Happiness at work is not a slogan. It is a question worth asking.
I host conversations with leaders, thinkers, and the occasional brave human who is willing to talk about what actually makes work feel human. We dig into listening, belonging, purpose, and the small decisions that shape how people treat each other at work.
No fluff. No corporate sparkle. Just honest stories, useful insights, and a steady reminder that
Want to be a guest on Inspiring Conversations? Send Hedinn (Héðinn) Sveinbjörnsson a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/hedinn_inspi
Victoria Pelletier - The Iron Maiden Who Became a Turtle
When Strength Becomes Armour
Strength gets rewarded.
We admire the people who keep going, who handle pressure, who bounce back, who seem almost unstoppable.
But what if the qualities that helped us succeed eventually become the qualities we need to question?
On October 1st, I’ll be joined on Inspiring Conversations by Victoria Pelletier (https://www.linkedin.com/in/victoriapelletier/), an award-winning executive, board director, author and speaker who has spent more than two decades leading through transformation, growth and change.
Victoria’s story includes reaching the executive ranks remarkably young, becoming a COO at 24, a president by 35 and a CEO at 41. Along the way, she built a reputation for toughness, performance and turning things around.
But our conversation will not really be about titles.
I want to explore what sits underneath them.
When does resilience become armour? When does the instinct to push through stop serving us? What happens when the version of ourselves that helped us survive is no longer the version we need to lead, connect and live?
And perhaps the hardest question of all, who are we when we no longer have to prove how strong we are?
Join Victoria and me for an Inspiring Conversation about strength, resilience, vulnerability, identity and the courage it sometimes takes to put the armour down.
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24 Sept 2026
Si Elliott - When Connection Becomes a Transaction
When Connection Becomes a Transaction
We have never had more ways to connect.
Customers can reach businesses instantly. Brands know more about their audiences than ever before. AI can personalise experiences, automation can remove friction, and almost every interaction can be measured, analysed and optimised.
And yet, genuine connection can still feel surprisingly difficult to find.
On September 24th, Si Elliott (https://www.linkedin.com/in/si-elliott/) joins me on Inspiring Conversations to explore what happens when our pursuit of efficiency begins to change the relationships we are trying to build.
Si has spent more than 20 years at the intersection of marketing, customer experience and human behaviour. He is the co-owner of creative agency Diversity, founder of customer experience consultancy Fabricx, and author of Customer Experience Thinking, where he brings behavioural science into the question of how organisations can understand and serve people better.
But I want to take the conversation beyond customer experience.
Have we become better at knowing about people without necessarily understanding them?
Where is the line between using behavioural science to serve people and using it to influence them?
What gets lost when every interaction becomes something to optimise?
And as AI becomes increasingly good at sounding human, how will we recognise the difference between an efficient interaction and a meaningful one?
Perhaps the question underneath all of this is quite simple.
When does connection stop being a relationship and become just another transaction?
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17 Sept 2026
Toni McLelland - When Compassion Has to Make the Hard Call
When Compassion Has to Make the Hard Call
Compassion sounds easy when everyone agrees.
It becomes much more interesting when the decision is difficult, the stakes are high, and someone is going to walk away disappointed.
On September 17, Toni McLelland returns to Inspiring Conversations. Toni describes herself as the “Queen of Compassion,” but her experience has been built in places where compassion has had to survive contact with reality. Criminal justice, safeguarding, organisational turnarounds, regulatory pressure, and major public incidents.
So this time, I want to explore the harder side of compassion.
Can you genuinely care about people and still make a decision they will hate?
When does kindness become avoidance? When does compassion require confrontation? And if people truly matter, does that sometimes mean giving them honesty rather than the answer they want?
Toni has spent four decades working at the intersection of people, purpose, performance and difficult decisions. I am curious about what those years have taught her about the difference between being nice and actually caring.
Because perhaps compassionate leadership is not about making every decision feel good.
Perhaps it is about how we treat people when it cannot.
#InspiringConversations #CompassionateLeadership #Leadership #PeopleMatter #WorkplaceCulture #Purpose #podmatch
Inside a recent episode
Jim Carlough - The Myth of the Born Leader, and the Six Pillars That Prove Otherwise
Published 22 Jan 2026 · Transcript excerpt
[…] And they give them more money. They give them a title. The person gets excited. They go home. They tell their spouse, hey, I'm going to be a manager. And the spouse turns to them and says, have you ever managed anybody before? Do you know how to do it? And they say, no. And in fact, the companies today aren't teaching people how to lead. They're putting them in the position. And then 18 months later, they get frustrated because they're burning out. Because what they're doing is they're trying to manage by solving everybody's problem. So if I have a problem, I go to my manager and say, hey, I can't figure this out. […]
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