What makes a leader worth following? Sam McAlister, former Newsnight Producer and Author of Scoops, answers One Question.

Can we live in a world of compromise instead of cancel culture? 

Sam McAlister is a former news night producer and the orchestrator behind one of the most famous royal interviews of our time. Since leaving the BBC, Sam has written Scoop, which later became a Netflix hit and featured Billie Piper and Gillian Anderson. Sam has since switched media for academic and is a fellow at the London School of Economics. 

Sam joined Sarah to explore what it means to lead today through the lens of public broadcast media, leadership of ourselves, from curiosity to resilience, and how we can model the type of leadership we want to see in the next generation. 

An honest, insightful, and amusing conversation on what it really means to lead today. 

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Transcript

UNKNOWN: 0:00

Oh,

SPEAKER_00: 0:04

I like the idea of a society in which we look for similarities rather than differences and where we look for consensus rather than hatred and where we look for compromise rather than digging our heels in and being big narcissists and saying this is my truth and there is no other way and that's the space that I like and I think is good for us all. Welcome back to the One Question podcast this series we're asking, how do we lead today? And I am joined by Sam McAllister, BAFTA-nominated interview producer, former criminal defence barrister and author renowned for her decade-long tenure at BBC Newsnight. During her time there, she secured high-profile interviews with figures such as Elon Musk, Sheryl Sandberg and President Bill Clinton. Most notably, she orchestrated the 2019 interview with HRH Prince Andrew. In 2022, Sam published her memoir, Scoops, behind the scenes of the BBC's most shocking interviews, offering an insider's perspective on her most significant journalistic endeavours. The book's success led to its adaption into a Netflix film titled Scoop, where actress Billie Piper portrays Sam. Transitioning from journalism to academia, Sam currently serves as a visiting senior fellow at the London School of Economics, where she teaches negotiation with the law faculty. Sam McAllister, welcome to One Question. Thank you for having me. It is a pleasure i'm delighted that you're here and that we're going to explore this uh this series question how do we lead today and i want to start uh you're going to make me laugh through this entire conversation well we've known each other for quite a while now as well and have so much in common and so much uh we have so much in common but also not in common we're like schrodinger's friendship simultaneously similar and dissimilar and it works beautifully as you can tell yes So we're going to start in between all the laughter. On your definition of leadership, I'm really interested how you perceive leadership and that can be in any different definition. So that could be business leadership within community and how you think that has evolved over the last five years. Blimey, Governor. I know, it's a big question. It's a big question. How long have we got? Well, I think leadership is very personal. If you're working in a corporation, of course, you have to be led by how the corporation perceives how things should and shouldn't be done in certain hierarchies. But I've always kind of preferred to be my own leader, whether it's of my two cats or of my son or, you know, trying to find ways for me to progress by thinking about myself as a leader of myself, which sounds a bit sort of like silly, but it's the way that I've been able to delineate myself as an individual from the large organisations or, you know, workplaces that I've worked for. So while I might be a minion as I was at the BBC, and I don't mean it disparagingly, you know, It was just a fact. I was still a leader in my own home. And sometimes that's all the leadership you have, you know, if you're like number 50 in command as I was. So no real autonomy in the workplace for most of my career until quite recently. The only autonomy I would have would be at home leading a small child and those two cats through thick and thin, but feeling that I had some element of autonomy. So I suppose I've been the CEO of myself, but until quite recently, I haven't been what other people would recognise as a senior leader in any other role. And how has that shifted, having done the role at Newsnight for so long, and then obviously the infamous interview with the Royal? How has that shifted for you since then writing Scoop, which then became this huge and brilliant Netflix drama? How has your leadership of yourself evolved or shifted? Well, I think it was just really nice because a Effectively when I was at the BBC of course there was lots of great leadership but also notoriously lots of not so great leadership and I don't always get it right but I suppose it's a bit like being the child of divorced parents and then wanting to create a really good family situation for your own child. So I feel a bit like that about the BBC that I had some great parents there, some great uncles and siblings but ultimately I realised the model was quite flawed in comparison to the kind of person I am and the priorities I have. So when I was And you're leading. Finally, I can delineate good behavior and bad behavior. If I see unhappiness, I can do something about it. If I see happiness, I can celebrate it. If I see poor behavior, I can challenge it. So for me, the joy really of the Netflix was that there was a large crew of incredible, brilliant people, far more experienced than me, and obviously famous actors and actresses. But for the first time, if I saw something I didn't like, which only happened, you know, maybe once, let's not be dramatic. It was incredibly positive. happy hard-working group of people absolutely inspirational but I could also go and use my influence to kind of say to someone you've done an incredible job and I knew that would elevate their day so whether it was the security guard who I became friends with or the person that was making the food or whether it was you know Billy Piper whoever it was in a sense I could use the things I love happiness compassion kindness patience communication for a elevated good in comparison to when I was a minion so that's how you define the most effective irrespective of how you define leadership itself those values values how you would isn't that the joy of leadership I would have thought from my limited experience that it's the values that I care about that I can implement for other people to enjoy their day I was so aware with not having leadership that somebody above me could just make a glib comment that meant nothing to them didn't really matter but to me as someone that they could sack someone more junior to them or someone else on the team. That's ruined your week. you know you go home miserable you're worried about your position maybe you have a