#64 - Victoria Jones: Building Trust, Situational Leadership and Growing Happy

People have a radar. They sense when a leader’s words, behaviour and genuine intent do not align. Trust is built less through grand gestures than through the small, consistent signals people experience over time.

Victoria Jones is Senior Manager, Leadership and Capability at UniSuper and a Director and Chair of the Professional Development Committee at Women in Super. Across more than 20 years in leadership and learning, she has worked at Monash University, Specsavers, Forever New and UniSuper.

Victoria makes  leadership work feel bright, practical and possible. She is upbeat, powerful, magnetic and easygoing, with a gift for reading a room, creating self-awareness and helping people experience the “light bulb moment” for themselves.

Victoria and Sam explore situational leadership, trust as organisational infrastructure, feedback, psychological safety and why self-awareness matters as AI accelerates work. They also move through family life, The Corner Store in Mentone, running, Women in Super, learning guitar, travelling around Australia and Victoria’s simple ambition: “I want to grow happy.”

Thank you to Sarah Jade Green for introducing us after sharing that Victoria’s situational leadership teaching stayed with her throughout her career.

What you’ll hear:
• Why people sense the mindset beneath a leader’s words and behaviour
• How trust grows through small, consistent gestures
• Situational leadership as a practical framework for adapting to each person
• The role of self-awareness, honest feedback and psychological safety
• Why trust and human judgement matter more as AI reshapes work
• The work, relationships and adventures that help Victoria keep growing happy

Guest links:
• Victoria Jones: https://www.linkedin.com/in/victoria-jones-7a085219/
• The Corner Store, Mentone: https://www.thecornerstore3194.com/

Conversation mentions:
• Sarah Jade Green’s Natural Genius: https://youtu.be/iSkU4WsIIzs
• Jack Dorsey and Roelof Botha, From Hierarchy to Intelligence: https://block.xyz/inside/from-hierarchy-to-intelligence
• Arbinger Institute: https://arbinger.com/about
• Blanchard SLII and Situational Leadership: https://www.blanchard.com/our-content/programs/slii
• Patrick Lencioni and The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: https://www.tablegroup.com/topics-and-resources/teamwork-5-dysfunctions/
• The Five Behaviors of a Cohesive Team: https://www.fivebehaviors.com/
• Women in Super: https://www.womeninsuper.com.au/who-we-are/our-people
• Mother’s Day Classic: https://www.mothersdayclassic.com.au/
• Geoff Brown’s family travel archive: https://campingfeet.wordpress.com/

Chapters:
00:13 Sarah Jade Green and a leadership lesson that lasted
01:22 From academia to leadership and capability development
06:09 Self-awareness, facilitation and the light bulb moment
09:05 People have a radar: trust, behaviour and intent
15:58 Situational leadership and finding your own way to lead
21:42 Family, The Corner Store, running and Women in Super
26:22 Learning guitar, Australian adventures and growing happy

Explore further:
Discover Natural Genius: https://naturalgenius.com.au
Learn more about Sam: https://samanthabell.com.au
Other platforms: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2568387
Subscribe to hear future episodes.

Credits:
Hosted by Samantha (Sam) Bell in Kiama and Murrumbeena, 24 July 2026.
Produced at the Kiama office, 24 July - 5 August 2026.

Natural Genius Podcast https://naturalgenius.com.au