ESG Strategy

Why organisations work with Edie Lush She has conducted thousands of interviews at Davos, the UN General Assembly and COP summits, so she can run a senior panel at the level buyers actually book her for. Her coaching is built from journalistic craft: structuring a story for a listener, handling a difficult question, holding a point under pressure. Leaders leave with technique, not affirmation. She co-wrote How To Speak With Confidence in Public with Charlotte McDougall, published by Pan Macmillan’s Bluebird imprint in 2016, giving clients a named body of work to draw on. Her Global GoalsCast work, recognised with the 2018 Media for Social Impact Leadership Council Award at the UN, gives her credibility to moderate sustainability, climate and SDG conversations without needing a briefing to sound informed. She reads a room and a panel in real time, keeping senior speakers on the agenda rather than letting a programme drift into set pieces. Biography highlights Executive Editor, Hub Culture, covering Davos, the UN General Assembly and COP climate summits. Co-host and co-creator of Global GoalsCast, distributed by CBS News Digital. 2018 Media for Social Impact Leadership Council Award, presented at the United Nations. Co-author, How To Speak With Confidence in Public, Pan Macmillan (Bluebird), 2016. Former Economics and Political Correspondent, Bloomberg Television; columnist, The Week; Associate Editor, Spectator Business. Chair, British American Project; board member, Ellen Meloy Fund for Desert Writers. BA Political Science, UCLA; MA International Relations, Yale University. Biography Most senior leaders can brief a board, but freeze when the format changes. Put the same person on a live panel, a podcast, a camera at Davos or a climate summit platform, and the craft that got them into the room stops helping them. Journalists notice this quickly, because they sit on the other side of it all day. Edie Lush has sat on that side for a long time. At Bloomberg Television she covered economics and politics. She went on to write a column at The Week and serve as Associate Editor of Spectator Business. She is now Executive Editor of Hub Culture, where she produces interview content from Davos, the UN General Assembly and the COP climate summits. The common thread is interviewing serious people under time pressure and making the result land for a general audience. That interviewer’s discipline is what clients hire her coaching practice to transfer. How To Speak With Confidence in Public, co-written with Charlotte McDougall and published by Pan Macmillan’s Bluebird imprint in 2016, sets out the method: structure a story for a listener, manage the energy in a room, hold a point under challenge. She applies the same toolkit as moderator and MC, and as co-host of Global GoalsCast, the CBS News Digital podcast that earned her the 2018 Media for Social Impact Leadership Council Award at the UN. The work now reaches two audiences. One is organisers of serious events who need a chair who can keep a sustainability, policy or tech conversation on the agenda rather than letting it wander. The other is executives and founders who have to carry their company’s voice in public and know they are a draft short of doing it well. Key speaking topics Executive communication and public speaking Moderation and panel craft for senior audiences Sustainable Development Goals and climate communication Storytelling for leaders and founders On-camera and podcast presence for executives Women in leadership and public platforms Ideal for CEOs, founders and C-suite leaders preparing for investor days, town halls, earnings calls and keynote moments. Heads of Communications and Corporate Affairs briefing spokespeople for stage, camera and podcast. Organisers of senior conferences, summits and board offsites who need a chair who can hold a room of principals. Sustainability, ESG and policy leads running SDG, climate or development events in front of mixed government and corporate audiences. Audience outcomes A clearer method for structuring a talk or panel answer so the point lands on first hearing. Practical techniques for managing nerves, energy and presence on stage and on camera. A sharper read on how journalists and moderators hear executive messaging, and how to adjust. For events she chairs: a programme that stays on agenda, with senior speakers pushed past their prepared lines.

