• 1 hour 10 minutes
    ERIN BAKER: “I'm sick and tired of being resilient”

    This is a very unusual episode. It is rare that we would choose to have someone join us on the podcast so close to their crisis – usually our guests come to these conversations with the clarity that a few years' distance can bring. Erin Baker is just weeks on from the death of her partner, James, and still very much living in it. What she offers instead of distance is something rarer: the raw, unfiltered honesty of someone grieving out loud, in real time.

    A warning – this conversation is powerful and at times very difficult, and some of the themes may be upsetting.

    Erin Baker is one of the most respected motoring journalists in the country – the youngest and only female motoring editor on Fleet Street in her day. But in the autumn of last year, her life came apart. Her partner of thirteen years, James, was diagnosed with an aggressive, terminal brain tumour, and the blows kept coming: her father died, one of her sons was rushed to hospital, the family dog was put down, and a car was written off in a collision with a deer. Wave after wave, all at once. Then, this year, James died. He was 53.

    Rather than retreat, Erin made the conscious decision to grieve in public, writing for The Times and keeping a diary on Substack called Postcards from Grief, documenting James's dying, the days since, and the unexpected things his death has taught her. She joins Andy for a conversation about resilience and its limits, about loss and control, about black humour and love, and about what actually carries us through the very worst of it. She is, without a shadow of a doubt, someone we can all learn from.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY

    Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters, and build real resilience when the pressure is on.

    Visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    FOUR LESSONS FROM ERIN

    1. Being "strong" can be a trap. If people decide you're resilient, they assume you're coping – and leave you to it. Sometimes the bravest thing is to admit you're not fine, and to ask for the help you need.
    2. Honesty is what makes people feel less alone. It's not the tidy, theory-shaped version of grief that helps others but the messy, unguarded truth. Say the thing that feels too close to the bone; it's often the thing someone else desperately needs to hear.
    3. You can't control the future, because it doesn't exist yet. Make your plans, but hold them loosely, they're only ideas of what you'd like to happen. Learning to live a day at a time is the only way through.
    4. Find your release. For Erin it was writing, walking in nature, even paint-by-numbers – something meditative to pour the fear and grief into. When you can't carry it all in your head, give it somewhere to go.

    CHAPTERS

    03:37 – “I'm sick and tired of being resilient”: the exhaustion of always being the strong

    07:52 – Grieving out loud: the decision to write through it

    11:55 – The formidable mother, and a childhood that built the muscle

    13:55 – Keep buggering on

    15:20 – Fighting her way to Cambridge, and up a male-dominated newsroom

    20:23 – Meeting James

    23:05 – The life that looked perfect from the outside – and wasn't

    25:08 – The Amazon night shift: the proudest she ever was of him

    30:30 – The diagnosis

    39:49 – When the blows kept coming

    47:02 – Her son's seizure: the worst thing she's ever seen

    51:02 – Learning to hold your plans loosely

    53:22 – The last night, and a hug she'll never forget

    57:04 – The chaos of loss

    1:06:05 – The stranger by the roadside who knew exactly what to say

    FOLLOW ERIN'S WRITING

    Postcards from Grief https://erinbaker1001.substack.com/

    FOLLOW ERIN BAKER

    Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/erinbakerauto/?hl=en

    LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/erin-baker-58901a48/

    FOLLOW CRISIS WHAT CRISIS?

    Instagram – www.instagram.com/crisiswhatcrisispodcast

    TikTok – www.tiktok.com/@crisispod

    This was a Crisis What Crisis Production – Rex Fisher (producer), Ioana Barbu (studio manager), Fred Sharp (research), Johnny Seifert (audio), Jasper Cullen (video)

    18 August 2026, 5:30 pm
  • 5 minutes 27 seconds
    JULIAN LLOYD WEBBER'S CRISIS COMPASS

    Julian Lloyd Webber spent half a century as one of the world's great cellists — and then had to discover who he was without the instrument that had defined his existence.

