Cultural Intelligence speakers

Why organisations work with Jana Azizi Her live broadcast range covers hard news, live morning television, entertainment magazines, and lifestyle formats, so she can shift register inside a single event without the audience registering the adjustment. She presents professionally in German, English, French, Spanish, and Russian at television standard, which is unusually rare in a single moderator and genuinely useful for events with multiple language markets in the room. Her Sky Sport News role included editorial team work, not only on-screen presenting. She arrives as a journalist who has already researched the guests and anticipated the angles. Thousands of hours of daily live broadcasting, including live sport, guest drop-outs, and technical failures, mean she has already encountered most of what can go wrong in a live room. A business administration degree from Mainz University of Applied Sciences lets her absorb a corporate brief quickly and translate dense business content for mixed audiences. Biography highlights Presenter at Sky Sport News from 2017 to 2020, working on the editorial team as well as on-screen Presenter across RTL flagship formats including RTL aktuell, Punkt 12, Guten Morgen Deutschland, Extra, Explosiv, and Explosiv Stories Presenter of Deluxe, the n-tv lifestyle and luxury format, from October 2020 Business administration degree from Mainz University of Applied Sciences (Hochschule Mainz) Marketing communications training at Grey Worldwide, Dusseldorf; presenter training at Logo Institut, Frankfurt Works professionally in five languages: German, English, French, Spanish, and Russian Biography Seven years of daily live television at Sky Sport News, RTL, and n-tv shape a specific kind of professional. Jana Azizi reads a room mid-conversation, absorbs the unexpected, and keeps an audience with her through shifts the room never sees. Her Sky Sport News role ran from 2017 to 2020 and included editorial team work alongside on-screen presenting. That side of the job built a journalist’s instinct for interview structure and story preparation, rather than only camera presence. At RTL she presented across the broadcaster’s flagship formats including RTL aktuell, Punkt 12, Guten Morgen Deutschland, Extra, and Explosiv. From October 2020 she also fronted Deluxe, the n-tv lifestyle and luxury programme. Sport, hard news, morning television, entertainment, and lifestyle each demand a different register. A moderator who has worked across all five reads what a corporate audience actually needs in the moment. Azizi works professionally in German, English, French, Spanish, and Russian. The five-language range matters most for events that are genuinely multi-market in the room, not simply bilingual on paper. She holds a business administration degree from Mainz University of Applied Sciences, which gives her the vocabulary to move confidently through a corporate brief and carry dense content for a mixed audience. Key speaking topics Live event moderation and conference hosting Broadcast communication and on-camera presence Interview craft and panel facilitation Storytelling in a business context Multilingual event hosting Women in media and male-dominated industries Ideal for Corporate conferences and leadership summits requiring a professional moderator or host International events where facilitation in multiple languages is needed at broadcast standard Award ceremonies, galas, and high-profile company anniversaries Media, sport, and communications sector organisations that need a credible, broadcast-trained panel moderator Audience outcomes Events that run with broadcast-level control, professionally paced and clearly structured Panels and interviews driven by focused, well-prepared questions rather than generic facilitation Live sessions handled cleanly when guests go off-script, formats slip, or tech fails Multi-language audiences held by a moderator who moves between languages without losing authority

Why organisations work with Jennifer Sarah Boone Native bilingual fluency in German and English – thinking simultaneously in both, not translating between them – means international technology events get equivalent quality of moderation across both audience groups. Her MSc in Business Psychology, completed in 2024 with a focus on digital coaching and consulting, means she can interrogate a panel on AI ethics or data governance with the vocabulary that makes technical experts take the conversation seriously. A broadcast career built across three countries – news editing at Wack Radio in Trinidad and Tobago, TV presenting at Reelkandi in Hamburg, morning show hosting in the UAE – gives her a level of live composure under pressure that is professional in the deepest sense. She has moderated at Deutsche Telekom’s stage at Mobile World Congress 2023 in Barcelona and at events connected to the German government’s Digitalgipfel – two of the most scrutinised technology forums in Europe. A cross-sector client portfolio spanning enterprise software (SAP, Google), semiconductor and automotive technology (Infineon, TWAICE Technologies, Nexperia), and climate innovation (Greentech Festival) means she can move between technical depth and commercial context within a single event day. Biography highlights Bilingual presenter and event moderator with over 20 years of professional on-stage and on-camera experience MSc in Business Psychology (focus: digital coaching and consulting), DIPLOMA Nordhessen, completed 2024 BA in Media Management and Media Journalism, DIPLOMA Nordhessen Host at Deutsche Telekom’s stage, Mobile World Congress 2023, Barcelona Client portfolio includes SAP, Google, Infineon, TWAICE Technologies, Nexperia, and Greentech Festival Confirmed panel moderation topics include AI ethics, autonomous mobility, cybersecurity, data governance, digital sovereignty, and sustainable aviation Broadcast background: Wack Radio (Trinidad and Tobago), Reelkandi TV (Hamburg), morning show host (UAE) Performing arts training at Stage School of Music, Dance and Drama, Hamburg Biography The moment a technology panel drifts – experts talking past each other, the room disengaging – organisations discover that event facilitation is a specialism, not an afterthought. Jennifer Sarah Boone has spent over 20 years preventing that failure, moderating across AI, digital transformation, autonomous mobility, and sustainability for some of the most demanding technology forums in Europe. Her academic formation is unusual for a professional host. An MSc in Business Psychology – completed in 2024, focused on digital coaching and