GCS Connect: Leaders

Sarah Longdon, Head of Service Planning at Public Health Dorset, takes us through change during the COVID crisis, managing different factions in the UK Public Sector, and remaining calm and communicating well during adversity. She also explains the difference between Public Health and NHS and shares her career journey from the Finance to Heathcare industry.

Sarah is a Change and Transformation leader in local government and previously in financial services. She works with leaders to define and deliver strategic objectives and manage change programmes, bridging strategy, technology and operations. Sarah communicates using a personable style with calm and reflective listening skills to create successful relationships. She also builds successful teams by being open and collaborative, inspiring and motivating through quiet authority.  In her 12+ years in local government in Dorset, she has: delivered organisational change, strategic planning and a response structure for covid-19 in Public Health Dorset; overseen the implementation programme to create the new Dorset Council; developed the strategic programme to transform local government in Dorset for the Chief Executives and Leaders; and developed the business case for change, planned the political, legal, organisational and communication elements of a significant and unique transformation of local government structure in Dorset - just to name a few accomplishments. 

Working in financial services, she managed multiple programmes of change activities including replacement IT platforms, organisational restructures, switching banking provider and platforms.  She lives on the coast in Dorset, and enjoy this beautiful location by trail running, cycling and sea swimming, and put that all together with the occasional triathlon. She also volunteers as chair of the Academy Advisory Committee at their local secondary school.

We are joined by Jennifer Cox this week, Security Engineering Manager at Tenable, a global leader in Vulnerability Management. Jennifer shares with us why cybersecurity is so exciting and how important it is to make 'best practices' a priority in this industry. She also explains how she grew into her leadership role, how we can use diversity to promote customer service, and the importance of mentorship.

Jennifer Cox is a Security Engineering Manager at Tenable, a global leader in Vulnerability Management.

After studying Theatre Studies and Media Production, she began working in an admin role at a tech company based in Ireland. Here, she started to learn the various tools of the trade and skillsets that enabled her to progress to a tech support role handling retail, payroll, and accounting software. After working there for 11 years, Jennifer sought a new challenge and joined Tenable in 2016 where she has achieved several promotions and awards, including PCR Top 25 Women in Tech in 2019 and 2020 & Outstanding Contribution to Women in Tech Ireland in 2021.

Ihab Mahna, CEO of Zeetta Networks, is disrupting the idea of how the telecoms industry is seen and how we all think about connectivity. Ihab shares his ideas on providing great customer service, how networks link into the cloud, and how we can change our mentality to deliver innovation.

Ihab is an accomplished telecom and IT executive with over 20 years of global experience turning ideas into winning strategies, solutions and successful product launches. He has a track record in the leadership of several startups and taking their innovations to market, resulting in successful exits. His experience covers product development, product management, solutions sales and business development, within large companies as well as early and late stage startups. He offers his technical and business expertise to help organizations with this challenge and grow their business, both local market and internationally.

How does Space connect with our daily lives? David catches up with Andrew Strain, CTO of AAC Clyde Space, who shares with us how a space and satellite business is building software to collect and use data in ways to positively impact the way we live. They also discuss how the business and leadership has evolved, the layers of planning that go into executing a satellite mission, and they use innovation to drive the industry forward while keeping sustainability a priority.

In his role as CTO, Andrew contributes a wide range of skills, such as systems engineering knowledge, product development, manufacturing, project management, quality and business development. While at Clyde Space, including as Chief Engineer, Andrew has built more than 15 years of experience in developing and delivering small satellites. Andrew has a MEng, Electrical and Electronic Engineering with Business Studies, University of Strathclyde.

Be inspired by our guest, Hira Ali, CEO of Advancing Your Potential. We speak about her experience being an entrepreneur in various countries, how to become an ally of DEI, building a diverse culture by being proactive and aware, and creating the best workforce for all - not some.

An inspiring leadership trainer and career coach and an acclaimed writer and speaker, Hira Ali has been committed to helping others achieve their inherent potential throughout her award-winning career. Hira is also a successful entrepreneur who has launched several businesses to support her mission. Her work has been featured in Forbes, Telegraph, BBC, Harpers Bazaar, Independent, CBC, Huff Post, and Entrepreneur, among hundreds of other print, radio and television outlets, and has earned Hira several prestigious honours and awards. She was recently appointed as The Senior Advisory Team member at The Benedictine University Illinois L.E.A.D.S leadership program for undergraduate women and has joined WLG’S Conversations with Men Advisory Council.   

Hira was also included in a list by DiverseIn of global D&I voices to follow on LinkedIn. In addition, she has been featured as a role model in the book Girls Who Do You Want To Be alongside phenomenal world changers. She is passionate about empowering women and ethnic minorities, closing the gender gap and advocating diversity and inclusion in the workplace.  

In 2019, Hira released her first book entitled Her Way To The Top: A Guide to Smashing the Glass Ceiling which received outstanding testimonials worldwide. Hira's second companion book—Her Allies: A Practical Toolkit to Help Men Lead Through Advocacy—invites men to join the gender equality movement and has received extensive media coverage and acclaim. For more on Hira, please visit www.advancingyourpotential.com. You can follow her on Twitter, LinkedIn, Insta or Facebook.

