Motivation och inspiration speakers

Why organisations work with Katie Derham Fifteen years anchoring national news at the BBC and ITV News, where she covered general elections, royal weddings and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. That live-broadcast discipline is what shows up on stage when a panel goes off script. A working economics background. She read Economics at Cambridge and started at BBC Radio 4’s Money Box, which is why finance and business clients book her over generalist presenters. A serious arts and culture credential. Face of the BBC Proms on television since 2010 and presenter of Radio 3’s In Tune, with the cultural literacy that comes with both. Author of The Classical Music Book for DK’s Big Ideas Simply Explained series, and a 2017 judge on the Women’s Prize for Fiction. The reading and editorial work behind those credits informs the way she prepares and questions. A name that travels. Strictly Come Dancing finalist, Classical Brit Awards host, household-recognisable, which matters when the brief is a high-profile awards ceremony or televised gala. Biography highlights Presenter, BBC Proms television coverage on BBC One and BBC Two since 2010. Presenter, In Tune on BBC Radio 3. Former Media and Arts Editor and lead newscaster, ITV News (1998 onwards), the youngest ITN newsreader since the broadcaster’s launch in 1955. Host of the Classical Brit Awards at the Royal Albert Hall. Author, The Classical Music Book, DK Big Ideas Simply Explained series (2018). 2017 judge, Women’s Prize for Fiction. Strictly Come Dancing 2015 finalist (fourth place, partnered with Anton Du Beke). Patron of Eastside Educational Trust and ambassador of the Ashdown Forest Foundation. Biography The hardest part of any conference is not the keynote. It is the connective tissue: the on-stage interview that has to draw something new out of a CEO, the panel that has to land in 40 minutes, the awards ceremony that has to keep a room of 800 people on side from cocktails to the final trophy. That work belongs to the host. Katie Derham came to that work through 15 years of national news. She joined ITN in 1998 as Media and Arts Editor for ITV News and, at 27, became the youngest national newscaster the broadcaster had appointed since its founding in 1955. The roster from those years includes general elections, royal weddings, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which is the schooling that produces a host who can hold a stage when the autocue fails. Her second act has been arts broadcasting at scale. She has presented BBC Proms television coverage from the Royal Albert Hall every season since 2010, fronts In Tune on BBC Radio 3, and authored The Classical Music Book in DK’s Big Ideas Simply Explained series. She has hosted the Classical Brit Awards and judged the 2017 Women’s Prize for Fiction. The economics is what differentiates her commercially. She read Economics at Magdalene College, Cambridge, and started her career as a BBC Radio 4 Money Box researcher, which is why finance, business and brand clients book her over presenters who have only ever covered culture. That dual fluency, business credibility and arts authority, is the reason serious organisations put her in front of their leadership team. Key speaking topics Conference and event hosting On-stage CEO and leadership interviews Awards ceremony presenting Panel moderation Classical music and the arts Broadcast journalism and live media Women in broadcasting and media careers Ideal for CEOs and chairs who want their on-stage interviewer to do the briefing properly and ask the next question. Comms and brand teams running flagship customer events, awards ceremonies, or televised galas. Investor days, AGMs and finance sector conferences that need an economically literate host, not a generalist presenter. Cultural institutions, philanthropic galas and arts boards programming high-profile public events. Audience outcomes A room that stays with the agenda from the opening session through the closing remarks. Sharper, more candid contributions from senior interviewees, because the questions land. Smooth transitions across a complex run-of-show, with live recovery when timings slip. A stage presence the audience remembers and associates with the brand hosting the event.

Why organisations work with Katie Hilborn She has spent two decades making high-stakes calls in environments where missing a signal carried immediate human cost, so her account of judgment under pressure is operational, not theoretical. The Architect’s Read gives leaders a repeatable way to trace a problem from surface event to root structure, rather than a set of principles to admire and forget. As founder of Regenerative Infrastructure Holdings, she is building AI infrastructure in practice, which makes her credible on the human judgment the technology cannot replace. Recognition includes a Silver Anthem Award in the same cycle as the Dalai Lama and Jane Goodall, multiple Telly Awards, and the President’s Volunteer Service Award for Lifetime Achievement. Biography highlights Founder and CEO, Compass Rose International, the nonprofit behind the Girls INpowerment Center in Nepal, which holds the GuideStar Platinum Seal of Transparency. Founder of Regenerative Infrastructure Holdings, developing AI data centres powered by renewable energy and governed by community trusts, with a first site under way in Nepal. Led 13 aid missions in Nepal after the 2015 earthquake; uncovered and reported a child-trafficking ring during relief operations. 10x award-winning humanitarian, including a Silver Anthem Award in the same cycle as the Dalai Lama and Jane Goodall, multiple Telly Awards, and the President’s Volunteer Service Award for Lifetime Achievement (AmeriCorps); member of the Forbes Nonprofit Council. Has spoken at RegenWorld, EarthX, the Global Family Office Investment Summit, and Northern Illinois University; featured in New York Magazine, NBC, and ABC. B.A., Colorado Mesa University; M.Ed., Grand Canyon University; certified secondary teacher. Biography The 2015 Nepal earthquakes flattened entire villages in minutes. Katie Hilborn flew in with no organisation behind her, led 13 aid missions across remote districts, and read what the relief effort had dismissed as chaos for what it was: a child-trafficking network preying on displaced girls. Spotting it was the easy part. Tracing it to the structure producing it, and building something that addressed it at the source, became the work of the next decade. That skill has a name in her work: pattern recognition under pressure. It is the ability to catch the weak signal everyone else rationalises away and to act while acting is still cheap. As organisations hand routine decisions to AI, this is the judgment that does not automate, and the one leaders need