Leadership

Why organisations work with Alex Payne A working operator’s read on the brand-influencer market through The Room, the marketplace business he co-founded in 2017, rather than commentary from outside the category. Ten-plus years presenting live for Sky Sports built the practical communication discipline he teaches to senior leaders: clarity under time pressure, listening on camera, holding a room. A safe pair of hands for high-stakes hosting at scale, with named credits including HSBC, Heineken, the World Rugby Awards and the NSPCC. One of British rugby’s most recognisable broadcast voices, useful for organisations whose audiences sit in or adjacent to that world. Biography highlights Led Sky Sports’ rugby union coverage for more than ten years and hosted the channel’s Rugby Club studio show. Presenter across Sky Sports News and Sky News, with additional credits in tennis and poker coverage. Co-founder of The Room, a marketplace tech business connecting brands and influencers, launched in 2017. Co-host of The Good, The Bad and The Rugby with James Haskell and Mike Tindall, a UK number-one Apple podcast with a 2024 book and live tour. Hosting credits for HSBC, Heineken, Help for Heroes, NSPCC, the World Rugby Awards and the RPA Awards. Biography The brand-influencer market still clears through relationships and gut feel more than through any agreed operating model. That is the gap Alex Payne walked into when he co-founded The Room in 2017, a marketplace tech business built to connect brands and influencers on terms both sides could measure. Before that, and still alongside it, he spent more than a decade as the lead presenter of Sky Sports’ rugby union coverage. He fronted the channel’s Rugby Club studio show and presented across Sky Sports News and Sky News, including tennis and poker assignments. The studio years gave him a working communication discipline that he now teaches to senior leaders. He co-hosts The Good, The Bad and The Rugby with James Haskell and Mike Tindall. The show debuted at number one on Apple Podcasts in the UK and has expanded into live arena tours and a 2024 book. His event-hosting roster includes HSBC, Heineken, Help for Heroes, NSPCC, the World Rugby Awards and the RPA Awards. Payne is most useful to organisations as a host who knows how influence works on the inside. He has built a business in the category, sat behind a camera through ten years of live broadcast, and run rooms for some of the largest sponsoring brands in British sport. Key speaking topics Brand and influencer marketplaces Communication under pressure Media training for senior leaders Sport, sponsorship and audience Live event hosting and moderation Ideal for Marketing and brand leaders rethinking influencer spend Sponsorship and partnership teams in sport, lifestyle and consumer brands Senior leaders preparing for media-facing moments Awards ceremonies, conferences and client events needing a credible host Audience outcomes A clearer view of how the brand-influencer market actually clears, from someone running a marketplace inside it. Practical adjustments to how senior leaders show up on camera and on stage. A working sense of what makes communication land in high-pressure live settings. For hosted events, a steady tempo and named credibility with sport-adjacent audiences.

Why organisations work with Tim Henman The pressure he performed under was not generic high-stakes pressure. It was sustained, nationally televised, and deeply personal, with British tennis’s entire public narrative resting on each Wimbledon fortnight for nearly a decade. That specific form of high-visibility, high-expectation performance is directly legible to leaders who carry organisational reputation on their results. His record demonstrates competitive consistency rather than isolated peaks: six Grand Slam semi-finals across all four major surfaces, across two distinct periods of competitive form, while sustaining a top-10 ATP ranking across multiple seasons. The argument he makes about sustained performance is grounded in measurable, verifiable results. As an AELTC board member, he speaks from a position few sports speakers occupy; not only as a former competitor, but as an active participant in the governance of one of the world’s most scrutinised sporting institutions, with direct experience of its most consequential decisions. His 2020 captaincy of Great Britain at the inaugural ATP Cup provides specific, recent experience of leading a team of elite, independent individuals in a compressed, high-pressure competition: a format with obvious organisational parallels for senior leaders managing high-performing, high-ego teams. Two decades immersed in Wimbledon – as competitor, board member, and BBC commentator – means he speaks from the inside of a complex sporting and commercial operation across all its dimensions, not from match-day memory alone. Biography highlights Former ATP world No. 4 in men’s singles; British