Magnify Your Impact
Strength in community and fighting inequality A Ghanaian who has spent his life in the thick of it with no rose-tinted glasses. Francis’s strength is having African blood, surrounded by a culture of community coupled with adversity and inequality. Whilst working in West Africa myself, to bring the opportunity of education to communities. Such a big part of my learning was in fact to give what is necessary and asked for, rather than what I thought was needed and this was a steeper learning curve than I could have anticipated. Francis echoes what took me some time to learn due...
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Grit, determination and courage personified After reading Economics and Politics at Exeter University, Sanger trained as a chartered accountant at Ernst & Young before moving to an advertising agency. Frustration with the decision-making process led Sanger to open his own business, a chain of sandwich bars in West London. David is an award-winning entrepreneur with experience in corporate acquisitions, shareholder exit and corporate sales, he has the ability to grow turnover & profitability. Key Takeaways Some of the things we do in our beginnings, specifically towards our work and...
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So skilful, humble and leading with strength from the very front Caron Bradshaw is Chief Executive of Charity Finance Group. She joined CFG in June 2010 from the ICAEW, where she was Head of the Charity and Voluntary Sector. In addition to supporting a number of small charities and community organisations Caron has been a member of the NCVO’s National Assembly and the Charities SORP Committee, has sat on a number of government working parties, is a member of the Church of England Pension Board’s Audit and Risk Committee, and is Chair of the Board of the Directory of Social Change...
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A true empathetic leader of both head and heart Carole has a broad knowledge of growing business through face to face development and sales knowledge. She's a risk-taker and entrepreneur, who loves coming up with new ideas, implementing them and then watching them develop (through hard work!) Carole specialises in Idea implementation - growing the business from an idea to a full-blown concern. Understanding people, what their needs are and then finding something they want! Key Takeaways A philanthropic mindset is something that I see a lot of and is, of course, a great support for the change...
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A courageous leader who combines a never say die attitude with heaps of compassion Started the Infusion100 movement 5 years ago as part of a fusion project to give back to communities around the world. Since its inception, Infusion100 has built 5 schools and 1 house. The 5 schools are in: Malawi (2), Senegal, Haiti, Nicaragua and the house build is in Mexico. Over the 5 years over 8000 children have been educated as a result. To raise the funds every year 100km is walked in different countries and so far 1300km has been walked in UK, Canada, China, USA, Hong Kong and...
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How to really deliver on your vision Nathan is Founder and CEO of Ultimate Performance, previous founder and CEO of Inspire, Nathan is president of Malta’s largest non-profit organisation the Inspire Foundation, as well as the chair of the Voluntary Organisations Council, and a trustee of Children in Need and supports a wide range of other philanthropic initiatives through his endurance challenges. Nathan co-owns Hellfire Events, the country’s toughest endurance race series, He is a lecturer at the University of Malta, the Malta Institute of Management and guest speaker at many educational...
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Diving into the deeper structure of our successes Udayan has been a keen proponent of the fast-changing landscape of Financial Services in the transition from an industrial era to the information age and now to the networked economy. He fell into the intersection of Financial Services and technology well before the term FinTech was coined and traversed the Growth Markets when they were called frontier markets. His global experience began as the son of a diplomat living across multiple continents with his working life commencing in traditional investment banking and transitioning through...
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A truly international authority on our personal power and brand Lesley Everett is an internationally recognized professional keynote speaker and specialist on Personal Branding and The Personality of the Brand, known for her content-rich, engaging and practical advice and delivery. Lesley is the founder and CEO of Walking TALL Training & Consulting, Inc, with offices in the US and UK. She has created a methodology for Personal Branding that has inspired audiences for the past 16 years. Lesley was awarded the Professional Speaking Award of Excellence in the UK in 2010 (the first female...
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Determination and clarity personified, a leader living with the highest of standards Yolan Friedmann is currently the CEO of the Endangered Wildlife Trust, she has an academic background in Veterinary Nursing, a BA in English and Communications, an MSc in Environmental Studies (WITS) and an MDP from the Gordon Institute for Business Science (University of Pretoria). She was the first female recipient of the SAB Nick Steele Environmentalist of the Year award, which she won in 2011. She was also the winner of the CEO Most Influential Woman in Business and Environment award in 2012 in the...
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A millennial leader with a true global vision At 9 years old, Felix Finkbeiner, inspired by the story of Kenyan politician and environmental activist Wangari Maathai, developed the idea that children could promote climate justice by planting a million trees in every country. With the support of children from over 100 countries, Felix launched the youth initiative Plant-for-the-Planet in 2007. So far, more than 85,000 youth in 76 countries have been trained in Plant-for-the-Planet Academies. As Climate Justice Ambassadors, the children give speeches to adults, motivate everyone to plant trees...
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Elsbeth Dixon joined Common Purpose South Africa in 2006. The organization is focused on leadership development. They work globally to develop nimble leaders without borders that can implement problem-solving to make their cities a better place. As an applied mathematician, she’s used her natural precision and decisiveness skills to make an impact - by vision and actualizing. Dixon mentions that she is conscientious of where she pours her energy; she wants all of her efforts to bear fruit. She views the path to making a difference as sequential and logical, which landed her in leadership development.
My Key Takeaways
“The world is our classroom.” These are the words that Elsbeth used. Of course, when we hear them, they sound obvious but before we hear them, we may not consciously realise the power of that statement. Take this time to think about how big that classroom really is and the potential it holds, if we’re prepared to be the most observant student, taking advantage of this hugely valuable education at our fingertips.
Elsbeth also talked about collaboration being an absolute must. The attitude of the world being our classroom lends itself so well to this. It’s through collaboration, connection and conversation with others that we so often find the how for our cause and gain the much-needed support and knowledge for the success of the impact we want to create.
We consciously go to such lengths to create the right meetings, with the right people and this is of course extremely valuable. Elsbeth mentions some of her most salient moments have come at the most unexpected times - a less professional time, in the middle of the night, in her pyjamas. We need to have more trust in what we don’t yet know and what I mean by that, is by opening ourselves up to the less obvious, this is where we so often become much more open to diversity in our thinking and our light bulb moments are created.
This openness allows us to hear in such a powerful way and that hearing will only broaden our minds and horizons. The level of self-reflection this has the potential to lead to is the potential of the impact we’re setting out to create. One great mind is all that is needed to start a hugely impactful machine.
This interview took me to so many places, through the powerful words that mean so much to Elsbeth; conviction, collaboration, contradiction, transparency, courage and trust. Valuable food for thought!
Let’s Stay Connected
Speak with Craig about Magnifying Your Impact
https://www.craiggoldblatt.com/work-with-me/
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Connect with Elsbeth
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elsbeth-dixon-55a1b010/
Website: https://commonpurpose.org/