Difference Makers Podcast

Networking is neither an art nor a science. It is a process, and Kingsley Aikins has spent a career proving it.

In the second part of his conversation with Sinead Donovan, the founder of Diaspora Matters explains why 305 million people now live outside the country they were born in, how 120 countries have built strategies to engage them, and what the philanthropist Chuck Feeney meant when he said there is no roof rack on the hearse.

Kingsley also names the hidden cost of COVID for the profession: our networks shrank to an inner ring of family and close colleagues, while the outer ring of weak ties, where opportunity actually lives, quietly fell away. He sets out the five consequences he sees inside the firms that call him in, and offers genuinely practical tactics for walking into a room where you know nobody.

In this episode:

- Why a diaspora is now a national asset rather than a lost one
- Andrew Carnegie, Chuck Feeney and the case for giving while you live
- The honest role of self interest in every professional relationship
- The five things firms lost when networks contracted
- Why early in your career you are paid for what you do, and later for who you are
- Name badges, ones and twos, and standing near the bar

This is part two of a two part conversation. Part one closed season 4. Difference Makers Discuss is brought to you by Chartered Accountants Worldwide.

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Season 4 of Difference Makers Discuss took us from Sydney to London, from Olympic tracks to the maize fields of Mozambique, from online exam halls in South Africa to audit rooms in Zambia. In this special episode, host Sinead Donovan brings the best of those six conversations together in one place.
You will hear Kingsley Aikins on how a 12 person dinner club in Sydney became the largest Irish business network in any city in the world, and how one letter to a stranger led to a 21 year working relationship. Aster Thackery describes arriving in London pregnant, during a pandemic, knowing nobody, and building a community that now connects around 2,000 parents. Manuel Rodrigues explains how Escolha do Povo has drawn tens of thousands of small scale farmers in Tete Province into a working microeconomy, and the commercial insight behind it. Caitriona Jennings shares what really happened on the day she ran the 2012 Olympic marathon. Nick Riemer sets out one of the most nuanced arguments we have heard on where AI belongs in assessment. And Liswaniso Namatama makes the case that audit is, at its core, a deeply human profession.
Kingsley returns at the close with the thought that ties it all together. Hard skills get you on the ladder. Soft skills get you up the ladder. And the things that count but cannot be counted tend to get discounted.
Whether you have heard every episode of Season 4 or you are joining us for the first time, there is something here that will stay with you.
Season 5 of Difference Makers Discuss premieres on Thursday 1 October.
In this episode
Why one letter, one lunch and one conversation can redirect a whole career
The difference between wanting a village and being willing to be a villager
How poultry changed farmer income in Tete Province from once a year to every 35 days
What Caitriona learned from finishing a race she could barely run
Where AI genuinely helps in assessment, and where a human has to make the call
Why professional judgment in audit still needs a person in the room
The soft skills nobody grades at university, and why they matter most
Guests in this episode Kingsley Aikins, Aster Thackery, Manuel Rodrigues, Caitriona Jennings, Nick Riemer and Liswaniso Namatama.
Host Sinead Donovan
Chapters
00:00 Welcome to a special episode
01:11 Kingsley Aikins on building the Lansdowne Club in Sydney
04:14 Aster Thackery on turning a coffee meetup into a community of 2,000
11:03 Manuel Rodrigues on building a microeconomy in Tete Province
16:44 Caitriona Jennings on the 2012 Olympic marathon
23:30 Nick Riemer on using AI in assessment without losing human judgment
30:22 Liswaniso Namatama on why audit is a human profession
35:14 Kingsley Aikins on the skills that count but cannot be counted
38:26 Closing reflections
Listen to the full episodes Every Season 4 conversation is available in full wherever you get your podcasts.
Know a difference maker? If you know someone who should be on the show, a difference maker in the world of finance and beyond, get in touch with the team at Chartered Accountants Worldwide.
Find out more at www.charteredaccountantsworldwide.com

Someone asks to “work from another country for a few weeks” and it feels like an easy yes. Then the questions start: does a visitor visa change tax status, when do workdays become taxable, and could a single remote worker accidentally create a permanent establishment abroad? We sit down with Carla Wilson, the Chairperson of the Chartered Accountants Worldwide UAE Committee, international tax specialist Hugo Van Zyl and HR leader Sarah Brooks to get brutally practical about cross-border remote working, especially for organisations employing UAE-based staff who want flexibility without triggering hidden compliance costs.

