The Secrets of Learning & Development

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When you ask a question, how much room do you leave for an honest answer?

“Why did you do it like that?” and “Talk me through your thinking” can lead to very different conversations. The words we choose influence whether someone feels able to explain, admit uncertainty or challenge an assumption.

In this bonus episode of The Secrets of Learning and Development, Valerie Merrill and Julia Bend explore the secret power of great questions — in leadership, learning and the conversations we have with ourselves.

They examine how familiar questions can keep us returning to the same conclusions, why positive feedback can leave important gaps hidden and what we miss when we’re busy preparing our next response.

Listen for practical ways to ask with greater purpose, hear more of what matters and give yourself permission to reconsider what you think you know.

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Losing your job can feel like losing everything you’ve worked towards. But does starting again really mean starting from scratch?

Chris Bradshaw’s career has taken him from a British Gas call centre to Sony Europe, through redundancy and depression, and into building learning and development functions from the ground up. Through it all, one thing has remained central: the satisfaction of hearing someone say, “Chris, I did it.”

In this episode of The Secrets of Learning and Development, Chris joins Julia Bend and Valerie Merrill for an open conversation about ambition, setbacks and recognising the value of the experience you carry into your next chapter.

He shares what it meant to rebuild after losing a job he loved, why imposter syndrome surfaced when he moved into strategic leadership and how helping his children understand their neurodivergence prompted him to recognise ADHD traits in himself.

That personal understanding now shapes the questions he asks of employers. Who might your job adverts be discouraging? How well do you understand the people you lead? And does support continue beyond the hiring process?

From career reinvention to his forthcoming book, Hiring to Retiring, Chris offers a practical, personal perspective on helping people succeed and why good leadership starts with recognising that we don’t all think or work in the same way. 

Key Learnings

Starting again doesn’t mean starting from scratch. After redundancy, Chris felt he had returned to square one. Yet his experience and skills helped him succeed in a different business. A role can end without erasing the value you bring.

Inclusive leadership starts with questioning everyday assumptions. Chris’s example of job adverts shows how language can discourage capable candidates. Supporting different ways of thinking begins with examining what a role actually requires and understanding what helps each person perform at their best.

Guest Information:

[email protected]
https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-bradshaw-flpi-67430b2b9/

Since recording this episode Chris is now a Talent Development partner at Diligenta, writing full competency framework, onboarding and induction programme content. (FTC 12 months).

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Sometimes it’s a guest’s story that stays with you. Sometimes it’s a sentence that makes you question something you’ve always accepted.

In this Season 5 round-up of The Secrets of Learning and Development, Julia and Valerie revisit the voices and moments that made them think again. Eleven guests shared their experiences of overlooking their own needs, challenging other people’s assumptions and recognising the value of what they bring.

With candid reflections and humour along the way, this episode looks back at what those conversations revealed about the things we miss, the limits we accept and what can change when we begin to see things differently.

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What do you do with the parts of your career you find difficult to explain?

The job you took for the income. The profession you trained for but never enjoyed. The move that seemed to take you away from your plans.

In this bonus episode, Julia Bend and Valerie Merrill explore what those experiences can reveal about the work that suits you and the abilities you may have overlooked.

We discuss why competence can keep you in work you no longer want, why changing jobs doesn’t always change the pattern and how to recognise what you’ve learnt from an experience you wouldn’t choose again.

If your career feels disconnected or changing direction feels like starting from scratch, join us to consider what links your experience beyond the titles and how that understanding could inform your next decision.

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In this episode of The Secrets of Learning and Development, Julia Bend and Valerie Merrill are joined by inclusion and psychological safety specialist Sarah Burrell for an honest conversation about disability, communication and what it really takes to help people feel seen and heard at work.

Sarah reflects on experiences that shaped her own career, including the impact of being underestimated, overlooked and faced with assumptions about what she could contribute because of her speech impairment. She also shares how those experiences now influence the way she works with leaders and organisations.

At the heart of the conversation is a simple but powerful idea: apprehension can exist on both sides. People may worry about saying the wrong thing, while the person on the receiving end may be wondering whether they will be understood, listened to or valued. When that tension goes unspoken, meaningful communication can become much harder.

Sarah explains why naming that discomfort can be the beginning of a better conversation, how humour can help people relax and why psychological safety is about much more than using the right language.

The discussion also looks at the difference between having diverse people in the room and creating an environment where they are genuinely able to contribute, influence and be heard.

A thoughtful episode about the conversations we often avoid, the assumptions we do not always notice and what leaders can do differently when they move beyond good intentions.

Key Learnings

Psychological safety is created through real conversations, not good intentions.
People need to feel able to speak honestly, raise what is difficult and contribute without worrying that they will be dismissed or misunderstood. Sarah makes the point that this cannot be achieved through one-off statements or broad inclusion policies. It develops through ongoing conversations, trust and leaders being willing to address what might otherwise remain unspoken.

Representation only matters when people are genuinely heard.
Having different people in the room is not the same as inclusion. Sarah challenges leaders to think about whose voice is missing, who may be present but unheard and whether people are given meaningful space to contribute. Inclusion requires leaders to understand different communication preferences, individual needs and the conditions that allow people to participate 

Guest Information
http://www.sarahburrell.co.uk/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarahjburrell/
https://www.subscribepage.com/sarahburrell_newsletter
https://calendly.com/sarahburrell
Sarah Burrell Inclusion

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A one-way ticket. Very little money. No certainty about what would happen next. Just an unshakeable belief that he would find a way.

