Episode 4: Rob Threapleton on the Human Side of Leadership and Why It Still Wins

In this episode, Rob joins the conversation to explore the human side of leadership in a world increasingly shaped by technology.

Drawing from his personal and professional journey, Rob shares honest reflections on growth, self-awareness, and what it really takes to lead well under pressure. He speaks about resilience, decision-making, and the importance of staying grounded when navigating uncertainty and change.

The discussion also touches on how emerging technologies are reshaping the way we work — and why emotional intelligence, adaptability, and clarity of purpose matter more than ever. Rather than focusing purely on systems and strategy, Rob brings the lens back to people: how we show up, how we learn, and how we evolve.

If you’re interested in leadership that blends performance with perspective, and ambition with authenticity, this episode offers thoughtful insights and practical wisdom you won’t want to miss.

Learn more about our work:
Visit our website: https://intechsearch.com

🤝 Connect with Rob:
linkedin.com/in/robin-threapleton-58400b16

🤝 Connect with us on LinkedIn:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lucyrayden/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-thiel-insight/

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

So from military career to managing a portfolio of high-tech companies, Rob Freckleton brings a unique perspective on leadership and transformation. He's led organizations through major shifts in electronics, talent challenges, and now the area era of AI and automation. Rob, welcome.

SPEAKER_00 0:23

Thank you, Lucy. Good to be with you today.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

To start us off, I'm really interested to know a little bit more about something that you bought with you from the military into business, a skill that you carried forward that turned out to be surprisingly valuable to you. And also, was there anything you had to unlearn along the way?

SPEAKER_00 0:47

Yeah, the transition out of the military environment into the industrial one was interesting for sure and quite challenging at times. And probably I guess it probably took three years to properly iron out one culture from another, I guess. And yeah, there are, and certainly there are things, universal principles that the military gives you that have been highly relevant, actually. But before I come on to that, I'll just I I think one interesting aspect of your question is that I think for a period of probably three to four years, I my natural inclination was that industry had a lot to learn from the military. That was my default setting. But it was a bit of an epiphany to me that sort of four years into my industrial career, I realized that the military doesn't have it all wrapped up and doesn't have it all figured out and could learn quite a lot from industry. So back to your question around you know what what have I taken uh forward? Well, um I think a couple of things. The first one is uh the principle, well the value of building and maintaining a high performance team. You know, the the things that the things that you have to do to run a healthy, and that's a key word, a healthy team are universal. And no matter what the product, no matter how big the business, how big the teams are, those principles of maintaining a good healthy team are so critical. And and those principles have been relevant to me in every job that I've taken in the 20 years since leaving the military. And what am I talking about there? Well, of course, it's you know, recognition of good of good performance, good behavior, challenging the bad behavior, it's making sure that the tone and the values uh get set from you know from me through the team, um, and that uh you know, that code, if you like, those individual values, not just the corporate and institutional values, but your individual values, those characteristics that underpin good leadership, are there, are on display. Um, and they're and often subtly so, they're not um it's not uh you know, it's not always overtly shown, but subtly shown. And that that tone gets set, and that you may and to ensure that members of your team are leading um in accordance with that, and that the layer below your team is getting the benefit of those same principles. So maintaining though a healthy team, where as I say, good performance is recognized and rewarded, and poor performance is challenged, and the values that are on display is the single most important thing, I think, coming out of the military. I think uh one surprising area uh where I can see the military learning from industry is around creativity and in a sort of open, permissive, almost unstructured environment of some industrial settings that I've been in can lead to some quite creative solutions to some quite difficult problems. Um and and yet the military kind of tends to run on train tracks a little bit. It's very formulaic, very processed, very prescribed in the way that they go about their business. So, for example, the the battle planning procedure where you you look at um a battlefield scenario, you you do your assessments, you issue a set of orders, you give the, you know, you give the orders, and then the units go off and do the deed. That that is a very uh very procedural formulaic process, which I can I think can stymie creativity. And uh because you're it's very much dumbed down and and people are led by the nose to certain to ask themselves certain questions through that process. In industry, in my experience, where you don't have great structure around you, especially if you're leading an SME rather than in a big corporate setting, um, such a loose, open, unstructured environment can have surprising outcomes in terms of creativity and the opportunity for good ideas to come from anywhere. So I think um, you know, I think the military um uh uh arena can learn a little, uh can learn quite a lot from uh from being less structured in some of their key processes.

