Welcome to The Leader to Leader Podcast (season 1, episode 3)
In this episode, Janet Thorne, chief executive of Reach Volunteering, sits down with Kiran Kaur, CEO of Girl Dreamer, for a wide-ranging conversation about leadership, power, and what the next generation is bringing to the social impact sector.
Kiran opens by drawing on her dual vantage point: running Girl Dreamer while simultaneously conducting research with the University of Birmingham into young women of colour in social impact leadership. From that position, she identifies something that still holds the sector back: a fundamental misunderstanding of what shared power actually means. There remains, she argues, a stubborn hierarchy between who is seen as a leader and who is seen as a beneficiary — and until that shifts, the sector will keep missing the expertise that comes from lived experience combined with professional knowledge.
The conversation moves into community-centred design, and the distinction between designing for people versus designing with them. Kiran explores how leaders with lived experience tend to start from a different premise — one where power has to be distributed for the mission to work — and how that contrasts with structures where hierarchy is still quietly embedded. She references the idea, drawn from American activists, that even human-centred design can carry colonial assumptions, and that true change happens when communities can self-organise and move forward without needing the same structures to rely on.
Janet and Kiran then turn to what has shifted over the past five years. The momentum that followed 2020 — the funding, the recognition, the sense that things were finally moving — has, in Kiran’s view, started to regress. The rawness of that moment has faded, and many of the injustices it surfaced remain unresolved. And yet she finds hope, specifically in the wave of Gen Z leaders she is watching step forward. They are, she says, action-oriented in a way previous generations weren’t — moving first, questioning the rules rather than following them, and bringing a deep instinct for collectivism that she believes will change the shape of leadership itself.
Joy comes up as an unexpected but important thread. Kiran challenges the assumption that serious, systemic work has to start from a place of deficit and problem. In many cultures and communities, joy, play and radical celebration are how change is driven — and yet funding applications still demand you lead with the problem. She introduces the idea of being healing-centred first, approaching leadership from a place of what people already have and already bring, rather than what they lack.
On the question of what CEOs don’t talk about enough, Kiran is direct: their own wellbeing. The pressure to perform positivity on LinkedIn, to always be thrilled and honoured, sits uneasily alongside the reality of leading an organisation through hard times. She wants more space — real space — for leaders to share the lows, not as failure, but as part of the honest texture of the journey. She is actively trying to create that space for the young leaders coming through Girl Dreamer, and believes it would make leadership more accessible to exactly the people the sector most needs.
The episode closes with a look ahead. Kiran sees the role of the CEO changing fundamentally as Gen Z — and soon Gen Alpha — reshape expectations around power, hierarchy and collective action. Any leader who positions themselves above rather than alongside will, she thinks, find themselves quickly left behind. The task is to burn and build simultaneously: to maintain what still works while making genuine room for what’s coming.
Transcript
Janet Thorne
Hi, Kiran. It’s really such a big pleasure to be interviewing you. And where I ended with Kye at the end of the last interview,
Kiran Kaur
My pleasure.
Janet Thorne
The question that was in, well, I had two questions in my mind, but the first one I’d love to ask you is, what do you think that older white leaders like me can learn from young women of color, recognising that they have had to navigate systems often not designed for them and bringing a perspective also of a generation born in quite different places?
different times with different assumptions. I’m really interested to hear what you think. Yeah, what they bring and what we can learn or even unlearn from them.
Kiran Kaur
Well, firstly, hi Jane. It’s so lovely to be in the space with you. I think we’ve crossed paths maybe on LinkedIn and an e-mail previously, so it’s really nice to actually be in a space with you and speak with you.
Wow, we are going right into it on the first question.
Janet Thorne
Did you want me to start with a more gentle?
Kiran Kaur
No, no, I love it. I’m like, right, this is set in a so well. No, this is brilliant. Something that I think, okay, so
It’s really interesting that you’re asking this now because outside of my Girl Dreamer role, I’m actually undertaking a research role with the University of Birmingham. And in that, I’m speaking to young women of colour who are social impact leaders about their experiences with funding, with leading in the sector and around impact measurement.
So there’s been loads of really interesting themes and things coming out. And that’s on the side of me also operating Girl Dreamer, whereas, as you know, is working with young women of colour every day. So there’s actually so much in this. But I think one thing is there’s a lack of
I still believe there’s a lack of…
understanding of what shared power means. And I think the hierarchy between who is seen as leader and who is seen as beneficiary or who is seen as expert by learned experience versus expert by lived experience, there’s still a really big gap there. And I think the sentiment is that, you know, young women of colour sit
at the intersection of many, many different areas of life, whether that’s personal identity or the experiences that they have. There’s A uniqueness in understanding things from many different, from many different spaces, many different lenses. And I think that’s still being missed out of the picture because I think this idea of
seeing them as maybe lived experience first and that being the only thing of expertise or the only thing of credibility is still keeping us in this in this hierarchy of who is seen as a leader. But I think one thing that’s come out recently is how many of this new wave of young leaders who are coming through that
also have that professional expertise, their expertise by the trade or the space or the industry that they’re in, combined with their lived experience. And I think that understanding is a really big missing piece of the puzzle. And so we’re not moving on that.
understanding of shared leadership or shared power.
