Leading when trust is breaking down 📰 Lexie Kirkconnell-Kawana

I think what surprised me was that it was much more an exercise in your own introspection than it is about trying to model what other leaders are doing out there. Because I think that's the first thought I had is, oh, if I just replicate like a cookie cutter what other people are doing, maybe I'll grow into my own leadership style. And in fact, found what happened was that when I truly felt, you know, this is really authentically the way I'm going to approach the situation, this is how I'm going to be a leader. I felt much more confident and comfortable. That took, that took, you know, months and months of sort of self-reflection and coaching to get me there. Because otherwise I would have probably tried to revert to type. And even now I find myself sometimes when I'm really, you know, I'm a little bit frustrated or I'm quite stressed or a bit on burnout, I will revert back into type.

This week's Millennial Master is Lexie Kerkonnell-Kauanā. CEO of Impress, the UK's independent press regulator. Lexie is on the front lines of tackling some of the biggest issues in the media and information landscape. Lexie's journey is proof that leadership isn't a one-size-fits-all formula. In this episode, we explore leading authentically, why introspection why not imitation is key to leadership success. Hybrid work dynamics and how businesses can adapt to attract talent while fostering connection and culture. And of course, media's future, the urgent need for regulation in a world dominated by platforms, AI, and decentralized news sources. This episode is brought to you by OffWork. Let's be real, the usual staff perks like gym memberships or gift cards just don't cut it anymore. And don't even get me started on free coffee and pizza Fridays. That's where OffWork comes in, the employee perk that actually gets used. With OffWork, your team gets something they already love: travel. They can book their own flights, pick their own hotels, and plan the perfect getaway, all with the travel fund you've set up for them. The best part? It's super easy. Just set the contributions and OffWork handles the rest. Better time off means less burnout, more motivation, and happier employees when they're back. Give your team a perk they'll actually love. Check out OffWork today on offwork.com. Millennial Masters is proudly sponsored by Jolt, the UK's top web hosting service. Every great project needs a reliable home, whether you're launching a WordPress site or scaling up a custom app. Jolt has hosting plans starting at just £3.95 a month, with unbeatable deals on domain registrations too. Why Jolt? Well, it's a no-brainer. They have super fast support, so you can get help within 30 seconds on live chat, so there's no waiting around. They do flexible payments, so you can pay with Bitcoin, American Express, or whatever works best for you, all while racking up points. How good is that? And there's unbeatable uptime. So your site stays live no matter what. Ready to give it a go? Sign up today and enjoy your first 3 months free. Head to jolt.co.uk to get started. Lexie, welcome to Millennial Masters.

Thank you, Daniel. Lovely to be here. Thanks for having me.

You've had a lot of interest in your early life. But you settled on law. What was the turning point that made you go for law rather than anything else?

Yeah, I was a very multi-interested kid. I was sort of good at a lot of, a little bit good at a lot of things, and it was really, really challenging picking one thing in particular to go on and do in higher education, but I really liked learning about human behavior and systems. And so while I wasn't necessarily interested in the profession so much, even though I went on to be a qualified, uh, and practicing lawyer, I was really interested in how law and politics worked to create sort of the conditions for all of us to sort of thrive. And so pursued a career in the law. But also had studied psychology and had done political philosophy. And so I was really interested in that broader systems thinking as well when I first set out. And yeah, thereafter I went into practice. I thought I was going to be a commercial lawyer. And again, that pull of interest into sort of new and exciting developing things led me down the career path of media regulation, which was quite left-field, but at the same time, something that really spun out of my interest in public law and human rights and state censorship and all of the issues I saw with the way that the law worked with how we exchange media and information. So yeah, I've had a really exciting left turn that a lot of lawyers don't necessarily make in their lives, but I'm really pleased I did, because it's been a really exciting journey.

Speaking of exciting journeys, moving from New Zealand to the UK was a huge leap, basically on the other side of the world. What was the biggest challenge you had in adapting to a new country and a new work culture here?

It was, was a decision that again was one of those left-field ones that I sort of took, one of those risks. But I knew that I had sort of plateaued where I was in New Zealand, and it seemed like the UK was a place where there was a lot of really exciting new developments around media, internet governance and regulation. So I wanted to explore that over here, a bigger economy, a really dynamic and interesting place culturally. But I stepped off the plane the day after Brexit. Oh, it was one of those experiences of coming into a context where you were an immigrant and there was a lot of anti-immigrant sentiment in the country. And obviously as a white person, as an English-speaking person, you can sort of slide under the radar a little bit, but at the same time, every time I open my mouth, that accent comes out. People recognize straight away. That you, you know, that you are not, um, uh, sort of native. And so the, the challenges I think are really around embracing that cultural difference. Because I think there are a lot of, you know, quite pronounced differences between New Zealanders and Brits. Definitely one around how we communicate, how we express ourselves, the values we have. So I think definitely the challenges are part of that, were part of that cultural exchange for sure. But I've been here 8 years now. I've loved it. It's such an interesting place. There are a lot of challenges that the UK are facing and being able to be part of the project now of trying to address some of those and provide solutions, even in the kind of narrow focus area that I work in. In media is, is really exciting and there's sort of no other place I'd rather be right now to, to learn and grow and hopefully then, you know, take those lessons more global as well.