most when the stakes are highest. Hilborn now applies the same read at infrastructure scale. As founder of Regenerative Infrastructure Holdings, she is developing AI data centres powered by renewable energy and governed by community trusts, with a first site under way in Nepal. She continues to lead Compass Rose International, the nonprofit behind the Girls INpowerment Center, which holds the Guidestar Platinum Seal of Transparency. Her flagship keynote, Seeing What Others Miss, turns this into The Architect’s Read: a method for catching a problem at the surface, tracing it to the structure beneath, and acting where it resolves. The credibility behind it is a field record built under real operational stakes. She is a Silver Anthem Award winner recognised in the same cycle as the Dalai Lama and Jane Goodall, holds multiple Telly Awards and the President’s Volunteer Service Award for Lifetime Achievement, and sits on the Forbes Nonprofit Council. Key speaking topics Purpose-driven culture and leadership Heart-centric leadership through change Resilience and decision-making under pressure Social entrepreneurship and impact at scale Intuition and leadership judgment Employee engagement and meaning at work Humanitarian leadership lessons for business Ideal for CHROs and people leaders rebuilding engagement after restructure or mission drift CEOs and executive teams setting culture through integration, transformation, or strategic reset Foundations, family offices, and impact investors framing purpose for portfolio leadership teams All-hands and emerging-leader audiences where the brief is conviction and resilience, not content depth on a technical topic Audience outcomes A working definition of purpose that survives contact with budget, headcount, and reorganisation decisions A specific lens, drawn from frontline humanitarian operations, for making heart-led decisions that still hold up to scrutiny Renewed belief among leaders that conviction is a strategic asset, not a soft skill, with examples to back it up A vocabulary for talking about meaning at work that does not collapse into cliche when senior leaders use it Practical takeaways from Compass Rose’s operating record on building and sustaining mission-led teams

Why organisations work with Kavita Oberoi A first-hand account of selling into the NHS and global pharma as an outsider, including the specific moves that turned a Pfizer pilot into a multi-client healthcare consultancy. An OBE-recognised entrepreneur who is candid about the parts of company building that most founders gloss over: pricing the first big contract, hiring before revenue, and surviving the move from founder-led sales to a delivery team. A public profile shaped by The Secret Millionaire and ongoing BBC, Sky and ITV business commentary, which translates into audience trust before she opens her mouth. Genuine credibility on the diversity-and-resilience angle without the usual abstractions, drawing on a documented path from a 15-year-old taking a Saturday job against family expectation to chairing the Global Girls’ Fund. Biography highlights OBE for services to entrepreneurship and start-up businesses, Queen’s 2014 Birthday Honours. Founder and Managing Director of Oberoi Consulting, healthcare IT and clinical audit firm working with the NHS and pharmaceutical industry since 2001. Founder of Oberoi Business Hub, Derby’s Pride Park, serviced and virtual office facility for start-ups, opened 2012. Named in the 2009 HBOS report on Britain’s 100 Most Entrepreneurial Women. Chair of the Global Girls’ Fund, the international fundraising arm of Girl Guiding and Girl Scouting. Honorary Doctorate, University of Huddersfield, 2013; BSc Applied Chemistry, First Class, University of Huddersfield, 1992. Television: Channel 4’s The Secret Millionaire, BBC’s The Apprentice You’re Fired, ITV News Business Club panellist, BBC Breakfast, Sky News. Biography The clinical audit gap inside UK general practice was the opening Kavita Oberoi spotted in 2001. GP surgeries needed structured data work that pharmaceutical companies and the NHS both wanted, and almost nobody was packaging it as a service. From a standing start she won a contract with Pfizer, and Oberoi Consulting grew from there into a healthcare support business serving GP practices, primary care groups, private healthcare providers and global pharma. The route to that point matters because it shapes what she actually says on stage. A first-class chemistry degree from Huddersfield, then a stint as one of Bayer’s highest-performing medical representatives, gave her the technical credibility to sell into clinical buyers. Leaving a corporate salary at 30 to start a consultancy without a network or a war chest gave her the rest. In 2012 she opened Oberoi Business Hub on Derby’s Pride Park, a serviced and virtual office facility built specifically for start-ups and small companies that need infrastructure they cannot yet afford to own. The wider portfolio now spans healthcare consultancy, shared workspace, commercial property and media work, and earned her an OBE in 2014 for services to entrepreneurship and start-up businesses. She chairs the Global Girls’ Fund, the international fundraising body of Girl Guiding and Girl Scouting, set up the Derby Breakfast Club to feed children before school, and was named in the 2009 HBOS report on Britain’s 100 Most Entrepreneurial Women. Her Channel 4 Secret Millionaire episode put a lot of that work in front of a national audience and continues to drive board, charity and conference invitations across the UK. Key speaking topics Building a services business in a regulated sector Founder-led sales into NHS and pharmaceutical buyers Scaling beyond the first major contract Entrepreneurship and start-up infrastructure Women in business and overcoming cultural barriers Philanthropy and corporate giving Ideal for Founders, owner-managers and aspiring entrepreneurs inside accelerator, incubator or membership programmes Sales and growth leaders selling complex services into healthcare, pharma or public-sector buyers Diversity and women-in-leadership audiences inside FTSE and professional services firms Awards hosting and after-dinner addresses where the brief is credibility plus warmth, not theoretical content Audience outcomes A clear-eyed view of how a single enterprise contract can be turned into a sustainable services company, with the operational moves named. The questions a founder should be answering before they leave a corporate salary, drawn from someone who actually made that jump. A practical sense of what selling into the NHS and global pharma looks like from the supplier side, and where most start-ups misread the buyer. Renewed confidence in personal agency for audiences whose backgrounds are not typically reflected on the founder stage.

