Inclusive Leadership speakers

Why organisations work with Ade Adepitan He has lived disability discrimination in three intersecting dimensions – Nigerian-born, Black, and physically disabled in working-class East London – giving organisations a perspective on inclusion that is personal, structural and political, not theoretical. His Paralympic bronze, World Championship gold and 20 years as one of the UK’s first visibly disabled television presenters mean he speaks from earned authority on both peak performance and public representation – not campaigning alone. His Channel 4 documentary on Nigeria’s polio eradication prompted Bill Gates to invite him to address the Global Vaccine Summit in 2020 – evidence that his work on disability and global health has real policy reach beyond the broadcasting world. The 2023 RTS Best Sports Presenter Award and BAFTA-winning Paralympic coverage give him peer recognition from the broadcast industry as a communicator of genuine authority, which directly validates his use as a platform for any inclusion message. As Chancellor of Birmingham City University since 2024, he brings current institutional standing – and a live stake – in questions of access, diversity and representation in education and public life. Biography highlights Bronze medallist, 2004 Athens Paralympic Games (wheelchair basketball, Great Britain); gold medallist, 2005 Paralympic World Cup, Manchester; silver medallist, European Championships MBE (2005) for services to disability sport; Honorary Doctorates from Loughborough University and the University of East London One of the first visibly disabled television presenters in the UK; over 20 years broadcasting for Channel 4 and the BBC Lead presenter, Channel 4’s BAFTA-winning coverage of the 2012 London Paralympic Games (alongside Clare Balding) RTS Award, Best Sports Presenter (2023), for Channel 4’s 2022 Winter Paralympics coverage Named in the Powerlist 2020 – 100 most influential Black British people Chancellor of Birmingham City University (from 2024), succeeding Sir Lenny Henry Speaker, Global Vaccine Summit: We Changed History (2020), at the invitation of Bill Gates, following Channel 4 documentary on Nigeria’s polio eradication Biography Disability rarely gets equal airtime in inclusion conversations – and when it does, it tends toward legal compliance rather than lived experience. Ade Adepitan MBE has spent over two decades making that distinction impossible to ignore: as a Paralympic medallist, a BAFTA-winning broadcaster, and now as Chancellor of Birmingham City University. His credentials begin with sport. Contracting polio in Lagos at 15 months and growing up in East London, he reached the highest level of wheelchair basketball – winning bronze at the 2004 Athens Paralympics and gold at the 2005 Paralympic World Cup in Manchester. The disciplines of elite competition – preparation, decision-making under pressure, and recovery from setback – form the foundation of everything he brings to organisations on resilience and performance. He became one of the first visibly disabled presenters on British television and has been a lead voice for Channel 4 and the BBC for over 20 years. That includes the BAFTA-winning 2012 London Paralympic Games coverage, the four-part BBC Two documentary Africa with Ade Adepitan, Climate Change: Ade on the Frontline, and extensive coverage of Paralympic Games from Athens to Paris. The 2023 Royal Television Society Award for Best Sports Presenter – for his 2022 Winter Paralympics work – came with judges describing him as a broadcaster of genuine insight and charisma, not a ceremonial accolade. His reach extends into policy. His Channel 4 documentary investigating Nigeria’s polio eradication prompted Bill Gates to invite him to address the Global Vaccine Summit in 2020. He appears on the Powerlist of the 100 most influential Black British people. And in 2024 he became Chancellor of Birmingham City University, where his stated mission is to be a torchbearer for disability rights in education and public life. Organisations working with Ade Adepitan are engaging someone whose work has moved from screens into summits – and whose authority on inclusion is earned from all three directions at once. Key speaking topics Disability inclusion and workplace accessibility Resilience and elite performance mindset Diversity, equity and representation in organisations Storytelling and the role of media in shaping social perception Global health advocacy and public responsibility Climate change and environmental impact Inclusion in education and leadership pipelines Ideal for CHROs and DEI leads developing or stress-testing disability inclusion strategies Leadership conferences addressing the gap between ESG commitments and workforce experience Organisations with social impact and public accountability mandates Education sector and public institutions focused on access, representation and opportunity Audience outcomes A sharper understanding of how disability inclusion differs from – and connects to – broader DEI programmes, grounded in direct lived experience An honest account of how resilience and elite performance are built over time, drawn from competitive Paralympic sport and a 20-year public career Insight into the role organisations and media play in either sustaining or dismantling the invisibility of disability Awareness of the strategic cost of treating disability as a compliance exercise rather than a cultural and commercial priority A credible, evidence-based challenge to the assumption that DEI commitments translate automatically into inclusion

Why organisations work with Ade Oladipo He brings live broadcast craft to corporate events: DAZN Boxing, talkSPORT and Amazon Prime Premier League coverage are all built on holding a live audience under pressure, which is exactly what large internal conferences and award nights demand. His career is a documented case of breaking a colour barrier in UK sports media, becoming the first Black presenter of a live Premier League match in December 2023. That is concrete material, not abstract DEI commentary. His speaking themes (adversity, mental health, working in media) are grounded in his own route through fostering, East London, sports trials and a non-traditional path into journalism, which gives the content specificity rather than slogans. He is equally credible as keynote speaker, panel moderator and awards host, which makes him useful for clients who need one booking to cover the whole evening. Biography highlights Lead presenter for DAZN Boxing and host of “The DAZN Boxing Show”, covering Anthony Joshua, Canelo Alvarez, Gervonta Davis and KSI fights. First Black presenter of a live Premier League match in the UK, anchoring Amazon Prime’s coverage of Crystal Palace v Bournemouth in December 2023. Presenter across the talkSPORT network, including “The Social” on talkSPORT 2 and pundit work on “Kick Off Added Time”. Winner of the 2021 Audio Production Awards “Best New