Economic Trends & Global Markets

Why organisations work with Ngaire Woods Her 2006 book “The Globalizers” set out a specific, named argument – that IMF and World Bank lending conditions are shaped by the geopolitical interests of dominant states as much as by economic theory. Organisations that have read it do not approach multilateral institutions the same way again. She has worked inside the institutions she analyses, not just around them: advisor to the IMF board, member of the G20 High Level Independent Panel on pandemic financing alongside Lawrence Summers and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, and member of the Lancet Commission on COVID-19. As founding Dean of the Blavatnik School since 2011, she has trained a generation of ministers, central bankers and senior officials from across the world. That means she knows where public policy is heading before it becomes a headline. Her analysis stays current and policy-facing: monthly contributor to Project Syndicate, regular quoted source in the Financial Times, and current Co-Chair of the WEF Global Future Council on Good Governance. As an Independent Non-Executive Director at Rio Tinto, she applies the same analytical framework she brings to lecture halls and policy rooms directly to boardroom-level governance – which means the distance between her intellectual work and live organisational decisions is shorter than it is for most academics. Biography highlights Founding Dean of Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government since its inception in 2011 – one of the world’s leading schools of public policy and government Professor of Global Economic Governance, University of Oxford; founder of Oxford’s Global Economic Governance Programme Author of “The Globalizers: The IMF, the World Bank, and Their Borrowers” (Cornell University Press, 2006) and “The Politics of Global Regulation” (with Walter Mattli, Princeton University Press, 2009) Member of the G20 High Level Independent Panel on Financing the Global Commons for Pandemic Preparedness and Response, co-chaired by Lawrence Summers and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala; member of the Lancet Commission on COVID-19 CBE (2018) for services to Higher Education and Public Policy; Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences; International Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Monthly contributor to Project Syndicate since 2013; quoted in the Financial Times; former regular presenter of BBC Radio 4’s Analysis programme Independent Non-Executive Director at Rio Tinto; Co-Chair of the WEF Global Future Council on Good Governance; Rhodes Trustee Biography The IMF and the World Bank were not built to be neutral. They were built to reflect the interests of their most powerful members – and understanding how those interests are encoded in loan conditions, governance structures and regulatory frameworks is what separates informed global strategy from exposed global strategy. Ngaire Woods has spent three decades studying exactly this: how international institutions work, who shapes them, and who is left out. Her 2006 book “The Globalizers“, published by Cornell University Press, made a specific and consequential argument – that the conditions attached to IMF and World Bank lending were shaped as much by the geopolitical priorities of dominant states as by economic theory. Her subsequent work, including “The Politics of Global Regulation” (Princeton University Press, 2009, co-authored with Walter Mattli), extended the analysis to how regulatory systems are constructed, contested and fragmented across global markets. These are not abstract frameworks; they are the tools that senior officials and corporate strategists use to understand conditions that resist simpler explanations. In 2011, Woods became the founding Dean of Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government – an institution she built from proposal to one of the world’s foremost schools of public policy. The school trains ministers, senior officials and public leaders from across the world; its alumni hold government positions on multiple continents. In 2021, the G20 appointed her to its High Level Independent Panel on pandemic financing, alongside Lawrence Summers and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, to propose how global commons could be financed in an era of systemic and cross-border risk. For organisations navigating a period in which the rules governing global trade, investment and regulation are being openly contested, Woods offers something specific: a structural account of where power sits, which institutions are losing coherence, and which are quietly accumulating it. She currently serves as Independent Non-Executive Director at Rio Tinto and Co-Chair of the WEF Global Future Council on Good Governance – roles that keep her analysis grounded in live institutional reality rather than historical retrospect. Key speaking topics Global economic governance and international institutions Geopolitics and the fracturing of the multilateral order Political risk and the regulatory environment for global business The IMF, World Bank and the politics of conditionality Global development and institutional reform Pandemic preparedness and the financing of global commons Democracy, governance and the erosion of public trust Ideal for Boards and senior executive teams operating across multiple jurisdictions and regulatory regimes Chief Strategy Officers and Chief Risk Officers in global businesses navigating geopolitical uncertainty Government and public sector leaders, and executives within multilateral institutions Conferences focused on global economics, institutional risk and geopolitical strategy Audience outcomes A working framework for understanding how international institutions shape the conditions that corporate and government strategy depends on Sharper analysis of where power is shifting in the global economic order – and what this means for investment, regulation and market access decisions Clearer sight of the political and governance risks embedded in global operations that conventional risk tools typically miss Insight into how policy is made, and how conditions are set, inside multilateral institutions – from someone who has advised them directly A more realistic account of which elements of the post-war international order remain durable, and which are already being renegotiated