cry you know maybe it ruins your partner's day maybe your child sees you sad so careless words from people more senior than you or a lack of compassion is really quite ruinous for people and it can be really like disheartening it can be bad for mental health it can be making you angry so I had those experiences rarely but sometimes and so for me leadership at its best and I don't always get it right because I know I can be a pain too for which I apologize to anyone out there listening, thinking, God, you're a pain to work with, mate. You don't know what you're talking about. But nonetheless, my heart is in the place of trying to lead with kindness, graciousness, respect, lack of favouritism, lack of looking to be friends, you know, lack of kind of choosing other people to elevate me. So that's my goal. And whenever I'm doing anything at the moment, that's what I'm trying to achieve. For me, it's joining a dotted line between leadership and the impact of leadership on the individual's self-worth. that's the line you've just drawn. It's the most important line. Because, I mean, you spend more time in a workplace than you do with your own family. So I don't like to call a workplace a family. I think that's kind of unhelpful. Yeah, it's tried. But also because, you know, your family won't forget you if you walk away. Right. So, I mean, I work with Jeremy Paxman, the best in the business. And I swear to you, like he'd been there 25 years and three days later, no one ever mentioned his name again, you know. So a family isn't like that. A workplace is a different entity. I was always acutely aware that if I'm not there, they're not my crew anymore. It's not malice. It's just the way that humanity works. But I do think that that is the most important element of it, to be aware of the effect that it has, to realise that it's temporary, to not confuse colleagues for family and to make sure that you kind of act in a way that if other people were looking at you, you would think was worthy of your integrity and your values. Do you see the sort of type of leadership that you value and the values behind the kind of leadership that you aspire to do you see that playing out often enough? Yeah well I'm in a very precious position so I had a really good leader before I left Newsnight Esme Wren who's now the editor of Channel 4 News but for whom none of this would have happened because she gave me due credit on Twitter or X as it's now known for my work right so without that proof I would have been in trouble in terms of doing any of the things that I've done since so I'm hugely grateful to her for her leadership but since I've left the BBC I have to be honest I can choose my leaders so that's the huge privilege so you know I was lucky enough to manage to wangle a book agent who's called Sarah Ballard I mean that's really hard when you're a nobody I'm not putting myself down but you know gets a message from a random woman hey you know I scored the interview of the century I'd like to write a book about it believes me supports me takes me on and then Cecilia Stein who was my editor at One World who took on a difficult story that you know had legal complexities from a woman that nobody has heard of that's probably going to sell four copies but she backed me so another female leader in a sense and then I was working obviously at Netflix with a huge group actually of female leaders like Anne Mensah and Fiona Lamptey who originally commissioned the piece and then of course Philip Martin who I've already mentioned who was the director but other producers on that project you know all the leaders I've worked with over the past three and a half years either have chosen me poor things or I have had the rare privilege to be able to choose my leaders and that is really an absolute joy for happiness autonomy and also for when things do go wrong as they inevitably do that we have mutual respect and can challenge one another without it turning into something personal so i've had the opposite absolute polar opposite experience for the past three years in comparison to the 20 years prior Which is fascinating in and of itself. I'm really liking it. I bet you are. I'm really into it. And rightly so. I want to come back to this particular theme, and we'll talk about it through the lens of your work now as a fellow at LSE. But before we move into that space, can we just talk about the lens of media as a leader? Because we've done one media perspective already, as you know, with Gillian Tett from the Financial Times. And I wanted to have a slightly different lens through the BBC and this public broadcasting service that has been around, and an item forever. and the responsibility that comes with it and your experience do you think firstly that the media can and should lead I think it's a really tricky one because it's a bit chicken and egg right so the joy of the BBC in a sense at its best is that it's meant to be an impartial medium and you know you and I have spoken about this before I kind of see impartiality as the Hippocratic oath of the BBC's journalism it really really matters I appreciate you can't be 100% impartial you bring your prejudices and your views But the laudable aim of being impartial is because of the reason that this question exists. The reason is that what you're trying to do is empower people to come to their own conclusions, in my view, make their own choices. So when I've had opportunities to work in institutions that I admire and I think are brilliant, but which in a sense are trying to make thoughts happen in certain ways through certain political prisms, I've always preferred the BBC because at its best, what it's doing is saying, here's the information which we've collected because we're in a privileged position to have access to different worlds different experts different opportunities different points of view you take it and you draw your own conclusions at its best that's what the bbc offers so the chicken and egg element of it is that i feel at its best the media should offer people the opportunity to have semi-objective facts drawn impartially for them to come to their own conclusions But that is increasingly rare. And the BBC, like many institutions, perhaps sometimes loses its way on empowering rather than disempowering the consumer. So I think most people now have a very complex relationship with the media. I think a lot of them are suspicious of it, that they don't trust it. And I don't think the BBC has done itself as many favours as it should in understanding the disconnect between the way some of the BBC views the world and how the vast majority of people consume information or view the world so at its best great But increasingly, it's a very chaotic world, the media, and it's chaotic to consume information, even for those of us in the privileged position of having worked there. Well, it's also quite interesting in the sense that I think now the media's relationship with itself is so complex because of the rise of