Yesterday I had the pleasure of attending the Women in Leadership event at Brighton’s i360, an early start for a morning packed with powerhouse stories, honesty, and the kind of wisdom that sneaks into your bones and rearranges things.
Running a creative business with an amazing team, who spend most evenings teaching people how to trust themselves and each other, meant I heard improvisation woven through every single talk.
Liz Beck – Expanding the Pot You Grow In
Liz Beck, founder and CEO of AspiringHR, opened with a simple question that hit like a truth bomb: “Who’s in your network to help you grow? Who’s got your back?”
Imposter syndrome? She says do it anyway.
Superpower? Connection. Warmth. Relationships that actually matter.
Liz shared a business analogy I loved:
If a plant outgrows its pot, it becomes root-bound. Your business is no different.
Get a bigger pot.
Start before you feel ready. Surround yourself with cheerleaders. Hire for potential, not perfection. Family first. Boundaries are leadership. Resilience is leadership.
Honestly, this is pure AndAlso. We work the way we do because we genuinely believe humans come first, creativity thrives in safety, and nothing grows in a cramped pot.
Susannah Atherton – Big Pants, Big Values
Next up was Susannah Atherton, MD of The English Soap Company, who brought both fire and humour.
Her take on imposter syndrome?
Put your BIG pants on.
She left a job because of bad leadership, and made it very clear:
Great leaders understand people’s lives and lead with empathy.
And then she said something that made me laugh out loud, because it was basically my autobiography:
“I’m Marmite, and I like that. Not everyone’s going to like you.”
Same, Susannah. Truly. I’ve been called Marmite my whole life.
Her advice:
Lead with your values. Surround yourself with people who are aligned. Commit to new opportunities (even if they flop). Be authentic because it’s non-negotiable. And for the love of all things holy: resting is good.
YES. (And my Lel-Potato-Days are verified as good!)
At AndAlso we see this constantly, when we drop the people-pleasing and show up as ourselves, our improv cracks open in the best possible way.
Sarah Willingham – The Power of Being Underestimated
Finally, Sarah Willingham, entrepreneur, former Dragon’s Den dragon, and now owner of the i360, delivered the kind of origin story that makes you want to sprint toward your dreams.
She worked in teams where everyone had each other’s backs. She grabbed opportunities that could have easily passed her by (hello, Planet Hollywood Europe). She travelled, learned, failed, built, scaled, tried again.
One year working in the same office as the Pizza Express CEO and MD made her realise…
“I can do what you’re doing.”
And she went on to prove it, building and scaling incredible businesses, including the Bombay Bicycle Club chain.
Her life ambitions were simple:
- Be a mum
- Be a partner
- See a business through the full circle
And she did them, marked symbolically with a Japanese daruma doll: colour in the first eye when you set the goal, the second when you fulfil it.
Then she shared the part I think every woman in the room felt in their chest:
She has been underestimated her whole career. Men assuming she was the tea girl.
Her superpower? They didn’t see her coming.
So she embraced it.
That landed.
Where Improv Meets Leadership
As I listened to these three brilliant leaders, I kept coming back to our recent improv leadership events we’ve been involved with, and why they resonate so deeply in corporate spaces. Improv works because it’s leadership training cleverly disguised as play.
It teaches:
- Start before you’re ready
- Take up space
- Trust your instinct
- Surround yourself with people who lift you
- Fail in public and laugh
- Back yourself
- Be warm, be human
- Say yes, and… to opportunities
- Show up as your weird, wonderful, Marmite self
I love working at AndAlso, as we believe everyone deserves to take up space, everyone deserves brave support, and everyone deserves to grow into a bigger pot.
Yesterday was a reminder that I’m surrounded by kick-ass women and men who make that possible.
And that leadership, at its heart, is just showing up, authentically, imperfectly, resiliently and saying, “Let’s do this together.”
If you’d like to talk to us about bringing Improv into your Workplace, you can book a discovery call here or pop us an email to hello@andalsoimprov.com. If you’d like to bring improv into your life, then check out where to start your adventure with us here.