consulting – sits alongside a BA in Media Journalism. That combination produces content literacy, not just stage craft. She can interrogate a panel on data governance, AI safety, or software-defined vehicles with the vocabulary and curiosity that makes subject-matter experts raise their game. Her broadcast roots run deep. News editing at Wack Radio in Trinidad and Tobago, TV presenting at Reelkandi in Hamburg, morning show hosting in the UAE built a live composure that a conference facilitator cannot replicate. She was a working journalist before she was a technology moderator, and that shows in how she manages complexity at speed. Deutsche Telekom trusted her to front their stage at Mobile World Congress 2023 in Barcelona. What makes her specifically valuable to international technology events is native-level bilingual fluency in German and English – a combination exceptionally rare at this professional level in Europe. Clients spanning SAP, Google, Infineon, TWAICE Technologies, and the German government’s Digitalgipfel represent the full spectrum of environments where moderation quality is commercially and reputationally visible. Key speaking topics Technology and AI event moderation Digitalisation and digital transformation Artificial intelligence and human communication Autonomous mobility and future technologies Sustainability and climate innovation Cross-cultural and multilingual communication Ideal for Technology conference programme directors and corporate event leads managing flagship international forums CTOs and CDOs hosting multilingual summits or cross-border innovation events Government and public sector digital policy bodies running German-language or bilingual events Corporate communications leads managing hybrid or large-format live technology productions Audience outcomes Panels that remain structured and substantive without losing energy or audience accessibility Complex AI and digital transformation content rendered in language that non-specialist senior leaders can engage with and act on Multilingual events where German and English audiences receive the same quality of facilitation Coherent through-lines connecting multiple speakers, disciplines, and sessions across a full event day A stage environment where technical experts and strategic executives communicate with each other rather than alongside each other

Why organisations work with Jose Ucar A structured methodology for cross-cultural influence, set out in Global Influence, shortlisted by The Institute of Leadership for its 2024 Leadership Book of the Year. Direct experience operating across four continents and two working languages, with delivery for Procter & Gamble, Amazon, SEAT-CUPRA, DAF Trucks, Hyundai, and Chiesi Pharmaceuticals. A practical lens on the gap between what senior leaders intend to communicate and what their international counterparts actually receive. Material that travels: the same frameworks land with a UK board, a Spanish-speaking sales team, and a multinational engineering function. Biography highlights Author of Global Influence: How business leaders can simplify, improve, and amplify their international impact, shortlisted for The Institute of Leadership’s Leadership Book of the Year 2024. TEDx speaker and host, including talks at TEDxSheffieldHallamUniversity and TEDxUniversityofSalford. Founder of Jose Ucar Ltd and the World-Class Communicator online programme. Delivered to Procter & Gamble, Amazon, SEAT-CUPRA, DAF Trucks, Hyundai, Chiesi Pharmaceuticals, Oral-B, UK Research and Innovation, the NHS, and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. Featured in LA Weekly, Yahoo Finance, Thrive Global, and Authority Magazine. Works fluently in English and Spanish; has lived, studied, and worked across Venezuela, Sweden, the UK, and beyond. Biography Most senior leaders are competent communicators in their home market and surprisingly ineffective the moment the room shifts language, culture, or hierarchy. Global Influence, Ucar’s book, is built around that gap. The Institute of Leadership shortlisted it for its 2024 Leadership Book of the Year, a recognition specifically tied to leadership practice rather than communications craft. His starting point is that international influence is a learnable discipline, not a personality trait. The frameworks set out in the book and on stage are designed to be portable across countries and functions, so a UK executive can use the same approach with a Spanish sales team, a German engineering function, and a US investor without re-engineering their style each time. That portability shows up in the client list. Procter & Gamble, Amazon, SEAT-CUPRA, DAF Trucks, Hyundai, Chiesi Pharmaceuticals, UK Research and Innovation, and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development have all booked him to work with leaders who carry international remits. The common brief is consistent: senior people whose technical authority is established and whose cross-border influence is not yet where it needs to be. His own background sits behind the work. Born in Venezuela, schooled in Sweden from sixteen, based in the UK, fluent in English and Spanish, with delivery experience across four continents. He uses that lived experience as evidence rather than ornament, which is what separates the material from generic communication training. Key speaking topics Cross-cultural communication and influence International leadership and global business Executive presence across cultures Communication and storytelling for senior leaders Personal brand and authentic leadership Resilience and mindset in international roles Ideal for CEOs, MDs, and country leaders with multi-market remits Senior commercial, sales, and partnership leaders working across borders HR, talent, and L&D leaders investing in international leadership capability Global teams in regulated, technical, or engineering-led industries where communication failure carries commercial cost Audience outcomes A clearer reading of how their current communication style lands in unfamiliar cultural contexts A working framework for adapting message, delivery, and presence without losing authenticity Specific language for the cross-cultural moments that most often derail senior conversations Renewed confidence to lead difficult conversations across markets, languages, and hierarchies

