Lee Madden, Founder and Managing Director, GR8 Recruitment, Jersey

Lee Madden knows how to lead under pressure. Nearly two decades in the British Army and the police - in Cheshire and in Jersey - built habits that worked in those environments. Directional, hands-on and high standards held tightly.

When he founded GR8 Recruitment in 2018, those habits came with him. The business grew. But the way Lee led it didn't change - because in a founder-led business, nobody tells the founder.

"In the forces, command and control works. You're supposed to be very directional and in the detail. I just kept leading that way, because it's what I knew and of course nobody challenged me. It was my business and I was the boss."

But Lee feels it could have grown faster without it.

Leadership in Management put Lee in a cohort of peers who had no history with him, no stake in his success and no reason to soften what they observed. The challenges at Chelsea Parkfields - team projects, personal challenges, unfamiliar and deliberately pressured - made behaviour visible. The peer feedback and theory that followed every project helped Lee make sense of what he was experiencing. What he saw reflected back was specific: how he took control when he didn't need to, how his presence closed down the space around him, how his team had learned to wait for his direction rather than exercise their own.

"It wasn't comfortable. But it was clear. I could see exactly what I was doing and what it was costing the people around me - and probably the results my business was achieving."

The change at GR8 since the programme has been visible to everyone in the business.

Lee stepped out of the operational detail and into the strategic leadership the business needed from its founder. His team, trusted to lead their own work without close supervision, grew into the space. Decisions that previously waited for Lee started getting made without him - correctly, and faster.

GR8 has continued to grow, extending beyond Jersey to work with clients internationally across multiple sectors.

The clearest signal of what the programme produced: Lee is now sending two of his most senior people through Leadership in Management. Not because it's a reward. Because he's seen what changes when a leader sees themselves clearly - and he wants that for the people who lead alongside him.