The Success Nuggets

Success Nuggets #34 - Embracing Unexpected Journeys and Resilience with Chris Browne

• David Abel • Season 2 • Episode 14

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Chris Browne, our most popular guest, shares an unexpected career twist that led to self-discovery and happiness after being let go from Ted Baker after 30 years. His story is a testament to resilience, as he found joy in new opportunities, including an exciting role in Saudi Arabia. Chris’s insights, drawn from Malcolm Gladwell's "Blink," reveal the power of instinctive knowledge and how it aided him in adapting to fresh environments.

His journey underscores the possibility of finding purpose in unexpected places while continuing his passion for visual merchandising and engaging with cultures that are worlds apart. 

The episode takes a deeper look into embracing neurodivergence as a powerful asset. We explore personal stories of happiness amidst adversity, challenging imposter syndrome, and the empowering exercise of defining oneself with four personal words.

 By drawing inspiration from figures like football manager Brian Clough, we discuss perseverance, humour, and the notion of being 'difficult' as a constructive trait. 

Speaker 1:

Thank you about the patterns that drive progress. Get ready to dive into a world of insights and inspiration. This is the Success Nuggets podcast, with the founder of the Digital Lightbulb and your host, david Abel.

Speaker 2:

Yes, okay, listeners, chris Brown is back. Chris Brown is the number one voted podcast of the Success Nuggets series to date. Chris also recorded a pilot with me that was two minutes long, where I think I said welcome to, and so I'm going to say again welcome to chris brown, chris brown I must have, I must have voted for myself many times to make myself number one, david.

Speaker 3:

But thank you for that. That's uh, that's nice, nice to know.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, choose. Happy was the one that everyone said they absolutely loved. Now there was a time in your life where you left Ted Baker after many years.

Speaker 3:

Well yeah, I'll call it a euphemism when I left, I was sacked. I was unceremoniously dumped after 30 years, but the reaction and'm still. I still puzzle this myself. In a kind of amused way. I spent 30 minutes or so walking away from the office, going up to king's cross and going for a bite to evil. Maybe an hour in hysterics. I was laughing, I was laughing so deeply and I kept on thinking, oh dear, and I was having this self-conversation am I, am I going? Am I going mad? Am I literally? Is it hysteria? And actually it wasn't. And I don't think to this day, I don't think it was.

Speaker 3:

So, yeah, I mean, it was a massive lesson and you do look into the depths of your soul in a funny way. But I did and I just saw, I liked what I saw. I saw someone who's inside my core, unhappy, inside my core. I'm happy. I mean that's where the laughter was coming from, a happy place, and I just thought I'll be all right, I'll be all right.

Speaker 3:

What happens next? And I've ended up having? I would swap it. I like calling it the truth. If I could go back and somehow or other get through, navigate what was happening at that time, I couldn't have done. It was a point of principle really that I was leaving the company. But if I could somehow I don't know undo that problem and the company still be great to this day and still be in one piece and still what I originally wanted it to be, I'd go back and choose that. So I wouldn't choose what's happened, but the seven years that have gone by since I've just had the most amazing, crazy time, and just before we came on air I said to you I've had an awful lot of I'll call it failure, but things haven't gone my way.

Speaker 3:

Now I'm in a role where I'm using my skills. I'm working with an entertaining and interesting team in a different culture. Working in Saudi Arabia already got to love a lot of the Saudi people that I'm working with. Great people, so warm and so welcoming Hospitality. First, you know you can't have a meeting without the coffee being served and the dates being brought out and I love all that. It's nice and there's a genuine. They touch their heart and you know they pretty, they mean it, it's nice.

Speaker 2:

If you could go back, and maybe it wouldn't have changed, the same outcome may have happened. Sometimes the destiny is just pointed in a new way. What age were you? Do you remember which age you were at the time?

Speaker 3:

I was 55, yeah, when I left right.

Speaker 2:

So you're right in the zone where many people then retreat to what's known as a lonely island. Yeah, and they don't have the confidence and they don't have the toughness or the resilience, or maybe, in your case, you just can't sit still. But you've done like lots of speaking roles. You've still continued to travel the world. I think you still can't sit still, but you've done like lots of speaking roles. You've still continued to travel the world. I think you still can't walk in a shop without visually merchandising it and that's it.