Janet Thorne
Wow, you totally are the right person to answer this right. It’s amazing how much, how many different sources you can draw on. It’s really interesting. So could you talk a little bit more about the shared power and what that looks like? It’s such an interesting, because a lot of us talk about it, but I’m not sure where that many of us are that great at thinking about what does that actually look like in practice.
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Mhm.
Yeah, of course. So I think.
So one thing I’ve been looking a bit more into is about community centred driven design and how, in my experience, many women of colour when they lead design with and many, and obviously not generalising, but in the sector,
there tends to be an understanding of like…
Sorry, I just lost my train of thought. Designing with and designing for. I think that was the difference that I wanted to say. So
Janet Thorne
Mm.
Kiran Kaur
When a lot of leaders with that lived experience design with, it has that understanding of the starting basis that this has to work for all of us. Power has to be distributed in order for this mission or this change that we’re seeking to make to be able to happen. It relies on how collectively we do things for the outcome.
Whereas I think there’s something that already exists where it says this person is the most experienced and this person can help if they add this to the picture and this person’s not as needed because they don’t have it. I think there’s this…
There’s this hierarchy that’s still very much embedded in the existing systems. And I think in order to get to a point of shared power, I think we need to understand more broadly or more deeply about the power of collectivism and how each person plays or each person’s role plays a picture.
in that shared mission. I think at the moment it’s more that I have more experience, therefore I take this role and I have less, therefore I don’t take this role versus what does each role bring to the shared mission.
Janet Thorne
Yeah, that’s so powerful. And it’s just the hierarchy. And then I really like what you said about the starting point, whether you’re starting from the idea that you’re going to do it with everybody, and then you think about how you’re going to roll it out or how you’re going to design it rather than getting going and then asking someone to contribute.
Kiran Kaur
Mm.
Janet Thorne
kind of around the edges almost as it were. And I think that’s probably key to what you’re saying as well.
Kiran Kaur
You know?
Yeah, and I think just to add to that, there was something I was doing recently, some work around, and I know a lot of people are aware of like human centred design and how we keep people at the core. But there was something that I learned from actually American friends and activists who do a lot around community centred driven design versus
human centred design. And there’s a sentiment that human centred design is still rooted in a more colonial structure. There’s still hierarchy that exists within that community centred driven design. And I think you actually touched on this in a different way in your interview, which was around if we give people
the tools that they need, they actually design for those needs away from us. And that is the true, now we’ve got to the point of where change really exists. When people don’t need those same structures to rely on anymore, we’ve enabled people to actually self-organize and understand and identify the change that’s needed amongst them and actually have the ability to move with that away from us.
And I think that’s something that’s still not a more broadly understood or accepted way of doing things in the sector, in my opinion.
Janet Thorne
Yeah, so there’s that collectivist versus individual. We’re at danger of geeking out now on design and that might not be of interest to the wider equivo. So I’m trying to hold myself back here, but I do think there’s something about our very atomized, individualised society and therefore design, which is focusing on the individual versus something which is intentionally starting with
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Yeah.
Janet Thorne
the collective and it leads you in a really different place. But I think we should, I’m sure we’ll come back to this thing, but to try and avoid the risk of getting too design nerdy. The other question I really wanted to ask you, which you’ll know because I commented on LinkedIn when you posted, was you posted something about kind of doing my silly little job while the world is on fire. And, you know, it was kind of half tongue in cheek. Obviously, you care deeply about your job and don’t think it’s silly, but it is that sense of how our work can feel a little bit inconsequential compared to the scale of what’s going on out there. And I was really keen to hear more about that if you’re up for talking about that.
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Yeah, of course. Yeah, that post, it was really funny because…
I when I when I posted it, obviously it was it was coming from a real place, but there was there was a there was a humor, there was a humorous part in that. But it’s really funny because I think even I was getting messages and people being like, you know, your job’s not is not silly, like what you do is important. And it was it was really lovely because at one time I was like, no, no, I completely appreciate that.
But I think for me, I was like, two things definitely can exist at the same time. I can absolutely love this job and also find it really ridiculous given, you know, jumping onto Zoom calls a day after we hear that, you know, war has broken out and this has happened and that and I think sometimes that that feeling of just like you hear that you’re sitting with it as a human being, you’re feeling the effects, especially if you
are connected to the communities that are impacted by it directly. So on a very human level, very visual, you’re feeling it. And then it’s like 9am the next day, you have a Zoom call or you’ve got to log on to your emails and you’re about 50 emails behind. And as you’re like typing away, you’re like, what am I doing in the grand scheme of things?
And I think that these days that hits me more and more, and…
In a way, though, I appreciate that it does because I think it allows me to have perspective. And sometimes when I am maybe too much in the work, like deadline or this thing and thinking that this thing matters maybe more than it needs to, the life kind of is keeping me very grounded right now to be like,
There is a whole world out there and there’s a lot going on. Yes, this stuff is important, but in the grand scheme of things, you are also a person who exists outside of this role and this and this work. And I think it’s helped me to be like, what does what does that mean for me as a person, not for me as a professional?