Voice”. Co-host of the 2023 ARIAS-nominated podcast “The Men’s Room”. Prior credits include Sky Sports News (Premier League and EFL transfer reporting), ESPN, Fox Sports and Arise News. Biography Live boxing on DAZN, Premier League football on Amazon Prime, weekly radio on talkSPORT. Three different audiences, three different production cultures, one presenter holding the room when the broadcast is live and the script has gone. That is the working life Ade Oladipo has built, and it is the material he brings into the corporate room. In December 2023 he became the first Black presenter of a live Premier League match in the UK, leading Amazon Prime’s coverage of Crystal Palace against Bournemouth. The story behind that night runs through Brighton foster care, East London, Essex football and athletics, a Tottenham Hotspur Academy trial, and an entry into sports journalism in 2015 at Arise News. None of it was the standard route. His speaking work draws on that route directly. The themes are adversity, mental health, and what it takes to keep doing the work when you are the only person in the room who looks like you. Awards include the 2021 Audio Production Awards “Best New Voice” and a 2023 ARIAS nomination as co-host of “The Men’s Room” podcast, evidence that the craft holds up alongside the story. For corporate clients his most direct value is hosting craft: keynote, Q&A, awards, panel moderation, all delivered with the calm of someone who presents live boxing for a living. The keynote on adversity and mental health is the additional offer when the brief calls for it. Key speaking topics Mental health and resilience in high-pressure work Adversity and non-linear career paths Race and representation in UK media Sports broadcasting and live presenting Event hosting and panel moderation Awards night MC Ideal for Corporate event organisers needing a host who can carry a full evening: keynote, panel, awards. Internal CHRO and DEI leads commissioning content on lived experience rather than policy. Sports, media and entertainment industry conferences. Employee Resource Group events, particularly those focused on Black professionals in white-majority industries. Audience outcomes A clear sense of what sustained mental health practice looks like for someone working under public scrutiny. A specific story of breaking into and breaking through a closed industry, used as material for their own career conversations. A sharper view of what genuine inclusion feels like from inside, beyond the slide deck. An event held together by a presenter trained on live broadcast, not a corporate stage.

Why organisations work with Adele Bates Her classroom experience covers every major UK school setting: mainstream primary and secondary, pupil referral units, alternative provision, and special schools. School leaders can bring her to a mixed-audience CPD day knowing the examples hold up across every context in the room. Her approach is informed by funded comparative international research. In 2019, she received a full grant to research Finland’s inclusive education system. Research in the Dominican Republic and Costa Rica followed. What she recommends draws on documented practice from functioning systems across three countries. Her book, published by Corwin/SAGE, has been used by headteachers to rewrite whole-school behaviour policies from scratch. It provides a structured, chapter-by-chapter framework that school leaders can put to immediate institutional use. She writes for TES, SecEd, and Headteacher Update, reaching school leaders at scale. Audiences in her sessions often arrive knowing her work, which changes the quality of the conversation. Her TEDx 2020 talk and BBC Radio 4 appearances as the network’s expert on teenagers and behaviour give her name recognition well beyond the education conference circuit. Biography highlights Author, “Miss, I Don’t Give A Sh*t”: Engaging with Challenging Behaviour in Schools (Corwin/SAGE) TEDx 2020 speaker BBC Radio 4 expert on teenagers and behaviour Trainer for the National Education Union and Amnesty International Education WeAreTheCity Rising Star Award, Education category Funded international researcher in behaviour and inclusion: Finland (2019), Dominican Republic, and Costa Rica Biography Behaviour policies give teachers a sequence of steps. They rarely explain what to do when those steps stop working. For more than 20 years, Adele Bates taught in the settings where that gap matters most: mainstream primary and secondary schools, pupil referral units, alternative provision, and special schools. Her book, “Miss, I Don’t Give A Sh*t”: Engaging with Challenging Behaviour in Schools, is published by Corwin/SAGE. It gives school leaders a structured framework for rebuilding behaviour culture from the ground up. Headteachers have used it to rewrite their school’s behaviour policy from scratch. In 2019, she received a full grant to research Finland’s inclusive education system, observing classes and interviewing teachers across several schools. She has since carried out school-based research in the Dominican Republic and Costa Rica. Those visits inform how she frames what is achievable, with reference to systems that have solved problems UK schools are still working through. She is BBC Radio 4’s expert on teenagers and behaviour and gave a TEDx talk in 2020. She writes regularly for TES, SecEd, and Headteacher Update. She trains for the National Education Union and Amnesty International Education. School leaders who book her often know her work before she arrives. Key speaking topics Inclusive behaviour in schools Social, emotional and mental health (SEMH) in education Trauma-informed practice Whole-school behaviour culture and consistency Pupil engagement and relationship-led teaching Equality, bias, and inclusion in education Staff confidence and wellbeing in schools Ideal for Headteachers and senior leadership teams in mainstream and specialist schools Classroom teachers and subject leaders seeking practical behaviour frameworks Multi-academy trust (MAT) CPD and professional development leads National education organisations and education conference organisers Audience outcomes A clearer account of why SEMH-driven behaviour does not respond to sanctions, and what the evidence suggests actually works Practical strategies for rebuilding positive relationships with disengaged pupils, applicable from the next lesson A framework for evaluating whether a school’s behaviour policy is built to support or to separate A sharper understanding of how equality, bias, and inclusion connect to behaviour patterns across a whole school Tools for strengthening staff confidence and consistency in challenging classroom situations