Speaker 3:

That's funny, you know, that's any shop. I can go into other brand shops and start, you know, start ticking over what I would do, and if I get a chance to do anything about it, I do it. You know, I start doing it, which is nonsense really. It's like a busman's holiday. But no, I, you know, I.

Speaker 3:

I I like referring to um a book called blink by Malcolm Gladwell, and that is about how, when you've got a deep knowledge of something, it becomes almost instinctive and innate that you can use that knowledge. And I did things. I walked into a store for two minutes and then left the store my old ted baker stores and then I diagnosed the store and I first time I did it I was in dallas and I did it with the store manager s, johanni, who's a remained a good friend of mine to this day and I said to her I'm not in this occasion I didn't even go into the shop. I sat outside and I said I'm gonna set this bench with you and I'm gonna tell you all sorts of stuff about the shop. And she said that I think five of the seven things I told her were wrong at the time and I said no, no, I'm not wrong and they'll all come true. And she's like no, that's really arrogant, that's not going to happen. Anyway, I was right.

Speaker 3:

There was a girl actually in the stockroom who was chronically autistic and I could see that in the precision in the way things were put out in the shop. And I said there's no team in the world that puts things out as precisely as that. And I said I bet, if I go in the stockroom, you can eat your lunch off the floor. And they were like, oh my God, yeah, it's washed with bleach every single day. Now, you know, stockrooms in shops, they're not washed with bleach every day. She washed that shoproom stockroom floor with bleach every day because she was, you know, clean. But I saw, and I didn't even see her, I just saw. Looking at the shot, this is too perfect. So, yeah, so I have got.

Speaker 3:

I've now got a savants ability, I suppose, to do retail, and it was all just bricks and mortar. No, not just bricks and mortar. Online too. Online, as it's so bloody boring Clicking and buying something. What do you get? You might get a little video. That's about it. Where are the holograms I was promised? Where are the flying cars? You know where's? Where's the? Where's the virtual mall where I see an avatar of me who goes to meet the avatar of my sister and go shopping. You know, halfway around the world, in Vegas, when I'm sitting in England and she's sitting in Australia, none of that is happening yet.

Speaker 3:

So what's also exciting about working in Saudi Arabia is they are working in the future. Everything's about what can we do. What can we do? You know I'm working to do an immersive presentation. Apparently, we're working how that could be, working with various companies that produce it for us. So we want an immersive experience of what this park is going to be and what it's going to become over the next. Sorry, I should say I work for King Salmon Park, which is one of the seven wonders of the world that's happening in Saudi Arabia. So, yeah, my resilience has meant that I've ended up, seven years later, doing a job. I've done some other jobs, but this one really feels like you know something special and I can be involved in one of the giga projects.

Speaker 2:

And there you go. And, chris, if I may ask, how old are you now?

Speaker 3:

62 now.

Speaker 2:

Okay. So for anyone listening out there, there's a guy here who may have been through that same almost what could be a crushing loss after all those years a project that wasn't finished, couldn't get a job with his friend. Seven years later he's gone on to accomplish several things and now he's got a dream project. So it's a great message never to give up. Where does that never sit and still come from? How far back can we attribute it?

Speaker 3:

is from childhood. It's developed over time, so I have got a hyperactive kind of history, I suppose. Yes, when I was a child and I had it, I used to like do things. I'd try and control the whole classroom and make the whole classroom do things that I decided we were doing. I mean, that's another, that's a story for another day. I used to get threatened with being expelled frequently by the headmaster, but that's just an excess of energy.

Speaker 3:

I mean, I've got this thing and I know anyone with a autistic child or a child with any kind of divergent brain. You know I've probably got a neurodivergent brain and probably a neurodivergent body. But it's a superpower and that's how I regard it. You know, one of my, one of my family, has got quite a chronic case of sort of an ADHD condition. I'm not sure they finally diagnosed what it is yet. And yet I don't, I don't know, maybe it's a like, like minded person to me, I don person to me, I don't, I don't see that when I'm with them I find I don't want to say the name, but I find that I, I get. I get what they're doing, I get what's what's going on, I get why they're behaving the way they are, and I just think that should be used as a superpower. You know, I think I think that with everything though, it's like, you know, we, we all get sick from time to time. So you get sick, you get better, you get on with it.