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 Dambisa Moyo She reads the global economy from inside the boardroom. Few macroeconomists hold simultaneous directorships at companies of the scale of Chevron, Starbucks and Condé Nast, and that vantage point reshapes how she frames risk for senior audiences. Her four New York Times bestsellers gave decision-makers a vocabulary for the questions that now dominate board agendas: aid dependency, the West’s structural decline, China’s resource strategy, the failure of democratic capitalism to deliver growth, and how boards themselves should function. She is a serving member of the House of Lords as Baroness Moyo of Knightsbridge, which gives her a working line of sight into how policy, regulation and geopolitics actually move. Her training is unusually broad for a public macro voice: a DPhil in Economics from Oxford, an MPA from Harvard Kennedy, plus eight years inside Goldman Sachs research. Audiences get a practitioner, not a commentator. She has spent two decades being asked the same question by long-horizon capital allocators: where does the next dollar go when the old growth assumptions stop working. Boards engage her because that is the question on their own table. Biography highlights DPhil in Economics, St Antony’s College, Oxford; MPA, Harvard Kennedy School Eight years at Goldman Sachs in research; two years at the World Bank Current board director at Chevron Corporation, Condé Nast and Starbucks Corporation; trustee of the National Geographic Society Prior public-company boards include Barclays, SABMiller, Barrick Gold, 3M and Seagate Technology Life peer in the United Kingdom House of Lords as Baroness Moyo of Knightsbridge (created 2022) Author of Dead Aid, How the West Was Lost, Winner Take All, Edge of Chaos and How Boards Work; recipient of the Hayek Lifetime Achievement Award (2013) and TIME 100 (2009) Biography The argument that ran through forty years of cheap goods, cheap money and integrated supply chains has stopped working. Capital allocators now have to price geopolitics into every decision, and most of the management vocabulary they grew up with was built for a different world. Dambisa Moyo’s career has been spent on exactly this fault line. Her first book, Dead Aid, took on the development consensus and argued that aid dependency was choking African growth. How the West Was Lost and Winner Take All extended the argument into the structural decline of advanced economies and China’s strategic accumulation of commodities. Edge of Chaos asked whether liberal democracies can still deliver economic growth at all. The books are not adjacent to her speaking; they are the speaking. The credentials behind the argument are unusual. A DPhil in Economics from Oxford and an MPA from Harvard Kennedy, eight years inside Goldman Sachs research, simultaneous directorships at Chevron, Condé Nast and Starbucks, prior boards at Barclays, SABMiller, Barrick Gold and 3M, and a seat in the House of Lords as Baroness Moyo of Knightsbridge. The combination is rare because it spans three rooms that usually do not talk to each other: the academy, the trading floor and the boardroom. What makes her useful in a leadership setting is that she has had to act on her own analysis. The question of how to allocate capital across China exposure, energy transition timelines and political risk is not a thought experiment for her; it is the agenda of the boards she sits on. How Boards Work, her most recent book, was written from that seat. Key speaking topics Global macroeconomics and capital allocation Geopolitics and the future of globalisation China and the contest for resources Democracy, governance and economic growth Energy transition and the cost of capital Corporate governance and how boards should function Emerging markets and frontier investment Ideal for Boards and investment committees pricing geopolitical and macro risk into capital decisions CEOs, CFOs and Chief Strategy Officers reassessing China exposure, supply chain footprint and growth assumptions Asset managers, family offices and institutional investors setting long-horizon allocation strategy Senior leadership offsites where the economic and geopolitical context for the next plan is the agenda Audience outcomes A clearer reading of how geopolitical fracture, sanctions regimes and energy transition are reshaping the cost of capital A defensible view on China’s resource strategy and what it implies for Western corporates and investors A working framework for how boards should govern in a more politicised, slower-growth global economy Confidence to challenge consensus assumptions about globalisation, growth and aid that no longer hold

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

Why organisations work with Will Hutton Three decades of macro-economic analysis tested in public, from The State We’re In in 1995 through This Time No Mistakes in 2024, so the framework is not a recent rebrand. A working seat inside the institutions that shape British policy: the Hutton Review of Fair Pay in the Public Sector, the Commission on Creative Industries, the EU Kok Commission, and the National Institute for Economic and Social Research. A genuinely structural argument on corporate purpose through The Purposeful Company, used by boards rethinking governance, executive pay and stakeholder accountability. Editorial and broadcast judgement built over years as Editor-in-Chief of The Observer and Economics Editor at Newsnight, which makes him unusually clear on which economic stories matter and which do not. Equally credible on China, Europe and the United States, so a board worrying about exposure across all three gets one coherent analysis rather than three partial ones. Biography highlights President of the Academy of Social Sciences. Principal of Hertford College, Oxford, 2011 to 2020. Co-chair of The Purposeful Company; co-founder and chair of the Big Innovation Centre. Former Chief Executive of The