About this episode

Dru Patel discusses how embracing failure can enhance data leadership through a human-centred approach.

In Episode 6, of Season 7 of Driven by Data: The Podcast, Kyle Winterbottom was joined by Dru Patel, Data Lead at The Football Association, where they discuss how embracing failure fuels a human-centred approach to data leadership that unlocks adoption, trust, and real organisational change, which includes; How an unconventional background spanning Kenya, the Cabinet Office, and a life coaching qualification shaped a distinctly human approach to data leadership. Why hard work alone has a ceiling, and how the first ten years of Dru's career proved that technical output without soft skills will only take you so far. Why starting with the "why" is the most powerful tool a data leader has for driving engagement, adoption, and business buy-in. How asking "why" five times gets you to the real root of what a stakeholder actually needs, and why most data teams stop at the first answer. How the gap between data teams and the business is normal, and why failing to challenge it with the right questions is the real problem. Why data teams need to push back on the brief rather than just building what's requested. How a dashboard that stops being used isn't always a failure, and why it often…

People in this episode

Host: Kyle Winterbottom

Guest: Dru Patel

Topics covered

• data leadership
• embracing failure
• human-centred approach
• data culture
• stakeholder engagement
• data literacy

Keywords

• data leadership
• failure
• stakeholder engagement
• data culture
• data literacy
• human approach
• soft skills

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: The Football Association, Cabinet Office

Places: Kenya

More episodes of Driven by Data: The Podcast

• Data Debrief: Demystifying Data Leadership & Kyle makes a Bet on Topic Choice · June 4, 2026 · 49 min
• S7 | Ep 9 | The Mandate Gap: Why Data Teams Keep Failing to Deliver Commercial Impact with Keith Moody, VP of Analytics & AI · June 2, 2026 · 53 min
• Data Debrief: Navigating the Executive Journey with Confidence and Patience · May 28, 2026 · 39 min
• S7 | Ep 8 | How to become a NED? with JoAnn Stonier, EX-CDO Mastercard, Lara Izlan, Director of Data, ITV & Abbi Agana, CEO, Leathermarket JMB · May 26, 2026 · 1h 2m
• Data Brief: Stop asking permission, and claim your lane (and the whole pool whilst you're at it) · May 21, 2026 · 31 min
• S7 | Ep 7 | From Cost Centre to Revenue Engine: How to Make Data Pay for Itself (and Then Some) with Edward Chenard, Fractional CDAO · May 19, 2026 · 1h 3m

Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the Driven by Data: The Podcast podcast page.