Speaker 3:

I'd love to do a course in counselingselling because I think I'm accidentally being a counsellor throughout my career. You know, counselling people, giving people guidance and advice, coming from my point of view. I'm not sure how valuable it is, because my point of view is to be relentlessly happy. You know, I gave myself my own little mantra relentlessly happy and I asked the team to come up with their own ones. Your own phrase that you live by Mine was relentlessly happy. It doesn't really mean work it.

Speaker 3:

Your own phrase that you live by Mine was relentlessly happy. It doesn't really mean work, it just means I just did everything in life. I don't want to go back to the choose happy thing again, but if you have that mindset being relentlessly happy, you know people are like oh yeah, you can't be. Yeah, you can, you can be happy. You know, stephen at One Gold Nugget always said to me and but he can correct me if I'm wrong, but he said my nugget, my original nugget of choosing happy, was something that really struck him, because he doesn't choose happy, because he actually wakes up and almost sometimes decides not to be happy. I've never done that in my life, never done it in my life, even the worst days of my life. You know deaths in the family, bad news, you know illness, whatever it could be that's the time when you really prove it.

Speaker 3:

The other day it was from cassia afferton, who all right, I think you may know as well, but I've seen this, I've seen her yeah, she does phenomenal work out globally empowering women in the trade, but she's a great coach as well.

Speaker 2:

and I had a moment and said to me choose four words that describe yourself, but they cannot be dad, husband, son, brother. What brand JTMs do you want, man, just for you? And I had the word adventurous down, looked it up in the dictionary, confirmed adventurous suits fun, I thought I'd go with, and then I thought I'd go with, and then I thought about my family and and coming from love, you know, as you say, is a key, key part fun loving, adventurous spirit. Right, and in terms of choosing happy, if I can choose, fun loving, adventurous spirit every day, yeah, when I write a piece of content and go, great, that's mine. I don't know if there's an imposter syndrome out there or not.

Speaker 3:

I just don't believe in imposters. It's nonsense. Yeah, you are who you are and you're trying to be something, in some circumstances maybe, but I don't suffer from that. I'm me, I'm me and I'm me, here, there and everywhere. I think people are that I'm me, I'm me and I'm me, here, there and everywhere. I think people are that Even if you're I don't know putting a show on, it's still you doing it. So, no, imposter syndrome is a damaging phrase. I'm quite anti that. I don't know if you're going to ask me about my four words, but I've got a word for you which you might not necessarily associate with me, but I'm really proud of this word, which is one word.

Speaker 3:

Years ago, my former colleague and the founder of Ted Baker said that I was difficult and I thought, yeah, sometimes I am difficult. I think my team, jamie, my close colleague in the team, in the retail team, at times would find me difficult in terms of being demanding on time, maybe demanding on speed of doing things, in terms of thinking things were doable that probably weren't or possibly weren't, and then we managed to do it. So I quite like the word difficult in that context of actually. Yeah, you know I'm. I think I exhaust my family at times. I apologize to them, but if that's because it's demanding, it's because of standards, because it's being a bit difficult, then I think that's actually quite a good thing. You know, I like the football manager, brian Clough. He was difficult but it was a thread of genius running through being difficult. You know, I have literally honestly pounded away. I mean it took a year to get the job that I'm doing now, literally honestly pounded away. I mean it took a year to get the job that I'm doing now. And my wife said to me several times give it up, give it up, give it up. I won't give it up. It's the same as I am with sport, same as I am with work, same as I am with everything. Keep on battering away and you get through in the end. So, yeah, it's difficult.

