Building A Strong Leadership Culture With AuthentiCulture’s Laura Hounsome

To start, it would be great to hear about your work at Amazon and IBM, and how your training there helped shape culture through the programs you delivered.

I started my career in IBM, where I have to say, from a training and development perspective, it was amazing. I haven’t come across another company that does it so well. When I was there, I built my future L&D career without starting in training and development, recruitment, or HR, which is where most people begin.

I was a business administrator. I became an expert in contract management, an SME, and went on to teach people how to do the job, essentially i trained newcomers when they were onboarded. I then moved into business controls so I could understand the audit and compliance side of things, make sense of why we train the way we do, and what the impact is if you don’t deliver certain things in a certain way.  

So i guess, the entire time I was doing Learning and development type activities, but not necessarily realising that’s what I was doing. I had a massive passion for getting people up to a certain standard and setting that bar high. I moved from the UK to Slovakia and went into people management, which was a big shift from being an individual contributor. It was great. I went through some fantastic people courses like coaching and leadership basics, but there was always room for more.  Being part of a shared services centre where growth was rapid, there was a definite need for more in depth leadership training prior to taking on a sizeable team. 

After being in the manager role for some time, I started creating my own leadership development for upcoming managers to support them in their journey, knowing what I had gone through in my journey. I went from team leader through to senior leader in IBM, but my roles were more about leading operational teams as opposed to leading an L&D function.

Then I moved to Amazon. They approached me because of my recognised people capability and my ability to drive high-performing teams. I went into contact centre management, which was completely new to me. I had no clue what I was doing, but I was really good at leading people and leading without knowing the work itself.

I worked a lot with the L&D team there and started doing facilitation, fireside chats, and individual coaching. I created internal leadership programmes where I saw gaps. This wasn’t because it was my job. I found a lot of enjoyment in it. Then I got pregnant, left, came back, and eventually moved into a formal learning and development role.

I was in L&D for about five years at Amazon. I was initially running associate training and leadership development. By the time I left, I was running leadership development for Europe and India within Amazon Transportation Services, and later Amazon Logistics. I left in October 2025 and co-founded a company with my ex-boss from Amazon. We called it AuthentiCulture. We focus on leadership strategy, people strategy, culture change, executive coaching, and consultancy, mainly in the leadership space rather than job-specific training.

That’s a wide range of useful experience to bring to your current role. I found it interesting you mentioned filling leadership gaps even when it wasn’t your role at Amazon. What drove that instinct?

Good question. I think it’s because I’m a perfectionist. I want to do well, but more than that, I feel like I’m a perfectionist for others. I want everyone to do well. I naturally want to help people. If I’ve gone through something and I think it was good but could have been better, I want to fix that.

If it’s something I hate, I likely won’t touch it. I need that drive. So I probably saw gaps and thought this could really help people. Especially around coaching. Before I had any formal training, I was coaching without realising it. I’m ICF certified now, but even before that, I was doing it intuitively.

I remember going on a leadership academy programme in my early days if IBM where they pointed it out to me. They said, “You coach intuitively, you don’t even know you’re doing it.” And the impact I was having was significant.

It was something that finally felt easy compared to other things that felt clunky. Leadership felt natural because ultimately it’s about being a good human being. It’s knowing when to be tough but fair when giving feedback, being inclusive and giving people the space to grow and develop with your unwavering support. I find that natural, and it seems to engage and develop people.

You mentioned founding AuthentiCulture with your former boss. How did that relationship develop, and what does the business do?

I met Amanda not long after I joined Amazon. I'd just moved to a site in Bratislava that was, to put it diplomatically, in a bit of a state. The culture had taken a hit over time. KPIs were off track, attrition was through the roof, engagement scores were on the floor, and recruitment was a nightmare because the site's reputation had spread outside the building. It needed fixing, and that was my job. 

Amanda had been the one to open that site originally. She'd built it up brilliantly before moving to Japan, and I was essentially trying to restore what she'd created. It took some time, but we turned it around.

I first met her properly in Seattle. She was leading an internal employee engagement initiative, running daily pulse surveys across the business. We clicked immediately. We had the same passion and same belief in what good leadership looks like and what happens when it's missing.

She later became my manager. I left on maternity, came back, moved into L&D, and then convinced her to move from talent acquisition into the business because I knew she'd love it. She grew the L&D team from seven people to about 140. My remit expanded to developing thousands of leaders across Europe and India.

Amanda and I complement each other really well. I'm more of the crazy ideas person, full of energy and probably too many thoughts at once. Amanda brings the structure, the depth and the realism that stops me flying off into the stratosphere.

Eventually, we both felt we'd done everything we could within that environment. We'd built something we were genuinely proud of, but it had started to feel like it wasn’t quite enough. We wanted to do more, reach more people, and do it on our own terms.

