ESG Strategy

Why organisations work with Janusz Antoni Lewandowski Direct first-person insight into how the EU’s multiannual budget is built, negotiated, and defended. He led that process for the 2014 to 2020 framework. One of the few European speakers who designed a national privatisation programme, the Polish Program Powszechnej Prywatyzacji, and co-founded the Warsaw Stock Exchange. Useful for boards reading Central and Eastern European exposure. A Solidarity-era economic adviser turned cabinet minister turned Commissioner. The arc gives him standing on how political will translates into economic structure, and where it fails. Active commentary in Rzeczpospolita, Gazeta Wyborcza, Polityka, and Newsweek Polska. He is a working public voice on EU and Polish policy, not a retired official. Biography highlights European Commissioner for Financial Programming and the Budget, 2010 to 2014, under President José Manuel Barroso. Chair of the European Parliament Committee on Budgets from 2004; later First Vice-Chair (2019 to 2024). Member of the European Parliament across the 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th terms. Minister of Ownership Transformations in two Polish governments (1991; 1992 to 1993); co-founder of the Warsaw Stock Exchange. Co-founder and Chair of the Liberal Democratic Congress (KLD), 1988. Economic adviser to Solidarity, 1980 to 1989. Chairman of the Economic Council under Prime Minister Ewa Kopacz, 2015. Doctorate in economics, University of Gdańsk. Founder of the Institute for Market Economy Research, Gdańsk. Biography Poland’s transition from a state-planned economy to a market economy was not an academic exercise. It was designed and run, in real time, by a small group of economists who had been advising Solidarity through the 1980s. Janusz Lewandowski was one of them. As Minister of Ownership Transformations in the Bielecki and Suchocka governments, he co-founded the Warsaw Stock Exchange and built the Program Powszechnej Prywatyzacji, the mass privatisation programme that reshaped Polish corporate ownership. That experience travelled with him into Brussels. He served as a Member of the European Parliament from 2004, chaired the Committee on Budgets, and was appointed European Commissioner for Financial Programming and the Budget under José Manuel Barroso between 2010 and 2014. The Commissioner role placed him at the centre of negotiations for the 2014 to 2020 Multiannual Financial Framework, the trillion-euro budget settlement that defined EU fiscal priorities through the post-crisis decade. He returned to the European Parliament in 2014, served as First Vice-Chair of the Budgets Committee in the 2019 to 2024 term, and has continued as a working voice on European economic policy. In 2015 Prime Minister Ewa Kopacz appointed him Chairman of the Economic Council. He writes regularly for Rzeczpospolita, Gazeta Wyborcza, Polityka, Parkiet, Wprost, and Newsweek Polska. The combined record gives him a vantage point that few European speakers can match. He has built market institutions from a standing start, written a national privatisation programme, and held senior fiscal responsibility for the entire Union. When he reads EU budget politics, Central European exposure, or the durability of the European project, he is reading instruments he has helped to build. Key speaking topics EU budget architecture and the Multiannual Financial Framework The political economy of European integration Post-communist economic transition and privatisation Central and Eastern Europe in the EU Polish economic and political outlook Geopolitical risk for European capital The future of EU fiscal policy Ideal for Boards and executive committees with material exposure to Central and Eastern Europe CFOs, treasury, and policy teams tracking EU regulatory and fiscal direction Investor and banking audiences reading European political risk Senior public-sector and institutional audiences on EU policy and enlargement Audience outcomes A clear read of how EU budget priorities are set and where they are heading Direct insight into the political economy of Central and Eastern Europe from someone who shaped it Sharper interpretation of European policy signals affecting capital allocation A working framework for thinking about EU enlargement, sanctions, and the durability of the European project

Why organisations work with Christian Berg A Club of Rome author whose report mapped the structural barriers blocking sustainability across economy, politics, law, and technology, giving boards a diagnostic rather than a slogan. Direct experience translating sustainability strategy into corporate practice as Chief Sustainability Architect at SAP, not commentary from outside the firm. Advisory standing at federal government level through the Sustainable Economic Activity and Growth taskforce within Chancellor Merkel’s Future Dialogue. Live exposure to capital-allocation decisions as an investment committee member at GLS Bank, Germany’s first social and ecological bank. Academic authority across two German universities and a transdisciplinary base in physics, philosophy, theology, and engineering, which lets him connect technical and ethical questions in the same conversation. Biography highlights Author of Sustainable Action: Overcoming the Barriers (Routledge), published as a report to the Club of Rome. Former Chief Sustainability Architect at SAP, responsible for the sustainability consulting function. Honorary Professor of Sustainability and Global Change at Clausthal University of Technology. Visiting Professor for Corporate Sustainability at Saarland University. Co-founder and board member of Think Tank 30 within the German Chapter of the Club of Rome. Investment committee member at GLS Bank. Biography The 2030 Agenda set the targets. It offered little guidance on which structural barriers stop organisations from meeting them. Christian Berg’s Club of Rome report, Sustainable Action: Overcoming the Barriers, was written to answer that question across economy, politics, law, and technology in a single integrated frame. That frame is not theoretical. He spent more than a decade as Chief Sustainability Architect at SAP, leading the sustainability consulting function inside one of the largest enterprise software firms in the world. He has also led the Sustainable Economic Activity and Growth taskforce within Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Future Dialogue, putting him in the room where federal sustainability policy was negotiated. His academic base sits at Clausthal University of Technology and Saarland University, where he holds professorships in sustainability and corporate sustainability. The transdisciplinary training behind the work, in physics, philosophy, theology, and mechanical engineering, is what allows him to move between the technical, ethical, and economic registers a board conversation actually requires. The capital allocation question is live for him too. As an investment committee member at GLS Bank, Germany’s first social and ecological bank, Berg sits inside the decisions that test whether sustainability claims survive contact with credit and risk. Key speaking topics Corporate sustainability strategy Sustainable finance and capital allocation Barriers to sustainability transformation ESG operating substance Climate action and resilience Innovation under sustainability constraints Ideal for Boards and executive teams setting or reviewing ESG and net zero strategy Chief sustainability officers, CFOs, and treasury leads navigating capital allocation under transition Investor and banking audiences working at the intersection of finance and sustainability Innovation and strategy leaders translating sustainability commitments into product and operating decisions Audience outcomes A clearer map of the structural barriers blocking their sustainability commitments, from incentives to regulation Sharper criteria for which sustainability investments are likely to compound and which will stall A working vocabulary for connecting net zero ambition to capital allocation decisions Reference points from corporate practice at SAP, federal policy, and the GLS Bank investment committee

