Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

Why organisations work with Barjis Chohan A 25-year operator’s view of brand discipline. She has run a designer label long enough to have seen the failure modes of growth, dilution, and trend-chasing, and to speak credibly about the cost of each. Hard-won sustainability substance. Seven years rebuilding supply chains, materials, and product lifecycles inside a working business, not a sustainability practice attached to a marketing function. A bicultural commercial perspective most boards do not have access to. She has financed and sold into the GCC, manufactured in the UK, and served Muslim, Western, and luxury hospitality clients inside one operating model. Verifiable entrepreneurial credentials, including Designer in International Trade from the Financial Mail on Sunday, Entrepreneur of the Year (London), and the Global MSME Champion Award from the Global Council for the Promotion of International Trade. Inclusion content with a practitioner’s edge. Her work on gender and cultural difference is shaped by running a multicultural business, not by a corporate DEI mandate. Biography highlights Founder and CEO of BARJIS London, established 1999, with bespoke luxury rugs preceding the womenswear line launched in 2011. BA Fashion Design, London College of Fashion, 1995; further study at Central Saint Martins. Worked under Vivienne Westwood and with a French fashion house in Monte Carlo before founding her business. Award record includes Designer in International Trade (Financial Mail on Sunday), Entrepreneur of the Year (London), Fashion Brand of the Year, and the Global MSME Champion Award from the Global Council for the Promotion of International Trade. Founder of The Barjis Initiative (2018), supporting creative entrepreneurship and enterprise education in schools. Speaking engagements include JP Morgan, the London School of Economics, Fonterra, Aston University, University of Surrey Students Union, and the Ministry of Culture of Colombia. Biography Most fashion businesses that survive their first decade do not survive their second with the same ethos intact. BARJIS London is an exception. Founded in 1999 with bespoke luxury rugs, the brand extended into womenswear in 2011 and has operated continuously across UK manufacturing, GCC investment, and luxury hospitality clients, with a sustainability programme rebuilt inside the business rather than added to its marketing. Chohan trained at London College of Fashion, graduating in 1995, and studied at Central Saint Martins. She interned with Vivienne Westwood and worked with a French fashion house in Monte Carlo before founding her own label. The Guardian described her as a Westwood prodigy. Her early commercial decisions, including writing to oil companies for investment at seventeen and travelling to the Middle East with a young family, set the bicultural pattern her business has followed since. Recognition has come from credible bodies. She holds the Financial Mail on Sunday Designer in International Trade award, Entrepreneur of the Year (London), Fashion Brand of the Year, and the Global MSME Champion Award from the Global Council for the Promotion of International Trade. The Barjis Initiative, launched in 2018, supports creative entrepreneurs and enterprise education in schools. Boards and leadership audiences book her for the operator’s lens, not the celebrity-founder presentation. Her talks examine brand erosion under growth pressure, creativity as a managed discipline rather than a slogan, and the specific commercial value of cultural fluency in markets where most British brands struggle to operate. Audiences at JP Morgan, the London School of Economics, Fonterra, and the Ministry of Culture of Colombia have heard versions of the same argument: ethos is a commercial asset, but only if it is defended structurally as the business scales. Key speaking topics Brand integrity and ethos at scale Creativity as a growth discipline Sustainability in product, supply chain, and operations Founder-led entrepreneurship and scale-up Cultural fluency in international markets Gender equity and inclusive workplaces Modest fashion and bicultural consumer markets Ideal for Founders, CEOs, and senior brand leaders in consumer-facing businesses CMOs and creative directors managing brand dilution risk under growth Heads of sustainability, procurement, and product development in fashion, retail, and luxury DEI and people leaders looking for practitioner-led content on gender and cultural inclusion Audience outcomes A working definition of brand ethos that holds up under commercial pressure A founder’s view of where sustainability programmes succeed and where they stall Practical reference points for entering GCC and modest-fashion markets without misreading them A reframing of gender and cultural inclusion as commercial capability rather than compliance Confidence to interrogate where their own organisation is trading long-term brand value for short-term growth

Why organisations work with Seyi Akiwowo She built Glitch from a personal campaign in 2017 into a working UK charity on online gender-based violence, which gives her a different register from consultants who study the issue from outside. Her Penguin Life book How to Stay Safe Online is one of the few mainstream titles that treats online harm as a serious workplace and leadership concern, not a parenting issue, and gives executive audiences a reference text. She served as an elected councillor in Newham at 23 and addressed the 38th session of the UN Human Rights Council, which means she is comfortable in regulated, scrutinised, formal rooms, not just activist spaces. She has held trust and safety advisory roles with major platforms including TikTok, which gives her direct read on how the largest platforms handle abuse, moderation, and policy. She declined an MBE publicly in 2022. That decision and the way she framed it gives her unusual credibility with audiences who are sceptical of inclusion as institutional theatre. Biography highlights Founder of Glitch, the UK charity addressing online abuse and online gender-based violence, established out of the 2017 #FixTheGlitch campaign. Author, How to Stay Safe Online, Penguin Life, 2022. Elected councillor