly a decade and wanted on this podcast from the beginning.

They start with the human reality behind the polished surface of senior leadership. The so-called "soft stuff" is usually the hardest work a leader will ever do, and the most important.

Jo then traces three moments that shaped her life and career, each one revealing the values that have anchored her decisions since. What surfaces are the quiet themes beneath a life spent at the top of big organisations, and some great lessons in how to navigate the tough challenges.

Jo Whitfield is a Non-Executive Director at ASDA since April 2025. A qualified accountant, she chairs Asda's audit committee. Jo previously spent eight years with Asda and George from 2008, holding a number of senior leadership positions across the business. After this, she joined the Co-op, where she was Chief Executive of Food for five years from 2017 and was awarded the CBE in 2021 for her work during the pandemic. Until 2024 Jo was the CEO at Matalan, leading a business turnaround strategy and a refocus on value. Outside of her executive responsibilities, Jo's activities are mainly focused on inclusivity, mentoring and networking. One of Jo's key achievements was pioneering a network for the grocery industry called Grocery Girls. She is also a Non-Executive Director for Factory International.

This one is personal. Charlie Cannon is one of the best leadership coaches and resilience specialists Simon knows, and he still remembers the first time they met. Simon was interviewing Charlie for a big culture change programme in a bank, and asked him why he personally wanted to be on it. Charlie told him he wanted to heal the relationship with his father.

That is more or less where this conversation picks up. Simon and Charlie talk about the forces that shape a life and a leadership style, returning again and again to the same idea: leadership does not begin with changing other people, it begins with the lifelong adventure of knowing ourselves.

Charlie has spent more than twenty-five years helping leaders and teams perform under pressure and meet change with more resilience and awareness. He draws on elite sport, leadership development, depth psychology and contemplative practice, and works with people who want high performance and real personal growth at the same time.

His work rests on one belief: lasting transformation comes through presence, courage and meaningful human connection.

Find out more about Charlie at www.charliecannon.com.

The tables turn again, and this time Simon is the client.

All models are wrong and some are useful, and this one is only useful if you can watch it working on a real life. So rather than explain Reframe as a framework, Simon asked Jaroslav to coach him through it live, using something from his own life that still has heat in it.

They work with a moment of tension after Simon's wife Monica's second cancer diagnosis, and with what it revealed about the way fear, love and old survival patterns shape even our best intentions. Simon looks at the stories running underneath his behaviour, at the strategies that once kept him safe and now cost him something, and at why growth is not about leaving the past behind - it is about giving it its rightful place.

Listeners hear Reframe in action rather than as a model, which is as close as it gets to showing what the work actually asks of a person. It is uncomfortable in places. It is also a reminder that the work of reframing is never finished - it is a lifelong practice of understanding ourselves so that we can better connect with others.

Simon has been waiting to have this conversation for a long time. Nicole Cunningham-Snell is Vice President of Leadership Development at Shell, and her work sits where human potential meets the systems we live and lead inside. She has also shaped Simon's own thinking more than she would ever admit.

They start with volatility, at work and at home, and with the pressure every leader is under to look after today while seeing round corners for tomorrow. Then they open the mask wardrobe. Nicole names the mask she reaches for first, and rather than criticise it they look at what it has given her, because the parts of ourselves we reject tend to be the ones that end up running the show.

Dr Nicole Cunningham-Snell is a Chartered Psychologist and Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society. She has built her career at Shell, working across a wide range of businesses and geographies. As Vice President of Leadership Development, she leads Shell's approach to developing leaders at every level and shaping a culture that is playing to win. Her work brings together psychology, neuroscience and organisational development, with a particular interest in the mindsets and conditions that enable people, teams and organisations to grow, adapt and perform at their best.

The views shared in this episode are Nicole's own and do not necessarily reflect the views of her employer.

I came to this one having had a properly bad morning. A shower that exploded over me, a client meeting I turned up to soaking wet, and a few things weighing considerably heavier than that. Megan Galloway arrived on the other side of it, celebrating two things at once. We decided to keep both in the room.

Megan is a facilitator, a coach, and a friend who has taught me a great deal. We have been running parallel thinking for years without ever doing it in public, so a lot of this is said out loud here for the first time.

We talk success: about what drives high achievers and what it quietly costs. Why receiving is harder than giving for most of us, what a TEDx stage taught her about being loved rather than admired, and the dials we expect to hold at a hundred per cent all at once. We also come back to a spiral we once sketched on a piece of paper in the Cascade Mountains, and to why the collapse turns out to be part of the rise.

If today is one of those days for you, this might be the conversation to sit with.

Megan Galloway is a leadership development professional who helps leaders and teams navigate the real, often messy work of growth and change. An executive coach, facilitator, and leadership strategist, Megan has designed and led experiences for a range of organizations.

Her work combines the neuroscience of change with practical experimentation, candid conversation, and real-world application. Rather than treating leadership development as a classroom exercise, Megan helps people examine the identities, assumptions, and habits shaping how they lead, then practice new ways of showing up where it matters most.

How to Change Your Identity Without Losing Yourself | Megan Galloway | TEDxKU