Why organisations work with Jochen Zeitz He originated the Environmental Profit & Loss Account at PUMA – the first methodology to assign monetary values to environmental impact across a full corporate supply chain. The UK government cited it in its 2011 Natural Environment White Paper as a best-practice case in sustainable business. He has led turnarounds at three global brands – PUMA, Kering, and Harley-Davidson – as the accountable executive. The sustainability work he is known for was built under genuine commercial pressure, not alongside it. His commercial record – approximately $4 billion in annual PUMA revenue, around 4,000% share price growth, and three Financial Times Strategist of the Year honours – separates his sustainability argument from advocacy. Boards engage with this material as strategy. His 4Cs framework – conservation, community, culture, commerce – is a tested model for aligning environmental accountability with long-term commercial viability, embedded in a live enterprise across 50,000 acres of wildlife habitat in Kenya. As co-founder of The B Team with Sir Richard Branson – a coalition of 24 global business leaders including Paul Polman and Mo Ibrahim – he has been central to building the most credible executive-led case for redefining the corporate bottom line. Biography highlights Chairman and CEO of PUMA for 18 years (1993-2011); the youngest CEO in German history to head a publicly listed company, appointed at age 30 Led PUMA from near-bankruptcy to approximately $4 billion in annual revenue, with share price growth of approximately 4,000% Conceived and launched the Environmental Profit & Loss Account at PUMA (2011) – the first monetary valuation of environmental impact across a corporate supply chain; cited as a best-practice case in the UK government’s Natural Environment White Paper Chairman of Kering’s Sustainable Development Committee and CSO of Kering’s Sport & Lifestyle division; President, CEO and Chairman of Harley-Davidson (2020-2025) Financial Times Strategist of the Year three times; Germany’s Federal Cross of Merit (2004); ZSL Conservation Fellow; Honorary Warden of Kenya Co-author of The Breakthrough Challenge (with John Elkington, 2014) and The Manager and the Monk (2012, published in 15 languages); co-founder of The B Team with Sir Richard Branson and of the Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art Africa Biography Until 2011, no major corporation had put a monetary value on what it cost the natural world. PUMA changed that. Jochen Zeitz conceived the Environmental Profit & Loss Account – the first framework to assign monetary values to environmental impact across a full corporate supply chain. It quantified PUMA’s 2010 footprint at €145 million and established a commercial language for environmental accountability that organisations across multiple sectors have since adapted. The EP&L came out of 18 years as PUMA’s CEO – a tenure that began when Zeitz was 30 and the company was near bankruptcy. He became the youngest CEO in German history to head a public company. Under his leadership, PUMA grew annual revenue to approximately $4 billion and share price by around 4,000%. That commercial track record is what makes the sustainability framework credible: it was built not alongside a turnaround, but as part of one. At Kering, Zeitz chaired the Sustainable Development Committee and served as CSO of the Sport & Lifestyle division, embedding the same approach across a portfolio of global luxury brands. He became President, CEO and Chairman of Harley-Davidson in 2020, leading the Rewire and Hardwire strategic resets that refocused the company on its most profitable segments and strongest brand identity. He retired from Harley-Davidson in October 2025. Beyond his executive roles, Zeitz co-founded The B Team with Sir Richard Branson, convening global business leaders to advance a redefined model of corporate accountability. He co-authored The Breakthrough Challenge (with John Elkington, 2014) and The Manager and the Monk (2012, published in 15 languages). The Financial Times has named him Strategist of the Year three times. His 4Cs framework – linking conservation, community, culture and commerce – underpins the Zeitz Foundation’s work across 50,000 acres of wildlife habitat in Kenya. Key speaking topics Environmental Profit and Loss accounting Corporate turnaround and brand transformation ESG integration into commercial strategy Responsible capitalism and redefined value creation Conservation-commerce models and the 4Cs framework Purpose-driven corporate governance Ideal for Boards and executive leadership teams navigating ESG integration into commercial strategy Chief Sustainability Officers and ESG leads building environmental measurement frameworks Corporate strategy and transformation teams leading large-scale brand or business model renewal Investor forums and governance audiences focused on long-term value creation and accountability Audience outcomes A clearer understanding of how environmental impact can be quantified in commercial terms, using the EP&L as a working reference Practical perspective on the conditions under which sustainability can be embedded into core strategy rather than treated as a reporting obligation A framework for aligning conservation, community, culture and commerce as mutually reinforcing business priorities Insight into leading corporate turnarounds that require simultaneous commercial discipline and long-term accountability Grounded context for what responsible capitalism means at board level, drawn from governance experience across three major global brands

Why organisations work with Ben Garrod Two decades of frontline conservation work across Africa, Asia, South America, the Caribbean and the Arctic, including several years running a chimpanzee field site for the Jane Goodall Institute, give him direct evidence of ecosystem collapse that most ESG briefings lack. A tenured Chair at a Russell-adjacent research university (Professor of Evolutionary Biology and Science Engagement at UEA) places him inside the scientific community rather than adjacent to it, which matters for boards scrutinising sustainability claims. A long BBC broadcast record alongside David Attenborough, plus his own series Secrets of Bones and Secrets of Skin, means he can carry a main-stage room without the usual trade-off between scientific credibility and audience access. Trustee of the Jane Goodall Institute UK and Vice President of Norfolk Wildlife Trust, so the conservation positions in his talks are backed by governance roles in the organisations doing the work. Can also chair and moderate science, sustainability and innovation programmes where the host needs genuine subject fluency rather than generic presenter polish. Biography highlights Professor of Evolutionary Biology and Science Engagement, University of East Anglia PhD from UCL and the Zoological Society of London on island-primate evolution in the Lesser Antilles Presenter of BBC documentaries including Attenborough and the Giant Dinosaur, Attenborough and the Mammoth Graveyard, Secrets of Bones and Secrets of Skin Trustee of the Jane Goodall Institute UK; Vice President of Norfolk Wildlife Trust; Fellow of the Linnean Society Author of the Extinct series and the Ultimate