Why organisations work with Kari Nixon She brings the historical pattern recognition of a literary scholar trained in 19th-century epidemic narratives to live problems of misinformation, vaccine hesitancy, and corporate trust collapse. Her published work, including “Quarantine Life from Cholera to COVID-19” with Simon and Schuster, gives her a public platform that translates academic rigour into language a board can act on. She has worked the actual mechanics of disinformation as a Norway-based fact-checker for Logically Facts, not just commented on it from the outside. Fluency in Norwegian and English, plus a decade living between the United States and Scandinavia, makes her unusually credible on cross-cultural risk messaging for organisations operating across both markets. She trains scientists, executives, and communicators on the specific point most playbooks miss: framing decides whether data lands or rebounds. Biography highlights Author of “Quarantine Life from Cholera to COVID-19” (Tiller Press, Simon and Schuster, 2021), a public-facing book drawing thirty lessons from past pandemics. Author of the academic monograph “Kept from All Contagion” (SUNY Press) on germ theory and Victorian narrative. Co-editor of “Endemic: Essays in Contagion Theory” and “Theorizing Syphilis and Subjectivity,” both Palgrave Macmillan. PhD, English, Southern Methodist University, 2015. Former Assistant Professor of English at Whitworth University, specialising in medical humanities and Victorian literature. Norway-based fact-checker at Logically Facts; bylines at CNN, HuffPost, and YES! Magazine. Biography The way an institution names a risk shapes whether the public obeys, ignores, or revolts against it. Kari Nixon spent her academic career inside that question, reading how Victorian Britain talked itself through cholera, syphilis, and tuberculosis, then watched the same patterns repeat in real time during COVID-19. That double vantage, historical scholar and live observer, produced “Quarantine Life from Cholera to COVID-19” with Simon and Schuster’s Tiller Press, a book that translates two centuries of epidemic communication failures into operating lessons for the present. Her academic monograph “Kept from All Contagion” with SUNY Press sits behind it, alongside two co-edited Palgrave Macmillan volumes on contagion theory and the cultural history of disease. She left a faculty role at Whitworth University to work in Norway, including as a fact-checker at Logically Facts, monitoring how disinformation moves on social platforms. The shift from English department to fact desk is the point. Her argument is that risk communication is not a science problem with a comms wrapper. It is a narrative problem with a science core, and the people best placed to fix it are the ones who can read both registers. Her writing has appeared in CNN, HuffPost, and YES! Magazine. She works with science labs on graduate communication training, with corporate teams on crisis framing, and with cross-Atlantic organisations on how a message built for an American audience tends to misfire in a Nordic one, and the reverse. Key speaking topics Risk and crisis communication Misinformation and disinformation in public discourse Public trust in institutions Health communication and vaccine hesitancy Cross-cultural communication between the United States and Europe Narrative framing of contagion and contagion-adjacent risks Media literacy training for organisations Ideal for Communications, public affairs, and corporate affairs leads preparing for reputational or regulatory shocks Health, life sciences, and public sector organisations facing trust deficits with the public they serve Cross-border leadership teams operating between North America and the Nordics Science and research institutions whose technical experts need to speak to non-technical audiences Audience outcomes A working diagnosis of where their current crisis playbook will break under speed, scale, or scepticism Specific historical analogues showing what worked and what backfired when institutions tried to correct misinformation A framework for assessing whether a given message will travel, mutate, or be rejected by its intended audience A clearer sense of how Nordic and Anglo-American audiences read trust signals differently Language they can use the next morning to reframe a contested fact for a sceptical public

Why organisations work with Karl Pilny Three decades of operating inside Asian deal rooms, not commentary from the outside. He opened Coudert Brothers’ Berlin office in 1995 and has structured M&A and joint ventures between European, Japanese, Chinese, Korean and Indian companies since the late 1980s. A published long-range thesis on Asia. Asia 2030 (Campus Verlag, 2018) sets out his case that four of the five most powerful economies will soon be Asian, with implications boards can act on. Legal and commercial fluency in the same person. PhD from the Max Planck Institute for International Intellectual Property, professorship at bbw Hochschule Berlin, and a working life spent advising entrepreneurs and family offices through asia21 GmbH. Delivery in German, English and Japanese. Few European Asia speakers can hold a Tokyo board conversation in the language of the room. Biography highlights Founder and Managing Director, asia21 GmbH, Zurich (since 2006). Professor of International Technology Transfer Management, bbw Hochschule Berlin (since 2018). Author of Asia 2030 (Campus Verlag, 2018), nominated for the getAbstract International Book Award 2020. Author of the Das asiatische Jahrhundert trilogy and the Investment Guide Asien. Former resident partner at Coudert Brothers, where he opened the Berlin office in 1995; later Managing Partner Germany at Travers Smith. PhD from the Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law, Japan Department; former lecturer at the universities of Kyoto and Osaka. Biography Asia 2030 (Campus Verlag, 2018) argued that four of the five most powerful economies would soon be Asian, and that European companies were already late to price the shift. The book was nominated for the getAbstract International Book Award in 2020. It set out the case that Karl Pilny had been making for years in board rooms across Germany, Switzerland and Japan. That argument is anchored in unusual depth of practice. After a PhD at the Max Planck Institute for International Intellectual Property and a teaching post in German law at Kyoto and Osaka, he spent a decade as a partner at Coudert Brothers, opening the firm’s Berlin office in 1995. He went on to lead Travers Smith’s German practice before founding asia21 GmbH in Zurich in 2006, advising entrepreneurs, family offices and corporates on investment into and out of Asia. The work spans renewable energy, infrastructure, financial services and consumer goods, and the books span a wider field still: the Das asiatische Jahrhundert