Work Foundation; former Editor-in-Chief of The Observer; former Economics Editor of BBC Newsnight and The Guardian. Author of seven books on political economy, including The State We’re In (1995) and This Time No Mistakes: How to Remake Britain (2024). Chair of the Hutton Review of Fair Pay in the Public Sector (2010 to 2011) and the Commission on Creative Industries (2007); rapporteur to the EU Kok Commission (2004). Biography The State We’re In sold more copies than any British political-economy book since 1945. It set the terms of a debate, on short-termism, on the costs of financialised capitalism, on what serious institutional reform would look like, that the country has been having ever since. Thirty years later, This Time No Mistakes: How to Remake Britain returns to the same argument under new conditions and was reviewed in the Financial Times, the LSE Review of Books and the Literary Review. What sits behind both books is an unusually wide working footprint. Hutton has been Editor-in-Chief of The Observer, Economics Editor at Newsnight and The Guardian, Chief Executive of The Work Foundation, and Principal of Hertford College, Oxford. He chaired the Hutton Review of Fair Pay in the Public Sector for the Coalition government and the Commission on Creative Industries for the Labour government, and was rapporteur to the EU Kok Commission. The current focus is institutional. As co-chair of The Purposeful Company he works with boards and asset managers on what corporate purpose, governance and executive pay should look like if shareholder primacy is no longer the working assumption. As President of the Academy of Social Sciences and chair of the Big Innovation Centre, he sits across the British social science and innovation policy systems. For senior audiences, the value is in the synthesis. Hutton reads China, the United States, the European Union and the United Kingdom as one connected system, and his Observer column is the long-running test bed. A board trying to make capital, governance and political-risk decisions in that environment gets a single coherent reading from a single voice with thirty years of public track record. Key speaking topics The British and European political economy Corporate purpose, governance and executive pay China, the United States and the future of the global economy Stakeholder capitalism and institutional reform The future of work and the social contract Innovation policy and industrial strategy Fairness, inequality and public sector reform Ideal for Boards and executive committees of UK and European corporates assessing geopolitical and macro exposure Asset managers, pension funds and institutional investors recalibrating governance and stewardship expectations Government, regulator and think-tank audiences working on industrial strategy, public sector reform or corporate governance Senior leadership programmes at business schools and professional services firms Audience outcomes A working map of how the British, European, Chinese and US economies now connect, and where the pressure points sit A clear view of what corporate purpose and stakeholder governance mean in practice for board agendas, pay and stewardship An informed reading of how UK political and policy shifts feed through to corporate operating conditions A sharper sense of which economic news is structural and which is noise

Why organisations work with Thomas Piketty He owns the primary dataset. The World Inequality Database, which he co-directs from the Paris School of Economics, is the reference series most finance ministries and international institutions cite when modelling distribution. His arguments have moved policy. Capital in the Twenty-First Century reset the global conversation on wealth taxation, inheritance and progressive capital rules at the OECD, EU and G20 level. He works at a 250-year time horizon. Boards modelling political risk, sovereign debt sustainability or long-run capital returns get a frame that goes well beyond standard cycle analysis. He is independent of national political circuits. He declined the French Legion d’Honneur in 2015, and his credibility with European, US and emerging-market audiences rests on that distance from government. A senior buyer gets an economist who has both the academic standing (EHESS, PSE, LSE) and the public reach to engage a leadership team on inequality without flattening it into a slogan. Biography highlights Professor at the École des hautes études en sciences sociales and the Paris School of Economics. Centennial Professor at the LSE International Inequalities Institute since 2015. Co-director of the World Inequality Lab and the World Inequality Database. Author of Capital in the Twenty-First Century, Capital and Ideology, and A Brief History of Equality, all published by the Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Recipient of the Yrjo Jahnsson Award (2013) and the British Academy Medal (2014). Delivered the Ellen McArthur Lectures at the University of Cambridge Faculty of History in 2025. Biography The distribution of wealth is not a side-effect of growth. It is now the variable that shapes tax design, capital controls and the political tolerance for global business. Capital in the Twenty-First Century, published in 2014, made that case with 250 years of historical data and forced finance ministries, central banks and large investors to take inequality seriously as a risk factor. The author of that book runs the dataset behind the argument. The World Inequality Database, co-directed from the Paris School of Economics, is the reference series for income and wealth concentration used by the OECD, the European Commission and the IMF. Capital and Ideology in 2020 extended the analysis into a comparative history of inequality regimes, and A Brief History of Equality in 2022 distilled the argument into policy terms. His institutional base is unusual. He holds chairs at EHESS and the Paris School of Economics, is Centennial Professor