What sort of culture shock comes to mind that you found totally different or you still haven't reconciled maybe with and you are just adapting?

Yeah, I mean, the communication one still comes and sort of bites me. On the behind every now and again, where I read quite recently this interesting concept of what's called sort of high communication and low communication. Brits, I think, have this penchant for this quite restrained style where there's a lot of politeness, there's a lot of talking around an issue rather than directly to the issue head-on. There's lots of courtesies and social rules around how you sort of express ideas and exchange knowledge. And again, I, I come in very direct, sometimes a bit strong-willed. I often like to cut to the chase and head right to the solution and dispense with those courtesies. And I have been described by some as a bit of a fire hydrant when it comes to how I express myself. And I think that is part of the culture shock really. And so I've definitely learned to code some of my language and my approach to make it more, um, uh, sort of discernible and acceptable in British context. But it's still, it still rears itself every now and again. Where you find you are speaking directly to an issue and you see this sort of shocked look on someone else's face because there was all these sensibilities around how you were supposed to approach that first. So I think that that's definitely one of the, the key issues is communication. But also I think the fact is, is that Britain's values are changing quite rapidly. We've seen a lot of change economically, politically, culturally, even over the last 10 years. So when you are trying to kind of move in a space where there's still a lot of dynamism and change, and there's a lot of values are sort of being now sort of washed aside for a new generation of them, you are navigating that all the time when you're trying to come to a solution, get things done, realize opportunities. And I think Britain isn't yet really settled on what its 21st identity, 21st century identity is. And Again, that, that, you know, also presents an opportunity to be part of shaping that, which is, I think, really exciting as well as immigrants like us, we get to be part of that conversation about defining what being British means here and now and beyond.

Speaking of shaping conversation, when the opportunity for the CEO role at Impress came up, I've read that you didn't initially picture yourself in that position and you did an intense leadership training period. And I'm wondering what were the biggest takeaways from you from that particular period of time as you were learning intensely?

It was, it was a real, um, uh, again, for me, something that happened really left field where I, I had been shoulder tapped by my predecessor who said that this is something that I should be thinking about. And I just didn't feel at that point in my career I even saw the blueprint or the pathway of me becoming a leader. So the intensiveness of that training was definitely necessary because it was a, a huge mindset shift. It was going from thinking I'm this specialist, I'm this technician, that's where the pathway of my career is gonna go to all of a sudden taking on this responsibility, being accountable, having to practice this ethic of integrity. Which were all things that were sort of latent going on for me, but had to really surface and become my primary sort of directive. And so the training really focused on coaching and shadowing. I spent a lot of time with different mentors over about a 12 to 18 month period. I spent a lot more time in the boardroom. I spent a lot more time co-making decisions with my predecessor as well, and had that sort of safety net of being insulated from the sort of risk because ultimately they were still there and they were the ones that took ultimate kind of accountability for decisions that were being taken. But it was, yeah, it was a really, really important time for me in terms of that stomping ground to test out what my leadership style was going to be, what my unique kind of proposition as a leader was going to be. And I was really, really grateful that the organization gave me that grace and patience to do that. And without it, I just don't know that I would've been ready to take on the opportunity, ready to kind of get my training wheels off and get into the role as I did. And, and so I think that period, if I was going to do it again, I would do it, I would've done it in the exact same way. I don't think I would've done it much differently. And so for people thinking about that, I think that's important. Do you have that support to, to trial and error and test out, you know, that style if you're going to do it in that quite intensive and short time frame fashion, if that was not something you've already been kind of training your whole career to do?

So as you shadowed and learned from other leaders, both in your organizations and other you were meeting from other organizations, as you said you were in the boardroom co-making decisions. What surprised you most about leadership or something that changed your perspective from a specialist to a leader?

So I guess I probably had quite a narrow view of chief executives. I didn't see a lot of them that looked like me, that had had the same career path as me. And so As I said, for me, the biggest thing was the shift in mindset around what a leader looks like, how they are and how they behave in relation to their team and to their organization. All of my career, I'd basically only had male CEOs in their 50s. So, there's a certain generational style which comes with that, a certain business context that a lot of them emerge from where they cut their teeth to come, you know, to come into leadership. And so for me, it was really sort of reinventing that in my own mind about who I was, being very self-aware about the strengths that I have, the qualities that I bring, and, um, and then kind of fitting that to what the organization's needs were at the time and are now. And so I think what surprised me was that it was much more an exercise in your own introspection. Than it is about trying to model what other leaders are doing out there. Because I think that's the first thought I had is, oh, if I just replicate like a cookie cutter what other people are doing, maybe I'll grow into my own leadership style. And in fact, found what happened was that when I truly felt, you know, this is really authentically the way I'm going to approach the situation, this is how I'm going to be a leader, I felt much more confident and comfortable. And again, that took, that took, you know, months and months of sort of, again, self-reflection and coaching to get me there. Because otherwise I would've probably tried to revert to type. And even now I find myself sometimes when I'm really, you know, I'm a little bit frustrated or I'm quite stressed or a bit on burnout, I will revert back into type. I will want to become that specialist, that technician again, and I have to take stock, pause, and do that stretch back into being leading from the front and being accountable and being responsible and serving the needs of my team and my business. But that temptation is always there to go back into specialism and process and being that technician in the back room. And so resisting that, I think, is still part of the growth journey that I'm going on as well.