And quite often we interlink those identities. But yeah, I didn’t imagine it to be something where I kind of needed to be reminded that the work is not silly. But there we go. That was a response.
Janet Thorne
I think that probably speaks to the support and love people have got for the work that you do. So I would take that as a compliment.
Kiran Kaur
Yeah, it’s really nice. It’s really nice to know. Yes, no, absolutely. It’s really lovely to know that people, if I do ever think that for real, that there’s a bunch of people who would be able to tell me otherwise and I appreciate that.
Janet Thorne
We all need those people in our corner, right? So thinking about, so you’ve been in the role for a while now, right? And thinking back to, I don’t know, maybe five years ago, what do you think feels different about leadership now compared to then?
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Wow.
Yeah, so this is my 10th year in post with Girl Dreamer. So yeah, five years ago, directly halfway in the journey and that would have been, oh, just after the pandemic or still within it at some point. Wow.
I think then there was, weirdly, there was a new sense of momentum, I’d say five years ago. And I think coming off the back of, you know, so many worldly events happening at the same time, so many things have been brought to light, injustices coming to the surface. And I think it created this push
in the sector, this nudge is particularly within funding. And it propelled a lot of the things that had just been there existing beneath the surface, particularly around the injustices that were happening in the world and that were affecting people on the everyday level. It just brought it all to life. And then I think there was this momentum of like,
What do we do about it? You know, so much funding became available. So many new organisations were starting. So many people who were doing grassroots work before that were registering and going and the funding was available and it was being distributed. And there was almost this like sense of like, oh, okay, like we’re sharing resource, we’re sharing power, it’s happening, it’s happening. And I feel like that really rose.
five years ago for a short while. And now I feel like we’re regressing a bit. And I know that there’s loads of change around, like, you know, focusing on, you know, systemic issues and how funding goes towards that and how organisations are working with that. But I think there was a there was five years ago, all of that felt more raw.
And now I feel like we’ve gone to the point where we’re like, oh, okay, that phase might be over. And there’s parts where we’re seeing new things unearth, but we’ve still not necessarily dealt with those ones that came up five years ago.
Janet Thorne
That really resonates with, yeah, my experience of the changes as well. And I think there’s so much from the pandemic that we could have learned from. Even while we were going through it, it felt like such a brilliant education alongside all of the terrible things that were happening as to how a society deals with huge change. But I don’t feel like we’ve collected.
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Yes.
Janet Thorne
relatively being able to learn those lessons for, I guess, a variety of reasons. And that’s a shame. And it does feel like it’s snapping back a bit. It was interesting. Jane and Kai in their interview were very waxing lyrical about the period when local councils were really working closely with the voluntary sector. Suddenly, the voluntary sector wasn’t the third sector. It was very much like almost the first sector, right? They were kind of right there at the front line, along with the health services.
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Janet Thorne
is obviously delivering what people needed. But yeah, how that’s kind of slipped back as well, as well as the money seems to have retreated somewhere, right? How do you think as a leader, it’s, what does it, how does that impact you as a leader, the change between the two periods, do you think?
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Oh, that’s a great question.
I think it’s on a very simple level. I feel like it’s confused me. And I think that might be because of the space that I operate in. So that directly impacted, like I said, the communities and the type of work I do in, you know, 2021 around that time.
And even moving into this space where it finally felt like the recognition of the work that we do, the importance placed on it, given world events, was finally coming to light. And there was going to be this like, oh, God, finally, I don’t have to try and really make a case for this and explain it. It’s just being understood. And so it’s going to now be a much
easier journey moving forward, only to find out that that wasn’t necessarily the case. And in fact, we’re still having to do a lot of that groundwork again. And in fact, over the past five years, just on a societal level, like we
Like I said, we’ve gone backwards in many ways. We’ve become more polarised in other ways. And I think that’s now created this slight sense of confusion about what that means for organisations like mine or leaders like me. But in the same breath, I think I’m also feeling this great sense of hope. And I think that’s coming from the fact that during that time, during the past five years,
There are so many new people taking up the or stepping into their own social impact leadership light. And that’s really prevalent amongst Gen Z. And I’ve seen this huge wave of what it means when this generation comes in to take over. And that’s something
for my own leadership, it gives me hope because I’m like, okay, even if it’s when I’m not in this space anymore, when if I’ve moved on, there’s this generation coming through and for that reason, leadership’s going to be okay. So that’s where I’m sitting with that at the moment.
Janet Thorne
That is massively hopeful. So let’s drill into that a little bit more. What are you seeing the Gen Z generation bringing?
How would you, how do you think they’re different to previous generations?
Kiran Kaur
I mean, the first word that came to my mind was fire. They are bringing in heat and momentum and they are action oriented at the core. I think there’s this thing of before we’d have to think about things and ideate them and then do lots of research and
years worth of if this thing’s going to work out or this thing’s a good idea and then we execute. Whereas they’re like, this thing is not okay, this thing is needed, we should have done something 10 years ago, we’ll do it right now. So they’re very like, we move first, we try to, we do action 1st and then we talk about it later.
