Gus Newby Grant
Most recent experience: Leadership and management curriculum design and delivery; Leadership presentations; Team effectiveness interventions; Change management training; Team and individual effectiveness training; Competency training
Previous experience: British Army – (Major) Officer training instructor, Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
Education: Graduate of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
An interview with Gus
What is your area of specialty?
Teams and organisations, leadership, employee motivation and engagement. My military experience helps me to see and understand the more human side, to define where the pressure or the bottleneck is and to create solutions and methods to alleviate those pressures.
What motivates you most in your role ?
The fact that by understanding an organisation’s culture, people and their issues, pressing the right buttons can create a transformation. Simply put, with a little guidance and adjustment, any team or organisation can unleash its potential.
What is the biggest challenge? How do you overcome that?
The people we work with are not necessarily the ones who have chosen to undergo change. There are nearly always barriers to overcome and egos to handle. To convince in minutes that we are bringing something valuable to the table is paramount, and I believe that the Kinetic Team achieves this in every programme and intervention.
What’s been your greatest success to date?
Beyond client delight, I have personally gained so much in this role. What I find ultimately motivating is the opportunity to constantly learn and better oneself which I genuinely feel day to day. To have been involved in building and supporting Kinetic to where it is now from such a comparatively recent and small start is greatly rewarding.
Who is your business hero?
I would take a handful of different qualities from people I’ve encountered along the way and bottle them all. I have been fortunate to witness remarkable examples (good and poor!) of leadership and the disproportionate effect that it can have on people, teams and businesses. For me, I have seen heroes appear in an array of forms and types – quite often the least expected.
Give us your key nugget quote…
‘Don’t believe what your eyes are telling you. All they show is limitation. Look with your understanding, find out what you already know, and you’ll see the way to fly.’
From Jonathan Livingstone Seagull by Richard Bach.