Why organisations work with Alex Beresford A live broadcaster used to high-stakes interviews and unscripted moments, including the March 2021 Good Morning Britain exchange with Piers Morgan that drew over 41,000 Ofcom complaints and ended in Morgan’s resignation. Direct lived experience of race in British media, used to open inclusion conversations that internal facilitators cannot host with the same credibility. A working journalist’s grasp of climate, extreme weather and current affairs, having reported in the field for ITV and produced Channel 4 documentaries on tornadoes and British weather extremes. Substantive ties to youth and social mobility through his role as ambassador for Empire Fighting Chance and his long-running schools and prisons tour on knife crime and media careers. A trusted morning television face who can chair a panel, moderate a town hall or anchor a conference day with the rhythm and composure of live broadcast. Biography highlights Lead weather presenter, ITV Evening News, and regular presenter on Good Morning Britain. Host of Channel 4’s The World’s Weirdest Weather and Britain’s Most Extreme Weather. Ambassador, Empire Fighting Chance, Bristol-based youth violence prevention charity. Selected for the UK government’s Reach Role Model Programme, 2008. Honorary Doctorate of Philosophy, University of Gloucestershire. Debut book Things We Should Talk About acquired by Sphere, Little, Brown. Biography The 9 March 2021 episode of Good Morning Britain ended with Piers Morgan walking off set. The presenter who pushed the conversation about Meghan Markle, race and what counts as fair comment was Alex Beresford, then ITV’s lead weatherman. Morgan resigned the same day. Ofcom logged over 41,000 complaints. The clip is still cited as a turning point in how British morning television talks about race. Beresford has been on ITV since 2004, first as a teleprompter operator at ITV West in Bristol, then as a regional weather presenter, then on the national network. He has fronted Channel 4 documentary series on extreme weather, flown into Oklahoma after the 2013 EF5 tornado for the film Super Tornado, and in March 2022 became the live weather presenter on the extended ITV Evening News. The work outside the studio is what carries weight with corporate audiences. He is an ambassador for Empire Fighting Chance, the Bristol charity that uses non-contact boxing to keep young people away from violence, and he has spent years touring schools, colleges and prisons talking about media careers and knife crime. The UK government named him a National Black Role Model in 2008. He holds an Honorary Doctorate of Philosophy from the University of Gloucestershire. His debut book, Things We Should Talk About, has been acquired by Sphere. For a corporate audience that wants an inclusion conversation hosted with broadcast composure rather than activist register, the offer is unusually concrete: a working journalist with lived experience, a track record of holding difficult ground on live television, and credibility with the youth communities the conversation usually leaves out. Key speaking topics Race and representation in British media Inclusion and difficult conversations at work Mental health and personal resilience Youth violence, knife crime and social mobility Climate, extreme weather and broadcasting Conference hosting and panel moderation Ideal for CHROs and inclusion leads commissioning sessions on race that need credibility outside the HR voice Conference organisers booking a host or moderator for a multi-stage event day ESG, sustainability and corporate affairs teams running internal events on climate and extreme weather Foundations, social mobility programmes and youth-facing organisations engaging schools and community partners Audience outcomes A franker conversation about race and representation than internal facilitators usually produce A working broadcaster’s view of how climate stories land with mainstream audiences A clearer picture of the real lives behind inner-city youth violence statistics A panel or town hall held together with the pacing and composure of live television

Why organisations work with Amar Latif He has spent twenty years running an inclusion business that makes commercial sense. Traveleyes pairs blind and sighted travellers worldwide and has twice been voted Best Accessible Holiday Company at the British Travel Awards, in 2019 and 2020. His corporate CV gives him credibility with a board. Before founding Traveleyes he was Head of Commercial Finance at BT, and he makes the commercial case for inclusion in the language a board expects to hear it in. The lived experience is specific and substantial. Amar has retinitis pigmentosa and lost 95% of his sight by 18, and has spent his career building and running an organisation inside that constraint. Mainstream media recognition earns audience attention before he speaks. Regular BBC presenter, first blind contestant on Celebrity MasterChef UK, and appointed OBE in the 2023 King’s Birthday Honours for services to the visually impaired and entrepreneurship. Biography highlights Founder and Chief Executive of Traveleyes, the world’s first commercial tour operator pairing blind and sighted travellers on group holidays worldwide; established 2004. Appointed OBE in the 2023 King’s Birthday Honours for services to the visually impaired and entrepreneurship. President of The Ramblers, Britain’s largest walking charity, since April 2023; patron of SeeAbility and of the Rafiki Thabo Foundation. Inaugural recipient of the Stelios Disabled Entrepreneur Award (2007), presented by Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou in partnership with Leonard Cheshire Disability. Presenter across BBC and Channel 4, including Beyond Boundaries, River Walks (Royal Television Society Yorkshire Best Single Documentary, 2019), Travelling Blind, Pilgrimage: The Road to Istanbul, How to Get Fit Fast; first blind contestant on Celebrity MasterChef UK (2020). BSc (Hons) Mathematics, Statistics and Finance, University of Strathclyde; former Head of Commercial Finance at BT. Biography Traveleyes was founded in 2004 on a single commercial insight: that blind and sighted travellers could be paired on the same group holiday, with sighted guests receiving discounted travel in exchange for describing what they see. Twenty years later, the company has twice been voted Best Accessible Holiday Company at the British Travel Awards, and the insight has held up. Amar Latif built the business after leaving a role as Head of Commercial Finance at BT. The route from commercial finance into inclusive travel is unusual, and it gives him the language to make the commercial case for inclusion to a board. The authority on resilience comes from a specific set of circumstances. Amar has retinitis pigmentosa and had lost 95% of his sight by 18. After a BSc in Mathematics, Statistics and Finance at the University of Strathclyde, he trained as an accountant and worked his way up to Head of Commercial Finance at BT before founding Traveleyes. A parallel broadcasting career runs across BBC One, BBC Two and Channel 4, including Beyond Boundaries, Travelling Blind, Pilgrimage: The Road to Istanbul, How to Get Fit Fast, and his appearance