Leadership rarely breaks in a single moment—it wears down through sustained pressure, blurred boundaries, and leaders carrying too much for too long.

In this episode of The Change Agent, leadership coach Erin Treacy joins the conversation to explore burnout, emotional intelligence, and what sustainable leadership actually looks like in practice. Drawing on nearly three decades across hospitality, marketing, and communications—as well as her experience as a former competitive alpine skier—Erin reframes leadership away from endurance and toward rhythm, recovery, and clarity.

This is a grounded discussion for leaders who are still performing, but at a cost—and want to lead well without losing themselves in the process.

Erin's Website

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Leadership is often judged by confidence and certainty. But in reality, the most defining moments of leadership occur when clarity disappears.

In this episode of The Change Agent, Eric Adams is joined by Thomas Jepson-Lay, executive coach and former senior humanitarian leader, to explore what leadership actually demands when control is impossible.

Drawing on nearly two decades leading emergency responses across conflict zones and disaster environments, Thomas unpacks:

• why vulnerability can stabilise teams under pressure
• how leaders unknowingly default to past behaviours in moments of fear
• what it means to move from intention-based leadership to consequence-aware leadership
• why complex and “wicked” problems cannot be solved with linear thinking
• how trust, nervous-system awareness, and perspective-sharing shape better decisions

This is not a conversation about tools or techniques.
It is a conversation about responsibility, judgement, and who leaders become when certainty is no longer available.

If you lead people, teams, or systems in high-stakes environments — this episode will challenge how you think about control, authority, and decision-making.

Learn more about Thomas Jepson-Lay and his mission:

https://www.thomasjepsonlay.com/

Check out his podcast - The Sector Debrief

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What happens when the life you worked hard to build no longer fits?

In this episode of The Change Agent, Eric sits down with Myrna King—business and life coach, former tech consultant, and founder of A Life Aligned—to explore what it really means to make YOURSELF the priority.

Myrna shares how high-performing professionals often reach the goals they fought for, only to discover burnout, misalignment, or a quiet loss of purpose. Together, they unpack why accountability feels threatening, how courage shows up in personal leadership, and why alignment isn’t about doing more—but doing what actually restores you.

This conversation bridges practical leadership execution with inner work, showing how tools like structured project thinking, Socratic questioning, and emotional release practices help leaders move from feeling stuck to living deliberately.

If you’ve ever felt successful on paper but unfulfilled in reality, this episode will help you rethink progress, redefine leadership, and take your next step with clarity.

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Leadership advice is everywhere—but leadership that actually works is rare.

In this episode of The Change Agent, Eric sits down with Dr. Valentina Schneider, a leadership advisor and organizational behavior researcher, to unpack what most leaders misunderstand about empathy, assertiveness, and effectiveness.

Drawing from years of academic research and real-world advisory work, Dr. Schneider challenges the false binary that leaders must choose between being nice or being effective. Through evidence-based insight, she explains why that belief is not only wrong—but actively damaging to teams, performance, and careers.

Together, they explore:

• Why conflict is still mostly destructive—and how leaders can make it productive
• The critical difference between cognitive empathy and emotional contagion
• How over-assertiveness quietly erodes trust, safety, and performance
• Why leadership effectiveness lives in a narrow “middle ground” most leaders miss
• How gender norms rig the leadership game—and what leaders can do about it
• Why data, when misused, reinforces bias instead of truth
• How cross-functional teams fail without emotional intelligence at the centre

This is not a conversation about soft skills.
It’s about leadership under pressure, where decisions carry consequences and behaviour sets the emotional temperature of entire organisations.

If you lead people, manage conflict, or operate in high-stakes environments where clarity is rare and responsibility is heavy—this episode will change how you think about leadership.

🎧 Listen closely. The science is clear—but the work is yours.

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Most organisations don’t fail because they lack strategy.
They fail because reality changes faster than their plans.

In this episode of The Change Agent, Eric sits down with Mike Jones, Founder and Director of LBI Consulting, to unpack what leadership and strategy actually look like when certainty disappears and complexity takes over.

Drawing on his experience as a former British Army officer and leadership instructor at Sandhurst, as well as his work advising organisations across rail, healthcare, infrastructure, and large-scale enterprises, Mike challenges one of the most deeply held assumptions in modern leadership: that more clarity is always better.

Instead, he introduces a more uncomfortable — and more effective — idea: strategic ambiguity.

This conversation explores why over-specified strategies create fragility, how leaders can set clear intent without strangling execution, and why trust, decentralised decision-making, and freedom of action are essential in complex environments.