    In this bonus episode of Crisis What Crisis, Andy sits down with Julian to discuss his Crisis Compass. The four points of navigation that he turns to in order to help survive a crisis – a person, a habit, a comfort and a piece of advice.

    If you haven't heard the full conversation yet, go back and find it in the feed. It's well worth your time.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY:

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters and build real resilience when the pressure is on.

    This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley, visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    CHAPTERS:

    00:58 A Person – His wife Jiaxin, and why he's not sure he'd have got through it without her

    01:20 A Habit – A couple of pints of lager every night

    02:49 A Comfort – Leyton Orient

    03:25 A Piece of Advice – "Don't waste a second."

    BUY JULIAN'S BOOK

    Bows & Arrowshttps://www.amazon.co.uk/Bows-Arrows-Julian-Lloyd-Webber/dp/1837360588

    SEE JULIAN LIVE

    Julian's Irish tour with his wife, Jiaxin – https://julianlloydwebber.com/events/

    FOLLOW JULIAN LLOYD WEBBER

    Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/julian.lloydwebber/

    FOLLOW CRISIS WHAT CRISIS?

    Instagram – www.instagram.com/crisiswhatcrisispodcast

    TikTok – www.tiktok.com/@crisispod

    This was a Crisis What Crisis Production – Rex Fisher (producer), Ioana Barbu (studio manager), Fred Sharp (research), Johnny Seifert (audio), Jasper Cullen (video)

    11 August 2026, 11:00 am
  • 53 minutes 4 seconds
    JULIAN LLOYD WEBBER: The Day the Music Stopped

    Julian Lloyd Webber is undoubtedly one of the country's greatest living musicians – the man who, perhaps more than anyone of his generation, took classical music out of the concert hall and into the mainstream. But in October 2013, ten minutes into a recital in a Suffolk seaside town, the power drained from his right arm and he found he could barely draw the bow across his cello.

    Within six months, at 63, he was forced to retire – unemployed overnight and stripped of the thing that had defined him since he was a boy of thirteen.

    For half a century, the cello had been Julian's whole life. He toured the world, playing with everyone from Yehudi Menuhin to Elton John, took an Elgar recording to a Brit Award and his brother's Variations to number two in the pop charts. He was the first officially licensed busker on the London Underground and the only classical soloist at the London Olympics closing ceremony.

    Then, at 64, he sat the first job interview of his life and went on to lead the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire into a £57 million new home, winning it royal status along the way. On his 75th birthday – and while quietly managing a prostate cancer diagnosis – he walked back onto the Wigmore Hall stage and played again. And now, twelve years after the power drained from his arm, Julian is touring – a full run across Ireland this autumn with his cellist wife, Jiaxin.

    His memoir, Bows & Arrows, is out now, and this conversation is about the abuse he survived as a boy, the instrument he loved and lost, and how you rebuild an identity when the thing that made you who you are is taken away.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing a crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters, and build real resilience when the pressure is on. This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley.

    Visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    FOUR LESSONS FROM JULIAN

    1. Talent and hard work aren't enough on their own – you need passion, because that's the only thing that gets you up to do it all again after a bad night.
    2. A second string to your bow can end up saving your life. When you lose the thing that defined you, throw yourself into whatever else genuinely moves you – even if it's nothing like what you did before. Find something that truly absorbs you, and the healing takes care of itself.
    3. When a setback knocks you down, picture the alternative. For Julian, the fear of ending up disappointed with his life was the fuel that kept him going.
    4. Healing is not forgetting; it's reaching the point where the trauma you carry doesn't drag you down.