trilogy, the Investment Guide Asien, and the political thrillers Japan Inc. and Korea Inc. Since 2018 he has held a professorship in International Technology Transfer Management at bbw Hochschule Berlin, where he teaches on innovation leadership in Asian companies and on digitalisation. For European leadership teams the value is direct. He has structured the deals, written the long-range analysis and worked in the languages. He can take a board through the political risk in a China exposure, the cultural mechanics of a Japanese joint venture and the capital flows reshaping Southeast Asia in a single session. Key speaking topics Asia macroeconomic trajectories to 2030 China, Japan, Korea and India political risk Cross-border M&A and joint ventures in Asia Investment strategy for European corporates and family offices Renewable energy and infrastructure capital flows in Asia Technology transfer and IP between Europe and Asia Cross-cultural negotiation with Asian counterparties Ideal for Boards and executive committees of European corporates with material Asia exposure Chief strategy officers, corporate development and M&A leads working on Asian deals Family offices, foundations and institutional investors allocating into emerging Asia Industry conferences on energy transition, infrastructure and financial services touching Asia Audience outcomes A defensible read on where capital, technology and political weight are moving across Asia to 2030 Specific implications for European market entry, joint ventures and M&A in China, Japan, Korea and India A sharper view of cross-cultural risk in Asian deal structures, drawn from named cases A framework for sequencing Asia exposure across sectors, from renewables to consumer goods

Why organisations work with Katherine Melchior Ray She has made the standardise-versus-adapt decision from inside five global brands, so she can tell a leadership team which elements of a brand must stay fixed worldwide and which should flex by market. Her cultural intelligence framework, set out in Brand Global, Adapt Local (Kogan Page, 2025), gives teams a repeatable method for entering new markets instead of one-off market research that ages quickly. She has led marketing in Japan, France, Germany, and the US in three languages, so her read on a market comes from having sold to those consumers herself. She teaches this material to MBAs at UC Berkeley Haas, which means her frameworks are built to be taught and applied by a team, not performed once from a stage. Biography highlights Lecturer in international marketing and leadership at UC Berkeley Haas School of Business. Co-author of Brand Global, Adapt Local: How to Build Brand Value Across Cultures (Kogan Page, 2025), endorsed by David Aaker, Greg Hoffman, and Jonah Berger. Former CMO of Shiseido’s luxury portfolio in Tokyo and former CMO of Babbel in Berlin. Senior roles at Nike (GM, US Women’s Footwear), Louis Vuitton (VP Marketing, Japan), Gucci (Executive Director, Japan), and Hyatt (VP, Luxury Brands). Featured on CBS 60 Minutes and CNN, and profiled in The Wall Street Journal. Keynote speaker at Cannes Lions and DMEXCO; fluent in English, French, and Japanese. Biography Louis Vuitton broke sales records in Japan with the Neverfull launch in a market where most Western brands struggle to read the customer. Katherine Melchior Ray ran that marketing. The difference was cultural intelligence: knowing which parts of a global brand to hold firm, and which to adapt for a specific market. That judgement came from an unusually broad operating career. She led Nike’s US women’s footwear business, ran global marketing for Nordstrom’s Façonnable from France, and directed Gucci in Japan before taking on Hyatt’s Park Hyatt and Grand Hyatt luxury brands. She later became CMO of Shiseido’s luxury portfolio in Tokyo, then CMO of Babbel in Berlin, growing both through rapid market change. In Brand Global, Adapt Local, written with Nataly Kelly and published by Kogan Page in 2025, she turned that experience into a method. The book argues that cultural intelligence, the ability to flex across markets, now matters more than ever, because AI scales reach cheaply but cannot read culture. David Aaker, Greg Hoffman, and Jonah Berger endorsed it. She teaches the same material to MBAs at UC Berkeley Haas. Her career spans four countries and three languages, and every framework she offers has already been tested against a real market and a real profit-and-loss statement. Key speaking topics Cultural intelligence as competitive advantage Global brand building across cultures Brand localisation and market entry Marketing leadership in luxury and consumer goods High-performing global teams Culture as a source of innovation Ideal for CMOs and brand leaders scaling a brand into new international markets Global marketing and international expansion teams balancing brand consistency with local relevance Executive teams and boards at consumer-facing businesses in retail, luxury, beauty, hospitality, and tech Leaders of multicultural or multinational teams Audience outcomes A clear test for which brand elements to keep consistent worldwide and which to adapt locally Named examples of how brands such as Apple, Louis Vuitton, and Kit Kat handled the same tension A working definition of cultural intelligence and how it differs from general and emotional intelligence A view on where AI helps global marketing and where human cultural judgement still decides the outcome

Why organisations work with Kevin Olusola He performs the argument rather than narrating it. The “Foundation +1” idea (start with one simple element, add one layer at a time) is built live on stage through cello and beatbox, so the audience sees the method before they hear the framing. Three Grammys with Pentatonix and a Sony recording contract give him a credibility profile most innovation speakers cannot match, particularly with audiences sceptical of corporate creativity content. His route into music sits next to a Yale East Asian Studies degree and extended fellowship time in Beijing, which gives the cross-cultural innovation material genuine personal weight rather than a borrowed example. Opened TED2014 in Vancouver and was hand-picked by Quincy Jones for the 2012 Montreux Jazz Festival, alongside Bobby McFerrin and Chick Corea. He has worked at the level of stage where corporate audiences notice. Biography highlights Three-time Grammy winner with Pentatonix: Best Arrangement, Instrumental or A Cappella (2015 and 2016) and Best Country Duo/Group Performance (2017 with Dolly Parton). Won NBC’s The Sing-Off season three with Pentatonix, leading