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For our 20th and final episode of the third season, Jessica Fellowes, co-founder of Forum 500, talks to Charlotte Holl, our member with a foothold in New York, LA and Munich. President and co-founder of First Growth Brands, a French sparkling wine brand and family business that Forum 500 members in America have been lucky enough to taste. Produced using the 'méthode traditionelle,' Charlotte is very interesting to hear on the challenges of building an alcohol brand in America, with even today's distribution channels rooted in post-Prohibition laws. 

Charlotte began her working life in executive search, and will be launching her own search company in the new year. We particularly enjoyed her advice for young people seeking employment today, who find the AI bots making it difficult to stand out in a crowd. 

"I think that people are starved for human real connection. And I start the statement by saying that because if I'm hiring a manager, I am so sick of getting my AI generated report of who telling me who my best optimized hire is, right? If I'm a candidate trying to stand out at this point, I am writing my resumé myself. I am printing out copies on really nice, beautiful cardstock, and I am walking in the front door and handing my resume personally. I'm dressed well. Put on a shirt with a collar, comb your hair, be prepared to meet an executive, walk into the office and have the guts to do that. Especially if you're in the US, if you are trying to stand out and someone gets a handwritten letter from you, you show up, you actually have the opportunity to shake a hand because they're so stunned because nobody comes into their office anymore. Do that."

This episode was edited by Vanessa Heaney.

Music by Alex Vickers

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This is a great discussion with maths-fiend, Mensa member Rachel Pether (Abu Dhabi), who trained as a journalist before switching to finance. She packed her bags aged 21 and moved from New Zealand to London, to pursue her dream of working for the BBC. Now settled in the UAE, where she has been for almost twenty years, Rachel combines her journalism skills with finance in a number of ways. She is a host on FinTechTV, Managing Director of 3iQ Assets and runs the Speakeasy Club, to help others find their own public speaking confidence. 

"What I found as the number one top tip was about mindset. So much of it can be down to nerves, and the mindset trick that I use can work with every single audience. So it's not specific to any situation, but instead of thinking: 'Oh my gosh, I'm so nervous.I have to speak in front of X,' or 'I'm so nervous. I have to go and ask my boss for a raise,' whatever it might be. If you just change your mindset and tell yourself, 'I'm so excited for the opportunity,' it really changes everything. If you are hosting an event, rather than thinking, 'I have to get on stage in front of 300 people who are all finance CEOs or successful entrepreneurs,' you think: 'I am so grateful that I get to be in a room with great finance leaders and entrepreneurs.'"

This episode was edited by Vanessa Heaney.

Music by Alex Vickers

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Forum 500 member Manoj Gursahani (Mumbai) started India's first e-commerce travel portal, the beginning of a long career in which a blend of technology with entrepreneurial vision has been the hallmark. Chair of Tiger 21 in his home city, Manoj is an established mentor and coach of high networth leaders, and as co-chairman of the India Business Group, he strengthens India's role in internationa trade and partnerships. An established speaker, author and currently working with Vira Healthcare on AI-led health diagnostics, Manoj is also a dedicated father. This is a very enjoyable and relaxed conversation with a high achiever! However, Manoj is honest about the fact it took an intentional step to achieve this balance. 

"Personally, for my side, it was tough for me to be vulnerable. It was very tough. When my daughters were growing up, I did not give them enough time. And I was busy working and largely focusing only on the work aspect. And then I realized what I've been missing out on. I started ten years back deciding that, listen, we need to stop and smell the roses kind of thing... And then it was initially very tough to adapt that. When I'm working, I try to work with less distractions. And in today's world of constant pinging, I also try during the weekend to sometimes put my phone on airplane mode."

This episode was edited by Vanessa Heaney.

Music by Alex Vickers

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This episode sees Jessica Fellowes talking to Sarah Anderson (Boulder), the founding partner of Vault Fund, which principally invests in company builders. Sitting in her round home office – a converted silo – where she lives on 100 acres with her family, Sarah talks with great enthusiasm about the world she works in, one that is very different from the enormous corporations she worked with when at J.P.Morgan (Proctor & Gamble, Facebook, Electronic Arts). 

With a great sense of humour and an ability to describe complex ideas simply, Sarah discusses A.I and the current concerns/hopes around it, as well as drawing nice comparisons with her former pole vaulting achievements! 

There's also a great moment discussing the number of women and people of colour in finance (not enough, less than there were five years ago...). 

"We definitely do still have women that are able to be successful against all odds. But I think when we start seeing large funders roll back, that's when it starts to hurt. And we have made so much progress. So to me, it's quite sad. I think that there are so many capable women. There are so many capable people of color. And to be honest, I don't know that a white man would have started this. It's too different. You have to have a very unique perspective to see it, to do it. And I think that there's just a natural hunger there to prove it out. Not that a white man couldn't have done it. They have so many more opportunities that someone like you or me may not have. 

"I tend to think that women and diverse people in this category actually have a huge advantage. Because we're remembered. There aren't many of us."

This episode was produced by Vanessa Heaney.

Music by Alex Vickers

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For this episode, we welcome a longstanding friend of Forum 500, James Arroyo, OBE. James is the Director of the Ditchley Foundation, an organisation established to strengthen democratic relations, to help sustain peace, freedom and the rule of law. The Foundation is based in the magnificent setting of Ditchley Park, a Georgian Palladian masterpiece, one of the last surviving country houses of James Gibb and where this interview took place. 

One of James's special interests has always been in technology – previously he was director for data at the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office – and he has been looking at ways in which fast-developing tech can be aligned to the Foundation's purpose. 