Would that be, say, one of the key pieces of advice from your leadership training that you rely most on now that you are a CEO?

I think so. I think it's about trusting your own sense of identity and the strengths and the values that you bring. Because you are never gonna be able to replicate what others do well, and any Businesses and leaders are matchmaking exercises. You can get an off-the-shelf CEO to come into a business and they're going to do a standard set of behaviors and practices that they know work for their sector or, or their market. And often I think where you find that businesses begin to sort of suffer and fail is by using a very template approach to leadership. And so I think it's really important that leaders know who they are. They know what they have to bring and make sure that they try and position themselves either with their own entrepreneurial business, if they're a founder or entrepreneur, or with a business that they can get on board with the mission with and get passionate about and need to make sure that there is that true match there. And that's, that's often reveals itself after the fact, but as much work as you can do in advance to know what are the qualities that I bring and does this business need this is the best way to ensure that you'll be successful. And at any point, I, I've always said that the reason that I knew I was gonna get this job was because I knew I was the best person for it and that there wasn't anyone else out there in the market that was gonna be able to do the job better than I was. And at a point where I know that I'm no longer that person, where I think that there's someone that's gonna be able to do that better than me, that's when you know that that's the time for transition and It might sound as that's, that's that kind of ego element to it, that confidence element to it, but it is true. When you know that you are the best fit and the best match for that business, that's when you're gonna be really successful. So it's, it's yeah, having that level of self-awareness.

With law, you learn from books, but with leadership, is that the same case? Obviously there's hundreds and thousands of books on leadership. Was there any particular one that inspired you and that you could recommend to others, or you would advise to freestyle a little bit?

So I think leadership is definitely a muscle that you practice. It's, I think anyone has the capacity for leadership. I truly believe that when the right sort of circumstances, anyone can rise to that type of position. And I also think everyone should give it a go. I know a lot of people naturally don't consider themselves leaders, but I don't think there's anything intrinsic to it. And so when it comes to the kind of like resources I was drawing from, there were a lot of really good podcasts that were out there that I was listening to that I was really pleased about because it provides that validation from real people, real personalities who are in different contexts and And it's that osmosis of exposure to as many different types of leadership styles and individuals and personalities as possible to get that sense again about who you are and how you're going to be. You know, and there were, you know, there were a couple of books in particular that I really drew on that were really helpful for me. Texts that refer to that kind of 90-day plan and strategy that is all about, you know, making sure that you are going in with a really clear sense of what you are going to contribute. But mostly I found like the best teaching resource for me was just conversation. And what I found on the other side, now that I'm in a leadership position, is that that's still the best teacher for me is spending time with other CEOs and other MDs and directors, because yeah, as someone who's very bookish and has a lot of love for, you know, those types of resources, they, they've got their sort of upper limits. And ultimately, being a leader as well can be a really lonely position where you are kind of being squeezed at both sides, either if you've got, you know, a board of directors or trustees or shareholders, and then your executive team and your stakeholders and your customers as well. So making sure that you have that wide network of support and other leaders you can talk to is just incredibly important. And I still learn every day from those conversations with others in the same sort of positions that I'm occupying. So that for me is the best, the best way to learn. And that's how I'll continue to learn probably in the future.

Surrounding yourself with like-minded people and people who experience things from your perspective or their own different perspective is something certainly I've heard as well from other Millennial Masters I've been speaking to. Do you have any tips that you can share with others to find their crew, find their clan, find their peers? Obviously, you can reach out to a lot of people, but to vibe with them and understand them is a slightly different process from my experience as well.

Yeah, I think it's, it's sort of a post-pandemic phenomenon as well, that our access has become more limited and narrow. When I talk about people and, uh, talk about leadership with people from older generations, they often have really fond memories of being able to network, um, and conference and find, yeah, their tribe, their peer group. And I think for our demographic, it is more challenging in a, in a kind of more global context, um, in a more video-based context, um, where a lot of workplace now takes place online. We do get less opportunities to see each other and find that vibe. Um, and, and so I think for me, it's always about how can I get out more? How can I be putting myself in different contexts where I'm exposed to as many people as possible, not just over the phone, over video, over LinkedIn. And that can be hard, you know, everyone's, you know, really, really busy and there's a lot, there's a lot on, a lot to do. But, you know, I find myself in the last 3 weeks, I've probably been in conference at least 3 times a week. I've spent the last two weekends traveling to Brussels, traveling to North Devon, and I just find myself sort of so much more nourished by being out and about and meeting people where they are and finding, finding, you know, those connections that way. So my kind of advice is if you're finding yourself, you've spent, you know, You know, the third week in a row behind your desk in your home office, you're limiting yourself from that exposure and from finding those connections. Get out as much as you can is probably my key piece of advice.

Arrived on Brexit Day. 4 years later, we had the pandemic. Across the world, it changed the name of the game, but it also changed the leadership rulebook a little bit because ever since we've had remote and hybrid working becoming the norm. So how do you adjust leadership style to manage teams that aren't always in the same room?