to a Sony Music Entertainment contract. Opened TED2014 in Vancouver with a celloboxing performance. Selected by Quincy Jones to represent him at the 2012 Montreux Jazz Festival, on a programme with Bobby McFerrin and Chick Corea. Yale University, East Asian Studies, with pre-med coursework. Spent extended fellowship time in Beijing and became fluent in Mandarin. Pioneered celloboxing, the simultaneous playing of cello and beatboxing; his viral 2011 video of Mark Summer’s “Julie-O” led directly to his Pentatonix recruitment. Biography The first time most audiences see Olusola on stage they are watching a method, not a performance. A single scale on the cello, a single percussive sound, then another, then another, until a Daft Punk medley or a Pharrell track is built in front of them out of parts that were obviously small a minute ago. He calls the underlying idea “Foundation +1”, and it is the spine of his corporate keynote work. The performance credentials sit behind the method. Pentatonix have won three Grammys, signed with Sony Music Entertainment after winning NBC’s The Sing-Off in 2011, and built one of the largest a cappella audiences on YouTube. Olusola opened TED2014 in Vancouver and was selected by Quincy Jones to represent him at the 2012 Montreux Jazz Festival, on a programme with Bobby McFerrin and Chick Corea. The cross-cultural material runs in parallel. Olusola read East Asian Studies at Yale with pre-med coursework, and spent extended fellowship time in Beijing where he became fluent in Mandarin. The idea of “celloboxing” itself came from a teacher in China, who asked him whether he had ever considered playing cello and beatboxing at the same time. The biographical detail is doing real work in the keynote: it gives a specific story for how stepping into an unrelated domain produced an original artistic form. For senior teams, Olusola is closer to a performing keynote than to a conventional management speaker. The intellectual content is light, the demonstration is heavy, and the value sits in how an audience leaves thinking about creative method and ambition. He suits openings, closings, and offsite moments where the brief is to shift the room rather than to teach a framework. Key speaking topics Creativity as a working method Cross-disciplinary innovation Ambitious goal-setting and execution Cross-cultural perspective and collaboration Team dynamics in creative work Performance keynote and corporate entertainment Ideal for Annual kick-off and conference opening or closing slots Leadership offsites focused on creativity, innovation, or culture Awards dinners and high-profile client events Internal events where a sceptical senior audience needs a non-standard creative input Audience outcomes A shared, memorable reference point for breaking ambitious goals into a starting move A concrete example of how cross-disciplinary thinking produces original output A genuine performance moment that anchors the rest of the agenda A reframing of creativity as practice rather than personality

Why organisations work with Laura Winterling Her reference point for high-stakes team performance is not a business school case study. She trained more than 80 international astronauts at ESA’s European Astronaut Centre in conditions where errors carry mission-critical consequences. A master’s in Physics and a second in Organisational Psychology (UCL) let her diagnose both the structural and human causes of team failure simultaneously. Most leadership consultants address one or the other. She is a certified Crew Resource Management instructor. CRM is the human-factors methodology aviation uses to systematically reduce error in complex operations, and it is mandatory recurrent training for working pilots. Organisations working with her receive a framework tested in environments far more demanding than their own. She authored the on-console handbook for Mission Control Europe: her understanding of how multinational teams coordinate under live operational pressure comes from having written the procedures that govern it. She is an active commercial helicopter pilot and helicopter flight instructor. The CRM principles she teaches in leadership rooms are her own working discipline in the air. Biography highlights Astronaut Instructor, European Space Agency (European Astronaut Centre, Cologne); trained more than 80 international astronauts – including crews from NASA, ESA, and Roscosmos – on spacecraft systems for ISS modules Authored the on-console handbook for Mission Control Europe Commercial helicopter pilot and helicopter flight instructor Certified Crew Resource Management (CRM) instructor and licensed MBTI practitioner MSc in Physics, University of Bayreuth; MSc in Organisational Psychology, University College London Three TEDx talks, including «From Perfection to Excellence» (TEDxUniMannheim), published on TED.com Founder and CEO, Space Time Concepts GmbH; clients include Mercedes-Benz, SAP, and Boston Consulting Group Biography Laura Winterling spent nearly a decade as an Astronaut Instructor at the European Space Agency’s European Astronaut Centre in Cologne. She trained more than 80 international astronauts from NASA, ESA, and Roscosmos on the spacecraft systems they would rely on during missions to the International Space Station. In that environment, how a team communicates, decides, and recovers from error determines whether a mission succeeds. Her responsibilities extended beyond the classroom at EAC. She worked across mission control centres in Toulouse, Houston, and Moscow, sat console during live ISS operations, and observed three Soyuz launch campaigns in Kazakhstan. She also authored the on-console handbook for Mission Control Europe, which specifies how multinational teams coordinate under live operational pressure. She holds master’s degrees in Physics (University of Bayreuth) and Organisational Psychology (University College London), and is also a commercial helicopter pilot, helicopter flight instructor, and certified Crew Resource Management instructor. CRM is the human-factors methodology aviation uses to systematically reduce error in complex operations, and it is mandatory training for working pilots. Her teaching of these principles in leadership rooms is grounded in her own active practice of them in flight. Since founding Space Time Concepts GmbH in 2016, she has taken these frameworks into leadership sessions at organisations including Mercedes-Benz, SAP, and Boston Consulting Group. Three TEDx talks make her central argument publicly available – that excellence under pressure can be designed and trained. «From Perfection to