    CHAPTERS

    04:01 – Growing up in a chaotic, bohemian home

    09:12 – The day on the Tube that took his childhood

    11:03 – Why some things you don't get over – and shouldn't have to

    15:21 – His father's warning that lit the fire

    17:39 – Fifty years at the top: how he kept the flame alive

    27:25 – The longest relationship of his life

    33:12 – A football bet, a number two record, and a gold disc

    35:01 – The night the power drained from his arm

    39:02 – Losing your job, your income and your identity overnight

    39:59 – The first job interview of his life, at 64

    44:22 – The daughter's remark that brought him back to the cello

    47:57 – Facing a cancer diagnosis

    51:32 – Why he refuses to slow down, even now

    BUY JULIAN'S BOOK

    Bows & Arrows https://www.amazon.co.uk/Bows-Arrows-Julian-Lloyd-Webber/dp/1837360588

    SEE JULIAN LIVE

    Julian's Irish tour with his wife, Jiaxin – https://julianlloydwebber.com/events/

    FOLLOW JULIAN LLOYD WEBBER

    Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/julian.lloydwebber/

    FOLLOW CRISIS WHAT CRISIS?

    Instagram – www.instagram.com/crisiswhatcrisispodcast

    TikTok – www.tiktok.com/@crisispod

    This was a Crisis What Crisis Production – Rex Fisher (producer), Ioana Barbu (studio manager), Fred Sharp (research), Johnny Seifert (audio), Jasper Cullen (video)

    4 August 2026, 12:00 pm
  • 4 minutes 58 seconds
    FRANK GARDNER'S CRISIS COMPASS

    Frank Gardner has lived, by his own description, two very different lives — and found a way to carry the best of the first into the second. Twenty years on from the attack in Riyadh that nearly killed him, the BBC Security Correspondent is still reporting from the places most of us wouldn't dare go.

    In this bonus episode of Crisis What Crisis, Andy sits down with Frank to discuss his Crisis Compass. The four points of navigation that he turns to in order to help survive a crisis.

    Frank is the BBC's Security Correspondent and the author of a series of best-selling thrillers — the latest, Ballistic, is out now. If you haven't heard the full conversation yet, go back and find it in the feed. It's well worth your time.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY:

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters and build real resilience when the pressure is on.

    This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley, visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    CHAPTERS:

    00:53 A Person – Himself

    01:21 A Habit – Lifting his eyes to the horizon, the birdwatcher's discipline of really looking

    02:23 A Comfort – Driving.

    03:40 A Piece of Advice – Grieve it, deal with it, but don't keep defining yourself by what happened

    BUY FRANK'S BOOK

    Ballistichttps://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/178763549X?tag=prhmarketing2552-21

    FOLLOW FRANK GARDNER

    Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/frank.gardner/?hl=en

    X – https://x.com/FrankRGardner

    FOLLOW CRISIS WHAT CRISIS?

    Instagram – www.instagram.com/crisiswhatcrisispodcast

    TikTok – www.tiktok.com/@crisispod

    This was a Crisis What Crisis Production – Rex Fisher (producer), Ioana Barbu (studio manager), Fred Sharp (research), Johnny Seifert (audio), Jasper Cullen (video)

    28 July 2026, 4:30 pm
  • 1 hour 2 minutes
    FRANK GARDNER: The day I should have died

    On June 6th 2004, Frank Gardner was in Riyadh filming what was meant to be a routine piece of background footage when an Al-Qaeda cell opened fire. His cameraman, Simon Cumbers, was killed. Frank was shot six times and left for dead. One surgeon later told him he'd arrived at hospital the colour of a lab coat, bleeding from every wound faster than they could pour the plasma in. It was, in the truest sense, the day Frank should have died.

    That day split his life in two. Before it, he was a restless Arabist who'd hitchhiked across the Middle East with nothing in his pocket, spent a decade in banking, turned down MI6, and talked his way into the BBC in his mid-30s to become its first ever security correspondent. After it, he was partially paralysed and in daily pain – yet back at work within ten months, and has spent the twenty years since reporting from the very places that nearly killed him. He describes crossing an invisible bridge to a new version of himself, this conversation is about what that crossing actually cost.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing a crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters, and build real resilience when the pressure is on.

