Stuart Sandeman
Wellbeing budgets are large and rising, yet most leaders still cannot point to a single intervention that measurably shifts how their teams perform under pressure. Mindfulness apps, resilience workshops and EAP hotlines have become table stakes without solving the problem. The gap is something closer to physiology: a practical tool people can use mid-meeting, before a board paper, or in the hour after bad news.
Stuart Sandeman is a breathwork practitioner, BBC Radio 1 host and Sunday Times bestselling author who teaches senior teams how to use breathing as a working tool for stress, focus and recovery.
Full Profile
Why organisations work with Stuart Sandeman
- He turns a research-grounded physiological practice into something a CFO will actually use on a Tuesday morning, not a wellness add-on that lives outside the working day.
- His book “Breathe In, Breathe Out” reached the Sunday Times bestseller list and gives buyers a defensible reference point for the substance behind the session.
- He has run programmes inside Google, Nike, Spotify, Adidas, PwC and Warner Music, with the same framework adapted for Olympic athletes, UFC fighters and the England football squad at Euro 2024.
- The format pairs structured breathing protocols with curated music, drawing on his prior career as a DJ and producer. The room experience is part of the product, not a backdrop.
- BBC Radio 1’s “Decompression Session”, now in its sixth series, gives him a public platform that very few corporate wellbeing speakers can match.
Biography highlights
- Founder of Breathpod, a breathwork and corporate wellbeing business with clients including Google, Nike, Spotify, Adidas, PwC, Warner Music, MediaCom and Merkle.
- Sunday Times bestselling author of “Breathe In, Breathe Out”, published by HarperCollins.
- Host of BBC Radio 1’s “Decompression Session”, a guided breathwork and electronic music programme now in its sixth series.
- Performance work with Olympic athletes, UFC fighters, the US rugby sevens team and the England team at the 2024 Euros.
- Former financial markets professional in the UK and Asia, music producer and DJ, and a Scottish national-level judo black belt.
- Featured in The Times, The Guardian and The Evening Standard.
Biography
Most corporate wellbeing programmes fail the same test. They are voluntary, optional and asynchronous, and the people who most need them never turn up. The result is a category of spend that boards struggle to defend when the next round of cost cuts arrives.
Stuart Sandeman built Breathpod to sit inside the working day rather than outside it. Sessions are short, structured and physiological, designed for boardrooms, sales floors and athletic preparation rooms. The clients on the list, Google, Nike, Spotify, Adidas, PwC and Warner Music, repeat-book because the practice produces a measurable shift in state inside the meeting it is delivered in.
His credibility as a practitioner is reinforced by two adjacent platforms. “Breathe In, Breathe Out” reached the Sunday Times bestseller list and gave the field a serious mainstream reference book. BBC Radio 1’s “Decompression Session”, now in its sixth series, pairs guided breathing with curated electronic music for a national audience. The hybrid, scientific instruction inside a broadcast-quality sound experience is the same form he brings to corporate rooms.
The route in is unusual. A career in financial markets in the UK and Asia, a parallel life as a DJ and producer, a Scottish judo black belt, then a turn to breathwork after losing his partner to cancer in 2016. Performance clients have followed: Olympic athletes, UFC fighters, the US rugby sevens team, and the England squad at Euro 2024.
Key speaking topics
- Breathwork for stress and recovery
- Focus and performance under pressure
- Sleep and energy management
- Wellbeing inside high-performance cultures
- Emotional regulation and resilience
- Mental health in the workplace
Ideal for
- CHROs, CPOs and wellbeing leads designing interventions that need to land with senior populations, not just with HR.
- Executive teams and leadership offsites where stress, sleep and focus are direct constraints on output.
- High-performance environments in sport, broadcast and creative industries where physiological state is part of the job.
- Sales, trading and consulting teams operating in sustained high-pressure cycles.
Audience outcomes
- A small set of breathing protocols that audiences can use the same day, in meetings, before pitches and during recovery.
- A clearer mental model for how breath, nervous system and performance interact, drawn from research rather than wellness language.
- A shared room experience, structured breathing inside a curated soundscape, that resets state and shifts the energy of the day.
- Practical tools for sleep, focus and emotional regulation that do not depend on apps, kits, or further enrolment.