167: The Good Listening To Show with Chris Grimes - Episode 167167: The Good Listening To Show with Chris Grimes - Episode 167
UK Health Radio Podcast
Chris Grimes chats with travel founder Ingrid Sanderson about building a calm, human-centred business that helps professionals arrive “focused, not frazzled”. Their conversation touches on resilience, trusted support and the value of doing less of what drains you so you can concentrate on what matters most.
47:32•2 May 2026
Focused, Not Frazzled: Ingrid Sanderson’s Calm Approach to Business Travel
Episode Overview
- Protecting time, money and wellbeing can be more effective than managing every detail yourself, especially for frequent business travellers.
- Trusted support systems, like a dedicated travel company, free people to focus on the work only they can do.
- Resilience grows by handling constant disruptions calmly, whether they are global crises or everyday missed flights.
- Surrounding yourself with strong people, mentors and coaches helps sustain a business over decades.
- It’s often better to act than to wait for perfect conditions; as Ingrid’s favourite quote suggests, learning to ‘dance in the rain’ matters more than hoping storms will stop.
“Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass, it’s about learning how to dance in the rain.”
How do people find strength in their journey to sobriety? Here, the focus lands on stress, resilience and calm, told through the lens of business travel rather than booze. The Good Listening To Show with Chris Grimes brings a gently playful, Desert Island Discs-style chat, complete with metaphors, props and even a wax apple, to unpack the founder story of travel specialist Ingrid Sanderson.
You’ll hear how Ingrid built Principal Travel from a one-woman operation in 1999 into a close-knit, largely female team that helps high-performing professionals and international speakers arrive “focused, not frazzled”. She shares how constant curveballs – terrorist attacks, ash clouds, strikes, Brexit, a “cheeky bit of a pandemic” – have forced her to learn, adapt and keep clients calm while the travel industry goes wild around them. There’s lots here for anyone juggling recovery, work and travel stress.
Ingrid talks about the value of trusted support, comparing using a business travel expert with hiring an accountant or solicitor: why spend your precious time trawling flight sites when you could be doing what only you can do? Her strong family influences, especially the “golden thread” of resilient women, echo themes that often come up in sobriety journeys too.
Chris keeps the tone light and fun with his 5-4-3-2-1 storytelling exercise (shaping moments, inspirations, “squirrels” or distractions, and a quirky police-station anecdote), plus a “golden baton” to pass the conversation on to future guests.
One quote sums up the spirit of the conversation: “Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass, it’s about learning how to dance in the rain.” If you’re looking for a gentle, human conversation about stress, support and doing less of what drains you so you can focus on what matters, this one might give you a few ideas – and a smile. Where could you create a bit more ‘focused, not frazzled’ in your own life?
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