Why organisations work with Karl Schmedders He brings a computational finance lens to ESG, climate risk, and carbon pricing, so net zero plans get tested as financial decisions, not as messaging. His public position on the “just transition” gives executive teams a defensible way to talk about the social and governance side of ESG, without retreating into either greenwashing or culture war. He directs IMD’s Strategic Finance program and has taught finance to senior executives at Kellogg and IMD for over two decades, which means complex valuation and risk arguments arrive in language a non-finance board can act on. His research record in journals such as Econometrica, the Journal of Finance, and the Review of Financial Studies makes him a credible counterweight when consultants and asset managers are pitching the same story to the room. Board roles at LPX Group and SYLVA AG, plus advisory work with firms including ABB, Airbus, Maybank, and Julius Baer, mean the examples land in operating reality. Biography highlights Professor of Finance at IMD; Director of the Strategic Finance program. PhD in Operations Research, Stanford University; Walter J. Gores Award for teaching at Stanford. Former Associate Professor at Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University; L.G. Lavengood Professor of the Year, 2002. Former Professor of Quantitative Business Administration at the University of Zurich. Published in Econometrica, Journal of Finance, Review of Financial Studies, Review of Economic Studies, Journal of Financial Economics, Management Science. Co-editor, Handbook of Computational Economics (Elsevier). Board member, LPX Group and SYLVA AG; Advisory Council member, Reward Value. Regular columnist on ESG and climate finance in I by IMD. Biography ESG has spent a decade as a marketing layer over corporate strategy. Karl Schmedders treats it as a finance problem. He starts from the externality, works through the price signal, and asks whether the company’s capital allocation reflects the climate position it has publicly committed to. That move, from narrative to numbers, is what most boards still find uncomfortable. His authority for that move comes from a long career in computational finance. After a PhD in Operations Research at Stanford, he taught at Kellogg School of Management for over a decade, where he was named L.G. Lavengood Professor of the Year. He was Professor of Quantitative Business Administration at the University of Zurich before joining IMD in 2019, where he now directs the Strategic Finance program and teaches across the Executive MBA portfolio. His research has appeared in Econometrica, the Journal of Finance, and the Review of Financial Studies. The applied work follows the same logic. As a board member of LPX Group and SYLVA AG, and an advisor to firms including ABB, Airbus, Maybank, and Julius Baer, he tests claims about climate strategy, executive pay, and financial risk against the underlying economics. His writing in I by IMD argues that carbon taxes are still too low to price the “mother of all externalities,” that climate financial risk is being understated on corporate balance sheets, and that companies are quietly admitting their net zero promises were unrealistic. He is also one of the few finance economists making a public, technical case for the “just transition.” His argument is that ignoring the social and governance side of ESG, the cost borne by lower income households and developing economies, is the fastest way for the political consensus on climate to collapse. For a board that is being told ESG is either everything or a fraud, that is a more useful framing than either. Key speaking topics Climate financial risk Carbon pricing and the economics of net zero ESG strategy and capital allocation Just transition and the social side of climate policy Strategic finance for non-finance executives Executive compensation and sustainability incentives Computational finance and quantitative decision making Sustainable investing and stranded assets Ideal for Boards and CFO offices stress testing climate commitments against capital allocation Investment committees, asset owners, and asset managers reviewing ESG and sustainable investing strategies CSOs and Heads of Sustainability who need a finance-grounded counterpart to the consulting view Executive education audiences in Strategic Finance, EMBA, and senior leadership programs Audience outcomes A clearer view of where their organisation’s net zero plan does and does not survive financial scrutiny. Concrete vocabulary for separating ESG substance from ESG narrative when investors and regulators ask. A working sense of how carbon pricing, stranded assets, and climate risk feed into corporate valuation. An economist’s case for the “just transition” that holds up in front of a sceptical board. Sharper questions to take into the next investment committee or strategy meeting.

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 Jaideep Prabhu He wrote the books that put frugal innovation on the boardroom agenda. “Jugaad Innovation” and “Frugal Innovation” are the reference texts, and the latter won the Chartered Management Institute’s Management Book of the Year in 2016. He connects innovation theory to what is actually happening in India, China, Brazil and Africa, not as case studies but as strategic signal for Western firms facing the same constraints a decade later. His work travels into public policy. “How Should a Government Be?” takes the same logic on digital, lean operations and citizen value, and applies it to how state power is now exercised. He holds two chairs at Cambridge Judge Business School and is a Fellow of the British Academy, which means the frameworks have been pressure-tested by academic peers, not only by consultants. Biography highlights Professor of Marketing and Jawaharlal Nehru Professor of Indian Business and Enterprise, Cambridge Judge Business School Director of the Centre for India and Global Business at Cambridge Judge Business School Fellow of the British Academy; Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge Co-author of “Jugaad Innovation” (Jossey-Bass, 2012) and “Frugal Innovation” (Economist Books / Profile Books, 2015), winner of the CMI Management Book of the Year 2016 Author of “How Should a Government Be? The New Levers of State Power” (Profile Books, 2021) Commentary and profiles in The Economist, Financial Times, The New York Times, The Times, Le Monde, BBC News, BBC Radio 4 and Bloomberg BusinessWeek Biography “Jugaad” is the Hindi word for an ingenious, improvised fix. In 2012, Jaideep Prabhu and his co-authors turned it into a serious argument about how Western firms should learn to innovate when money, time and certainty are all in shorter supply. That book, and its successor “Frugal Innovation”, reframed a generation of conversations about growth under constraint. Prabhu holds two chairs at Cambridge Judge Business School: Professor of Marketing and the Jawaharlal Nehru Professor of Indian Business and Enterprise. He directs the Centre for India and Global Business, and sits as a Fellow of the British Academy and of Clare College, Cambridge. The research sits where marketing, innovation, strategy and international business meet, with a steady focus on what firms in emerging economies are teaching firms everywhere else. “Frugal Innovation”, co-written with Navi Radjou and published with The Economist, won the Chartered Management Institute’s Management Book of the Year in 2016. His 2021 book “How Should a Government Be? The New Levers of State Power” extended the same question beyond companies, arguing that digital infrastructure, lean operations and new organisational forms are reshaping what governments can credibly deliver. The through-line is practical. Leaders who work with him come away with a clearer view of how to compete on creativity and economics at the same time, and a sharper sense of which