for Newham, East London, at the age of 23, the youngest Black woman councillor in the UK at the time. Speaker at the 38th session of the UN Human Rights Council on online gender-based violence; Amnesty International Human Rights Defender (2018). Digital Leader of the Year (2019); Marie Claire Future Shaper (2019); WIRED Changemaker cover (2021); TEDxLondon speaker (2019). Trust and safety advisory roles with platforms including TikTok; bachelor’s degree in social policy, London School of Economics. Biography In 2017, a recording of a speech delivered at the European Parliament went viral. The reaction was a flood of racist and misogynistic abuse, more than seventy reports filed with the platforms, and almost no response from them. The campaign that emerged from that experience, #FixTheGlitch, became the charity Glitch. Glitch is now a recognised voice on online abuse and online gender-based violence in the UK. It works with women, marginalised communities, parliamentarians, and platforms, and its evidence has been part of the policy conversation around the UK Online Safety Act. The work is operational, not theoretical: training, casework, lobbying, partnerships with platforms including TikTok where Akiwowo has held trust and safety advisory roles. Her credibility predates Glitch. At 23 she was elected a Labour councillor for Newham, the youngest Black woman councillor in the UK. She holds a bachelor’s degree in social policy from the London School of Economics. She has addressed the 38th session of the UN Human Rights Council on online gender-based violence and was named an Amnesty International Human Rights Defender in 2018. Penguin Life published How to Stay Safe Online in 2022. It is the rare mainstream book that treats online harm as a serious leadership and workplace concern. In the same year she was offered an MBE and chose not to accept it, a decision she explained publicly. For corporate audiences thinking about inclusion, employee safety, and values-based leadership, that combination, an elected politician’s record, an operating charity, a Penguin book, and a refused honour, is the substance she brings into the room. Key speaking topics Online safety as a workplace duty of care Online gender-based violence and digital harm Values-based and inclusive leadership Digital self-care and resilience for senior leaders Platform accountability and trust and safety Inclusion in a contested political climate Ideal for CHROs, Chief People Officers and Heads of DEI rebuilding the inclusion case for sceptical executive audiences Heads of internal communications, employee experience, and risk responsible for staff wellbeing in public-facing roles Trust and safety, policy, and product leaders inside platforms and regulated technology businesses Senior women’s networks, employee resource groups, and leadership development programmes Audience outcomes A working definition of online harm as a workplace and leadership issue, not a personal coping problem A direct read on how platforms actually respond to abuse, drawn from advisory work with companies including TikTok Practical content from the Penguin Life book How to Stay Safe Online that audiences can use the next day A confident position on inclusion and values-based leadership that holds up in the current political climate A senior voice that has chosen difficult institutional decisions, including declining an MBE, and can speak credibly about leadership under public scrutiny

Why organisations work with Roberta Lucca She has built a multi-million dollar VC-backed business from scratch and won a BAFTA doing it. Few speakers in the innovation category can show that operational record. As a Venture Partner at Octopus Ventures, she sees what an early-stage company that actually has traction looks like, and translates that pattern recognition into how corporates should evaluate their own internal bets. Her AI material is shaped by founding BOLDR, an AI-powered coaching product, not by commentary at a distance. She speaks about deployment, user behaviour and product reality. She works fluently across gaming, AI and consumer technology, which lets her unpack why game-industry mechanics (engagement loops, iteration speed, distributed teams) increasingly apply to non-games businesses. Visible UK platform credibility through BBC One’s The Apprentice and Amazon Prime’s Ready Set StartUP makes her recognisable to senior internal audiences and easy to position to a wider all-hands. Biography highlights Co-founder of Bossa Studios, the London games studio behind BAFTA-winning Monstermind, Surgeon Simulator and I Am Bread BAFTA Games Award winner (Online-Browser category, 2012) Venture Partner at Octopus Ventures, the UK fund whose portfolio includes Zoopla, Cazoo and Depop Co-founder and CEO of BOLDR, an AI-powered virtual coaching product Judge and angel investor on BBC One’s The Apprentice; mentor on Amazon Prime’s Ready Set StartUP Forbes Top 50 Women in Tech; named London’s Most Influential in Creative Arts by the Evening Standard Biography Bossa Studios was a blank canvas in 2010. A decade later it was a VC-backed multi-million dollar games business with a BAFTA on the shelf for Monstermind and global hits in Surgeon Simulator and I Am Bread. Roberta Lucca was the co-founder and CMO who shaped that arc, and the experience defines the perspective she brings to corporate audiences. She has since repeated the founder cycle. WonderLuk was an early move into on-demand 3D-printed consumer goods. BOLDR, her current company, is an AI-powered coaching product where she sits as co-founder and CEO. The pattern matters: she has built across gaming, consumer hardware-adjacent commerce and applied AI, which is unusual range for a speaker booked into innovation slots. As a Venture Partner at Octopus Ventures, she sees the deal flow from inside one of the UK’s most active early-stage funds. That vantage point sharpens her view of what genuine traction looks like and how corporates routinely misread it. It also gives her language that lands with executive teams trying to decide whether their innovation programmes are working. She is visible on the UK platforms that senior internal audiences recognise, BBC One’s The Apprentice as a judge and angel investor, and