SPEAKER_01 6:31

Yeah, that's really interesting. I think you know, collaboration and um having discussions with different types of business, businesses, different types of industry, you can learn so much, right? So I agree, and also having that time and space to reflect and to think and to be creative. And with AI, we get more time for that. So, really, there's a lot of positives that can come together for everybody by taking that time to be creative.

SPEAKER_00 7:02

You're you're quite right. Collaboration is absolutely the key part of a private sector scenario, and it's one that you don't necessarily get to enjoy too much in the military. You know, you you have those units around you because of the mission that you're about to embark upon. Whereas in industrially, you know, private sector, your ability as a stakeholder to know who to approach, to put in a room with you know, with the the wider team to get as valuable and diverse input uh is is fun is really key to the value of collaboration and your and your um I guess the flexibility and the uh room that you've got to literally pull anybody into any problem in a private sector setting is is of great value.

SPEAKER_01 7:59

Yeah, and I think again another thing that you you've honed in on there is diversity of thought. You know, we get so much more from diversity of thought, and that can come in many ways. It's not you know, diversity can be seen as uh a gender, a race, but the reality is that diversity of thought is what's needed. It doesn't matter where it comes from, but the more different experiences people have, the more things can come to the table and the great things can be created. So super interesting, and I think it's a it's a big lesson for for leadership teams as well. Look for diversity of thought all the time because you're gonna benefit from that in your you know the the confident having the confidence to invite into your team um strong voices, strong opinions, diverse opinions should not be a threat to your position, should not be a threat to your leadership.

SPEAKER_00 8:53

Uh quite quite the opposite, but you've got to get comfortable with inviting into your sphere uh those the challenges that are very much needed to put a good a good plan together. Um, and and how and where did the military give you that? Well, it gives you that at the tender age of you know 20 as a graduate going to the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. That that whole year, which is a challenging year, is half theoretical and half practical leadership. And uh and you learn as much about the theoretics of leadership of healthy teams as much as you do practically, you know, on an assault course or on a um battlefield scenario. Um so that so I would so that that's what I've certainly you know certainly carried forward, I would say. Um I think also the ability to communicate communicate clearly and succinctly, you know, you know, as complicated messages, but communicated well, um it's it's always painful. We've all been there when you listen to someone rambling on, boring you senseless, with zero personality. And we're sort of coming onto the personalities, the personality bit that under underpins leadership. But if you can't get a message across simply and succinctly, um then you're done for really, you'll just switch people off, and and and the military the military practices that to an art form.

SPEAKER_01 10:34

Yeah. Um communication, clear communication, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:38

Yeah, exactly, clear communication. I mean, there are things, however, I did say that this flows in both directions. There are things that I've had to unlearn. So um I guess in the military setting, you can you're pretty much guaranteed that people are gonna do what they are supposed to do. Um part because the purpose is is just so overriding, it's so it's so bigger, so much bigger than any one individual, um, and and often with lives at stake. So you you know once a you know a directive is issued or or a strategy is created or an intent is given, you know that the team's gonna execute it um with a high degree of reliability. Not so in not so in the private sector. I mean, it was I I really had to uh find myself uh needing to get comfortable with the fact that this this concept of consent and evade, i.e., people nodding and smiling and saying they're gonna go they're gonna do something and then not doing it. Um was was was an expectation. It was more than an it was more it's more an expectation that I had to unlearn uh rather than a skill. But um, but yeah, that but that but that's that must have been really frustrating, no. Well, it was it took it took a while it took it took a while to work out that's what was happening. You know, you would you would be in a room with a team, everyone, you know, you'd think that there was energy there, you would think that there was uh wide agreement and um happy consent, but you'd realize uh that um that there wasn't, and stuff just wasn't getting over the finishing line, and it was for that reason. So I th I think uh having a healthy um cynicism or skepticism or that that the will of the team is there is is a is a good thing to have. And I'm of the view now, 20 years into my private sector career, that it takes that it can take between two and three years to identify seemingly compliant members of the team that are not compliant.

SPEAKER_01 12:54

Yeah, that's super interesting. Thank you. So, as we know, in electronics, great people are really hard to find and to keep. How would you attracted and developed talent? And what would you give, what advice would you give CEOs trying to win the war on talent today?