social media, because of the demand of 24-hour news seven days a week, and then because of the economic model that we find ourselves in and this drive for clicks and lights and views and the sensationalist news that draws attention. Of course. Then the sort of rise of misinformation that the BBC feels to me perhaps and it's an opinion that it's sort of in this rock and a hard place in the sense that factual news is quite often not favoured as much than some of the more sort of sensationalist news. Yeah and they just got rid of Hard Talk which is one of the most famous brands the BBC has ever had. Exactly. So do you think Do you think that there's going to be a zeitgeist moment or do you think that it's just going to evolve and innovate in a way that the BBC can or has to? Or do you think there's going to be a shift over the next few years for it? Where do you think it is now and where do you think it can go at this moment, at this landscape? Personally, if I was Director General, which I'd be happy to be, if anybody wants to give me some Director General work experience, if Tim Davey fancies taking a couple of weeks off and giving me a job, I'm available. No biggie. That salary would be quite nice. And, you know, we can buy your drink, babe. Thanks. You heard it here first. You're welcome. Every listener is a witness. Just one. Just one drink. I think the truth is that it's, in a sense, the BBC's playing catch up because it always feels like an institution that is a little bit behind the curve. And the danger in the current climate is that it's very fast moving. And if you like the social contract that the BBC had with the country, with individuals who generously paid pay the very expensive licence fee which for a normal person on a normal salary which I have always been for most of my life not much above the UK average salary it's a lot of money so I think that assumption that the BBC is basically kind of like doing the public a favour as opposed to understanding that it's a privilege to receive that income I think that that's been a problem so I think that really in terms of what the next five years of the media is no one really knows it is as we say technically a shit show uh it's a wild west it's a free for all you know people are trying to throw things at podcasts one minute and then it's kind of like you know tiktok and then it's snapchat you know everyone's confused about where things are going so i think at its core the thing that the bbc did offer and that's why i think hard talk is a good and sad example was this cross-pollination yes we can do strictly which will you know get in the viewers and make us you know basically like the money that we need to continue but But equally, we can have an elite brand like Hard Talk with Stephen Sacker and that amazing team who've now all been acts doing long form accountability interviews. So we cross pollinate. Newsnight is doing really well now since Victoria Derbyshire and the new editor. There are about 300,000, I think, at the stage at which Emily and Esme and I left, sometimes 400,000. And they're now hitting over a million, which is an extraordinary turnaround. But ultimately, Sarah, the truth is that when I say to people I used to work at Newsnight they'll be like oh I love Newsnight and then I will ask oh when did you last watch and usually the answer is a little bit of an ashen face looking a little bit sheepish so we have to consume what we want if you think that these things are important you need to consume them because the consumption is the thing that will drive the choices that places like the BBC and others make and unfortunately you know it's going to become an elite thing to have access to the kind of news and things that we used to take for granted because the BBC and is waning David Rhodes at Sky News has made some sounds that make it sound like Sky News is you know having some issues so all these things are disappearing into the ether so we have to back the things that matter to us and if they don't matter to us then we don't back them so in order for media and perhaps more traditional media is what you and I are talking about in order for the media to lead in the way that we are discussing today that through that sort of Hippocratic lens through that new we have to take responsibility for investing in that. Yeah, and I think also we should delineate more carefully about the terms we use in the media. So, for example, one of the things I'd really noticed during the time that I was there, I was often almost quite careful to describe myself as a producer rather than a journalist because I felt that in a sense what I was doing was trying to find other people to make news by saying something for our content so we were in the business of production. Some of the people on the team were in the business of pure journalism but I didn't really feel I was one of them so I was careful. I think latterly we've created a problem with this dichotomy between what I would call journalism and commentary. I feel that there is really a misunderstanding at the moment between facts and opinions and i think that we have to be careful to brand ourselves in the correct way so if i am doing you know kind of like something where i'm giving my opinion masquerading as a fact i you know i'm eroding even further the understanding and trust that people have in journalism which is completely different from commentary and i think that commentary sells a lot currently and it's a great thing and it's on the rise and it's on the rise and commentary is where the money's at but we should call ourselves commentators when we're doing commentary and journalists when we're trying to find the truth and get scoops and get information and change conversations around factual elements and I think that would be a helpful delineation I completely agree I also think it lends itself to the conversation that you and I had only last week around this I'm a bit scared which one it was I'm a bit worried I mean fair point well made No, one for podcast ears. Oh, we'll be sober. We were. Oh, great. It was the conversation around the two sides of the same coin when it comes to morality and profitability. Exactly. And I think what you've just said, which is so important and honestly, it's so misunderstood from my perspective. And I want us to just explore this idea of the factual news that we're talking about and the way in which journalism can lead is by holding truth to power. is by holding political leaders, economic leaders to account. Correct. And that has to be founded in fact. Correct. And with that comes that moral lens. Absolutely. And that's what I was doing. You know, that's what I felt I was doing without being pretentious. You know, you have to kind of believe in the mission. And to me, the mission when I started was, you know, we are but cogs. You know, we weren't sort of like looking for profile or huge salaries because, you know, neither were available. I mean, I've accidentally had stumbled into