So working with peers and spitballing ideas and bringing along challenges with, you know, board discussions or strategy like that I found that stuff so so valuable yeah and it kind of you know kept me away from making some mistakes or taking the organization down that that peer support because it really matters

Absolutely.

It's what I call the beating heart of Akiko.

So in simple terms, we are here as an organisation, we've got three really clear objectives.

One is around supporting our members in their leadership development.

And that's perhaps something that's evolved over the years of Akiko's history, that understanding that wherever is whatever stage you're at in your leadership journey whether you're aspiring to be a chief executive or whether you've been around the block and been doing it for 25 years there's always more that you need to learn to think about to reflect on to develop and and at different stages in that journey you'll have different needs and different needs of different ways of wanting to learn around that so we do a lot of work in that space and that's where we deliver programs and events and a whole calendar of things that happen through the year that our members can tap into The second part, which is a really crucial part and has become increasingly important, which again I think is perhaps rather different to our more recent history because the need has become so much more obvious, is the support that we offer to our members.

Again, it kind of goes back to that point of being quite an isolating role.

But talk to me about that tension from your perspective.

Does that have any pros, cons, or just what is that experience like as a whole?

I think it, I think it definitely has aspects to it which in some ways, if you look at it logically, seem quite ridiculous.

What difference does it make? Especially these days of, you know, we, we are, at Acevo, we're a completely, um, remote working...

I, well, I don't like the word remote, 'cause that sounds like we're distant from each other or anything, but, but we don't have an office space anymore.

We did.

We used to be, we used to be a London-based organization, 'cause that was how we were founded and how we were set up.

And, and certainly in years gone by, you know, part of the history of Acevo was that the majority of our members were b- based in London, so where else would you be? But- The pandemic obviously started to change that.

Yeah.