Cannes Lions isn’t just about awards. It’s also about influence.
Simon Cook leads one of the most powerful platforms in global creativity. As CEO of Cannes Lions, he sits at the intersection of brands, culture and commercial impact, shaping how the industry celebrates its best work and confronts its biggest challenges.
In this episode of the Empower Podcast, Simon joins Louise and Kate for a candid conversation about leadership, responsibility and the role of the festival in driving meaningful change.

From Empower Café to building safer, more inclusive festival spaces, Simon shares how Cannes Lions is evolving.Not through side events or symbolic gestures, but as environments where honest dialogue can happen, perspectives and behaviours challenged, and new standards set.
This episode goes beyond the awards and the headlines. It’s about the culture behind the curtain, and the leadership required to make creativity not just celebrated, but responsible and accountable.

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Karen Stacey is a visionary leader in media and a powerful advocate for equity and inclusion. As CEO at Digital Cinema Media, she has spent more than a decade transforming cinema’s role in the modern media mix, driving innovation, inclusive culture and record growth while championing diverse voices and purpose-driven storytelling.

Karen is also co-founder of Empower, bringing her passion for equitable leadership, empathy and systemic change to the heart of a movement that seeks to celebrate, amplify and connect leaders who are reshaping how inclusion works in practice. Her work bridges business, advocacy and community, proving that true empowerment starts with making space for every voice to be heard.

In this very first episode of the Empower Podcast, Kate turns the tables on co-host Louise to delve into her and Karen's early ambitions for Empower, why they chose to set it up and how it's already enabling change.

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It’s time to re-write the myth that kindness is a weakness. It’s a strategy.

Because empathy, equity and inclusive leadership aren’t just nice-to-haves – they're what the future is built on.

That's why we’re sitting down with leaders, makers, disruptors, doers and grass roots decision makers across the media and advertising industry, to understand what good business really looks like.

It’s not enough to just talk about it – change needs action.

This is the Empower Podcast, co-hosted by Louise Watson (Co-Founder of Empower), and Kate Chaundy (Associate Director at Propeller). Join us every month for fresh perspectives, tough truths, and inspiring stories.

Everyone’s welcome.

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