No. 1 continuously from 1999 to 2005 Six Grand Slam semi-finals: four at Wimbledon (1998, 1999, 2001, 2002), plus the French Open and US Open (both 2004) 11 ATP singles titles, including the 2003 Paris Masters (ATP Masters 1000); 4 ATP doubles titles (15 combined) Olympic silver medallist, men’s doubles, 1996 Atlanta Games (with Neil Broad) OBE, 2004 New Year Honours, for services to tennis Board member, All England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC), the governing body of Wimbledon BBC Wimbledon commentator and analyst since 2008 Great Britain captain, inaugural ATP Cup, Sydney, 2020 Founder, Tim Henman Foundation (education and health support for disadvantaged young people) Biography For a decade, every British summer began with the same question: would this be Tim Henman’s year? The weight of expectation he carried – sustained, public, and deeply personal – shaped him as a competitor in ways that resonate directly with leaders. As Britain’s world No. 4 and British No. 1 from 1999 to 2005, he performed year after year under conditions few professional athletes encounter and fewer corporate high-performers can imagine. His record spans six Grand Slam semi-finals across all four major surfaces: four at Wimbledon, and semi-final runs at both the French Open and US Open in 2004, the latter confirming a second competitive peak well into his career. His 2003 Paris Masters title, won with consecutive victories over three top-ten players, remains one of British tennis’s landmark single-tournament performances. That consistency, sustained across two distinct periods and multiple surfaces, is the foundation of what he brings to the platform. Since retiring in 2007, Henman has not stepped back from elite sport. He joined the board of the All England Lawn Tennis Club, contributing to institutional decisions, including the management of the 2020 cancellation and the transition to AI-assisted line-calling, from inside Wimbledon’s governance. He captained Great Britain at the inaugural ATP Cup in Sydney in 2020, leading a squad that included Andy Murray. He has been a BBC Wimbledon commentator since 2008, translating elite performance for broad audiences across more than fifteen competitive cycles. The Tim Henman Foundation, which he founded to support disadvantaged young people through education and health, reflects a commitment that stretches well beyond the results sheet. Key speaking topics Performing under pressure Competitive resilience and mental discipline Sustained high performance National representation and public expectation Team dynamics in high-stakes competition Athletic-to-leadership transition Preparation, focus, and decision-making under scrutiny Ideal for Senior leadership and executive conferences where competitive mindset, performance culture, and resilience under pressure are central themes Sales and commercial leadership events where the parallels between elite sport and high-stakes commercial performance are directly applicable Sports industry forums, Wimbledon-adjacent hospitality, and British-market events where his cultural profile adds immediate resonance HR and people leadership audiences exploring what sustained high performance looks like in practice, and how organisations can build environments that produce it Audience outcomes A first-person, evidence-grounded perspective on how elite performers maintain output under sustained, high-visibility pressure – not as a set of techniques, but as a practised, testable discipline Understanding of how competitive consistency is built over time: through preparation, surface adaptation, and the ability to perform across conditions rather than only in ideal circumstances Insight into the specific mental challenges of carrying high expectation: when it fuels performance, and when it becomes a liability Practical reflection on what the shift from individual competitor to team leader requires, drawing on experience as both a Davis Cup player and ATP Cup captain A perspective on elite sport that extends beyond the athlete’s experience into institutional governance, offering audiences a more complete picture of what world-class performance systems actually look like from the inside

Why organisations work with Macer Gifford He has built two functioning units from nothing, a Combat Medical Unit with Kurdish forces in Syria and Operation Golden Hour in Ukraine, both still saving lives. That is a rare proof point on creating capability under pressure. He has fought alongside Kurdish and Syriac forces against Islamic State and now serves as a reconnaissance infantryman and medic in the Ukrainian Foreign Legion’s 131st Battalion. The material is firsthand, not interpreted. His talks translate combat decision-making into language a board, a transformation team or a frontline manager can actually use, without the bravado that typically comes with the genre. He brings credible standing on two of the defining conflicts of the era, with