Why organisations work with Keira Walsh She has held the central midfield role in two winning European finals for England, including as Player of the Match at Wembley in 2022, which is a specific position about reading risk and keeping a team in shape under pressure. Her career carries the weight of a world-record transfer fee, which is a useful frame for any leader being asked to perform after a step-change in expectation, scrutiny or investment. She offers an inside account of an elite team culture, the Lionesses under Sarina Wiegman, that has now won back-to-back European Championships and reached a World Cup final. Her move from Barcelona to Chelsea in January 2025 is a recent, deliberate case study in choosing environment and ambition over comfort, told first-hand. Biography highlights MBE in the 2026 New Year Honours for services to association football. UEFA Women’s Euro 2022 final Player of the Match; UEFA Women’s Euro 2025 winner with England. World-record transfer fee in women’s football when Barcelona signed her from Manchester City in September 2022. Two UEFA Women’s Champions League titles with FC Barcelona. Chelsea midfielder since January 2025 on a four-and-a-half-year deal. Over 100 senior England caps; ever-present in Sarina Wiegman’s midfield through two winning European Championship campaigns. Biography Holding midfield in a winning international final is, in football terms, the most exposed leadership job on the pitch. It is the role that connects defence to attack, absorbs pressure when the opposition raises tempo, and decides which risks the team can afford in the last twenty minutes. Walsh has now done that job twice, at Euro 2022 and Euro 2025, in the two most scrutinised matches in the women’s game. The 2022 final at Wembley was the case study. England were level with Germany when Walsh produced the assist for Ella Toone’s opening goal and was named Player of the Match. UEFA’s technical observers noted that she “balanced the team throughout the game” and rarely lost possession. Three years later she was back in the starting line-up for the Euro 2025 final in Basel, helping England retain the title in a penalty shoot-out against Spain. Her club career has carried a comparable weight of expectation. Barcelona paid a reported 400,000 pounds for her in September 2022, a world record in women’s football, and she went on to win two UEFA Women’s Champions League titles and a domestic continental quadruple. In January 2025 she returned to England with Chelsea on a four-and-a-half-year contract, signed explicitly to help the club convert domestic dominance into European success. For corporate audiences, the substance is composure under exposure. Walsh is a working professional who has been the named senior player in a unit twice asked to win a continental final, and a transfer asset twice priced at the top of her market. The MBE awarded in the 2026 New Year Honours marks the public record. The more useful material is the operating detail behind it. Key speaking topics Composure and decision-making under pressure Elite team culture and cohesion Resilience after setback and injury Performing after a step-change in expectation Women’s sport and the commercial reset of the game Leadership in the holding role Ideal for Leadership teams preparing for a high-scrutiny year: post-IPO, post-acquisition, new mandate CHROs and culture leads building cohesion in senior teams under sustained pressure Conference audiences in sport, media and consumer brands engaging with the growth of women’s football Employee and partner events where the brief is human performance rather than technical content Audience outcomes A first-hand picture of how a winning international squad makes decisions in the final twenty minutes of a closely fought match. A working definition of composure that is usable by senior leaders, not motivational language. A concrete example of what changes when an individual is priced and expected to operate at the very top of their market. An honest account of leaving a winning environment for a harder one, and the reasoning behind it.

