Meet the Future-Proofers

Andrew Henning

Area Managing Director - London, Grosvenor House Suites

What’s a great piece of helpful career advice you’ve been given, that you’d pass onto others? You’re only as good as your team, so hire the best, develop them and create an environment for them to flourish.

What moment in your current job really cemented your passion for what you do? The challenge of reopening an independent Grosvenor House Suites, with a new team, in a short period of time and achieving great results.

What professional achievement have you been most proud of over the past year? Taking further responsibility with overseeing the transition of Highgate’s next hotel in London.

What is a key professional goal you’ve set for yourself over the coming year? The planning of a significant refurbishment of Grosvenor House Suites.

Personally, what highlight is on the horizon for 2023? I’ve just been signed up for the London Marathon, so need to start training!

Adam Sebba

CEO, The Luminaire

What’s a great piece of helpful career advice you’ve been given, that you’d pass onto others? One of the best pieces of business advice I ever received was one of our investors once told me that good service was the best form of marketing. It’s something that really stuck with me, about how to run a service company.

The best career advice I ever received was from a great mentor, John Botts – a towering figure and an amazing man. He urged me to invest in my own learning and do an MBA, and it proved truly lifechanging.

What moment in your current job really cemented your passion for what you do? I’ve always been passionate about travel, but, for me, the passion comes both from seeing our guests’ delight at the experiences we’ve created for them, but more so from seeing the personal growth of the individuals that comprise a team.

What professional achievement have you been most proud of over the past year? I am incredibly proud of the achievements of The Luminaire: growing a new and disruptive brand. However, that is an achievement brought about by our dedicated team and visionary investors, so it is certainly a shared accomplishment.

What is a key professional goal you’ve set for yourself over the coming year? I have two goals. Firstly, I am lucky to be surrounded by such talented advisers and board members. One of my goals is to take the opportunity to learn from them and their experiences to help my own personal growth. My other professional aim is, counterintuitively perhaps, to try to achieve more balance with my family and professional life

Personally, what highlight is on the horizon for 2023? I’m incredibly excited about some of the partnerships we are launching in 2023, some with global scale and reach – and my eldest son will be finishing his GCSEs so there’ll definitely be cause for celebration.

Andrew Roberts

Senior Vice President, Corporate Relations and Engagement, Burberry

What’s a great piece of helpful career advice you’ve been given, that you’d pass onto others? “If you feel safe in the area you’re working in, you’re not working in the right area. Always go a little further into the water than you feel you’re capable of being in. Go a little bit out of your depth. And when you don’t feel that your feet are quite touching the bottom, you’re just about in the right place to do something exciting.” – David Bowie.

What moment in your current job really cemented your passion for what you do? Covid-19 and how we responded as an organisation. A true test of our ability to manage through adversity and come out stronger. A time when we really stepped up as a team and as a company to support each other and the country, and lived our purpose.

What professional achievement have you been most proud of over the past year? There has been a lot of exciting change at Burberry over the past 12 months with the arrivals of Jonathan and Daniel, but I am going to say the evolution of my team. I couldn’t be prouder of the way they have gone about their business and developed this year, individually and collectively. They are the best.

What is a key professional goal you’ve set for yourself over the coming year? To keep listening to David Bowie. See above!

Matthew Cox

Creative Director, Matthew Cox

What’s a great piece of helpful career advice you’ve been given, that you’d pass onto others? Right at the beginning of my antique dealing journey, my antique dealer father Robin, along with a number of his contemporaries, told me I’d be wise to pursue a different path. Antique dealing wasn’t what it used to be, they said. I quickly discovered that every generation feels this way – my grandfather having had the same conversation with my father 35 years earlier! The truth is that each of us brought innovation to our careers, and none of the three generations of our family has approached antique dealing in the same way. Embrace the future with enthusiasm and you won’t look back.

What moment in your current job really cemented your passion for what you do? Three years ago we spent time doing a branding exercise to try to get to the bottom of why I’ve been compelled to do what I do for the last 25 years, and it all came back to an absolute reverence for nature. It was a defining moment for me - not only because it made sense of all the choices I’d made so far, but also because I knew it would give me a way to share my passion with the next generation, and make a genuine difference to the world.

What professional achievement have you been most proud of over the past year? Steering our growing studio and workshop through yet another choppy old year.

What is a key professional goal you’ve set for yourself over the coming year? Laying the foundations of the business has been phenomenally time-consuming, so in this coming year I’m excited to spend more time working on our creative direction.

Personally, what highlight is on the horizon for 2023? To go on a family holiday with as many of us as possible!

Bernie de la cuona

Founder and CEO, de la Cuona

What’s a great piece of helpful career advice you’ve been given, that you’d pass onto others? My father once said, no doesn’t mean no, just find a different way of asking the question. If you are determined to make something happen it is a great mindset to have.

What moment in your current job really cemented your passion for what you do? There hasn’t been one particular moment. Whenever I see something new or different that inspires me I get a great thrill from dreaming up ways to translate them into beautiful natural textiles. The many constant challenges of running my own business drives me forward each and every day.

What professional achievement have you been most proud of over the past year? Being able to continue to launch stand-out marketing campaigns and as many quality collections as previous years in the current economic environment has been a real achievement in the last year.

What is a key professional goal you’ve set for yourself over the coming year? As a luxury business I am determined to continue to elevate the brand and to examine every aspect of what we do from our product design and supply chain traceability to our customer experience and marketing. It is only through doing so that we will continue to deliver the customer what they have come to expect from de Le Cuona.

Personally, what highlight is on the horizon for 2023? My husband and I have been working on a conservation project in Zambia. It has long been my dream of ours, and 2023 is going to be a big year for the initiative.  

Monica Rastogi

Regional Director of Inclusion, Diversity & Equity, Estee Lauder Companies

What’s a great piece of helpful career advice you’ve been given, that you’d pass onto others? An old boss of mine told me that there is no such thing as perfect work/life balance. There are times when your personal life will and should take priority and others where you work life needs more of you and that's ok. Be comfortable flexing differently at different times and own the decisions you make at that time.

What moment in your current job really cemented your passion for what you do? I don’t have an exact moment, but what constantly fuels me is how much I learn on a daily basis. I have said this before: I feel like a beauty anthropologist! Leaning into our commonalities, celebrating our points of uniqueness and understanding how culture, traditions, environment play such a big role in our we connect with beauty and engage with each other on a daily basis.

What professional achievement have you been most proud of over the past year? The inroads that we are making at ELC UK&I around disability inclusion and prioritising employee and consumer needs across disability and neurodiversity – ensuring we can truly live our promise of being the most inclusive beauty company in the UK&I across all touchpoints from education to store design to communications.

What is a key professional goal you’ve set for yourself over the coming year? Now that we are back to in-person events, I want to continue to build out my ID&E network – there is so much we can learn from each other and across industry. What does ‘success’ look like, how can we challenge the status quo, and how do you keep ID&E relevant?

Personally, what highlight is on the horizon for 2023? After living in the UK for almost 14 years, I am going to try for my UK drivers license. A goal in the making for years and 2023 is the year!

James Amos

Director of Marketing, Boodles

James Amos joined Boodles nearly 15 years ago and, following a number of years managing the Harrods boutique and then the Dublin shop, he has now established himself in his role as Marketing Director for the company. James finds so many areas of the business interesting, but it is the development of the Boodles brand and the strategic decisions behind the growth of the business that really excite him.