a profile at this stage in my career but you probably would never have known I existed if it hadn't been for the Prince Andrew thing but that was the that was the skill that was the joy to us we felt we were part of something meaningful we felt we were perhaps you know a little bit up ourselves but we were like arbiters of the truth you know we were trying to hold powerful people to account we were speaking about truth to power we were trying to delineate information in a way that showed when people were telling the truth or weren't whether they were politicians or leaders or people in the public eye and the job of a producer at Newsnight effectively was to try and find those accountability issues where the weaknesses were in someone's argument and to give the presenter the facts and information to be able to answer that question are you telling the truth you know where are your responsibilities the accountability that a democracy and advanced democracy needs and pretentious but true I felt that I had you know a mission as part of that and that was important to me and many of the people that i worked with and i think that's laudable i think it's laudable i don't think it's pretentious i think it's a little bit pretentious it's a little bit like a wanker can i say wanker i've said it twice now You can say it, absolutely. Thanks, mate. I don't think it's pretentious. I think it's accurate. But I do think what's so interesting is, again, it brings this conversation of so much commentary is where the advertising spend is. And that puts the BBC in a compromise, not compromising, difficult position. Right, exactly. And I think, you know, there's a big narrative for business case, the business case to invest in X, Y and Z, the business case to spend advertising pounds and dollars in X, Y and Z. And quite often, so many, and I will put my hands up as being an idealistic romantic on five days out of seven. I'd say six. Thank you. I'll take that. Is that we would all like to believe that there is a profitability from investing in the moral element of any story. Yeah, well, there may or there may not be. But my feeling is that in terms of keeping a brand if we want to call it that right like the BBC yeah in people's hearts is something that they trust is through the moral argument right so obviously you need the financials to make the journalism of course but if the journalism is landing into people's homes or into their minds and it doesn't have to be through the BBC you know I was a massive fan of making my content make news and if it was in the Express the Mail the Sun you know the Guardian the Telegraph getting it into people's heads that this came from somewhere and it's something it's interesting or something challenging or something that has an element of accountability or truth telling getting it into people's kind of like heads that's the important part of the journey which in a sense is a moral mission which then allows them to think well maybe I need to keep you know the BBC because actually three times this week I've seen things in my own sphere maybe it's on Instagram who cares I don't care how they found it but it's come to them somehow that something the BBC has done has made a difference in terms of accountability or morality or truth telling. That's very hard to achieve. But at its best, I think that the integrity value of impartiality is something that is very compelling but i think in the climate that we've had for the past five years you know with people this is my truth and you know all of the kind of things that we don't need to go into you know kind of like those kind of disconnects with how people consume information has made it increasingly hard to do that in a way that is meaningful and profound but that's the stuff that i loved Can you see a space in which, in light of what's happened over the last, oh goodness, I mean, even since the European referendum and the impact of COVID, the fact that Donald Trump is in his second term, the sort of polarisation that we're all living through in this country and globally, you could argue, do you think that there is a sort of tilt from more financial investment in arguably more traditional news? because of that integrity that comes with that fact finding journalism do you see that or is that completely naive do you think no I don't think it's naive but I look at it a different way as usual obviously obviously is that actually I don't think the polarization is as real as people think in terms of you know right in terms of the percentage of people who literally were never speaking to their family again because of Brexit or you know someone voted for Trump and they're never going to talk to that that is some people but a very very small minority yeah and probably they've made up by now Right. So the truth is that the vast majority of people are somewhere in the middle of that conversation. They might be kind of like self-conscious about, for example, terminology around, you know, issues to do with sexuality. They might be self-conscious or behind the times. So they might see it in terms of some of the terminology and the way that they communicate with different generations. So people are worried. And I think that the cancel culture has made people extra worried and has closed down important conversations. But the vast majority of people are in the middle right most people want their kids safe they want you know their cat fed they want their dog fed thank you food on the table they want a safe country they want mutual respect and the vast majority of our adult lives are spent in that space but we're very easily distracted by the contentious and you know kind of like the fear and the difference seems exciting and you know sexy and everyone can kind of get all fired up But actually what we all value, almost everyone, is that middle space. And I think at its best, the media and the BBC in particular should be looking to obviously reflect the differences and, you know, those big kind of like polarisations that we've all been speaking about and populism and, you know, all those things. But in a sense, we've also fuelled that idea that we're all so smegging different and we're really, really not. Most of our concerns and interests and worries are exactly the same and i like the idea of a society in which we look for similarities rather than differences and where we look for consensus rather than hatred and where we look for compromise rather than digging our heels in and being big narcissists and saying this is my truth and there is no other way and that's the space that i like and i think is good for us all and it's good for our friendship it's very good for our friendship it's also very good for one question um because that That's where one question sits, as you well know. Absolutely. to your point to actually compromise and to have the conversation because as I have said on numerous different occasions quite often now disagreement stops the conversation rather than