Why organisations work with Kellie Maloney A first-hand account of coming out inside professional boxing, one of the least forgiving commercial environments in sport, given by someone who managed a world heavyweight champion. A direct, unsanitised perspective on suicide, depression and recovery in the LGBT+ community from someone who has lived it and chosen to talk about it publicly. Credibility on female participation in sport grounded in actual commercial activity, having returned to promotion in 2020 to back female boxers at the start of their careers. Public profile built through Celebrity Big Brother, two documentaries and a published autobiography, giving the story reach beyond a corporate audience. Biography highlights Managed Lennox Lewis to the undisputed world heavyweight title between 1989 and 2001. Guided four further fighters to world titles plus British, European and Commonwealth champions. Named Transgender Champion at the 2015 Glamour Women of the Year Awards. Author of Frankly Kellie: Becoming a Woman in a Man’s World, Blink Publishing, 2015. Subject of Amazon Prime documentary From Frank to Kellie (2020) and feature documentary Knock Out Blonde: The Kellie Maloney Story (2025). Returned to boxing promotion in 2020 with a focus on female fighters at the start of their careers. Biography Professional boxing is not where most people would expect a public gender transition to begin. Kellie Maloney spent nearly three decades inside it, managing Lennox Lewis from 1989 to 2001 to the undisputed world heavyweight championship and steering four more fighters to world titles. Her standing in the sport was earned in a culture that did not make room for what came next. In August 2014 she announced publicly that she would live as Kellie. The decision was effectively forced by tabloid pressure rather than chosen on her own timing, a detail that matters when organisations talk about psychological safety. The aftermath included Celebrity Big Brother, the 2015 Glamour Women of the Year Transgender Champion award, the autobiography Frankly Kellie: Becoming a Woman in a Man’s World, and a period of severe depression that culminated in a suicide attempt and recovery. She now speaks about identity, mental health and inclusion from inside the experience, not from theory. The Amazon Prime documentary From Frank to Kellie and the 2025 feature Knock Out Blonde: The Kellie Maloney Story give the material a reach most corporate speakers do not have. Her audience is HR, DEI and wellbeing leaders who want a session that lands emotionally and tells the truth about what inclusion costs the people it is aimed at. In 2020 she returned to boxing promotion with a stated commitment to female fighters at the start of their careers. That detail closes the circle. The story is not only about transition; it is about going back into the same hard commercial environment as a different person and changing what it is willing to back. Key speaking topics Identity and transition in commercial environments LGBT+ inclusion in male-dominated cultures Mental health, depression and suicide prevention Resilience after public exposure Female participation in sport Personal courage and reinvention Ideal for HR, DEI and ERG leads designing inclusion programmes that have to work in practice Wellbeing and mental health leads building suicide prevention and crisis support content Sports, security, construction, manufacturing and other traditionally male-dominated sectors Internal events tied to Pride, Mental Health Awareness Month, or International Women’s Day Audience outcomes A clearer picture of what inclusion policies look like from the perspective of the person they are written about. A direct, lived account of depression, suicidal crisis and recovery in the LGBT+ community. An honest read on how hard cultures can change, and what individuals inside them carry when they do. Renewed willingness to ask colleagues about mental health rather than assume.

Why organisations work with Dame Kelly Holmes A first-hand account of competing, and winning, at the highest level while concealing identity for fear of personal and professional consequence, a story directly relevant to inclusion, wellbeing, and retention agendas. Operational credibility on mental health: trained Mental Health First Aider and Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, not a generic wellness presence. A track record of building a durable institution beyond sport. The Dame Kelly Holmes Trust has paired retired elite athletes with disadvantaged young people since 2008, giving her practical, not theoretical, content on mentoring and transition. Cross-format flexibility for major corporate moments: keynote, after-dinner, awards host, panel chair, in-conversation interviewee, television-grade on stage. Biography highlights Won 800m and 1500m gold at Athens 2004; first British woman to win two golds at the same Olympic Games. Appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2005; MBE in 1998 for service in the British Army. Served almost a decade in the British Army, including as an HGV driver and Physical Training Instructor, before turning fully professional in athletics. Founded the Dame Kelly Holmes Trust in 2008, mentoring disadvantaged young people through retired elite athletes. Author of “Unique: A Memoir” (2023), shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year 2024. Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists (2024) and a trained Mental Health First Aider. Biography Winning two Olympic gold medals in the same week, at 34, is rare. Doing it while hiding a private fear that began in the British Army, where being gay was illegal until 2000, is the part of the story that matters most to organisations now. That is the spine of Holmes’s public work today. Her sporting record is well documented. Athens 2004, 800m then 1500m, made her the first British woman to win two golds at a single Games and the oldest woman to win either distance at the Olympics. The MBE in 1998 recognised her army service. The Damehood followed in 2005. The substance of her speaking comes from what happened next. In 2008, she founded the Dame Kelly Holmes Trust, an institution that pairs retired elite athletes with disadvantaged young people, now nearly two decades old. She trained as a Mental Health First Aider and was made an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in 2024, anchoring her wellbeing work in something more rigorous than personal testimony. In June 2022, she came out publicly through an ITV documentary, “Kelly Holmes: Being Me”, and a year later published “Unique: A Memoir”, shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year 2024. The book traces 34 years of concealment, including standing on the Athens podium in fear of being outed. For a corporate audience it is unusually specific evidence of what hidden identity costs a high performer, and how that cost compounds