And I think that’s going to cause a rate of change or a change in leadership that I don’t think we’ve seen yet. I think every other generation may have played by the rules a little bit more because the rules were made by the generations and therefore followed after that. Whereas I think this generation might rewrite some of those because there’s a lot more questioning of why certain things exist, how they exist, why we even do them, who set them up. Whereas I don’t even remember asking that many questions when I started. So I think that deep curiosity, action oriented and just a deep sense of collectivism and being unified is what’s going to change the world versus that individualistic approach. I think that’s what they’re going to bring or they are bringing. And what I’ve noticed in the past couple of years in particular, being a real, a real driver, and I don’t think they stand for things that are not okay.
Janet Thorne
You’ve made me so happy as the mother of two daughters who are very much in that generation. And I feel like you’ve literally just described my daughters to me. So, but you know, then it’s like, am I a biased mum and are other Gen Zers like this? So I’m really thrilled to hear that they are because I think we need lots more people like that in the world in positions where they can make change happen. And it’ll happen. I think, I wonder if it’s
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Wow.
No.
Yes.
Janet Thorne
partly because they’ve grown up. I mean, I grew up in an era when no one questioned the neoliberal paradigm, right? It was like, if you questioned capitalism, it meant you were a crazy socialist to, you know, there was, it was a very binary conversation. And now,
Kiran Kaur
I mean.
Yes, this.
Janet Thorne
You know, you’ve got Mark Carney questioning the…
rules-based order of the world, so questioning, it’s fairly obvious that it’s lying in tatters, right? But you know, all of these, they’re growing up in an era where all of these things are at least being contested, if not falling apart. So I guess it’s unsurprising that there are a lot more on the front foot in terms of challenging them and questioning them, but it’s great to hear that they’re bringing that.
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Mhm.
Janet Thorne
But, ohh, that’s super encouraging.
Kiran Kaur
Oh, they are. They are. And they approach very differently. I think I had a call with someone recently who was telling me all around, all about the power of TikTok with how you mobilise and possibly fundraise and how TikTok is a search engine. It’s not a social media platform.
And I was like, that is something I have never, because I don’t have it. It makes no sense to me. I thought it was just funny videos and then she was like, no, no. So she grew her.
following on TikTok first. So background is in engineering, built a social platform on TikTok for aspiring girls that want to go into STEM, got it to 120,000 followers in a very short amount of time, then registered, no, then applied for funding.
which we go through and then registered the organisation and completely worked backwards because she was like, you prove the case in a social space like this first and then you do it. And now all market research and even some fundraising tools are coming through TikTok. And that’s something that I just had never heard of before.
Janet Thorne
Wow, that’s such a brilliant, really concrete example of how differently things can be done by people with a different perspective. That’s amazing. So actually, that leads really neatly onto my next question, which is what assumptions about leadership do you think the charity sector needs to rethink?
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Yeah.
Ohh.
Oh, that’s a great question.
What assumptions?
I think there’s still an assumption of…
Who gets to be?
the leader and who’s still the beneficiary of things. I think there’s an assumption of even the people that are supported through many charities, it’s not seen as those people
are the ones that are also needed for the leadership. There just remains this like we help people and it’s the people who need help versus the people who are helping. And I think there’s something massively lost in not identifying that group who we support as being the potential leaders to continue.
the work that we’re doing or even take over. And I think they’re best placed, but there’s an assumption that, yeah, they need to be helped or empowered and they’re not the ones to lead on that. I also think there’s an assumption around what work
Is.
Deemed.
systemic and which one is deemed grassroots. And I think there’s a real missing piece around
For example, in particular, there’s a lot of organisations I know, and this was even my organisation in the early days, that centre a lot of work around joy, radical joy, play, things that, you know, come to the core of people. And those things are
Not.
Those things are assumed to be nice to haves, not where like real work, quote unquote, exists or where real impact exists. But I think there’s something hugely missing because in a lot of cultures and communities, that is how you drive change. That is a type of leadership. But I still think there’s an assumption that those are the nice to haves.
and the real work is where policy sits and the real work is where, you know, you can talk to government, you can change things. And I think something, there’s an assumption that that work is too far away from power or where it changed sits rather than the thing that actually changes things at the core. So there’s a huge assumption
Missing there.
Janet Thorne
Well, there’s a lot in what you’ve just said. It feels to me like there’s loads of different strands there. And one of them about joy, I just think is such a brilliant thing to bring in. And it’s, you know, if you ever sat down to, well, you will have sat
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Janet Thorne
to fill out funding applications, for example. And you always have to start with what’s the problem? It was always framed as a problem or a deficit, right? And it’s really difficult to, I mean, I actually have this problem with reach because we’re largely about opportunity rather than problems. And I find it very hard to and frustrating to have to re-engineer everything into problems. But you’re already talking to something even more profound than that, which is about starting
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Janet Thorne
Which I suppose a little bit like asset-based community development as well, isn’t it? But it’s focusing on what’s strong and joyful and positive. And I mean, who wouldn’t rather focus on that than everything that’s going wrong? Because we all know that that’s, which isn’t to say that you’re going to ignore it right or not fix it. But if it’s your primary focus, then it.