at the LSE International Inequalities Institute, and taught earlier as an assistant professor at MIT. He declined the Legion d’Honneur in 2015, on the grounds that it was not the state’s role to decide who is honourable. For a senior audience, the value is direct. He gives boards a way to read inequality as a structural input into long-run capital allocation, regulatory exposure and political risk, drawn from the empirical work that has reshaped how governments think about taxation since 2014. Key speaking topics Income and wealth inequality Taxation and capital regulation Long-run capital returns and political risk The future of progressive taxation and inheritance Inequality in Europe, the US and emerging markets Macroeconomic policy and redistribution Globalisation, trade and capital mobility Ideal for Boards and investment committees price long-run political and policy risk into capital allocation. CFOs, heads of tax and group treasurers tracking the direction of corporate, capital and inheritance tax regimes. CEOs and strategy heads at multinational firms are exposed to shifting regulations on wealth, labour share and globalisation. Senior teams in banks, asset managers and sovereign investors that need a serious empirical frame on inequality. Audience outcomes A clear read of where wealth concentration is heading in major economies and what that implies for tax and regulation. A 250-year frame on capital returns, growth and inequality that sharpens long-horizon strategic decisions. A working understanding of the policy proposals (progressive capital tax, inheritance reform, tax transparency) under serious discussion at the OECD and EU. An independent academic perspective on the political conditions for global business, distinct from sell-side commentary. A direct exchange with one of the economists whose work is most cited by policymakers shaping the rules companies will operate under.

Why organisations work with Stuart Rose He has run a defensive takeover at the highest level in British retail. M&S beat Sir Philip Green’s bid in 2004 with Rose as chief executive, three weeks into the job. He turned Arcadia around and sold it for over £800m, then took on the M&S turnaround the same decade. Two CEO-led recoveries in adjacent businesses, a year apart. He authored the 2015 Better Leadership for Tomorrow review for the Department of Health, the standing reference document on why NHS hospital leadership underperforms and what to do about it. Plan A at M&S was the first time a FTSE retailer treated sustainability as a board strategy with capital attached, not a CSR report. Rose committed £200m and signed his top suppliers in private before launch. Sits in the House of Lords as Baron Rose of Monewden and chaired Ocado Group from 2013 to 2021. Buyers get a perspective shaped by both governance and operating accountability. Biography highlights Former Chief Executive (2004 to 2008) and Executive Chairman (2008 to 2011) of Marks & Spencer. Former Chairman of Ocado Group (2013 to 2021) and Chairman of Asda (2021 to 2024), with day-to-day executive leadership at Asda from September 2024. Former Chief Executive of Arcadia Group, Argos, Booker plc and Burton Group. Author of the 2015 NHS leadership review commissioned by the Secretary of State for Health, Better Leadership for Tomorrow. Knighted in the 2008 New Year Honours for services to retail and corporate social responsibility. Conservative life peer: Baron Rose of Monewden, created 2014. Biography Marks & Spencer was three weeks into a hostile bid from Sir Philip Green when Stuart Rose was appointed chief executive in May 2004. The defence held. What followed was a six-year programme that restored profit, rebuilt the supply base, and put sustainability at the centre of the operating plan rather than the CSR report. Plan A launched in 2007 with 100 commitments across climate, waste, raw materials, fair partnership and health. The framing was deliberately blunt: there is no Plan B. £200m of capital was committed up front, and the largest M&S suppliers were briefed privately before launch so the public commitment was already operationally backed. The retail track record runs deeper than M&S. As chief executive of Arcadia from 2000, he led the turnaround that culminated in the £800m sale of the group in 2002. Earlier, he ran Argos, Booker plc, where he engineered the merger with Iceland to form the Big Food Group and the Burton Group. The 2015 NHS leadership review for the Department of Health applied the same operating discipline to a non-commercial setting, with 19 recommendations on talent, accountability and visible frontline leadership. He chaired Ocado Group from 2013 to 2021 and took the chair at Asda in November 2021, stepping into executive responsibilities in September 2024 to stabilise the business. He sits in the House of Lords as Baron Rose of Monewden. Key speaking topics Turnaround leadership in large consumer businesses Defended takeover bids and board response Sustainability as an operating strategy Public sector reform and NHS leadership Corporate governance and the chair role UK retail and the future of the high street Ideal for Boards and chairs of large consumer or retail businesses are going through performance recovery Public sector leadership audiences responsible for hospital, trust or system reform CEO and CFO offsites where the agenda is restoring investor and workforce confidence Sustainability and ESG forums where the audience is past narrative and into capital allocation Audience outcomes A working account of how a defended takeover changes board behaviour and the CEO calendar in the first 90 days. The decisions behind Plan A, including how Rose secured supplier alignment before public launch. A clear view of why NHS leadership underperforms and which of the 2015 review recommendations still apply. The chair’s perspective on when to intervene executively and when to hold back, drawn from the Ocado and Asda chairmanships.

