Samantha Simmonds

Why organisations work with Samantha Simmonds

• She has spent more than two decades reading live news on Sky News and BBC News, so a live audience, a faulty autocue or a delayed senior speaker does not move her off the agenda.
• She has interviewed Snapchat founder Evan Spiegel and Nobel laureate Juan Manuel Santos in fireside format, which is the part of the job most hosts cannot do: keeping a global leader on the substance without flattening the conversation.
• She works at the top of UK corporate hosting, with named clients including the UK Government, Deloitte, London Stock Exchange Group, Sainsbury’s, Hewlett Packard, British Business Bank and Manpower Group.
• She compered the Qatar-UK business investment forum alongside both the British and Qatari Prime Ministers and chaired an innovation forum for the King of Bhutan, both of which require protocol judgement on top of presenting craft.
• When she keynotes in her own name, the material is grounded in something specific: how a live news anchor stays composed, frames the question, and reads the room when the script breaks.

Biography highlights

• BBC News presenter, currently hosting Politics London on BBC One.
• Sky News main anchor from 2005 to 2016, covering UK general elections, the EU referendum, the murder of Jo Cox MP and the Royal Wedding from Buckingham Palace.
• Earlier presenter on BBC Breakfast and BBC London News, producer on Channel 5 News.
• Postgraduate Diploma in Broadcast Journalism, City University London; BA, University of Liverpool.
• Co-host of the podcast It’s a Grown Up Life with journalist Lauren Libbert.
• Named conference and awards hosting credits include the UK Government, Deloitte, London Stock Exchange Group, Sainsbury’s, Hewlett Packard, British Business Bank and Manpower Group.

Biography

Live news anchoring is closer to senior corporate hosting than most buyers realise. Both require holding a room, reading the agenda live, asking a useful question of someone who would rather stay on message, and recovering quickly when the running order breaks. Samantha Simmonds has done one for more than two decades and now does the other at the top end of the UK corporate market.

Her on-air career runs from local radio in Yorkshire through Channel 5 News, BBC Breakfast and BBC London, into more than a decade as a main anchor at Sky News from 2005 to 2016. She returned to the BBC in 2017 and currently presents for BBC News and hosts Politics London on BBC One. The Sky years covered UK general elections, the EU referendum, the Royal Wedding live from Buckingham Palace and the murder of Jo Cox MP.

The corporate work sits on top of that. She has hosted conferences, awards and fireside chats for the UK Government, Deloitte, London Stock Exchange Group, Sainsbury’s, Hewlett Packard, British Business Bank and Manpower Group. Her named fireside subjects include Snapchat founder Evan Spiegel and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Juan Manuel Santos, and she has compered the Qatar-UK business investment forum alongside both Prime Ministers and chaired an innovation forum for the King of Bhutan.

She also writes and podcasts. It’s a Grown Up Life, her podcast with journalist Lauren Libbert, covers the working and personal lives of midlife women. When she keynotes in her own name, the material is drawn from the anchor chair: how to ask better questions, how to keep composure when the autocue dies, and how to read a room of senior people in real time.

Key speaking topics

• Conference hosting and moderation
• Fireside chats with senior leaders
• Awards ceremony hosting
• Interviewing technique under pressure
• Composure on the live stage
• Women, work and midlife
• UK political and current affairs context

Ideal for

• Corporate annual conferences, leadership offsites and investor days needing a senior host.
• Awards ceremonies and gala dinners requiring an experienced presenter on stage.
• CEO, chair or political-leader fireside chats where the interviewer needs to hold the room and the substance.
• Government, financial services and professional services events with a UK political or current affairs frame.

Audience outcomes

• A stage that stays on time, on agenda and on tone for the duration of the event.
• Senior-leader interviews that go beyond pre-approved talking points without becoming combative.
• A host who can absorb a last-minute running order change, speaker no-show or live technical failure without the audience noticing.
• For keynote bookings, a working account of how live broadcasters prepare for, and recover from, things going wrong on air.