Amazon Prime’s Ready Set StartUP as a mentor. Forbes named her in its Top 50 Women in Tech list, and the Evening Standard named her among London’s Most Influential in Creative Arts. The recognition matters less than the operating record behind it: she is, demonstrably, someone who has built the kind of company most corporate innovation teams say they want to learn from. Key speaking topics Entrepreneurship and scale-up discipline Applied AI and emerging technology Innovation inside large organisations High-performance team building Creative industries and gamification Diversity in technology and venture Futurism, Web3 and the metaverse Ideal for Boards and ExCos shaping innovation portfolios and corporate venture programmes CMOs, CDOs and product leaders facing decisions on AI and emerging tech investment CHROs and talent leaders rethinking team composition and entrepreneurial capability Conferences and internal summits in technology, media, financial services and consumer goods Audience outcomes A working definition of what early traction looks like inside a new venture, drawn from venture capital deal flow A sharper view of which corporate innovation pilots are worth doubling down on and which are quietly stalling Specific examples of how gaming mechanics and AI products are built, taken from companies she has founded Language to use with boards about risk, capital allocation and team design for innovation bets A more confident point of view on where AI is genuinely changing product, and where it is hype

Why organisations work with Nicola Green She brings firsthand observation of how power, identity and leadership operate at the highest level, drawn from sustained artistic access to Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign, Pope Francis, the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu and Jonathan Sacks. Her work is held in the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Library of Congress and the Obama Presidential Center, which gives any inclusion conversation she leads an authority that consultancy-led sessions cannot match. She treats allyship as a discipline with daily behaviours, not as a values statement, which lands with senior leaders who are tired of slogans and want something they can act on. She founded the Khadija Saye Arts Programme and co-founded the Diaspora Pavilion at the 57th Venice Biennale, so the institution-building she talks about is institution-building she has actually done. Biography highlights Co-founder and director, Diaspora Pavilion, 57th Venice Biennale (2017), with David A. Bailey, David Lammy and Peter Clayton. In Seven Days…, her artistic record of the 2008 Obama campaign, is held by the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Library of Congress, the Obama Presidential Center and the UK Government Art Collection. Encounters, a fifty-portrait series with Pope Francis, the Dalai Lama, Justin Welby, Jonathan Sacks, Ali Gomaa and Desmond Tutu, exhibited at St Martin-in-the-Fields; book published by Brepols. Founder, Khadija Saye Arts Programme at IntoUniversity, addressing underrepresentation of Black and minority ethnic communities in the creative industries. Principal Artist on The World Reimagined, a UK-wide public art project on racial justice and the legacy of the transatlantic slave trade. Co-founder and Chair, Sophia Point Rainforest Research Centre, Guyana. Biography Allyship has become one of the most used and least understood words in the workplace. Many leaders have signed up to it in principle while still being unsure what it asks of them in practice. Green’s work begins in that gap. Drawing on a decade of direct access to the figures who define modern leadership and faith, she treats allyship as something senior leaders do, not something they declare. Her portrait series In Seven Days… documented Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign from the Democratic Convention through to the inauguration. Sets are held by the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Library of Congress and the Obama Presidential Center. A second body of work, Encounters, sat her across the table from Pope Francis, the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Justin Welby and Jonathan Sacks. The accompanying book, Encounters: The Art of Interfaith Dialogue, was published by Brepols. Beyond the studio, Green has built institutions for the conversation she leads on stage. She co-founded the Diaspora Pavilion at the 57th Venice Biennale, featuring twenty-two artists from culturally diverse backgrounds, and founded the Khadija Saye Arts Programme at IntoUniversity in memory of her mentee, the artist Khadija Saye, who died in the Grenfell Tower fire. As Principal Artist on The World Reimagined, she created public work confronting the legacy of the transatlantic slave trade across the UK. For senior teams, the value is that Green has spent twenty years studying how leaders actually behave around questions of identity, power and faith. She does not arrive with a framework borrowed from elsewhere. She arrives with primary observation, recorded in works that now sit inside the national collections of two countries. Key speaking topics Allyship as leadership practice Identity, race and power in organisations Inclusive leadership Visual storytelling and narrative change Diversity in the creative industries Representation and institution-building Interfaith dialogue and leadership Ideal for Chief executives, CHROs and DEI leads rebuilding inclusion strategy after the post-2020 backlash. Boards and executive committees setting tone on identity, representation and culture. Senior leadership conferences in financial services, professional services, media and the public sector. Cultural institutions, universities and faith-based organisations working on representation and access. Audience outcomes A clearer working definition of allyship, expressed as behaviours leaders can hold each other to. A direct view of how high-stakes leaders, political and religious, handle identity and power in practice. A sharper sense of how visual culture and representation shape what an organisation looks like from the outside. Practical reference points for inclusion work that has stalled or lost credibility internally.

