WHO WE ARE
Dr. Elsbeth Johnson, Founder and Managing Director
Elsbeth spent the first half of her career as a banker, equity analyst and corporate strategist. As an equity analyst, she covered the pan-European Financial Services sector, including banks and insurers. Hired by one of the companies she covered, Prudential plc, she became Director of Customer & Market Strategy for its Asian business, a role she held for just over six years.
Returning to London from Asia in her late-30’s, she went back to academia, completing her PhD and becoming a Professor at London Business School where she taught for five years. She is currently a Senior Lecturer at MIT’s Sloan School of Management where she teaches the core Leadership course (15.716) on the School’s EMBA degree programme, as well as being Faculty Director of her own Leading Strategic Change Program, the Founder and Co-Faculty Director of MIT’s Women’s Leadership Program and the lead strategy and leadership Professor on the School’s flagship, five-week Advanced Management Program.
However, Elsbeth spends most of her time working with leaders to build more successful organisations. It was to do this work that she founded SystemShift back in 2016 - in response to leaders asking her to help them solve a range of issues, all of which needed a combination of academic knowledge and commercial experience if they were to be solved.
Some of these issues – such as "we have an execution problem" or "we're not growing fast enough" – suggested they had a strategy problem. It needed to be either clearer, and/or more widely shared and understood within their organisation. Other issues – such as "we need better leadership", or “we need to do more with less” – suggested there were capability and/or culture gaps that needed to be addressed.
Whatever the issue, Elsbeth’s approach was to consider the whole system that was producing these results and identify, and then close, the underlying gaps - hence “SystemShift”.
Elsbeth holds a first degree in Law from Queens’ College, Cambridge - where she was also President of the Cambridge Union; as well as a postgrad in Economics and a PhD in Management Science from Birkbeck College, London.
Her previous corporate roles include ten years as Head of Leadership & Learning for QBE’s European operations; five years as Head of L&D for AJ Gallagher’s EMEA business; and, most recently, three years as Global Head of L&D for the fintech Simply Business. As a coach, she has worked with leaders across three continents and in a range of sectors, including banking, insurance, fintech, healthcare, pharma and education.
Chris holds a diploma in Executive Coaching (AOEC) and is a certified coach for the Hogan suite, DiSC, Firo B, Via Edge, Korn Ferry’s ALP, NLP and BPS Level A&B.
Christine Ling, SystemShift’s Head of Learning
With more than 25 years experience in learning, talent management and HR leadership within global organisations, Chris has been an L&D designer, procurer and provider. This background makes her your perfect learning and development partner. Whether you’re an individual seeking solutions for yourself, or an L&D manager or HR leader looking for solutions or advice for your organisation, Chris’ passion and deep skill for building confident, capable leaders, strong talent pipelines and high performance cultures, will have a real impact on your and your organisation.
At SystemShift, Chris manages our licensed, off-the-shelf programmes. She will work with you to make sure the programme you’re choosing is right for your target population; onboard you and your people to make sure that everything is working for you and them; and regularly check-in with you to ensure the programmes are delivering on your expectations. Chris also manages the bench of SystemShift coaches to whom you’ll have access – as well as doing some of the coaching sessions herself.