‘Get started. Accept that you need to write and get something out of you. That’s the feeling to notice and then respond to it however it shows up.’
Dr Claire Handby is a business leader, executive coach and author who’s driven by the impulse to ‘make the invisible visible’. Her first book, Uptick, draws on her own experience of career reinvention; her forthcoming book, Zip It, deals with the under-explored experience of professional silencing and how to find your voice again after a difficult career transition.
In this conversation we explore how books can transform lived experience into something that helps others make sense of their own lives, and how writing itself helps us process those experiences and find a way forward. We also talk about finding your voice, literally as well as metaphorically – it’s a rare joy to hear a Northern woman narrate her own business book.
Claire also shares how she deliberately turned her unhelpful doomscrolling habit into a writing practice: simply noticing things, capturing thoughts, and gradually building up the body of work that would become her books.
It’s a reminder, if you needed one, that writing a book starts with simply noticing that you have something to say.
Claire’s site: https://drclairehandby.com/
Claire on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-claire-handby/
Alison on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/the-alison-jones/
The 10-day Business Book Proposal Challenge: www.proposalchallenge.com
Alison Jones: I’m here today with Dr Claire Handby, who’s a chartered professional with over 25 years experience spanning big four management consulting, infrastructure, and board level leadership. Now she’s a business owner, advisor and coach, empowering individuals to pivot their careers with clarity and confidence, drawing on her own journey to inspire purposeful professional change.
And she’s the author of Uptick: Clarity, courage and confidence for your next chapter, and the forthcoming, you’re going to love this title, Zip It: The essential guide for those who’ve been professionally silenced. So intriguing, isn’t it?
So first of all, welcome Claire. It’s really good to have you on the show
Claire Handby: It’s a delight to be with you
Alison Jones: Let’s start with the bigger picture. I know you’ve got an unusually clear sense of the progression of the books you want to write, of what you want them to do in the world. Just tell us your vision for the books that you’re writing.
Claire Handby: So my vision is ever since being a little girl, really I haven’t liked injustice. And so my vision is to make the invisible visible. And so when I see themes in my career, when I reflect back or in present day or the business that I do, when I’m inspired around, it’s usually the flash of a title, and then I’m like, the inner workings of my mind just get going around what could the reader avatar look like?
What could the table of contents look like… I can’t help it because I’m a project manager by background, so I see jigsaw puzzles and if there is a topic in the market that I think I should be having my voice against, then I show up. And that’s what the ethos of all my books, the ones I’ve done and the ones…
Alison Jones: … ones still to come….
Claire Handby: …that’s the ethos that I live by
Alison Jones: So if we start with Uptick, tell us about the genesis of that, and then we’ll talk about Zip It.
Claire Handby: So the genesis was a few years back, I’d done 15 years in the corporate world and was just getting jaded by it. It was getting more challenging to get out of bed in the morning, like the physical manifesting of Sunday evenings, not the same enthusiasm that I used to have. And so I had to respond to that myself internally.
I had to notice, I had to process where I was on that journey. And then I had to also reach for books, and it was the fragments of a variety of books that came together to help me. And then it was to say I get feedback that I’m a good storyteller and that I’ve always been inspiring, writing notes to my parents when I was at university. Like, they felt that they could be living the life that I was doing.
And so I just leaned into it around what have I had to learn about and the mistakes I’ve had to make to go for this change in my life. And so Uptick is the result of the journey I went on. But also because I’m an executive coach and I have all those qualifications now, it’s through a very professional lens of how do you do this using the skill set that I’ve created and to be in teacher mode now, which is where I am in my career, to give this insight away to people to help them always to realize their full potential.
Alison Jones: It’s a lovely illustration of that sort of journey you go through, I think, when you’re writing a book, is that lived experience. And they do say if the book you need doesn’t exist, then you need to write it. So there’s that kind of lived experience, there’s that research, there’s that applying it to yourself, and then there’s that switch, as you say, to teacher mode, to write: this is now not just mine, this is for other people as well. And I think that that’s, it’s a lovely way of thinking about the book. If it hasn’t been born out of your experience, if you can’t attest to it, why should we listen?
But if it’s just about your story, again, why should we listen? You’ve got to have done that sort of processing to say here’s what I’ve discovered. Here’s how you can use it, and package it up and give it to someone.
Claire Handby: Yes. And so the theory that I reached back to back in my teenage years first was introduced to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, for example. Or then in later years, it’s existed since the ’70s, but the Kubler-Ross change curve and how you go through stages of grief on a personal space, but also grief as a career, when you’re wanting to do a change.