It started as a casual idea, then became real. We began with a clear idea of our offerings, but that evolved quickly. Every client is different. One-size-fits-all doesn’t work. It’s about understanding the business, the people, and what drives behaviour before designing solutions.

Many L&D companies create generic products without operational experience. We design from the perspective of real managers and what will work in their environment.

I’m always interested in hearing about examples of programmes that inspire real behaviour change. Can you share some examples of programmes you’ve worked on where this has happened.

I can talk to you about some of the things we did within Amazon where we saw massive change, because that’s really where we built a lot of the thinking that’s informed our Authenticulture programmes. 

One of the key programmes we delivered was actually one that already existed, which is Liz Wiseman’s Multipliers. It’s fantastic because at its core it’s everything that, if you interviewed anyone, they would tell you these are the great things that good managers do, and these are all the things that bad managers do, but it’s dressed up in engaging language. 

It’s simple, which is why it works, because when you start teaching it to people, it lands. The stories resonate, people relate to the practices, and the changes you’re asking them to make in their day-to-day work are easy to implement, they’re memorable, and importantly, they’re not adding workload. Instead of telling people the answers, you start asking questions, for example. It’s those small flips.

We saw a massive difference, particularly with senior leadership teams, which is where we were targeting that programme. I can’t share specific numbers but I can talk to sentiment, and the difference in how people felt was significant. Leaders were developing their teams more, giving them more stretch opportunities, using different language, getting out of their teams’ way, and you could hear the change. People would reference the language in real time. 

They’d say things like, “I’m just going to play my poker chips in this meeting,” which is one of the practices where, as a senior leader, you limit how much you speak. Maybe you’ve got three “chips” and you can only speak for a certain amount of time across the whole meeting. It forces you to be intentional and stops you taking all the oxygen in the room, allowing your team to step up.

Those kinds of simple practices made a massive difference in culture. What we noticed from managers who had been through the training, was that there was far less micromanagement and much more coaching, more questioning, more empowerment. It had a real impact on engagement, retention, and overall team performance.

When we left, we continued that relationship with Wiseman Group. We became master practitioners, so we can deliver their programmes externally, and we also became certified coaches for the Multipliers coaching programme, which works really well because both Amanda and I are ICF certified, so we can integrate that coaching element deeply.

We also have another programme called Zentra9, which is something we developed around what we see as the nine dimensions of successful teams. It’s a diagnostic tool which allows a team a  clear picture of where they currently perform, or don’t perform. What makes it powerful is that the team then drives the outcome. We facilitate the conversation, but they take ownership. 

We look at what’s working, what’s not working, where the biggest gaps are, and what actions they want to take. It’s not about being perfect in all areas. The important things are maintaining strengths and lifting the areas that are causing pain so they’re no longer blockers. So really, we’re facilitating and coaching, but the change is owned by the team, which is why it sticks.

You talk a lot about how people feel. How do you encourage that emotional feedback?

I think some of it comes naturally in that you can see how people are feeling through their behaviour and how they respond in situations. When people enjoy something, they want to talk about it, they want to share it. What we saw a lot of was people going through our programmes and then posting about it continuously on LinkedIn. They shared what they’d learned and what they’d experienced and that in itself creates a sense of community. It encourages others, it makes people feel part of something bigger, and that feeling of being heard and seen makes a huge difference.

There’s also something really important about giving people space away from their day-to-day work. Most people are on autopilot, they’re busy, they don’t have time to think. When you take them out of that environment and give them space to reflect, to practice, to try things out in a safe place where it’s okay to fail, that’s where the real growth happens. And then the best part is when they take that feeling back into their teams. It creates a ripple effect. If they feel safe to fail, they’re more likely to create that same environment for their teams.

But one of the biggest things I always say is that one-off training just doesn’t work. You can have a great day, high engagement, great feedback scores, but if it’s one and done, it’s not going to stick. It has to be continuous. You need to build communities where people can keep talking, keep reflecting. You need tools, whether that’s reflective logs, activities, peer feedback, coaching that keep the learning alive.

Then beyond that, the system itself has to support the behaviour. That’s critical. You can train someone, but if they go back into an environment where their manager is telling them to behave differently, or where the performance management system doesn’t support what they’ve learned, it’s not going to work.

You have to look at the whole system: how people give feedback, how promotions work, how performance is measured, even how people are expected to work day-to-day. If those mechanisms don’t align, the learning can’t flourish.

That’s why we always push back when someone says, “We’ve got this problem, can you just deliver a two-hour training on feedback?” Because it’s never that simple. You have to understand the root cause. Otherwise, you’re just putting a plaster over something deeper, and that’s often why training gets a bad reputation because it’s not addressing the real issue.