under pressure. Key speaking topics Mental health and wellbeing in high-performance environments Resilience and performance under pressure Identity, belonging, and the cost of concealment at work Mentoring and the transition out of elite careers Inclusion and LGBTQ+ visibility in regulated and uniformed settings Goal-setting and sustained motivation across long careers Ideal for HR, CPO, and CHRO audiences responsible for wellbeing, mental health, and inclusion programming Leadership conferences where peak performance and personal resilience are central themes DEI and ERG events, particularly around LGBTQ+ inclusion in regulated, military, or traditional sectors Awards dinners, anniversary moments, and major town halls requiring a recognisable keynote presence with substantive content Audience outcomes A direct, named example of what concealing identity costs senior performers over a career Practical language for talking about mental health at work without slipping into wellness cliche A clear account of how mentoring, structured rather than informal, changes outcomes for young people and post-career athletes An honest read on how high performers actually manage pressure, injury, and self-doubt over time

Why organisations work with Kelly Hoppen She has run a creatively-led business across forty years of cycles, from private residential commissions to hotels, yachts, cruise ships and a direct-to-consumer product line, and can speak to the commercial trade-offs at each stage. Her Dragons’ Den seat on BBC Two gave her direct, public investor experience evaluating early-stage consumer brands, including portfolio names such as Skinny Tan and Reviveaphone. The “East meets West” design philosophy is a defined intellectual signature that has carried through books, product ranges and international commissions, demonstrating how a creative point of view translates into a brand asset. As chair of the GREAT Ambassadors’ group, she has represented British creative industries to overseas markets at a level few founders are asked to operate at. A CBE for services to the GREAT campaign and an MBE for services to interior design provide independent validation of contribution beyond the studio. Biography highlights CBE awarded in the 2020 Birthday Honours for services to the GREAT campaign; MBE awarded in the 2009 New Year Honours for services to interior design. Founder of Kelly Hoppen Interiors, with international projects including One Park Taipei, the Celebrity Edge cruise ship for Celebrity Cruises and LUX* Grand Gaube in Mauritius. Investor “Dragon” on BBC Two’s Dragons’ Den, series 11 and 12 (2013 to 2015). Author of multiple interior design books, beginning with “East Meets West: Global Design for Contemporary Interiors”. Winner of the Andrew Martin International Interior Designer of the Year Award (1996) and the European Woman of Achievement Award (2007). Chair of the GREAT Ambassadors’ group and ambassador for The Prince’s Trust. Biography A single kitchen, designed for a family friend, was the first commission. Kelly Hoppen had left school at sixteen. The business that grew from that job now spans private residences, yachts, jets, hotels, cruise ships and a direct-to-consumer product range, and trades on a name that has become its own design vocabulary. The creative argument is “East meets West”, set out in her first book and carried through more than a dozen titles since. It gave the studio a recognisable signature long before personal brands were a formal commercial category. The same instinct shaped the move into product, retail and licensing, where the discipline is no longer a single client but a coherent offer at scale. Public-market judgement followed. Hoppen sat as an investor on BBC Two’s Dragons’ Den across series 11 and 12, backing early-stage consumer companies including Skinny Tan and Reviveaphone, and speaking openly afterwards about which bets were working and which were not. That experience sits alongside four decades of running her own balance sheet. Recognition has come from outside the design world as well as inside it. An MBE for services to interior design in 2009, a CBE for services to the GREAT campaign in 2020, and the chair of the GREAT Ambassadors’ group, where she represents British creative industries to overseas markets and government counterparts. Key speaking topics Creative entrepreneurship and building a personal brand Design-led business and the commercial value of a distinctive aesthetic Women in business and founder resilience Investor judgement on early-stage consumer brands British creative industries and global market positioning Career reinvention across forty years of cycles Ideal for Founders and CEOs of design-led, consumer or lifestyle businesses considering brand expansion or licensing Senior marketing and brand leaders working on a defined creative signature Women’s leadership and founder networks across consumer industries Trade and government audiences focused on UK creative-industry exports Audience outcomes A working view of how a creative signature becomes a defensible brand asset, and the commercial decisions that protect or dilute it. Investor-side perspective on what makes an early-stage consumer brand fundable, drawn from public Dragons’ Den deals. Honest reflection on what forty years of running a name-led business teaches about cycles, partners and product extensions. A confident position on how British design and creative industries compete in international markets.

Why organisations work with Kemba Smith Pradia She brings a story that has been independently verified by Congress, the United Nations, two presidents and a feature film, which gives DEI and values conversations a level of moral authority that internal speakers cannot replicate. She has worked inside the system she critiques. Service on the Virginia Parole Board and Virginia Criminal Sentencing Commission gives her policy fluency that pure advocacy speakers lack. Her memoir Poster Child and the BET+ film KEMBA give audiences a shared cultural reference point before she walks on stage, which compresses the time needed to land a serious message about fairness and institutional accountability. She speaks to domestic violence, coercive relationships and self-esteem with the same first-person credibility she brings to incarceration, which makes her useful to organisations running employee resource groups and wellbeing programmes that need substance rather than awareness theatre. A presidential pardon from Joe Biden in January 2025 closes a loop that has been open in public for thirty years. Few speakers carry that arc of personal and institutional resolution into a room. Biography highlights Founder, The Kemba Smith Foundation, 501(c)(3) focused on criminal justice education and youth advocacy. Author, Poster Child: The Kemba Smith Story. Executive producer, KEMBA (2024), feature film on BET+. Appointed to the Virginia Parole Board by