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Janet Thorne
It just puts you in a totally different relationship to the work, to each other, everything.
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Janet Thorne
Yeah, so I think joy is a lovely. I don’t know if you’ve got anything more you want to say about joy or whether that’s, I don’t want you to have to stretch the point, but I do think it’s such a great angle.
Kiran Kaur
No.
No, just actually what you just said, it just, it brought a point back about the assumption of when you want to make change, when you’re doing work in the charity sector, you know, often we talk about it having to all come from, like you said, a point of what the problem is or, you know, if you are trauma informed,
as an organisation and as a type of leadership, that that’s the way to go. But I think there is something potentially there or not there around healing centred and being healing centred 1st and approaching things from that place. And like you said, that covers things like joy, that covers things of like what are the places where people are speaking from
a place of power and not just a place of pain. Because again, often we focus first on problem and then fix it versus what opportunities, strengths, things that have already been done and already have moved that we can work with to build on. And I think, yeah, there’s something really interesting going on around that space. And I think
That’s also when we talked about the Gen Z point, there’s something in them coming forward with being more healing centred at the start. They don’t necessarily see themselves in the same way that maybe others would paint them or they would be painted as the people in quote unquote need.
versus what they believe that they already have to bring to the table and to the picture. And I think we’re seeing a shift there, one that I very much welcome. But yeah, definitely a shift there.
Janet Thorne
Yeah, absolutely. And it’s the shift from, I don’t even know if this does justice to actually, but there’s the do with versus do to or do for. So do 2 is, or do for is the old charity model, I guess, the old fashioned one. Do 2 is, I don’t know, going back as a level to kind of authoritarian kind of.
Kiran Kaur
And.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Janet Thorne
or really, yeah, but the do with is the idea of working with, but in a way, perhaps if the, if you’re starting with the community, it’s not even do with it, because do with sounds like an external agency coming in to do with, right? So it’s, yes, I’m not quite sure what the term would be, but
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
That will be the thing we’ll think about after this and maybe, yeah, maybe there is a way to frame that more accurately, but there’s definitely something in there, yeah.
Janet Thorne
Excellent. I’m sure you guys will be the ones to coin it, so I’m waiting for that. Do you think the charity sector, I don’t know if you, do you identify as being part of the charity sector for starters or not?
Kiran Kaur
That’s such an interesting question.
And I think it’s interesting because until people say it, like actually say the word child centre, I don’t feel like I do. Yeah, so I don’t know. Like it doesn’t, it’s not something that every day, like in my self identity, if I talk about myself, I don’t tend to lean that way.
Janet Thorne
How would you describe the work or the arena that you work within? Social impact or what’s your… yeah.
Kiran Kaur
Yes, I broadly say social impact and I’ll say social impact leader then if I have to kind of, yeah, add that. But I’ll definitely say social impact more than charity.
Janet Thorne
Okay, so thinking about the kind of leadership qualities that are needed to be successful in the social impact sector.
Kiran Kaur
Mhm.
Janet Thorne
Do you think that there are particular mindsets and skills that…
people working in those sectors have that maybe other sectors don’t have so much or could learn from.
Kiran Kaur
Mmh.
I definitely think…
a lot of empathy. I think empathy is a huge skill that
I believe the sector possesses a lot and I guess in part of that is that nature of when you work with underserved or vulnerable communities is a very human-centered way to be, you know, where we interact with people at the core. And so I think that being empathetic by
not necessarily by nature. It’s not the way everybody operates and I completely appreciate that too. But I think there’s an increased sense of empathy, compassion and care that I think exists within this sector versus maybe other ones.
And I think…
And I’m not sure if this is a skill or a thing, but there’s more of a crossover between…
personal attributes that overlap with the professional ones. There’s more of a sense of bringing those personable or those interpersonal skills to the jobs that we do. And there tends to be a lot of overlap between what people are personally, what they care about or what they engage with outside of the work is similar to what the work that they do. And so I think people are a lot more connected
to the work. I also think…
Communication is a massive one. I think from my experience, the way people communicate in the sector is more…
Yeah, is more.
detailed or more lived or more, I’m not sure the word I’m trying to use, but the communication.
It can come from a sense of being connected to the calls or connected to the work or the impact.
And I don’t see that as much outside of it. Yeah, those are some things that come to mind.
Janet Thorne
Hmm.
Kind of a more relational way of working, I guess, is kind of underpinning what you’re saying, yeah.
Kiran Kaur
Yes, there is. There’s more a sense of that collaborative effort. We need each other to make this happen versus working in isolation for, you know, personal gain. It’s more how do we come together to, there’s a lot more we.
Um, in in in this sector.
Janet Thorne
And you’re very much, very much framing things as a we rather than an I, but I’m going to throw this in an I question in there. I want to know what behaviours you most try to model for your teams that you work as a leader.
Kiran Kaur
Okay.
Do I try to model?