Why organisations work with Simon Anholt Twenty years of direct advisory work with Presidents, Prime Ministers, monarchs and governments across more than 60 countries gives him a breadth of comparative case material that no academic or agency can match. The Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index, one of the largest social surveys ever conducted and running since 2005, gives his analysis a measured baseline rather than an anecdotal one. The Good Country Index reframed nation performance from domestic output to global contribution and has become a reference point for governments, NGOs and multilateral institutions. His book The Good Country Equation was described by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights as «a masterpiece», and his earlier books Competitive Identity, Brand America and Brand New Justice are among the standard texts on place branding and its implications. He founded the Journal of Place Brand and Public Diplomacy, anchoring him inside the academic community that now studies the field he defined. Biography highlights Independent policy advisor; Anholt & Co. has worked with governments of more than 60 countries Coined the term «nation brand» in 1998; founder of the field of place branding Founder of the Good Country Index (2014) and the Global Vote (2016) Founder of the Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index (2005-); 300 billion+ data points analysed Honorary Professor at the University of East Anglia Author of Brand New Justice, Brand America, Competitive Identity, Places and The Good Country Equation Founding and emeritus editor of the Journal of Place Brand and Public Diplomacy Biography National reputation is one of the most consequential and least-understood assets a country owns, and Simon Anholt has spent more than two decades making it measurable. He coined the term «nation brand» in 1998, founded the Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index in 2005, and has since advised more than sixty governments, Presidents, Prime Ministers and monarchs on how to build the kind of international reputation that actually shifts investment, talent and political influence. His central argument is that reputation is earned through what a country does, not what it says. That thesis became the Good Country Index in 2014, an annual ranking of how much each country contributes to humanity and the planet, built from 35 indicators drawn largely from United Nations and World Bank datasets. It has since become a reference point in international policy discussions, and a rare example of a league table that leaders take seriously. The Global Vote project, which he launched in 2016, extends the same argument into electoral politics, allowing international participation in national elections on the basis of candidates’ potential contribution to humanity. His books, Brand New Justice, Brand America, Competitive Identity, Places and The Good Country Equation, set out the academic and practical foundations of the field, with the latter described by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights as «a masterpiece». He holds an Honorary Professorship at the University of East Anglia and founded the Journal of Place Brand and Public Diplomacy, the academic journal that now carries the field he defined. For governments, national agencies, multilateral institutions and multinationals working on the intersection of reputation, policy and global cooperation, Anholt offers a combination of comparative advisory experience, independent data and a coherent ethical frame that is difficult to find elsewhere. Key speaking topics The Good Country Index and the case for global cooperation Nation branding and place branding Reputation, policy and national competitiveness Governance and the global consequences of domestic decisions Big data and national identity Tourism, trade and investment promotion strategy Ideal for Governments, heads of state offices, ministries and national agencies working on reputation, investment and tourism Multilateral institutions, NGOs and policy forums focused on international cooperation and the SDG agenda Multinationals with significant place-branding or country-of-origin exposure International conferences on geopolitics, development and public diplomacy Audience outcomes A measurable framework for national reputation drawn from the Nation Brands Index and the Good Country Index A clearer view of the policy decisions that genuinely move international perception, versus those that do not Comparative case material from more than 60 countries advised by Anholt & Co. Reference texts in Competitive Identity and The Good Country Equation for internal and programme follow-up A framing of national strategy that integrates reputation, policy and global contribution rather than treating them as separate agendas