Why organisations work with Nicolas Hamilton First disabled driver to compete in the BTCC, a UK series where the field has won at Le Mans and Formula One; the credential is verifiable and singular. Brings a working operator’s view of high-performance teamwork from inside a competitive racing garage, not a retired-career retrospective. Author of Now That I Have Your Attention with Radar, an Octopus imprint, structured around seven applied lessons rather than memoir, which gives corporate audiences usable material. Speaks from the experience of being told as a child he would not walk and building a professional racing career anyway; the story carries weight without rhetorical lift. Has delivered to Nomad Foods, GSK, Grant Thornton, Dentons, McCormick, and Shell Energy UK across financial services, healthcare, and consumer industries. Biography highlights First disabled driver to compete in the British Touring Car Championship, debuting in 2015 with AmD Tuning. Scored his first BTCC championship point in 2020 with ROKiT Racing and Team HARD, and his strongest season in 2023 with Go-Fix and Autoaid Breakdown. Channel 4 Formula One analyst from 2016. Author of Now That I Have Your Attention: 7 Lessons in Leading a Life Bigger Than They Expect, Radar / Octopus Books, 2024, acquired in a seven-way publisher auction. Subject of the BBC documentary Racing with the Hamiltons: Nic in the Driving Seat. Has spoken at Nomad Foods, GSK, Grant Thornton, Dentons, McCormick, Shell Energy UK, and Active Care Group. Biography Most leadership stories about overcoming odds end with the protagonist’s achievement. Nicolas Hamilton’s begins with it. Told as a toddler he would never walk because of cerebral palsy, he became the first disabled driver to compete in the British Touring Car Championship, the same series whose alumni have won at Le Mans and reached Formula One. The racing itself is the substance, not the symbol. Hamilton entered the BTCC in 2015 with AmD Tuning in an Audi S3, returned with ROKiT Racing and Motorbase in 2019, scored his first championship point in 2020 with Team HARD, and posted his strongest season in 2023 with Go-Fix and Autoaid Breakdown in a Cupra Leon. He continues to race competitively, sharing grids with reigning champions. That working knowledge of a professional racing garage is what corporate audiences buy. Hamilton speaks from inside an environment where preparation, recovery, and competitive feedback are non-negotiable and where his physical setup has to be engineered differently from every other driver on the grid. He has been a Channel 4 Formula One analyst since 2016 and has spoken to Nomad Foods, GSK, Grant Thornton, Dentons, McCormick, and Shell Energy UK. His book, Now That I Have Your Attention: 7 Lessons in Leading a Life Bigger Than They Expect, was acquired by Radar at Octopus Books in a seven-way auction and published in 2024. It is structured as applied lessons, not memoir, which is how he treats his keynotes too: a working argument about what high performance demands when the conditions are not on your side. Key speaking topics Resilience under sustained constraint High-performance teamwork in elite motorsport Self-leadership and mental strength Disability and representation in competitive environments Goal-setting and long-horizon ambition Inclusion in high-performance cultures Ideal for Senior leadership teams running multi-year change or transformation programmes HR, talent, and L&D leaders shaping resilience and inclusion programmes Sales conferences and commercial kick-offs anchoring a growth-mindset theme Disability employee resource groups and DEI council audiences Audience outcomes A working frame for what sustained performance looks like when conditions cannot be improved, only adapted to. Specific lessons from elite motorsport on teamwork, preparation, and feedback cycles. A sharper view of what disability representation looks like inside a high-performance environment rather than a policy conversation. A reset on the gap between what people are told they can do and what is actually possible under disciplined effort.

Why organisations work with Naomi Sesay She has run inclusion from inside the commissioning machine of a major UK broadcaster, not as an external consultant, so her advice carries the weight of decisions she has actually had to make and defend. Her training portfolio inside FTSE 100 clients and at Google, YouTube, NBC Universal, Deloitte and Lloyds Bank means she has tested her approach against the realities of regulated, scaled corporate environments. She frames inclusion as a leadership capability tied to commercial output, drawing on a 30-year broadcasting career where audience, talent and brand decisions were never separable. She brings a builder’s perspective on equity through her Sierra Leone smart-city project, which gives keynotes a concrete reference point beyond the standard DEI canon. Biography highlights Head of Creative Diversity, Channel 4, 2022 to 2025; previously On Screen Diversity Executive and Interim Head of Diversity & Inclusion at the broadcaster. Earlier television career as Producer, Director and Presenter at MTV News, and among the early producers on Channel 4’s Big Brother. Former Head of Innovation and Diversity, Media Trust. Senior Lead Trainer in Race Fluency and Inclusive Leadership with APS Intelligence, delivering programmes inside FTSE 100 organisations. Training and keynote work for Google, YouTube, NBC Universal, Amazon, Deloitte, Lloyds Bank, Warner Bros, Viacom, UN Women, Harvard Medical School and the Met Police. Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts; author of The Human Upgrade: The Power to Create Your Future; leads a female-centric sustainable smart-city project in Sierra Leone. Biography Most diversity work in large organisations is built by people who have never had to make a commissioning decision, hire a senior leader, or sign off a brand campaign. The view from inside those rooms is different. It is harder to be theoretical when the choice is in front of you and the budget is real. Naomi Sesay spent three years as Head of Creative Diversity at Channel 4, with two earlier spells at the broadcaster as On Screen Diversity Executive and Interim Head of Diversity & Inclusion. Her remit covered commissioning, training, talent and the broadcaster’s relationships with culturally and ethnically diverse creative communities across the UK. Before Channel 4 she ran innovation and diversity at Media Trust, and worked at APS Intelligence as a senior trainer in race fluency and inclusive leadership for FTSE 100 clients. Her television career started at MTV News during the channel’s European peak as a producer, director and presenter, and continued through one of the original production teams on Channel 4’s Big Brother. That broadcasting grounding shapes the way she talks to corporate audiences. Inclusion is not framed as a values statement; it is framed as an editorial, hiring and commercial discipline that decides which work gets made and which people get heard. Outside the broadcaster she is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, author of The Human Upgrade: The Power to Create Your Future, and leads a network of architects and investors developing a female-centric sustainable smart city in Sierra Leone. The combination gives her keynotes for Google, Deloitte, UN Women, Harvard Medical School and others a practical edge: she has built things, not only advised on them. Key speaking topics Inclusive leadership Diversity, equity and inclusion in practice Cultural intelligence Creative industries and representation Emotional intelligence for senior teams Storytelling and human connection Social enterprise and equitable city design Ideal for CHROs, chief people officers and heads of DEI under pressure to show operating impact, not statements. Boards and ExCos reassessing inclusion strategy after political shifts and ESG scrutiny. Commissioning, editorial and creative leaders in media, entertainment, publishing and advertising. Senior leadership programmes inside FTSE 100 and equivalent corporates rebuilding inclusive leadership capability. Audience outcomes A clearer test for distinguishing inclusion that changes decisions from inclusion that performs them. Specific language for talking to senior leaders about race, identity and culture without retreating into either jargon or platitude. Working examples from broadcasting, FTSE 100 corporates and global brand environments that translate into the audience’s own commissioning, hiring and team practices. A way to connect inclusive leadership to commercial output, audience reach and talent retention rather than to compliance reporting.