Dinosaurs series for Head of Zeus; author of The Chimpanzee and Me Regular contributor to BBC Radio 4’s The Infinite Monkey Cage and Inside Science; columnist for The Guardian and The Conversation Biography The chimpanzee population in the forest where Ben Garrod once ran a Jane Goodall Institute field site has fallen within a single professional lifetime. That kind of data point, drawn from direct fieldwork rather than a secondary report, is what a conversation with him tends to start from. It is also why leadership teams working through ESG and climate exposure increasingly want him in the room. His academic base is the University of East Anglia, where he holds the Chair of Evolutionary Biology and Science Engagement. The PhD, completed at UCL and the Zoological Society of London, looked at how primate species diverge on Caribbean islands, a question about the mechanics of evolution that connects directly to how ecosystems respond under pressure today. The published work, including the Extinct series and the Ultimate Dinosaurs series for Head of Zeus, extends that lens across deep time. The broadcast profile matters for the room he can command. He has presented alongside David Attenborough on Attenborough and the Giant Dinosaur and Attenborough and the Mammoth Graveyard, and carried his own BBC Four series Secrets of Bones and Secrets of Skin. On radio he is a familiar voice on The Infinite Monkey Cage and Inside Science, and he writes regularly for The Guardian and The Conversation. The governance roles are worth reading closely. He is a Trustee of the Jane Goodall Institute UK, Vice President of Norfolk Wildlife Trust, a Fellow of the Linnean Society and a Patron of the Natural Sciences Collections Association. For buyers assessing the difference between a broadcaster with an environmental hobby and a scientist with genuine standing in the field, those are the signals that settle the question. Key speaking topics Biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse Climate risk through an evolutionary lens Extinction science and what deep time tells us about current pressures Great ape conservation and the economics of protecting megafauna Sustainability and ESG reporting grounded in field evidence Science communication for non-specialist audiences Ideal for Sustainability, ESG and CSR leads briefing boards on biodiversity and nature-related risk Corporate offsites and industry conferences where the climate session needs to land with scientific weight Financial services, insurance and asset management teams assessing nature and biodiversity exposure Science, innovation and R&D events needing a chair or keynote with genuine subject fluency Audience outcomes A clearer line between biodiversity loss in the field and the risk categories that now appear in ESG and TNFD reporting Specific evidence from African, Asian and Caribbean fieldwork rather than the familiar stock of climate statistics A sharper sense of how extinction and ecosystem science inform current corporate sustainability decisions For mixed audiences, a scientific voice that holds the room without retreating into jargon or headline generalities

Why organisations work with Jayati Ghosh Sits on the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism and the WHO Council on the Economics of Health for All, so her read on global financial and health governance is drawn from inside the rooms where it is being rewritten. Co-chairs ICRICT, the independent commission pressing for reform of international corporate taxation, which gives her first-hand authority on the OECD-led tax overhaul that is reshaping how multinationals plan their effective rate. Reads emerging-market risk from a development-economist vantage point, not a Wall Street one, which is what buyers booking her tend to want: a sharper picture of sovereign debt, currency stress, and the political economy of the Global South. Thirty-five years at Jawaharlal Nehru University and now at UMass Amherst, author or editor of nineteen books, and winner of the ILO Decent Work Research Prize and the Galbraith Award: credentials that translate into credibility with serious audiences. Writes a monthly column for Project Syndicate, so her current thinking is publicly available and buyers can hear the argument before booking the room. Biography highlights Professor of Economics, University of Massachusetts Amherst, since January 2021. Member of the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism (2022). Member, WHO Council on the Economics of Health for All, chaired by Mariana Mazzucato. Co-chair, Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation (ICRICT). ILO Decent Work Research Prize (2011); John Kenneth Galbraith Award, AAEA (2023). Author or editor of nineteen books, including Women Workers in the Informal Economy and The Making of a Catastrophe: Covid-19 and the Indian Economy; monthly columnist for Project Syndicate. Biography The rules governing cross-border capital, corporate tax, and public health spending are being rewritten at the same time. Boards that track any one of these in isolation tend to miss how they interact. Ghosh works across all three. She is Professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, a post she took up in 2021 after nearly 35 years teaching at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi. Her research has long focused on globalisation, employment in developing countries, macroeconomic policy, and the gendered structure of informal labour. Nineteen books and roughly two hundred scholarly articles sit behind that work. The institutional footprint is what sets her apart from other macro voices. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres named her in 2022 to the 12-person High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism, the body tasked with proposing reforms to global governance ahead of the Summit of the Future. She sits on the WHO Council on the Economics of Health for All, chaired by Mariana Mazzucato, and co-chairs ICRICT, which has driven much of the civil-society case for a global minimum corporate tax. Outside academic journals she writes a monthly Project Syndicate column read by finance ministers and central bankers, and for nearly three decades ran a fortnightly column at Frontline. The ILO awarded her its Decent Work Research Prize in 2011; the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association gave her its Galbraith Award in 2023 for contributions to economics and to humanity. Key speaking topics Global financial architecture and reform International corporate tax and ICRICT’s agenda Inequality, labour, and the informal economy Development and growth in India and the Global South Economics of health and public goods Sovereign debt and emerging-market risk Gender and the economics of care Ideal for Boards and investment committees sizing emerging-market and sovereign-debt exposure. CFOs and tax leaders tracking the OECD minimum tax and the next wave of multinational tax reform. Leadership teams in global health, pharma, and development finance who need a public-goods frame for their strategy. Conferences on globalisation, inequality, and the future of multilateralism where a policy-insider voice is needed. Audience outcomes A clear read on how the UN, WHO and OECD reform agendas translate into corporate risk over the next three to five years. A defensible position on international tax reform and what it means for transfer pricing, effective rates and reputational exposure. A sharper picture of sovereign debt and currency stress in the Global South, drawn from development-economics evidence rather than market commentary. An argument for why care, informal labour, and gender sit inside the macro picture, not alongside it.