as the first blind contestant on Celebrity MasterChef UK. He was appointed OBE in the 2023 King’s Birthday Honours for services to the visually impaired and entrepreneurship, and serves as President of The Ramblers, Britain’s largest walking charity. Key speaking topics Inclusive leadership Disability inclusion as commercial strategy Entrepreneurial resilience Risk and decision-making under constraint Customer experience in underserved markets Purpose-driven organisations Ideal for Chief People Officers, CHROs and heads of diversity, equity and inclusion Boards and executive teams building the commercial case for inclusion Entrepreneurship and innovation forums Customer experience and service design leaders Audience outcomes A commercial case for inclusion built to hold up in a board or CFO conversation Specific examples of how inclusion shapes service design and customer experience in underserved markets A reset on how to think about risk when there is no stable precedent A narrative that changes how senior audiences talk about inclusion back in the business

Why organisations work with Amy Cappellanti-Wolf She has held the CHRO seat at Dayforce, Cohesity, Symantec and Silver Spring Networks, including taking Silver Spring Networks public on the NYSE in 2013. Her HR career runs from Frito-Lay and The Walt Disney Company through Sun Microsystems and Cisco, so she can speak credibly to consumer, entertainment and enterprise tech leadership teams in their own language. At Dayforce she runs people strategy at an HR technology vendor and acts as “Customer Zero” for the company’s AI-powered HR releases, which gives her an unusually concrete view of where AI lands in real HR operations. She works at board and committee level on talent and rewards, currently as Compensation Committee Chair at Softchoice and as a director or advisor at D-Wave Quantum, Betterworks and Wellist. Recognised externally on people and tech leadership: National Diversity Council Top 50 Most Powerful Women in Technology, Silicon Valley Business Journal Women of Influence, and the Forbes Human Resources Council. Biography highlights EVP and Chief People Officer, Dayforce, since April 2024. Former CHRO at Cohesity, Symantec and Silver Spring Networks; led people strategy through Silver Spring Networks’ 2013 IPO. Earlier senior HR roles at Cisco Systems (2001 to 2009), Sun Microsystems, The Walt Disney Company and Frito-Lay (PepsiCo). Compensation Committee Chair at Softchoice (TSX: SFTC); board and advisory roles at D-Wave Quantum, Betterworks and Wellist. Forbes Human Resources Council member since 2018; National Diversity Council Top 50 Most Powerful Women in Technology. Inducted into the Roll of Distinguished Alumni, WVU’s John Chambers College of Business and Economics, in 2019. Biography Few CHROs have stood in the room for a Cisco-era leadership build, a Disney creative organisation, a Symantec security business and a Silver Spring Networks IPO. Amy Cappellanti-Wolf has. That cross-section is what gives her practical authority on what culture and talent actually take when a company changes shape. Her current seat sharpens the point. As EVP and Chief People Officer at Dayforce, she runs people strategy inside an HR technology vendor and uses Dayforce’s own platform as “Customer Zero” for AI-powered HR releases. That gives her a working view of where AI lands in payroll, performance and workforce planning, not as a forecast but as a live deployment. Boards use her where rewards, governance and people risk meet. She chairs the Compensation Committee at Softchoice, sits on the board at D-Wave Quantum, and advises Betterworks and Wellist. Her recognition track record, Forbes HR Council, the National Diversity Council Top 50 in Technology, Silicon Valley Business Journal Women of Influence, sits alongside the operating record, not in place of it. For senior buyers, the practical value is specific. She can talk credibly to a CHRO planning an IPO, a CEO integrating an acquisition, an HR team rebuilding engagement after a restructure, or a board asking what AI in HR really changes. The answers come from having done it, not from observing it. Key speaking topics People strategy through IPO, M&A and divestiture AI in HR and the future of the people function High-performance culture in scaling tech companies Diversity, equity and inclusion as an operating discipline Leadership and talent for enterprise transformation The CHRO as a board-level voice on people risk Ideal for CHROs and senior HR leaders preparing for IPO, M&A or large-scale restructure CEOs and boards weighing the people implications of AI deployment in core operations Compensation and talent committees considering rewards, succession and culture risk Technology, consumer and entertainment leadership teams running concurrent transformations Audience outcomes A clear sense of how to sequence people priorities through IPO, integration and restructure A practical view of where AI changes HR operations now, drawn from a live enterprise deployment Sharper questions for boards and executive teams on culture, rewards and talent risk Concrete language for inclusion outcomes that survive a politically contested environment

Why organisations work with Andy Ayim He works with leadership teams where the brief is not a keynote but a measurable shift in how the team makes decisions, handles conflict and holds each other to account. His track record sits on both sides of the table: senior product roles at WorldFirst and Zilch, then Managing Director at Backstage Capital running accelerators on three continents. He has been the executive being coached and the investor pushing portfolio leaders to grow. His MBE, awarded in 2020 for services to diversity in the technology industry, signals a substantive record on inclusion rather than a stated commitment. Clients booking inclusive-leadership work get an external voice the room cannot dismiss as marketing. Through the Angel Investing School he has trained over a thousand new investors and built the curriculum used by 100 senior Google executives who went on to raise a $70m fund. He brings that operator’s view of capital, ownership and opportunity into corporate rooms that rarely hear it. Biography highlights MBE for services to diversity in the technology industry, awarded 2020 (London Gazette, Issue 63135). Founder of the Angel Investing School, which has trained 1,000+ new angel investors and produced the Open Angel platform. Former Managing Director at Backstage Capital, helping run accelerator programmes in Detroit, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and London. Senior product roles at WorldFirst (acquired by Ant Financial for $700m) and Series C fintech Zilch. Trained 100 senior Black executives at Google who formed the Black Angel Group and raised a $70m fund. Named in the Financial Times Top 10 Most Influential BAME Leaders in Tech; HSBC and UK Black Business Show Top 25 Black Entrepreneurs to Watch. Opened the Venture