constraints to design around and which to design with. Key speaking topics Frugal and jugaad innovation Business model innovation in emerging markets Growth strategy under constraint India and the global innovation economy Digital transformation in the public sector The future of government and state capacity Global marketing and competitive advantage Ideal for Boards and executive teams setting innovation and growth strategy for cost-sensitive or emerging markets CSOs, CMOs and heads of innovation looking to pressure-test portfolios against leaner competitors Public sector leaders, policy teams and ministers redesigning delivery around digital and citizen value Corporate India programmes, global leadership forums and any organisation with a serious India or emerging markets thesis Audience outcomes A working definition of frugal innovation that distinguishes it from cost-cutting and makes it usable at board level Named examples from India, China, Brazil and Africa of firms that built scale under constraint, and what they reveal about Western incumbents A framework for spotting which parts of the business model are most exposed to leaner competition and which offer the fastest route to reinvention For public sector audiences, a clearer view of the levers that modern states are using to deliver more with less Specific, citable references from the three books that senior teams can build internal conversations around

Why organisations work with Christoph M. Schmidt Seven years chairing the German Council of Economic Experts, the body that formally advises the federal government, gives him a working command of how policy is actually made in Berlin and Brussels. As co-chair of the Franco-German Council of Economic Experts, he reads the Paris-Berlin axis from inside the room, useful for any business whose European strategy depends on it. His research sits where most boardroom questions now live: energy transition economics, CO2 pricing design, labour market structure, and inequality. He has published on all of them. Project Syndicate columnist and contributor to the World Economic Forum Agenda and Brookings, which means audiences are getting a voice already trusted by the serious business press. Recipient of the Gustav Stolper Award (2016), given by the Verein fuer Socialpolitik for economists who shape public debate with empirical work, not rhetoric. Biography highlights President of RWI – Leibniz Institute for Economic Research in Essen since 2002. Chair for Economic Policy and Applied Econometrics, Ruhr-Universitaet Bochum. Chairman of the German Council of Economic Experts, 2013 to 2020. Co-chairman of the Franco-German Council of Economic Experts since 2020. Gustav Stolper Award (2016); honorary doctorate, Leibniz Universitaet Hannover (2019). Ph.D. in Economics, Princeton University; CEPR Fellow; IZA Research Fellow. Biography The German Council of Economic Experts exists to tell the federal government what the data actually says, in writing, every year. Christoph M. Schmidt chaired that body from 2013 to 2020, which means he authored or co-authored seven annual reports that shaped how Berlin framed growth, fiscal policy, labour reform, and the energy transition. He has been President of RWI – Leibniz Institute for Economic Research in Essen since 2002, while holding the Chair for Economic Policy and Applied Econometrics at Ruhr-Universitaet Bochum. The combination is unusual. RWI is one of Germany’s largest economic research institutes; Bochum keeps him teaching and publishing the empirical work that gives the policy voice its weight. Since 2020 he has served as co-chairman of the Franco-German Council of Economic Experts, a body set up to surface where the two largest eurozone economies can cooperate and where they cannot. For any executive team with European exposure, that bilateral view is rarely available from a single speaker. His training is Princeton applied econometrics, with a Ph.D. supervised in the Alfred P. Sloan tradition. The research output covers energy and CO2 pricing, labour markets, health, and inequality. He writes regularly for Project Syndicate, the World Economic Forum Agenda, and Brookings. The Gustav Stolper Award, given in 2016 by the Verein fuer Socialpolitik, recognises economists who translate serious empirical work into public debate. Schmidt is one of the few German economists to have done both at the scale the award implies. Key speaking topics European economic policy and the Franco-German axis Energy transition economics and CO2 pricing German and European labour market reform Income and wealth inequality Fiscal policy and debt sustainability in the eurozone The role of evidence-based economic advice in democracies Productivity and structural change in advanced economies Ideal for Boards and executive teams with European operations weighing the fiscal, energy, and labour policy outlook CFOs, strategy leads, and government affairs teams briefing on eurozone direction Investor audiences and policy forums examining the Franco-German economic relationship Industrial and energy sector leadership assessing the real cost trajectory of the transition Audience outcomes A sharper read on where German and European economic policy is heading and why A working framework for thinking about CO2 pricing, energy cost pass-through, and competitiveness A clearer view of the Franco-German policy interface and what it means for European business decisions A sense of which reform debates carry durable weight and which are political theatre Direct engagement with an economist who has sat inside the machinery of federal advice

Why organisations work with Brahma Chellaney He named the concept boards and ministries now use to discuss Chinese lending. Debt-trap diplomacy entered the policy lexicon through his January 2017 Project Syndicate column and is now cited by three successive US administrations. He wrote the canonical book on Asian water security. Water: Asia’s New Battleground won the Asia Society’s Bernard Schwartz Award in 2012, ahead of nearly 90 other titles. For organisations with manufacturing, agricultural or infrastructure exposure across South and Southeast Asia, he treats water as a hard strategic variable, not a sustainability slide. He helped draft India’s nuclear doctrine in 1999 as convener of the National Security Advisory Board’s External Security Group. When directors ask what New Delhi is actually thinking on Pakistan, China or the Quad, they are getting analysis from someone who has sat in the room. His distribution is institutional. Project Syndicate, Nikkei Asia, The Japan Times, The Hill, with op-eds in the Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Le Monde and the South China Morning Post. The same readers who set strategy on Asia are reading him in primary sources. Biography highlights Professor of Strategic Studies, Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi. Richard von Weizsacker Fellow, Robert Bosch Academy, Berlin; affiliate, International Centre for the Study of Radicalization, King’s College London. Former adviser to India’s National Security Council and convener of the External Security Group of the National Security Advisory