Excellence» (TEDxUniMannheim) and «Why Astronauts Don’t Need Telepathy» (TEDxHHL) are available on TED.com and YouTube. Key speaking topics Leadership and decision-making under operational pressure Crew Resource Management and human factors in organisations Team communication and structured debriefing High-reliability operations and organisational resilience Cross-cultural team performance in international programmes Excellence vs. perfection in professional and team development Leadership and followership as interdependent disciplines Ideal for Senior leadership teams and C-suite executives building capability for decision-making under uncertainty CHROs and people development leads designing resilience and high-performance team programmes Engineering, operations, and technology organisations where system failure carries real consequences Organisations managing international, cross-cultural, or mission-critical teams Audience outcomes A clear framework for distinguishing team performance in stable conditions from performance under genuine pressure Practical understanding of Crew Resource Management principles and how they apply in non-aviation organisational settings Specific protocols for communication clarity, structured debriefing, and error recovery drawn from ISS mission operations A reframe of mistakes as diagnosable, recoverable data – not indicators of individual inadequacy Concrete tools for moving teams from competent to reliably high-performing in complex, multinational environments

Why organisations work with Leee John He carries the weight of a verifiable cultural archive. The Flashback documentary alone represents over a decade of original interviews with figures including Labi Siffre, Billy Ocean and Pauline Black, giving inclusion conversations a body of named, recorded testimony rather than slogans. His authority on Black British contribution is built on lived participation. He fronted one of the defining British soul acts of the 1980s, which lets him talk about representation, visibility and creative gatekeeping from inside the room rather than the academy. He moves an audience emotionally. A career built on falsetto vocal performance and stage presence translates into keynote energy that DEI sessions, gala dinners and cultural-anniversary moments often lack. His humanitarian work is concrete, not decorative. As an ambassador for SOS Children’s Villages he has campaigned annually for World Orphan Week and was recognised with a Humanitarian award in France, which gives credibility on purpose-led brand and CSR programmes. He brings a reinvention story senior audiences recognise. Singer to producer to documentary director to charity ambassador is a useful proof point for any room thinking about second-act careers, creative longevity or staying commercially relevant across generational shifts in taste. Biography highlights Founding member and lead singer of Imagination, the British soul/funk trio with three UK top 10 singles, including “Just an Illusion” (UK No. 2, 1982). Imagination earned four platinum discs, nine gold discs and over a dozen silver discs between 1981 and 1983. Director of Flashback: The History of UK Black Music, an independent documentary featuring 80+ interviews across jazz, soul, funk, reggae, ska and 2-tone. Ambassador for SOS Children’s Villages and recipient of a Humanitarian award in France for charity work; also holds a UK Lifetime Achievement award. Released the jazz album Feel My Soul on Candid Records in 2005; later solo album Retropia reached No. 1 on UK Soul and UK Reggae charts. Trained at the Anna Scher Theatre School; appeared in the 1983 Doctor Who serial Enlightenment, and went on to host and produce television including ITV’s Night Network strand Leee’s Place. Biography The history of British Black music is mostly told in fragments. Leee John has spent more than a decade pulling those fragments into a single record, with over 80 filmed interviews across jazz, soul, funk, reggae, ska and 2-tone now sitting inside Flashback: The History of UK Black Music. Subjects include Labi Siffre, Billy Ocean, Jaki Graham, Pauline Black and Neville Staple. Before that work, he was the front of Imagination, the British soul/funk trio whose 1982 single “Just an Illusion” reached No. 2 in the UK and No. 1 in Spain. Imagination earned four platinum discs and nine gold discs in a two-year run between 1981 and 1983, which places him inside the small group of Black British artists who broke into mainstream European pop charts in that era. That career is the substance behind his keynote work on inclusion, identity and creative reinvention. He talks about gatekeeping, visibility and longevity from someone who has been on both sides of them, and he extends the same argument into philanthropy as an ambassador for SOS Children’s Villages, where his campaigning was recognised with a Humanitarian award in France. The reinvention thread runs through everything: lead singer, jazz recording artist on Candid Records, film and television producer, documentary director, charity ambassador. Flashback is the current centre of gravity, and it is the body of work that gives a contemporary inclusion conversation a name, a face and a primary source. Key speaking topics Diversity, equity and inclusion Cultural identity and Black British heritage Creative resilience and career reinvention Storytelling and oral history Music, media and representation Purpose, philanthropy and brand Motivation and inspiration Ideal for DEI and ERG leadership programmes seeking a culturally substantive keynote presence rather than a policy-led speaker. CSR, purpose and brand teams marking heritage moments such as Black History Month, World Orphan Week or cultural-anniversary launches. Senior audiences in media, music, entertainment and creative industries debating representation, longevity and the economics of Black British creative output. Conference organisers wanting a closing keynote that combines testimony, performance presence and emotional lift. Audience outcomes A clearer mental map of British Black music history and why it underwrites contemporary conversations about representation. A worked example of creative reinvention across four decades, useful for anyone thinking about second-act careers and staying relevant. A felt understanding of why inclusion is a question of belonging and visibility, not compliance language. Direct exposure to a cultural archive most rooms have never heard, drawn from the Flashback documentary interviews. An emotional close, often involving live vocal performance, that lifts the room rather than ending on a slide.