And then also wanting to arrive at a point where you’re letting something go, and I have total respect for the environments that I’ve worked in up to this point, but I have let something go in order to create fresh. And I’ve gone from being construction Claire to corporate Claire to creative Claire, and I’ve physically manifested, I had a bob, a straight bob, and I have a curly hairstyle now because I’ve leaned into I’m a creative and I can’t help it coming out of me, whereas the past environments kept it within me to fit in.
And so I do feel liberated to some extent finding being an author and writing.
Alison Jones: I think many people who are in corporate will find that resonant. I think many people who’ve made the leap will identify with it. Let’s talk a little bit about Zip It as well, because I think this is really interesting. When you and I first talked about it, I think I remember saying to you that I’ve not ever read a book on this, I don’t think, and that phrase about professional silencing.
And I know it’s tricky to talk about, but just tell me what it is and what the book’s about and why it matters.
Claire Handby: So yes, this is a response that I’m seeing in the market. So I’ll take you back to 2008 and the crash, the financial crash, and people were exited out of businesses, whether or not privately exited that didn’t involve agreements or formal agreements like non-disclosure agreements you may hear. And then as the years have gone by, this tone of non-disclosure agreements, this tone of people being held to silence has been coming out more and more in the market.
And then you fast-forward to 2026 and you have AI come in, major disruption in these environments. And again, whether or not people exit because of being in uncomfortable environments, so personal choice, or they’re actually brought into formal agreements around non-disclosure agreements and compromise agreements.
They all involve an element of that person holding silence. And in my executive coaching, the clients that I support who have had complex exits and very personally traumatic transitions that they didn’t choose. Zip It is written from the point of view of what does that trauma do to a person? How do you delayer the onion, yes, layer by layer. And so that’s the first five chapters, is going deep, taking a layer off at a time around this silence. And then the following five chapters are the rise again. And that is accepting going through this set of circumstances and not going into the detail of any of those professional circumstances.
Instead, holding Zip It, that person has been made to feel like what is often said to a child, Zip it. But when you have that said to you as an adult, how much more it cuts and how you can actually unzip yourself in those five chapters, and by chapter 10 move to a point that you’ve prevailed through it.
And you might even arrive at the point, hopefully, Zip It is set about to say by chapter 10, you arrive at that point and say, “I wouldn’t change that having happened to me. Look at where I am or look at the vision that I’ve got now.” And that is a real transformation to go from absolute tragedy of a career ending in an environment where you didn’t choose that, but then to prevail through it.
And that’s the hope that I wanted to give to people through Zip It. So it was a very hard book to write because of not betraying any of the people who have confided in me. And so it’s took me a long time to write it, but I’m so proud of it and excited. Roll on next March when it’s available.
Alison Jones: And it’s interesting that we’re talking about the Kubler-Ross grief sort of progression earlier because that’s almost exactly what you’re talking about here, isn’t it? And I think there’s something about… So you coach people through it. You also write through it.
So one thing I really want to talk to you about is what writing does for you. You’ve talked about responding to need and processing your own information stuff.
I think that’s really fascinating. There’s a number of different ways you could address issues that you see. You could just start putting TikTok videos out in the world. What is it about writing? What does it do for you personally and what does it do for you professionally as well?
What do the books do for you professionally?
Claire Handby: Yes, so writing is very cathartic for me. My mind works a million miles an hour. I’ve never been diagnosed with any neurodiversity, and I’m happy to just say everybody’s got some neurodiversity. But what writing does for me is settle me down. When I’m gearing up to write a book, I put in my notes app on my phone observations, I’m not sure where they’re going to fit in the table of contents, but I just purge myself into my phone whenever I feel like it.
It’s like I was doom scrolling before I started writing looking at too much of the news apps and it was really getting under my skin and I created a habit, that said instead of doom scrolling on one of those apps, go and write something in my notes on my phone about what I’ve observed during the day.
And so that is how I started. So when I first started Uptick, I went through my phone and I had, going back to COVID days, hundreds of reflections in my phone. So then it became get the infrastructure together, because I’m a project manager by background. So then it was to do in Excel, create a spreadsheet and go and organize the themes which went then to inform my table of contents, the structure of my book.
And then a book coach, this is about serendipity. This wonderful lady on LinkedIn just reached out to me and said, “I’ve been reviewing your profile and you should be showing up in the market like with everything that you’ve achieved, Claire.” So that was like this drive, this injustice in me to say, “Yes, I am actually fed up with the lack of diversity around authors that I was listening to in COVID to inspire me.”