starts it totally but it also becomes vicious hyperbole you know the second you start getting into hyperbole and viciousness it's all over and people are frightened clearly to have conversations I mean you know you mentioned that I teach at the London School of Economics got some amazing students there you know they are 18 and 19 I'm a little bit older than that we don't need to go into that and you know marginally marginally just a couple of years I have an 18 year old myself you know a son and we have conversations that I think people of my age would be frightened to have and that fear is not good for them and it's not good for me you know I literally have said it's not good for society it's not good for anyone it's complete no you can interrupt me anytime you like and it's not good for society and I think that it's been really lovely to be able to have those conversations with the with the students and I will say to the look, you're probably not going to like what I'm going to say, but I want you not to come at me with hyperbole or viciousness. So if you think I've said something that's inappropriate or that you disagree with. I want you to approach me respectfully and second of all I never want you to give me an opinion I need evidence an opinion with evidence is a fact they are law students after all and I used to be a lawyer so I can't help myself but if you disagree with me and you think I've said something hurtful or offensive your position should be okay I respect Sam I probably quite like her I know she doesn't have viciousness in her she's not looking to be malevolent or cruel so how can I approach her in a way that informs her without demeaning her or ostracizing her or using anger rather than kindness and reciprocal understanding. So in that space where someone can call me out and say, do you know what, Sam, we don't use that terminology anymore. Instead of going, you are... You're cancelled. You're cancelled. That's the beautiful space, I think, that one question obviously you and I are looking for. But it's also a much better space for all of us because we don't want to be terrified of young people and I don't want young people being terrified of me. I want us to find a calm place where we can have mutual respect and learn from one another. Even if we end up dismissing one another's opinions, we dismiss with listening and respect rather than cruelty and hyperbole. Do you think those spaces exist anymore other than within the halls of LSE and perhaps other educational institutions? Do you think those spaces exist? I think they exist everywhere. I think they exist in your and my life all day every day. We are maybe perhaps the exception to the rule. I don't know. No, I don't think we are. conversations. that we don't necessarily feel comfortable for having for fear of being cancelled. Yeah, so I'm in a really lucky position. So basically I work as a speaker now, right? So I travel the world or I travel, you know, travel around London. I made it sound really bougie, didn't I? You did a little bit, but that's fine because it is up to Liverpool occasionally. Yeah, up to Liverpool occasionally, off to Malta occasionally, you know. Going to Guernsey soon. Going to Guernsey. Oh, that's for a literary festival because I'm pretentious. So the thing is that I'm in a really amazing, amazing position that I think other people might be quite fearful of, which is that I meet maybe you know hundreds of people a week so i'll go into an organization it might be a bank or a law firm where people have very kindly paid me to come and give my expertise or you know my insights and i'm meeting 20 30 40 new people and i'm speaking to them you know having never met them with no knowledge of them what their sensitivities their fears their issues are and i might sometimes be speaking on quite contentious issues and obviously i speak about the prince andrew interview i speak about resilience i speak about class that's something i'm passionate about social mobility i basically speak about myself i mean that's the nature of being a speaker but I'm relentlessly every day of the week with new people in environments where I have the choice to either be glib and superficial or I have the choice to show authenticity and openness and perhaps sometimes people might raise an eyebrow but I don't find any of those environments are not receptive to different conversations and different issues but I have an unusual situation because when I've done the speech ultimately people can take me or leave me literally and I don't have to see them every day of my life so I think the familiarity in a sense creates the fear because if you say something in an environment or a workplace you've got to see them tomorrow and next week and possibly for another 10 years so I have a privileged position that I'm meeting new people all the time some of whom may think I say cool stuff and some of them may think that I don't but I don't have to work with them for another 10 years not even another 10 minutes so the answer then is yes those spaces exist but they are rare and actually aren't available to everybody? Well, I think in a sense, we have to be responsible for the world we want, right? So if the choice is... Am I going to risk? Obviously, I don't want to be in a situation in which I have no income or I get cancelled and, you know, that's what people are fearful of. But most of the time, gentle disagreement with mutual respect and integrity is not going to end there. But people are not even going to start that conversation. So the fewer times that we start these kinds of conversations, the more the boundaries seem bigger and bigger and insurmountable. So I'm a big fan of when I have situations where I think the behaviour needs to be challenged in some way that I do that with kindness and gentleness but it is a risk but I feel to me and to society in general the risk is greater if I don't challenge that because then we put ourselves in this invidious position of feeling that we can't say anything well we can but there is risk involved but the risk of not speaking and not communicating I think is far far greater than the risk of being silent I couldn't agree more I'm excited to explore this idea of the cancel culture with you because I do obviously you and I are completely aligned in terms of finding space for these conversations leaning into them trying to create environments in which people feel safe and comfortable it's why breaking news we're partnering on where you've joined us to partner on some of the one question work that we're doing which is incredibly exciting but for so many business leaders political leaders leaders within their community it's a very difficult space to lean into for some people for those reasons that you've just talked about. I mean, you talked about it through the lens of your own personal brand, which has huge ramifications for you. Oh, yeah. I mean, I've been like in the public domain now for three and a half years. So I'm at risk of