Please forgive the audio quality – this was recorded right after the conference finished. This is a conversation with Orian Medes who is a professional focusing on Growth and Development within businesses. We talk about how PMO (programme, portfolio and project management) professionals are perfectly placed to realise value from within an organisation. The role of a PMO is to ensuring that strategy leads to execution. We talk about how systems thinking can help within information management which leads to better decision making, which leads to generating more value.

In this episode we offer a practical overview of the six distinct forms of complexity that organisations face: technical, process, structural, organisational, people, and power. Drawing on systems thinking, Martin explores how each type demands a different approach—ranging from optimisation and workflow redesign to cultural insight and addressing power dynamics. The episode unpacks relevant tools like Soft Systems Methodology, the Viable System Model, and Critical Systems Heuristics, highlighting how practitioners can tailor interventions to the nature of the complexity at hand. This episode is an essential guide for anyone navigating transformation in today’s complex organisational environments.

In this episode we focus on how organizations help change to happen using a psychological stages of change model, originally developed for addiction recovery, the model helps explain how individuals move from denial to action, often looping back through relapse. Martin illustrates this with the BBC's decision to not renew Jeremy Clarkson’s contract, emphasizing the role that boundaries play in triggering and sustaining change. The episode underscores that inaction corrodes culture, and leaders must reframe risk, recognize systemic patterns, and protect those who speak up, to foster genuine transformation.

Today we look at the organizational and people dimensions of complexity. Laura Watford of STEMunity shares her journey of organisational development, highlighting the impact of coaching on her approach to developing STEMunity and growing in confidence as a female entrepreneur. Laura describes her recent inspiring STEM events for children including an incredible event in the Mary Rose museum.

In this episode we continue to explore how to deal with the people dimension of complexity. Today I am talking to Genovefa Kefalidou, a lecturer in Human-Computer Interaction at the University of Leicester. We talk about the importance of user-centric design in AI. Genovefa explores how evolving technologies—from smart homes to AI interfaces—require human trust, comfort, and inclusion to succeed. Genovefa’s work in trustworthy AI highlights the critical role of placing the human user at the core of designing AI technologies in order to increase trust.

In this second podcast, we talk about information security and about how much information we are each willing to give up so that we can be provided with particular services. We focus on 5 areas that are most critical to consider to build our skills if we are to make sure that our AI solutions are effective: (1) productivity - new ways of looking at productivity, (2) value - what value do you want to provide and how do these match with the shifting value systems of the stakeholders, (3) ethics - maturity and governance of ethics is key, (4) leadership - need to move away from 'top down' management, ensuring that we value people who deliver solutions rapidly and (5) people - need to feel that they are part of the change and that they are valued.

Today I am talking to Professor Alan Brown, Professor of Digital Economy at the University of Exeter and Director of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for Digital Leaders. We talk about how small and medium sized companies can get the best from AI. We cover how AI can help in education. We also talk about the Feasibility, viability and desirability of new solutions. We will look at relationships with technology, how AI can improve education and how adoption of new technology can be affected by people’s perceived vulnerability – ultimately the question is how can people learn to trust technology?

I really want to hear your views about the podcast, what topics and who I include in series 2. Please do have your say in the survey https://rb.gy/qlbau2.

We live in a complex world yet some leaders try to pretend that complexity is not there. Systems thinking provides prescriptions for standard types of complexity. In this episode I will talk about the 6 types of complexity that we are concerned with in business: Technical, Process, Structural, Organisational, Power and People.

Series 2 of the podcast will be themed around these.