Board. Author of nine books on strategic affairs, including Water: Asia’s New Battleground (Georgetown University Press), Asian Juggernaut (HarperCollins) and Water, Peace, and War (Rowman and Littlefield). Winner of the 2012 Asia Society Bernard Schwartz Book Award. Columnist for Project Syndicate, The Hill, Nikkei Asia and The Japan Times; visiting appointments at Harvard, Brookings, the Nobel Institute in Oslo, Johns Hopkins SAIS and the Australian National University. Biography Debt-trap diplomacy entered the language of Western policy in a single Project Syndicate column in January 2017. The author was Brahma Chellaney, writing on China’s Belt and Road lending. Within five years the phrase was being used by three successive US administrations, congressional committees and finance ministries across Asia and Africa. That trajectory is the clue to what he offers. Chellaney works on the structural fault lines of Asia, Chinese statecraft, India’s strategic posture, and the contest over rivers that sustain nearly half the world’s population, and gives them names that policymakers can act on. The work is grounded in primary sources and in years inside India’s own strategic apparatus, where he served as adviser to the National Security Council and convened the External Security Group of the National Security Advisory Board that drafted India’s nuclear doctrine in 1999. His books have set the terms of two distinct debates. Asian Juggernaut, published in the United States by HarperCollins in 2010, became a reference point for how China, India and Japan compete economically and militarily. Water: Asia’s New Battleground, published by Georgetown University Press, won the Asia Society’s Bernard Schwartz Book Award in 2012, beating nearly 90 other titles, and remains the canonical treatment of transboundary water risk in Asia. A follow-up, Water, Peace, and War, broadened the analysis to the global water crisis. His current platform is institutional and global. He holds the Richard von Weizsacker Fellowship at Berlin’s Robert Bosch Academy, is affiliated with King’s College London’s International Centre for the Study of Radicalization, and has held visiting appointments at Harvard, Brookings, the Nobel Institute in Oslo, Johns Hopkins SAIS and the Australian National University. His columns run in Project Syndicate, Nikkei Asia, The Japan Times and The Hill, with op-eds in the Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Le Monde and the South China Morning Post. For boards wrestling with China exposure, water-stressed supply chains, or the strategic logic of the Indo-Pacific, he is one of the very few analysts whose framing tends to be cited back to them by their own regulators. Key speaking topics China’s strategic statecraft and debt diplomacy The Indo-Pacific power balance and the rise of Asia India’s foreign and security policy Transboundary water risk and resource geopolitics Asian supply chain and infrastructure exposure Nuclear and security dynamics in South Asia Great-power competition and the fracturing global order Ideal for Boards and executive committees with material exposure to China, India or the wider Indo-Pacific CEOs, CSOs and government affairs leads reassessing political risk and country exposure Infrastructure, utilities, agriculture and manufacturing leaders facing water-related operational risk in Asia Investor and policy forums focused on geopolitical risk and capital allocation Audience outcomes A working vocabulary for Chinese economic statecraft, including the original mechanics of debt-trap diplomacy A sharper read on how Beijing, New Delhi and Tokyo each calculate strategic risk, and where their interests collide A defensible view of where transboundary water disputes are likely to disrupt supply chains, agriculture and infrastructure A clearer sense of what India’s foreign and security policy is, beyond Western reporting of it Frames for board-level conversations on Asia exposure that hold up under scrutiny from policy and regulatory readers

Why organisations work with Andrew Scott His published distinction between an “ageing society” and a “longevity society”, developed in The Lancet Healthy Longevity and across his books, gives leadership teams a concrete alternative to deficit-focused demographic thinking, with direct implications for workforce design, business model adaptation, and long-term investment. His two books, The 100-Year Life (over one million copies sold) and The Longevity Imperative (2024, shortlisted for the FT–Schroders Business Book of the Year), translate macroeconomic and health research into specific decisions organisations face: how to structure careers, what skills to invest in, how to redesign pension and benefits frameworks. His academic research, including a paper in Nature Aging co-authored with David Sinclair and Martin Ellison, connects macro-economic strategy to the science of ageing itself, giving organisations a basis for anticipating how advances in health and geroscience will affect labour supply and workforce composition over the next two decades. As leader of the CEPR Research Policy Network on the Economics of Longevity and Ageing, he has an overall view of policy, academic research, and applied economic intelligence: not a commentator on the trend, but one of the people who defines the research agenda. His advisory roles at the UK Office for Budget Responsibility, and his prior work with HM Treasury and the Bank of England, mean he can brief boards on the regulatory and fiscal changes that longevity economics will drive – before those changes arrive on the agenda. Biography highlights Professor of Economics at London Business School; Principal Scientist (Economics) at the Ellison Institute of Technology, Oxford CBE, 2026 New Year’s Honours – for services to economics, research and public discourse Co-author of The 100-Year Life (with Lynda Gratton) – over one million copies sold; runner-up for the FT/McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award Author of The Longevity Imperative (2024) – shortlisted for the FT–Schroders Business Book of the Year; named one of the FT’s best summer economics reads Research Fellow, Centre for Economic Policy Research; leads the CEPR Research Policy Network on the Economics of Longevity and Ageing; member of the WEF Global Future Council on Healthy Ageing and Longevity Former Non-Executive Director, UK Financial Services Authority; former Managing Editor, Royal Economic Society’s Economic Journal; advisory board member, UK Office for Budget Responsibility; adviser to HM Treasury and the Bank of England Biography The 100-Year Life, co-authored by Andrew Scott and Lynda Gratton, has sold over a million copies. What made it resonate was not the data on life expectancy; it was the argument that longer lives require a fundamentally different structure for careers, organisations, and economic systems. That argument sits at the centre of Scott’s research at London Business School and the Ellison Institute of Technology in Oxford. Scott’s central distinction – between an “ageing society” and a “longevity society” – reframes longevity from a background risk into a strategic imperative. An