Shift Happens with Richard Sutton

Magda Wierzycka is known as the founder of Sygnia, a woman once reported to be South Africa’s richest, and one of the country’s loudest voices against corruption. This is not that interview.
In an unguarded conversation with Richard Sutton, she goes back to the places the headlines skip: a Lego city she knew she would never see again, a handful of Polish soil slipped into a red coat pocket, a father digging ditches through an Austrian winter to buy his daughter a toy, and a grandmother who told her she could be whatever she wanted.
She talks about learning to separate her emotions from her work, imagining a Perspex box around herself in boardrooms, and living with chronic insomnia. She tells the story of leaving Coronation (“fired or resigned, it’s a 50-50”), an overnight R300 million negotiation in which she says the other side never noticed she had left the room, and the days she spent in a London hotel room going through half a million emails after being advised to leave South Africa. She explains why she would press a “giant delete button” on AI even as Sygnia reinvents itself around it, and the promise she has made to her staff.
And she describes the version of herself she wishes people could see: on a couch, laptop on her knees, answering 200 emails by evening, privately knowing that no one is coming to share the load. It ends with a princess dress, and a childhood dream that took forty years to come true.
Courage comes before readiness. Every meaningful choice carries a cost. This is what that looks like up close.
In this episode: the Polish border crossing and the Traiskirchen refugee camp, a hidden Jewish heritage, scarcity and independence, the bursary that decided her career, why people who chase money in their 20s plateau in their 30s, founding Sygnia on “innovate, don’t imitate”, AI and job security, the 2008 crisis, principle over comfort, why she came home, and what the girl in the refugee camp would need to hear today.
Guest: Magda Wierzycka, founder and CEO of Sygnia and author of Magda: My Journey. Host: Richard Sutton.
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Tarryn Tomlinson was in her final year of high school when she was diagnosed with aggressive rheumatoid arthritis.
Her mobility deteriorated rapidly. Within roughly 18 months, she was using a wheelchair, and a future that had once seemed straightforward suddenly looked completely different.
But Tarryn's story is not simply about living with illness or disability. It is about what happened next.
In this episode of #ShiftHappens, Richard Sutton speaks to Tarryn about the pain, anger and loss of independence that followed her diagnosis, and the slow process of rebuilding a life around a reality she had never expected.
They talk about her decision to go to Italy despite having almost no money, the power of allowing yourself to dream beyond your circumstances, and how travel helped her rediscover adventure and independence.
Tarryn also explains how experiences with inaccessible hotels, buildings and travel turned frustration into purpose, eventually leading her to establish LiveABLE and work in universal access and accessible tourism.
And then there is Kilimanjaro.
After initially saying no for two years, Tarryn eventually climbed the mountain in her wheelchair in 2020, reaching Kibo Hut at approximately 4,720 metres. Her experience challenged her own ideas about independence and showed her the importance of having the right people around you.
A conversation about resilience, identity, purpose, asking for help and the decision to keep building a life when the original plan has changed.
#ShiftHappens with Richard Sutton explores the moments, decisions and unexpected turns that change the direction of people's lives and careers.
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Ntsiki Biyela never set out to become a winemaker.
Raised by her grandmother in rural KwaZulu-Natal, wine was not part of her world. After matric, a year working as a domestic worker in Durban was followed by an unexpected opportunity: a scholarship to study viticulture and oenology at Stellenbosch. She had never tasted wine.
That journey would lead to becoming South Africa’s first Black female winemaker, 13 years at Stellekaya Wines and, eventually, the decision to leave employment and build Aslina Wines, named after the grandmother who raised her.
In this episode of #ShiftHappens, Richard Sutton speaks to Ntsiki about the moments that changed the direction of her life, the culture shock of arriving in Stellenbosch, finding her place in an industry she initially knew almost nothing about, and taking the risk of building something of her own.
It is a conversation about opportunity, resilience, identity, leadership and the shifts that can happen when where you start does not determine where you end up.
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Richard Sutton speaks to Adrian Gore, founder and Group Chief Executive of Discovery, about the ideas, decisions and shifts that have shaped more than three decades of building a business.
Gore talks about growing up in a family where questioning what you were told was encouraged, and why going back to first principles became part of how he thinks. He reflects on the uncertainty of starting Discovery in 1992, backing ideas that initially seemed unconventional, and the behavioural science behind the Vitality model.
The conversation also moves into leadership and what it takes to create environments where people feel safe to fail, take chances and ultimately outgrow the organisation that helped develop them.
Gore talks about his new book, The Four Principles: Multiply Your Impact in Life and Leadership, and the ideas of disciplined optimism, focused urgency, behaviour and agency.
And in a conversation about South Africa, hope and the temptation to focus only on what is going wrong, he explains why a sense of agency can change how people experience difficult circumstances.
Richard and Adrian also explore the things that cannot be recovered once they're lost: time and reputation.
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Richard Sutton welcomes Chad le Clos back to Shift Happens for a special episode following his historic Commonwealth Games triumph.
When Chad first joined Richard in Season One, he spoke about the ambitions still driving him and the history he wanted to make. Now he returns having done exactly that.
In this special bonus episode, Chad reflects on becoming the most successful swimmer in Commonwealth Games history, achieving a goal he had spoken about months earlier. But what should have been one of the greatest moments of his career became a week of extraordinary contrasts.
As Chad celebrated victory in Scotland, his apartment back home caught fire. His neighbour tragically lost his life.
It forced a profound moment of perspective.
Chad speaks about looking up into the stands and seeing his family, the same people who had backed him from the beginning, sitting in the same pool where his journey had come full circle. He reflects on the sacrifices his parents made, putting everything into his dream, and believing in him before he fully believed in himself.
He also talks about why celebrating the success of others matters, his determination to change the future of South African swimming, and the perspective his parents gave him in the aftermath of the fire.
This is a conversation about achieving history while being reminded of life's fragility. About family, sacrifice, legacy and gratitude.
And about understanding that even in the greatest moments of success, perspective is everything.
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