Today we’d like to introduce you to David Bovis

Hi David, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?

My story begins at around seven or eight years old, when I first leafed through the phone book to see if there were any other “Bovis’s” listed. What I found set the foundation for everything I’ve pursued since. An innocent question uncovered a family tale of betrayal in a business spanning generations, true or not, it gave me a sense of injustice that I’ve never been able to shake. From that moment, I vowed to prove to the world that you could be ethical, kind, and still succeed in business.

That inner conviction became the driving force that helped me overcome one adversity after another. At 12, I had a major accident, falling 15 feet and breaking three vertebrae. That led to decades of back pain and a victim mentality that took years to overcome. By 19, while still in my engineering apprenticeship, I was on my way to owning my first home, only to lose it to a cruel betrayal. Shortly after, I faced redundancy during a national recession, and as I struggled to stay afloat, I contracted across Europe before finding my way into World Class Manufacturing (Lean).

From there, I built my career across a variety of sectors, automotive, aerospace, contract manufacturing, taking on technical sales, leadership roles, and even advising investors. Each experience was marked by both triumph and setback. I’ve been made redundant three times, run multiple redundancy programs, and even closed a company that could have turned a significant profit if the investors hadn’t pulled out early.

Despite these challenges, I remained curious and committed to growth. I explored theology, philosophy, and eventually turned to psychology and neuroscience. In time, I earned a Master’s in Applied Neuroscience and began working to integrate these learnings into business leadership through a framework I created: BTFA (Believe-Think-Feel-Act).

Through it all, I never wavered in my commitment to do things the right way, i.e. ethically, driven by values and connected to a deeply ingrained purpose to do what’s right, fair and proper for people … and by people, today, I mean brains, brain function and the quality of life people experience in the current world, formed from our historic beliefs and behaviours in the global market of business and organisational change.

Today, we’re educating leaders globally, using the BTFA framework to help them shift their thinking about leadership and foster high-performance cultures.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?

To say the road has been smooth would be a disservice to the journey. It’s been littered with challenges—physical, financial, and personal.

The accident I had at 12 years old left me dealing with the physical repercussions for over three decades. It wasn’t until my 50s that I realized my body had been compensating for the pain for so long that it required some minor surgery and a significant realignment, through 3 year program of exercise, to fix it.

Professionally, I’ve had my fair share of ups and downs. I faced redundancy during my early career, lost a home due to a betrayal, and navigated multiple recessions. Perhaps one of the most significant challenges was being let go from a company that I had transformed, just as we were poised for success. The owner, someone I considered a friend, bluntly told me my salary would look better as his bonus. That experience, among others, tested my resilience in ways I couldn’t have imagined.

The worst part about these struggles wasn’t the failure itself, but how easily these adversities could have pushed me to abandon my belief in a better way and promoting it for others to benefit from. But time and again, I found guidance at just the right moment, whether from mentors like Doug Young and Robert Camp, or the miraculous appearance of funds when I was at my lowest. These serendipitous moments inevitably delivered a clear message that I was on the right track, which reignited my passion just when the flame was flickering and keep me moving forward.

As you know, we’re big fans of Duxinaroe Ltd. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?

Duxinaroe is a fun play on words, at one level, it’s about getting your “Ducks in a row” and deep alignment. At another, we find Dux is Latin for Leader, and ROE = Return On Equity… so the name kind of speaks for itself.

Today, we are a leadership development consultancy that specialises in the application of the latest findings from the world of neuroscience to help leaders and teams drive cultural change and improve business performance through effective and efficient change and project management that puts people first. This way, we address some of the most amorphous root cause issues plaguing organisational performance today … e.g. Resistance to change, Misalignment and perhaps worst of all, Disengagement.

To the last point, recent Gallup reports show there is a 79% global average disengagement rate in business and this sits at base of most other problems being faced, including a lack of sustainability following change programs and those problems that hit the top and bottom line, i.e. Quality, Cost, Delivery, Growth, Safety and obviously, Morale.

Our core framework, BTFA (Believe-Think-Feel-Act), is rooted in our years of research in psychology and neuroscience, combined with our practical experience in leadership roles across various industries, provided not only by myself and my own journey, but also from my esteemed business partner, Levent Turk, who is the former country president of Toyota in Turkey. He gained this position toward the end of his 16 year Tenure in that organisation before going on to lead other successful transformations in organisations like MAN truck and Bus.

What sets us apart is the combination of scientific rigor and real-world application. We don’t just teach theories … we’re not academics or trainers; we are qualified engineers who have become directors and led successful change programs, who also studied multiple disciplines outside of engineering and business, combining them with our experience. This has given us the ability to sort the wheat from the chaff over 30 years of a hard knock life and esoteric studies. From those endeavours, we learned what was most important for successful sustainable change, and now deliver everything leaders in business need to know about brain function, in a very effective package.

We provide the tools leaders need to reshape their Beliefs and Thinking to influence how they Feel and Act (BTFA).

All of this cascades into their teams and organisations to improve success sustainably. We’re increasingly known for helping companies create high-performance cultures by aligning leadership beliefs and attitudes with the kind of organisational success that follows improved people [brain] performance.

What I’m most proud of is that we practice what we preach. Everything we teach our clients, we apply to our own operations. The results speak for themselves, Duxinaroe is growing rapidly, and we have our first BTFA related £1 million in revenue on the horizon. That is within just two years since the launch of this approach in a deeply entrenched market that insists on seeing change through the established lens. Our work has a profound positive impact on individuals and teams, and that’s what drives us every day.

So, before we go, how can our readers or others connect or collaborate with you? How can they support you?

We’re always open to working with like-minded individuals and organisations that want to create lasting change through the development of their approach to leadership. You can collaborate with us by engaging in our consultancy services, whether that’s through leadership training, cultural transformation projects (which are often linked to Lean, given our backgrounds), or even keynote speaking, which I’m doing more of as the word gets out.

For those in leadership roles who want to explore neuroscience’s role in effective business change, reach out to us directly through our website or LinkedIn. We believe in partnerships that foster mutual growth and are always eager to work with those in organisations that are ready to adopt a new approach. We introduce a new normal and a higher standard to the concept and practice of effective efficient leadership, so if that’s something you recognise as a need in the market, i’m confident we can help.

Pricing:

• BTFA – £2400 per person
• BTFA Lite – £600 per person
• Coaching – £600/hr
• In person – £1600 / day
• Licensing options are also available

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.duxinaroe.com
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@BTFA

Image Credits

If you use the conference photo’s, if possible in the space available, please recognise the organisers / conference title:

KeyNotion – Operational Excellence and Process Transformation Conference – Hamburg 2024

Mark Allen Group – European Manufacturing Strategies (EMS) Summit – Munich 2023