In this episode, Julia speaks with Trinh Tu about one of the most difficult — and surprisingly universal — questions in leadership: How do we know when, or whether, we are ready to lead?
When Julia first met Trinh, she described her own journey into leadership in four stages: “No way. Dragged in. Glad I did it. No endpoint.” It’s a phrase that captures something many people recognise: the uncertainty, hesitation, and vulnerability that often come with stepping into greater responsibility.
Trinh Tu, Managing Director of Public Affairs at Ipsos UK, reflects candidly on why she initially resisted a senior leadership role she had repeatedly been encouraged to take. At the time, she loved the work she was already doing — and excelled at it. Leadership felt unfamiliar: more responsibility, more visibility, and more uncertainty. Most importantly, it felt like stepping into something she wasn’t yet fully prepared for.
But the conversation raises an uncomfortable question: Does anyone ever truly feel “ready” for leadership? Or is readiness itself partly an illusion?
Through Trinh’s experience of unexpectedly stepping into a major leadership role almost overnight, Julia and Trinh explore what happens when responsibility arrives before confidence fully catches up.
A central theme of Trinh’s story is the influence of role models. She reflects on watching her own boss lead through an incredibly difficult period and realising that leadership could look very different from what she had imagined. Instead of command and control, she witnessed decisiveness, momentum, care, and the ability to bring people together during uncertainty. The episode explores how seeing leadership embodied by someone we admire can sometimes help us believe we might be capable of it too.
Julia and Trinh also discuss something often overlooked in conversations about career progression: the role of support at home. Trinh speaks openly about the importance of having a partner who both supports and challenges her — someone with a different perspective on life, who encouraged her to think more broadly about what stepping into leadership might mean, not only for herself, but for those coming after her. Together, they reflect on how family, partnership, and the perspectives of those closest to us can quietly shape our willingness to take bigger risks.
The episode also explores what leadership actually feels like once you’re in it: the loneliness, visibility, difficult decisions, and uncomfortable transition from being someone’s peer to suddenly leading them. Trinh reflects honestly on moving from a role she had mastered to one where she often felt she was learning in real time — and why bravery sometimes has to come before confidence.
A powerful idea running throughout the conversation is Trinh’s belief that great leadership requires balancing anchor and momentum. In uncertain times, people need steadiness, direction, and something to hold onto — but leaders must also remain flexible, willing to adapt, and brave enough to change course when circumstances demand it. The challenge, as Trinh explains, is learning how to provide both at once.
Together, Julia and Trinh explore the realities of stepping into leadership unexpectedly, the myth of feeling fully prepared, and what it really takes to lead when certainty is impossible.
About the Guest:
Maryam Parsha
Maryam Pasha is a Storytelling strategist, producer and curator. She is co-founder of XEQUALS Studio, a creative studio dedicated to telling stories that can create a just, sustainable and joyful future. Projects include TEDxLondon, the Climate Curious Podcast and THE HERDS London.
As a storyteller and coach she has worked with hundreds of speakers, including philanthropists, Nobel-prize-winning academics, business leaders, technical experts, activists and students. She has helped organisations to raise over a $1.5 billion to fight climate change, worked on talks that have been viewed over 25 million times and supported activists who’ve successfully changed the law in England to protect girls from child marriage. Earlier this year she joined the Palestine Comedy Club as an Exec Producer, is on the board on Climate Spring and a visiting Fellow at Oxford University.
About the Host
Julia Middleton
Julia Middleton is the host of the Women Emerging podcast and a best-selling author of “If that’s leading, I’m in” as well as two previous books: “Leading beyond Authority” and “Cultural Intelligence”. She is deeply committed to helping people from all backgrounds to find their own approach to leading. In 2020, Julia launched Women Emerging and in 2022 she lead an expedition of 24 women to find ‘an approach to leading that resonates with women’. She now leads expeditions with women all over the world based on 4Es methodology, discovered in the first expedition.
Prior to that, Julia was founder and, for over thirty years, Chief Executive of Common Purpose, which grew to become one of the biggest leadership development organisations in the world.
Julia is also an Ambassador for the Aurora Prize based in Armenia, on the boards of Alfanar Venture Philanthropy in the Arab World and Equality Now, which operates globally, and on the Advisory Councils of Fundacao Dom Cabral in Brazil and Synapse in Pakistan. Born in London and brought up in New York, Julia was educated at French Lycées and graduated from the London School of Economics. She is married, with five children and lots of grandchildren.
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