This is, I think, a question I don't see any business having the silver bullet solution to. When I talk to a lot of people at different levels of organization, there's, there's so many different ways of doing this. And I think it's really, really about thinking clearly, really clearly about the needs of your business and the needs of your people. I remember pre-pandemic, the kind of culture of staff satisfaction was always about send out a survey once a year. You know, maybe upper management read that feedback or not, but it didn't change. You came into work 9 to 5, maybe you participated in some wellbeing program or did a little bit of additional training, but your routine was set based on where the business premise was. And, um, there really wasn't any flexibility around that whatsoever. And now I think businesses are, are much more aware of how susceptible to those changing needs of, of staff are. And, uh, you know, when we're in this kind of state of sort of market collapse and economic downturn, those sensitivities become more risky for businesses overall because of staff attrition and loss of institutional knowledge and surveillance and effective, um, effective management practice. So I, again, I don't think any particular business has got this right. For me, the main thing I think about as a business leader is how am I listening? How am I listening to staff? Because I often find that while we as business leaders and businesses went through this transition, you know, the workforce did as well. And that we haven't got a new settlement amongst the workforce about what working life should be, what that quality of work life should be. And often people don't really know themselves exactly what they need. And so I think it's more of a collaboration. It's being a little bit experimental. It's trying flexible working. It's trying different programs for development and wellbeing. It's trying more prescriptive office hours or different types of working settings like Teams or Zoom or, or Meet and figuring out what really works for your people. You know, at the end of the day, you do have to come up with a sort of consistent policy, right? You can't sort of have an individual policy for every single member of your team, but that collaboration, I think, brings you much closer to what is going to be effective for your business. And being adaptable, you know, again, we're still changing, things are still changing for a lot of people. We haven't come out of the fallout of the pandemic. We haven't come out of the fallout of the cost of living crisis. Until we really get a settlement for how people are in their context, we aren't going to really know what the kind of gold standard is for how you adapt and what we should all be doing going forward. It makes me nervous seeing a lot of businesses now bringing people back into full-time office work. You see a lot of particularly the larger, the larger businesses starting to say, right, everyone back to work 5 days a week in these commercial office spaces. And while that might be part of that kind of experimentation, that ex-novation, I do get concerned about us just reverting to type when a lot of presumptions have been upended by the pandemic and If you are doing that as a consequence of not listening to your people, you might find it really challenging to be the kind of quality employer people want to work for, for the future. So I think it's a bit of wait and see really, but always listening, trying to collaborate, trying to be adaptable, I think is really important right now.

Has hybrid and remote working enabled a new wider pool of talent for organizations and leadership?

Yeah, I mean, one thing I've certainly found is that I, you know, I don't have to be so London-centric as a business anymore, which means I get to, you know, I get to bring on people in, um, from a lot of different places that otherwise I wouldn't have. And, uh, while, you know, there's still this element of bringing everyone together so that they can socialize and build culture. Which we still do. I'm, I'm really grateful for the, the way that remote and hybrid has opened up those opportunities to work with a broader set of skills and experience from across the employment market. And I think that decentralization of talent, you don't have to be London-based to find the best people, is really important from a more holistic sense for sort of regional economic revival. And I think it's, it's better for a business because you just get more diversity and you get, you get the best talent at the time and you can really, really employ based on merit in those contexts. So, so I, I think that there's a lot of, a lot to be gained for continuing to make sure that your business is open to hybrid and remote in terms of the, the geography and spectrum that, that enables in terms of who you're potential new employees there.

Speaking of diversity, a lot of organizations, particularly some of the larger ones, appear to be doing a bit of a tick-boxing exercise when it comes to diversity. But in, in Impress and your organization, in a way, you're leading from the front when it comes to diversity. So are there any tips for any other leaders on how they can truly open up and be more diverse rather than stick to a template and a CV line and then doing a tickboxing exercise.

Yeah, I think a lot of businesses feel quite nervous about this, but I never have. I mean, I, um, I've certainly come up with challenges in the early part of my career because of issues of bias and, and discrimination and to have landed where I have. This early in my career and overcoming those barriers means I know that because of the way that people championed me and advocated for me and overcame issues of discrimination and put diversity first, I'm a testament to that. And so what I would say for businesses thinking about this is you have to be proactive. I understand where, again, there's this nervousness around sort of positive discrimination. And whether or not that that is going to eclipse merit in decision-making. But, but you have to be proactive. You have to go out and you have to build those networks. You have to, you can't just satellite in. You need to build authentic relationships with diverse networks to get the right pools of people to come back in and really change not just the face, but the values of the business over time. And I'm a really big advocate of making sure that diversity is front and center of recruitment, of workplace culture, of staffing strategy, of visibly representing that, but then standing up and championing it and advocating it as well. So, I'm not a person that shies away from that at all in terms of our business leadership and the results sort of show we've got an incredibly diverse organization. From directorship all the way down to the junior executive staff. And it's a very international business as well, in the sense of where we recruit from. And, and, and that is all very conscious and intentional. It's not incidental because we put some policy or process in place. In every single decision we're making, that's at the forefront.

Looking back at your career so far, What were some of the toughest challenges you faced early on and how did they shape you into the resilient person you are today?