And so then it was to say if Helen, my book coach thinks I can write a book, and she’s saying, “Come on, live up to all these credentials you’ve got.” And then I’ve got all these notes in my phone. She’s like, “You’re almost there. We’ve got to organize it all around a table of contents. Then you’ve got the infrastructure comments to be putting in your book.”
So now it’s to start writing the chapters and then the hardest part is to get started with a chapter. I typically start at chapter two. I don’t know why. That’s the last two books. But chapter two is the one that I feel most comfy getting into and then I go chapter two all the way… My books are typically 10 chapters, so all the way to chapter 10 and then I wrap it all up into Chapter one as the defining, this is what you’re going to get from the book and the note from the author and build it like that.
And I love the process of building my books because I’m a project manager. And then the publishing process, what a revelation that has been. And serendipity, this ecosystem I’ve built around me as well, like I have an editor before I even come to you, Alison. And Rebecca is amazing just about, “You’ve got a tic on this, Claire, you say this throughout all your chapters,” and she, refines me and then I’m like, “Wow, what a wonderful product we’ve got.” And then I let PIP get their hands on it, and there we are showing up in the market.
Alison Jones: Yes. There’s so many sort of layers of different grades of sandpaper that go onto a manuscript. And it’s lovely, of course, because Rebecca and I used to work together at Oxford University Press, so there’s a lovely sort of connection there. So it’s very nice. Yes.
I love that thing that you did about challenging yourself to go, “This is not helpful for me. This is not who I want to be. I’m going to create a different habit.” And I think even that noticing, because before you can write something down, you have to have noticed it, right? So what you’re doing is really saying to your brain, “Notice stuff that’s interesting.” And how many people go through life like that? I don’t think it’s the majority of us.
So I think that’s– what you’ve just outlined is a very gentle incline towards getting a book. You don’t just sit down and write a book. You start by noticing what resonates. You start by capturing it over a long period of time, and then you start to put it together, and it’s a lovely description of how it all works.
I really like that.
And the point about processing it as well, which is 100%, it’s a very personal thing, isn’t it? It really helps you as a person process stuff, find out what you think, elevate your thinking, all that good stuff.
Let’s talk about the professional bit as well.
What do you notice now that Uptick is out in the world? How does that change how you see yourself, change how other people see you? How does it impact in your business?
Claire Handby: So what does it change? It’s a responsibility to live up to the things that I’ve said in Uptick. So it’s not difficult to do that because I’ve been so authentic and truthful to the person that I am. But there’s practical examples in Uptick, so there’s a pressure that not to go in conversations and invent something about how to support yourself, but actually I’ve imprinted in my mind what do I say works in Uptick?
And so there is this recognition. Then there’s lovely things. So I’m a big fan of saying doing something daily creates movement. Movement builds to create momentum. And so if creating Uptick is the daily action I had to do to get to creating a book and having it published, then the movement was to put it out there.
And I describe it as my book babies. I’m a mum of three daughters, and having a book go out there professionally is like my eldest daughter’s just gone to university on Saturday, and it is letting go of this book baby the same as letting go of my 18-year-old daughter to say I’ve done enough. I’ve put enough guardrails around you.
Like it’s time for you to go fly now, and…
Alison Jones: …make your own friends…
Claire Handby: …wherever you want to go.
Yes. And so that’s what I did with Uptick. And then I get lovely messages now out of the blue. Gorgeous where, a guy the other week just out of the blue texts me and says, “Start my new job today. I’m upticking.”
Alison Jones: Created a new language around it. I love that
Claire Handby: Oh my gosh. And I did have a dilemma because it does throw up about my grammar saying there’s no such word as upticking.
Alison Jones: There is now.
Claire Handby: …my social media, but– and I’m like, I’m going to get that word in the Oxford Dictionary. To uptick. There is this lens of ageism as well is talked about quite a bit in the market, and I rebuff that and I say, I’m not interested in somebody’s age. You don’t have to put your age on your CVs anymore. Don’t even bring age to the table. The reason that you’re going for a change in your career, in anything that you do, no matter your age, is because you want to uptick. That’s a financial term from a corporate environment. How do we uptick this business? Or did you see that uptick in the financial terms?
So if we can do it with numbers, we can do it with people, and so that’s why it resonates so much. And it pays homage really to my corporate background of course, I’d use that word uptick. She’s from that environment.
I’m still in that environment. I’m helping businesses to grow small, medium, and large. Now, I’m a non-exec director, an independent director out in America. I still live everything that I’ve done in my career today, as well as being an author.
