Go behind the scenes with leaders in Digital, Product & Design to find out how high performance teams are built and managed.
Hosted by Nicole How, a former professional athlete turned recruitment consultant with a background in psychology, this podcast is an open conversation with experts about their experiences, behaviours and beliefs about what defines leadership, team performance and success. We prioritise depth and practical mechanics over high level theory.
If you’re a leader or aspiring leader in digital, product or design, this podcast is for you.
Ep 11 | Beyond Craft: Career Ownership, AI Mindsets and Team Unity with Canva’s Simone Attanasio
Who is truly responsible for your career growth?
On this episode of Behind the Teams, host Nicole How sits down with Simone Attanasio, Head of Design, User Voice at Canva and founder of Therapy for Designers.
Simone breaks down why creatives must look beyond craft to take radical ownership of their development, how to lead people who do not mirror your personality and why approaching AI as a playground beats productivity anxiety every time. We also explore regional design cultures, what it takes to protect team unity and why modern design leaders need to get their hands dirty in the tools again.
Key takeaways:
Owning Your Growth: Why leaders are guides, but personal progression is entirely your responsibility.
AI as a Playground: Replacing fear with playful exploration to understand technical constraints and LLM behaviour.
Leading Different Minds: Adapting your communication style to manage and collaborate with people unlike yourself.
Back to the Tools: Why design leaders must return to hands-on UX workflows in the age of AI.
21 Sept 2026
Ep 10 | You Can Sprint Towards Anything, But Is It The Right Direction? with Storm Jarvie
On this episode of Behind the Teams, I sit down with Storm Jarvie, who has spent 18 years at the intersection of product, data, and experimentation, building and leading teams inside complex organisations before recently stepping out to work independently.
We covered:
What she's had to unlearn about leadership — the assumption that people decide logically, when most decisions are actually driven by emotion or politics
How to scale an experimentation culture inside large, siloed, and regulated organisations — and where the resistance really comes from
The hiring signals that separate people who thrive in experimentation from those who just interview well
Why she believes any org serious about experimentation should build the capability in-house, and what led her to go independent
Connect with Storm: stormjarvie.com.au (http://stormjarvie.com.au)
30 Aug 2026
Stop Giving Feedback, Start Paying Attention. Strategic Workforce Planning with James Comer
James Comer (Global Head of Strategic Workforce Management, ResMed) breaks down what strategic workforce planning actually looks like when 39% of the workforce needs new skills by 2030.
We get into:
Scenario-based planning vs. headcount planning
Why vulnerability-based trust separates the best teams
Why "feedback" might be the wrong word entirely
And what it looks like to plan your own succession plan.
If you're building, leading or planning for a team right now this one is a must listen!
9 Aug 2026
Leading with Purpose: Jim Nelson's Journey from Premium Consumer Goods to Digital Mental Health
Jim Nelson has spent decades leading digital teams from scaling startups through a pandemic to selling luxury brands online but nothing quite prepared him for leading at Beyond Blue.
In this episode:
Jim unpacks the mindset shift from commercial conversion metrics to upstream care,
The ethics of not collecting user data in a mental health context
Why he's rethinking "hire for skill" in favour of "hire for cause alignment
And what it's really like feeling like a commercial outsider inside a not-for-profit.
A candid conversation on leadership and purpose.
20 Jul 2026
Nowhere to Hide: Simon Lester on Small Teams, Safety and Hard Conversations
Simon Lester, Head of Product Design at Nuix, has spent his career proving that great teams don't need scale — they need proximity, trust and honesty. In this episode, Simon takes us back to the bosses who shaped him early on (the good and the genuinely bad), and unpacks what he's built since: small, high-functioning teams where mistakes are safe to make, feedback happens daily rather than in a monthly review, and nobody gets to hide behind the numbers.
We discussed:
What psychological safety actually looks like day to day
Why empathy is non-negotiable when hiring
How his own experience with workplace bullying shaped the way he leads now.
If you've ever wondered whether bigger really is better when it comes to teams, this one might change your mind.
22 Jun 2026
High Performance is About Behaviours, Not Results with Candice Pendergast
What does it actually take to build a high performing digital team?
Candice Pendergast, Head of Digital at Future Group breaks down why behaviour is the leading indicator of high performance, while results are the lag indicator.
She shares:
How she leads a remote-first team across five superannuation brands,
Why wellbeing and performance aren't in conflict
What leaders get dangerously wrong when they introduce AI as a cost lever rather than a growth lever.