SPEAKER_00 13:15

Yeah, it's you're so right. So difficult to find and and retain. You know, retaining is is is as difficult as attracting, uh, especially in the engineering arena, uh, in technical companies. I I think what I've seen um over recent years, particularly, is is a is a um, I guess increasingly it is the case that engineers don't necessarily see themselves working in the same company for any great length of time, especially young ones. Um they're look, you know, I'm I'm reluctant to use the word sort of gig, but it but it but it certainly feels like the that the expectation of young technical people, particularly, is is variety, variety, variety. And if your business, if it's you know, especially if it's an SME, cannot offer the breadth of you know variety of technical projects, that it's really hard to attract them into your business. And it's probably the single biggest risk and threat, I would say, to certainly the technical businesses within my division at the moment. Um, and so making sure, so what you tend to find is that um establishing strong third-party relationships with portfolio engineering service companies, consultancies ultimately, that have the engineering disciplines that are relevant to your product line is really, really important, as well as attracting and retaining the talent. So third-party relationships is is really is big is increasingly key, especially if you're a small business. Um you know, so let's talk about attracting first. I you know, I I think that I think that being prepared to put across almost almost right at the start what's in it for the candidate, rather than the traditional, you know, you'll be interviewed and maybe if you're lucky you'll get the job, is is the wrong way of looking at it. You've really got to differentiate yourself on having a good brand, a good purpose, um, and and and variety of of learning opportunity to attract the young the younger talent for sure. And you know, that's so so the candidate experience through the recruitment process has never been um as as important as as it is now. Um I think what's once you've got them, if you're lucky enough to get them in the first place, uh you know that the retention um challenge is is really key, and and it's really interesting. That challenge is immediately there. It's not one five, ten years down the road. It's it's your your the challenge of keeping those people in your organization is is immediate because those decisions to leave because this isn't what I signed up for. I you know, I don't like working in this small office with this boring project, is is an immediate is an immediate threat. Um and I have I think I've read and I've heard quite a bit recently the concept that it's you know the concept of um the idea that purpose is is is the core you know is the most fundamental factor of keeping people in jobs is perhaps no longer the case. Leadership could be the most important thing, i.e. the relationship between you and your boss is is is increasingly seen as more important than purpose. I and I can totally believe that. I can I I can totally buy into that idea. Um I think when I've had to make changes in my career, it's it's almost entirely because I haven't got on with my boss. And it's it's never been the company, it's never been the product. It's it's always that that key relationship in terms of is my boss inspiring me? Um, are they motivating me? Are they encouraging me? And and do I trust? Do I trust in that relationship? So as long as you have those that technical talent, those engineers in your organization, my focus immediately switches to the engineering team leader and the quality of their leadership and the quality of their of and the extent to which they're engaging those new people from day one. Because if they're going to leave, they're going to leave within two to three months. So, you know, that's where the focus has to be.

SPEAKER_01 17:59

That's really interesting, actually, you know, because it's a challenge that so many of our clients face as well. And I think as leaders, something that you've pinpointed there is it's actually about how we lead, more than necessarily the even the purpose. You know, how do we lead that team? How do we inspire them? How do we motivate them? How do we make them feel safe? And how do we allow them to have impact where they can grow their own careers, do work that's interesting for them and stay motivated. It's a lot, right? It's a lot to do. It's changing all the time.

SPEAKER_00 18:35

It it link it links to the first question you're asking me around um, you know, principles of principles of good, healthy teams and communication and regular, regular huddles with that team is key. I'm a great believer in little and often uh team interactions, not not infrequent, long, boring meetings where you sat around a table with an agenda. Nobody wants to be in that situation. So, but if you have a daily touch point, and I'm not talking about at your desk or one-on-one, I'm talking about getting the team out of place to somewhere nice in your building with a cup of coffee and a donut, where you talk as a team and as individuals, and and talk about what's the focus this week, what did we do last week, what's going well, what's not going so well, and and and just connecting with them as a team all the time, as often as possible. And you you'll soon pick up on whether there's there's some issues within the team, whether someone's you know retreating into themselves, or whatever may that those dynamics will be will be seen at that point. So that relationship between you as a team leader and your team is is about those collective huddles as much as it is about the one-on-ones, but it's got to happen almost daily.

SPEAKER_01 19:55

Yeah, interesting. Thank you. Um you've led transformations across very different businesses. Can you share a project that almost failed and what turned it around? If there's been any, maybe there's none.