Why organisations work with Ghislaine Boddington She coined the Internet of Bodies, a named research concept now cited in academic and policy work on biometric data and human enhancement. Few speakers in this space own a defined intellectual territory of their own. Three decades of hands-on practice in body-responsive technology, telepresence, motion capture and immersive design. She speaks from inside the discipline, not from a desk review of it. A long-running co-presenter slot on BBC Digital Planet (BBC World Service) gives her a working week of structured exposure to global technology stories and the ethics around them. Sits inside formal advisory infrastructure: UK Government College of Experts via DCMS, advisory board of the Springer journal AI & Society, Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Brings the inclusion dimension to technology conversations without losing the technical thread. Founder of Women Shift Digital, trustee at Stemettes Futures, former lead mentor on Deutsche Bank’s Women Entrepreneurs in Social Tech accelerator. Biography highlights Reader in Digital Immersion, University of Greenwich, School of Design and Creative Industries. Co-founder and Creative Director, body>data>space, an internationally exhibited interactive design collective. Co-presenter, BBC Digital Planet, BBC World Service. Author of “The Internet of Bodies, alive, connected and collective” in AI & Society (Springer, 2021). Adviser, UK Government College of Experts (DCMS); Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Recipient of the IX Immersion Experience Visionary Pioneer Award (2017), Society for Arts and Technology, Montreal. Biography Biometric data, immersive interfaces and human enhancement are moving from research labs into mainstream products, and most leadership teams are catching up in real time. Boddington has spent thirty years working inside that shift, first as a practitioner in body-responsive design, then as a research voice on what it means for identity, intimacy and consent. Her concept, the Internet of Bodies, sets out how physical and digital selves are merging through telepresence, biometric sensing, wearables and AI-enabled enhancement. The work appears as a peer-reviewed paper in the Springer journal AI & Society and runs through her keynote programme. The argument is not speculative. It is built from three decades of practice at body>data>space, the design collective she co-founded and still directs. The institutional footprint sits alongside the practice. Reader in Digital Immersion at the University of Greenwich, Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, adviser to the UK Government’s College of Experts through DCMS, advisory board member at AI & Society. On BBC World Service she co-presents Digital Planet, which keeps her working through global technology stories week by week. Inclusion runs through the work as a technical condition, not a tone. She founded Women Shift Digital, mentors with Stemettes Futures and led Deutsche Bank’s Women Entrepreneurs in Social Tech accelerator. Her case is that immersive and biometric systems built without diverse human input encode the bias from the day they ship. Key speaking topics The Internet of Bodies Biometric data and digital identity Immersive technology and virtual presence Human enhancement and the body as interface AI ethics and embodied technology Inclusion and diversity in emerging tech Future human studies Ideal for Boards and executive teams setting policy on biometric data, AI ethics and immersive customer experience. Technology, product and R&D leaders building wearable, sensor-based or immersive products. Innovation, foresight and strategy functions inside regulated industries (financial services, healthcare, telecoms, media). Conferences and corporate events on the future of work, future human and responsible technology. Audience outcomes A working definition of the Internet of Bodies and what it means for organisations handling biometric, behavioural or sensor data. A sharper view of the ethical and consent issues that sit underneath immersive, wearable and AI-enabled products. A picture of where body-responsive technology is heading over the next five to ten years and which sectors are moving first. A specific argument for why inclusive design is a technical requirement in immersive and biometric systems, not a values statement.