ageing society focuses on supporting rising numbers of older people. The longevity society, as Scott defines it in The Lancet Healthy Longevity, demands that organisations prepare for fifty-year careers, not just older employees. The implication for workforce strategy, benefits design, and long-term investment is structural, not cosmetic. The Longevity Imperative (2024, shortlisted for the FT–Schroders Business Book of the Year) extends the analysis from individual careers into system-level change: health systems, fiscal policy, financial markets. Academic research published in Nature Aging with David Sinclair and Martin Ellison grounds this macro-economic framing in the science of ageing itself – connecting what medical advances mean for labour supply to decisions boards face today. Scott advises the UK Office for Budget Responsibility and has previously advised HM Treasury and the Bank of England. He co-founded The Longevity Forum and serves on the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Healthy Ageing and Longevity. In 2026, he was appointed CBE for services to economics, research and public discourse. Key speaking topics Economics of longevity Demographic change and long-term economic growth Multigenerational workforce design Career reinvention and the 50-year working life Health, ageing, and the economics of prevention Fiscal sustainability and pension system reform AI, technology, and demographic change Business strategy and long-run demographic risk Ideal for CHROs and heads of people strategy at large, multigenerational organisations navigating career architecture and workforce planning for longer working lives Boards and senior leadership teams integrating demographic risk into long-term strategy alongside AI and geopolitical disruption Financial services leaders – asset managers, pension funds, insurers – whose business models are directly shaped by the structural economics of ageing populations Policymakers and public sector leaders with responsibility for labour market, health, or fiscal policy Audience outcomes A concrete framework – the ageing society vs longevity society distinction – for identifying where current workforce and business strategies are misaligned with demographic reality Clarity on the three-dimensional longevity dividend: what it means in practice to build for lives that are longer, healthier, and economically productive Specific implications for pension design, benefit frameworks, talent investment, and career architecture – not trend-watching, but decision-relevant analysis An evidence-based view of how advances in geroscience and health technology are likely to affect labour supply and workforce composition over the next two decades A new strategic vocabulary for the board conversation on longevity – one that moves from “ageing burden” to a concrete set of opportunities and organisational decisions

Why organisations work with Zanny Minton Beddoes She edits the publication that shapes how the world’s finance ministers, central bankers, and institutional investors read the global economy: her vantage point is not advisory, it is editorial, which means she sees patterns across geographies, sectors, and governments simultaneously rather than from within any single industry or country. Her pre-journalism career – macroeconomic adjustment programmes at the IMF and economic reform work in post-communist Poland as part of the Jeffrey Sachs team – gives her an understanding of what policy looks like under institutional stress, not just in theory. She has written and overseen major special reports on the world economy, European stagnation, Latin American finance, Central Asian development, and U.S. fiscal sustainability. Her depth on structural economic themes goes well beyond the commentary that most media-figure speakers provide. Two Gerald Loeb Awards (2012 and 2017, the latter for breaking the Saudi Aramco story) signal editorial credibility of a different order from standard speaker-bureau economics commentary. For financial services, institutional investors, and multinational boards, she offers a rare combination: the institutional authority of The Economist brand with the direct analytical access of someone who has run the publication for a decade. Biography highlights Editor-in-Chief of The Economist since February 2015 – the first woman to lead the publication in its 180-year history; also serves on the board of directors of The Economist Group Held successive senior roles at The Economist over 30 years: emerging markets correspondent, US Economics Editor, Economics Editor (Washington DC), Business Affairs Editor Economist at the IMF (1992-1994), working on macroeconomic adjustment programmes in Africa Economic reform adviser to Poland’s Minister of Finance under Professor Jeffrey Sachs of Harvard University Oxford PPE (St Hilda’s College); master’s degree, Harvard Kennedy School (Kennedy Scholar) Gerald Loeb Award winner in 2012 (economic journalism) and 2017 (Breaking News, Saudi Aramco scoop) Trustee, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace; member, Research Advisory Board, Committee for Economic Development Named among Forbes’ «Most Powerful Women in the World»; featured in Debrett’s 500 as «one of the most influential voices in financial journalism» Biography The challenge that keeps most boards and strategy teams off-balance is not a lack of information about the global economy. It is the absence of a coherent framework for integrating macroeconomic dynamics, geopolitical risk, and policy shifts into decisions that were never designed to carry that weight. Very few people are positioned to provide that framework with both practitioner rigour and editorial breadth. Zanny Minton Beddoes is one of them. As Editor-in-Chief of The Economist – the first woman to hold that position in the publication’s 180-year history – she oversees the analytical infrastructure that shapes how central bankers, finance ministers, and institutional investors read the global economy. Her perspective is not that of an adviser operating within a single sector or region; it is the perspective of someone who has spent three decades at the editorial centre of the world’s most closely watched economics publication, watching structural forces play out across geographies and cycles. Before journalism, she was inside the machinery of policy under pressure. At the IMF she worked on macroeconomic adjustment programmes in Africa. In Poland, as part of the Jeffrey Sachs team, she was present during one of the most consequential economic transitions of the post-Cold War period. That experience of watching institutions, incentives, and political constraints interact in real time, is audible in the way she talks about markets and policy today: not as abstractions, but as systems with observable failure modes. Her special reports for The Economist – covering the world economy, European stagnation, Latin American finance, Central Asian development, and U.S. fiscal sustainability – reflect a career-long engagement with structural economic questions, not topical commentary. Combined with two Gerald Loeb Awards and a decade leading the publication, that record gives her a