Remi is a leading strategic coach, systemic leadership consultant, speaker and founder of I Am Remi. I Am Remi is a coaching and mentoring consultancy that has a sharp focus on alignment, influence and impact. Remi supports female leaders to wisely and strategically navigate rising and leading in their industries and lives in general.
Affectionately termed the CEO’s secret weapon, she is highly sought after by C-Suite leaders and their teams and works with influencers, trailblazers and change makers across a range of sectors such as Finance, Fashion, Technology, TV, Charity and Law.
Rising to the top of her profession, Remi previously lead the Equity Capital Markets Syndicate Desk at Goldman Sachs, and was Global Head of Equity Syndicate at Renaissance Capital raising multiple billions in capital for companies globally throughout her career. She was voted Top 100 Women in European Finance, and named as the City’s 100 Rising Stars and is also one of the BBC’s BAME Expert Voices.
She is passionate about female empowerment and leadership, human potential, transformation, and systemic work and their potential impact on business. Remi’s thoughtfully sequenced combination of coaching & mentoring ensures her clients gain clarity, apply critical insight, such that they can transform themselves by doing their inner work and have the necessary influence and impact within their organisations.
She is also a successful social entrepreneur and angel investor. Co founder of award winning London restaurant, The Palmerston and a co-founder of Medicine Festival, launched 2020. She holds a Bachelors degree in Social Policy and Sociology, and a Masters in Social Research from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
1. Best piece of advice you’ve been given
People do business with people they like – Kill with kindness.
I would add that we need to start where it counts, compassion to self means we are able to be compassionate to others. In the old paradigm, business used to be about mortal combat, as we shift our focus to a different intent and worldview, we can start to see organisations and businesses need to encompass mortal compassion. It can get you just as far, I’d argue even further and allows for joy along the way. Remember, you’re in your business every day, so there needs to be fun and joy in it to make it enriching and sustainable.
Some may perceive compassion as a weakness in business. However, if you are able to truly hear what is needed, then you are able to innovate for what is actually required – be that a product or service, it’s the same difference.
2. Worst piece of advice you’ve been given
Calm down, don’t be so loud / bossy.
Well, that didn’t go too well for me – thankfully!
My take on this is that society often expects us to conform and toe the line. Showing up authentically sometimes requires you to be big i.e. take up space and show courage and boldness of spirit. This can be triggering for others and quickly criticised. Work on your delivery, sure. However, in business your ideas and ability to express them with clarity and conviction are your currency. They won’t get heard if you don’t speak up.
3. What would you tell your younger self?
Spend a lot of time, more than you normally would getting to know yourself, your pain points, your shadow, your patterns, the murkier aspects of yourself.
This self enquiry will become a very useful map, if you really want to understand your drivers, your strong suits and the skills you’ve honed. As well as how to manage relationships – both business and personal with better self awareness. Don’t be afraid of this, it allows you to make far more empowered choices about who you want to be, what you want to do and work with those very human blind spots that we all have. Gut instinct and intuition are important in business and life in general. The more we know ourselves, the more we can learn to truly trust ourselves and the decisions we make.
4. What excites you most about the future of your industry?
We live in a time of great peril but also great promise. Human systems are having to evolve rapidly. Helping to shape, transform and support our human potential, and build both capacity and capability, is in my opinion critical to our survival and the future of all life.
My industry positively influences how we self-learn, relate and how we lead. We are being called upon to step up in a big way. This is exciting and deeply rewarding, especially when supporting change makers to be and do things differently, as they rise to the new challenges we face as individuals and as a collective.
Women leaders, (the majority of people I support ) are leading radical change and innovation, taking their rightful place in the world. I am excited to be in service to this.
5. Who or what is your biggest inspiration?
My late mother was deeply inspiring.
A force for good and a pioneer in her own right and a huge source of inspiration to me and many women. She was a young woman from a Brahmin caste, in Assam, North East India. She came to England alone in her early 20s and soon proudly became the first Assamese woman to work for the British Government. She was courageous and bold, which also allowed her to follow her heart and she married a black man from Nigeria in West Africa, despite much criticism and going against the cultural expectation of an arranged marriage.
It was 1960s Britain, a time when racism, immigration and segregation were at fever pitch. Nonetheless, she spoke her truth, challenged the status quo and wasn’t afraid to lead from the front. I feel she firmly handed me the baton, to be in service and to inspire all women to fulfil their potential, and be the change.
….And so to Mother Nature – Planet Earth and its flourishing diversity. If you want a real lesson on growth cycles, collaboration, natural rhythms, change, innovation, strategy, abundance, resilience, consequence, sustainability etc. etc. Look outside.