Why organisations work with Alex Depledge She has built, scaled and exited a venture-backed UK consumer marketplace, and is currently advising the Chancellor of the Exchequer on entrepreneurship policy. Few speakers can hold both a founder’s lens and a policy lens at once. She speaks to boards from inside the boardroom. Her FTSE-100 seat at Persimmon and NED role at Goodlord mean her advice on innovation, governance and growth is grounded in current PLC reality, not consultancy abstraction. She frames the gender funding gap and the women-in-tech question with hard numbers and self-implicating honesty rather than the standard talk-track, which is why programme committees book her for conversations they want to feel more honest than usual. She has a working view, formed through Hassle.com and Resi, on why corporates struggle to copy start-up behaviour, and what they can realistically take from it. She talks about regulation, sharing economy policy and UK scale-up barriers as a current operator and current government advisor, which gives those sessions weight that retrospective speakers rarely match. Biography highlights First ever Entrepreneurship Advisor to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, appointed by Rachel Reeves in June 2025. Independent Non-Executive Director, Persimmon PLC (FTSE 100), since May 2023; sits on remuneration and nomination committees. Founder of Resi.co.uk, the UK’s largest residential architectural practice, with over 10,000 home projects delivered. Stepped down as CEO in December 2025 and moved to the board. Co-founder and former CEO of Hassle.com, sold to Helpling in 2015 after Accel Partners-led funding. MBE for services to the Sharing Economy, 2016. Named in Computer Weekly’s 50 Most Influential Women in UK Tech and Debrett’s 500 Most Influential People; FT 30 Female Founders to Watch. Biography Most established companies want to behave more like start-ups and very few succeed. The reason is rarely a shortage of ambition. It is that the operating habits, the speed of decision and the comfort with risk that actually produce scale-up growth get filtered out by the systems large organisations use to govern themselves. Alex Depledge has lived on both sides of that gap and now advises across it. She co-founded Hassle.com in 2012 with Jules Coleman, took Accel Partners funding, expanded across Europe and exited to Helpling in 2015. The next year the same partnership launched Resi.co.uk, now the UK’s largest residential architectural practice with more than ten thousand projects delivered. She led Resi as CEO for nearly a decade before stepping back to the board in late 2025. Her current portfolio is what makes her unusual on a stage. She is the first Entrepreneurship Advisor to HM Treasury, appointed by Chancellor Rachel Reeves in June 2025 to work directly on the barriers UK companies hit when they try to scale. At the same time she sits as an independent non-executive director of Persimmon PLC, the FTSE-100 housebuilder, and joined Goodlord’s board in December 2025. That mix gives her audiences a rare combination of inputs: a founder who has banked an exit, a board member inside a UK plc, and a named voice in active conversation with the Treasury about why British scale-ups stall. She was awarded an MBE in 2016 for services to the sharing economy and writes and broadcasts regularly on entrepreneurship, technology policy and the gender funding gap. Key speaking topics Scale-up leadership and the founder operating mindset What large organisations can and cannot learn from start-ups UK entrepreneurship policy and barriers to scale Women, funding and structural bias in venture capital Innovation inside regulated and traditional sectors The future of work and platform-economy business models Proptech and the digitisation of legacy industries Ideal for CEOs, COOs and strategy leaders in incumbent businesses trying to behave more entrepreneurially Boards and Chairs commissioning sessions on innovation governance and growth CHROs and inclusion leads addressing gender, funding and pipeline questions in tech Industry conferences in property, financial services, professional services and government Audience outcomes A clearer read on which start-up behaviours scale into a corporate environment and which do not A current operator’s view of UK entrepreneurship policy and the live Treasury debate on scale-up barriers An honest framing of the gender funding gap that names structural causes rather than rehearsing the symptoms A board-level perspective on innovation as a governance discipline, drawn from FTSE-100 practice A real example of building, scaling and exiting a venture-backed UK consumer marketplace

Why organisations work with Mohsin Zaidi He speaks about inclusion from inside the institutions that struggle most with it: the English Bar, the UK Supreme Court, magic-circle law, and a global strategic advisory firm. The argument carries because the credentials are the audience’s own. A Dutiful Boy is the only memoir to win both the Lambda Literary Award and the Polari First Book Prize while also being named Book of the Year by The Guardian, GQ and New Statesman. That literary standing changes how a corporate audience receives a personal story. His subject is the specific friction between social mobility, faith, race and sexuality, not a single identity strand. Useful for organisations whose inclusion conversations have plateaued on single-axis framing. He has done the unglamorous work alongside the writing: trustee of Stonewall, former board member of London Pride, named on The Lawyer Hot 100 and the FT future LGBT leaders list. The advocacy is institutional, not performative. He translates lived experience into questions a leadership team can act on, particularly on mental health stigma in ethnic minority communities, where most corporate wellbeing programmes are weakest. Biography highlights Author of A Dutiful Boy (Penguin, 2020), winner of the Lambda Literary Award and the Polari First Book Prize. Book of the Year selections from The Guardian, GQ, New Statesman and Attitude. BA Law with European Legal Studies, Keble College, Oxford; qualified as a solicitor at Linklaters and a New York attorney. Judicial Assistant to Lord Sumption and Lord Wilson at the UK Supreme Court; criminal barrister at 6 King’s Bench Walk. Management consultant at Hakluyt & Company since 2021. Trustee of Stonewall; Financial Times top future LGBT leader; The Lawyer Hot 100. Biography Walthamstow to Keble College, Oxford was the first improbable journey. Linklaters, then the UK Supreme Court as Judicial Assistant to Lord Sumption and Lord Wilson, then the criminal Bar at 6 King’s Bench Walk, were the next. The institutions Mohsin Zaidi passed through are the same institutions that most struggle to retain people who look and sound like him. A Dutiful Boy, published by Penguin in 2020, is the memoir of how those journeys actually felt from the inside. It won the Lambda Literary Award and the Polari First Book Prize, and was named Book of the Year by The Guardian, GQ, New Statesman and Attitude. The literary reception matters because it sets the register: this is not a corporate diversity talk dressed up as a story. The argument Zaidi makes to organisations is narrow and useful. Single-axis inclusion frameworks (race, or class, or sexuality, or faith) miss what most people from minority backgrounds actually carry into work, which is the interaction effect. He is direct on mental health stigma inside ethnic minority communities, an area corporate wellbeing programmes routinely under-serve. He is a trustee of Stonewall and a former board member of London Pride, so the institutional knowledge sits alongside the personal one. Since 2021 he has been a management consultant at Hakluyt & Company, alongside his writing and advocacy. The combination is what makes the work travel into senior commercial rooms: he is asking the same questions the partners and executives in front of him are asking, from a position that takes their context seriously. Key speaking topics Intersectionality at work Social mobility in professional services Mental health stigma in ethnic minority communities LGBTQ+ inclusion in conservative cultures Race, faith and workplace identity Belonging and authenticity in elite institutions Ideal for CHROs, heads of D&I and culture leads at professional services firms Law firm and financial services leadership audiences working on retention of minority talent ERGs, Pride networks and multicultural networks at large corporates Executive committees reviewing the substance, rather than the optics, of their inclusion programmes Audience outcomes A clearer view of how race, faith, class and sexuality interact in the daily experience of minority staff. Specific language for talking about mental health in communities where the topic is stigmatised. A sharper sense of why retention of senior minority talent stalls in firms that recruit well. Permission for senior leaders to engage personal identity as a leadership question, not a compliance one.