Key speaking topics Corporate governance and board leadership Digital transformation and technology strategy Business innovation and organisational change Strategy and competitive positioning Leadership in technology-driven markets Business transformation in global organisations Corporate decision-making and strategic management Ideal for Corporate leadership teams and executive committees Board directors and governance forums Strategy, innovation and transformation leaders Technology and digital transformation conferences Audience outcomes Clear perspectives on how technology and innovation reshape organisational strategy. Practical insight into leadership and governance in complex organisations. Frameworks for managing digital transformation and organisational change. Understanding of board-level decision-making and corporate oversight. Why organisations work with Isabel Aguilera Navarro Brings senior executive experience across global technology, hospitality and industrial businesses. Offers board-level perspective on governance, strategy and organisational oversight. Combines corporate leadership experience with academic engagement in strategy and management. Provides practical insights relevant to organisations navigating technological and structural change. Biography Isabel Aguilera Navarro brings senior leadership experience from some of the world’s most recognised global organisations, offering a board-level perspective on strategy, innovation and digital transformation. Her career spans executive leadership roles across technology, hospitality and industrial sectors, providing organisations with practical insight into how businesses adapt and compete in rapidly evolving markets. She has held senior executive positions at GE, Google, NH Hoteles and Dell across Iberia and Southern Europe. This cross-sector experience informs her work advising organisations on strategic decision-making, technology-driven change and the organisational capabilities required to lead in complex, global environments. Alongside her executive career, Isabel serves as an independent director of several listed companies. Her board roles include Cemex, Lar España, Oryzon Genomics, Canal de Isabel II and Making Science, where she contributes to governance, strategic oversight and corporate decision-making. She also chairs the Audit and Control Committee at Lar España. Isabel combines corporate leadership with academic engagement. She is Executive in Residence in the Department of Strategy and General Management at ESADE and previously served as President of the Social Council of the University of Seville. She is also the author of Lo que estaba por llegar ya está aquí, exploring the forces shaping business and society in a rapidly changing world.

Why organisations work with Gillian Tett Her track record on the 2008 crisis is specific and verifiable: she conducted ethnographic research into JPMorgan’s banking culture from 2005 to 2007, published FT warnings about derivative risk before the crash, and documented the analysis in Fool’s Gold – giving organisations a concrete, tested basis for trusting her read of current systemic risk. The Anthro-Vision framework translates anthropological field methods into a practical leadership tool: a way to surface the unstated assumptions, classification systems, and cultural dynamics that standard data analysis cannot reach. The Silo Effect provides boards with a specific diagnostic – that the most dangerous organisational failure modes are cultural, not structural – and a set of case-studied arguments for why addressing them requires a different kind of analysis than process redesign. As co-founder of FT Moral Money, she has tracked the ESG movement from its earliest institutional phase, giving her a longitudinal perspective on how sustainability commitments become financial and reputational risk that few analysts or advisers can match. Her simultaneous role as an active FT journalist and Provost of King’s College Cambridge produces a form of authority that is genuinely rare: live market intelligence, editorial independence, and academic standing, without advisory-firm positioning. Biography highlights 45th Provost of King’s College, Cambridge, since October 2023 FT editorial board member and weekly columnist; former US managing editor (2013-2019) and former Chair of the FT US Editorial Board Co-founder, FT Moral Money newsletter Author of four books: Fool’s Gold (New York Times bestseller), The Silo Effect, Anthro-Vision (Porchlight best business book award; Columbia Business School Eccles prize), and Saving the Sun PhD in Social Anthropology, University of Cambridge Awards: Wincott Prize for financial journalism (2007); British Press Awards – Business Journalist of the Year (2008), Journalist of the Year (2009), Columnist of the Year (2014); British Academy President’s Medal (2011); American Anthropological Association President’s Medal (2022); OBE for services to journalism (2024) Chair of the board of trustees, Knight-Bagehot Fellowship Program in Economics and Business Journalism, Columbia University Biography Gillian Tett has spent thirty years at the Financial Times covering global markets. What she found, consistently, is that what moves them is cultural as much as numerical. The forces shaping systemic risk – tribal behaviour, unspoken institutional assumptions, rigid classification systems – are largely invisible in standard economic analysis. Her most verifiable proof point came before the 2008 financial crisis. From 2005 to 2007, she studied JPMorgan’s banking culture ethnographically and published FT warnings about the systemic risks of credit derivatives – risks that most economists and regulators had not yet identified. Fool’s Gold – a New York Times bestseller – documented that analysis and became one of the definitive accounts of how cultural insularity inside banking created the conditions for the crash. Her subsequent books formalised the method. The Silo Effect showed how cultural classification systems – not just structural inefficiencies – create the organisational blindness that precedes major strategic failures. Anthro-Vision – winner of the Porchlight best business book award and the Columbia Business School Eccles prize – translated this into a practical framework for applying