- Series launches with Lee Child, author of the phenomenally popular Jack Reacher novels
- Upcoming guests include Lord Karan Bilimoria, Sharmadean Reid, Sir Brad Fried, Liv Boree and Asbjørn Rachlew
It was announced last week that acclaimed business journalist, broadcaster and best-selling author Bruce Whitfield is launching a podcast on decision making.
Decisions, decisions….It’s estimated that each of us make more than 30,000 decisions a day. These range from small, automatic choices such as what to wear or eat, to the more deliberate calls on who to marry or where children should go to school and, at work, what projects to focus on and which to cut loose.
In a new podcast, The Art of Deciding with Bruce Whitfield the award-winning journalist meets a wide range of decision makers – from a criminal investigator to titans of industry, an award-winning author and a champion poker player.
The conversations shine a light on the crux of decisions we all have to make in our daily lives, with each guest sharing insight into the tools they use to steer them in the right direction.
We’re often required to make big decisions using imperfect data and unreliable information and every decision we make requires some kind of trade off.
Kicking off The Art of Deciding, the first episode features best-selling author Lee Child, creator of former military police officer Jack Reacher. To coincide with the launch of his latest Reacher novel In Too Deep – the 29th in the acclaimed series – Child speaks to Bruce on the decisions he makes to keep his character interesting without resorting to outlandish plot twists.
Child describes himself as the only person Reacher is scared of, as his fate rests in the mind of the author. Does he have an end in mind for one of fiction’s tough-guy heroes?
Upcoming guests in the series include:
- Founder and chairman of The Cobra Beer Partnership, Lord Karan Bilimoria. Today, a cross-party peer in the House of Lords and a key figure in trade between the UK and India, the country of his birth. Bilimoria shares with Bruce his insights into knowing what to ignore and how to recognise when to grab an opportunity and when to let it pass you by.
- Entrepreneur, innovator and feminist champion, Sharmadean Reid, who talks about what inspired her decisions that led to a reimagining of the way the beauty industry works – especially for the women in it – and about why it is that women are often forced to make decisions that don’t serve their own interests.
- Former chair of the Court of the Bank of England, Sir Brad Fried on how he gets the best out of his teams and how the power of giving agency to teams of smart, capable people means leaders can guide and mentor rather than instruct.
- Former world poker champion, Liv Boree. Hear how Boree studied astrophysics but entered a reality TV show and found herself thrust into the world of competitive card playing which earned her millions over a decade before she gave it up. An expert on calculating probability, how do you ensure that you make the best choice, fast?
- Norwegian police superintendent Asbjørn Rachlew who has worked as a homicide detective for eight years, including as advisor to the team interviewing Anders Breivik, the man who carried out two domestic terror attacks in Oslo and Utøya in 2011. His work has seen the development of global standards for investigative interviewing which are the antithesis of the stereotypical fist-slamming interrogation of the Hollywood cop drama. He bases his decisions on one key principle: “What if the opposite is true?
Bruce Whitfield, host of The Art of Deciding with Bruce Whitfield, said: “We live In a world where nothing is certain or guaranteed, and where people constantly prevaricate and procrastinate to the point of distraction. I’m fascinated by people and what motivates us. The decisions we all make in a myriad of ways each day have immediate and long term consequences but how do we make them? What factors determine our decisions? Through these revealing and insightful conversations, I’m excited to see if we can find out with the most brilliant guests in The Art of Deciding and I can’t wait to share them with you.”
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About Bruce Whitfield
Bruce Whitfield is a business speaker, journalist, author and moderator who interprets the noise at the murky intersection of business, politics and society. He has the extraordinary ability to bring clarity, humour, and insight to complex issues.
This fresh perspective helps his audience understand how we can choose to fix the future.
As a sought-after keynote speaker, he is backed by nearly three decades of impeccable journalistic credentials. He is as comfortable on a stage as he is on camera or behind the microphone. He has shared platforms with Bill and Hillary Clinton, Nouriel Roubini, Charlize Theron, Lord Mervyn King, and hundreds of business and political luminaries and personalities.
Bruce is an award-winning journalist, who, for the last 20 years has continuously hosted a nightly radio show, condensing the complex world of money, economics, and business amidst the noise and clutter of a confusing world. Bruce has also hosted numerous TV programs, is a Contributing Editor to business publications and a foreign correspondent to multiple international news providers.
He has spoken and facilitated discussions as a media leader at the World Economic Forum in Davos and delivers content to audiences around the world.