Speaker 3:

I like another one. Oh, here we go Bending the rules. Now, yeah, funny, I literally and this is I don't mean funny as in I'm super funny, david I just think every single thing I find humor in. Yeah, I can be driving along and just laugh at some silly thoughts coming to my head, or somebody I've seen on the street who's something they've done has amused me so funny. If it got a bit serious in the board meeting. I found that really funny and I would literally start smirking and laughing to myself. The other board members go. Oh dear, he's gone. So I've got my four words actually two together relentlessly happy. So relentless is a word actually. Relentless and happy is two separate words. I'm relentless and you know, I know I'm not everyone's cup of tea. Sometimes that can be oh my God, can he just shut up? You know I probably can't.

Speaker 2:

But if you can wear those badges before and if anyone out there is doing the exercise.

Speaker 3:

I get sick of this idea. I think the 55 thing let's just go back to that for a second 55, mid-50s maybe getting to 60, crisis of particularly the ones that have lost a job male or female lost a job that they wanted to do for a bit longer. The business world is changing in every category, so things don't have the longevity they had Again. I just think, well, hold on you. So things don't have the longevity they had Again. I just think, well, hold on, you've got skills. You've got to a point and an age and experience and you've got skills. That's like another little test for you to go again, not to shrink from it.

Speaker 3:

Now, obviously some people don't find it easy. I'm not dismissing it, but that's your chance. It's like sometimes you need a bit of adversity. It's not always hearts and flowers. It doesn't always work out the way you want it to. And I've ended up. I've done private equity, I've done non-exec work and advisory, done an awful lot of consulting, which is this much maligned word. But actually you're a consultant for a reason You've got skills and knowledge that people need and they haven't got really, really obvious. And shall I not bother saying it. Then I realised, no, these people don't know one. They don't know about retail, they don't know about numbers of rails and units and staffing requirements and roles within a retail team, but they can't see the value of it or the need of it because it's not their skill set, it's not their area. So I feel like I can add huge value.

Speaker 2:

I'm going to go back to the word difficult, if I can. I think that's a brilliant word, and I've worked with you, I've worked under you. Difficult was how we liked it. Difficult is also a challenge, not that it's impossible, but by being difficult and applying difficult. That's why you like sport. Yeah, it is quite a sportish mindset, perhaps.

Speaker 3:

It is. It absolutely is, and that's why I would sometimes do things with the team. I would get the team together and we'd break up something that was doing okay and I'd break it up, and I do use that as a sport analogy. It's like when a football team is doing well and sometimes the time to change it is when it's at its peak. I think Alex Ferguson, guardiola, has been doing it well and maybe he's missing a moment now, but it's a bit interesting where they're out there. They're still doing a great team, but they decided to break up and I did that with the teams. I would also spot talent within the team which wasn't immediately obvious, and if some of my colleagues were here, they'd all be claiming oh no, no, we knew that so and so was going to be good at operations or so and so wasn't suited to that store or that environment or whatever. I was like. No, you didn't. I genuinely spent.

Speaker 3:

I think deeply about everyone that I was working with and where should the, where are their skills best allied to and where should they go? And we have a strong underpinning, as you know, at ted, in that we did the training events with my good friend, john doll yes, we did, and the best part of it was it was secret. So so we did it, and then the people who attended didn't come back and speak about it because they could see that by speaking about what we did they'd ruin it for the next people that attended. But then it became it's self-perpetuating excitement. We ran five events in the end five different events and people would want to go, and there we would stress people's abilities and get them to think differently who they were, what they wanted to achieve. Sometimes it led to people leaving.

Speaker 3:

That's also good, because actually, if you get someone to go, I don't want to be a retailer or I don't want to be an operations or a merchandiser or accountant within the retail side or in the fashion company. I actually want to go and be the artist I originally was, and if we uncover that, that was a fantastic investment from the company too. And you could argue that's quite a difficult thing to do and people would go. Oh, my god, I'm literally getting to delve into who I am. What do I really want to be? What am I good at? What do I need assistance with? There's a whole world of training, learning and development, but I am, again, relentless and obsessed about gonna wrap it up today, chris.

Speaker 2:

Do you have a new one golden nugget you could share?

Speaker 3:

well, you throw that on me when I wasn't thinking about golden nuggets, but let me come up with one who is in like, who's inspiring you today to keep pushing forward, like these kind of ideas I think.