anthropological field methods to business, markets, and geopolitical risk. Her current position is what makes her singular. As the 45th Provost of King’s College Cambridge and an active FT columnist, she reports on markets while leading one of the world’s most significant academic institutions. She co-founded FT Moral Money and holds the OBE for services to journalism. Key speaking topics Global economic risk and geopolitical uncertainty Financial markets and systemic risk Anthropological analysis in business and strategy Organisational silos and decision-making failure ESG and sustainable finance Political tribalism and social change Cultural dynamics of markets and institutions Ideal for Board directors and C-suite executives navigating economic and geopolitical uncertainty CFOs, CROs, and investment audiences requiring independent analysis of financial market dynamics CHROs and transformation leads addressing structural silos, organisational culture, and decision-making quality Policy, government, and public sector leaders facing complex political and economic risk Audience outcomes A framework for identifying the cultural assumptions and social dynamics that standard economic analysis tends to miss A clearer perspective on how organisational silos and cultural classification systems create the blindness that precedes strategic and financial failure Practical insight into how anthropological methods can be applied to risk assessment, market analysis, and organisational decision-making A grounded, independent reading of current global economic forces and geopolitical shifts, drawn from active FT journalism A reframing of ESG as a systemic risk discipline rather than a reputational management exercise

Why organisations work with Deborah Meaden Twenty years of unscripted investment judgement on Dragons’ Den, where she has personally backed dozens of businesses, given audiences a working language for evaluating risk, founders and growth. Operator credibility built on a £33 million sale of Weststar Holidays to Phoenix Equity Partners in 2005, after a management buyout she led from inside the family business. A consistent, public position on sustainability as a commercial question: through The Big Green Money Show on BBC Radio 5 Live she has interrogated CEOs of major UK and global businesses on what climate strategy actually costs and earns. Author credibility across audiences from senior operators (Common Sense Rules) to financial literacy for children (HarperCollins Little Experts series, including a Financial Times Book of the Year 2023 Critics’ Choice). A direct, plain-language style that translates entrepreneurial decisions into something a leadership team can argue with, not just admire. Biography highlights Investor on BBC’s Dragons’ Den since 2006. Led the 1999 management buyout of Weststar Holidays and sold the majority to Phoenix Equity Partners in 2005 for £33 million. Author of Common Sense Rules (Random House Business, 2009) and the HarperCollins Little Experts financial literacy series. Why Money Matters named a Financial Times Book of the Year 2023 Critics’ Choice; silver at the Made For Mums Toy Awards. Co-host of The Big Green Money Show on BBC Radio 5 Live with Felicity Hannah. Trustee of Tusk Trust, Fellow of WWF, Ambassador for the RSPB, Marine Conservation Society and World Horse Welfare, Compassion Visionary at CIWF. Honorary degrees from the University of Exeter Business School, Staffordshire University, Keele University and Bath Spa University. Biography Weststar Holidays was a single-site family business when Deborah Meaden joined its arcade operations in 1988. By 2005 it was a five-park operator hosting around 150,000 holidaymakers a year, sold to Phoenix Equity Partners for £33 million after the management buyout she had led six years earlier. The arc, from operator to owner to seller, is the spine of how she reads other people’s businesses. Two decades on Dragons’ Den have widened that lens. Since 2006 she has sat through several thousand pitches and put her own capital behind a long list of UK ventures, from artisan manufacturer Fox Brothers to consumer brands across food, retail and clean technology. The pattern audiences see, the questions about unit economics, founder discipline and market truth, is the same pattern she applies to her own portfolio. Her published work extends the argument into financial literacy and commercial sustainability. Common Sense Rules (Random House Business, 2009) sets out the operating principles she uses on the Den. The Little Experts series with HarperCollins takes the same plain-language approach to children: Why Money Matters was named a Financial Times Book of the Year 2023 Critics’ Choice. On The Big Green Money Show with Felicity Hannah, she presses senior corporate leaders on whether climate commitments survive contact with a profit-and-loss account. Trustee at Tusk Trust, Fellow of WWF, Ambassador to the RSPB, Marine Conservation Society and World Horse Welfare, and Compassion Visionary at CIWF: the environmental work is a working part of how she frames commercial choices. Honorary doctorates from Exeter, Staffordshire, Keele and Bath Spa recognise the same combination of operating record and public argument. Key speaking topics Entrepreneurship and scale-up leadership Investment judgement and growth strategy Building and selling a business Sustainability as a commercial discipline Brand, customer and consumer trust Resilience and decision-making in private companies Women in business and leadership Ideal for Founders, CEOs and senior operators of growth-stage and family-owned businesses Boards setting strategy on sustainability and long-term capital allocation Sales, partner and customer-facing leadership teams Annual conferences and leadership offsites for operating businesses Audience outcomes A practical view of how an experienced investor reads pitches, plans and people. Concrete reference points from twenty years of UK private investment, including her own deals. A clear-eyed framing of sustainability as a commercial choice, with named examples from major UK and global businesses. Confidence to ask harder questions of their own numbers, founders and customers. A memorable, direct keynote voice that audiences quote back inside their organisations.

