New Thinking: Leaders

David Abrahamovitch is the founder & CEO of Grind – the leading sustainable coffee company founded in Shoreditch, which has expanded to ten central London locations since 2011 – and now also has a partnership with Soho House, Los Angeles.

He shares the reality of starting his own business at 25 and discusses the biggest challenges he faced setting up a brand that needed to compete with the market leaders. With a clear vision of what it should look like, David describes the business’ growth over the past ten years, highlighting the changes they have gone through, like targeted audience or positioning, as well as the exciting parts of being an entrepreneur.

As a premium brand among already popular chains, David praises Grind for “having the right ethos” of being sustainable, sourcing the grains ethically or using home compostable pods, and explains these practices are a requirement at a time of climate crisis.

Jane Velez-Mitchell is the founder and content editor of UnChainedTV – a free streaming tv network covering vegan lifestyle, animal rights, plant-based cooking, health, and climate change.

Jane talks about how veganism is rooted in her childhood and touches upon the harm caused by Western governments supporting the meat and dairy industries nowadays. By criticizing mainstream media for propagating unsustainable lifestyles and deliberately making people sick, Jane presents her station’s program, which highlights the benefits of an animal cruelty-free life. However, she mentions the challenges of being a non-commercial provider – recalling how creating their own streaming app, where they could offer the content for free, helped with dropping audiences on other streaming platforms. In response to the all-embracing brainwashing through commercials, Jane comments on how these are causing people to become addicted to meat – a major reason for the current global environmental crisis – the industrialisation of animals.

Allie Burns is CEO of Village Capital. Founded in 2009, the venture capital firm seeks to fight imbalances in funding startups. It supports entrepreneurs cutting through markets such as healthcare, education, and climate change, and has worked directly with more than 1,100 entrepreneurs in 28 countries. In this in-depth conversation, Allie shares her storied journey to becoming the company’s CEO, which started not in business but in journalism, when she was striving for a career as a sports reporter; discusses how the firm’s affiliated fund, VilCap Investments, has invested in 110 startups that have gone on to raise more than $4 billion in follow-on capital; and delves into the firm’s so-called “2030 goals”, which include the ambitious target of “activating and influencing” $50 billion of capital while “supporting 50,000 entrepreneurs who are building solutions in line with sustainable development”.

Alan Greenberg is Chairman of the Advisory Board of Unlearn/Relearn – a company that redefines the transition from education to work. They organise events to introduce employers to potential employees and educational institutions. With an innovative approach using VR technology and improving critical thinking, they aim to re-image current reality and bring governments, institutions and corporations together. In this in-depth conversation, Alan explains why the cosmopolitan environment of the Middle East is a perfect location for his business due to the existing need to stabilise the transition from education to employment, tackling challenges such as mindset or mental health; shares his view on the positives of Web 3.0 based on decentralisation, blockchain technology and digital identity, which is revolutionary for education or Health Tech systems, as well as provides privacy and security; and describes the concept of “Education Radio”, an individual channel dedicated only to education, which facilitates challenges of individual learning.

Markus Pflitsch is a co-founder and CEO of Terra Quantum AG - a Zurich-based deep tech company founded in 2019 that develops revolutionary quantum applications to shape the technology of the future. The company raised $75 million in Series A funding (including an extension), which marked one of the largest funding rounds achieved in the quantum tech space. Markus has expertise in scientific and financial sectors, making him an experienced CERN Quantum Physicist, senior financial executive, and deep tech entrepreneur. In this in-depth conversation, Markus delves into how quantum physics gave rise to quantum computing and quantum machines; shares his opinion on building a successful company, especially when it comes to the relation with investors and clients; and describes the level of competition within a growing ecosystem of startups.

Dr. Charlie Easmon is a medical director and founder of Global Health Action Strategies & Solutions. They aim to provide a 2nd opinion on global disasters, analysing and reviewing the commercial, media, political, environmental, and inter-agency challenges, allowing efficient proposal creation, saving time, money, and most importantly - lives. Charlie has also built his own private medical business, Your Excellent Health Service, which serves over 12% of the FT100 amongst their many other clients. In this in-depth conversation, Charlie delves into his career journey, from deciding he wanted to be a doctor at the age of 5 to the realities of the job; discusses the importance of paying attention to not just physical health but also mental and spiritual health and why positive projection is so vital within the role of a doctor; and shares his ambitions to set up a global health agency - with an aim to tackle poverty and poor quality of life worldwide.

Jay Goldman is the co-founder and chief executive of Sensei Labs. Founded in 2015, Sensei Labs enables organisations and their services partners to build more intelligent workplace solutions. Their Conductor platform, used by Fortune 500 companies worldwide, is the only enterprise-grade platform that provides project collaborative work, data, and knowledge management in an easy-to-use way. Co-author of The New York Times bestseller The Decoded Company, Jay regularly speaks with companies across the globe about the Future of Work and has spoken at TEDx, NASA, Harvard Business School, Google, and Twitter World Headquarters. In this in-depth conversation, Jay reflects on his career journey so far, embracing all opportunities he’s been given to reach the position he’s in now; delves into co-writing his book to both inform people on how technology can create an environment for talent, but to also attract people to work for them at Klick; and shares the story of Sensei Labs, and their mission to build smarter workplace solutions.

Tevin Tobun is the CEO of GV Group. Founded in 2001, GV Group is the UK’s leading independently owned food logistics specialist with a global footprint spanning the UK, South America, and Africa. They focus on operations within the education, social, healthcare, retail, and business and industry sectors. Tevin is also chair of the non-profit organisation Inspirational You and Life Patron of the Springboard Charity. He has set up his own scholarship scheme, the GV Scholarship, which helps young talents from disadvantaged backgrounds get into university through financial support and mentorship. In this in-depth conversation, Tevin talks us through his career journey so far and why he always had the focus of helping the next generation achieve their goals; he delves into the Tobun Foundation, a charity supporting the educational needs of young underprivileged people across the UK, and the work they do to give the next generation enough tools and support to make the best decisions; and shares his future plans to expand and globalise the business and play a role in developing countries.

Bram Van Der Hoek is the chief executive of Sircle Collection. Founded in 2011 by award-winning industry expert Liran Wizman, the company has grown to be a collection of creative hospitality brands and properties across Europe’s most inspiring neighbourhoods. With a passion for producing exciting experiences for guests, they currently have three hotel brands across 13 locations, four restaurants, one design concept store, three landmark properties and a private members' club. Bram is responsible for the collection’s overall global strategy and maintaining the group’s unique values and company culture. In this in-depth conversation, Bram reflects on starting out in his career journey and how the Sircle Collection began in Amsterdam; discusses how Covid impacted the company and the opportunities to grow that have come since; and shares their expansion plans and future goals to be more sustainable.

Rebekah Clement is sustainability director at Lloyd’s of London. Founded in 1688, Lloyd’s is the world’s leading insurance and reinsurance marketplace, which provides specialist insurance services to businesses in over 200 territories. Rebekah is responsible for leading and executing the company’s sustainability and ESG strategy. Her role also includes running Futureset, their action leadership platform, which helps stakeholders better understand, model, and protect against challenges. This in-depth conversation discusses why the response of Lloyd’s of London during a significant earthquake in New Zealand made Rebekah realise the importance of their work and what led her to join the company; delves into what exactly her job role involves and how they “encourage sustainable practices”; and shares the insurance industry's fundamental role in preventing future risks of climate change and working towards a “greener, cleaner future.”