This book is entirely built on the experiences I have had working with hundreds of talented people from a large number of UK and global businesses. I thank them, their colleagues, their bosses, and their HR partners. It was a pleasure and an honour to work with every one of you.
I wouldn’t have found my way into leadership consulting if I hadn’t met Gurnek Bains. He became my boss, my inspiration and my friend. To make a good living doing something so inherently interesting and worthwhile is a blessing. I thank him and his then business partner Ken Rowe for welcoming me to YSC.
There I met some great people. Early readers of my drafts included Kylie Bains, Rani Bains, Francesca Elston, Anita Kirpal, Georgia Samolada, Jane Anderson, Jonathan Bloom, Nik Kinley, Georgina Cavaliere, Kevin Bright, Emmett Gracie, Chris Rawlinson and Stuart Schofield. In particular Susannah Yule, David Longmore and Lara Menke have become close friends and each contributed a great deal to my thinking.
I left YSC to set up CDP and my partners Sarah-Jane Last and Paul Jeffrey, along with Joanna Floyd, Rob Davies, Gerard de la Garde, Susie Orbach, Juliet Rosenfeld, Susan Kahn, Orla Coughlan and the rest of our Associates deserve thanks for putting up with me being distracted from our new business for the best part of a year. Our UCL based researchers Alex Farcas and Felix Schmirler provided valuable research help in the early days. Thanks also to the CDP designer Mike Hughes, our finance manager Chriss Goodey, our accountant Marc Jason, our lawyer James Harman at Simkins and my Executive Assistant Claire Acfield.
My leadership consultancy rests on the foundations of the psychology I learned at the Wright Institute in Berkeley, California and at the Tavistock Clinic in London. My erstwhile US psychotherapy supervisors Jessica Broitman, Laurie Case, Peter Silen and Mike Rubino, and my UK ones, Brett Kahr and Susie Orbach, but above all my psychotherapy patients, have over the years enabled me to develop the capacity for the deep psychological thinking that informs my corporate work today. As did my US BFF Caroline Date.
My CDP colleague Elloa Atkinson was actively involved in the final stage of the project and her research, ideas and drafting were vital to the book being completed. She was a joy to work with and it’s no exaggeration to say that certain sections of the book are as much hers as mine.
Ed Docx deserves special thanks as he worked with me in the early stages of the book to make the theme clear and compelling. He is an amazing writer, teacher and friend. Others who read and commented on versions of the manuscript include Henry Birch, Rowenna Davis, Richard Hawkes, Darren Watmough, Nick White, Anton Fishman and my in-laws Marylyn and Gordon Garraway. As always Ben Wegg-Prosser was a true adviser, ally and friend throughout.
Andrew Gordon at David Higham Associates took the book under his wing and there surely can’t be a more pleasant, thoughtful, committed agent. His comments on the book altered its structure fundamentally and improved it significantly.
Louisa Dunnigan, my editor at Profile Books, cajoled and challenged me until the book was the best it could possibly be. She was penetrating, thorough and always right. I can’t thank her enough. My copy editor Joe Staines made some typically understated but excellent suggestions, all of which were gratefully received.
Of course, final thanks and acknowledgements go to my parents Ken and Chrina and to my own wonderful family, to whom the book is dedicated.