Aaron Henderson’s Life-Altering Lessons

Aaron Henderson is head of agency at Grand Visual and a marketing leader with over 15 years of experience.

With a background across leading organisations including MKTG, Bauer Media and Posterscope, Aaron has delivered award-winning campaigns and developed emerging tech solutions for huge global household brands.

His expertise spans OOH, AI, AR, programmatic advertising, retail innovation, and proximity marketing, underpinned by a hands-on approach to design thinking, R&D, and scalable innovation.

Over the years I've learnt to never let obstacles define my limits, both in life and in my career.

Ever had a job that didn’t go the way you planned, or a personal setback that knocked the wind out of you? Real resilience is about saying, “This didn’t go how I hoped, so what can I learn? How can I grow from this?” It’s about reinventing yourself. Every obstacle, whether it’s personal or professional, is a chance to level up. To shift direction. To discover a version of yourself you didn’t know existed.

Back in the early 2000s, I was in Las Vegas and noticed something simple but brilliant, ads playing on 7.5-inch LCD screens in the back of yellow taxis. At the time, I hadn’t seen anything like that in the UK. It was such straightforward but great thinking.

When I got back home, I bought myself a black cab, installed a custom-made media player system, and mounted a 15-inch TFT screen behind the driver's seat. It was a bit of a DIY project, but it worked. I presented the idea to Orange, who agreed to be my primary advertiser and gave me 1,000 free airtime cards. This allowed me to set up a private LAN so I could update content remotely from the office to the cabs. That kind of setup was pretty unprecedented at the time.

I took the prototype to Posterscope, who thought it could revolutionise the industry. The catch? They wanted 1000 cabs. Just the hardware alone would’ve cost around £2 million. I managed to raise just over 10% of that. Not nearly enough.

I thought that was the end of the road. But instead of shutting the door, Posterscope offered me a position on their Hyperspace team. What started as a potential failure turned into my entry point into the world of OOH.

That first experience in OOH taught me the value of bold ideas and the power of perseverance. But life had an even bigger lesson in store for me.

A few years later, I was kicked in the head by a horse. I needed titanium plates, a new eye socket and a new cheekbone to rebuild the entire right side of my face due to the devastating impact. I miraculously kept all my teeth but it was a long, challenging and humbling recovery.

During that time, I gave my life and career a lot of thought. I came to understand that resilience isn’t just about bouncing back from business setbacks, it’s about facing life’s hardest moments head-on and figuring out how to move forward. No matter how difficult the situation may seem.

That mindset carried me through. I went on to build businesses and sell one. I dove into emerging tech, developing blockchain solutions, AI-powered track-and-trace systems, and even running a screen network across O2 music venues. I designed a UI for a major retailer, and now I’m fortunate enough to be the head of agency for the diversely talented team at Grand Visual, the creative OOH arm of Talon.

I was lucky enough to have been surrounded by people who supported me during both of these experiences.

My opportunity with Posterscope taught me that if you have vision and passion, even a failed pitch can lead to new opportunities. My accident brought me back to this point in my life and reminded me that although parts of my pitch fell short, they still saw my potential.

During my recovery, one of my surgeons said something that stuck with me in a similar way, "Your face may have changed, but your vision hasn't.” As someone who has always been a tech product guy, it reminded me that real value is found in the things we decide to create next, and not what we have already built.

Both my recovery from a life-altering injury and my first entrepreneurial foray into OOH taught me that resilience and innovation are two sides of the same coin.

You can’t truly innovate without the courage to take risks, and you can’t be resilient without the willingness to try again when things don’t go to plan. Whether it was building a media system in a black cab or rebuilding my life after a serious accident, I’ve learned that real leadership isn’t about having all the answers.

These experiences didn’t just change how I approached business; they completely reshaped how I saw life.

I became more daring and willing to take calculated risks with my career. I also didn’t want anyone else to have to experience what I had. So, I designed a new equine safety solution, something that directly addressed the risks that nearly cost me everything. I flew to China, met with factory owners, oversaw production, and patented the product. I’m proud to say that eventually, it was distributed across Europe.

As my career has evolved, I’ve come to realise that resilience isn’t a one-time trait, it’s a lifelong practice.

Every new challenge, whether personal or professional, brings with it a chance to grow. Sometimes it’s about bouncing back from adversity. Other times, it’s about leading a team through uncertainty or pitching an ambitious idea that might not land. But in every case, the lesson is the same: adapt, learn, and keep moving forward.

I have shared this message to my teams, mentees and anybody else who is at a crossroads in their life. And it means a lot that some of those original team members from twenty years ago still reach out to me today for advice. One of the biggest truths I’ve come to believe is that adversity should refine you rather than define you.

Challenges and setbacks are not the end of your story; they’re often the beginning of something even greater. My greatest takeaway is that genuine leadership is rooted in adaptability and resilience. Your next chapter is always yours to write, regardless of the obstacles you face in your career or life. And as a final note, I discovered the hard way that horses are dangerous at both ends and crafty in the middle.