Why organisations work with Marianna Evenstein DW News anchor experience translates directly to live event control: she keeps senior speakers on the question, manages timing without visible effort, and reads a multilingual room in real time. Three working languages (English, German, Russian) let her host the same agenda for a Berlin board, a global trade fair, and a Russian-language guest in one programme without handoffs. Has hosted events for Adidas, Allianz, BASF, Bayer, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Telekom, Mercedes-Benz, Samsung, Volkswagen, and Philips, which is the relevant proof for a corporate communications lead deciding whether she can carry a tier-one stage. Advises on programme design and speaker preparation before the event, not just on-the-day delivery, which raises the quality of what panels actually produce. Doubles as a media coach for executives who will be on the same stage, useful when the brief includes both running the event and getting senior leaders camera-ready. Biography highlights News editor and television anchor at DW News, Germany’s international broadcaster, since 2008. Former radio host and reporter for DW’s Newslink. Moderator at Falling Walls 2025, the Berlin science and society summit. Hosts and moderates conferences, panels, galas, and trade fairs for clients including Adidas, Allianz, BASF, Bayer, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Telekom, Hugo Boss, Mercedes-Benz, Philips, Samsung, and Volkswagen. Media coach for executives preparing for interviews and on-camera appearances. Comparative Literature and Philosophy degree, New York University. Biography A live event with five named speakers, three languages, a hard finish time and a senior audience is not a panel discussion. It is a production. The person at the front of the room is responsible for whether the agenda translates into something the audience can use, or whether it dissolves into competing monologues. Marianna Evenstein has spent her career on that side of the camera. As a news editor and television anchor at DW News, Germany’s international broadcaster, she has worked the same discipline live for international audiences since 2008, after starting in radio at DW’s Newslink. The transferable skill is not charisma. It is timing, accurate listening, and the ability to redirect a conversation without losing the speaker’s dignity. That is the basis on which she is booked by Adidas, Allianz, BASF, Bayer, Deutsche Bank, Deutsche Telekom, Mercedes-Benz, Philips, Samsung, Volkswagen and Austrian Airlines, among others, to host conferences, summits, trade fairs, and gala evenings. She works in English, German, and Russian, which removes the seam most international events have to design around. In 2025 she moderated Falling Walls in Berlin, a summit format that demands quick comprehension across science, policy, and business in a single afternoon. Her work also extends backwards into the agenda. She advises clients on programme design and speaker preparation, and runs media coaching for executives who will be on stage themselves. This is the part of the offer that distinguishes her from a presenter who arrives on the day with cue cards. Key speaking topics Conference and summit moderation Panel moderation across business, policy, and science Awards ceremony and gala hosting Trade fair and product launch presenting Multilingual event hosting (English, German, Russian) Media coaching for executive interviews Programme design and speaker preparation Ideal for Heads of communications and event directors planning international flagship events with multilingual audiences. Corporate teams whose agenda includes senior internal speakers who need on-camera coaching alongside event hosting. Foundations, NGOs, and policy institutes running cross-sector summits where panel discipline matters. Trade fair and awards organisers needing a presenter who can carry a televised-quality main stage. Audience outcomes A live agenda that finishes on time with the planned questions actually answered. Panels in which senior speakers are kept on point without visible correction. Smooth handover between English, German, and Russian segments without translation friction. Executive contributors who arrive better prepared because they were briefed and coached in advance.

Why organisations work with Marina Ibrahim She has run cross-cultural integration work inside named multinationals including BMW Group, Bentley, Nike, Kellogg’s, PepsiCo, BP, UBS and Deutsche Telekom, across automotive, FMCG, financial services and life sciences. Her own biography (British-German, born to a German mother and Egyptian father, bilingual in English and German) is the lived case study behind the work, which lands with international audiences in a way a single-culture expert cannot match. She brings instrument-led rigour, not opinion. GLOBE+, her signature framework, integrates Country Navigator, Wiley Everything DiSC Certified Partner, Wiley Five Behaviours Certified Partner (Lencioni’s Five Behaviours of a Cohesive Team), GlobalDISC and ICQ Growth 2.0 into diagnostic data on team performance. She has worked the British-German interface specifically, including post-merger cultural integration, where most cross-cultural speakers stay at a generic level. Externally judged: FSB West Midlands Diversity and Inclusion Award 2024 for the consultancy she founded, and Professional Speaker of the Year Staffordshire 2025. Biography highlights Founder of Globility Insights, the West Midlands-based cultural agility and inclusive leadership consultancy she established in 2011. Creator of GLOBE+, her signature cultural agility framework, used with multinational clients across automotive, FMCG, financial services and life sciences. Senior Culture Coach at Country Navigator, the cultural intelligence training platform. Finalist at The Speaker Awards 2026, the UK awards for the professional speaking industry, shortlisted for Best Thought Leadership Speaker and Best Storyteller. Federation of Small Businesses West Midlands Diversity and Inclusion Award 2024; Professional Speaker of the Year, Staffordshire 2025; Cartus Service Excellence Award 2020. Client organisations include BMW Group, Bentley, Nike, Kellogg’s, PepsiCo, EMI, Commerzbank, BP, UBS, Deutsche Telekom and Wood PLC. Wiley Everything DiSC Certified Partner; Wiley Five Behaviours Certified Partner (Lencioni’s Five Behaviours of a Cohesive Team); Country Navigator, GlobalDISC and ICQ Growth 2.0 Coach; MirrorMIRROR Certified Team Coach; NLP Practitioner; MCIM Chartered Marketer. British and German national with Egyptian heritage; bilingual English and German. Biography