SPEAKER_00 20:12

No, of course, of course there have been failures. Of course they there have. And and all and probably ones I'm I I don't know about because it'll be, you know, it the lag effect of some of those decisions may only be happening now. But yes, of course. I mean, there are there are there have been a couple of failures. Um, so um transformation, let's just talk about that for a moment. Uh I I think literally uh two months after I took my first managing director role of an industrial group with a PL, uh, two months later, the 2008 recession hit. Uh and my business unit, which was not insignificant within a UK corporation, was we lost uh I lost 25% of sales within two weeks. And so that number, that 25% revenue loss, which was as much as 35-40% for some organizations, was catastrophic and uh and and caused huge operational transformation and uh and restructuring. And I've really been in the forges of restructure, I guess ever since, because I at no point have I have I enjoyed huge organic growth environment that perhaps existed pre-2008, a little bit maybe in 2010-11 with such China GDP growth. But nonetheless, I think cost sensitivity has been always part of the challenge I've faced in in industry. Um, where where has it gone wrong? Well, I'll give you two examples. There was one um, yeah, which which I think is sort of precedent, really, now uh with the geopolitical situation that's going on and the need to find local. Supply chains. The first is a um is actually in the wake of the 2008 recession needing to restructure an industrial business unit that had factories all over Europe and it had sales companies with customer service resources pretty much in every single country of Europe. At the time it felt like the right decision to uh get uh to let go of all of those local in-country customer service sales branches uh to take the cost saving. But but in hindsight, a really short-sighted decision because it it took away our ability to read and understand culture properly, uh especially in southern Europe, um, and the intimacy that was that was hard won over many years that existed between those customer service resources and local customers in that same country, and we did not pay enough respect to that. So, a bit like the classic uh call center model, you just sever any intimacy between yourselves and the customers. And for what was relatively a small amount of overhead cost, opex cost, we should have left those resources in place in hindsight. And it and I don't think it did us any favors in terms of our in terms of customer intimacy, which we we all know is a big differentiator. Yeah, so that's that was mistake number one, which was you know, which was not paying enough respect to you know to the local network, I would say.

unknown 23:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:40

And then and then perhaps the second one was for a big uh American, I was in a big American uh corporation, we were looking to move a lot uh to effectively outsource a lot of manufacturing, and we we took tens of millions of dollars of of uh manufacturing out of the UK and put it with uh an Eastern European toll manufacturer. And in the contract, in the negotiation of that contract, uh there was an expectation that, of course, there would be labor cost savings to help with the gross margin, but there would also be material procurement savings. So they were in the contract, but not that but there was no obligation to achieve those. So what we found, having moved all this business and we effectively got pregnant with that project, there was no going back. Um there was no obligation to deliver those savings, and and we suddenly found ourselves dealing with a toll manufacturer that wasn't delivering the effect that we had anticipated, and they never got there with those cost savings, and um and uh and there was no nothing in the contract that safeguarded us from that. So the devil is in the detail. I think if you're going to make a decision like that and off and and outsource any, particularly manufacturing at the loss of jobs, you need to make sure that what you hope is going to happen does happen and contractually so.

SPEAKER_01 25:05

Yeah, I mean that's it, you know, you learn these things as you go along, right? Nobody could have could have kind of preempted that. And even when you have sometimes the best lawyers looking at contracts, going through the details, things can be missed, it can happen. Um, but you know, as we as we lead, we we learn from these mistakes and we don't make them again, right? So it's all part of the parcel. Okay, you you we we touched on this briefly, but I wanted to talk to you a bit more about this. Um, so with AI automation and the the geopolitical shifts that are reshaping businesses, what do you think will separate leaders who thrive over the next 10 years from those who are going to struggle?

SPEAKER_00 25:55

Um well, you know, it's it's it's amazing being in manufacturing and engineering how robust and longstanding those technologies can be, regardless of the leadership structure around them. There that there's incredible resilience in manufactured technologies, actually. Um to some extent you should, unless you do something catastrophically wrong, expect that the market will be there and that technologies, the longevity uh of some of these technologies will help you as a leader. However, I I think you're right, Lucy, that you know, in this in the era of um of uh AI and so and automation, you've got it the leaders will be separated by the extent to which they embrace this stuff. And I it's very interesting looking at the sort of the anti-AI um you know sort of um uh feeling that there is out there, almost like it's it's kind of it's kind of fashionable to reject it at the moment, and no one wants to see a document that's created by AI, and that is a great puzzle to me because I'm I'm increasingly finding that some of the less glamorous but but time you know time painful aspects of my job, like writing lengthy monthly reports and so on, are being shortened, speeded up dramatically with the use of AI. It doesn't mean that I'm I'm you know abrogating my responsibilities to put good content in there. I'm feeding it the content, but it is doing the donkey work to create the volume and uh and the structure around it. So it is it is completely transforming the more procedural and and less value-added parts of my job, I would say. And it's definitely leaving me more time to sit staring at the wall, thinking about what I'm gonna do with you know business X, Y, and Z. Yeah. Um, and and so it's it's really valuable, but I do detect this sort of anti-AI sentiment out there that people want to kind of reject it. I think what will truly differentiate leaders in the future is is the is is how much they keep up to speed with it, because it is changing all the time. You know, it's um there used to be a website, there you there used to be a sort of channel called there's uh there's an app for that, right? It used to tell you what the app was for any particular purpose. There's now such a thing as there's an AI for that, because the proliferation and the and the and the uh variety of AI for certain purposes, specific purposes, is brilliant. Now, if you but if you don't keep pace with this, then you'll be left behind. So I think it's it's almost your duty bound to on behalf of the organization that you work for to take an interest and to stay, you know, stay in pace with it.