This week, we catch up with Product Engineering Manager at Sage, Elizabeth Pienaar, to discuss the importance of putting the customer first - especially in tough economic moments - and ways to improve the decision-making process as leaders. David and Elizabeth speak about bridging the divide between support and development, the value of diverse teams for customers, partners and employees, and the importance of working in a collaborative and agile environment.

Elizabeth is a Product Engineering Manager, a Scrum professional, and a committed advocate for racial, cultural, and gender diversity in technology. She has over 16 years of technical and leadership experience in 10 companies, from start-ups to multinationals. 

Since joining Sage in 2016 to manage Sage CRM, she has been the Diversity & Inclusion Champion for Sage Ireland, launched UKI Gender Alliance @ Sage, and founded Women@Sage Ireland, leading initiatives to achieve flexible working for colleagues, establish a mentoring programme, and promote gender-neutral recruitment. 

Having started her career as a musician, Elizabeth has a Master of Music degree from the University of Cape Town, and a BSc in Computer Science and Psychology.

Our guest this week is Mradul Khandelwal, Global VP of Business Development at LogiNext. Listen to his thoughts on rapidly increasing expectations as a company grows, dealing with different cultures within a multi-national sales team, and being a part of a highly mission-driven company.

Mradul Khandelwal has been the core drive behind fast-scaling and high client retention at LogiNext. With multiple sales and tech aces up his sleeve, Mradul has become the prime spokesperson for highly engaging business sales and relationships. He has been at the helm of sales for more than 10 years. The central pillar for LogiNext, Mradul has supervised its rise to 150 enterprise clients across 25 countries.

He is an avid and passionate speaker on the rapid advancements in technology as the key enabler for logistics, through live delivery route planning, auto-package allocation, live driver tracking, and even voice-controlled logistics. Channeling his learning from leading the business development for one of the fastest-growing companies in the world, he regularly engages young entrepreneurs and his followers with best practices and deep B2B sales insights.

Stefano Cantarelli, Chief Marketing Officer & Executive Vice President at Mavenir, joins us today to speak about the importance of a rebrand for the culture and vision of a company, moving a company from bespoke solutions to a product portfolio, and the importance of competition for innovation. He gives us additional insight into Open RAN and his experience in being part of a company that is making real changes to an industry.

Stefano has spent almost three decades in the Telco industry and brings leadership in technology vision, innovative IP solutions in the mobile and convergent communication and also operational excellence in major technology transformation cycles and introduction in the overall Telecommunication market worldwide. Stefano is responsible for helping Mavenir expand its market share as a partner of choice for its global customer base, and ensures that Mavenir continues to drive innovation that provides value to customers and agility to their technology. Recently, Stefano was driving the Network and IT strategy for O2 UK and defining the Virtualisation Strategy in the Telco Cloud project. Previously, Stefano was CTO and R&D Vice President of Acision and at Huawei in UK as Vice President of Carrier Networks for UK and Ireland, and at Vodafone, he was responsible for the network engineering & operations, transforming the infrastructure and launching 3G and internet services together.

We welcome Maryse Gordon to the series this week, who recently placed 1st on the EMpower Ethnic Minority Role Model List as 2021 Future Leader. As Partnerships and Business Development Manager at RepRisk, she shares with us how she uses international opportunities as a way to become a better leader, the cultural differences for ESG and D&I between Europe and the US, and using data to drive organisational change. Learn a few ways to work with your organisation to improve D&I and how to develop an ESG strategy for your business.

Maryse has worked with financial services between London and New York for over 15 years and gained a wealth of knowledge and experience ranging from product development and support, to product management and business development. Staring her career at Hewlett Packard, progressing onto Logica and then London Stock Exchange Group, Maryse spent 10 years working across global regulatory compliance, risk management, data solution, fixed income analytics, ESG and sustainable investment analytics offerings at LSEG.

Maryse now represents RepRisk as a Partnership and Business Development Manager actively contributing to the growth of the RepRisk business via strategic partnership engagement.

Maryse has played an active role in several diversity and inclusion initiatives throughout her career, holding leadership positions for the LSEG Women’s and Black Employee Networks for many years. Maryse recently placed 1st on the EMpower Ethnic Minority Role Model List as 2021 Future Leader, and previously won the 2017 Markets Media Women In Technology Rising Star in Regulation and 2018 LSEG CEO Award for Integrity as part of Women’s Network in the Americas.

We discuss characteristics of great leaders with Paul Ruppert, Growth Strategy and Business Consultant at Global Point View, with reference to 'Mission, Mates, Self' and using military experience to become a better business leader. He talks about the sheer scale of innovation and change in telecoms, the building blocks of a great business from start-up to megacorp, and retaining passion over a long career. All in all, keep the answer simple and focus on the outcome in business.

Paul Ruppert has over two decade’s experience in commercializing telecommunications technology, specifically focusing on the global use of text messages by enterprises connecting with their end customers. He’s an “ambidextrous executive” having deep experience in start-ups as well as global Fortune 100 Enterprises, including “going global from the start” with a startup, and selling it five years later for $500M.  As a strategic consultant to enterprises developing conversation commerce, his clients include Facebook, MasterCard, Western Union, Liveperson, as well as PE and VC firms. His functional skills span business development, award winning product development, global commercialization as well as framing M&A thesis on deals ranging from $5m to $60B. In addition, he’s co-authored two SMS related patents, as well as having been a professional ski instructor for 25 years.