programme at SXSW London 2026 (Christ Church Spitalfields). Biography Most senior teams are not short of intelligence or ambition. They are short of safety. People hold back the disagreement, the bad news, the half-formed idea that might change the decision. Andy Ayim’s work begins there. He is hired by leaders at Google, Stripe, Uber, Diageo, Novartis and Tesco to do the harder thing: change how a team behaves with each other in the room. His authority is built on doing the job, not describing it. He held senior product roles at WorldFirst before its $700m acquisition by Ant Financial, then at Series C fintech Zilch. In 2018 he joined Arlan Hamilton as Managing Director at Backstage Capital, designing accelerator programmes for underrepresented founders in Detroit, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and London. The pattern is consistent: operator credibility first, advisor work second. The inclusion record is documented. He was appointed MBE in 2020 for services to diversity in the technology industry, gazetted by the Central Chancery of the Orders of Knighthood. In the same year he founded the Angel Investing School, which has since trained over a thousand new angel investors and built the curriculum that produced the Black Angel Group, 100 senior Google executives who went on to raise a $70m fund. What that means for a client is straightforward. When Ayim walks into a leadership offsite, he is not a consultant translating a theory. He is a former executive and active investor who has seen the same trust and capital problems from inside companies, inside portfolios and inside an honours system that has recognised the work. Key speaking topics Human-centred leadership Inclusive leadership and team performance Psychological safety in senior teams Diversity and inclusion in technology Angel investing and ownership Future of work and hybrid team design Talent and the next generation of leaders Ideal for CHROs and Chief People Officers commissioning inclusive-leadership and culture work for senior populations. ExCo and board offsites where the brief is honest conversation, trust and decision quality, not a standard keynote. Heads of Diversity and Inclusion looking for an external voice with a credentialled record rather than a generic DEI speaker. Investor and founder audiences inside corporate venture, accelerators and innovation functions. Audience outcomes A clearer picture of the specific behaviours that produce psychological safety in senior teams, and the ones that quietly destroy it. Language for naming the inclusion problems leaders are nervous to name, with examples drawn from operator and investor experience. A view of inclusion as a leadership capability tied to performance, not a compliance function bolted onto HR. An informed perspective on angel investing, ownership and wealth creation for audiences that rarely get it from a credible practitioner.

Why organisations work with Anelia Uzunova A corporate operator’s read on wellbeing. She has run point for a CEO at Galderma and managed global innovation projects at Novartis, so the inner-leadership conversation lands as an executive discipline rather than a soft-skills add-on. Founder of the wellbeing community at the World Economic Forum, which gives her a credible vantage point on how peer organisations are actually structuring this work, not just how they describe it on their careers page. A structured method, the RISE Inner Leadership framework, that gives leadership teams something concrete to take back to their day-to-day, rather than a workshop afterglow. A bilingual, cross-cultural speaker with working experience across Switzerland, the US, and the UK, well suited to executive audiences in pharma, healthcare, and globally distributed corporate teams. INSEAD-trained executive coach who lectures on Leading for Wellbeing to its MBA audience, which translates into content that survives a sceptical senior room. Biography highlights Chief of Staff to the CEO, Galderma Global Leadership Fellow, World Economic Forum; founder of the WEF wellbeing community Former global digital innovation project lead at Novartis, Switzerland MBA and executive coaching certification, INSEAD Executive Masters in Global Leadership, World Economic Forum programme Lecturer to INSEAD MBA audiences on Leading for Wellbeing Biography Pharma is a useful test case for the limits of conventional wellbeing programmes. The work is high-stakes, the regulatory load is heavy, and the senior teams running global functions tend to be senior precisely because they absorb pressure for everyone else. That is the environment Anelia Uzunova has worked inside for most of her career, first at Novartis in Switzerland and then as Chief of Staff to the CEO of Galderma. Her shift from operating roles to coaching and speaking was not a reinvention away from corporate life. It was a decision to teach explicitly what she saw working at the top of complex organisations. The Global Leadership Fellows Programme at the World Economic Forum gave her a comparative view across industries; founding the WEF’s wellbeing community gave her a structured one. Both inform a body of work focused on the inner state of the leader as an operational variable. The teachable form of that work is the RISE Inner Leadership framework, organised around four stages: Root, Ignite, Surrender, Embody. It is used with executive audiences and with the INSEAD MBA cohort she lectures to on Leading for Wellbeing. The framing is not therapeutic. It is closer to executive coaching with a clear curriculum, designed for senior leaders who have already tried the surface interventions and want something that holds up under pressure. Her credentials sit across INSEAD, the World Economic Forum, and a fifteen-year corporate track record in pharma and healthcare. The reason this matters for serious organisations is straightforward: when wellbeing is treated as an HR programme, it stays peripheral. When it is treated as a leadership capability, it changes how people work. Uzunova argues, and demonstrates, that the second framing is the one that pays back. Key speaking topics Inner leadership and executive composure Wellbeing as a leadership capability Personal transformation and reinvention for senior leaders Leading through change and uncertainty Purpose and alignment in executive careers Mindful leadership for high-pressure industries Women in senior leadership Ideal for CHROs and Chief People Officers building wellbeing into the leadership agenda rather than the benefits stack C-suite and senior leadership offsites in pharma, healthcare, and other high-pressure regulated industries Executive development programmes and high-potential cohorts Women’s leadership and senior talent forums Audience outcomes A working definition of inner leadership that an executive team can use, not a wellness vocabulary The four-stage RISE framework as a reference structure for how senior leaders manage their own state A sharper view of how composure, alignment, and presence affect team performance and retention Practical anchors for executives navigating role transitions, restructure, or extended pressure A frame for treating wellbeing as a leadership discipline that boards and CEOs can sponsor with confidence