Speaker 3:

I think all four of my children are inspiring me and that's going to sound really a bit oh yeah, we've all got great kids. We love our kids. My son is working with the founders of Be Real and Bumble over in America and he's become a model in six months and he's become an influencer and he won that job out of 10,000 people. My daughter, elvie mixes. She manages a gym and she mixes some of the great and good of the Brighton society, from football people to Frank Smith, the CEO of Matchrooms, a friend of hers. You know the fact that she's doing that and working at that level every day.

Speaker 3:

My daughter Holly is a teacher working in a school in Oxford, one of the best schools. I always forget the name of it Christ's College, oxford or something. It's amazing. It's an amazing, old-fashioned, beautiful school. She's working in and again working a high level. And then my daughter Lucy's out in Australia and, just firing up the ranks, she's become an insurance broker running running one of the biggest. She does run the biggest account of the biggest insurance brokers in Australia and she's an accidental insurance broker.

Speaker 3:

So watching what they're doing and feeling like I had a bit to play in that I mean their moms, but their moms did too, absolutely. But I know I had a bit to play in that. You know, I was saying to my daughter, my oldest daughter, the other day, just like how badass she was, and she came back and said I'm not badass, that's a funny word. And I went, I don't know, just think it suits you. You are badass, you've cruising through life. Yeah, there's something. So yeah, there's that. I mean I think my, my golden nugget is absolutely now I think I've read this somewhere the other day, so it's not my nugget but reach out to somebody that you're thinking about. Don't just think about them, don't just remember them. Reach out to them, you know.

Speaker 3:

You know, a friend of mine died three years ago from covid and he was found. This is a miserable way to end, but he was. He died from covid. He wasn't found for two weeks because he was down on his luck. He was found. This is a miserable way to end, but he died from COVID. He wasn't found for two weeks because he was down on his luck. He was living in a bedsit and having a tough time.

Speaker 3:

I spoke to him about a month before he died and we had this very late night rambling crazy conversation with him, and it was a big regret of mine. We arranged to meet for coffee and then he went quiet on me. Well, he went quiet on me. Well, he went quiet on me because he passed away. But I just wish I'd been a bit quicker. You know, I wish, I wish I'd reached out a day or two earlier and got to him a bit earlier and then had that conversation.

Speaker 3:

So with that sort of miserable thought in mind, don't get me wrong. The guy was the most flamboyant, genius guy in my life and I just feel like you know he's a loss to the world, he's a loss to to me. But there's somebody out there that probably needs a call from you, needs your time. I can do this. I'll tell you one last thing and then I'll shut up.

Speaker 3:

I was always told I could do this and I test myself. I can make people contact me by thinking about them. That's great, but actually I'm going to do better than that. I'm just going to call them. I'm not going to wait for the magic to happen. I am going to call them. So, in fact, the guy that I was talking about earlier, who I'm trying to help get a job, I'm going to give him a call. I'm in London for a day next week. I'm going to meet him for coffee next week. That's my promise to you and a promise to him. Teach people you know, go and see them, speak to them, contact them, send them something random and in the audience.

Speaker 2:

Just close your eyes just for 10 seconds and think of that person that you're going to call. Okay.

Speaker 3:

You got someone, David.

Speaker 2:

I've got a meeting in three minutes. I'm going to call that person.

Speaker 3:

No, but did you get the person? Oh, you got the person.

Speaker 2:

No, I have got the person. I've got the person and they're in my family. I'm going to get.

Speaker 3:

I've got the person and they're in my family. I'm going to give them. I bet you they need you right now, so that's why.

Speaker 2:

It's two people in my family and they very much do so. Thank you for that exercise, Chris. Thanks for coming in. I cannot wait for version three, version four and all the others that we've got in store. Yeah, I look forward to it and I do Good speaking to you, david, brilliant Chris, thanks so much, and to the audience, thanks for hanging in there. Go and call someone, bye, bye.

Speaker 1:

Join David and his incredible guests next time on the Success Nuggets podcast and to find out more, visit one golden nugget dot com. Thank you for listening.