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Lucy Adams

Lucy Adams was the HR Director on the Executive Board of the BBC during one of its most turbulent periods. In just five years the BBC had four CEOs, opened the new BBC in the North of England and the largest multi-media newsroom in Europe, became ever more digital across its news and television output, delivered significant financial reductions and managed numerous crises. Lucy was at the heart of all of these and led on many more.

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About Lucy Adams

Lucy Adams was the HR Director on the Executive Board of the BBC during one of its most turbulent periods. In just five years the BBC had four CEOs, opened the new BBC in the North of England and the largest multi-media newsroom in Europe, became ever more digital across its news and television output, delivered significant financial reductions and managed numerous crises. Lucy was at the heart of all of these and led on many more.

Biography

Lucy Adams always aims to provide her audiences with very practical take-aways and whilst she does include insights from the latest research, her speeches are essentially very earthy and pragmatic, based on years of actually delivering at the top of very large organisations. Her speeches are incredibly honest and filled with real life examples and anecdotes from the BBC and elsewhere.

Lucy Adams’s time as HR Director at the BBC saw it make the headlines on many occasions in 2013.  Most notably the Jimmy Savile scandal and the resignation of its leader after just 54 days. In the autumn of that year Lucy found herself on the TV news and in every major newspaper in the UK as she experienced her own personal crisis around the pay-offs to senior BBC Executives.

Prior to the BBC, Lucy Adam was Group HR Director at Serco plc, a multi-national plc delivering large scale government contracts across the world. She has led and delivered change in complex organisations for over 15 years.

Speech Topics

Resilient Leadership

Businesses invest significant amounts of time and money developing business continuity plans for when disaster strikes. What these plans often overlook is the impact on them as individuals and their teams – their behaviours and their reactions. This speech uses personal experience, anecdotes and examples from business leaders in the public eye and the latest research into resilience. It helps leaders understand the attributes which can make them personally and collectively more resilient. It takes the audience through an original model for handling setbacks or crises which will enable them to manage them more effectively and become better leaders as a result.

Key elements:

The test of modern leadership – reacting and remaining resilient in the face of adversity
Threat responses and the impact on the team
How resilient are you? How resilient is the team?
In the grip – warning signs
Getting stronger after a setback – The 3 Rs model of Recognition, Recovery and Renewal

This speech is aimed at leaders who have to deliver difficult changes within their organisation or who have experienced a major setback or crisis as a team

Delivering Real Change in Complex Organisations

The failure of most change programmes is well documented. This speech draws on practical experience of designing, leading and delivering change in large, international, complex organisations over 15 years. It looks at what has worked and, perhaps more importantly, highlights the lessons from what hasn’t. It provides practical solutions for leaders who are having to lead changes to business models, operations, organisation structures, behaviours and culture. It provides insights into some of the more nuanced aspects of change such as delivering change amongst highly intelligent people, in a hostile industrial relations climate, in a consensus culture or amongst long serving employees. It uses anecdotes and examples from the BBC and other businesses and sectors combined with the latest research.

Key elements:

Why change should never work
Understanding why change fails – what we can learn
How to counteract our animal brains
The role of the leader and leadership communications

Options:

Delivering change with intelligent people
Change in a hostile landscape
Managing intense media scrutiny
Delivering change in a consensus culture
Delivering in a paternal culture
Delivering in a creative culture

This speech is aimed at leaders in organisations needing to deliver difficult or unwanted change

Developing your own brand – career advice for senior women

Many women fail to recognise that some of the perceived barriers to their success are of their own making. Whilst organisational barriers do still exist, there are many aspects of a woman’s career development that she can handle and improve herself. This speech is based upon years of working with senior females, mentoring younger women and interviewing people for senior roles. It also looks at the latest research into areas such as body language, negotiation skills for women and unconscious bias. It provides practical help for women of all ages who want to increase their chances of promotion or who want to improve their reputation and standing in their current role.

Key elements:

Understanding how career decisions are made
Why manage your own brand
Media handing
Developing your own strapline
Who’s in your team?
Staying strong. Staying female.
Increasing your charisma, impact and gravitas

This speech works well for female networks or high potential programmes for women

Booking Information

Testimonials

"You were the top scoring speaker!"

Richmond Events

"You were great! Exactly what we needed. The feedback about you was glowing."

IBM

"THANK YOU for a great session yesterday - you absolutely nailed it."

Standard Life

"You were fantastic! The levels of enthusiasm, engagement and participation from the audience were unprecedented with this group. I found you insightful, educational, inspirational ...."

Deloitte

"You managed to do that difficult thing of getting people to think more broadly about their profession, sharing fresh thinking from other companies and weaving this into a stimulating and entertaining narrative – great result!"

Accenture

"You were an absolute star turn."

Future Talent Conference

Lucy Adams Videos

Lucy Adams News

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