So I think the, one of the biggest challenges is overcoming presumptions. You can be sort of as specialized, as technical, you can be the expert in the room. And people will still look at you and they'll look at your background in context and say, immediately dismiss you or disregard your views and make it, make it challenging for you to operate. I've been in a lot of rooms, in a lot of situations where I can tell that that's the dynamic that's going on. And so for me, um, it's about learning how to navigate that. And, um, continue to have that confidence, um, that you're supposed to be there, that you've got something of value to add, and to take someone on that journey for, for that period where they will walk away from that situation thinking, no, this is the right person that I should be connecting with, and I can see also what they had to offer. I know for a lot of people that is not something that they've encountered and empathized with. So yeah, so it's, it, it's being able to do that gracefully, patiently, and be able to hold and recognize your own worth, knowing that maybe that's not how other people perceive you. So that's definitely a challenge, but I think with more and more practice and experience doing that, you build up the skills you need to navigate that with confidence. I think another challenge is also around this this idea of sort of, um, awareness and perception of your own business and brand. When I'm thinking about leadership in particular, um, I think one of the sort of presumptions you go into when you look across leadership is that you're often looking at like a timestamp where a business is very successful and you're starting— and you're thinking, oh, okay, that, that sort of happened, that's part of their reality. And you don't get to see a lot of the work that goes on behind to build a business to that point. And For me, coming into a business where it was, you know, a really challenging proposition in a market in decline and having to inherit a lot of the kind of legacies around our brand, I still think that we are, you know, definitely in a work in progress stage. And I'm really looking forward to that opportunity where we can take that snapshot and say, yep, this is the type of aspirational, inspirational business that people will learn we know we'll want to learn from and want to replicate. And so I think for me, that's an enduring challenge is knowing where you are, where you want to be, the steps you have to take to get there. And that there probably will never be a point where you're like, we've done it. This is, you know, this is, we're safe. We, there's nothing more that we need to do, or we need to just keep doing as usual. And so For me, that's, that's part of the story of resilience is recognizing that dynamism and, um, and that you're kind of always in that state of change and growth and, and that there's never going to be a point you can kind of rest on your laurels and go, oh yeah, we've, we've done this, we've cracked it, we cracked the code. So, so that's, that's more about, I think, kind of perspective and, and holding that perspective while you're doing what you're doing, putting one step in front of the other every day. And, um, some risks are going to pay off, some aren't. Some opportunities are going to come through, some others won't. And just being really confident in your strategy and your position.

You've taken on from a male CEO, so should female CEOs approach differently to male CEOs, or were you tempted to follow a a male model, or do you think women shape the CEO role differently?

I try not to be too generalized about this, but I do think there is quite a different style that can emerge with some male CEOs in a quite homogeneous way versus female CEOs. And obviously the sector of female CEOs is still growing, is still emerging. The style that will be established when women have more opportunities to lead businesses, I think, is still a kind of question that's in motion. I think one of the things I wanted to do was make sure that I brought my values and the values I'd seen other female women CEOs bring to, to their businesses. And I, um, think the first thing for me, which I felt was universal, was, um, integrity. And making sure that you practice the values, you practice the ethics that are part of your identity and your mission. And I've seen a lot of female leaders do that really, really effectively. And so that was something for me that was really aspirational. Definitely a lot of male CEOs and leaders out there that also do that, but we also just, because there's a broader spectrum of them, see a lot of, uh, uh, of male CEOs not lead with integrity, for example. But the other thing that I think was— is a point of difference is around this notion of care. And I've had the benefit of working for male CEOs that I do think practice care, but they practice care in, in different ways, which I think can sit around how men are socialized versus how women are socialized. And for me, practicing care was all about making sure that I was accessible at all times, that I led with real empathy, that I listened and I responded and I engaged as much as possible with staff, and that I, um, brought a heart to these situations because for me, there's a real privilege in being entrusted to lead an organization by people, people who are wanting to show up to work every day for you. And you should really honor that and really connect on that human level. Try and understand where people are and what their needs are and do the best you can to serve those. And finally, I think that quality of service is something that I think is quite distinct where, where I see a lot of female CEOs really, really successful and really, um, is around their commitment to service. And, um, that was always a value I grew up with. Service was a, you know, acts of service was like a, um, very important pillar of my family and a foundation to parts of my education and my thereafter my work life. Where I see, you know, where I'm always inspired is where I see CEOs undertake it from a perspective of service. This is me giving back to my community, giving back to my sector, giving back to my workforce. And again, I see, I see a lot of that in a lot of female CEOs that are operating now and being really effective. And those were not necessarily values that were modeled to me. From, from male CEOs that I'd worked with or, or that I was aware of. And I think that's changing. I think, um, I see, um, just recognition across the board that that is part of the accountability of leadership, is that value of service. And that makes me, you know, that makes me feel really good about the methodology I approach it with, um, about the broader context we're operating in, because I think that's what's going to sort of help us resolve some of the challenges and crises that we're seeing coming down the line.

Besides being a CEO, you are a person and life can get hectic, manic, and sometimes overwhelming. What are some habits and routines that you use to stay grounded, to stay focused, or to channel your best self out there?