being cancelled, you know, every minute of every day. Let's hope it doesn't happen today. But you've also been in the room with so many different CEOs, actors, and then obviously Prince Andrew. What do you think is the most important thing most effective way that leaders can communicate in those spaces because you've seen it go brilliantly and you've also seen it go horrifically what do you think leaders can can do in terms of being able to communicate their message the opportunity whether it's within their organization or whether it's externally at the moment when everything to your point moves so fast we are inundated with content often everything can be taken out of context and you run the risk of this idea of being cancelled yeah i think ultimately you know there are a thousand calibrations that i would make in 10 minutes that most people wouldn't be able to make and that's just because of the experiences that i've had and the rooms i've been in and the things that i've seen ultimately i think it comes down to humility and self-knowledge you know it would be really obvious um to a journalist or someone like me the points of someone's character personality their agenda their business their worldview their country whatever it was you know whatever it was a world leader or a prince or you know the leader of a global company and when you're dealing with those people within you know five minutes the journalist will be able to recognize the three points of weakness the three things that they should be worried about now if you as an individual don't know what those three things are you're in big trouble And I think ultimately what I found really fascinating during my time at the BBC was how rare it is actually for people to know those three things or those two things or those five things, whatever they are, that are their points of weakness, either as a business, as an individual or as a product or in terms of their argument. So I think going back to self-knowledge and humility is really important. I used to teach debating to kids at school. Right. And I would make them all go, OK, let's find an issue. Animal testing. Everyone who is pro animal testing stand here and they'll be like one person. and everyone who's anti-animal testing, you know, stand here. And then they'd all be excited about talking about animal testing. And I said, okay, so all the people who are anti-animal testing, tell me three great reasons that animal testing should happen. Three pro. And the one pro, tell me three anti. And that, in a sense, is I think the skill set that people have lost in this period is that they're so busy concentrating on themselves and their message and their narrative and their argument and their position that they've lost the positions to go, well, hold on a minute. What are the three weaknesses of my argument? Where are the dangers here? What would somebody who disagrees with me be thinking? How would they be criticizing this? What would their concerns be? You know, their personal concerns. They might be fearful of these. Those conversations are the really important space that change the understanding and also perhaps reduce the risk and also reduce what I would call leadership delusion, where you are surrounded by sycophants often you've got rid of annoying people like me and you SP you know who like are always challenging you and being a pain in the arse well keep that pain in the arse because the pain in the arse is the only one telling you the truth and humility and self-knowledge allow you to see the truth of what your product is or your argument is or what your weaknesses are as an individual and without that you are completely screwed I couldn't agree more oh at last that's it that's not true that's not true will someone sign it write it down and sign it no I couldn't agree more but i think also what i would add to that which i think you're saying in a different way obviously is the is the perspective i think we are not only are we not very good at the moment at holding mirrors up to ourselves i don't think we i think we've lost that art i don't know if i'm talking about we and the fate your favorite word in this sort of collective sense i always tell you for context i always tell sarah off when she says we because the assumption is you say it's not your assumption that you mean everyone but i feel it's the assumption that you mean both of Yes. And I never want an assumption that I agree with you. But the point of the idea that as a society, there is a space where we feel challenged by the idea of provocation or to your point, you know, you and I are being a pain in the arse because we ask difficult questions or we lean into those difficult conversations. Yeah, but some people are not thinking about that at all, to be honest. You know, for a lot of people, I think getting their kids fed during the day. No, but going back to the leadership conversation. Yeah, to leadership, sure. So going back to the leadership conversation and this idea of being talented. 100%. And the idea that you were talking about in terms of... The self-knowledge in the mirror. Precisely. But the mirror to your business, right? It's a mirror to you and a mirror to your business. 100%. Yeah. But there's this sweet kind of like hell, I think, for businesses at the moment, which is that there is this fear of the cancellation. But equally, there is an assumption of accountability. Yes. Any business work that's done at the moment, we all know that consumers feel that there is, you know, you need to show up and be accountable. accountable from any mistake that your business makes and there needs to be a specific figurehead you know he or she needs to say something on the record people are unconvinced by silence that's not going to work that was certainly my argument with Prince Andrew but obviously sometimes silence sometimes silence is really sometimes silence really works but you know if you have a brand and something goes wrong with your brand people assume that someone at some stage is going to have to say something but that combined with the fear of that everything you say could make a matter worse could creates this kind of like terrible sort of space in the middle where people are frightened to say anything but they have to say something but they don't want to say something but they know they need to and they kind of say words in a way that aren't really sentences anymore you know they don't feel kind of like real because they've probably been legal to death so you feel that when people often are giving statements about contentious issues that the sentences aren't even human anymore and that in a sense is this perfect hell that leaders face with knowing that they have to say something but the things that they say are going to be looked at through this prism of you know anger and assumption and hatred and lack of context so it's dangerous out there I think for businesses and of course they have shareholders and they have value and everything