credibility in a board or leadership setting that no amount of media presence alone can substitute for. Key speaking topics Global macroeconomic outlook and structural economic change Geopolitics and the fracturing of the multilateral economic order U.S. fiscal sustainability and dollar dynamics European economic stagnation and structural reform Emerging market resilience and vulnerability The intersection of energy transition and economic growth Trade, protectionism, and the rewiring of global supply chains Democracy, governance, and economic performance Ideal for Corporate boards and C-suite leadership teams navigating macro-level strategic uncertainty Financial services, asset management, and institutional investment audiences Government, policy, and international institutions requiring independent editorial-grade analysis Global leadership summits and senior forums where geopolitical and economic context is the primary agenda Audience outcomes A structured framework for reading the interaction between political, macroeconomic, and institutional forces – rather than treating each as a separate news event Calibrated perspective on where structural economic risk is concentrated, versus where conventional wisdom is overstating or understating it Clearer language for discussing macro uncertainty internally – specifically, the difference between cyclical disruption and structural shift An updated analytical map of the major economies and how their trajectories affect sector-level and investment decisions Context for evaluating specific strategic choices – expansion, capital allocation, supply chain configuration – against a coherent view of the global environment

Why organisations work with Yuriko Koike She runs the world’s largest metropolitan economy. Few speakers can describe the operating reality of climate, security and fiscal trade-offs at megacity scale from the seat where the decisions are made. She authored the Zero Emission Tokyo Strategy, with mandated solar panels on new detached homes from April 2025 and a target of halved emissions by 2030. Audiences hear how a major capital city is converting net zero language into capital allocation and regulation. As Environment Minister she designed Cool Biz, a behavioural and policy intervention that the Japanese Ministry of the Environment estimated cut 460,000 tons of CO2 in its first year. It is a rare example of a low-cost public policy producing measurable emissions reduction. She brings cabinet-level perspective on Japan’s geopolitical position. Former Minister of Defense, former National Security adviser, fluent Arabic speaker, Project Syndicate columnist on Asia, fiscal policy and the rules-based order since 2010. She is the first woman to govern Tokyo and the first to seek the LDP leadership. Her perspective on women in senior public and corporate roles is grounded in an actual executive career, not advocacy alone. Biography highlights Governor of Tokyo since 2016, re-elected in 2020 and 2024. Minister of the Environment of Japan (2003-2006); Minister of Defense (2007); Special Adviser to the Prime Minister for National Security. Architect of the Cool Biz campaign and the Zero Emission Tokyo Strategy. Asia Society Asia Game Changer Award, 2019. Chair, OECD Champion Mayors for Inclusive Growth Initiative. Project Syndicate columnist since 2010; World Economic Forum Agenda contributor. Biography Tokyo, with a metropolitan population near 14 million and a GDP larger than most G20 economies, is one of the few cities where climate policy, fiscal stress and geopolitical exposure all run through the same office. Yuriko Koike has held that office since 2016, re-elected in 2020 and again in 2024. The decisions she has made there are the substance of her platform. Her policy track record predates the governorship. As Minister of the Environment under Junichiro Koizumi between 2003 and 2006, she launched Cool Biz, a behavioural and dress-code intervention that the Japanese Ministry of the Environment estimated reduced CO2 emissions by 460,000 tons in its first year. As Governor she authored the Zero Emission Tokyo Strategy in December 2019, setting a 2050 net zero target with halved emissions by 2030, and pushed through a mandate that new detached homes in Tokyo install solar panels from April 2025. Few city leaders globally have moved climate ambition into binding metropolitan regulation at this scale. She also brings cabinet-level perspective on geopolitics. She was Japan’s Minister of Defense, served as Special Adviser to the Prime Minister for National Security, ran for the LDP presidency in 2008 as the first woman to seek the leadership of a major Japanese party, and has written for Project Syndicate on Asian security, fiscal policy and the rules-based order since 2010. Before politics she was a Nippon TV anchor and Arabic-speaking foreign correspondent, with a sociology degree from Cairo University. She chairs the OECD Champion Mayors for Inclusive Growth Initiative and was awarded the Asia Society Asia Game Changer Award in 2019. Audiences who book her are typically working on the same problem she works on every day: how to govern an exposed, dense, ageing, ambitious economy when energy, geopolitics and capital are all moving at once. Key speaking topics Climate policy and city-scale decarbonisation Megacity resilience and inclusive urban growth Japan, China and the geopolitics of East Asia Energy transition and capital allocation Women in senior public and corporate leadership Public sector reform and fiscal discipline Ideal for Boards and executive teams setting climate, energy and ESG strategy in Asia or with Asia exposure CFOs, CSOs and policy leads working on long-term capital allocation under climate and geopolitical risk Public-private convenings on urban resilience, infrastructure and inclusive growth Conferences on Japan, the Indo-Pacific and the global rules-based order Audience outcomes A first-hand view of how the world’s largest metropolitan economy is converting net zero policy into binding regulation and capital plans A sharper read on Japan’s economic and security position, and what it implies for organisations operating across East Asia A working example of behavioural climate policy that produced measurable emissions reduction at low fiscal cost A senior practitioner’s perspective on running large public institutions through fiscal pressure, demographic change and geopolitical realignment A direct account of breaking into senior leadership in a country and party where the path was not designed for women