This is going to sound really cheesy, but I do all of the wellbeing practices you're supposed to do. When I find myself, um, in those, in those very intensive cycles, um, uh, within a business where you're pulling those 60, 80-hour work weeks, where you haven't had a weekend in a month, where, where you're, um, you're, you're really, really drawing on your stores to, um, continue to show up for the business. For me, it's about making sure you've got that routine. I wake up in the morning, I, um, don't go straight on my phone. I spend some time centering myself. I meditate, I go out for a walk if I can, just to start me off on a day where I am myself and I'm present. And I know thereafter that I can move, transition into the focus of the day ahead. And particularly since taking on the role, I've just found that my own health is so important to me being able to show up. Um, I was never a smoker, but I've cut back on drinking. I'm trying to look after exercise so much more. I spend so much more time outdoors and looking after my health in a far more like precise way. Um, and have just found that it's, it's totally changed the levels of energy I have to be able to deliver in my work life and And then on the other side of it is making sure that I'm really enriched in myself as a person. So I spend a lot of time in film and theater, and I read profusely, have, um, you know, great circle of friends. I have a very supportive family. You know, I go out to different types of contexts and like, um, kind of conferences, which are totally different and adjacent to what I do. Um, to do sort of deeper learning for what's going on around the world. And for me, making sure that you're still pouring from that full cup is really, really important because I know that I can't show up for my team when I'm running on empty, and I can't show up for the business. So for me, that's time lost.

It's—

there's no amount of time that I can regain if I'm not bringing, you know, my best self, that energy that passion to the business. It's, it's those really boring things. It's drink lots of water, exercise, eat healthy, stay present, have a diverse set of interests.

So they're not myths, they're real and they work for you. Yeah.

Um, and, and I, um, I think I'm also being a little bit more intentional about like who I'm spending my time with as well. Who are those, who are those people that I really admire? That inspire me in my community and my sector and spending more time with them as a way of, again, building up those stores, that resource, that passion. Um, and I think that's, that's a really— that's for me is a kind of interesting change over the last year is, is being intentional with who in my life. And that I, you know, I'm starting to see some early kind of incremental reward from that as well, but For me, it keeps the job interesting. It keeps the business interesting to me and keeps me motivated to keep showing up every day.

You said sometimes work can get crazy, 60, 80-hour weeks, no weekends for a month. And I know sometimes more than that when it comes to crunch time. How do you find balance in your personal and home life? With the pressures of such a top job like yours?

For me, it's this kind of mantra that I've, I've kept over the last sort of 18 months I've been running the business, which is that everything is temporary. So just as much as those cycles, those intensive cycles can feel relentless when you are in them, it's knowing that this too shall pass. And there will be time to enjoy the kind of spoils of that work and that there will be times where you can recoup from those intensive cycles as well. So again, I'm very, I can be very, very disciplined about my rest periods. And I try and model that for staff as well, where when, whether it's reclaiming my days in lieu, taking your annual leave, taking those half days and signing off, putting the phone away, putting the laptop away. And not checking emails, as the case may be. It's that for me is the balance is knowing that while those intensive periods will happen, you will also have those rest opportunities. And that rest itself as well is also temporary because if you're not working, there are those opportunity costs that can be lost. So, for me, that's it. It's a matter of perspective and then it's a matter of practice. And what I've You know, I've had really nice feedback from staff and employees as well about that, is that, that it's very visible for them that I do that, that when I'm, when I've signed off and I've said I'm signed off, I am. And I'm not sort of lurking in team, responding to messages and things like that, which gives them permission to do the same. And for me, it's not just me and the business, it's me and my whole team delivering all, all at the same time. And one practice that we have now that I'm, that I'm really enthused by is the beginning of our team days. We do. That kind of, that mental check-in where we say, right, where are you in terms of your capacity right now? Don't worry about the work program. Don't worry about the operational plan and your projects at the moment. Like, just give us a sense check. And we sometimes use metaphor to describe that. That gives a very good read across the organization of where everyone is, where the capacity in the business really lies in terms of who can take on more, who can be delegated more to. And you as a leader are still a person in that conversation. That creates much more visibility, much more awareness around the business overall. For me, that practice I think is really helpful as well in terms of that personal and work-life balance, because it's sharing that load, sharing that burden. And it's no good if your CEO is at 100% and showing up every day if anyone else, if everyone else in the business can't, right? So, so, um, Yeah. Recognizing that dynamic as well, I think is really important for the balance, for balance overall.

Now that we're a bit more introspective, what's the biggest sacrifice you had to make to be where you are today?

Listen, this is probably going to sound a little bit unusual, but for me, part of the sacrifice is what opportunities have I not been able to pursue for committing to this? Because it is a commitment. It's almost a sort of marriage between yourself and the mission of a business. And that, that does mean that as someone who's a very multi-interested person, there have been different missions that I've not been able to pursue in light of this, opportunities that would, that have and would have come my way, which isn't just a, you know, isn't just about different different roles. It's about those different causes. And as someone who's really, really passionate about justice, about fairness, about equity, when you commit to this, you are saying you're closing the door on the other paths that your life could have taken if you pursued that other mission or that other, that, you know, that other path. And that's, that's for me is part of the sacrifice, is knowing I could add value in lots of different, you know, um, in lots of different places and lots of different businesses, but this is the one that I've chosen. And that choice I think is really, really powerful because you go, this is where I'm meant to be. And this is where I'm supposed to, um, I'm supposed to make change and be of influence. And so for me, that's a sacrifice. It's thinking about those, those kind of other lives that I've led, um, and, and having a little sort of moment for them, holding some space for them, but going, this is, this is for someone else. This is gonna be someone else's cause. Um, so for me, yeah, that's, that's definitely the biggest sacrifice. I mean, there's lots of little ones. When you are giving this much of yourself to something, there are gonna be other areas of your life which, um, you can't. And for some people that's relationships, for some people that's passions and hobbies, for, for some people that's, um, can be themselves and losing themselves in the work. And I think recognizing what, what it is where you are not showing up, um, is really important because you can also put a bit of a boundary around it and go, right, for 3 years, this is gonna be me and this is where I'm gonna, uh, and this is where I'm not gonna be able to serve these other parts of myself. Um, but again, because it's temporary, because you've created that boundary, you also know that you're going to be able to return to that. And so, so I think for me, um, when it comes to sacrifice, I think it's, it's so important to recognize that and to communicate about it if there are other people you're in relationship with that, um, are going to be affected by it. But also to think about, yeah, how can, how can I bring fence that and be able to return to it when, when I need to? When I've, when I've given what I can to this business, to this mission, and am prepared to then let that go a little bit and, and return to those other aspects of myself.