Why organisations work with David Lammy Direct, recent experience of conducting British foreign policy at Cabinet level, including engagement with the Trump administration, the EU, China and the Ukraine response, which is rare in a speaker market dominated by retired diplomats and academic commentators. Authored the Lammy Review, the independent UK government review on race in the criminal justice system that produced 35 recommendations and remains a working reference for government and the Prison Reform Trust years after publication. Wrote «Tribes: A Search for Belonging in a Divided Society», a published argument on identity, polarisation and what holds plural societies together, which gives audiences more than a politician’s stump speech on division. Operates across justice, foreign affairs and domestic equity, so a single conversation can move from US relations to workforce inclusion without losing depth in either. Visiting academic appointments at LSE and SOAS sit alongside the Cabinet role, which signals that the analysis is grounded in legal and policy substance rather than soundbite. Biography highlights Deputy Prime Minister, Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice of the United Kingdom since September 2025. Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom from July 2024 to September 2025. Member of Parliament for Tottenham since 2000; admitted to the Privy Council in 2008. Author of the 2017 Lammy Review for HM Government on BAME outcomes in the criminal justice system. Author of «Tribes: A Search for Belonging in a Divided Society» and «Out of the Ashes: Britain after the Riots», both published by Hachette UK. First Black Briton to study at Harvard Law School (LLM, 1997); called to the bar at Lincoln’s Inn, 1994. Visiting Professor in Practice, LSE Department of Law; Visiting Lecturer, SOAS. Biography The conduct of British foreign policy in 2024 and 2025 ran through one office. As Foreign Secretary, David Lammy handled the UK response to the war in Ukraine, the war in Gaza, the second Trump administration and a recalibrated relationship with the European Union, before being moved in September 2025 to Deputy Prime Minister, Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice. Few speakers can describe how governments make those decisions, because few have made them. That seniority sits on a long parliamentary record. Elected for Tottenham in 2000 at the age of 27, Lammy held ministerial roles in higher education, culture and skills under the last Labour government, and was admitted to the Privy Council in 2008. The constituency itself, scene of the 2011 riots, shaped his book «Out of the Ashes: Britain after the Riots» and his work on policing, justice and inequality. In 2017 he authored the Lammy Review, the independent government review of how Black, Asian and minority ethnic people are treated in the criminal justice system. Its 35 recommendations and its costing of disproportionality at over 309 million pounds a year remain a working reference for ministers and reform bodies. «Tribes: A Search for Belonging in a Divided Society», published the following year, sets out a wider thesis on identity, polarisation and what plural societies need to hold together. The credentials are unusually broad for a frontline politician. Harvard Law School (LLM, 1997), called to the bar at Lincoln’s Inn, visiting professor at LSE, visiting lecturer at SOAS. Audiences get a Cabinet minister who can argue the legal and historical substance of what he is describing, not only the politics. Key speaking topics UK foreign policy and the transatlantic relationship Geopolitical risk and political volatility Justice, the rule of law and constitutional reform Race, identity and social cohesion Tribalism and polarisation in plural societies UK domestic politics and public policy Leadership in fractured political environments Ideal for Boards and executive committees stress-testing geopolitical, regulatory and political-risk assumptions. Chief sustainability, public affairs and government relations leaders working at the policy interface. Chief people officers and CHROs working on inclusion, cohesion and the politics of identity at work. General counsel and chief risk officers tracking justice reform, rule of law and sanctions exposure. Audience outcomes A current read of UK and US policy direction from someone who has sat across the table from the principals. A clearer view of how government actually weighs sanctions, alliances and domestic politics in foreign policy decisions. A sharper frame for talking about identity, race and cohesion inside organisations without defaulting to slogans. Specific named reference points (the Lammy Review, «Tribes») that audiences can take back into their own policy and people work.