Why organisations work with Anj Handa She brings governance-level credibility into inclusion conversations that usually stop at HR, holding positions as Independent Governor of Leeds Arts University, Chair of Freedom Studios, and Fellow of the RSA. Her campaign craft is verifiable, not rhetorical. She built the legal team, petition, and media strategy on the Afusat Saliu FGM-asylum case, gathering 126,500 signatures and pushing FGM higher on the UK political agenda. She names the parts of inclusive leadership most speakers avoid: emotional correctness, healthy boundaries, psychological safety, and what allyship has to do that employee networks cannot. She offers a working alternative to the glass ceiling, the labyrinth, which describes the actual sequence of barriers women, and particularly Black and brown women, encounter inside large organisations. Forbes named her in its 10 Diversity & Inclusion Trailblazers list, and Grant Thornton UK featured her among its 100 Faces of a Vibrant Economy. The recognition tracks substantive work, not commentary. Biography highlights Founder of Inspiring Women Changemakers, an inclusive community and consultancy advising on equity, governance, and systems change. Independent Governor of Leeds Arts University and Chair of the Board of Freedom Studios. Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Named in Forbes “10 Diversity & Inclusion Trailblazers” and Grant Thornton UK’s 100 Faces of a Vibrant Economy (2018). Featured in Charity Times 2023 International Women’s Day list. Contributor to “Generation Share”, “Eradicating FGM in the UK” (Hilary Burrage), and “Refugee Tales” (Comma Press). Biography Most organisations have a diversity statement. Far fewer have governance and leadership practices that match it. The gap is where talent gets lost, complaints get managed, and senior leaders quietly accept attrition that the policy was meant to prevent. Closing that gap requires someone fluent in both the structural and the human side of the work. Anj Handa has spent more than two decades operating in that space. She is Founder of Inspiring Women Changemakers, an inclusive community and consultancy that advises senior leaders on inclusive governance, equity, and systems change. She is an Independent Governor of Leeds Arts University, Chair of Freedom Studios, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts; positions she has often noted are held by fewer than one percent of Black and brown women in the UK. Her authority is not theoretical. In 2014 she led the high-profile asylum campaign for Afusat Saliu and her daughters, assembling the legal team, running a Change.org petition that drew 126,500 signatures, and bringing MPs and national media into the story. The work was later included in Hilary Burrage’s “Eradicating FGM in the UK” and the Comma Press anthology “Refugee Tales”. Forbes named her in its 10 Diversity & Inclusion Trailblazers list; Grant Thornton featured her among its 100 Faces of a Vibrant Economy. What separates her work for senior teams is the territory she is willing to name. Psychological safety, emotional correctness, healthy boundaries, allyship that is more than a network. She challenges the glass ceiling as a useful frame and offers the labyrinth in its place, a more accurate description of the sequence of barriers women encounter inside complex organisations. That precision is what boards and executive teams hire her for. Key speaking topics Inclusive leadership and governance Equity, diversity, and structural change The labyrinth: rethinking the glass ceiling Allyship beyond employee networks Psychological safety and emotional correctness Self-care and resilience for changemakers Campaign craft and policy influence Ideal for Boards, governance committees, and executive teams setting inclusion strategy CHROs, Heads of DEI, and senior people leaders rebuilding programmes under scrutiny Public sector, charity, and arts leaders working on equity and safeguarding Women’s leadership and changemaker networks inside large organisations Audience outcomes A sharper vocabulary for the structural barriers women face beyond the glass ceiling A clear distinction between allyship as practice and employee networks as forum Specific governance-level questions to put to their own inclusion programmes Permission and language to address emotional correctness and boundaries in senior teams A view of inclusion that connects policy, governance, and lived experience without losing rigour

Why organisations work with Anna Allerton She built her authority inside a 17-year operational career at Sky, including founding and producing Sky’s Sportswomen programme, so she speaks about high-pressure performance from inside it rather than outside it. Her Management Today 35 Women Under 35 listing and editorial track record give buyers a credible name on the panel for senior internal audiences who are sceptical of the wellness market. She is qualified through the Academy of Executive Coaching, the triple-accredited UK training body, and runs a 1:1 executive coaching practice alongside the speaking work, which means workshop content lands as coaching, not awareness. Her client list, including Workday, IMG, the Premier League, Sky, The Forward Trust and NBCU New York, shows she has tested the same content across financial, sports, media and broadcast environments at senior level. She writes on the topic for serious audiences, including a co-authored chapter in Myths of Menopause (Sequoia Books, edited by Dr Nicky Keay), giving organisations published material they can circulate internally after the session. Biography highlights Founder and Director of Allerton Coaching & Consulting 17-year career at Sky, including roles at Sky Sports News from Sub-Editor through to Global Head of Internal Communications Founder and producer of Sky’s Sportswomen, launched in 2012 as the first dedicated women’s sport TV programme of its kind Named in Management Today‘s 35 Women Under 35 Trained and qualified executive coach with the Academy of Executive Coaching Co-author of a chapter in Myths of Menopause (Sequoia Books, edited by Dr Nicky Keay) Clients include Workday, IMG, Sky, the Premier League, The Forward Trust, Whisper, NBCU New York and Age UK Featured in Grazia, Stylist, Times Radio and We Are The City Biography Sportswomen launched on Sky Sports in 2012 as the first British TV programme dedicated entirely to women’s sport. Anna Allerton founded and produced it, and it ran inside one of the most demanding live broadcast environments in UK sport. That credit, alongside seventeen years of editorial and production roles at Sky Sports News, is the reason her work on women in the workplace