Craft & work

What do you consider your greatest achievement?

192 answers answered between 1985 and 2026 one of 25 in The Q&A

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The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

Verbatim recurring item in The Guardian Q&A; two fully readable publisher-hosted respondent pages establish institutional recurrence.

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Public figures who have answered a question like this elsewhere. Quoted from the source shown, not written for FLAPSS.

Read by field Everyone Science and medicine 2 Arts and letters 162 Politics and public life 14 Business and finance 4 Technology 1 Sport 9
Read by age Any age Before thirty 4 In their thirties 43 In their forties 38 In their fifties 43 In their sixties 35 Seventy and beyond 26
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Edwina Currie Former British politician, broadcaster and writer
As health minister, I brought in breast and cervical cancer screening. And in 1994 I called the first debate on gay rights for a quarter-century and we got the age of consent down to 18. There are pubs in Brighton where I still can’t pay for a drink.
Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 17 June 2017 source ↗
John Prescott Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007
Kyoto, when Tony Blair gave me the opportunity to start the first legislative framework for climate change.
Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 28 April 2018 source ↗
Barack Obama 44th President of the United States, 2009–2017; United States Senator from Illinois 2005–2008
One of the things that Michelle and I are proud of is that we came through the White House with our souls intact. Everybody has heard: Power corrupts. I do think if you are placed in such an artificial situation, and your office has great importance, there is a tendency for people to want to please you. To not be as honest with you. We fought against that.
Recorded Ben Tiggelaar, Forward Thinking Leadership, Amsterdam, Ben Tiggelaar, 28 September 2018 source ↗
Louis Theroux British and American journalist and author
To have made a career in TV while being nervous by nature and incapable of doing a piece to camera.
Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 17 November 2018 source ↗
John Lewis U.S. Representative from Georgia, 1987–2020; Chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee 1963–1966
Participating in a transformative movement that advocated human dignity and changed America forever.
Recorded Vanity Fair, Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, 6 December 2019 source ↗
Emma Barnett British broadcaster and journalist
Keeping a relationship with the love of my life, for 16 years.
Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 20 February 2021 source ↗
Caroline Lucas
Winning the first Green seat in parliament – although that’s cheating, really, as it was very much a collective achievement by the whole party.
Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 20 April 2024 source ↗
Chris Bryant
Getting elected as MP for the Rhondda in 2001 despite everyone saying I was too “exotic” or “flamboyant”, ie gay.
Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 13 September 2025 source ↗
Desmond Tutu Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town; chair of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission; Nobel Peace Prize, 1984
One moment, Nelson Mandela is in jail, and the next moment, he is walking, a free man. One moment, we are shackled as the oppressed of apartheid; the next, we are voting for the very first time. I was 63 when I voted for the first time in my life in the country of my birth. Nelson Mandela was 76 years of age. But it happened, it happened. It happened partly because the international community supported us. People prayed for us. People demonstrated on our behalf, especially young people. Students at universities and college campuses used to sit out in the baking sunshine to force their institutions to divest and the miracle happened. We became free because we were helped and we want to say a big “thank you” to the world. And, you can become free nonviolently.
Recorded Academy of Achievement interview source ↗

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