SPEAKER_01 28:56

Yeah. So maybe uh maybe AI training for leaders is something that organizations should be taking seriously as well.

SPEAKER_00 29:04

Completely, completely. And I yeah, I'm hearing that there are organizations of a certain scale that can afford now to have full-time AI employees who whose job it is put comp um constantly to grab people by the lapels to say, here's here's how you use AI. And I really like the idea of that because I do think you're going to need some dedicated resource to it in order to stay you know um up to speed with uh developments. I think that will be necessary. But you mentioned automation as well, just a quick word on automation. Automation's been been there for decades. Um I think interestingly, I find myself now in a situation where automation is not necessarily the answer, partly because some of the processes and operations in the technologies that that um I have the um you know the the fortune to lead um cannot be automated. And there's a lot of differentiation in that. There's a there's a lot of healthy pricing in that. So automation is not necessarily the key. I think the other sort of downside with automation, which I which I learned, uh, which was a hard lesson to learn actually, is is the cost from a capex, from a capital investment standpoint, on an annualized basis, to j maintain, not progress or develop, but just simply maintain a highly automated shop floor. There can be eye-watering levels of annual capex involved as a percentage of your revenue. And and um if you work for a group that's that's cash generative and and that's a key metric, you know, and and the extent to which you spend on capex is a factor, um, automation, you know, is is not necessarily the golden bullet to to to that.

SPEAKER_01 30:58

Yeah, interesting. Thank you. Um on to a slightly different topic. What do you wish you knew before leading high-tech companies, or what advice would you give to someone climbing the ladder in technical leadership?

SPEAKER_00 31:17

I've already mentioned that CapEx as a percentage of revenue on highly automated technical shop floors can be painful from a depreciation standpoint. I think the other one really about uh you know running technical organizations is making sure that your engineering capabilities are up to the task of supporting your product as they are currently and the product as they need to be in future. We talked earlier about you know you know attract attracting and retaining talent. Um, I wish I, taking one particular role in my career, I wish I had paid more attention during my diligence phase of the new role in making sure that I had the engineering skills and capabilities to be able to cope with what some of our long-standing and established customers were were going to present to us. And we didn't. And we made problems bigger than they were by not having the right span of technical capabilities within in the engineering team, and we didn't have the third-party relationships to solve the problem either. So we were left very exposed contractually to solving technical problems that we just didn't have the skill set to do, partly because of retention issues in the organization of talent. So I think for technical leadership, if you want to call it that, uh making sure that you have the capabilities to be operating in the space that you're in is I I wish I knew uh to look there in more detail than perhaps I did in the past. And and it's a it's it's changing landscape, by the way. I mean, literally as as people come and go in the organizations, that uh that dynamic changes. So it's it's a constant uh you know watch really to ensure you have the skills to be operating where you are.

SPEAKER_01 33:30

No, absolutely. Thank you. That's helpful. Um, and what would you say has been the toughest leadership decision you've had to make? And what did it teach you about yourself?

SPEAKER_00 33:44

Well, I said earlier that pretty soon after my first industrial role, the 2008 recession hit, um what was very much needed at that time was a lot of cost out, of course, and making difficult decisions about certainly human resources early is critical for survival in recessionary and um scenarios. You've got to make difficult decisions before you want to make them. Um, and but I have cut deep in the past in restructuring um moments in my career. I've I've made I've had to make very difficult decisions about a lot of people's livelihoods. And um and I here, you know, I guess 20 years on, I pause for a bit longer actually on some of those decisions and the extent to which the organization can weather the storm rather than just delivering cost savings really rapidly, which of course will get a big thumbs up from any kind of you know from a kind of headquarters standpoint, but but for the good of the business and the long-term health and survival, uh, I think I think I've learned to take a pause uh now on letting people go um and and restructuring. So I sort of come full circle a little bit. I I sort of learned in 2008 recession that speed was was key and yes it was, but now in order to make sure that the long-term future is being looked after properly, a pause on those decisions. And I I can't tell you exactly what that you know what what that pause is, but a pause to really think through uh whether you can afford to let talent, skills, and people's history and their legacy go so easily in a recession environment. So I think um I think that's a bit of a learning for me.