Together, Eric and Mike discuss:

• Why strategy should be treated as a practice, not a static plan
• How mission command enables adaptability without chaos
• When clarity helps leaders — and when it quietly makes things worse
• The role of trust and mistake-making in high-performing teams
• How organisational structure drives behaviour, not slogans or culture decks
• Why psychometrics and cognitive diversity matter more than personality labels
• How leaders can re-orient in uncertainty instead of clinging to control
• What to do when leadership climate above you is misaligned or corrosive

This is not a conversation about frameworks, buzzwords, or leadership theatre.
It’s about how strategy actually gets executed by real people under pressure.

If you’re a senior leader, programme manager, executive, or anyone navigating complexity where the stakes are real and the answers are incomplete, this episode will challenge how you think about leadership, control, and responsibility.

🎙️ Listen now — and learn why the ability to hold intent firmly, plans loosely, and ego lightly may be the most important leadership capability of our time.

Learn More About:

LBI Consulting

Mike Jones on LinkedIn

Mike's podcast - "Strategy Meets Reality"

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In this episode of The Change Agent, Eric sits down once again with Dr. Kevin Mays to explore one of the most uncomfortable—and defining—realities of leadership: chaos.

When certainty collapses, plans fail, and people look to you for answers you don’t yet have, how you show up matters more than what you know. Together, Eric and Dr. Mays unpack why our obsession with clarity can actually undermine leadership, how expertise can quietly become a liability, and why the most effective leaders learn to stand calmly in uncertainty rather than rush to control it.

This conversation dives deep into:

• Why leaders must learn to be okay with not knowing
• How emotional reactivity spreads through teams—and how calm does the same
• The hidden ways identity and ego block growth and innovation
• Why leadership is less about answers and more about presence
• How great leaders create other leaders, not followers

Drawing on real-world leadership experience—from military command to executive coaching—this episode challenges the idea that leadership is about certainty, authority, or control. Instead, it reframes leadership as an internal discipline: leading yourself first, so others can follow with confidence.

If you lead people in complex, high-pressure environments—or if you aspire to—this episode offers practical insight into navigating chaos without losing yourself or your team.

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In this powerful episode of The Change Agent, Eric sits down with Olga Rudnieva, CEO of the Superhumans Center, to explore what leadership looks like when everything familiar has been taken away.

Against the backdrop of war in Ukraine, Olga shares her lived experience leading a national effort to restore dignity, purpose, and hope to those who have sacrificed the most. This is not a conversation about titles or theory — it is about responsibility, courage, and humanity under pressure.

Together, we examine how leadership emerges in crisis, how moral clarity is forged through adversity, and why rebuilding lives is as important as rebuilding nations. This episode is a reminder that real change is driven by people who act when comfort disappears.

🎧 A conversation about resilience, purpose, and leadership when it matters most.

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Leadership doesn’t fail because of a lack of strategy — it fails when leaders lose clarity, ownership, and focus.

In this episode of The Change Agent, Eric sits down with Dr. Kevin Mays, a transformative leadership coach, speaker, and author whose work centres on one core belief: true leadership begins with self-leadership.

Dr. Mays shares what he sees behind the scenes when business owners and leaders feel stuck, overwhelmed, or stretched too thin — and why the real problems are often internal before they’re organisational. Drawing from his 5-Step Business Ascent process and personal leadership journey, Dr. Mays breaks down what effective leadership actually looks like in day-to-day life, not just in theory.

This conversation challenges leaders to stop managing symptoms and start leading with intention — building clarity, accountability, and healthier team cultures from the inside out.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode

• The most common leadership problem holding organisations back today
• Why feeling “overwhelmed” is often a symptom — not the root cause
• Which step of the 5-Step Business Ascent process leaders struggle with most
• What self-leadership looks like in real, everyday decisions
• A pivotal lesson from Dr. Mays’ own leadership journey
• How leaders can regain focus when pulled in too many directions
• A common mistake leaders make when trying to grow their business or team
• What separates coachable leaders from those who stay stuck
• One small change that can have an immediate impact on your leadership
• Where leaders often go wrong when building team culture — and how to fix it

Key Takeaway

Leadership isn’t about doing more — it’s about leading better.
When leaders take responsibility for their own clarity, behaviour, and growth, teams and organisations follow.

About the Guest: Dr. Kevin Mays

Dr. Kevin Mays is a leadership coach, speaker, and author dedicated to helping leaders and organisations move beyond survival and into sustainable growth. Through his coaching and frameworks, including the 5-Step Business Ascent process, Dr. Mays helps leaders strengthen self-leadership, build clarity, and create environments where people and businesses can thrive.

About the Podcast

The Change Agent is a podcast for leaders who refuse to stay comfortable.
Each episode challenges how leadership is practiced — focusing on accountability, motivation, professional growth, and leading when it actually matters.

Links

https://www.upgradeyourleadership.com

https://www.maysleadership.com

https://www.kalyna-vision.com

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