We talk through the real mechanics of tax residency and double tax treaties, including why the 183-day threshold is not a universal safe harbour and how source rules can tax income from day one in some jurisdictions. Hugo explains how dual residency can arise and how treaty tie-breakers like permanent home, centre of vital interests, and habitual home are applied in the real world. From the employer side, we dig into permanent establishment risk and what actually happens when you cross the line: registration, filings, potential VAT thresholds, withholding duties, and wider risk management considerations.

Sarah brings the people and policy lens: what happens to UAE payroll, WPS, visas, and end-of-service gratuity when someone works abroad, and why “approved on WhatsApp” is not a process. We also cover governance: who owns the decision, what a clear approval framework should include, and how to handle edge cases like maternity leave where “presence” and “exercising employment” can become a critical nuance. If you manage global mobility, HR governance, payroll compliance, or corporate tax risk, you will leave with a sharper checklist and a clearer line between supportive flexibility and unmanaged exposure.

Subscribe, share this with your leadership team, and leave a review with the country you find hardest to manage for remote working.

Your career is not a solo sport, and pretending it is can quietly stall your progress. We’re joined by Kingsley Aikins, widely known for his work on professional networking and relationship building, to talk about what networking really looks like when it’s done with decency, curiosity, and intent.

Kingsley shares the stories that shaped his outlook, from rugby and the “five people you spend time with” idea, to landing in Sydney knowing nobody and helping create the Lansdowne Club, now one of the largest Irish business networks anywhere. We dig into the moment many of us recognise: thinking networking is sleazy or fake, then realising that other people hold the keys to jobs, clients, promotions, and opportunities. Hard skills may get you on the ladder, but soft skills get you up the ladder.

We also get practical. Kingsley breaks networking down into a repeatable process (research, cultivation, solicitation, stewardship) and explains why introverts can be better networkers than extroverts. We talk about loneliness in a screen-first world, the layers of a modern network (personal, strategic, operational, online), and why your LinkedIn profile and personal brand matter whether you like those terms or not.

If you want clearer connections, stronger career resilience, and a smarter way to show your value without self-promotion, press play. Subscribe, share this with someone building their network, and leave us a review with the one relationship skill you’re working on.

A Chartered Accountant from New Zealand ends up advising global investors on Italy’s value proposition, and somehow that’s only the start. We sit down with Aster Thackery to trace the real career mechanics behind a “non-linear” path: why her Chartered Accountancy qualification travelled further than a law degree, how London changed her access to international business, and what foreign direct investment (FDI) looks like when you’re the person translating finance, tax incentives, and opportunity into plain language for decision-makers. 

We also get honest about culture and identity. Aster shares how being mixed shaped her early questions of belonging, then became a strength in a global city where cultural awareness is a serious professional skill. From working styles in New Zealand and Ireland to the hierarchy and nuance she encountered with Italian colleagues, she explains what she learned the hard way and why The Culture Map is a must-read for cross-cultural communication, leadership, and “reading the room” without guesswork. 

Then the conversation turns local, and surprisingly moving: how a simple Greenwich coffee meet-up during Covid grew into a community of around 2,000 parents, a free village fair, and a sold-out International Women’s Day family morning tea. We talk social impact, social enterprise structure, and the line that sticks: people want a village, but they don’t always want to be a villager. If you care about community building, networking, time management, and building a meaningful career without perfectionism, you’ll take plenty from this one. 

If this sparked something for you, please subscribe, share the episode with a friend, and leave us a review. What part of Aster’s story feels most relevant to your own path?