SSON Podcast series: Rob Bradford, Akzo Nobel

Our inimitable Podcast host Seth Adler (the David Letterman of SSON), points the mike at Rob Bradford...

Rob gave a keynote presentation at SSO Week 2018 in Lisbon, earlier this year. Here's a flavor of how the podcast conversation went...

Seth Adler: Rob Bradford joins us – senior vice president of GBS Operations at AkzoNobel. Welcome to SSON on B2BiQ. And we are here at SSO Week in Lisbon. But it's not Lisbon.

Rob Bradford: No, it's really Lisboa.

Seth Adler: Lisboa. That's exactly right.

Rob Bradford: I used to live in Brazil, so I speak a little Portuguese.

Seth Adler: Do you really?

Rob Bradford: Yes.

Seth Adler: Obrigado?

Rob Bradford: Yeah. I know obrigado.

Seth Adler: Yeah. And I guess it's between you and I. it's 'obrigado'.

Rob Bradford: Yeah, but for a woman, 'obrigada'.

Seth Adler: Yeah. Which is an interesting thing. We don't do that in English.

Rob Bradford: And in Brazil, they drop the O altogether. It's just brigado and brigada.

Seth Adler: Oh, wow. Okay.

Rob Bradford: Yeah, yeah. It's more laid back there, I think.

Seth Adler: I haven't been, so I'm going to have to check that out. I trust you though.

Rob Bradford: Well, that's your first mistake.

Seth Adler: Yeah, exactly. But you give off this kind of trusting vibe, with that big smile on your face. 

Rob Bradford: Ha!

Seth Adler: I'd love for you to take us through what happened at AkzoNobel, and the lessons learned because your session went well and came off well. You got some good questions from it.

Rob Bradford: Yeah, a couple of great questions. 

Seth Adler: Let's start with the end in mind. What was the goal when you began your journey?

Rob Bradford: Well, in AkzoNobel, it was to not relive the pain of the past. A lot of people are motivated by fame and money, and I'm motivated by avoidance of pain. So when I agreed to take
this job on, I thought back to all the other GBS organizations I've either worked for, consulted for, built in the past. And I said, "What would I have to have in place in order to do this one more time and kind of come out of retirement for one more shot?"

So a friend and I, we took this job together, we sat down, got a six pack of beer and said, "What's our demand list to take this?"

Find out where it goes from there in this ever-entertaining podcast series:

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