SPEAKER_01 36:02

If you were advising a young leader entering the high-tech sector today, what single piece of advice would you give them to stay relevant in the next decade? And obviously, we've covered keeping up to date on AI, but what about as a leader, aside from that?

SPEAKER_00 36:21

Well, look, I mean, I I think we started this conversation with these sort of univers, these important principles of leadership that for me have served have served me well timelessly for 20 well for 30 years of my adult life now. And um I would give I would lean on those because I think regardless of trends and shifts and market you know and market uh prospects, a any young leader needs to be able to get those fundamentals right. And if they get those fundamentals right around leadership, i.e., maintaining a healthy team, regular communications, rewarding and recognizing good behavior, challenging bad behavior, um, and maintaining relationships with their with their team. Um, they'll be okay. If they get those things right, they'll be okay for the future. Because, of course, if you get those things right, it usually elicits technical and market information that you're going to need to make the right strategic decisions to survive as an organization. But you've got to have you've got to have that information and people's will and um and their effort there in the first place. If they're switched off and you're not getting all of their uh commitment, if you like, professionally, then it you know you may not get the data points for those strategic decisions. So I would just I would tell that junior uh leader, that young leader, about the fundamentals of good good leadership and to practice it because it is it is a it's an art, nobody's born with it. You know, it's the nature-nurture argument you said, but you you can be born with probably half of it if you're doing if you if you're doing well, but the other half is absolutely through through your ability to see and not just look at what's going on around you.

SPEAKER_01 38:17

Yeah, that's great, thank you. And I think you know, something that you touched on earlier as well, is it it starts even before you have that team in place. If you are hiring people, it's a it's a two-way discussion. It's no longer, like you said, the old school of the person comes into the interview and they must sell themselves when you're in a technical environment where the the shortage of talent is is really an issue for so many companies. Um as an organization, if you want to secure those people, it's got to be a conversation. You have to be able to demonstrate what's great for the person, what's in it for them, for their career, for their life. And I still see, which horrifies me, companies who seem to not think like that. And we sometimes work on projects with them and it's horrifying. And I think you know, it it's taken us a long time to get these highly skilled people even in front of you, and now you're not giving them the attention they need. They don't grow on trees, you know. Um, so really, really useful points. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 39:28

Well, I mean, so I mean you're your your you know, interview technique is fundamental, and it's the quality and standard of some some of the interview techniques that you meet is is is the reason why you you probably you don't deserve to keep good talent, right? And and I've sort of I'm increasingly taking to for you know for that to be the first point of discussion in an interview, which is right, you know, Mr. and Mrs. Candidate, what's in it for you? And and because I think that's the starting point, which is a bit of a role reversal of how interviews have been in the past. You you sit there as the interviewer expecting to be blown away, and it's you know, and if they're lucky they get the job. And it absolutely is now a complete two-way uh discussion, and it might as well start with what's in it for the candidate. But the structure of those interviews, and not just the interview, because I know that uh CIPD did a um big piece of research many years ago about about the predictive value of just doing an interview, and it's something like 33%. You might as well flip a coin. If you're just gonna interview someone, then flip a coin. Yeah, but uh because because you stand a better chance of getting it right. So you have to explore someone much more than just an interview, the personality profiling, intelligence testing, all of that stuff. It's absolutely key. If you're gonna get the right cultural person with for the right cultural fit, you've got to go beyond just a one-hour, you know, unstructured interview.

SPEAKER_01 41:01

Yeah, absolutely. Brilliant. Rob, well, thank you so much for sharing the lessons both from the military and business leadership, you know, from talent to transformation to the future of AI. There's lots here for leaders to reflect on. For those watching, I'd love to know what leadership skill do you think will matter most over the next 10 years? Drop your thoughts in the comments. And if you found this conversation useful, please like, share, or tag someone who'd benefit from Rob's perspective. Thanks again, Rob, for joining me. It's been a pleasure.

SPEAKER_00 41:35

Thank you.