Why organisations work with Anne Lise Kjaer The Trend Management Toolkit is a published, step-by-step methodology – not a proprietary black box – giving leadership teams a repeatable, teachable system for reading and prioritising complex signals before they become obvious to competitors. The 4P framework (People, Planet, Purpose, Profit) gives boards a practical lens for evaluating long-range decisions against societal value as well as financial return – a model that predates mainstream ESG adoption and has been tested across sectors from automotive to humanitarian. Government advisory appointments – to the UK’s DEFRA and Singapore’s Urban Redevelopment Authority IPE – mean her foresight work is calibrated against real policy and long-horizon planning environments, not only corporate strategy rooms. Kjaer Global has operated continuously since 1988; the methodology behind her speaking work has been applied and revised across multiple economic cycles, not developed for the conference circuit. Her design background gives trend analysis a granular, sensory dimension: she reads cultural and behavioural shifts in material culture and consumer behaviour before they appear in quantitative data. Biography highlights Founder of Kjaer Global, London-based trend management and futures consultancy, established 1988 Author of The Trend Management Toolkit: A Practical Guide to the Future (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014) – a step-by-step methodology for strategic trend analysis and scenario planning Developer of the 4P framework (People, Planet, Purpose, Profit), applied with clients including BMW, McKinsey, IKEA, EY, UNICEF, Amazon, and Volvo Appointed adviser to the UK government’s DEFRA (2022); former member of Singapore’s Urban Redevelopment Authority International Panel of Experts (2018–2022) Listed among Forbes’ 50 Leading Female Futurists (2020); featured in MIT Technology Review’s profile of professional forecasters Profiled by the Financial Times; regular media contributor across BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera, The Guardian, Fast Company, and The Times Copenhagen Goodwill Ambassador (honorary title, since 2004); BA in Design, TEKO Design and Business School Biography Most organisations treat trends as incoming intelligence to be monitored. Anne Lise Kjaer’s argument – developed over more than three decades running Kjaer Global – is that monitoring is not enough. Trends require a system for evaluation, prioritisation, and integration into decisions. Without that system, even well-informed leadership teams are reacting, not preparing. The Trend Management Toolkit, published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2014, is the codification of that system. It moves through the practical mechanics of trend mapping: how to distinguish structural drivers from surface noise, how to scenario-plan across people, planet, purpose, and profit dimensions, and how to apply foresight to brand, innovation, and leadership decisions. The 4P framework at its core is not a values statement – it is a decision architecture, and it predates the mainstream ESG vocabulary by several years. The client range is deliberate evidence. BMW, McKinsey, EY, IKEA, and UNICEF are not natural strategic neighbours, but each has used Kjaer’s methodology for different planning challenges. Her formal advisory roles extend the same logic into government: as an appointed adviser to the UK’s DEFRA and a member of Singapore’s Urban Redevelopment Authority’s International Panel of Experts – advising on urban planning to 2060 – her foresight work has been tested against policy timelines, not only commercial ones. The Financial Times described her perspective as one that creates social prototypes based on nascent trends. Forbes included her among its 50 Leading Female Futurists; MIT Technology Review featured her in its 2020 profile of professional forecasters. She has contributed commentary across BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera, The Guardian, Fast Company, and The Times, and holds the honorary title of Copenhagen Goodwill Ambassador. Key speaking topics Strategic foresight and trend management methodology The 4P framework: People, Planet, Purpose, Profit Sustainable and responsible innovation Long-range consumer and societal trends Scenario planning for leadership and strategy Glocalisation and regional economic ecosystems Futures thinking for business model development Ideal for Executive and leadership teams building or pressure-testing long-range strategy Chief Strategy Officers and innovation leads with responsibility for horizon-scanning and scenario planning Boards integrating ESG and societal value into long-term business decision-making Strategy, futures, and sustainability conferences requiring rigorous methodology rather than trend commentary Audience outcomes Practical understanding of the Trend Management Toolkit methodology and how to apply it to their organisation’s planning cycles A working model for distinguishing high-signal trends from background noise in a saturated information environment Familiarity with the 4P framework as an operational decision lens – not an abstract value statement – applicable to board-level strategic choices Concrete examples of how organisations across sectors have translated structured foresight into competitive advantage Greater confidence in making long-term strategic commitments under conditions of genuine uncertainty

Why organisations work with Ana Palacio She has held executive authority inside three of the systems organisations most need to understand – the EU’s legislative and treaty-making bodies, the World Bank Group, and the energy infrastructure sector – not as an adviser, but as a principal. That changes the character of the analysis. Her standing argument is specific: energy security cannot be separated from geopolitical alignment. As a board director of Enagás (IBEX 35), where she chairs the Sustainability Committee, she is applying that argument under fiduciary conditions – not as commentary. Her monthly column in Project Syndicate and weekly column in El Mundo give her a verifiable track record of public positions on live geopolitical events. Audiences can test her analysis against what she has actually said, not just what she claims to believe. She participated directly in drafting the European Constitution as a member of the Presidium of the Convention for the Future of Europe. Her understanding of how EU institutions are built – and how they fail – is first-hand, not textbook. Her Georgetown course, “Global Powers Institutions and Governance,” signals a structured analytical framework behind her commentary on geopolitics – not anecdote, but architecture. Biography highlights First woman to serve as Spain’s Foreign Minister (2002-2004); at the time, the most senior governmental role held by a woman in the Spanish government Member of the Presidium of the Convention for the Future of Europe; Head of the Spanish Delegation to the EU’s Intergovernmental Conference – participated directly in drafting the European Constitution Senior VP and General Counsel, World Bank Group; Secretary-General, ICSID (2006-2008) Independent Leading Director, Enagás (IBEX 35), Chair of its Sustainability Committee; Director, Ecoener; board member, PharmaMar Visiting Professor, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University; course: “Global Powers Institutions and Governance” Monthly columnist, Project Syndicate; weekly columnist, El Mundo (Spain’s second-largest national daily) Sandra Day O’Connor Justice Prize (2016); Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters, Georgetown University; Officier de la Légion d’Honneur, France (2016) Biography Most organisations encounter geopolitics through external briefings. Decisions, however, are made by people who have never been inside the institutions being analysed. Ana Palacio has been inside three of them – and not as a visitor. As a Member of the European Parliament, Palacio chaired the Legal Affairs and Internal Market Committee and the Conference of Committee Chairs, the Parliament’s most senior legislative coordination body. As Head of the Spanish Delegation to the EU’s Intergovernmental Conference and a member of the Presidium of the Convention for the Future of Europe, she participated directly in drafting the