Governor Ralph Northam in 2019; former member of the Virginia Criminal Sentencing Commission. Former State Advocacy Campaigns Director, ACLU of Virginia. Bachelor of Social Work, Virginia Union University. Testified before the United States Congress and the United Nations; featured in The Washington Post, The New York Times, CNN, Court TV, Nightline, Essence, Glamour, People, Emerge and Jet. Sentence commuted by President Bill Clinton in December 2000; full pardon granted by President Joe Biden in January 2025. Biography In 1994 a twenty-three-year-old college student with no prior criminal record was sentenced to 24.5 years in federal prison for a non-violent drug conspiracy tied to a former boyfriend. The case became one of the most cited examples of the human cost of mandatory minimum sentencing in the United States, covered in Emerge, The Washington Post and on Nightline, and used by the Drug Policy Alliance and the ACLU as a reference point for federal sentencing reform. President Bill Clinton commuted that sentence in December 2000 after six and a half years inside. Kemba Smith Pradia then completed a Bachelor of Social Work at Virginia Union University and began a decades-long second career in advocacy, founding The Kemba Smith Foundation, working as State Advocacy Campaigns Director for the ACLU of Virginia, and testifying before Congress and the United Nations on incarceration, drug policy and the treatment of women in the criminal legal system. In 2019 Governor Ralph Northam appointed her to the Virginia Parole Board, and she also served on the Virginia Criminal Sentencing Commission. That inside-the-system service is what separates her from most lived-experience speakers in this space: she has read the case files, voted on parole decisions, and sat on the commission that sets sentencing policy. Her memoir Poster Child and the 2024 BET+ feature film KEMBA, on which she served as executive producer, give organisations a substantive cultural and documentary record to work from. On 19 January 2025 President Joe Biden issued her a full pardon, closing a public arc that began with the 1996 Emerge cover story “Kemba’s Nightmare.” Organisations book her when they need a serious, named voice on resilience, domestic abuse, inclusion and the practical content of values-based leadership, delivered by someone who has lived every part of the argument and helped change the policy that produced it. Key speaking topics Criminal justice reform and mandatory sentencing policy Resilience and recovery after institutional failure Values-based and inclusive leadership Domestic violence, coercive control and self-worth Women, race and the United States criminal legal system Personal responsibility and consequence Youth advocacy and civic engagement Ideal for Chief diversity officers, employee resource group leads and culture leaders running inclusion programmes that need substance over signalling. Heads of wellbeing and employee support designing serious conversations on domestic abuse and resilience. Universities, law schools, and public-policy audiences working on criminal justice, sentencing and policy reform. Leadership development programmes building values-based leadership content beyond business case studies. Audience outcomes A named, verifiable example of how mandatory minimum sentencing reshapes individual lives and the policy choices that follow. Language for talking about inclusion, dignity and fairness at work that survives political contestation. A direct account of coercive relationships and self-worth that audiences can use in employee resource group and wellbeing settings. A clearer sense of what personal responsibility, institutional accountability and second chances look like in practice rather than as abstractions.

Why organisations work with Kenton Cool He has summited Mount Everest 20 times, the most of any non-Nepali climber, which gives his observations on decision-making and risk a weight that no theoretical speaker can match. He led Sir Ranulph Fiennes to the Everest summit in 2009 and up the Eiger’s north face in 2007, so he speaks with first-hand authority on guiding individuals through environments they cannot manage alone. In 2013 he completed the Everest Horseshoe of Nuptse, Everest and Lhotse in seven days without returning to base camp, a previously unachieved sequence used as a case study in sustained performance and recovery between high-consequence efforts. His corporate content is rooted in repeatable expedition practice: how to read a team in real time, how to decide when to turn back, how to set a risk tolerance before the pressure begins. Biography highlights 20 summits of Mount Everest, the record for any non-Nepali climber, most recently on 22 May 2026. IFMGA/UIAGM Mountain Guide and member of the British Association of Mountain Guides. First person to climb Nuptse, Everest and Lhotse in a single push from base camp, May 2013. Led Sir Ranulph Fiennes on a successful Everest summit in 2009 and on the first British guided ascent of the Eiger’s north face in 2007. Author of One Man’s Everest (Preface, Penguin Random House, 2015). BSc Geological Sciences, University of Leeds; honorary Doctor of Laws, University of Leeds, 2018. Biography Most decisions in a corporate setting can be undone. On the Lhotse Face above Camp 3, with weather closing and oxygen burning down, they cannot. Kenton Cool has stood in that position more often than any non-Nepali climber alive, 20 times on the summit of Everest, and the corporate content he brings into boardrooms is built around what those moments actually demand of a leader. In 1996, an accident on a Welsh rock face fractured both his heel bones. A consultant told him he was unlikely to walk unaided again. He returned to climbing within a year, joined the British Association of Mountain Guides scheme, and went on to earn IFMGA certification, the gold standard for high-altitude guiding. That recovery, and the discipline behind it, shapes how he talks about resilience and the relationship between pain, judgement, and continued performance. His climbing record gives the talks their credibility. In May 2013 he completed the Everest Horseshoe of Nuptse, Everest and Lhotse in a single seven-day push without returning to base camp, a sequence no one had done before. He guided Sir Ranulph Fiennes up the Eiger’s north face in 2007 and to the Everest summit in 2009. In 2012, he carried a 1924 Olympic gold medal awarded to the 1922 British Everest expedition to the top, fulfilling an 88-year-old pledge that Lord Coe credited with helping launch the 2012 London Games. The corporate work translates this into specifics. How to set a risk tolerance before fatigue, ego or sunk cost distort the call. How to read team trust when individual capability is no longer the binding constraint. How to design decision processes that hold up when the time to think runs out. The frameworks are not academic. They