When Rajesh Agrawal arrived in London from India in his early twenties, he could not have known that his journey would take him from building a successful financial technology business to serving for almost eight years as Deputy Mayor of London for Business. What he did have was confidence in his ability to adapt, act on opportunity and keep going when circumstances changed.

In this thoughtful and wide-ranging conversation, Rajesh shares what he has learned about staying persistent without becoming rigid, why genuine curiosity matters more than strategic networking and how his philosophy of focusing on his actions rather than becoming attached to the outcome has shaped the way he approaches ambition, success and failure.

He also reflects on a belief instilled in him from childhood: that success is not simply about what you achieve for yourself, but what you are able to make possible for others. From supporting entrepreneurs and young people to his work today through Fair Growth, service has remained a defining thread throughout his career.

At its heart, this is a conversation about resilience, opportunity and choosing to look forward. Rajesh reminds us that setbacks do not have to define what happens next, that asking for help can open unexpected doors and that Britain has far more potential than we sometimes give it credit for.

Key Learnings

Be persistent, but not rigid.
Rajesh’s experience of having to change direction during the financial crisis shows that belief in the wider ambition does not mean clinging to the original plan. The ability to adapt while continuing to move forward can be just as important as determination itself. 

Focus on what you can control, not only on the outcome.
Rajesh speaks about putting your energy into your actions, intentions and effort while accepting that the result is not always in your hands. That mindset can make failure easier to learn from and success less dependent on everything going exactly as planned.

Guest Information:
[email protected]
https://www.linkedin.com/in/rajeshagrawaluk
https://www.fairgrowth.group/

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For years, people have described themselves as visual, auditory or kinaesthetic learners. The idea shaped workshops, training programmes and even educational policy. But what if matching learning to a preferred style does not actually improve how well someone learns?

In this bonus episode, Julia and Valerie look at why learning styles became so popular, what they changed for the better and why the evidence has led many L&D professionals to think differently.

They explore the risks of labelling learners, the distinction between preferences and how learning actually happens and what should influence learning design instead. From motivation and prior knowledge to retrieval practice, feedback, accessibility and reinforcement, this conversation considers how we can recognise individual differences without placing people into boxes.

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Some experiences do not simply change the direction of your life. They change the person you are.

For wellbeing practitioner, retreat host and author Jo Tocher, the loss of her first baby was one of those experiences. In this deeply personal episode, Jo shares how that loss changed her from the inside out and ultimately led her away from the corporate world towards a life and career centred on wellbeing.

Jo explains why she first needed to work through her own grief, how training as an aromatherapist opened the door to other forms of healing and the moment she recognised that her lived experience could help other women feel less alone. She also discusses writing Life After Miscarriage, bringing together the stories of other women and giving a voice to an experience that is still too often left unspoken.

The conversation explores the importance of listening for what is not being said, why meaningful support can never be one size fits all and how stepping away from the demands of everyday life can give us a different perspective on what needs to change.

Jo also shares her thoughts on connection, midlife and taking better care of ourselves after years spent looking after everyone else. Above all, she challenges the idea that age should determine what we can still do, become or experience.

This is an honest and moving conversation about living with loss, finding meaning without diminishing what happened and allowing personal experience to inform work that genuinely helps others.

Key Learnings

Our own healing must come before helping others
Jo’s experience shows that lived experience can bring a depth of understanding, but she first needed time to process her own grief before using what she had learnt to support other women.

Wellbeing requires deliberate attention
Creating space, maintaining meaningful connections and caring for our sleep, movement and mindset are essential, particularly in midlife. Age should not decide what remains possible for us.

Guest Information:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jotocher/

https://jotocher.com/

https://www.instagram.com/jo_tocher_holistics/

https://www.facebook.com/joy.holistics.9

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Competence earns trust, responsibility and respect. It can also create the impression that you never need support.

In this bonus episode, Julia and Valerie explore what happens when being known as the capable one means carrying more of the thinking alone. They consider why experience doesn’t remove uncertainty, how independence can quietly become isolation and why seeking another perspective strengthens rather than undermines your judgement.

Because the people trusted to make the difficult decisions still need somewhere to think before they make them.

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For much of her life, Sally Chapman felt she was playing catch-up — reaching for the milestones others seemed to have already achieved and working harder whenever something didn’t feel right.

Her career has been anything but conventional. From agricultural college and pig farming to running an award-winning pub, building a successful career in HR and becoming an executive and leadership coach, each chapter revealed something more about who she was and what mattered to her.

In this honest and engaging conversation, Sally shares how childhood beliefs shaped her choices, why her need to fit in followed her into the workplace and how coaching helped her recognise the values misalignment she had been trying to outwork. She also explains why emotions are central to the way we live and lead, and how this thinking inspired her Lead From Within workbook and programme.

This episode is a powerful exploration of identity, belonging and the patterns that quietly influence our decisions. It is also a reminder that meaningful work doesn’t always begin with a carefully constructed plan. Sometimes, it begins when we finally listen to the parts of ourselves we have spent years pushing aside.

Key Learnings

Working harder cannot fix work that conflicts with who you are. What appears to be a performance problem may actually be a clash between your role, values and emotional needs.

The need to catch up or fit in can quietly shape an entire career. Understanding the beliefs behind our choices allows us to make decisions based on who we are now, rather than who we once thought we needed to be.

Guest Information:
Website - https://shinecoaching.org.uk/
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sally-chapman-shine-coaching/
Instagram - @sallychapmanshinecoaching
PDF Workbook  | Printed Workbook

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