Why organisations work with Catherine Mayer She has reported on power at the most senior editorial level, as Europe Editor and Editor at Large of TIME, and then tried to rebuild it, by founding a national political party. Few speakers on inclusion have done both. Her book Attack of the Fifty Foot Women reframes gender equality as an economic and institutional argument, not a values statement, which makes it usable in a boardroom conversation about strategy and risk. She can talk about royal institutions, political parties and global newsrooms from the inside, which gives senior audiences a sharper read on how hierarchical organisations actually work. Her writing on ageing (Amortality) and grief (Good Grief) gives her authority on two subjects most workplaces handle badly: longer working lives and bereavement in the workforce. She is a working journalist by training, which shows in the room. Arguments are specific, sourced and willing to be challenged. Biography highlights Senior editor at TIME magazine from 2004 to 2015, serving as London Bureau Chief, Europe Editor and Editor at Large. Co-founder, with Sandi Toksvig, of the UK Women’s Equality Party in March 2015, and its President. Author of Attack of the Fifty Foot Women, Amortality, Charles: The Heart of a King and Good Grief. Winner of the Foreign Press Association «Story of the Year» award, 2010, and shortlisted for the Orwell Prize, 2011. Co-founder of the Primadonna Festival of ideas, writing and music, and advisory board member of NOON. Former President of the Foreign Press Association in London, 2003 to 2005; began her career at The Economist. Biography Gender equality inside large institutions has become a paradox. Reports, networks and policies have multiplied, yet the shape of senior power has moved far less than the paperwork suggests. Catherine Mayer has spent her career watching this pattern from two very different sides. For more than a decade at TIME magazine, she reported on presidents, prime ministers and royal courts as Europe Editor and Editor at Large, with her 2010 cover story on David Cameron’s first US visit winning the Foreign Press Association «Story of the Year» and her writing shortlisted for the Orwell Prize in 2011. Her biography Charles: The Heart of a King drew on years of access to the British royal household and generated international headlines for what it revealed about how closed institutions actually operate. In March 2015, with Sandi Toksvig, she co-founded the Women’s Equality Party and served as its President until the party was dissolved in 2024. Attack of the Fifty Foot Women grew out of that work and argues, in hard economic and political terms, that closing the gender gap is the single largest lever available to most societies. Amortality examines the other structural story reshaping workplaces: longer lives and the collapse of age-based expectations about careers. Good Grief, written with her mother Anne Mayer Bird after they were widowed within 41 days of each other at the start of the pandemic, has made her one of the more candid public voices on bereavement at work. She co-founded the Primadonna Festival in Suffolk in 2019 and sits on the advisory board of NOON. Senior teams book her when they want an argument about institutional change that has been tested against real media, real politics and real loss. Key speaking topics Gender equality as institutional and economic strategy Power, hierarchy and how closed institutions operate Media, journalism and political accountability Ageing, longevity and the multigenerational workforce Grief and bereavement in the workplace Founding and running a new political organisation Culture change inside legacy organisations Ideal for Executive teams and boards reviewing gender, inclusion and cultural change strategy CHROs and Chief People Officers looking beyond policy to institutional redesign Leadership conferences on media, politics and public trust Employee network summits and international women’s events with a senior audience Audience outcomes A sharper account of why most inclusion programmes stall, drawn from politics, media and royal institutions, not consultancy theory An economic and institutional case for gender equality that a CFO or board member can use A clearer view of how longer lives and multigenerational workforces change talent strategy Usable language for how organisations should talk to staff about grief and bereavement A journalist’s scepticism about the difference between corporate announcement and actual structural change

Why organisations work with Marianne Abib-Pech A verified large-cap finance record at the top: Global CFO of Shell Aviation, a circa $20bn turnover business, reached before age 35 Active operating practice through Transitions First, an industrial venture fund rebuilding local, modular and resource-efficient supply chains, which keeps her material current rather than retrospective Author of The Financial Times Guide to Leadership, a published thesis on what trust-based leadership actually looks like in execution Frontier-market depth across Africa, the Middle East, and the Caspian region, useful for boards weighing growth in places where their existing playbook does not transfer Biography highlights Global CFO, Shell Aviation, before age 35 Earlier career at Arthur Andersen (Luxembourg) and GE Capital, including integration of a private bank Author, The Financial Times Guide to Leadership (FT Publishing / Pearson) Co-founder, Transitions First, industrial venture fund focused on local and modular supply chains Founder, LTF Partners, M&A and strategy advisory in emerging and frontier markets Women’s Business Initiative International Ambition Award, 2014 Biography Most leadership material is written from the inside of mature markets. Marianne Abib-Pech wrote hers from the other side. The Financial Times Guide to Leadership argues that trust, not charisma, is the operating system of senior leadership, and the cases that shape it come from places where that argument is hardest to apply. Her credibility on that point is operational. She was Global CFO of Shell Aviation, a circa $20bn turnover business, before she was 35, after earlier roles at Arthur Andersen in Luxembourg and at GE Capital, where she ran the integration of a private bank into the wider business. The seat at the top of a global division is what gives her material weight with senior audiences. Today the work is split between writing, advising, and investing. Through LTF Partners she works on M&A and strategy in frontier markets across Africa, the Middle East and the Caspian. Through Transitions First, an industrial venture fund she co-founded in 2022, she backs companies rebuilding modular, resource-efficient supply chains, the kind of capital decisions boards are now being asked to underwrite themselves. What that produces in a room is unusually concrete. She talks about leading across 88 nationalities because she has done it. She talks about capital allocation in difficult geographies because she is currently allocating it. She received the Women’s Business Initiative International Ambition Award in 2014, but the more useful credential is that her examples are still being built. Key speaking topics Leadership in male-dominated and frontier environments Trust as the operating system of senior leadership Strategy and capital allocation in emerging and frontier markets Industrial venture capital and supply-chain rebuilds Women in finance and senior leadership Cross-cultural leadership and global team performance Ideal for CEOs, CFOs and divisional leaders entering or scaling in frontier markets Boards weighing capital allocation into industrial transitions and supply-chain reconfiguration Senior women’s leadership programmes and executive development cohorts Finance leadership audiences moving from analyst to operator roles Audience outcomes A working definition of trust-based leadership grounded in real CFO-level decisions A clearer view of what changes when a leadership playbook crosses into frontier or industrial-transition contexts Specific reference points for capital allocation and deal execution in unfamiliar geographies Reframed expectations of what credibility looks like for women leading in male-dominated sectors