I think a sense of…
authenticity. I definitely accidentally got here and sometimes I feel like it shows. Sometimes I don’t know how to feel about that because there’s a sense of trying to keep up with the sector and leaders and CEOs and I’m like, this was not a planned journey. And so
there was times where that used to feel like it really held me back in terms of how I, you know, how I present myself in the sector or how I lead or what I do. And I think over time, I’ve just learned to lean into that. And so I try to model that, you know, whether you got here accidentally, whether you studied or you come from experience and just
however you are, whatever that authentic voice is, I think I’ve leaned into that a bit more with myself and I just try to be like, I’m not perfect. I have no idea what’s happening quite often, but the best thing I can do is be here
authentically. And I can, and I try to model that because I also don’t expect that, you know, these polished versions from my team, I want them to also come authentically and present what they’re great at and what they struggle with and have the safety and the space to express that.
So I try to do that a lot and hope that it’s how we can work better together.
And yeah, so I think that’s where I sit with that.
Janet Thorne
I think there’s two things on that that I’d love to say back to you, which one is that I think there’s a large proportion of leaders who got there by accident. Certainly I myself had, in fact, I actively didn’t want to be a CEO, but I found myself bounced into the position.
Kiran Kaur
Mmh.
And.
Janet Thorne
Many years later, here I still am. And I think my story is probably less uncommon than I imagined it was when I first took on the role. It took me a long time to believe that I could actually, I used to sort of apologise for it or be slightly embarrassed to even say my job title because it seems so unlikely than what I’d first thought of. And I think the second thing, we were having a conversation about this in the office early yesterday, which was how
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Janet Thorne
And we weren’t really talking just about the sector. I think we were talking about the world at large, but how a lot of the people who end up in leadership positions who really wanted to get those positions aren’t always the best people to have them right. The people who seek power, for example, aren’t necessarily the people you want to have power. And so a lot of the people you want to encourage to imagine themselves into leadership positions are those who wouldn’t naturally
Kiran Kaur
Mm.
Janet Thorne
imagine themselves into that position. And therefore, by modelling an authentic self where you’re not polished and full of gravitas or whatever it is that we imagine leaders officially are meant to look like, is actually a huge encouragement to the very people that we want to become leaders.
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
No.
Yes.
Janet Thorne
To think, yes, they could do it.
Kiran Kaur
I absolutely, absolutely agree.
Janet Thorne
OK, I’m gonna change change up a little bit and ask you.
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Janet Thorne
What’s one challenge you think you see CEOs in our sectors wrestling with that we just don’t talk about enough?
Kiran Kaur
The great question.
I think we don’t talk enough about…
our wellbeing. I think there’s a need. And I think maybe LinkedIn doesn’t help with this because we always have to be honored, thrilled and excited to announce something great all the time. So there’s this pressure, there’s already pressure being a CEO to actually, you know, keep the organisation going and keep it alive.
And then there’s another kind of pressure of how we present ourselves constantly and having to kind of keep up with that and not compare and not feel not great about ourselves because we’re comparing and all of this stuff and then having to take to platforms where the only thing you can share is how wonderful everything is going. And I think we don’t
talk enough about the fact that we’re probably not okay all of the time. And so it seems, and how as CEOs, it’s okay to be, you know, be leaders and be responsible for things, but also to be responsible for
how we feel or be forthcoming about the fact that if we need support or we’re not fit to do this right now or this, you know, we’re feeling uncertain or we’re not feeling great about things to have safer spaces to be able to express that.
I don’t see that enough. And I wish that we’d just be like, not having a great time with this or really struggling with that. And I think sometimes we, you know, relate those things to failure or things not going right. But I think the journey of a leader or a CEO is to ride those waves.
And I, and I just wish, I wish that we did that more.
Janet Thorne
So riding the waves of things not going well on an organisational level and on a personal level, but that…
accepting that that is just part of the journey and modelling in a way how to do that without sacrificing your own health or yeah.
Kiran Kaur
Yeah, ’cause it.
Yeah, exactly. Because I think there’s, and it’s a message, it’s a message that I’m trying really hard actively to, to the new people that, new young leaders that we’re funding through Girl Dreamer, I’m trying really actively to create space where people can express
more openly about the highs and the lows of the journey, because I think then there’s a danger of setting, especially people who are entering new into the space with less resource, there’s a danger of setting people up for a facade about what it means to be a leader, because we always, because we constantly highlight all the great parts.
There’s not room to be like, and also things can go really wrong. And in fact, this is how things went wrong. This is also ways you can get around that. But I think it really helps people and coming back to your point about people not necessarily seeing themselves as leaders, that could actually be a really encouraging way to bring new leadership into the space by being like,
if we were just more open about how generally the journey highs and lows, even speaking about the lows after we’ve come through them, if that feels better to just be like I’m speaking from a place of power on this, but this did happen, or that if we’re not okay, where’s the kind of spaces for CEOs to lean into that more? What’s that community
Space.
that CEOs have to lean into that and not think that it’s you kind of coming forth with all what you would consider failures, but rather an opportunity for others to hold space and care for you as you do for others.
