Lessons for No10 from the My Little Ponyverse
This article was first published on Polly Mackenzie’s ‘How to Run a Country’ Substack on November 14, 2025.
In the 1960s, comic book publishers started to pull their superheroes together into team formats: the Justice League, the Avengers and the X-Men. The commercial logic of cross-promoting different heroes to boost sales was strong – but surely, only effective because the narrative logic makes intuitive sense. Even the greatest heroes can achieve more when they work together.
This idea is taken to its pastel apotheosis by My Little Pony, a universe of talking horses in which friendship is – quite literally – magic. The ‘Mane Six’ – Applejack, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Pinkie Pie and Twilight Sparkle – each embody a different civic virtue from honesty to loyalty. When bad things happen it’s always because relationships are out of balance; and the problem is always resolved by re-establishing harmony through friendship.
As the Prime Minister’s office struggles once again with personnel problems stemming from a ‘lone genius’ at loose in the halls, the question is: why are they so blind to a basic truth that every seven year old knows?
(The ponies in glorious technicolour)
The genius model
We have had our fair share of maverick geniuses in No10 over the last 15 years. I shared an office with the shoeless, tantrum-prone creative Steve Hilton for the first two years of the coalition. Dominic Cummings was at least interested in bringing other weirdos and misfits into the government, but with no plan for orchestrating their genius into coherent shape. Now we have Morgan McSweeney, who seems to have both the temperament and talent of the single-minded genius, and the enemies to go with it.
I like misfits. I like innovators. Steve had ideas that no other Conservative would have brought to the table and licence from the Prime Minister to push them forward even past civil service intransigence. Health visitors, start-up support, parenting classes, the troubled families programme: none of these would have happened without Steve. Dominic Cummings forced through the establishment of ARIA – a well-resourced and radically structured new R&D funding agency designed to push forward scientific and technological breakthroughs. Morgan McSweeney’s track record is political, but undeniable. He succeeded by bulldozing forward when others would have despaired.
Mavericks, in other words, are a critical part of team. But they are not a team.
Recruitment is a skill
Recruiting people does not appear to be a talent of our Prime Minister. He has changed up his top team time and again:
- A year into his tenure as opposition leader he sacked his Chief of Staff and reshuffled his team extensively.
- He recruited Sue Gray, a talented political operator in the civil service but with almost no track record on policy or operational delivery – and then removed her in part because she wasn’t doing policy or operational delivery very well. Was anyone who knew her surprised?
- They have hired Chris Wormald as the Cabinet Secretary – a substantial civil servant, but known best to me as the person Jeremy Heywood was willing to surrender to the Liberal Democrat side of the coalition. In other words, good enough but no threat. Now they are briefing against Chris for being exactly what anyone would have told you he’d be.
This summer, and into the early autumn they have restructured again, bringing in new staff like Tim Allan and Minouche Shafik, reshuffling the ministers to bring Darren Jones into the central departments, and bringing together policy and delivery under deputy Chief of Staff Vidhya Alakeson. And yet the McSweeney briefing row has already started a new set of rumours and demands from the parliamentary party for change.
The No10 operation seems chronically undecided about what good looks like, and how to hire the people to build it.
Transforming Downing Street
Fortunately for them, a couple of weeks ago, the Future Governance Forum published an extensive report on how to fix the centre of government. I was one of many people consulted on the project and I admire what they’ve come up with.
They propose creating a dedicated Department for the Prime Minister out of the current piecemeal units split between No.10 and the Cabinet Office, FGF recommends one cohesive body directly accountable to the PM. This revamped centre would be built around four core functions – strategic politics, policy delivery, diplomacy & security, and the Prime Minister’s own private office – supported by a cross-cutting political and communications team. Beyond structural reform, the report calls for deep cultural change, with clearer decision-making processes, more rigorous performance management, and better incentives for attracting and retaining high-calibre talent.
What I was surprised by is that No10 – who could have had access to any or all of this advice at any point in the last few months – have done so little of what was recommended. I think it’s the genius delusion that is holding them back.
One neat trick
Hiring a team is not the same as hiring a person: it’s more like casting a play. The dynamics between the members of the team are as am important as the capabilities of the individuals. A Prime Minister doesn’t just need staff who’ll go to the mattresses for them – they need staff who will go to the mattresses for each other.
But every recruitment cycle in the last two and a half years has been – basically – adding a couple of clever new people in at the top. What the Prime Minister wants to believe is that there is ‘one neat trick’ to solve his problems – one new set of brain cells. What My Little Pony can tell you is there is no neat trick: you need the whole crew.
I could cast a whole Downing Street operation with ponies (my daughter would be horrified because she’s now 13 and far beyond that sort of nonsense)
1. Twilight Sparkle: Chief of Staff
Twilight Sparkle is not just the leader-by-default; she is the integrator who makes the whole team greater than the sum of its parts. That’s what a Chief of Staff needs to be – a PM’s right hand, wholly aligned with your political and policy agenda. They need to see across politics, policy, comms and operations, and keep mission, process and people aligned.
2. Applejack: Director of Policy
Applejack is the walking embodiment of “how things actually work”. She doesn’t do sparkle, she doesn’t do spin, she does delivery. She’s the person who knows what can and cannot be done this side of Christmas, understands the machinery and its constraints and tells truth to power. Applejack is the anchor against magical thinking.
3. Rarity: Comms Director
Rarity cares deeply about presentation, elegance, tone, colour, style and understands that how you are seen shapes how you are understood. She’s your head of comms because:
- she knows the narrative magic of “this is the moment”
- she understands optics
- she can strike the balance between authenticity and polish
4. Rainbow Dash: Political Director
Rainbow Dash embodies Loyalty, but not the soft kind. It’s the fierce, high-speed, force-of-nature loyalty that throws itself between the team and danger, and drags everyone over the finish line through sheer kinetic force. She manages the parliamentary party with swagger and fearlessness, reading morale, factions and mood faster than anyone else. She knows who’s wobbling, who’s furious, who’s plotting and who just needs a biscuit
5. Fluttershy: Deputy Chief of Staff
Fluttershy is the safe-space pony: gentle, honest, grounding, and able to tell you difficult truths without escalating the drama. This is the person who can close the door and tell the PM he’s being a tosser, without ego, without agenda, and without getting fired.
6. Pinkie Pie: Director of Innovation
Pinkie Pie is chaos with purpose. This is where the mavericks belong. She represents the creative, enthusiastic energy that cuts through bureaucracy and energises everyone else.they bring imagination within constraints. Pinkie Pie energy prevents the policy team becoming Applejacks in grey suits.
They’re rubbish on their own
And to circle back to the point – the fundamental message of My Little Pony is that none of the Mane Six can do very much on their own.
- Twilight is brilliant but paralysed without grounding.
- Rainbow Dash is heroic but chaotic without direction.
- Rarity creates beauty but needs others to give it purpose.
- Applejack works hard but can’t always see the wider picture.
- Pinkie spreads joy but can’t diagnose what’s broken.
- Fluttershy heals, but only when someone protects her while she does it.
Each pony has magic, but the magic only works when they act together. In other words, Prime Minister: stop trying to rely on a genius and start insisting on a team.
FGF published our In Power report in November 2025. The report’s recommendations were guided by an expert advisory group with senior civil service experience within both No.10 and the Cabinet Office, including Polly Mackenzie.