Most multinational organisations treat culture as a soft variable. Strategy is hard, culture is decoration. The teams running the actual work know better. They are the ones absorbing the friction when a German engineering function tries to land a project inside a Brazilian commercial team, or when a British acquirer tells a Japanese subsidiary that “nothing will change”. Marina Ibrahim has spent more than 25 years inside that gap. Through Globility Insights, the consultancy she founded in 2011, she has worked with BMW Group, Bentley, Nike, Kellogg’s, PepsiCo, BP, UBS and Deutsche Telekom on the parts of cross-cultural collaboration that do not show up on a strategy slide: trust between merged teams, decision-making across British and German operating styles, the difference between an inclusion statement and a multicultural team that actually functions. Her own profile is part of the credibility. Born to a German mother and Egyptian father, British-German, bilingual in English and German, she is the lived case study behind the work. The method is not. GLOBE+, her signature framework, runs senior teams through Country Navigator, Wiley Everything DiSC, Wiley Five Behaviours, GlobalDISC and ICQ Growth 2.0, so leaders leave with diagnostic data on how their teams actually operate, not a set of stories. In 2024, the Federation of Small Businesses named Globility the West Midlands Diversity and Inclusion Award winner, an externally judged signal that the practice she built holds up under scrutiny. For senior teams trying to make global structures actually perform, that is the relevant test. Key speaking topics Cultural agility as a competitive advantage Inclusive leadership in multinational organisations High-performing multicultural teams Post-merger cultural integration British and German business cultures and operating styles Unconscious bias and inclusive decision-making in practice Leading internationally distributed and hybrid teams Ideal for CHROs and DEI leads embedding inclusion beyond policy into team behaviour Executive teams running cross-border integrations or post-merger collaboration Global function heads managing multicultural and internationally distributed teams Leadership development programmes for senior leaders preparing for international roles Audience outcomes A working definition of cultural agility that names what behaviours actually shift performance across borders A diagnostic view of where their own multicultural teams break down, drawn from established cultural instruments rather than opinion Specific moves leaders can use the next day to manage British, German and broader European operating differences A sharper sense of where current inclusion efforts are stalling and what to do about it

Why organisations work with Marlo Clarke He gives employees a working language for purpose and fulfilment that is concrete enough to use on a Monday morning, built around named frameworks like the Cycle of Success through Intentional Action and the Spectrum of Joy. He treats setbacks as feedback to be evaluated, not motivation to be hyped past, which makes his content usable for teams under real pressure rather than after-dinner inspiration. His range is unusually wide for the format: the same content has landed with corporate audiences in the United States and United Kingdom and with rural community programmes in South Africa, which forces the ideas to be portable rather than context-dependent. Two TEDx talks at the University of Chester and the University of York give a public, watchable proof of how his material plays to a serious audience. Biography highlights Two-time TEDx speaker: TEDxUniversityofChester and TEDxUniversityofYork Former international rugby player for Barbados Has worked as a strategic and programme director across the United States, United Kingdom and South Africa Led U.S. federally funded youth and community development programmes in the American Midwest Conducted a year-long research project across 13 European countries on fulfilment and career meaning Currently runs volunteer development programmes in rural South Africa Biography Most workplace conversations about purpose end up too abstract to act on. Clarke’s work starts in the opposite place. He teaches people to answer one specific question at the end of a working day, then builds outward from that into how individuals define success, evaluate feedback, and decide what to do next. The material is shaped by an unusual working life. Born in Barbados, Clarke played international rugby for the country, then spent years running development programmes in the American Midwest funded by U.S. federal grants, working as a strategic director in the United States and United Kingdom, and leading volunteer programmes in rural South Africa. A year-long research project took him through 13 European countries interviewing people about what made their lives and careers feel worthwhile. Out of that came a small set of named frameworks: Define, Strive, Achieve, Share as the broad arc; the Cycle of Success through Intentional Action for the day-to-day; the Spectrum of Joy for what to do with achievement once it arrives. The frameworks are the spine of two TEDx talks, “What Now? What Next?” at the University of Chester and “How was your day today?” at the University of York. For an organisation, the value is practical. Clarke gives employees and leaders a way to talk about intention, setbacks and fulfilment that sits inside the working day rather than alongside it, and a vocabulary that holds up whether the audience is a corporate summit in the United States or a rural classroom in South Africa. Key speaking topics Self-defined success Intentional action Navigating uncertainty Feedback evaluation Personal fulfilment at work Cultural competency and cross-context storytelling Purpose and engagement Ideal for HR, learning and development leaders designing engagement and purpose programmes Internal conferences and leadership offsites focused on resilience and renewal Early- and mid-career talent populations being invested in by their employer Mission-driven organisations and NGOs working across cultural contexts Audience outcomes A short, repeatable daily checklist for evaluating progress against self-defined goals A working method for treating setbacks as feedback rather than failure Language for distinguishing between bliss, happiness and contentment, and why that matters at work A framework, Define / Strive / Achieve / Share, that maps onto how employees actually move through goals Renewed intent to act, grounded in two equations Clarke teaches: Passion plus Intention equals Purpose; Time plus Energy plus Money equals Purpose