lands differently from most. She came back from her second maternity leave at 38 with debilitating symptoms that took a year to be correctly diagnosed as perimenopause. The experience pushed her to retrain through the Academy of Executive Coaching, the UK’s triple-accredited training body, and to build a practice specifically around keeping experienced women in senior roles through their forties and fifties. The work now runs on two tracks. A 1:1 executive coaching practice for senior women, and a consulting and speaking offer for organisations on what a menopause-inclusive workplace actually looks like in operating terms. Clients to date include Workday, IMG, the Premier League, Sky, The Forward Trust, Whisper, NBCU New York and Age UK. She co-authored a chapter in Myths of Menopause, edited by Dr Nicky Keay and published by Sequoia Books, and has written and spoken in Grazia, Stylist and Times Radio. What makes her useful in a boardroom rather than a wellness slot is the angle. She frames menopause as a talent-retention question first and a wellbeing question second. She was named in Management Today‘s 35 Women Under 35 for her work in sports journalism, not for her current specialism, and that older credential is part of why senior internal audiences take the newer one seriously. Key speaking topics Perimenopause and menopause in the workplace Talent retention of women in their 40s and 50s Women’s leadership and career navigation through midlife Women in sport and women’s sports journalism Returning to senior roles after maternity leave Menopause-inclusive workplace policy and practice Mental health and wellbeing for senior women Ideal for CHROs, heads of DEI and talent leaders designing retention strategy for women in senior roles Executive teams and ERGs in financial, professional services, media and sport launching menopause workplace programmes Senior women’s networks and leadership development cohorts in the 35 to 55 age range Boards and ExCos commissioning a credible non-clinical voice on menopause as a business issue Audience outcomes A clear reframing of perimenopause and menopause as a talent-retention and performance issue, with management implications Practical language for line managers and senior women to use when the conversation comes up at work An honest account, drawn from a high-pressure broadcast career, of what symptoms actually do to focus, confidence and decision-making Specific organisational examples from work with Workday, IMG, the Premier League, Sky and others Reference material from Myths of Menopause and Allerton’s published writing for internal follow-up

Why organisations work with Anna Baréz-Brown A track record at scale: the Shine programme has reached thousands of women across four continents and more than 75 nationalities, with named corporate clients including WPP, Channel 4, TikTok, Rothschild & Co, and Google. Her work is built around retention and progression metrics, not engagement scores. Clients commission her when the gender balance of their senior roster needs to change, not when they need an inspirational keynote. She frames inclusion as a commercial discipline. Her core argument, that diversity fails in most companies because it sits with people who lack decision rights and budget, lands credibly with COOs and CEOs as well as CHROs. A corporate operator before a coach: a former European Sales Director responsible for 12 countries and 85 employees, with credentials as a CTI Leadership Coach, NLP Master Practitioner, and qualified Organisational Relationship Systems Coach. She talks to men as well as women. The programme deliberately addresses allyship, micro-aggressions, and the part male leaders play in changing the system, which makes her workable for organisations nervous about polarised DEI framing. Biography highlights Co-founder of Shine (now We Are Shine), launched 2013 with Caroline Whaley. Former European Sales Director with responsibility for 12 countries and 85 employees. Earlier roles at Axel Springer Verlag and Bertelsmann. Programme has worked with thousands of women across more than 75 nationalities and four continents. Named clients include WPP, Rothschild & Co, TikTok, Channel 4, Google, Channel 4, ITV, and EasyJet. Credentialled as a CTI Leadership Coach, Neuro-Linguistic Master Practitioner, and qualified Organisational Relationship Systems Coach. Biography Most diversity work fails on the same fault line. Programmes sit inside HR, measured by sign-up rates and sentiment, while the senior roster keeps reproducing itself. Promotion patterns do not move. Mid-career women leave. The gap between stated values and lived experience widens. Shine, the organisation Anna Baréz-Brown co-founded with Caroline Whaley in 2013, was built to attack that fault line directly. The programme is delivered into companies including WPP, Channel 4, TikTok, Rothschild & Co, and Google, and is measured against retention, promotion, and the gender balance of senior teams. It has worked with thousands of women across more than 75 nationalities and four continents. The credibility behind that work is corporate, not activist. Before launching Shine, Baréz-Brown ran a sales business as European Director with twelve countries and eighty-five staff reporting in, after earlier roles at Axel Springer Verlag and Bertelsmann. She is a CTI Leadership Coach, an NLP Master Practitioner, and a qualified Organisational Relationship Systems Coach. Her argument to senior teams is commercial. Diversity stalls because the responsibility is delegated downward, the investment is underestimated, and the conversation polarises before any system actually changes. Her work treats inclusion as a leadership discipline that involves men and women, allies and sceptics, and the operating decisions of the business itself. Key speaking topics Gender balance in senior leadership Inclusive leadership and allyship Building corporate leadership pipelines Coaching cultures and feedback Personal energy and performance at work Influence, impact, and executive presence Courageous conversations and managing micro-aggressions Ideal for CHROs, Chief People Officers, and Heads of D&I designing senior pipeline programmes. CEOs and ExCo sponsors who want gender balance treated as a commercial outcome, not a comms initiative. Leadership development teams running cohort programmes for high-potential women and their managers. Male executives and line managers being asked to act as allies and sponsors in practice. Audience outcomes A clearer view of why most diversity programmes do not move the senior roster, and what does. Language and tools for courageous conversations across difference, including on micro-aggressions. Specific practices for women navigating senior career transitions: stakeholder management, brand, energy, narrative. A framing of inclusion that male leaders can act on, not just endorse. A diagnostic for where their own organisation’s pipeline is leaking and who needs to own the fix.