Why organisations work with Vicky Pryce She has operated on both sides of the policy-commercial divide: as the senior government official responsible for UK productivity strategy at the Government Economic Service, and as Chief Economist and strategic adviser at KPMG and FTI Consulting. That combination is rare and difficult to replicate from outside it. Her book Women vs Capitalism (Hurst, 2019) makes a specifically economic case (not a social one) that gender inequality is a structural market failure with direct consequences for productivity and growth. It reframes inclusion as a strategic performance issue, supported by empirical evidence rather than advocacy. Her current position at CEBR means her economic analysis is grounded in live forecasting and modelling – not retrospective commentary or academic abstraction. She co-founded GoodCorporation, an advisory firm on corporate social responsibility and business ethics, giving her a rare combination of macro-economic credibility and applied governance insight. As the first woman to serve as Chief Economic Adviser at what is now the Department for Business, she brings direct experience of where the gap between policy intention and commercial impact typically opens: a perspective shaped by being inside the room when the policy was being made. Biography highlights Chief Economic Adviser and board member, Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) Former Joint Head of the UK Government Economic Service and Director General for Economics, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills First woman appointed Chief Economic Adviser at the Department for Trade and Industry (2002) Former Partner and Chief Economist, KPMG; Senior Managing Director, FTI Consulting; earlier career roles at Williams & Glyn’s Bank (RBS) and Exxon Europe Author of seven books including Women vs Capitalism (Hurst Publishers, 2019) and How to be a Successful Economist (Oxford University Press, 2022) Visiting Professor, Birmingham City University and King’s College London; Fellow, UK Academy for Social Sciences; Companion, British Academy of Management Co-founder, GoodCorporation (corporate social responsibility and business ethics advisory) Senior Member, British Chambers of Commerce Economic Advisory Council; Advisory Board member, OMFIF (central banking think-tank) Biography UK productivity has been the central puzzle of British economic policy for three decades. Vicky Pryce worked on it from the inside, first as the first female Chief Economic Adviser at what is now the Department for Business, then as Joint Head of the Government Economic Service, overseeing economic analysis and evidence across Whitehall from 2007 to 2010. That insider perspective shapes how she reads the policy landscape now. At KPMG, where she served as Partner and Chief Economist, and at FTI Consulting as Senior Managing Director, she translated government intent into commercial implication, helping large organisations understand what regulatory and fiscal shifts meant for their strategic position. Her current role as Chief Economic Adviser and board member at the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) keeps that analytical work live, grounded in ongoing economic modelling and forecasting. Her book Women vs Capitalism (Hurst, 2019) makes an argument that separates her from most economics commentators: gender inequality is not a social problem the market will eventually correct, but a structural market failure with direct consequences for productivity and growth. The case is economic and evidential. Greekonomics (Biteback, 2012), which was shortlisted for the Spear’s best business book award, applied the same forensic clarity to the eurozone crisis, and led to her appearing as an expert witness before the House of Lords cross-party subcommittee on economic and financial affairs. Pryce also co-founded GoodCorporation, advising organisations on corporate social responsibility and ethics. She is Visiting Professor at Birmingham City University and King’s College London, a Fellow of the UK Academy for Social Sciences, and a Senior Member of the British Chambers of Commerce Economic Advisory Council. Key speaking topics UK and global economic outlook Economic policy, fiscal strategy, and government reform Productivity, competitiveness, and long-term growth Political and regulatory risk for business Gender economics and labour market policy Corporate ethics and responsible business practice Manufacturing, industrial policy, and economic rebalancing Ideal for CFOs, strategy directors, and board executives navigating policy-driven economic risk Financial services, professional services, and public affairs organisations requiring independent economic analysis HR and talent leaders seeking an evidence-based, economic case for gender inclusion Senior leadership conferences with a UK or European economic policy dimension Audience outcomes A framework for distinguishing short-term economic fluctuation from structural policy shifts that require a strategic response Clearer understanding of how the UK’s persistent productivity challenge affects their sector and what policy instruments are actually in play An economic – not ideological – argument for why gender inclusion is a business performance issue, grounded in market failure analysis and labour market evidence Sharper contextual understanding of the regulatory and fiscal environment shaping their planning horizon Practical basis for scenario planning under conditions of domestic and international economic uncertainty

Why organisations work with Tanya Beckett Her banking career at Citibank and Commerzbank means she reads financial and economic data with the fluency of a practitioner, not just a reporter: and audiences notice the difference. Thirty years of front-line international broadcasting with BBC, CNN, Sky News, and CNBC has produced a presenter with genuine command of geopolitical complexity rather than surface-level confidence in it. Her advisory work with the World Bank, EBRD, EIB, ADB, Chatham House, and the British Foreign Office gives her direct insight into how trade and policy decisions are actually made, not just reported. She makes complex global dynamics legible for senior audiences without simplifying them, a skill that comes from structuring coverage for BBC Radio 4 and BBC World Service audiences with a high tolerance for nuance. As a facilitator and panel chair, she brings the interrogative discipline of a seasoned broadcast journalist to conference formats, which produces sharper discussions than a conventional MC approach. Biography highlights BBC broadcaster since 1998, with presenter credits on World Business Report, Working Lunch, Newsnight, Today, Our World, The Inquiry, and Talking Business across BBC One, BBC Two, BBC Radio 4, BBC World News, and the BBC World Service Three-year posting to New York as BBC World US Business Anchor, reporting from Times Square and Washington DC Earlier broadcast career at CNBC Europe, Sky News, and CNN International (1993–1998) Career began in journalism at the Financial Times Former investment banker at Citibank (London, Credit Analysis) and Commerzbank (Frankfurt, Capital Markets Division) Advisory and facilitation work for the World Bank, EBRD, EIB, ADB, Chatham House, and the British Foreign Office, among other multilateral and government bodies Degree in Metallurgy and Materials Science, Pembroke College, Oxford; fluent German and French Biography Tanya Beckett started her career not in a newsroom but on a trading floor. Her years in investment banking at Citibank in London and Commerzbank in Frankfurt gave her a working understanding of capital markets, credit risk, and cross-border financial transactions before she ever picked up a microphone. When she moved into journalism, starting