they say can make a massive difference to that so it's very tricky. but that's what leadership is, so bad luck. Okay, let's talk about the hearts and minds of young people. Ooh, lovely. Because one of the things that you and I have passionately in common is the power of resilience and the power of not giving up, the power of knowing thyself and knowing what you're capable of and working incredibly hard to achieve that in sometimes very, very difficult circumstances or environments or places and spaces, and you spend an awful lot of time, obviously with your teaching, with young people, do you think resilience is something that you can teach? I do. And equally, I think that lack of resilience is something that society has been teaching and can teach. And that is the is the horror of it. So lots of the young people I work with, you know, are super resilient, you know, and they've they've had massive achievements to get to a place like London School of Economics, you know, and if you've come from a different background, you know, as you know, my parents left school at 14. We're Eastern market people. Of course, I'm middle class now. But, you know, my Nana was on the market. She left school at 13. She was pregnant. You know, I I come from a background that didn't have tons and tons of money. Things are different now. I know how lucky I am. I pinch myself every day to have a home and, you know, to be able to feed myself and have a bougie martini now and again. But I think lots of the students have personal stories that already show a huge amount of resilience, but it's no longer kind of celebrated in the way that it should be. So one of the things that I find really interesting is when you get beneath the surface of many of the students that I meet, there will be a powerful human story, you know, in their short 18 or 19 years of something that they have overcome or something that they've done to achieve this massive thing of getting to university, which is still a privilege of a tiny minority of people in the world. And in a sense, they've kind of like lost sight of the things that they've achieved and they've been told to concentrate, I think, sometimes on the wrong things. For example? So I think this kind of like, you know, that this is your truth and everything you say is important. That's something that I try and discuss with them because when they walk into a room with me and I don't know them their pontification or their views you know are not really the first thing I want to hear I want to learn a bit about them as human beings so I think they've been sort of a bit of a pup sometimes that they've been given the impression that everything they think is really really important and in a workplace it's completely unimportant and it's also a real turn off to a lot of employers who are like my age and your age you know we're a different generation we don't care about their treatment They've been sold in a sense. I was talking about this with some of the students the other day without wanting to offend them. And I said, I say this with kindness, but they've been sold a bit of a sort of a special narcissism, which is not good for resilience. It's not good for them. It's not good for ideas generation because ideas come from interaction, not from just being obsessed with ourselves and our own views and opinions. And so I think a lot of them have like really untapped resilience and stoicism and capabilities. And sometimes their eyes have been put on other things to do with, you know, social media or image that we would not think are as important and also undermine some of the incredible qualities that they have that perhaps aren't being valued in the way that they should be so those conversations I find really interesting because I often feel they have a bit more of a spring in their step or they're annoyed at me depending on who they are once we've had some more personal conversations because let's just take 10 seconds I say sometimes of silence to just go holy hell I made it to LSE I mean what an achievement you know and when was the last time someone just said to you well done you know you've done a great job you know just to be here you know well done bravo it sounds a bit trite it sounds a bit silly but actually What an achievement at 18 or 19 to go to university and to be at such an auspicious place. I didn't get into LSE. I didn't even know it existed. I hadn't even heard of it. So I'm looking to raise them and celebrate them, but also to challenge the idea that everything they say really, really matters. Because rule one is most of the time no one cares. And rule two is that you're just going to really alienate people and seem really narcissistic. And that's not a pleasant and enjoyable way to interact with other people. And so most of them are very kindly... receptive to me saying that and they teach me all kinds of things too about communication styles and you know how I need to communicate in a way that is palatable to them so we're helping one another it's interesting because to me that sounds like a sort of lack of curiosity for some of them because they've been taught that their voice and their perspective and their opinion is so important it stifles curiosity it stifles ideas which is interesting going back to our previous point of this perspective for some leaders for example or this idea that for some leaders being afraid to truly understand yourself and your values and being concerned about that mirror and therefore being concerned about how you operate in that space and are you saying the right thing at the right time rather than allowing for your own curiosity because it feels like increasingly it comes at such a high cost is being modelled to a next generation not intentionally unintentionally and we're sort of modelling this stifling of curiosity by accident and actually encouraging this sort of individual me myself and I yeah 100% I mean I remember when I was at the BBC you know one of the things that they were really interested in was you know diversity of thought in theory so in theory diversity of thought was a great thing but you know it was I was still fearful when I was you know kind of like putting forward different opinions and they weren't necessarily even my opinion but But because of impartiality, I think it's important if we're, for example, doing a piece about Donald Trump, that we're making sure that we understand that for lots of people, he's a fantastic, incredible leader who they think is doing an amazing job and that the journalism has to reflect that. It can't just be kind of like, you know, bashing things, same with Nigel Farage. You know, you can't just bash these people based on your own perspectives. So the thing that I found challenging when I was in that workplace is when I first started out at the BBC, that would have been obvious and there wouldn't wouldn't have been a conflation with me raising that with the assumption that that was my personal opinion which it may have been