    This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley. Visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    FOUR LESSONS FROM FRANK

    1. Don't waste your energy mourning what you can no longer change. Pour it into what you still can.
    2. When crisis hits, there's a fork in the road. One path is self-pity – and it's entirely justifiable. The other is deciding to make the most of what you've got left. Choosing the second is a daily struggle.
    3. Look outwards, not inwards. Fill your life with the things that make you feel useful and alive. Fixating on your own troubles is a trap – curiosity about the world around you is the way out.
    4. Volunteer for the work no one else wants – the weekends, the bank holidays, the night shifts. It's how you make yourself indispensable, and how you get your shot when it finally comes.

    CHAPTERS

    05:18 – The daily indignities most people never see

    08:57 – Why he refuses to let it define him

    11:33 – Where his grit really came from: two extraordinary parents

    14:19 – The bold early decisions that shaped a life

    20:38 – Turning down MI6 – and the self-awareness to know why

    27:45 – How to break into a career when there's no job at the end of it

    30:27 – The attack: what actually happened that day

    31:02 – Seven months in hospital, and living with the what-ifs

    39:45 – The one thing he's still bitter about

    42:15 – Losing Simon, and finding a way through the grief

    44:37 – "You'll never walk again" – the second hammer blow

    48:05 – The letter from the BBC that gave him something to aim for

    50:42 – Going back to Saudi Arabia to face it down

    53:52 – Why he doesn't spend his life grieving

    BUY FRANK'S BOOK

    Ballistic https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/178763549X?tag=prhmarketing2552-21

    FOLLOW FRANK GARDNER

    Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/frank.gardner/?hl=en

    X – https://x.com/FrankRGardner

    FOLLOW CRISIS WHAT CRISIS?

    Instagram – www.instagram.com/crisiswhatcrisispodcast

    TikTok – www.tiktok.com/@crisispod

    This was a Crisis What Crisis Production – Rex Fisher (producer), Ioana Barbu (studio manager), Fred Sharp (research), Johnny Seifert (audio), Jasper Cullen (video)

    21 July 2026, 11:30 am
  • 24 minutes 50 seconds
    UNDERSTANDING SHOCK: The body's crisis handbreak

    Shock is a fundamental part of almost any crisis. It's a state of complete operating system override which, when left unacknowledged, can turn into something far more damaging.

    In this special compilation episode, Andy Coulson revisits five past guests who each experienced shock in very different ways, and found very different routes through it.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters, and build real resilience when the pressure is on. This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley. Visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    FULL EPISODES:

    Johnny Mercer: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/crisis-what-crisis-with-andy-coulson/id1517015748?i=1000482235919

    Rupert Soames: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/crisis-what-crisis-with-andy-coulson/id1517015748?i=1000700198554

    Dr Richard Shepherd: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/crisis-what-crisis-with-andy-coulson/id1517015748?i=1000533310865

    Jill Halfpenny: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/crisis-what-crisis-with-andy-coulson/id1517015748?i=1000661591052

    Kate Bowler: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/crisis-what-crisis-with-andy-coulson/id1517015748?i=1000762523544

    FOLLOW THE GUESTS:

    Johnny Mercer: https://www.instagram.com/johnnymercermp/?hl=en

    Dr Richard Shepherd: https://www.instagram.com/drrichardshepherd/?hl=en

    Jill Halfpenny: https://www.instagram.com/jillhalfpenny/?hl=en

    Kate Bowler: https://www.instagram.com/katecbowler/?hl=en

    14 July 2026, 11:30 am
  • 5 minutes 33 seconds
    JEREMY KING'S CRISIS COMPASS

    Jeremy King is the legendary restaurateur behind Le Caprice, The Ivy, The Wolseley and Simpson's on the Strand. His is a story of extraordinary gambles, of rooms that became London institutions, and of losing the company that carried his own name — and choosing to build all over again in his 70s.

    In this bonus episode of Crisis What Crisis, I sit down with Jeremy to discuss his Crisis Compass. The four points of navigation that he turns to in order to help survive a crisis – a person, a habit, a comfort and a piece of advice.

