My guest this week is Mary Portas. You may know Mary from the high street, from business, or you may know her as the red bob, hard exterior business woman from the TV. In this conversation today I saw a very different one to the one I’ve seen in the media. Mary Portas is an English retail consultant and broadcaster, known for her retail and business-related television shows, founding her creative agency Portas and her appointment by David Cameron, the British Prime Minister, to lead a review into the future of Britain's high streets. She’s worked in various retail roles: John Lewis and Harrods, Topshop. Then creative director at Harvey Nichols – which was her rise to fame. In 1997 launched an agency called Yellow Door producing campaigns for clients including Clarks, Louis Vuitton, Oasis Stores, Swarovski, Dunhill, Boden, Thomas Pink, Patek Philippe and Mercedes-Benz, Sainsbury's, Habitat, Westfield, Liberty and The Body Shop. In 2013 she re-launched her agency as Portas Agency Ltd. Today, Portas Agency advises retail clients from every continent, and the businesses success is built on an obsessive understanding of human and cultural behaviour. Today she’ll talk about an idea thats fairly radical to some people, especially people that are building or have built big businesses which is based on her new book ‘Rebuild: How to thrive in the new Kindness Economy’. This conversation is incredible, Mary is hilarious, she is smart and she is kind. On top of all that her brutal honesty blew me away which is a central part of what we spoke about, the idea of being true to yourself or facing the inevitable of ending up in disappear. Mary’s been a public figure, a media star, she’s faced public scrutiny but through it all she’s emerged as this levelled headed, down to earth, warm hearted individual. I laughed, I realised and I was deeply inspired and you will be too. Follow Mary: Twitter - https://twitter.com/maryportas Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/maryportasofficial Mary’s book - Rebuild: How to thrive in the new Kindness Economy - https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08V85WGNK  Follow me: https://beacons.ai/diaryofaceo Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

My guest this week is Matthew Syed, he has written some of the most important books in the self development, self improvement, team, company building space. His ideas are original, challenging and important. He is a British journalist, author, broadcaster and former table tennis player. He competed as an English table tennis international, and was the English number one for many years. He was three times the men's singles champion at the Commonwealth Table Tennis Championships (in 1997, 2000 and 2001), and also competed for Great Britain in two Olympic Games, at Barcelona in 1992 and at Sydney in 2000. After leaving the world of table tennis he embarked on a journalism career working for The Times. Throughout his career he has published four books that are highly regarded taking all of the learnings across his life as an elite level sports man and journalist. To say this conversation is diverse would be an understatement, we covered everything from creating innovation, build confidence and how to reach your full potential. This man is fascinating, engaging and thought provoking, trust me when I say you need to hear this. Follow Matthew: Twitter - https://twitter.com/matthewsyed Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/matthewsyedauthor Website - https://www.matthewsyed.co.uk Follow me: https://beacons.ai/diaryofaceo Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices