Laura Davies-Clare
UK
Laura Davies-Clare is a delight to work with – she has an exceptional ability to truly listen and understand her client’s needs, whilst also being constructively challenging. She has a commercial focus and I have always found her to go above and beyond in her work, demonstrating a real commitment to the value she delivers.
Global Head of Talent,
Healthcare Company
The ambition and purpose in Laura’s work is to enable people and their organisations to be adaptable to an increasingly challenging and dynamic environment, without experiencing the pain that is commonplace with conventional change programmes. Laura places growth mindset principles and practices at the heart of her work to build resilience and agility at all levels within an organisation. This approach enables people to challenge assumptions and shift underlying beliefs and behaviours to create sustainable change and transformation.
Originally a procurement and supply chain specialist, she has over 15 years commercial experience in both the public and private sector. Laura has worked in FMCGs and Defence, and consulted across Finance, Infrastructure, Emergency Services, NHS, Energy, Legal, Manufacturing, Healthcare, Telecoms, Central Government, IT and Pharmaceuticals. She is experienced in delivering multi-national programmes and working across all levels within organisations, from new graduate entrants through to c-suite executives.
Laura started her career as an internal change consultant at Unilever, and has maintained continuous improvement and innovation as a thread throughout her career; one programme Laura designed and delivered creating savings of £50M. She has created multiple programmes to enable high performing teams, with particular focus on creating the conditions for psychological safety.
Laura has extensive experience in developing leaders in matrix organisations, with particular focus on enabling business partners to leverage their effectiveness and drive high performance across the business.
Her most recent work has included the design and delivery of a bespoke leadership programme designed to enable technical specialists to become first time people managers; making the shift from delivering outcomes to delivering through others.
“My early career focused on process improvement and quality management. Whilst I could see the benefits of these practices, I discovered that ultimately they created voids in organisations – empowering some and leaving others feeling marginalised. My ever evolving approach has allowed me to meet the needs of people within organisational systems at all grades, taking a holistic perspective of people impacts, change and improvement – providing people with the skills & insights they need to be and do differently. My defining moment was realising that it is not only possible, but vital, to balance the commercial objectives of an organisation with the needs of the individuals it comprises.” – Laura Davies-Clare
Specialties & Passions
- Growth Mindset – creating the conditions needed for sustainable high performance by reframing attitudes and behaviours, and enabling a psychologically safe space where people are able to learn from their mistakes and leverage their collective intelligence.
- Partnering and Collaboration – enabling people to leverage their influence rather than relying on direct authority. Helping people who are stuck in ‘the middle’ to find the balance between meeting their functional objectives and wider organisational objectives.
- Culture Change – enabling people to expand their circle of influence to leverage shifts in ‘the way things get done around here’, allowing new and different ways of working to emerge.
- Learning and Development – analysis of where an organisation is stuck and the skills and capabilities needed to make a step change at all levels of leadership.
- Change Leadership – works with teams at all levels in organisation, delivering individual and team coaching/mentoring, and the creation of high performing teams (HPT). Expert in the blend of leadership practices people need to effectively lead change.
- Organisation modelling and new ways of working – has led or been centrally involved in organisational redesigns in central government and management consulting. Expertise in enabling structures; policies, governance, reporting and risk.
- Lean – has a deep understanding of Total Quality Management (TQM) approaches, including Lean, Kaizen, Agile, Value Stream Mapping and Total Productive Maintenance (TPM)
- Commercial Management – has 10 year’s commercial experience delivering procurements worth £millions, and latterly advising on projects and partnerships worth £billions.
Work Experience
- Consultant with Matthew Syed Consulting; delivery of approaches to embed growth mindset and enable innovation to happen in complex and uncertain times
- Design and delivery of multiple programmes to develop leaders in matrix organisations, with particular focus on enabling business partners to leverage their effectiveness and drive high performance across the business.
- Design and delivery of a bespoke leadership programme for a global engineering consultancy to enable technical specialists to become first time people managers; making the shift from delivering outcomes to delivering through others.
- Design and delivery of a High Impact Team Leadership programme at a leading health care company.
- Design and delivery of an organisation-wide continuous improvement methodology in the public sector, driving both innovation and cultural shifts.
Qualifications
- System Coaching & Constellations Essentials
- Holacracy Practitioner
- Member of Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply
- Certificate of Competence, Commercial Practice – National School of Government
- BA (Hons) Business Studies
- Certificate of Business Practice