"I think one of the things that's going to evolve is going to be an alliance...what do we build together? What supply chains do we have together? [Rather than] about what do we do diplomatically. You can think in some ways of the good old days, the unipolar moment, where it looked like serious questions were going to be settled in the UN. Then, it was important to coordinate between powers as to who would vote for this resolution, the drafting of this, who could find compromise. And that wasn't wrong, because it really was influential. But if very few things are being decided in that kind of forum, and instead things are being decided more combatively, then it changes the terms of trade. I think how are we relevant in Europe to the counterpower that America is now trying to build towards China is going to be really important."

This episode was edited by Vanessa Heaney.

Music by Alex Vickers

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Anthony Monckton (London, Vienna) is an expert on risk, security, negotiation and conflict resolution, having served as an army officer before moving into diplomacy, specialising in national security. He talks this week to Jessica Fellowes about ViennEast, the company he established over ten years ago as a risk advisory and due diligency consultancy. 

ViennEast deals with a wide range of challenges faced by individuals and companies, from retrieving money that has been stolen and transferred across several countries – one case involves dealing with lawyers in six European countries – to personal fraud. Increasingly, too, there are complicated ethical and legal implications around data training in AI. But his simplest and best tip for protecting your own digital data: do the updates on your smartphone apps!

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This week, we talk to Forum 500 member Hanlie van Wyk (Chicago), a social scientist, psycho-geographer and executive coach working with leaders and teams across borders, resolving polarisation and conflict. All of us, no matter what our industry, have faced something of this nature at some point.

Hanlie talks about how her own upbringing, in which she witnessed first-hand apartheid and the 1994 transition in South Africa to a democratically-elected government, informed so much of the way she works today. Hanlie brings great insight, too, to how conflict at work often starts small but if left unresolved can lead to very difficult situations: 'Death by papercuts.' There are also the bigger challenges that occur when companies merge or expand quickly, which is often the point at which Hanlie is brought in to help. Hanlie has found recently that it's become even more important to shift attention to the layer just beneath the most senior level of management, to ensure an open and fair culture. 

Music by Alex Vickers

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Winston Fisher (New York) is a partner and third generation of the Fisher Brothers, the royal family of real estate in Manhattan, founded in 1915. Winston directs the company’s financing and investing activities, property acquisitions and dispositions and oversees all new development initiatives. One of the most exciting of these being Area 15 in Las Vegas, which was developed with Michael Beneville (NY/LA). Winston sits on a number of boards and is also seriously involved in several philanthropic activities, particularly the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Funds, participating in extreme sports to raise funds to support wounded US troops. Alongside all of this, Winston has an active, thoughtful interest in politics, writing a monthly newsletter on current issues. And on the subject none of us can get away from, Fisher has a stark warning for the use of AI in his industry:

'I said three years ago, there's going to be two types of people who are employed. People who use AI will have a job and people who do not will not. At the end of this year, that's going to apply to everybody. Does that mean we're going to let everybody go? No, but if you're not able to utilize it, if you're not able to vibe code, if you're not able to understand sophisticated prompt engineering and multi-agent programs, I don't know if you have a place. It's not terrible. It's exciting.'

This episode was edited by Vanessa Heaney. 

Music by Alex Vickers

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Druv Kent – aka ‘Dhruv’ – is a financier turned singer/songwriter, recording in both English and Hindi. HIs 2015 debut saw him become the first Asia-based artist supported by BBC Radio 2 in twenty years. He’s since scored several #1 hits on the World Indie Music Charts, the Euro Charts and the US Top 20. Recently, he featured in Rolling Stone magazine. 

Brought up in Kolkata before moving to America, Druv returned to India in the mid-90s to begin his banking career. In this he was very successful, and his work took him to Hong Kong and Singapore, for Credit Suisse and Deutschbank. But all the while that Druv was working as an investment banker, he was also a musician, and finally in 2013, he decided to pursue music as a career. There are some lovely thoughts in here about creativity and how to open yourself up to it: 

"What's changed [for me] is there's a level of quiet confidence... when I started, I was in such a rush because I could not believe that I was capable or I could channel this kind of energy through me. It's less about my own capability. It's more about this ability to get into the state of being able to move yourself out of the way, move your ego out of the way, and let the song come to you and, through exploration, figure out what it's trying to say and let it speak through you."

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Forum Radio host Jessica Fellowes talks in this episode with Lindsay Cooper (Singapore) about his transition from finance into the longevity and health sector. Lindsay attempted to semi-retire from business in 2017 but was scuppered when he was tempted into buying a convent in the Cotswolds just before the COVID pandemic. Initially intended as a wellness retreat, the project sparked an interest in preventative health and longevity science. 

Through connections in Singapore – he has lived in Asia for most of his adult life –Lindsay met leading experts including Professor Brian Kennedy and Professor Andrea Meier. Together they have brought longevity science research into clinical practice with Chi Longevity, rapidly growing the business through partnerships with luxury brands like Four Seasons. 

Linday argues that longevity medicine represents a fundamental shift in healthcare – from reactive, specialist-driven treatment to proactive, preventative and personalised care, driven by tech advances and increased public health awareness. 

"We've had this wellness menu for some time, with diet, exercise, sleep and so forth. But the real excitement – and the reason that everyone's putting such huge money into this space just now – is because of the medical breakthroughs, which are increasingly beginning to break and will only be helped by the AI revolution."

This episode was produced by Vanessa Heaney. 

Music by Alex Vickers