at the Financial Times and then building her broadcast career at CNBC Europe, Sky News, and CNN International, that foundation travelled with her. At the BBC, where she has worked since 1998, she has presented across the full range of the corporation’s business and economics output: World Business Report, Newsnight, Today on Radio 4, Our World, Working Lunch, and The Inquiry, the BBC World Service’s weekly current affairs documentary. Her three-year posting to New York as BBC World US Business Anchor placed her at the centre of transatlantic financial and political coverage during a period of sustained global market volatility. What distinguishes her from most journalists who move into the conference circuit is the institutional depth behind the broadcast profile. She has worked with the World Bank, the EBRD, the EIB, the ADB, Chatham House, and the British Foreign Office on matters of trade and communication, giving her direct exposure to how policy is shaped and where geopolitical risk is actually concentrated, not just how it is narrated. For organisations hosting high-stakes leadership events, that combination – thirty years of international broadcast experience, a banking foundation, and access to the institutions that shape global economic policy – produces a facilitator and keynote voice whose grasp of the material is substantive rather than performative. Key speaking topics Global economic trends and financial markets Geopolitical risk and international trade International institutions and multilateral policy Business communication and economic literacy for leaders Transatlantic business and US–Europe dynamics Current affairs in context: interpreting global risk Ideal for C-suite and board-level leadership conferences requiring substantive economic and geopolitical framing Financial services organisations hosting client, leadership, or regulatory briefings International trade and policy forums needing a credible facilitator with institutional fluency Global corporates running town halls or leadership summits with a geopolitical or macro-economic agenda Audience outcomes A clearer framework for interpreting current global economic and geopolitical developments, anchored in how those events are shaped by international institutions Confidence engaging with financial and trade data without requiring an economics background Practical context for how major macroeconomic shifts – in trade policy, financial markets, or geopolitical realignment – translate into business risk and opportunity Greater precision in the questions leadership teams ask when briefed by economists or policy advisers

Why organisations work with Susan HayesCulleton She holds the CFA charter and runs a financial-training practice with clients across Europe and the United States, so the economic read is grounded in capital-markets discipline, not punditry. She wrote the textbook that Irish students learn economics from twice. That same instinct for sequencing complex material into something a room can act on is what she brings to executive audiences. She presents “Taking Stock” on Newstalk, interviewing experts on the issues moving the world economy each week. The implication for buyers is current material, sourced from named guests, refreshed continuously. She sits on the boards of the Irish International Business Network and the Ireland Hong Kong Business Forum, which gives her a working view of cross-border trade flows that few keynote economists hold. She built #SavvyTeenAcademy and Active Peers AI alongside the speaking practice, which means the economic argument lands with someone who has actually run payroll, raised invoices and made a hire. Biography highlights CFA charterholder; MSc Executive Leadership; BSc Financial Maths and Economics; Diploma in Taxation. Co-author of “Positive Economics”, a market-leading Leaving Certificate economics textbook in Ireland. Author of “The Savvy Woman’s Guide to Financial Freedom” and “The Savvy Guide to Making More Money” (Penguin Ireland). Author of “Money Matters”, a financial literacy textbook sponsored by CFA Society Ireland and distributed to Irish secondary schools. Presenter of “Taking Stock” on Newstalk; host of Fantastic Female Fridays and the ESG and Tech Show. Managing Director, Hayes Culleton Group; Associate Lecturer, Ulster University; board roles with the Irish International Business Network and the Ireland Hong Kong Business Forum. Biography Most boardrooms do not have an economist in the room. They have a CFO with a P&L, a strategy lead with a deck, and a set of macro headlines none of them can confidently translate into a hiring decision or a hedge. Susan HayesCulleton works in that gap. The credentialing matters here. The CFA charter, the MSc Executive Leadership and the BSc Financial Maths and Economics are not decoration; they are the reason the read on rates, currency and capital flows hold up under questioning. The Hayes Culleton Group serves clients across Europe and the United States out of that same training discipline. The public work is what makes the material legible. “Positive Economics”, co-authored twice, is the textbook generations of Irish students sat the Leaving Certificate with. “Money Matters”, sponsored by CFA Society Ireland, went into every secondary school in the country. On Newstalk, “Taking Stock” runs each week with named guests on the issues moving the world economy. The instinct for sequencing technical content into something a non-specialist room can use is the through-line. She also runs businesses. #SavvyTeenAcademy places teenagers into corporate work experience programmes; Active Peers AI captures and diffuses tacit knowledge inside networks. Board seats with the Irish International Business Network and the Ireland Hong Kong Business Forum keep her close to the cross-border trade flows that most economists discuss only in the abstract. Key speaking topics Global economic outlook and macro forecasting Capital markets and investing for non-specialist audiences Cross-border trade, Ireland, UK and Asia-Pacific exposure ESG and sustainability in commercial decision-making Financial literacy and women in finance Entrepreneurship and scale-up economics Ideal for Boards, executive committees and CFOs are preparing capital allocation, hedging or pricing decisions against an uncertain macro backdrop. Banking, financial services and professional services audiences who want a working economist on the platform rather than a generalist commentator. Conferences hosting international trade, ESG, or financial literacy themes. Corporate audiences seeking a credible Irish or European economic voice for European, UK or US-facing programmes. Audience outcomes A clearer read on what the current macro signals mean for the specific decisions in front of the leadership team. Working vocabulary for capital-markets concepts (rates, currency, equity flows) that previously sat with the CFO alone. A view on cross-border exposure for organisations trading into Ireland, the UK, the EU or Asia-Pacific. Confidence to ask the next-level question of internal finance and risk teams. An economic argument paced for a mixed-seniority audience, not a specialist one.