are what an IFMGA guide does to bring people home from 8,000 metres. Key speaking topics High-stakes decision-making Risk tolerance and contingency planning Team trust and shared purpose Resilience after setback Leadership under physical and psychological pressure High-performance culture Ideal for Senior leadership teams and boards facing high-consequence strategic decisions Sales kick-offs, partner conferences, and after-dinner events where lived authority is the brief Transformation and operations leadership groups navigating sustained pressure Awards evenings and hosted events requiring a credible, on-stage presence Audience outcomes A concrete account of how an expedition leader sets risk tolerance and decides when to turn back A vocabulary for talking about team trust as an operational capability, not a soft attribute A working model of how to make binary calls when information is incomplete and time is short A reset on what resilience looks like when the recovery is long and the prognosis is bad Energy and a story senior audiences will repeat, anchored in a verifiable climbing record

Why organisations work with Kerry Daynes Twenty-five years assessing risk in prisons, secure hospitals and police investigations gives her workplace mental health content a substance that wellness-industry speakers cannot match. She translates clinical psychology into language line managers actually use, drawing on case material from homicide, stalking and serious violence work without sensationalising it. Sunday Times Top Ten bestselling author of “The Dark Side of the Mind”, with a second title longlisted for the Crime Writers Association Golden Dagger; her published thinking is on the public record, not bureau copy. Trustee of the Suzy Lamplugh Trust and patron of the National Centre for Domestic Violence, which makes her a credible voice on personal safety, stalking, and domestic abuse as workplace risks, not abstract HR topics. Biography highlights Consultant Forensic Psychologist, Chartered Psychologist, Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society, HCPC-registered, Chartered Scientist Court-appointed expert witness in homicide, sexual assault and serious violence cases Author of “The Dark Side of the Mind” (Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller, Cassell 2019), “What Lies Buried” (Crime Writers Association Golden Dagger longlist) and “Is There a Psycho in Your Life?” “The Profiler” on Discovery’s “Faking It: Tears of a Crime”; documentary contributor for BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, Netflix and the History Channel Trustee of the Suzy Lamplugh Trust; patron of the National Centre for Domestic Violence and Talking2Minds Former Lecturer in Applied Psychology, Manchester University Biography Most workplace conversations about mental health stop at awareness. They name the issue and offer a helpline. They rarely give managers the tools to interpret what they are actually seeing in a colleague, a candidate, or a customer. That gap is where Kerry Daynes works. Her grounding is forensic. Twenty-five years inside prisons, secure psychiatric hospitals and major police investigations, including work as a court-appointed expert witness in homicide, sexual assault and serious violence cases. She began her career at HMP Wakefield at twenty-one and went on to lecture in applied psychology at Manchester University. The published record carries the argument further. “The Dark Side of the Mind” was a Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller; “What Lies Buried” was longlisted for the Crime Writers Association Golden Dagger for non-fiction. As “The Profiler” on Discovery’s “Faking It: Tears of a Crime”, and through documentary contributions across BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Netflix, she has built a public body of work that takes clinical material seriously without flattening it into entertainment. For corporate audiences, she draws on that material to address how people actually behave under pressure, how risk presents before it escalates, and how organisations can build mental health and personal safety practice that does more than tick a box. Her roles with the Suzy Lamplugh Trust and the National Centre for Domestic Violence give her work on stalking, coercion and domestic abuse a credibility that translates directly into safeguarding and duty-of-care conversations. Key speaking topics Workplace mental health Behavioural risk and threat assessment Personal safety, stalking and coercive behaviour Psychology of motivation and human behaviour Resilience in high-pressure roles Communication and influence under stress Ideal for CHROs, heads of wellbeing and people directors building substantive mental health strategy Heads of security, risk and safeguarding addressing personal safety and threat behaviour Leadership teams in healthcare, policing, legal services and frontline professions exposed to vicarious trauma Conference audiences in HR, EAP, occupational health and corporate safety sectors Audience outcomes A clearer way to distinguish stress, distress and behavioural risk in colleagues and clients Practical language for managers who currently avoid mental health conversations A grounded view of stalking, coercion and domestic abuse as workplace safeguarding issues Insight into how forensic psychologists assess motivation, deception and threat, applied to everyday organisational life A more confident, less squeamish stance on the human realities behind wellbeing policy

Why organisations work with Kevin Brown He brings the operator’s view. Twenty years inside SERVPRO’s leadership team, helping build a franchise system into a billion-dollar category leader, gives him direct credibility with sales, service, and franchise audiences that academic culture speakers cannot match. The HERO Effect is a usable framework, not a slogan. It gives frontline teams and managers a shared language for personal accountability that survives the flight home from the conference. He sits comfortably in front of mixed audiences: sales kick-offs, franchisee conventions, dealer meetings, and customer-experience summits. The same material lands with technicians, agents, and senior leaders. Repeat-booking proof. His client list, which includes American Express, Delta Air Lines, PayPal, ExxonMobil, Chick-fil-A, and Ernst and Young, reflects organisations that buy speakers on outcomes, not on novelty. Recognition from buyer-facing bodies. Global Gurus Top 30 Motivational Speakers (2024), SpeakInc Top 10 Keynote Speakers (2021), and NorthStar Meetings Group Best Keynote Speakers (2019). Biography highlights Author of The Hero Effect: Being Your Best When It Matters the Most (2017) and Unleashing Your Hero (HarperCollins Leadership, 2021). Spent more than 20 years on the senior leadership team at SERVPRO, helping grow the franchise system into a billion-dollar category leader. Creator of the HERO