Inspire-Ability Series 3 Episode 6
In the second part of her story, Sarah Stephenson-Hunter reveals what led to her tidal wave moment, forcing Sarah to confront unimaginable challenges. With unwavering courage, Sarah opens up about the hard decisions she's had to make, fully embracing her new reality, relentlessly building her confidence to be the best disabled entrepreneur she can be today and most importantly, her authentic true self.
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In this heartfelt episode, we sit down with Sarah Stephenson-Hunter, who shares her powerful journey of growing up with health challenges and the profound impact it had on her childhood. Facing severe bullying and struggling to fit in at school, Sarah battled through some dark times. Despite her health deteriorating over the years, she opens up about the emotional journey of losing her sight, but through it all finding the resilience in the face of adversity. Listen in to hear Sarah's story of strength, perseverance, and the unwavering belief in living life to the fullest.
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In the second part of Mandy’s chat with Harriett, she reflects upon her experiences navigating life in the military. Mandy opens up about the challenges of being female in a traditionally male-dominated field, exploring the power of teamwork, selfless service, and the evolution of mental health awareness. Sharing personal stories from her deployment in Iraq, she paints a vivid picture of the resilience and courage required on the frontlines, proving a powerful conversation about strength, sacrifice, and the importance of honesty.
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This week, fast jet pilot, now motivational speaker and author of ‘An Officer, Not a Gentleman’ Mandy Hickson sits down with Harriett Pound. Mandy walks us through her early career and the stepping stones she faced as she navigated the RAF in the 1980’s. Facing failures, building resilience and educating others on ‘Femininity’, Mandy reflects on how her past experiences have shaped her into the un-apologetic woman she is today.
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In Part 2, Paul and David share how their mother ensured that they remained grounded throughout the peaks and troughs of their career paths. With twists and turns, we find out these brothers have had no easy ride, but through it all made invaluable memories and maintained a brotherly bond that they’ll cherish forever.
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Kicking off the New Year, Harriett is joined by the Winstanley brothers; Paul (Air Traffic Controller, Chair of the UK ATCO union and Aerobility trustee) and David (C.E.O of Biggin Hill Airport). Sharing their unfiltered highs and lows, Paul and David discuss how they navigated through early life, learning to look after their mental health, and how bouncing back from mistakes helped them develop into the inspirational leaders they are today.
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In a special one-off live episode of Inspire-Ability, recorded out in the elements at Blackbushe during our fantastic Aerobility Live event, Harriett is joined on stage by Katherine Moloney. Katherine is a successful businesswoman, and recently established the ‘Elevate Her’ programme to educate, inform, and inspire gender diversity in the aviation industry. Despite her current passion for all things flying, Katherine tells Harriett how this was not always the case, having been uninterested in aviation until she was 18! Now though, Katherine is driven by her love of flying, and her desire to share this with as many other women as possible. She discusses with Harriett the importance of having conviction in your beliefs, the positive impact that imposter syndrome can be harnessed to bring, and why aviation must be made into a more inclusive environment.
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For the final episode of this year’s studio recordings of Inspire-Ability, Chrissie Miller takes us through her journey from graduating staff college through to taking the role she dreamed of when first starting out within the RAF. Although her experiences in this time challenged the preconceived ideas that she had about service life, Chrissie shares with Harriett her observations as a female in a senior leadership role in the RAF, when so often she found herself to be the only woman in the room. Chrissie also reflects on the progress that has been made in society, especially in Forces life, in comparison with her parents’ generation, and in this she firmly advocates for the flexible working policies that enabled her to remain in her position while raising a young family.
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In the second part of our conversation with Chrissie, she discusses the challenges she faced during the training for her role in the RAF. To help her overcome this, she shares with Harriett how she found “another little family” within the Air Force, especially in the extracurricular sporting opportunities it presented. Despite the stresses of her course, Chrissie was ultimately successful in graduating as an area radar operator at the first attempt, and what follows was an extremely impressive progression in the field, including a deployment to Afghanistan.
Read MoreInspire-Ability Series 2 Episode 25
The first episode with our final studio guest of the series sees Chrissie Miller catch up with Harriett. The current RAF Group Captain discusses her childhood and military upbringing, with both parents serving in the Navy, and how she left university with a sports science degree but very little firm career direction. With the military calling, Chrissie goes on to describe how she approached the interview process, and explains why working in an office role at Vodaphone was the perfect training to become an RAF Air Traffic Controller!
