Web of Us

"There’s no secrets in what we do," says Alexander Scheirle on the Web of Us podcast. In conversation with Claire Wathen, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra's executive director explains the curious formula behind how the group plays without a conductor – which he describes as ”like a school of fish”. Orpheus' rotating and communal approach to leadership isn’t a top-down vertical; it’s about looking across the aisle, so no one gets stuck as second violin! Tune in to hear what shared governance looks like in practice (and how to navigate tensions), the implications of lifelong membership, and how giving away 2,700 tickets to a Carnegie Hall concert is helping rebuild the sense of community orchestras used to offer.

Learn more about the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra: https://orpheusnyc.org/ 

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.

What can movement teach us about how people and networks hold together? "HollowBody is about letting the body guide you and not allowing the mind to take over the conversation," says Fiona Thng on Web of Us. In conversation with Claire Wathen, Kuik Swee Boon, founding artistic director of Singapore's The Human Expression (T.H.E) Dance Company, and assistant to artistic director Fiona Thng explore HollowBody: a body-heart-mind practice born from years of dedicated inquiry into what it means to exist in a rapidly changing world. Tune in as Swee Boon and Fiona trace what inner breath means as a bridge between emotion and movement, why the most logical people are often furthest from the methodology, and what becomes possible when this way of knowing travels beyond the studio.

Read the paired essay on Web of Us Substack: https://webofus.substack.com/p/connector-notes-what-the-body-knows 

Learn more about The Human Expression (T.H.E.) Dance Company: https://www.the-dancecompany.com/

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.

How does capital move through a circle of women meeting in a room, with no prospectus, no fund manager, and no formal credit history? In West Africa, it always has, says co-founder of Haskè Ventures, Madji Sock, on Web Of Us podcast. In conversation with host Claire Wathen, Madji shares her first experiences of a tontine in Senegal, how it inspired her to set up a new kind of venture studio empowering African female entrepreneurs with access to capital and resources, and what the tontine teaches us about reimagining the formal flows of finance to empower a broader range of entrepreneurs to thrive.

Paired Substack essay: https://webofus.substack.com/p/connector-notes-when-investment-is

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.

"To be around soil, is to be who we are as people," says “soil yoda” Kylie Woodham, a farmer, gardener, and sustainability and agribusiness strategist on Web of Us. In conversation with Claire Wathen, Kylie offers fresh narratives of how we could reorient food systems starting at the grassroots level, why soil is a life force in itself, and why it all starts with critical thought about something very simple – what’s on your plate!

Paired Substack essay: https://webofus.substack.com/p/connector-notes-food-as-culture

Discover more about Kylie Woodham at her Substack, 'Soil Sister': https://substack.com/@kyliewoodham

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.

For more than 1,400 years, the waqf – a form of Islamic endowment – has channelled private wealth toward public good. Today, Mohamad Zaoud, business owner, brand executive, and former Al Jazeera strategist, is applying that model to philanthropic challenges. "Since we launched this cash waqf for families," he tells Web Of Us host Claire Wathen, "I have seen the best of humanity." Tune in to join Mohamad as he traces the history of waqfs, makes the case for their relevance for contemporary philanthropy, and shares how its helping everyone from MomTok creators to 70-year-old orphans get started with philanthropic giving.

Paired Substack essay: https://webofus.substack.com/p/connector-notes-giving-that-outlasts

Show notes: 

• Awqaf Australia: https://awqaf.org.au/ 
• Public Ancillary Fund, Australia: https://research.qut.edu.au/australian-centre-for-philanthropy-and-nonprofit-studies/research/accountability-of-public-ancillary-funds/
• Community Foundations Australia: https://www.cfaustralia.org.au/ 

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.

Indonesia has hundreds of indigenous ingredients, but most of the world has never tasted them. Enter Helianti Hilman, the food entrepreneur kickstarting Indonesia’s homegrown food revival. Leaving her legal career to found Javara in 2008, she connects local food culture to markets. "It’s about reviving their identity," she tells Web Of Us host, Claire Wathen. Tune in to hear Helianti share how a network reaching farmers, rural women, and indigenous communities is building shared production, marketing, and financing systems to revive Indonesia's food heritage, why training handpicked trusted conveners is key to growing a strong and thriving web of growers and sellers, and what local flavours lie beyond rice: nipa, sorghum, and sago. 