Why organisations work with Robert Swan Lived proof that renewable energy can meet extreme operating conditions, drawn from the 2018 South Pole Energy Challenge powered by solar, advanced biofuels and lithium batteries in temperatures below minus forty. A founder’s perspective on the Antarctic Treaty’s 2041 review window, which gives leadership teams a concrete date and policy anchor for long-range climate scenario work. Two decades of practical engagement with corporate sustainability through the 2041 Foundation, having taken more than 4,000 young leaders from over 35 countries to Antarctica. A first-walked-to-both-Poles credential, recognised with the Polar Medal and OBE by HM Queen Elizabeth II, that gives ESG and energy-transition messages cut-through with sceptical senior audiences. A position recognised by the UN and UNESCO, useful when a board wants the climate conversation framed by someone who has worked the policy side as well as the field. Biography highlights First person in history to walk to both the South Pole (1986) and the North Pole (1989). Awarded the Polar Medal (1988) and appointed OBE (1995) by HM Queen Elizabeth II. Founder of the 2041 Foundation, dedicated to the preservation of Antarctica and to scaling renewable energy. Co-author of Antarctica 2041: My Quest to Save the Earth’s Last Wilderness with Gil Reavill, published by Broadway Books. Led the South Pole Energy Challenge in 2017 to 2018, the first polar expedition powered solely by renewable energy, reaching the Pole on 15 January 2018. UN Goodwill Ambassador for Youth and Special Envoy to the Director General of UNESCO (1994). Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. Biography The Antarctic Treaty’s environmental protocol comes up for potential review in 2041. That date is the operating premise of the 2041 Foundation, established by Robert Swan after his 883-mile walk to the South Pole in 1986 and his subsequent trek to the North Pole in 1989. The Foundation has since taken more than 4,000 young leaders from over 35 countries to the Antarctic to study what is at stake. The exploration credentials are the platform, not the point. Swan was awarded the Polar Medal by HM Queen Elizabeth II in 1988 and appointed OBE in 1995. He was named UN Goodwill Ambassador for Youth and, in 1994, Special Envoy to the Director General of UNESCO. The intellectual work that followed is about how serious organisations move from climate language to climate decisions. The clearest evidence of that work is the South Pole Energy Challenge of 2017 to 2018. Swan and his son Barney travelled the final 600 miles to the geographic South Pole on solar power, advanced biofuels and lithium batteries, with NASA-designed ice melters for water. They reached the Pole on 15 January 2018. The expedition was not a stunt. It was a controlled proof that renewable systems can deliver in operating conditions most boardrooms will never face. For organisations weighing energy-transition strategy, supply chain redesign and long-range climate scenarios, Swan offers something most ESG speakers cannot: a corroborated record of testing the technology in the most hostile environment on earth, and a Foundation built around the year by which the policy framework for Antarctica may be rewritten. Key speaking topics Climate action and Antarctic stewardship Renewable energy in operating conditions Sustainability leadership for boards and executives Long-range environmental policy and the 2041 horizon Resilience and team leadership under extreme conditions Youth engagement and the next generation of climate leaders Ideal for CEOs, COOs and board members setting net zero and energy-transition strategy Chief Sustainability Officers and ESG leads moving from disclosure to operational delivery Energy, industrial and resource sector leadership teams reviewing renewable deployment Graduate, early-career and emerging leader programmes focused on climate and stewardship Audience outcomes A grounded sense of what renewable systems can do in extreme operating conditions, taken from the South Pole Energy Challenge. A clearer reading of the 2041 policy horizon for Antarctica and what it implies for long-range scenario planning. Renewed conviction at senior level that climate ambition can survive contact with real budgets and real operations. A vocabulary for resilience and team performance under sustained pressure, drawn from two completed polar walks.