or it may not but there wouldn't have been that conflation latterly i think you know if you raise an issue the assumption is that you personally believe that and that's about you and i didn't have that background so the thing that i've found challenging perhaps and for myself was a that conflation but b that actually for most people that is the case and that there was a point in which that rubicon was crossed and when people put forward an idea they're saying this is what I think whereas we used to have conversations around well we need to think about that or should we think about that or what about this without it becoming so personal so I think that leadership does suffer from the thing that you're describing which is that we're looking to be careful but we're also equally looking to be sort of super contentious all the time and worried what we say and so we're losing again these interesting middle places and we're giving the impression that you know not being authentic is the way to lead and the way to succeed, which of course it is not. Well, I also think to that point that the idea that curiosity is condonement, that by being curious about especially some of the more provocative or challenging or difficult things that we are all facing right now, whether it's through economics, politics, however you vote, however you feel, whatever your ideologies. And when you're curious about it, it is curiosity. It is not necessarily condonement. And I think it goes back to the point that I was making with this sort of blurring of ideologies and political preference. that we also then assume that if somebody has a point of view or a perspective that comes from curiosity, that they sit in a particular camp or that that might be how they feel. And I think we are modelling that to the next generation. I think one of the things that was really interesting that you and I have talked about, asked you about last week, is that recently you said in an interview with The Telegraph. Oh yes, did I? About the fact that you don't think that the interview with Prince Andrew would happen now because there isn't somebody there at the BBC doing the kind of job that you did yeah I mean that's a resource issue too that's no that's what I mean absolutely it's a resource issue yeah but it's also are we we and I say we as businesses creating leaders in businesses are we creating the spaces and places for people from different backgrounds from different experiences from different cultures to actually take the roles that you created for yourself and seeing the advantage of those or have we become so scripted in the kind of people we think that we want that actually we're kind of leaving money on the table and opportunity on the table. Yeah, I think there is a magic to kind of people from, you know, different perspectives and different backgrounds. I think ultimately, though, what's interesting about this is that when I'm teaching negotiation, you know, the first thing I always say is I'm not interested in what you want when you go into a negotiation. You know, what does the other person want? That's the only question that matters. And I think when it comes to curiosity and ideas, if you have like opinions and views, but you haven't tested what the other side thinks of those or what their perspectives are um then your views aren't really in a good foundation anyway they're not in a good place they're assertions rather than kind of like you know developed nuanced ideas and i think that ultimately if we're interested in curious lives which we are obviously and if we're interested in progressing and sometimes changing our minds god forbid god forbid what's that quote you know it's kind of like if you if you can't change your mind are you sure you've still got one you know i'm open and receptive to the idea that my mind could be changed because i don't see things as right and wrong you know strong opinions loosely held binary exactly so strong opinions loosely held i think are kind of like my my current position is this i like the word current um and maybe in the future that position will change and the way it changes is through curiosity and exchange of ideas and listening to people god forbid and also learning and And I like the idea that over my lifetime, I've changed my views on, you know, some big issues, some of which I would say in the public domain and some which I wouldn't. And that journey is what makes life interesting and which keeps the brain ticking over because I watch a lot of reality television. So I've got to, you know, I'm receptive. I'm receptive to changing my mind. I'm receptive to it because I don't see myself as right and everyone else as wrong. And I'm receptive to kind of like, you know, diversity of thought and i'm receptive to nuance and i like to kind of like think about things between episodes of you know love island and love is blind do you think that that position comes from a really good foundation of self-worth confidence openness do you think that you are somebody that is so comfortable being in that space it's something that you and i share we have no desire to be right we don't believe that we have all the answers Right, exactly. feather at all times in high heels and you know be gobby and you know wander around pontificating about this and that or sometimes I just don't want to talk about stuff you know there's a really nice place where we don't have to talk about issues all the time where we can just you know have a hug and chat about our pets or you know have a have a drink you know because it's exhausting exchanging ideas all the time and so I think if you have those boundaries I think it is important also to not have to talk about stuff all the time and I've because I worked in news you know I had quite a profound discipline about not talking about news when I wasn't at work. And I still really enjoy not thinking about geopolitical concerns and, you know, World War III as much as possible. But yeah, there is a self-confidence, I think, that comes from engaging in the conversations when you want to, sometimes changing your mind or moving a millimetre or actually going more the other way once you've heard some of the counter arguments, but being receptive to change and being receptive to, you know, developing yourself whilst also sometimes just not wanting to talk about all of this stuff because because it can be overwhelming. And frankly, let's be honest, a bit depressing. Absolutely. And I think it can also, I think creating those spaces where you're willing to lean into that conversation with curiosity and not needing to be right, but also creating the spaces where it is just about fun and joy. Sam McAllister, thank you so much for joining me today. It's what makes you so brilliant at what you do. Such a good friend and such a good person for one question. Well, thank you. Thank you. On behalf of we, I thank you.

UNKNOWN: 54:46

Hahahaha!

SPEAKER_00: 54:48

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