Effect framework, used as the basis of his keynote programmes and books. Named to Global Gurus’ Top 30 Motivational Speakers list (2024). Selected to SpeakInc’s Top 10 Keynote Speakers (2021) and NorthStar Meetings Group’s Best Keynote Speakers (2019). Keynote client list includes American Express, Delta Air Lines, PayPal, ExxonMobil, Chick-fil-A, Verizon Connect, O’Reilly Automotive, Ernst and Young, Booz Allen Hamilton, and Merck. Biography Service-led businesses spend heavily on customer-experience programmes and still lose customers at the moment of contact. The reason is rarely strategy. It is the daily, individual choices of the people closest to the customer, and most cultures do not equip those people to choose well under pressure. That is the territory Kevin Brown has worked in for thirty years, first as an operator and now as a keynote speaker. Two decades of his corporate career were spent on the senior leadership team at SERVPRO, where the team built the franchise system into a billion-dollar category leader. He learned culture from the inside, in a network of independent operators where consistency had to be earned every day rather than mandated from headquarters. Out of that experience came the HERO Effect, the framework that anchors his keynotes and his two books, The Hero Effect (2017) and Unleashing Your Hero (HarperCollins Leadership, 2021). The argument is straightforward. Excellence is a personal practice before it is an organisational outcome, and leaders who treat culture as a behavioural discipline, not a values poster, get measurably different results from their frontline teams. His client list reflects who that argument lands with: American Express, Delta Air Lines, PayPal, ExxonMobil, Chick-fil-A, Verizon Connect, Ernst and Young, Booz Allen Hamilton. Global Gurus named him to its Top 30 Motivational Speakers list in 2024. The work is not theory borrowed for a stage. It is a set of operating principles taken back into the room they came from. Key speaking topics Service excellence and customer experience Culture and frontline accountability Leadership at every level Personal performance and ownership Sales-team motivation and consistency Franchise and dealer-network performance Ideal for CHROs, customer-experience leads, and operations leaders running cultural change inside service-led organisations. Sales kick-offs, dealer conferences, and franchisee conventions where the audience is mixed-seniority and outcome-focused. Front-line and customer-facing teams in retail, hospitality, financial services, and field service. Audience outcomes A shared vocabulary for personal accountability that managers can keep using after the keynote. A clearer line between individual behaviour and customer-experience results, made concrete with examples from inside a billion-dollar franchise system. Renewed energy in mixed-audience settings such as sales kick-offs and dealer meetings, where engagement is the usual brief. Practical prompts for managers on how to coach service consistency rather than mandate it.

Why organisations work with Kevin Green A career arc that has tested his own frameworks in three different operating environments: professional kitchens, classroom education and corporate keynote delivery. The 3P Framework (Purpose, Passion, Potential) gives audiences a single, repeatable structure for moving from feeling stuck to taking action, useful for leaders managing people through reinvention. A teaching style built on practical demonstration, not abstraction. He came up running real kitchens and competing on Food Network’s Chopped, and brings that operator instinct to the stage. Strong fit for student and early-career audiences as well as corporate teams, with documented work with the University of Tennessee, Tennessee Department of Education and Pellissippi State Community College. Biography highlights Founder of Kevin Green Elevates, a keynote and workshop practice focused on leadership alignment and personal execution. Competitor on Food Network’s Chopped. Degree in Nutrition and Dietetics from Lipscomb University, Nashville. Built and ran Chef Kevin Culinary, a personal chef business spanning private dinners, cooking classes and culinary education. Speaking clients and partners include the University of Tennessee, Tennessee Department of Education, Pellissippi State Community College and Toastmasters. Reported keynote speaker for the IASP 2026 Global Conference, with a talk titled “Do It Scared”. Biography Most teams do not lack effort. They lack alignment. Priorities pile up, ownership drifts, and people work hard on the wrong things. That is the problem Kevin Green built his keynote practice around, drawing on a career that has crossed kitchens, classrooms and corporate rooms. His operator background is unusual for a speaker on this topic. He trained as a chef, ran his own personal chef business in Knoxville, Tennessee, taught culinary arts to teenagers, and competed on Food Network’s Chopped. Each of those environments forced him to translate intent into clean, repeatable execution under pressure, and that is the frame he brings to leaders. His core teaching tool is the 3P Framework, Purpose, Passion, Potential. It gives audiences a simple structure for separating what they actually want from what they have inherited, and then for moving from clarity into action. He uses it with college students choosing direction, with early-career professionals at crossroads, and with corporate teams trying to get priorities, roles and expectations into the same shape. He is known for energy on stage and for breaking complex ideas into language a working audience can use the next morning. Clients include the University of Tennessee, the Tennessee Department of Education and Pellissippi State Community College, and he was named to open the IASP 2026 Global Conference with a keynote titled “Do It Scared”. Key speaking topics Purpose, passion and potential as a personal operating framework Leadership and team alignment Personal execution and follow-through Resilience and self-leadership at career crossroads Authentic working life and identity at work Presence, body language and vocal delivery Ideal for Corporate leadership offsites and all-hands events focused on execution and ownership Sales kick-offs and culture days where energy and clarity matter as much as content University and college audiences, including career services, student life and athletic departments Early-career and high-potential cohorts navigating career direction Audience outcomes A clearer personal answer to what they are working towards and why A simple framework, the 3P method, that survives the trip back to the desk A sharper read on where their own priorities, roles and expectations are out of alignment Renewed momentum, with concrete actions to take in the days after the event Practical language for talking about presence, voice and how they show up at work