Thank you for opening up about that. I want to go close to home, and that's work and professionally, and talk about your view from IMPRESS as the regulator. What do you see as the biggest challenges facing media regulation and media in the UK right now and beyond? Because you earlier in our discussion, you described it as an industry in decline.

Yes. And that's probably not a fair appraisal overall, but I'll explain sort of my meaning behind that, which is that media as we know it is in decline is what we've traditionally understood as media. The, the news organization, the media company, which sits in an office somewhere with a hierarchy going out and collecting stories and coming back and putting them together and then distributing them to audiences is that style of business and the market wherein those businesses exist is rapidly changing. And as a media regulator, you know, our mandate is in relation to regulating the media that exists. And if the media that exists is changing or that market is shifting, then so do the regulators. And there's a temptation, I think, for markets and sectors and the regulators and bodies that sit around them to try and self-perpetuate. And go, let's just keep everything as they are. Let's try and preserve them as much as possible as they are. Because I think of, you know, around that sort of ego around it. And this is, you know, this is the best model for doing things. I think the biggest challenge for media right now is, um, is everyone in the media sector recognizes change is happening, but there isn't a lot of leadership on what is it changing to? And how do we kind of keep control over the parts that we want to preserve to ensure that those are still sort of standing on the other side of this change, these big catalysts that are going on. We know traditional print is almost dead and decline. There is still going to be the desire for some print publications as sort of heritage legacy items. Um, but the way people are receiving information now, um, and receiving media now is completely different than it was even 5 years ago. Uh, I think a study, Ofcom study recently came out that showed for the first time people are now predominantly getting their news from online sources, no longer TV, which was always the dominant news source. And when we open up that question about which online news sources, it's basically through various platforms. Platforms and search, um, uh, websites, which are all being appliance-sized into apps on our phone. And the sources within those platforms are incredibly diverse and very difficult to capture as a media market. We're seeing the rise of news influencers, news personalities, and people that don't recognize what they're doing is news and journalism, but nevertheless becoming the main sources of news for others. And so all of this change and the business models that support all of this change is, is in flux. And until we kind of reach settlement about what that looks like, it's very difficult for a media regulator to determine what are going to be the best interventions to reduce harm, because that's why media regulators exist. It's to enable the best practice of ethics and it's to reduce harm and If we don't know who's causing the harm or how they're doing it and we can't do interventions to address it, then, you know, we make ourselves redundant. Those are all of the things that I'm thinking about as the leader of a media regulator. And I know media regulators the world over are thinking about these questions as well. And obviously all of that is also now being disrupted by new tools like automation, machine learning, and generative AI, which are going to make it far easier for people to produce content en masse, to target that, to personalize that. And the scale of this and the speed at which it's happening, um, is, uh, creates a lot of discomfort for institutions that are used to very small, slight incremental change. And if institutions, if media regulators don't adapt to this quickly, um, we know we're going to find ourselves not fit for purpose and redundant in the future. And for me, a really, a really perverse outcome of all of this would be we enter into this new information economy where people are getting all of this information from lots of different sources. And some people are being harmed by that information, or that information is contributing to social discord or community discord. And we've got no tools in the toolkit to address that. And so what I'm spending a lot of time doing and thinking about is doing some of that futurist work. Thinking about where we might need to be in 5 or 10 years, how our service needs to change so it meets people's needs, it meets the needs of the sector, and setting up a bunch of those sort of work programs so that they're ready when this transition sees itself through, rather than trying to retrofit something when something really big and bad and catalytic happens and, and we have that kind of desperate need. For someone to do something about it.

Many have argued that the platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, they practically act like publishers, even though it's an algorithm deciding ultimately what gets pushed out. There is, there is a filter and in a way they act exactly like publishers, but they never faced the same consequences as a publisher, irregardless of who would be regulating that publisher. Would you say that platforms should take more responsibility for the content that they distribute, especially in the era which you described where you have news influencers who are not necessarily journalists and they don't always apply the same guidelines?