Why organisations work with Anne-Marie Imafidon She has run the experiment at scale. Stemettes has engaged more than 60,000 young women and non-binary young people across the UK, Ireland and Europe since 2013, giving her a live evidence base on what moves technical participation and what does not. Her technical credibility is not borrowed. Master’s in Mathematics and Computer Science from Oxford at 20, Honorary Fellow of Keble College, and guest arithmetician on Channel 4’s Countdown for 60 episodes, so technical audiences engage her as a peer rather than an advocate. She sits inside the UK policy conversation on digital skills. Co-Chair of the Institute for the Future of Work, 2022-2023 President of the British Science Association, and DSIT Women in Tech Envoy, which gives leaders a direct line to how regulation and industrial strategy are likely to land. She has a published thesis. She’s In CTRL (Transworld, 2022) argues that women need to take back tech as users, builders and decision-makers; that frame is portable into strategy conversations about product, customer and workforce. She is comfortable in front of non-technical boards. Her broadcast work and Chancellorship of Glasgow Caledonian University mean she translates between technical reality and senior decision-maker vocabulary without losing either. Biography highlights Co-founder and CEO of Stemettes, social enterprise founded in 2013 that has reached 60,000+ young women and non-binary young people across the UK, Ireland and Europe. Master’s in Mathematics and Computer Science, University of Oxford, aged 20; Honorary Fellow of Keble College, Oxford. Appointed MBE in the 2017 New Year Honours for services to young women and STEM. Chancellor of Glasgow Caledonian University; 2022-2023 President of the British Science Association; Co-Chair of the Institute for the Future of Work. Author of She’s In CTRL: How Women Can Take Back Tech (Transworld, 2022). Guest arithmetician on Channel 4’s Countdown across 60 episodes (2021-2022), first Black woman to take the Countdown board; voted Computer Weekly’s Most Influential Woman in UK Tech (2020); Forbes Top 50 Women in Tech. DSIT Women in Tech Envoy, co-chairing a UK government Taskforce with the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology (2025). Biography Stemettes was set up in 2013 after its co-founder returned from the Grace Hopper Celebration in 2012 and decided the UK needed its own infrastructure for girls in STEM. More than 60,000 young women and non-binary young people have passed through its programmes since, across the UK, Ireland and Europe. That operating record is the spine of Anne-Marie Imafidon’s authority on technology talent. The technical credentials are unusual. Imafidon took her Master’s in Mathematics and Computer Science at Oxford at 20, is an Honorary Fellow of Keble College, and was the guest arithmetician on Channel 4’s Countdown for 60 episodes in 2021 and 2022, the first Black woman to run the Countdown board. She was appointed MBE in 2017 for services to young women and STEM. Her public roles put her inside the UK conversation on digital skills and industrial strategy. She is Chancellor of Glasgow Caledonian University, Co-Chair of the Institute for the Future of Work, served as President of the British Science Association in 2022-2023, and in 2025 was appointed the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology’s Women in Tech Envoy, co-chairing a Taskforce with the Secretary of State. Her book She’s In CTRL, published by Transworld in 2022, argues that women should treat technology as something to take control of, not just consume or be represented within. For senior leaders it reframes the DEI-in-tech conversation as a product and capability question: who builds the tools, who governs them, and whose problems they get designed to solve. Key speaking topics Women and underrepresented groups in STEM Technology talent pipelines and digital skills Future of work and AI Inclusive product and technology design Social entrepreneurship at scale UK digital policy and industrial strategy Responsible and inclusive AI Ideal for CHROs, CPOs and heads of talent building technology hiring pipelines beyond the usual funnel. CTOs, CDIOs and engineering leaders under pressure to improve retention and representation in technical teams. Boards and ExCos setting policy on AI, digital skills and workforce strategy, particularly in regulated sectors. Corporate foundations, ESG leads and public-sector partners designing STEM and social mobility interventions. Audience outcomes A sharper read on why conventional diversity-in-tech programmes under-deliver and where the real intervention points sit. A working vocabulary for discussing inclusive AI and technology design at board level without defaulting to platitudes. Concrete examples, drawn from Stemettes and UK policy work, of what moves technical participation and retention. A reframe of women-in-tech as a product, governance and capability issue, not only a hiring issue. A sense of how UK digital skills policy and regulation are likely to shape talent strategy over the next cycle.