From Abbey Road to the Iron Road

I haven’t done a newsletter for a while, and since it’s been quite a week, I thought I'd share three things I've learned.

A change of environment helps creativity

I began my week in the world-famous Abbey Road , recording some episodes of the Human Risk podcast. All of my guests were people I’d recorded with before. But something about the studio environment brings out a special dynamic that makes it very different from recording virtually.

You’ll be able to hear the episodes very soon. And you’ll get to see what happened when Rory Sutherland , ?? Paul Craven , Gerald Ashley , and I tried to replicate the famous Beatles album cover. Here's us outside the famous doors:

Of course, I can’t always record in the studio. Many of my guests aren’t based in London, and sometimes I come across ideas for the show that can’t wait for a studio slot.

2. Your voice is louder than you might think

One of those ideas came from Kristina Stiles RN MSc ???? ???? . She’s a nurse who is an Ambassador for the Children's Burns Trust . They’re a charity that helps children who face life-changing injuries as a result of burns. A major cause of serious burn injuries is hot drinks. So, when Kristina saw a billboard advertisement for Costa Coffee that inadvertently promoted a potentially dangerous way to drink coffee, she wrote about it on social media.

I saw her post and invited her onto the show to talk about the ad and how we can all inadvertently take lots of risks on a daily basis without even realising it. It’s a fabulous episode with lots of human risk insights which came out last week.

But it's what happened this week, that's even better! Following the show, Costa Coffee got in touch with the burns charity and is now adjusting its marketing approach!

Neither Krissie nor I thought the episode would result in any change. But obviously — and huge credit to Costa here?? — it did. Sometimes we have a louder voice than we think!

3. Trust your employees

Finally, a lesson in trust. In an age when lots of companies try to restrict their employees’ social media activities — after all, who knows what they might say — here’s an example of one thinking really intelligently.

This morning, while checking in to my Brussels-bound Eurostar train, I spotted Justin Perkins , one of their train managers. We’d never met before. At least not in person. But we knew each other from social media.

I discovered Justin on Twitter last year when I was looking for people with useful insights that might help my regular rail journey between London and Munich. His tweets are a mix of fascinating behind-the-scenes insights and super-reliable restaurant recommendations, all delivered with a sense of humour. He’s a terrific Ambassador for Eurostar, as his enthusiasm for train travel is infectious.

I’m delighted to report that Justin is just as fabulous offline as online. While talking, it occurred to me that lots of companies will employ people like him. Not exactly like him, obviously! But people who love their jobs.

Yet we tend not to hear directly from them. So ?? Eurostar, for letting your employees be human. There are very few companies that seem willing to do that.

I really don’t know why. After all, Justin’s job involves ensuring passenger safety. If we trust people with responsibilities like that, then why wouldn’t we also trust them to be sensible on social media?

Until next time...

So that's it for this week. Next week, I'm based in Munich, though I'll be spending most of it travelling to client locations across Germany giving presentations. By train, obviously!

Want me to come to your company to talk all things Human Risk? In person or virtually? Get in touch here or visit www.human-risk.com.