It's, it's a necessity. I don't think it's a matter of should they, could they, it has to happen. They have to take more responsibility. Um, I think this is part of the consequence of us not having a really grown-up conversation about how our information consumption is changing. We've not had that public debate. We've not sort of brought the public and communities on board with how they should be processing information and what they want and how it's rather we've sort of dumped a bunch of new platform products onto them and said, well, if you get information this way, fine. You know, it's your choice. It's the market. And in fact, that's enabled platforms to really, you know, it means that they've not had to identify as publishers. And while at the same time, as you say, having huge amounts of control about over access to information and how people access information. And, and, you know, I've always heard the line, oh, it's the algorithm. Well, the algorithm is designed by people, people making decisions. And so the algorithm does what it's told. The algorithm isn't kind of sits over here with, without any human in the loop. And that means that we have to look at what those decisions are and, and what the consequences of them are. And if that means widespread dis and misinformation, hate speech, harm to children, harm to, um, broader society, then, then we need to be able to, as a, as a public, have more control over, um, uh, these businesses and how they operate. And there is states regulations coming down the line where that will address some of it, but that's been very slow and very long and been up against intense lobby. And, and so we find ourselves in a position now where we sort of have some light regulation, um, the public The vast majority of them now using this as their main form of ways of getting access to information and the reality of them taking on a much more publishing distribution-based role. So more needs to be done. Absolutely.

The platforms have been around now for, you know, 15 years or so, and they're dominating the market in terms of content distribution for sure, and also in terms of advertising revenue, which has knock-on effects on the entire industry. Many argue that it's weakening it, but there's a new kid on the block, which you mentioned before, and that's AI and its infinite capabilities to create both with qualitative but also divisive content. Could AI be brought and regulated in a way that media is to a certain extent, or are we too early to be able to ascertain the impact it could have?

I think we could do more now. Um, while leaving open the possibility of what its capability could be in the future and also meeting, you know, any potential harm or perverse consequence of that at that point in time. Um, I think this idea that we shouldn't do anything now and we should just wait and see what happens is a sort of abdication of our responsibility to recognize the harm it is doing right now. Which is that if people are relying on the information produced through AI-assisted platforms and that information isn't accurate, it doesn't have integrity, it is breaching people's rights, then we need to act on that now. Part of the challenge is a lot of these AI integrations are being developed by companies quite independently of the businesses that they're being applied to. So, um, an AI company is not necessarily developing a software, a program that is going to spread misinformation. And yet when it ends up in a search engine and, um, the data it's been trained on is entirely corrupted by bias and is incomplete, then misinformation is the obvious consequence of its application therein. And so we need, I think, to have a really, really good understanding of the market, what tools are being developed, where the integration is happening, and starting to create regulation around those integrations where it's very obvious that the harms already exist and will be perpetuated by it. I think some really obvious examples we've started to see is where some of the AI platforms have said, well, we're not going to let our GenAI application be used for political candidates or elections, and they already recognize what the harm is and putting in place the guardrails and in their license agreements, those types of terms of use. But that's happening in a very self-regulatory fashion. That's not happening because the state or regional bodies are imposing those requirements on them. And so we need to fast-track that work and ensure that the sector itself understands the, the conditions. The regulatory conditions in which they can operate, what the limits on their design and, and programming needs to be, and more, you know, collaboration across different sectors, across, you know, this new emerging AI sector and the businesses that want to use AI with civil society and the public to understand, well, what's the real need here for this and how can we ensure that ethical design as part of this conversation. So, so I think there are two prongs to this, um, you know, far more public conversation that we didn't have when it came to search and social about how it would impact on information distribution. Um, we've got that opportunity to do this now. And the second is to, to begin to apply some of those regulatory conditions to the obvious harms that are already emerging. So if those two pieces happen, I would be much more confident that we wouldn't be restricting the innovation of the sector. In the long term.

Is the UK at the forefront of regulation? Could it be? Is there anybody else who we could look up to as an example and say, they seem to be having a good model that we should implement? Or is there an in-between?

In the UK, a lot of the right noises are being made by the political class on this issue by regulators in the space, and the Digital Regulatory Cooperation Forum are doing a piece of work on this. And so, so it's— there's an acknowledgment, there's a recognition, but until we actually start to see the interventions on this that emerge from that, that discussion, those discussions, I'm, I'm, you know, I'm not, I'm not necessarily confident that, that we're, we're taking the best approach. But is anyone else doing this better? I don't think so. Not from what I can see from where I am. The EU obviously put in place the AI Act, which was anticipated some of these areas in relation mostly to how they kind of impacted on human rights in particular. But a lot of people already feel that that's behind and not fit for purpose and it needs to be much more comprehensive. And so I know that the Commission will be looking closely at that and the European Parliament probably in due course. Where I'm more encouraged is where I'm seeing a lot of academic attention and resource being put into this, particularly around the ethics. And a lot of civil society is starting to invest heavily in this as well. And there are a lot of programs out there looking at AI ethics. And, and so I think It's from those spaces, those expert spaces, that we're probably going to start to see emerge some of the best practice and the types of frameworks we should be adopting for this. So, so that's where I would be turning my attention to is more those expert spaces. But at a state level, at a regional level, I think everyone's been a little bit blindsided by this and it's a kind of buzzword at the moment. But until, yeah, until we see that turn into action. I think it's a little bit of hype. So, so hope that in time that will start to translate. But, but yeah, I'm, I'm, I, I think the UK is very prime for actually doing something and being a global leader on this issue, but it needs to do it.

I think that's a great spot to end this episode, Lexie. Thank you so much for sharing your insights.

It's been a pleasure, Daniel. Thank you so much for inviting me.

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