The importance of staying curious.

Proud to receive this special award in recognition of my career & achievements.

Alumni Achievement Award | A speech for the graduating students

I was recently awarded an Alumni Achievement Award by The University of Lancashire, where I graduated with a First Class Honours in 1994. I was asked to give a speech to the graduating students, to offer my advice and insights for their future.

Good afternoon everyone.

I would like to thank the University for my Alumni Achievement Award. It means a great deal to me and it’s an honour to receive it.

More importantly, I would like to congratulate all of you for graduating today.

I am sure getting to this point has taken a lot of hard work and determination. So, take a moment to enjoy your special day. You have all earned it.

When I graduated from this university in 1994, campus life looked very different. My faculty only had one computer, which was shared between several courses. And if I’m honest, none of us really knew what to do with it. There was no Google. No YouTube. No social media. We didn’t carry smartphones in our pockets. The internet existed, but only just. And the concept of AI belonged firmly in science fiction movies. The pace of change over the last thirty years has been incredible. Throughout this time, I have enjoyed a career in Marketing, working at some of the world’s best media and technology companies, including Disney, Sony PlayStation, Sony Music and Viber.

I’ve launched exciting new products and brands and worked with some incredibly smart people. I’ve had a front-row seat as technology, culture and consumer behaviour have transformed at a pace that would have seemed unimaginable when I was sitting where you are today. Looking back, one thing strikes me. The people who seem to have navigated change most successfully are the people who stayed curious.

I’ve spent most of my career understanding how people behave. What motivates them, what influences them, why they do what they do. And time and time again I’ve found the biggest opportunities come from asking the questions other people are not. A good example of this was at Sony Music in 2010, when I led the team that launched the boy band ‘One Direction’ – I’m sure a few of you will have heard of them! At the time, the music industry would obsess over radio airplay and chart positions. That was how success had been measured for years.

But a simple thought was nagging at the back of my mind:

How many teenage girls still listen to the radio anymore?

The answer was obvious to me: Hardly any.

They were all online - creating communities on Facebook, following celebrities on Twitter and sharing videos on YouTube. Social media was in its infancy back then, but you could already see how dramatically it was changing the behaviour of music fans. So instead of focusing our efforts on traditional media like radio, we built a global fan community online for the band. It might seem obvious today, but at the time, it wasn’t. What made the difference was our curiosity. We were paying attention to changing behaviour, rather than relying on the way the industry had always worked.

I found myself asking similar questions in 2004 as Marketing Director at PlayStation. At the time, gaming was largely marketed towards young men. Fast cars, action games and high-octane competition. My challenge from the CEO was to ‘get more women and girls into PlayStation’. So we created a new game called SingStar. Ultimately it was a competitive karaoke game. But what made it different was how people used it. Friends gathered around it and families played together. People who would never have described themselves as ‘gamers’ suddenly wanted to get involved. What looked like a simple music game, was a fun & very social experience.

That observation led us to think differently about how the PlayStation console might be used. We shifted it from the teenage boy’s bedroom into the heart of the family living room. It helped us make PlayStation feel more inclusive, more sociable and more accessible to audiences who had previously felt excluded from gaming culture.

Neither of these examples came from being able to magically predict the future. They came from paying attention and being curious.

I think a sense of curiosity is even more vital today. Because we live in a world overflowing with information. We can ask almost any question and receive an answer in seconds.

The challenge isn’t finding answers anymore. It is knowing which questions are worth asking in the first place.

More recently, my curiosity led me somewhere new and unexpected. After thirty years in marketing, I decided to change direction and retrain as a Garden and Landscape Designer.

I’m sure some people thought that was an unusual career move, especially at 52 years old. But for me, it felt entirely natural. I became curious about taking a different path. One thing I’ve learned over the years is that a career is rarely linear, and most people’s lives don’t follow a carefully laid out plan. Mine certainly hasn’t.

Industries evolve and unexpected opportunities appear. And sometimes the most important decisions you’ll make are based on information you simply don’t have yet. That’s why I’ve become increasingly sceptical of certainty. I’m less interested in people who claim to have all the answers. And I’m drawn to people who are open to changing their mind. Those who keep exploring and are curious about everything.

Today, you are graduating into a world where AI will generate answers in seconds and algorithms will serve them up instantly. But the correct answers have never been the scarce resource. It’s the challenging questions that are.

The assumptions that remain unchallenged. And the opportunities hidden in plain sight.

Don’t feel pressured to have everything worked out at this stage, as very few people do. Opportunities will come as technology strides forwards, and new industries emerge. The world you are graduating into today will look very different in five, ten, or even thirty-years’ from now…

And when change comes, your greatest advantage won’t be certainty. It will be your ability to remain open-minded, flexible and agile

And above all, to be curious.

Because curiosity is what leads to experimentation, discovery and innovation

It helps us see things differently and change direction when we need to.

So perhaps the most important thought I can leave you with today is this:

As you step into the next chapter of your life, what will you do to stay curious?

Thank you for inviting me to be part of today’s special celebration

and once again, congratulations to you all.