Read the paired essay on Web of Us Substack: https://webofus.substack.com/p/connector-notes-reviving-what-rice 

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.

“If you don't know how to be porous as a leader, [...] you're just not gonna get it done” says Maryana Iskander on the Web Of Us podcast. In conversation with Claire Wathen, she shares what started as a “joke” to now being called the “last best place on the internet”, Wikipedia gets 15 billion visits every month (twice the population of the globe!). But how do you set up, scale and maintain a self-governing organization without calcifying into command and control, or collapsing into decentralised chaos? Tune in to hear the Wikimedia Foundation, Harambee and Planned Parenthood leader on how to take dumb things out of the equation to make yours and your teams’ lives easier, top tips to bust hierarchy and keep information flowing (as opposed to weaponized), and the most urgent questions leaders should ask themselves to navigate the AI-age of disinformation and overwhelm. 

Read the paired essay on Web Of Us Substack: https://webofus.substack.com/p/connector-notes-leading-in-the-open

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.

Claire Wathen is back for season two of her podcast, Web of Us. A show exploring the visible and invisible connections that shape our world. In Season Two, 'What Holds?', we’re investigating how networks hold under pressure. Claire explains more. Episodes releasing weekly starting September 2026.

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.

“To make this world work, we have to be fanatically positive,” says globally renowned choreographer and founder of LINES Ballet Alonzo King on The Web of Us. In conversation with Claire Wathen, Alonzo shares why movement is life, growing up with artistic and activist parents, and why stillness is key for sincere creative thought and collective action.


Timestamps
00:00 Introduction to The Web of Us
00:34 Meet Alonzo King: A Choreographer Redefining Ballet
01:20 Alonzo's Upbringing and Philosophy on Connection
02:43 The Essence of Home and Internal World
04:47 Time Travel and the Astro Plane
05:56 Art Beyond Appearances
07:18 The Value of Every Human Being
08:17 Creating Spaces for Curiosity
08:45 Alonzo's Creative Practices and Influences
14:10 The Birth of LINES Ballet
24:56 Classical Ballet and Cultural Influences
28:39 Choreography as Thought Structures
35:31 Final Reflections and Future Questions
37:29 Season One Wrap-Up 

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.

"Even though there may be all sorts of conflicts brewing, we can still talk as human beings who are fascinated; filled with wonder and curiosity," says Emeritus Research Fellow in Fungal Biology at the University of Oxford, Sarah Watkinson, on The Web of Us. In conversation with Claire Wathen, Sarah shares how she’s built an enviable career spanning five decades as a university mycologist turned poet, what mycelial networks teach us about life, and the dry rot conversation stopper she likes to drop at every dinner party.

Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction to The Web Of Us
00:18 Meet Sarah Watkinson: University Mycologist turned Poet 
01:22 Sarah's Journey and Early Influences
01:59 Diving into Dry Rot Fungi
07:54 The Fascinating World of Fungal Networks
08:48 Dry Rot Fungus in Nature and Human Structures
10:53 Collaborations and Research Innovations
13:54 The Evolution of Fungal Research
24:01 Fungi's Role in Ecosystems
26:39 Exciting Advances in Soil Imaging
27:52 Biomimicry and Bio-Inspiration
29:07 Fungal Adaptations and Hydrophobic Surfaces
29:45 Fungal Reproduction and Communication
36:53 The Intersection of Science and Poetry
51:00 Advice for Aspiring Scientists

References:
Soil Fungi and Soil Fertility, S. D. Garrett
Flavr Savr tomato, BBC
The Control of Pesticides Regulations 1986
Read Sarah’s research publications on ResearchGate
Read Sarah’s poetry, ‘Dung Beetles Navigate by Starlight’

Hosted by Claire Wathen, Visiting Fellow at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. Produced by Studio Goldstar.

Essays, frameworks, and field notes at webofus.substack.com.

Have a question, an idea for a future guest, or feedback to share? I’d love to hear from you at [email protected]. 

Welcome to the Web.