Zero to N dives into the real journeys behind building and scaling companies across the Middle East and Africa.
Hosted by Rachid Labrik, it explores the trade-offs, failures, and transformations that shape the region’s most driven founders and operators.
No hype. No filters. Just the real code of transformation from zero to N.
Loubna Imenchal: Global Leadership, Women in Tech & Turning “No” Into Opportunity
Loubna Imenchal built a global leadership career by learning to treat “no” as a challenge, not a verdict.
She joins Rachid Labrik on Zero To N to unpack career reinvention, multicultural leadership, women in tech, intuition vs data, AI and critical thinking, while revealing the personal cost of always living in the future.
Now, her focus is increasingly turning towards impact: from Connect to Elevate to serving as a judge at Final Pitch Dubai and encouraging women entrepreneurs, Loubna is using the lessons and network she has built to help more women create opportunities of their own.
21 Sept 2026
“I Never Asked for a Promotion or Pay Rise” — Badr Zemmama on Playing the Long Game
“I never asked for a promotion. I never asked for a salary increase.”
For more than 25 years, Badr Zemmama has built his career from junior positions to executive leadership, without following one of the most repeated pieces of career advice: if you don't ask, you don't get.
He doesn't believe it.
His philosophy is different:
Prove the value first.
In this episode of Zero to N, Badr and Rachid Labrik explore what it really takes to build a career that lasts and why patience, curiosity, trust and execution may matter far more than constantly chasing the next title.
Badr shares the early failure that almost changed the direction of his life, the words from his father that restored his belief in himself, and why he later chose a corporate salary worth a fraction of what he had been earning because he believed the long-term opportunity was more valuable than the short-term money.
They challenge the obsession with fast success, discuss what social media may be teaching the next generation about ambition, and ask a harder question:
Have we become so focused on getting ahead that we've forgotten to become good enough to stay there?
Badr also breaks down his approach to leadership, hiring, underperformance and negotiation, including why he hires for curiosity, why leaders should build teams that no longer need them, and why trust starts by giving before you ask for something back.
His rule for business is simple:
Win the heart.
Then the mind.
Then the wallet.
And his code of transformation?
The right people. The right preparation. Relentless execution.
Because the idea is only the beginning.
The real work is going from Zero to N.
7 Sept 2026
From $300 to WILD Group: Emma Burdett on Reinvention, Personal Brand & Starting Again
Emma Burdett built WILD from a $300 event into one of the region’s best-known communities for women in leadership before realising that the business, and she herself, needed to evolve.
Emma joins Rachid Labrik to talk about being fired three times, building from zero in Dubai, the mistakes she made while scaling, using LinkedIn to create opportunity, trusting intuition in commercial decisions and why sometimes success requires the courage to reinvent what already works.
A conversation about entrepreneurship, identity, visibility, freedom and knowing when it is time to build the next version.
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