European Constitution. As Senior VP and General Counsel of the World Bank Group and Secretary-General of ICSID, she oversaw the legal and institutional architecture through which international investment disputes are resolved. These are not entries on a CV. They are the systems that shape the operating environment for global business. Her most specific intellectual contribution sits at the intersection of energy and geopolitics. Across a monthly column in Project Syndicate and a weekly column in El Mundo, Palacio has made a consistent and testable argument: that energy security is a geopolitical question, not a transition management one – and that the EU’s failure to build a genuine energy union represents a structural vulnerability, one that Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine made impossible to ignore. She makes this argument as the Independent Leading Director of Enagás, Spain’s IBEX 35-listed gas infrastructure operator, where she chairs the Sustainability Committee. The position is not academic. At Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, she teaches “Global Powers Institutions and Governance.” For organisations trying to move from geopolitical awareness to strategic decision-making, that is precisely the capability gap her work addresses. Key speaking topics Geopolitics and the fracturing international order Energy security as strategic risk European Union policy and strategic sovereignty International institutions and global governance Transatlantic relations and regulatory divergence Political risk and long-horizon investment decisions ESG strategy through a geopolitical lens Ideal for Board directors and C-suite leaders making investment and capital allocation decisions in politically exposed markets Government affairs, regulatory strategy, and public policy functions in multinational organisations Energy, infrastructure, and financial services organisations navigating geopolitical and regulatory exposure Senior leadership forums focused on EU policy, transatlantic dynamics, or geopolitical risk Audience outcomes A working framework for distinguishing structural shifts in the international order from short-term political noise – applicable to investment and strategy decisions A clearer understanding of how international institutions (EU, World Bank, multilateral bodies) actually function – and how their decisions create or foreclose market and regulatory conditions A geopolitically grounded perspective on energy security: why supply chain, infrastructure, and transition decisions cannot be separated from strategic alignment Sharper context for evaluating transatlantic dynamics, including EU-US regulatory divergence, trade frameworks, and the political pressures reshaping multilateral cooperation A more rigorous basis for incorporating political risk into board-level decision-making – with the same analytical discipline applied to financial and operational risk

Why organisations work with Alexandra Cousteau Oceans2050, which she co-founded and leads as President, published the first peer-reviewed global assessment of seaweed carbon sequestration in Nature Climate Change (2025) – giving her ocean restoration arguments a scientific grounding most sustainability voices cannot match. She reframes water security as a material business risk rather than a reputational issue, mapping how freshwater and ocean health are embedded in supply chains, food production, and coastal infrastructure in ways that affect operations, procurement, and investor disclosure. She has testified before the U.S. Congress on water policy and maintains direct relationships with heads of state and senior policy makers, giving organisations a credible connection point at the intersection of science, advocacy, and government decision-making. She pioneered real-time expedition storytelling on social media before it was standard practice – in 2010 she led National Geographic’s first interactive expedition, a five-month journey across North America – making her one of few climate voices who has demonstrably mobilised both institutional and popular attention at scale. As architect of the Blue Cities Alliance through Oceans2050, she connects organisations to a growing network of coastal city governments taking measurable action on ocean restoration, relevant to companies seeking credible local partnerships for their nature-based ESG commitments. Biography highlights Co-founder and President, Oceans2050 – lead organisation behind the first peer-reviewed global study of seaweed carbon sequestration, published in Nature Climate Change (2025), with research funding from WWF and the Bezos Earth Fund National Geographic Emerging Explorer (2008); World Economic Forum Young Global Leader (2010) Co-founder, EarthEcho International – youth environmental education organisation reaching more than 2 million people in 146 countries Founder, Blue Legacy International (2008) – produced 100+ award-winning short films on water issues, with expeditions across six continents Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters, Georgetown University (2016); BA in Political Science (International Relations), Georgetown University Senior Advisor, Oceana; CNN Principle Voices contributor (2008); UN Earth Trustee; U.S. Congress water policy witness Biography The ocean absorbs roughly a quarter of all carbon emitted since industrialisation, yet it remains largely absent from corporate ESG strategy. Alexandra Cousteau, co-founder of Oceans2050 and granddaughter of the legendary oceanographer Jacques-Yves Cousteau, has spent two decades building the scientific infrastructure to address that gap. The Oceans2050 study published in Nature Climate Change in 2025 was the first peer-reviewed global assessment of carbon burial beneath seaweed farms, demonstrating sequestration rates comparable to mangroves and seagrasses and establishing the scientific foundation for a new blue carbon market. Cousteau’s consistent argument, advanced across her work with EarthEcho International, Blue Legacy, and Oceans2050, is that water security is not a separate environmental concern but a material business risk embedded in every supply chain, food system, and coastal community. This is grounded in fieldwork across six continents, peer-reviewed science, and direct engagement with heads of state, NGOs, and senior policy makers. She has testified before the U.S. Congress on water policy and served for years as Senior Advisor to Oceana on ocean conservation and governance campaigns. Her credentials span the academic and the field-based. She holds a degree in International Relations from Georgetown University and received an honorary doctorate from the same institution in 2016. National Geographic named her an Emerging Explorer in 2008; the World Economic Forum recognised her as a Young Global Leader in 2010. She co-founded EarthEcho International, now reaching more than 2 million young people in 146 countries, and established Blue Legacy International in 2008, producing over 100 award-winning films on freshwater and ocean issues. The case she makes to organisations is specific: ocean restoration is market infrastructure. As architect of the Blue Cities Alliance and the Oceans2050 seaweed carbon project, she is building the verified frameworks that enable corporate investment in blue carbon at scale. Boards evaluating ESG commitments increasingly need to distinguish credible ocean science from reputational positioning. Cousteau provides that distinction with the rigour to back it up. Key speaking topics Ocean restoration and blue carbon markets Water security as material business risk ESG strategy and nature-based climate solutions Blue economy and sustainable aquaculture Science-based storytelling and public engagement Long-term environmental thinking and intergenerational leadership Ocean policy and governance Ideal for Chief Sustainability Officers and ESG leadership teams evaluating nature-based and ocean-based climate commitments Corporate boards and senior executives with water or coastal supply chain exposure in their risk frameworks Policy forums, international summits, and governmental bodies focused on ocean governance, climate action, and blue economy development Investment and financial audiences engaging with emerging blue carbon and voluntary carbon market opportunities Audience outcomes A clearer framework for distinguishing science-backed ocean and water climate solutions from greenwashing, directly applicable to ESG due diligence and investor reporting A systems-level understanding of how water security – from freshwater access to ocean health – connects to supply chain risk, food production, and community resilience Awareness of blue carbon markets as an emerging investment and risk management tool, including the peer-reviewed science behind seaweed farming as a carbon sequestration mechanism A reframing of ocean ESG commitments from reputation management to material strategic risk, with evidence-based criteria for evaluating corporate action Practical insight into what responsible, evidence-based corporate engagement with ocean conservation looks like, drawn from Oceans2050’s work with WWF, the Bezos Earth Fund, and global seaweed farming communities