    If you haven't heard the full conversation yet, go back and find it in the feed. It's well worth your time.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY:

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters and build real resilience when the pressure is on.

    This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley, visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    CHAPTERS:

    00:59 A Person – Himself. The only person he can absolutely trust in a crisis.

    02:43 A Habit – Up at 5am, every day, it's the ritual that stabilises him before the world wakes up

    03:44 A Comfort – His children, and the different perspective they bring

    04:26 A Piece of Advice – Why get inordinately upset about something you'll forget about in future?

    BUY JEREMY'S BOOK

    Without Reservation: Lessons from a Life in Restaurantshttps://www.amazon.co.uk/Without-Reservation-Lessons-Life-Restaurants/dp/0008599025

    FOLLOW JEREMY KING

    Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/jeremyrbking/?hl=en

    FOLLOW CRISIS WHAT CRISIS?

    Instagram – www.instagram.com/crisiswhatcrisispodcast

    TikTok – www.tiktok.com/@crisispod

    This was a Crisis What Crisis Production – Rex Fisher (producer), Ioana Barbu (studio manager), Fred Sharp (research), Johnny Seifert (audio), Jasper Cullen (video)

    7 July 2026, 1:15 pm
  • 1 hour 13 minutes
    JEREMY KING: “Let them take your money but never your soul”

    In April 2022, after a bruising auction battle with his own investors, Jeremy King lost the company that carried his name. He walked back into the Wolseley – the restaurant he had built into the highest grossing restaurant in Britain – to find his staff in tears and the new owners already arriving. His phone and laptop were taken from him, he felt, as he puts it, like a criminal – stripped of all his possessions and then cast out onto the street.

    But that was just the latest chapter in a career defined again and again by gambles, diligence, loss, and extraordinary success. Jeremy once handed the biggest decisions of his life to the roll of a dice. He built and sold an empire, built another, and now, at 72, is rebuilding for a third time – with Simpson's in the Strand, London’s most talked about restaurant of the moment and a venue he first tried to buy 26 years ago.

    Across the last forty-five years Jeremy has revived or built from scratch some of London’s most loved restaurants: Le Caprice, The Ivy, J Sheekey, The Wolseley and The Delaunay. His patrons have ranged from royalty to the greatest artists of the age, yet his gift has always been to make anyone who walks through his doors feel like they are the most important person in the room.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing a crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters, and build real resilience when the pressure is on.

    This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley. Visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    FOUR LESSONS FROM JEREMY

    1. Look for the good before the crisis has even hit. Whatever's going wrong, there's almost always something to salvage.
    2. Let them take your money. Never let them take your soul. You'll always find another way to make money.
    3. Don't act fast just to feel in control. People panic and make the wrong moves because they think a crisis demands speed. Often the bravest, smartest thing you can do is wait and see.
    4. Do the job better than it's ever been done – even sweeping a floor. Pride is yours to keep. That standard, once set, never leaves you.

    CHAPTERS

    04:54 – Why the best operators watch before they speak

    08:04 – How an early knock to your confidence can shape a whole career

    25:00 – Where a true standard of excellence actually comes from

    30:08 – What it really feels like to lose the company with your name on it

    39:26 – Why selling too early can be the smartest deal you ever do

    45:00 – Holding your nerve on the worst day of your business life

    49:16 – Protecting your reputation when the story's out of your hands

    51:44 – What five years with Lucian Freud taught him about risk and danger

    57:18 – Why integrity is simply never trying to get away with anything

    58:32 – The art of defusing a crisis before it becomes one

    01:03:20 – Keeping perspective: why every crisis is relative

    01:07:09 – Starting over at 72

    BUY JEREMY'S BOOK

    Without Reservation: Lessons from a Life in Restaurants https://www.amazon.co.uk/Without-Reservation-Lessons-Life-Restaurants/dp/0008599025

    FOLLOW JEREMY KING

    Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/jeremyrbking/?hl=en

    FOLLOW CRISIS WHAT CRISIS?