Janet Thorne
Yeah, I think there’s two really important things that are out there. And they’re kind of different because there’s what you need as a CEO. And as you know, as frequently said, but it’s said because it’s so true, it is a very unique role where you are. It is quite a learning role. And you do have a unique set of pressures on you that you need to be able to
share freely with someone, but can’t necessarily with people in your organisation. So I do think that, and people have peer learning groups and things, action learning sets and that and so on. And I think those are massively powerful, aren’t they? I think it’s really interesting, though, thinking about what you share externally and how
Kiran Kaur
Mm.
Janet Thorne
And what you don’t share does influence people’s perception of, or understanding even, not just of the role, but of the world in general. And I think we can create quite a…
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Janet Thorne
warped sense of what it’s like if we don’t share honestly. And there’s a lot of learning as well, right, in the things that aren’t going right. Often it’s richer in learning than the things that are going right.
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Yeah.
Absolutely, absolutely. I think if we, if that was slightly more balanced, then again, like…
I feel like it’d be cathartic for us to say, but it will also be much, or it’d be at least more accurate of a picture for other people who are considering, you know, what this role really entails. But yeah, I feel like sometimes I look at LinkedIn and I’m like, I need to come off it now.
This is not the day for it. This is not the moment for it. So we’ll just, we’ll leave it alone.
Janet Thorne
Yeah, absolutely. No, I share that sensation. And I think there’s something maybe that leaders are going to need in the future, that resilience of knowing how to work through tough times and how to just accommodate them as part of
Kiran Kaur
Mm.
Janet Thorne
part of the ebb and flow of life. As the world gets more tumultuous, I think it’s going to be an important skill set to have. So I guess the more we wear it publicly and encourage others to, and the more we learn to develop that skill.
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Absolutely. Isn’t we can also lean into each other more then? Because if I said something that then, and I said it openly and you were like, oh, you know what, I also went through a moment of that. Then suddenly I now am able to kind of lean into the space with you and take
Janet Thorne
Yeah.
Kiran Kaur
that that learning and you know that could have a ripple effect. And I think that’s a that would just be a wonderful thing to have. But there’s a there’s a certain armour that we that we carry. And I sometimes I really wish that we didn’t. And I could just say this openly or ask this question and it would just, you know, be welcomed with responses because I’d love to do that. So I’d love more of that.
to be happening around me.
Janet Thorne
Hundred percent. And I think I think that’s such an interesting point you make, actually, because it changes from being I had this issue to we’ve had this issue. And that kind of fundamentally changes how you relate to it. And not only can you learn from each other and support each other, but other people can go, oh, OK, that’s a thing, not just, you know, that’s a Janet thing, which is a bit strange, or, you know, whatever you fear is going to be.
Kiran Kaur
S.
Yes.
Yeah, exactly that.
Janet Thorne
response. So what helps you when the pressure is high? What helps you stay anchored as a leader?
Kiran Kaur
I was, you know what, funnily, my very first thought was like, as soon as you said that, I thought, when things are not feeling great, I was like, coffee. And then I was like, God, no, that makes everything 10 times worse in high pressure.
Honestly, I think…
leaning into practices, or the first thing that came to mind actually was my friends. And I know that’s like a very
Yeah, that answer is maybe just more simplified, but I think it’s…
when things get high pressure for me, I need to very quickly be anchored and put into perspective of something like the complete opposite. And I have a lot of friends who have nothing to do with the sector. And I love that because I can’t take that issue or have somebody relate to it. And when I’m feeling like the stakes are high or
the pressure is on, I really need someone to actually not understand what I’m talking about because it helps just lower a lot of that stress and a lot of those are like instantly, it’s like an instant pulling out of that space and being put into a completely different one. I really, I really enjoy
that. So I lean a lot into like my personal relationships away from work.
I absolutely stay away from social media. But yeah, I think that would be my answer, actually. I think friends, I lean into people straight away.
Janet Thorne
Sure, I think it’s the, I think my answer to that was partly like, just leave work and go and talk to my family. And very quickly I switched from the feeling that what I say is consequential to what I say is totally inconsequential. It’s a nice relief and a good reminder of that.
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Exactly.
Exactly that, exactly that. I love when I’m having those moments and whoever I’m talking to is so not, it’s so away from it that they can’t necessarily even hold space for that because it’s so out of their world. And I’m like, oh, I need this. I need to, I need to talk about something completely, completely different. Or I’ll speak to like my,
my younger cousins who are still like in school or in college and I’m just like learning about school drama of 2026 and, you know, thanking the God that I’m so far away from that. But also now I have no idea what my issue was anymore.
Janet Thorne
Yeah, exactly. There’s nothing more all engrossing than drama of a yes.
Kiran Kaur
Oh my god, yeah. And 15 year olds have a lot. There’s so much going on.
Janet Thorne
Yeah, and plenty to say about it as well, right?
Kiran Kaur
So much, so much.
Janet Thorne
So I think my final question is where do you think the next wave
of innovation will come from. In fact, I think we know that. It’s going to be Gen Z, right? So let’s rephrase that. Let’s say, how do you see the role of the CEO changing in the next decade?
