Kath Smythe - a little about me

My kids like to tell me I’m old!! I like to think that I’m wiser. And the wiser I get, the more confident I am in leaning into my core beliefs that shape who I am, what I do and how I do it.

I have three core beliefs:

1. Most people want to succeed at life and do a good job when they are at work

2. We enable people to thrive, perform, feel good and contribute well when they have the right conditions or enablers around them

3. The most important job for leaders and organisations is to create those conditions where people can thrive

And the evidence supports my beliefs. International, cross-sectoral evidence that shows us that when people are enabled to thrive at work most of our measures of organisational success will go up.

These beliefs are grounded in personal experience. I had a terrible time at high school and spectacularly under-achieved. I loved my time at college and thrived. The difference were the conditions that were around me - agency, friends, freedom to follow my interests, different conversations. 

When I reflect on my working life, I’ve done my very best work when I’ve had the freedom to apply my learning and use my judgement to do the things I believed to be right - not necessarily the things that were easy or expected.

And from a deeply personal perspective, caring for a family member who was seriously mentally ill enabled me to witness change in slow motion. I remember having a light bulb moment when I realised I couldn’t fix them. This moment of absolute clarity: my job was to make sure they had what they needed around them - love, safety, calm, support. Their change, in their way, at their pace. 

This experience changed me. It changed how I think about change.  It changed how I work to enable change.

How I work is shaped by my 25-year professional career as an employee in local government. I joined Manchester council - a council with a reputation for radical thinking and action - as a graduate trainee. I learned so much by moving around and gaining experience across different functional areas - corporate performance, partnerships, operational and front line delivery, HR and OD, change and transformation - as I progressed into senior leadership. 

My approach »

These experiences gave me a strong understanding of how organisations work as interconnected systems. I learned that change in one area can have unintended consequences in another, which is why it is important to think and act holistically.

For the last few years I’ve worked independently as a consultant. One of the things I love most about it is the freedom to lean into who I really am, unconstrained by a job description. And actually, I’ve learned that it’s the juxtaposition of my attributes that brings most value to my clients:

• I draw on my deep learning, knowledge and evidence but translate it into practical, actionable approaches

• I can think and act from strategic and operational perspectives at the same time to make sure change lands

• I have the freedom to work in the spaces where organisational transformation, culture change and people change intersect because that’s where real change happens

• I bring challenge and have honest conversations but do it with compassion and kindness so that people don’t feel attacked

• I don’t have to choose between big bang transformation and smaller incremental change because I understand how they are inter-connected

People describe me as a “quiet” leader. I’m most effective when I’m setting the rhythm for change to happen, and equipping and enabling people to understand how to deliver evidence-based change, working alongside and building sustainable capacity for the future.

So my kids are partly right… I am getting older, but that means I can draw on all of that experience and knowledge and the wisdom gained.

Having the courage to do things our own way brings freedom, joy and fulfilment and  that that’s how you give people the best of what you have to offer.

My approach »