She also makes the case that when performance drops, the first place to look isn't your team
If you lead a product, design or digital team and you've ever focused on hitting the number without asking how you got there, this one's for you.
1 Jun 2026
Why the difference between big D & little D design has never mattered more with Darren Smith
In this episode, I sit down with Darren Smith, Senior Director of Product Design at Multiplier for an honest and wide-ranging conversation about the state of design leadership.
We cover:
Why design leadership isn't broken but is often set up to fail, and the formula for getting it right
The difference between "big D" and "little D" design, and why AI is coming for one of them
How blurring boundaries between design, product and engineering are reshaping the role
The resilience it takes to lead design in organisations that don't fully value it and how to move upstream anyway
If you're in a design leadership role or thinking about stepping into one this conversation will resonate.
11 May 2026
Turning the Leaf: From Studio to Strategic Partner with Gemma Poesaste
What does it really take to turn the leaf and transform an in-house creative team from an execution studio into a true strategic partner?
In this episode, I sit down with Gemma Poesaste to unpack the journey of building Roam, Telstra's internal creative agency. From growing the team from 12 to 30, to navigating the very human side of change, we covered:
- Why quick wins matter more than people think
- The two-speed model of transformation
- How to build psychological safety for creatives in a corporate world
- Why getting creatives in the room early leads to better outcomes
- Tje biggest misconception non-creatives have about leading creative people.
If you lead, manage, or work alongside in-house creative teams, this one will resonate.
20 Apr 2026
The Proud Pragmatist: Why Design Quality is Negotiable with Matthias Schreck
In this episode of Behind the Teams, host Nicole How sits down with Matthias Schreck, Head of Design at WiseTech Global. With a career spanning nearly two decades, including nine formative years at Atlassian, Matty shares his philosophy as a "proud pragmatist". We dive into why the best design leaders are willing to negotiate on "gold standards" to ensure the ultimate success of the product.
Key Takeaways:
The Pragmatic Design Leader: Why sticking strictly to a process can be a trap and how to gain the confidence to "go right" when the process says "go left"
Hiring for Intellectual Horsepower: Why Matty prioritises a designer's raw ability to solve high-complexity problems over their ability to simply follow the Double Diamond
The "System" Trap: Why implementing design systems or rigid processes too early can stifle innovation and create blind spots.
AI and Future Workflows: How the rapid evolution of AI requires us to stay in an "era of experimentation" rather than rushing to build new guardrails.
30 Mar 2026
The Power of Reps with Simon Hilton: Why the Speed of Shipping is the New Metric for Career Growth
In this episode of Behind the Teams, I sit down with Simon Hilton, the Head of AI Products at MYOB, to explore the intersection of leadership, team dynamics and the rapid evolution of technology. Simon shares his career mission of building great teams that build great products, emphasising that a high-performing team is the fundamental requirement for software success.
The conversation dives deep into:
The Leadership "Middle Ground": Simon describes his style as a balance between top-down direction and total autonomy, focusing on creating space for talent while maintaining strict accountability for results.
The Kitchen Metaphor: A unique look at organisational strategy, comparing "McDonald’s style" teams that follow strict processes to "hatted restaurant" teams that innovate and solve complex problems.
AI and the "Team of One": How AI is shifting roles from technical execution to managerial oversight, allowing individuals to manage "parallel agents" to ship products faster than ever before.
The Future of Career Growth: Why "getting your reps in" through AI-enabled shipping can compress years of traditional experience into a much shorter timeframe.
9 Mar 2026
Leading Through Complexity with Sarah Stokes: Building Design Maturity and High-Impact Teams
In this episode we sit down with Sarah Stokes, a veteran of 25+ years to explore her experiences as a design leader.
Whether you’re a Senior Designer eyeing your first lead role or a Head of Design struggling to build your teams authority, this conversation is your roadmap.
We dive deep into:
The Influence Myth: Why "doing good work" isn't enough and how to make influence a "team sport."
The Research Phase: Why every new design leader should treat their first 90 days like a UX research project.
Feedback as Sport: Learning from professional athletes to separate "critique of the work" from "critique of the human."
Complex Systems: Navigating team dynamics, psychological safety, and the "player-coach" evolution.
The Transition: Real talk on the shift away from the tools and how to "act as if" before you get the title.
Why Listen? As the design landscape shifts the ability to communicate value and lead adaptive teams becomes increasingly important. Tune in for tactical advice on building design maturity and leading with authenticity.
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