Di Macdonald is a native Australian, adopted Brit and all round formidable leader. She has has worked across many industries, but notably at companies like Apple and EE, so this conversation is an unfiltered take on how to survive in corporate if you’re not willing to tow the line.

One for the intrapreneurs or 'pirates inside', she gives rare insights into the conversations that happen behind closed doors; in board rooms, at company off sites and leadership meetings.

Telling it like it is, there's plenty of advice here for how far to push the limits of your role, and how to go about rule breaking in a strategic way.

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Today’s episode is definitely one for the pirate fans, as we are interviewing the author of not one but two books on pirates.

And whilst we get into the symbolism of Peter Pan, Captain Hook, Luke Skywalker, heroes and anti-heroes alike, this episode's guest, Kester Brewin, is much more than just a writer. As an activist Kester has campaigned and stood up to corporations and won, but not for the reasons you might expect.

He shares with us what he learned from his lived experiences of standing up to power, what it means to be counter-cultural today, and why the idea of pirates still inspires him.

You can find find more about his work here:  kesterbrewin.com 

And peruse his books:

Mutiny

God-like: a 500-year history of Artificial Intelligence

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Welcome to Conversations with our Crew a sub series of the pod where we introduce you to members of our Be More Pirate community that are pushing boundaries, writing their own script and starting pirate inspired business. Our hope is that you'll meet some rebels you wouldn't otherwise hear about.

Today’s guest is Simon Dyer, the founder of Pizza Pirates and Dough Bros - a social enterprise based in Devon that combines peer to peer mental health support with pizza making.

But before that Simon has had a long history of working with vulnerable people and challenging the system on their behalf. In this episode you’ll hear about the many times he has quit his job in protest, his thoughts on where health and social care is going badly wrong, and how he has managed to make pizza pirates a success.

So, if you’ve been thinking of setting something up on your own, or you’ve started and hit some road blocks, then we hope Simon’s story gives you the motivation to keep at it.   

Find out more about Pizza Pirates here: https://www.pizza-pirates.co.uk/

And Dough Bros: https://www.resilientlives.org.uk/dough-bro-s

Connect with Simon here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/simon-dyer-a353221a/

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Sir Tim Smit, is probably best known as one of the co-founders of the Eden Project; A visionary conservation project set in a claypit in the middle of Cornwall

It’s fair to say that Eden was built against the odds, and Tim played a huge part in that. He’s someone who will pursue a grand idea, despite considerable risks, and isn’t afraid to be disliked in the process.

Before Eden he had a whole other career in the music industry before entering the world of conservation, co-founding the Lost Gardens of Heligan, and with Eden, pioneering the legendary community get together The Big Lunch.

Tim is a master of building crews, and not giving up when the going gets tough. With a tendency to not do as he’s told, this conversation took many twists and turns. We hope you enjoy it.

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Author, journalist and writer Ruby Warrington has a knack for getting ahead of the zeitgeist. In 2016 she coined the term sober-curious as a way of investigating her own relationship with alcohol. It clearly hit a collective nerve and inadvertently, she started a movement, resulting in a book, a popular podcast and no doubt millions of lives lived differently. 

Her latest published book is Women without kids, an in depth look at women choosing to live childfree and all the personal, political and systemic reasons it’s happening. In our conversation we cover alcohol, the taboos around parenting differently, and touch on her latest preoccupation - content addiction. 

We love Ruby because she models, explores, and informs; her brand of rebellion gently nudges you in a new direction without judgement. 

We hope you enjoy the episode. 

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We're excited to announce that the podcast is back!

After a hiatus we're back to explore what rules need breaking in 2025.

We're in tough times, which means more reason than ever to celebrate those who are pushing back in whatever way they can.

This season we'll have double the amount of episodes as were interviewing some seasoned rebels who've managed to grab public attention, alongside some inspiring people from across our Be More Pirate community who we think you should meet.

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In this particularly special episode we're talking to Reclaim These Streets co-founder Jamie Klinger, a week after she was in the high court taking on the Met Police.

In 2021 Philadelphia native Jamie and a group of women founded Reclaim These Streets in response to the death of Sarah Everard, a 33 year old marketing executive who was raped and murdered by metropolitan police offer Wayne Couzens. The group organised a vigil for Sarah on Clapham Common in London which was then violently broken up by the police and several people were arrested.

The police cited breaches in coronavirus restrictions, but the group took the Met police to court o challenge them on the illegality of the vigil. We're honoured to have Jamie on the pod to explain the events in more detail, and talk more broadly about what fuelled her to take this on.

We think you'll agree that she is an absolute force, a pirate you'd be very happy to have on your side.

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Towards the end of Be More Pirate there's a chapter in which Sam writes his own pirate code: article no.3 is 'Make the Citizen Shift' which is a challenge to us all to see ourselves as citizens rather than consumers. The inspiration for that article came from the New Citizenship Project which was co-founded by our guest this week, Jon Alexander. 

Jon spent the majority of his early career working in advertising - the pinnacle and pioneer of consumer culture but eventually turned his back on it when he realised very starkly the damage it was doing. The New Citizenship project was his rebellion - a challenge to the societal story that the only power we have is as consumers, and a challenge to organisations that the only thing they can do is sell. He's now captured all of this accumulated wisdom and learning with the NCP in his first book, aptly named, Citizens, which is out on March 17th. For anyone in our community who has connected with the idea of re-humanising transactional mechanistic work cultures - Jon's work will give you so much inspiration and ammunition.

Citizens is available to pre-order via Canterbury Press: https://www.canburypress.com/products/citizens-by-jon-alexander

New Citizenship Project: https://www.newcitizenship.org.uk/

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Be More Pirate is all about applied wisdom, so in this short new year special we have sourced some reflections from the network in the form of three questions:

• What was your most pirate moment this year?
• What rebellion would you most like to see in 2022?
• What advice would you give to a new pirate?

Many thanks to the wonderful folk who sent in their thoughts: Deana Wildgoose, James Berg, Lefteris Heratakis, Kristin Joy-Davis, Mark Walmsley, Miguel Fernandez, Paul Ginsberg and Graeme Cooke

What matters is what we are able to act upon and every small stepping stone towards change is significant in its own way. Don't stop just because you don't think it's big enough, exciting enough or even 'pirate' enough. The journey is not linear, and everybody has a different starting point.

Happy New Year.

*Unbelievably, this is the first episode with no swearing*

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Today's interview might be the most pirate one yet... but I'll leave you to be the judge of that.

Steve Chapman is an artist, coach, writer, speaker and (sort of) podcaster. The more accurate way to describe Steve's work is that he does 'projects that are experiments in the opposite of what is normal'. His time is spent fully inhabiting the edges, and he works with a range of organisations and individuals to help them do the same. The results are very interesting: we cover 'provocative absence' 'quantum flirting' the elusive 'chair game' and the legacy of the Lost Cat poster.

You can find all of Steve's work here:

https://www.canscorpionssmoke.com/

The blog post we mention is here - a must read for any pirate:

https://www.canscorpionssmoke.com/2016/11/05/want-creativity-workplace-serious/

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