Kiran Kaur
It is.
Yes, definitely right on the, it’s the Gen Z wave coming that we’re going to, we’re going to see. The Gen Z wave mixed with an introduction of the Gen Alpha wave and I don’t even know how ready we are for that wave, which is
So the onset of that’s going to happen as Gen Z really dig, because I think people don’t understand there’s older Gen Z. Gen Z is like, I think we’re still pushing into maybe late 20s. So obviously in 10 years, which means that alphas are coming up very soon and they’ll be the new 20 year old soon. So I’m not sure we’re completely ready for
for that, because I don’t know if we’ve got a good grasp of Gen Z yet, let alone Alpha. But I think that wave is coming there. And I think the role of the CEO will change massively because of the way Gen Z in particular think about power and distribution of power.
and how their approach to collectivism.
is stronger than ever before. I think there will, there’s a questioning of power regardless of intention. And sometimes I think.
Even when things are unneeded and they’re not all, they’re not all, they’re not all bad.
Sometimes she said, don’t necessarily understand that. And so there has to be a balance of understanding or at least communicating or showing why certain structures can still work with this new wave of changes that’s needed and how we still need to maintain a level of structure around the rapid rate of change that’s coming.
and how we don’t necessarily need to burn it all down all at once, but how we can burn and build simultaneously. And I think the role of the CEO understanding, one, accepting that that’s going to happen, like it’s coming thick and fast with the new generations. There’s no avoiding it. But I think to really understand and really go like,
10 toes in with this and understand how to build with them then and how to present itself as working in relation to as part of the bigger picture as a team, because any whiff of me versus you or, you know, I’m up here and you’re down there, that will crumble really quickly.
really quick. Like I said, there’s a new generation who are building power movement, fundraising thing on TikTok alone. And if they don’t trust or don’t see that in their in CEOs and in companies, they’ll just go and build away from us all. And then I actually don’t know what job we will have left to hold then.
Janet Thorne
And maybe that would be all right, but there are, maybe it could all burn down a little bit too easily as well. So there are, like you say, there are things which are still delivering elements of stuff that we need to keep going and protect, at least until all the new stuff is fully taken root. So yes, I feel like we might have a role. I’m now putting myself in the same generation as you, Kiran, which I don’t think is really justified, but
Kiran Kaur
Yes.
Janet Thorne
in relation to this Gen Z, I’m going to do it. And so, yeah, it’ll be interesting to see how we can marry the two with…
without seeming like we’re just digging our heels in or resisting change, but in a way that’s helpful and supporting it. I think that’s a really exciting proposition.
Kiran Kaur
Exactly.
Yeah, we’re going to have to generationally build like we’ve never have before. So I think intergenerational leadership is going to be really, a really important one.
Janet Thorne
Wow, totally. Yes. Well, I feel like that’s a whole other episode, but the next episode is not between you and me. Do you want to introduce the next the next guest who you’re introducing next, who you’re interviewing next?
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Okay.
Oh yes, of course, of course. Oh my God. I was just, I feel like there’s so many, like you said, there’s part twos and threes and fours of so many things that we touched on, Janet. Thank you so much for all the questions and really giving me so much to think about or we think about actually. So yes, the next episode,
Janet Thorne
Yeah.
Kiran Kaur
I actually have the pleasure of interviewing Jane Ide, who everyone will know as the CEO of Akivo. I have many, many questions for her. So it’s really hard to just be like, what’s one I can take the roof to start the next the next episode with?
And I think the one that’s maybe standing out right now is as someone connected to CEOs all over the country every day, it’s part of, you know, it’s such a huge part of her role. I wonder if there’s a sentiment that Jane thinks everyone is sharing right now.
that they might not know. As we all work in our silos, we all work around the space, you know, I wonder if there’s something that we’re not connected to or that we’re not aware of that she might be as somebody who kind of is able to sit more at the heart of it all.
Yeah, there was a two-parter in that as well, because I recently learnt that Jane is resides in Bakewell. And as the sector is quite London-centric and many things and a lot of the resource and the pattern, just everything is all in and around London, I wonder
how she navigates.
the journey of being a central figure within the sector, but being away from the London bubble of it all.
Janet Thorne
That’s 2 brilliant questions. I’m really looking forward to seeing how Jane answers them. I think they’re particularly the question about the sentiment maybe that we’re all holding, but not knowing that each other is holding. I think that’s a really interesting one. I was actually trying to find out. I had a German friend around last night and I was actually asking him if there’s a word for that. So this feels very
Kiran Kaur
Yeah.
Janet Thorne
like serendipity. I was thinking that the Germans must have a word for it, right? But it turns out they don’t. So we’ve yet to give it a label. But anyway, I think that’ll be such an interesting, be really interesting to hear the answer to that. Kiran, it’s been such a pleasure. It’s been so interesting talking to you and really uplifting and joyous as well. So thank you.
Kiran Kaur
Ooh.
Oh, interesting.
Ohh.
Thank you so much, Janet. Loved your questions. I love the flow of the conversation. And yeah, I just appreciate finally being in the space for you and you holding space for me. So thank you so much.