    Instagram – www.instagram.com/crisiswhatcrisispodcast

    TikTok – www.tiktok.com/@crisispod

    This was a Crisis What Crisis Production – Rex Fisher (producer), Ioana Barbu (studio manager), Fred Sharp (research), Johnny Seifert (audio), Jasper Cullen (video)

    30 June 2026, 9:30 am
  • 2 minutes 56 seconds
    JEREMY HUNT'S CRISIS COMPASS

    Over 20 years in frontline politics, Sir Jeremy Hunt held three of the great offices of state – Health Secretary, Foreign Secretary, and Chancellor of the Exchequer. He survived some of the most bruising political battles of his generation, and grieved, throughout, the loss of his father, his mother, and his brother.

    In this bonus episode of Crisis What Crisis, I sit down with Jeremy to discuss his Crisis Compass. The four points of navigation he turns to on his darker days – a person, a habit, a comfort and a piece of advice.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY:

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters and build real resilience when the pressure is on.

    This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley, visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    CHAPTERS:

    01:02 A Person — the one who'll still be there when the job, the title, and the headlines are long gone

    01:21 A Habit — the cross-country team he was forced into at school, and why he still hasn't stopped

    01:55 A Comfort — six and a half weeks of Lent torture, and why Easter makes it worth it

    02:15 A Piece of Advice — why criticism only hurts when it comes from someone you know

    BUY JEREMY'S BOOK:

    Can We Be Rich Again? The Surprising Potential of Britain's Economyhttps://shorturl.at/4Kv0D

    FOLLOW JEREMY:

    Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/jeremyhuntmp/

    TikTok — https://www.tiktok.com/@jeremyrshuntmp

    X — https://x.com/Jeremy_Hunt

    LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremyhuntuk/

    FOLLOW CRISIS WHAT CRISIS?

    Instagram — www.instagram.com/crisiswhatcrisispodcast

    TikTok — www.tiktok.com/@crisispod

    This was a Crisis What Crisis Production — Rex Fisher (producer), Ioana Barbu (studio manager), Fred Sharp (research), Johnny Seifert (audio), Jasper Cullen (video)

    23 June 2026, 9:30 am
  • 47 minutes 35 seconds
    JEREMY HUNT: Frontline politics is poisonous and I'll never go back

    In October 2022, the British economy was in freefall. Liz Truss's mini-budget had sent the pound into a nosedive, mortgage rates were climbing at a terrifying speed, and the IMF had issued a public warning to the government to reverse course. It was, by any measure, a national crisis.

    Into that emergency stepped Sir Jeremy Hunt who, over a single weekend, dismantled almost the entirety of the economic programme he'd inherited.

    But that was just the latest chapter in a political career defined again and again by an extraordinary capacity to absorb difficulty and get on with the job. All while managing a private grief that would have broken most people in any role, let alone one of the most demanding in the country. The loss of his father, mother, and brother, all lost to cancer.

    His new book, Can We Be Rich Again? The Surprising Potential of Britain's Economy, is an act of deliberate optimism in a country that has largely forgotten how to be optimistic. Sir Jeremy Hunt joins Andy Coulson for a conversation about loss, resilience, reputation, and what it really takes to keep your nerve when everything is falling apart.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing a crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters, and build real resilience when the pressure is on.

    This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley. Visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    FOUR LESSONS FROM JEREMY:

    1. Start a business in your 20s if you possibly can. You've got no mortgage, no kids, no dependents – it doesn't matter if things go wrong, and you'll learn more from failure than you ever will from success.
    2. You can cope with one thing going wrong. It's when two or three things go wrong at once that life gets really hard – so close down the smaller crisis as fast as you can, even if that means caving in.
    3. The most important thing any leader can build is a team that will tell you when you're wrong. If people are afraid to speak truth to power, you will make bad decisions.
    4. Grief gives you something a successful career can't: a sense of what actually matters.