Why organisations work with William McDonough His Cradle to Cradle framework is not a sustainability philosophy but an operational design standard that underpins a third-party certification programme (Cradle to Cradle Certified™), This programme has been adopted by major global manufacturers and retailers, giving organisations a verifiable, externally recognised pathway to circular design rather than a set of principles to interpret internally. He provides a direct counter-argument to the prevailing ESG framing: that the goal is not «less bad» but genuinely positive material and ecological outcomes; a reframe that changes what boards ask of product and operations leaders, not just what they report. His consultancy work spans the molecular (material chemistry and product formulation via MBDC) through to the industrial-architectural (Ford’s River Rouge plant, NASA’s Sustainability Base): a cross-scalar range that almost no other figure in sustainable design can match from direct project experience. As inaugural Chair of the World Economic Forum’s Meta-Council on the Circular Economy (2014-2016), he has been involved in shaping the global policy and business conversation on circular economy at the highest level, giving organisations access to the strategic framing that has informed international standards. His argument that sustainability and economic abundance are not in tension – that well-designed systems generate more value, not less – addresses the specific internal resistance that sustainability strategies encounter from commercial and operations leadership. Biography highlights Co-creator of the Cradle to Cradle design framework and co-author of Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things (2002) and The Upcycle: Beyond Sustainability-Designing for Abundance (2013), foundational texts of the circular economy movement Inaugural Chair, World Economic Forum Meta-Council on the Circular Economy (2014–2016); member, WEF Global Future Council on the Future of Environment and Natural Resource Security Co-founder, McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry (MBDC) – the consulting and assessment body behind the Cradle to Cradle Certified™ Products Programme Architect of landmark sustainable design projects including the Ford River Rouge/Dearborn Truck Plant (world’s largest living roof at the time of completion) and NASA’s Sustainability Base, Ames Research Center Recipient of three U.S. presidential honours: Presidential Award for Sustainable Development (1996), first U.S. EPA Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award (2003), and National Design Award, Cooper Hewitt/Smithsonian (2004) Named «Hero for the Planet,» Time magazine (1999); one of the World’s 50 Greatest Leaders, Fortune magazine (2019); WEF Award for Circular Economy Leadership (2017) Commissioned to write The Hannover Principles: Design for Sustainability (1992) as official design guidelines for the City of Hannover’s EXPO 2000 Consulting Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Stanford University; former Dean, School of Architecture, University of Virginia (1994–1999) Biography The core problem with most corporate sustainability programmes is that they are built on top of systems that were never designed to be sustainable; product lines, manufacturing processes, and supply chains conceived entirely within a linear, extractive logic. Reducing harm at the margins is not the same as changing it. The question organisations are increasingly unable to avoid is whether their design intentions, and the material and industrial systems those intentions produce, are structurally compatible with a regenerative future. William McDonough is the architect and designer who, with chemist Michael Braungart, developed the Cradle to Cradle framework as a response to precisely that problem. Published in their 2002 book Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things, the framework reframes design around three principles drawn from natural systems: that all materials function as nutrients for subsequent use, that systems run on clean and renewable energy, and that diversity rather than uniformity strengthens resilience. The follow-up, The Upcycle (2013), extended the argument from harm reduction to the active generation of ecological and economic abundance. Through co-founded firm MBDC, these principles became the basis for the Cradle to Cradle Certified™ Products Programme, an independent standard adopted by major manufacturers in fashion, consumer goods, and construction. His practice spans both the theoretical and the demonstrably built. McDonough’s architecture firm, William McDonough + Partners, has delivered some of the most cited proof points in industrial sustainability – among them the Ford River Rouge plant in Dearborn, Michigan, whose living roof became one of the most referenced examples of integrated green infrastructure in manufacturing, and NASA’s Sustainability Base at Ames Research Center. These projects are not showcases of green aesthetics; they are operational arguments that regenerative design performs economically and functionally at scale. He was commissioned to write The Hannover Principles: Design for Sustainability (1992) for the City of Hannover’s EXPO 2000 – a document that remains a reference point in sustainable design policy three decades on. At the World Economic Forum, McDonough served as inaugural Chair of the Meta-Council on the Circular Economy (2014-2016), positioning him within the institutional conversation that shaped how circular economy principles were adopted in global business and policy frameworks. For senior leadership, the value of that positioning is specific: McDonough is not a commentator on circular economy standards, he’s a figure who helped define them, and who speaks with direct authority to how the gap between current industrial design and those standards is closed. Key speaking topics Cradle to Cradle design and the circular economy Regenerative design for products, buildings, and industrial systems Material health and the elimination of waste as a design concept ESG strategy and circular business models Sustainable architecture and the built environment Carbon management and the Circular Carbon Economy The Next Industrial Revolution Ideal for Chief Sustainability Officers and ESG leads shaping long-term material and production strategy Chief Operating Officers and heads of manufacturing or supply chain facing regulatory and investor pressure on circular design Product design and innovation leadership in consumer goods, construction, and manufacturing sectors Board-level and executive audiences grappling with the strategic gap between current operations and net-positive environmental commitments Audience outcomes A clear, working understanding of the difference between linear sustainability (less harm) and circular design (positive output), and what that distinction demands operationally Specific grounding in the Cradle to Cradle framework as a design and certification standard that organisations can apply to products, materials, and buildings An evidence-based case, drawn from major industrial projects, that regenerative design is economically viable and operationally executable, not aspirational A revised framing of ESG and circular economy commitments: from reporting exercise to design mandate Practical insight into where the current generation of sustainability strategies falls structurally short, and what a structurally different approach looks like