Inspired Thinking Group’s CEO tells Jack Myers why radical self-care, an abundance mindset, and AI-powered content ecosystems are the new fuel for career acceleration -- and invites you to watch the full conversation.
If you have eight minutes - or better yet the full forty-five -cue up the latest Profiles in Leadership episode. In it, Andrew Swinand, CEO of Inspired Thinking Group (ITG) and former chief of Leo Burnett and Starcom, trades ideas with host Jack Myers on what it really takes to thrive in an AI-accelerated marketplace. The video is more than a leadership chat; it is a masterclass in combining technology, empathy, and personal wellbeing. Watch it and you will leave with a pocketful of practices you can apply before your next team meeting.
Swinand wastes no time reframing the scorecard. “Success is measured not only by numbers but also by impact,” he tells Myers, “and the way to get there is to surround yourself with kind, smart, dedicated people.” That conviction isn’t a slogan. Since arriving in London last year, he has helped ITG more than double its headcount, from 1,200 to over 2,100, while many agency groups are still treading water. The fuel, he says, is a deliberately human culture that attracts talent who “energize rather than drain” each other.
Kindness is the cornerstone of that culture and, in Swinand’s experience, a competitive advantage. He recounts how a simple favor years ago - helping an entrepreneur without expecting anything in return - recently boomeranged back as a multimillion-dollar investment in one of his ventures. “Good energy comes back around,” he smiles, embodying the abundance philosophy he now teaches across ITG. The story underlines his larger point: when people feel safe and valued, they share braver ideas, and braver ideas move markets.
Diversity amplifies that creative velocity. Swinand argues that fresh perspectives are oxygen for innovation and that DEI is “not a program, it’s how you win.” His own leadership journey was guided by mentors such as Vada Hill, Renetta McCann, and Rishad Tobaccowala, leaders who modeled kindness and opened doors for others. By institutionalizing psychological safety, he adds, you unlock the “white space” where breakthrough thinking hides.
Of course, ITG’s headline growth also rides on technology, specifically, a disciplined deployment of AI. After leading Publicis Groupe’s creative and production operations in the U.S., Swinand saw a once-in-a-generation chance to reinvent content workflows at scale. At ITG he built a development team that Gartner now ranks for best-in-class digital asset management, enabling marketers to version thousands of personalized videos in days instead of months.
Yet Swinand refuses to let the tools eclipse the talent. “AI should be viewed as a tool that enhances human creativity rather than a standalone strategy,” he says. Operational AI - organizing unstructured data, auto-generating briefs, intelligently tagging assets - is where he sees the fastest payback, not the headline-grabbing prompts. His counsel to CMOs: double down on originality, build a flexible content ecosystem, and teach teams to partner with machines rather than fear them.
That partnership demands a new breed of professional. ITG looks for people who can read a spreadsheet and a room - data-literate storytellers with emotional range. “AI still needs humans who understand emotion and connection,” Swinand notes, because relevance today is defined by how well a brand mirrors someone’s lived experience in real time. When algorithms deliver the mechanics, human insight becomes the differentiator.
Keeping those humans inspired starts with what Swinand calls radical self-care. Leadership, he argues, is an energy game: “If I don’t protect my own battery, I can’t light the way for the team.” His routine mixes daily exercise, mindfulness, and a gratitude ritual that opens every meeting. The practice is simple. Each participant names something they appreciate but the ripple effect is profound: meetings run warmer, feedback lands softer, and problem-solving speeds up.
Myers pushes the idea further, noting that Swinand’s approach counters the creeping “return of bossism” plaguing many companies. Swinand agrees kind leadership is not naïve, it is necessary. Aggressive command-and-control cultures burn out talent just when adaptability is most valuable. Instead, he champions “conscious leadership training” across ITG to hard-wire empathy, curiosity, and accountability into everyday decisions.
The results speak for themselves -- client satisfaction scores up, employee turnover down, and a growth curve that outpaces the category. But Swinand is quick to redirect the credit. “Our people and the space we give them to be creative are the real growth engine,” he says. AI simply removes friction so that imagination can travel farther, faster.
Spend time with the full video and you will collect more than quotable lines. You will pick up a toolkit: how to flip scarcity thinking into opportunity-finding, how to structure an AI pilot that actually pays off, how to design a meeting so it ends with more energy than it began. Above all, you will feel the contagious optimism of a leader who believes business can scale without losing its humanity.
Click play, take notes, and consider this episode your invitation to lead and live with a little more kindness, curiosity, and creative courage.