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For our final episode in conversation with Al, he and Harriett discuss the importance of role models while reflecting on his speaking visit to a school, where he was inspired by the childrens’ interest in aviation; conversation also covers the real and perceived barriers for various demographics, and how this can be improved by those within the industry.
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In the second part of our conversation with Allister Bridger, he discusses his role as Director of Flight Operations with British Airways during the coronavirus pandemic, and the challenges that he faced during the greatest period of uncertainty in aviation history. Al shares how he chooses to project confidence in these situations, even if internally he is “always catastrophizing”, and describes how this relates to his core values.
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The first part of our interview with our next guest, Allister Bridger. From a typical childhood in Tunbridge Wells, to a career in the Royal Air Force, and subsequently rising to such positions as Director of Flight Operations at British Airways, flying has been a huge part of Al’s life. But initially, living under the glide path for Gatwick Airport was only “peripheral”, and it wasn’t until a family holiday at the age of 12 on a Monarch airliner that he caught the flying bug! From that initial spark, Al describes to Harriett how the goal of being a pilot informed his choices of subjects in school, and how the RAF Air Cadets were an invaluable factor in achieving his PPL and ultimately his flying dreams.
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We close our conversation with Katy Lee MBE, with a discussion around the importance of mental health and the importance of support across all industries and working environments. Katy was responsible for establishing Pilots Together, a text service for confidential mental health support for pilots, and she speaks movingly about how the loss of her father has fed her drive to support these measures. Katy and Harriett also share advice on reaching out for help, and how to recognise the signs in your own mental health that indicate you might need support.
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In the second part of our conversation with Katy, she discusses with Harriett what she learned during her time as a teacher. She describes how some of the skills she applied to her teaching are applicable to everyday life, especially in her current training roles. On a similar note, Katy describes her role within the Air Training Corps, and how her involvement has grown to include taking part in expanding the use of drones and new technology for young people.
Read MoreInspire-Ability Series 2 Episode 19
Our next guest is Katy Lee MBE: a First Officer on the 737-800, RAF Air Training Corps officer, and Chair of Trustees for the charity Aviation in Reach. Such a passion for flying is unsurprising given Katy’s upbringing by her flight crew parents - Katy was able to pursue this passion despite academic pressures in school, by heading straight to flying school as opposed to university. Together with fellow commercial pilot Harriett, she discusses some of the challenges that she faced in her training, as well as the positive impact that gender neutral language and policies can have in creating an equitable platform.
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In the final part of our conversation with Dr Catherine Ruddick, she discusses with Harriett how therapy and communication has helped her to confront the well-intentioned but unhelpful coping strategies she had developed in childhood. These new strategies have led to Catherine’s increased mental resilience, which has been vital in bouncing back and reaching out when at a low ebb. In an emotional closing to our conversation, Catherine also opens up on her feeling of being “different”, both as a woman in the Army but especially as a gay woman, at a time when it was still ‘incompatible with service life’.
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For the third part of our conversation with Dr Catherine Ruddick, we learn about how opening up about mental health struggles can have a transformative effect on quality of life. Catherine describes to Harriett how her first experience of verbalising these struggles with a therapist at Headley Court has led to a healthier lifestyle with open dialogues. This took on a greater significance when Catherine was medically discharged from the Army, and had to find a new career. Having found her new calling as a GP, Catherine describes the challenges and delays that marked her journey towards her current position, and reflects on the resilience that she developed along the way - something that was to become vital during the Coronavirus pandemic.
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For the second part of our conversation with Dr Catherine Ruddick, she discusses how her foray into physiotherapy reawakened a medical passion, and coincided with an inexorable pull back to military life. Having joined the Territorial Army, Catherine was able to complete the training required to become a surgeon in the Armed Forces. However, despite these successes, she shares with Harriett how this still led to an identity crisis, and mental health struggles. In her recuperation time, Catherine embarked on a journey to “find me”, and discusses the things she learned: the importance of being assertive in saying no when struggling, the benefit of counselling and sharing her thoughts and feelings, and gaining a sense of perspective on the challenges she was facing.
Read MoreInspire-Ability Series 2 Episode 15
In the first of our episodes in conversation with Dr Catherine Ruddick, we hear how Catherine was fixated on flying from a young age, growing up in Northern Ireland during the Troubles. Moving quickly from the Air Cadets, through a University Air Squadron, Catherine was successful in her application to the RAF. Her career as a prospective Navigator was cut short by injury however, and she discusses with Harriett how her response to the setback of a medical discharge, and how her upbringing taught her to reframe these challenges, and believe that “you can do anything that you want to”.
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