I’ve noticed you use a lot of different frameworks to help with knowledge transfer in your training programmes. One that stands out is the Situation Behaviour Impact model.

For those who are unfamiliar with it, can you explain what it is and what your thoughts are about using frameworks generally?

We taught the SBI model in a recent session and it comes up a lot because feedback is one of those things that most people either avoid completely or deliver really badly. You tend to get two extremes. People who hate giving feedback and just don’t do it, or people who are very blunt and go in with something like, “That was terrible,” and there’s no real structure to it.

The SBI model is useful because it takes the emotion out of the situation. You’re simply stating what happened. So you describe the situation, what you observed, and then the impact it had. For example, “In that meeting, I noticed you raised your voice when speaking to [X] The impact of that was it made me feel uncomfortable.” You’re not making assumptions, you’re not labelling the person. You’re stating facts and the effect.

It’s hard to argue with that because you’re not attacking the person. And then what’s really important is layering in that coaching approach. So instead of stopping there, you ask, “What was going on for you in that moment? How were you feeling?” Because quite often there’s something else going on underneath. People don’t usually intend to behave badly. There’s often a reason, and you uncover that through conversation rather than assumption.

In terms of frameworks more broadly, I’m not a massive fan of using them rigidly just for the sake of it. I think they’re helpful as a guide, and we do use them, but I always encourage people to adapt them in a way that works for them. Because people are different, situations are different, and if you try to follow something too prescriptively, it can feel unnatural and actually be counterproductive.

I see that a lot with things like situational leadership. It’s great in theory, but it can become very boxy, like “this is how you speak to this type of person.” When you bring in things like neurodiversity, it just doesn’t work like that. So frameworks are useful, but judgment, practice, and learning from getting it wrong are just as important.

How do people avoid learning fatigue and actually apply what they learn?

It’s something I see a lot, especially in organisations where people are being told, “This is the way you’re going to be trained,” and multiple frameworks are being introduced at the same time. That can be overwhelming. I saw that in Amazon as well. There were different models being introduced, like situational leadership alongside things like Multipliers, and for the employee it becomes confusing. You’re thinking, “What am I actually supposed to do with all of this?”

What I always say is try things and see how they feel. If something resonates with you and works, use it. If it doesn’t, don’t. Because if you’re forcing yourself to use something that doesn’t align with you, it will feel inauthentic, and people will pick up on that immediately.

Authenticity is much more important than perfectly applying a framework. There’s a difference between something feeling uncomfortable because it’s new which is fine and something genuinely not aligning with you. If it’s the latter, don’t force it.

I also think people need to understand how they learn best. Some people like frameworks, some prefer practice, some learn best on the job with feedback. The problem is that a lot of L&D is done to people rather than with them. If you involve people more in their own learning journey and help them figure out what works for them, you’ll get much better outcomes.

What trends are you interested in, particularly around AI?

Everyone is talking about AI, and I do love it. I’m not someone who’s worried that it’s going to take my job. I think it has huge benefits in terms of productivity and efficiency, and I use it all the time. What I don’t like is the overuse of it and you can spot it immediately in things like LinkedIn posts or cold outreach emails, and it loses that human touch.

But it’s not going anywhere, so people need to understand how to use it properly. Not just as a search tool, but in a more personalised, thoughtful way to get better outputs.

Where I think it’s particularly powerful is in things like simulations within leadership development. For example, practicing difficult conversations with a chatbot, getting real-time feedback and being able to try things out without fear of judgment. That’s practical and it helps people build confidence.

The challenge is that there are so many tools out there now, it’s hard to know which ones to choose. I went to a learning event earlier this year and there were just so many options. It can be overwhelming, so there’s definitely a need for more clarity there.

But at the same time, we can’t lose sight of the human skills. Emotional intelligence, decision-making, authenticity, all those things aren’t going away. If anything, they’re becoming more important. AI can support learning, but it can’t replace that human connection. So for us, the focus is on building those skills, especially coaching skills for leaders, because that’s where the real impact lies.

How do you keep evolving in your own learning?

I think I’ve probably got a bit of an ADHD brain, so I’m always trying to keep on top of what’s going on, but in a way that works for me. I read a lot of articles and I use AI to help me filter information. I use prompts that ask it what’s happening in certain areas so I don’t have to sift through loads of dense content, because I do get bored quite quickly with heavy texts.

I do read books and listen to podcasts, but I’m selective. I love tools like Blinkist because they pull out the key insights without me having to read an entire book, which, if I’m honest, can sometimes feel like a lot of fluff for a few key takeaways. The same with video summaries, anything that gets me to the core learning quickly.

Beyond that, it’s about networking, going to events, seeing what’s new, experimenting, trying things out. I learn best by doing and staying open to new ideas.