Alison Jones: And that’s what you talk about with Uptick, isn’t it? It’s not that you turn your back on what you’ve done, you bring it all with you and you bring it to the next stage.
I always ask my guests, Claire, to tell us what their one best tip.
You are in that lovely position where not only remembering what worked for you, but also doing it again. So, if somebody’s listening and they are may be at the start of their business book writing journey, what would you tell them?
Claire Handby: What is my best tips to people? I would say get started. Accept that you need to write and get something out of you. That’s the feeling to notice and then respond to it however it shows up. If you prefer to have a notebook and pen in your bag or in your pocket just jotting down or your notes app in your phone, capture what is it that you are thinking about and then look for the themes and lean into it and keep the faith that you will see a book being produced and out into the world by daily action.
Alison Jones: I love that because I think often people think roll their sleeves up, I’m going to write a book, and they sit down and they, open their book file and then they dry up. But it doesn’t have- you don’t start with introduction. You start with noticing, and you start with capturing, and you build up that sort of body of material, and then as you say, you find the themes, you work out the structure from that.
And it can start right now with what’s on your mind and what you’re noticing out there, just keeping it down, and building that habit is everything. I love that. Thank you so much. We also ask people to recommend a book. You’re not allowed to recommend your own. What book would you recommend that somebody listening reads if they haven’t already?
Claire Handby: So this is one of my absolute favorites, and it’s The Chimp Paradox by Professor Steve Peters. I read that book back in the 2010s. Someone recommended it to me on a training course out in Sitges in Spain it was. I remember the moment. So I was like that sounds amazing. And then I got the book and I read it.
I didn’t read a lot of books at that time because books have come back into my life with audiobooks. And then in COVID, I got the audiobook of The Chimp Paradox, and then this is why it is so inspiring to me. One is Chimp Paradox is the first time I’d ever read anywhere that I had more than one voice in my head, and he made me feel normal.
But then the audiobook, Professor Steve Peters has a Northern accent, and he’d narrated his audiobook, and I just thrived in that. But he also inspired me to think if he can do it, so can I. And that’s why holistically that has been such an amazing book to me, both in terms of diagnosing, I would say, some things going on internally that I hadn’t noticed before, but then also inspiring me through his example of what I could become and have become.
Alison Jones: And you’ve got your Northern accent on your audiobook as well.
Claire Handby: I have, Yes. Full circle.
Alison Jones: It shouldn’t be such a huge thing that, but I do totally get that. And my accent’s been shaved around with years of living down South working in publishing, which is a very Southern-based thing. But when you hear business audiobooks they’re usually American authors or they are received pronunciation.
It is really still unusual to hear a Northern accent North of UK accent reading it. So that’s-
Claire Handby: And it’s usually a gentleman.
Alison Jones: Hadn’t really thought about it. it’s usually a bloke, need more Northern women reading their books. Yes
Claire Handby: When I started working with PIP it is about the feel of the paper, the quality of the books, the typesetting in the books from the book publishing perspective. But from the moment we started working together, I’ve been like: When can I do my audiobook?
Like my driver, even when I do my books and review my chapters, I have a headset on and I do the read aloud for my books for processing- my listening skills are stronger than my reading for processing. And so that’s how I get the flow of my books and people come back to me as well and say, “I can hear your voice in my head as I’m reading these books.”
Alison Jones: And do you know what? That’s– and it’s another really good tip actually. If you are writing a book, for goodness sake, read it aloud, because, A, you just catch errors much more consistently and robustly that way. But also, you can hear when the energy drops or where it starts to sound a bit pompous or a sentence no human being has ever said.
And if you are going to be recording an audiobook, you might as well find out now if it works or not when you speak it. So it’s a really, for lots of reasons, it’s a really good thing to do as you write, I think. And when you get to the point where you’re revising your text, read the whole thing aloud. Definitely.
Yes. Brilliant extra little tip there. Claire, it’s been so good to talk to you today. If people want to find out more about you, more about your books, more about your coaching and the work that you do, where should they go?
Claire Handby: I’m always on LinkedIn. That’s my headline social space. But I am on Instagram as well, and YouTube and TikTok, so you can find me there.
Alison Jones: All the places…
Claire Handby: …and then I’ve got my website. So go to is LinkedIn and DM me. You can reach me straight away there, or it’s also www.drclairehandby.com and that’s my website
Alison Jones: Nice and straightforward. I’ll get those links up on the show notes at extraordinarybusinessbooks.com along with the transcript and all the good stuff. Brilliant.
Claire, such a treat to talk to you today. Thanks so much for your time.
Claire Handby: Thank you for the opportunity for us to have this conversation.
