Prelims

Half Title Page

Braver Leaders in Action

Title Page

Braver Leaders in Action

Personal and Professional Development for Principled Leadership

By

Mike McLaughlin

Founder of Braver Leaders, UK

And

Elaine Cox

Oxford Brookes University, UK

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

Copyright Page

Emerald Publishing Limited

Howard House, Wagon Lane, Bingley BD16 1WA, UK

First edition 2022

Copyright © 2022 Mike McLaughlin and Elaine Cox.

Published under exclusive licence by Emerald Publishing Limited.

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Contact: permissions@emeraldinsight.com

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without either the prior written permission of the publisher or a licence permitting restricted copying issued in the UK by The Copyright Licensing Agency and in the USA by The Copyright Clearance Center. Any opinions expressed in the chapters are those of the authors. Whilst Emerald makes every effort to ensure the quality and accuracy of its content, Emerald makes no representation implied or otherwise, as to the chapters' suitability and application and disclaims any warranties, express or implied, to their use.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-1-80382-178-8 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-80382-175-7 (Online)

ISBN: 978-1-80382-177-1 (Epub)

Dedication

from Mike

For: Lucy, Luisa, Annabelle

Special thanks to: Carolyn, Gaynor, Peter, Thea, Edward, Poppy and Paul

from Elaine

Again, and always, for Chris

List of Figures

Foreword

Making changes in any business is scary – getting the culture ‘right’, especially when it needs to change significantly from the current state, is not straightforward. Getting individuals to focus on a wide range of factors, not only profit but also, for example, people development, mental health, climate change and wider environmental, social and governance matters, is not easy. This book provides a go-to reference for management of how to make changes in personal style, thinking and actions to achieve significant change in business and to do so without fear.

The exercises, questions and real-world practical examples aid understanding in an uncomplicated manner and help to demonstrate how relatively small individual changes in approach can make a massive change to an organisation for the better. The structure used in the book provides an easy-to-follow roadmap to develop each of 32 areas of focus. Although each are interlinked, the reader can also select those areas that they believe require more development. Either way, it provides the confidence to make changes with less negative emotion.

Being a braver leader requires well-developed emotional intelligence and the ability to deal with the pressures of everyday management. I have no doubt that using these insights, approaches and recommendations will lead to more organisations developing the right culture not only to improve performance but also to maximise the development of people at all levels. Mike and Elaine have expertly captured in this book what braver, high-performing business leaders and managers do in practice. What we need now is many more of them.

In summary, this book is an excellent tool which can be used in many different industries and situations by all levels of management to ensure we all become ever braver leaders achieving our full potential.

Chris Surch

Chris was a PLC Director (CEO and CFO) in a number of organisations in different industries. His focus has been on maximising performance through developing appropriate cultures and structures and helping management to achieve their full potential. This focus continues as a Non-Executive Director.

Acknowledgements

We really appreciate Mr Chris Surch agreeing to read and comment on the book and for writing the Foreword. We also wish to thank the various reviewers of the original manuscript who provided beneficial feedback.

Whilst the leaders who have contributed to this book are necessarily anonymised within the text, we do need to acknowledge their inputs. Each of our contributors has given their time and provided invaluable insights and vignettes that have helped greatly to improve the content and veracity of this book. Additionally we would like to thank our contributors' networks too, as many of them engaged with and explored these leadership ideas as well.

Craig Arthur

Lee Baker, Head of Supply Chain, Brompton

Terry Bennett, Corporate Risk Manager

Hannah Blair

Mark Crompton, Operations Director

Revd Canon Dana Delap, Church of England vicar

Peter Dent, Managing Director, LEMO (UK) LTD

Jayne Double, Lecturer in Teacher Education, Suffolk New College, University of Suffolk

Lucy Free, Programme Manager

Steve Free, Product Group Engineering Director

Anna Golawski, Founder and Director, Stratus Coaching Ltd

Rachel Goodfellow, Hidden Needs Trust Founder, Chair of Trustees, and Sole Fundraiser

Adrian Hussey

Huma Khan, Founder, SalesPsych Ltd

Jason Leeke, Sales Manager

Angus Maciver, Formerly CEO McCurrach Group

Mal Maginnis, President, Rapiscan Systems

Gerry McGeehan

Gordon Neil, Director

Rhona Neil

SJ Sloan, Marketing Director

Peter Steel, Director, Steelworks Consultancy

Scott Watts, Team Vicar of a group of rural parishes in the Cotswolds

Sally White, Senior Director Business Development, New Jersey Manufacturing Extension Program (NJMEP)