    CHAPTERS

    03:34 – Why naive goals are sometimes the most powerful ones

    05:20 – His father's greatest lesson

    07:50 – The tragedy his family never spoke about

    10:35 – What unconditional belief from a parent actually does to a child

    13:37 – Why failure in your 20s is an asset, not a setback

    17:07 – Why business and politics require completely different skills

    22:11 – Starting a business with your best friend

    26:43 – The junior doctors dispute

    30:09 – How to survive being the most unpopular politician in the country

    33:01 – Losing his brother Charlie: what grief teaches you that success never can

    36:56 – Walking into the eye of the storm as Chancellor

    40:59 – How to restore trust when trust is the only thing that matters

    44:20 – Why knowing who you are is the foundation of every crisis skill worth having

    44:59 – Why Britain thinks far worse of itself than the rest of the world does

    BUY JEREMY'S BOOK

    Can We Be Rich Again? The Surprising Potential of Britain's Economy – pick up a copy here: https://shorturl.at/DfIZa

    FOLLOW JEREMY HUNT

    Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/jeremyhuntmp/

    TikTok – https://www.tiktok.com/@jeremyrshuntmp

    X – https://x.com/Jeremy_Hunt

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    FOLLOW CRISIS WHAT CRISIS?

    Instagram – www.instagram.com/crisiswhatcrisispodcast

    TikTok – www.tiktok.com/@crisispod

    This was a Crisis What Crisis Production – Rex Fisher (producer), Ioana Barbu (studio manager), James Quinn (research), Johnny Seifert (audio), Jasper Cullen (video)

    16 June 2026, 5:45 am
  • 17 minutes 41 seconds
    LESSONS ON CONTROL: How to manage a crisis

    What is the single most important concept in crisis management? Andy Coulson believes it's control — a lesson he first learned sitting on a plastic mattress in a Glasgow police cell, with nothing to focus on but his own breathing.

    In this special compilation episode, he revisits four past guests who each arrived at the same conclusion through very different routes.

    POWERED BY KINGSLEY NAPLEY

    I know what it is to have the right legal support around you when facing crisis. Kingsley Napley are the kind of lawyers I wish more people knew about – there to help you make the right decisions, protect what matters, and build real resilience when the pressure is on. This episode is powered by Kingsley Napley. Visit www.kingsleynapley.co.uk for more details.

    FEATURING

    Ryan Holiday — bestselling author of The Obstacle is the Way and The Daily Stoic, on why Stoicism is history's greatest crisis management framework, and the remarkable story of Admiral James Stockdale tapping Epictetus through a prison wall in Vietnam.

    Alix Popham — former Welsh international rugby player, diagnosed with early-onset dementia and probable CTE, on how the athlete's instinct for discipline becomes a survival strategy when the stakes are as high as they get.

    Natasha Silver Bell — international model turned recovery coach, on the moment she stopped blaming her external circumstances and took control of her internal state.

    Cally Beaton — comedian, writer, and former Viacom CBS executive, on surrender, mayhem, and why she refuses to call herself a stoic — despite sounding exactly like one.

    Control the controllables. It sounds simple. It isn't. But as every guest in this episode shows, it is learnable — and it might just be the most important lesson crisis has to offer.

    FULL EPISODES:

    Ryan Holiday: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/crisis-what-crisis-with-andy-coulson/id1517015748?i=1000755722247

    Alix Popham: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/crisis-what-crisis-with-andy-coulson/id1517015748?i=1000712166764

    Natasha Silver Bell: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/crisis-what-crisis-with-andy-coulson/id1517015748?i=1000722574377

    Cally Beaton: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/crisis-what-crisis-with-andy-coulson/id1517015748?i=1000717250391

    FOLLOW THE GUESTS:

    Ryan Holiday: https://www.instagram.com/ryanholiday/

    Alix Popham: https://www.instagram.com/alix_popham/

    Natasha Silver Bell: https://www.instagram.com/natashasilverbell/

    Cally Beaton: https://www.instagram.com/callybeatoncomedian/

    9 June 2026, 8:15 am
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