Following our powerful weekend at the Elevate conference, and as we reflect on this year's "Brave" theme that animated our annual conference at Durham University and will guide us at Brown University this coming weekend, we turn to the words of Priyal Keni, a Laidlaw Women in Business alumna whose keynote address reminded nearly 100 women that courage often emerges not despite failure, but through it.
Priyal Keni: "Failure is inevitable. Every time we face it in our personal or professional lives, we have two options: either crumble or lift ourselves up and push harder. Failure humbles us and gives us the opportunity to reflect on our actions and recognise our flaws."
Learning to Lead Through Setback
Priyal Keni is a Laidlaw Scholar alumna from London Business School, chartered accountant, social entrepreneur, and former international rifle shooter who represented India for seven years. Growing up in Mumbai in a modest joint family of 12, she chose at age 13 to pursue rifle shooting, a male dominated and expensive sport. At 15, she became the only girl on her shooting team and made her international debut with the Indian Rifle Shooting Team, winning over 110 medals despite facing stereotypical barriers and criticism. She has since pivoted into consulting with Deloitte, serves as one of 30 individuals selected globally by UN Women for their 30 for 2030 network, and continues to lead her non profit organisation in India focused on girl education and empowerment. Her journey has been marked not by the absence of failure, but by her refusal to allow it the final word.
Bravery Forged in the Willingness to Fall
Keni's insight offers a necessary corrective to narratives that portray leadership as a sequence of unbroken triumphs. Failure, she reminds us, is not the exception but the rule. What distinguishes leaders is not their capacity to evade it but their response when it arrives. To crumble is human; to lift oneself and push harder is the deliberate work of courage. Failure humbles precisely because it strips away pretence and forces confrontation with limitation. Yet this humbling is not punishment but invitation, an opportunity to examine choices, acknowledge flaws, and rebuild with greater wisdom.
This understanding shaped last weekend's Elevate conference, where nearly 100 women from our Women in Business programme, Trailblazers, and select undergraduate scholars gathered to explore what it means to accelerate gender equity through creative leadership, mentorship, and entrepreneurship. Keni's keynote challenged attendees to see the Foundation not merely as financial support but as an institution committed to empowering women to chase opportunity without the paralysing weight of wondering whether they can afford to fail. In her address, she spoke candidly about her own journey, the moments when failure felt insurmountable, and the ways in which the Foundation's belief in her potential allowed her to take risks that reshaped her trajectory. The weekend fostered connection, inspiration, and shared purpose amongst women who refuse to let fear of failure dictate the scope of their ambitions.
As we prepare for Brown University this weekend, we carry forward this spirit of brave engagement. Our annual conferences create spaces where scholars can present research that challenges established thinking, engage in conversations where vulnerability becomes strength, and participate in masterclasses that push them beyond familiar territory. These are acts of courage undertaken with full awareness that failure remains possible, yet chosen nonetheless because the alternative, remaining safe and silent, carries its own profound cost.
Keni's message aligns with the Laidlaw value of #Brave and the Oxford Character Project virtue of #Resilience. Being brave means confronting uncertainty with resolve, acknowledging that failure is part of growth rather than evidence of inadequacy. Resilience means developing the capacity to recover from setback, to examine what went wrong without allowing it to define what comes next.
A Call to Reflect
As we carry forward the energy from Elevate and prepare for Brown this weekend, we invite you to reflect on Keni's insight. Share in the comments: What is one failure that humbled you, and how did it reshape your understanding of leadership? In what ways might embracing failure as inevitable, rather than exceptional, change how you approach the challenges ahead?