Roger Lewis MBE is difficult to put in a box, largely because he has spent his career moving successfully between them. Music, media, sport, business and public life have all featured, alongside senior leadership roles where judgement, persuasion and stakeholder management have mattered just as much as the job title.

He began as a professional musician before moving into broadcasting and leadership roles across the BBC, EMI Records, Decca, Classic FM and ITV Wales, later becoming Group Chief Executive of the Welsh Rugby Union and Millennium Stadium. Along the way, he also served on the British & Irish Lions Board, the Six Nations Rugby Council and the bodies governing Celtic and European club rugby, where stakeholder management is rarely a contact sport in name only.

His chairmanships have ranged from Racecourse Media Group and Cardiff Airport to Cardiff Capital Region and Cardiff Business School Advisory Board. At Racecourse Media Group, payments to racecourse shareholders rose from approximately GBP 45 million to more than GBP 110 million. His public roles have included President of Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales, Chair of the Yes for Wales campaign, adviser to the UK Government on the Platinum Jubilee Civic Honours and leader of the Welsh Government’s review of Cadw. He currently chairs the Churchill Lines Foundation, whose Patron is HM King Charles III, supporting service personnel and veterans, work recognised with an MBE in 2026.

We sat down with Mr. Lewis to discuss what his varied career has taught him about leadership, judgement, managing change and challenging assumptions.

1. Across media, sport and public institutions, you have led organisations whose value depends heavily on public attention and trust. As audiences become more fragmented and difficult to retain, what should CEOs and boards be doing now to protect and grow that value over the next five to ten years? 

In music and sport, authenticity creates trust, and the audience experience must remain exceptional. The live, communal experience is more powerful than digital fragmentation because people want to feel emotionally, physically and intellectually connected. 

Harness and protect that critical mass of engaged consumers, and value follows. Public trust is not a PR exercise; it is a balance sheet asset. Protecting it requires constant awareness of emerging risks, critics and changing sentiment. 

From the boardroom to the pitch or stage, everyone must believe in what the brand represents. When they do, your consumers will be the protector against market fragmentation. 

2. At the Welsh Rugby Union, you led an institution bound up with national identity, supporter loyalty and the financial legacy of the Millennium Stadium. When commercial necessity challenges tradition, how should leaders judge what to protect, what to change and how to bring people with them? 

Cultural traditions and commercial imperatives have always been uncomfortable bedfellows. The challenge is identifying the drivers of consumer loyalty and financial legacy, then relentlessly aligning the two. 

In sport, winning creates that bond. Sustained success builds respect but not necessarily love. Securing that emotional connection requires investment in the engines of success and a clear explanation of the ‘why’. 

Financial legacy will sometimes demand unpopular decisions. But when people are genuinely part of the journey, engaged in an authentic strategy and able to see and feel success, they remain united. 

3. You have directed several businesses where the government is a key stakeholder. How can boards distinguish stakeholder noise from pressure that presents a genuine risk to value? 

There will always be noise and pressure, from all directions. If it threatens commercial partnerships or public funding, the board must act quickly. Once noise starts driving flight, intervention is essential! 

Government should never be allowed to hear the facts second-hand. Ministers and civil servants need a clear, early understanding of the balance sheet and why the commercial strategy protects the public asset. Those relationships matter, but they must not compromise commercial integrity. 

Engagement should extend across the stakeholder chain, particularly permanent civil servants and institutional partners, to create continuity through political change. When government is involved, everything carries a political dimension. Managing that tight rope walk is part of protecting value. 

4. What are the biggest blind spots you see in senior management teams, and how can they identify them before they become problems? 

There will always be blind spots. Over time, every organisation and every leader develops them, so beware! 

Resistance to change is often the biggest hurdle; managing its pace is the challenge. Blind spots may come from brand sentimentality, a disconnect between public affection and commercial reality, siloed teams, or mistaking compliance for strategy. 

The answer is constant organisational scanning and shared responsibility for identifying vulnerabilities. Proactive diagnostics, challenging value-dilutive activity, breaking down silos and maintaining a forward-looking mindset are essential to protecting value. 

5. If you joined the board of a company tomorrow, what would you want to know in your first 90 days that management is unlikely to put in front of you? 

The work starts well before arrival. Cast the net wide, listen, read ahead and keep an open mind. 

The challenge is separating sentiment from commercial reality. Strip away the ‘sacred cows’ and test them through bottom-up financial analysis. Identify where silos dilute power, where activity should be aggregated, and where the organisation has created its own problems. 

Work down through the business, listen to the stories, establish the facts and understand the ‘why’. Ask for the future, not just the past. Beware bureaucracy dressed as strategy and focus on the real threats, not simply the loudest noise. 

6. You have led businesses across contexts where the formal data only tells part of the story. How should boards test what they are hearing internally against external perspectives, and what makes outside advice genuinely useful? 

Step outside the bubble and get out of the echo chamber. Data gives you the skeleton, but real people and real consumers provide the heart, the soul and the reality. 

Challenge internal thinking, scrutinise assumptions and stress-test them against the external economic and political environment. Make sure the board has a broad enough external network to challenge what it is hearing internally and use both quantitative and qualitative analysis to understand how the company or brand is really perceived. 

Ultimately, every decision rests on the evidence you choose to believe. Knowing what informed that decision, and why, is what allows you to judge whether you got it right.