published work in The Spectator and The Telegraph and regular appearances on BBC, CNN, MSNBC and Channel 4. He is the author of “Fighting Evil” (Weidenfeld and Nicolson, foreword by Andy McNab), a sustained piece of writing about why an ordinary person chooses to act when most do not. Biography highlights Volunteer fighter with the Kurdish YPG and a Syriac Christian unit in Syria, mid-2015 to 2017, including the Manbij offensive and the siege of Raqqa. Founder of a Combat Medical Unit with Kurdish forces in Syria, still operational, and of Operation Golden Hour, a battlefield first-aid training programme for Ukrainian and international volunteers. Reconnaissance infantryman and medic with the Ukrainian Foreign Legion’s 131st Battalion and the International Cossacks Expeditionary Force; awarded a medal by the Supreme Commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Author of “Fighting Evil: The Ordinary Man who went to War Against ISIS”, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, with a foreword by Andy McNab. Contributor to The Spectator and The Telegraph; regular interviewee on BBC, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, Channel 4, ITV, Sky News and LBC. Reading for a Master’s in Security, Peace-building and Diplomacy at Loughborough University London. Biography A foreign exchange trader from Cambridge with no military background flew to northern Syria in 2015 and joined the Kurdish YPG. Over the next three years, that decision became one of the longest tours by any British international volunteer in the war against Islamic State, ending at the siege of Raqqa. The interesting question is not why he went, it is what he learned about command, fear and group cohesion when the people around him were untrained, frightened and being killed. Out of that experience came a Combat Medical Unit, built from nothing with Kurdish forces, that still operates in north-east Syria. He repeated the pattern in 2022. Ten days before Russia’s full-scale invasion he was on the ground in Ukraine, and within weeks he had launched Operation Golden Hour, a battlefield first-aid programme that has trained domestic and international volunteers across the conflict. He now serves as a reconnaissance infantryman and medic with the 131st Battalion, was decorated in connection with the liberation of Kherson, and writes about the war for outlets including The Spectator and The Telegraph. His memoir, “Fighting Evil”, carries a foreword by Andy McNab and sits alongside regular appearances on BBC, CNN, MSNBC and Channel 4. For an organisation thinking seriously about leadership when the systems break, the practical question is simple: who actually has done it, and can explain it. Gifford can. Key speaking topics Leadership and decision-making under extreme uncertainty Building teams and capability from scratch in hostile conditions Courage, fear and individual moral choice Frontline lessons from Syria and Ukraine Humanitarian action and combat medicine in conflict zones The fight against Islamic State and the war in Ukraine Ideal for Senior leadership offsites and CEO forums focused on resilience and crisis decision-making Transformation, change and operations leaders dealing with high ambiguity and human risk Defence, security, NGO and public-sector audiences working in unstable environments Conferences and dinners that need a serious, firsthand voice on the conflicts shaping the decade Audience outcomes A direct account of how trust, command and morale actually function when conditions deteriorate A practical view of how small groups build capability quickly when no system supports them A frame for thinking about courage and individual responsibility that does not collapse into cliche A clear-eyed sense of what is happening on the ground in Syria and Ukraine, from someone still serving there

Why organisations work with Yan Lefort He has done the work commercial teams are usually only theorising about: replacing a category that funded an entire industry, in his case tobacco in Formula 1, with sponsors that pass modern scrutiny. As Commercial & Marketing Director of Sauber Motorsport from 2018 to 2022, he sat on the management board and was directly responsible for landing the long-term Alfa Romeo partnership and the Orlen title sponsorship that anchored the team’s finances. He has run the partner side and the rights-holder side of the same deal. At IWC Schaffhausen he built the Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 partnership during the Hamilton era; at Sauber he sold the property. Few speakers can credibly describe both seats. His operating context is one of the most commercially exposed environments in business, where every quarter the product performs in public and sponsors decide whether to renew. That discipline transfers to any organisation whose revenue depends on relationship renewals under pressure. Biography highlights Commercial & Marketing Director, Sauber Motorsport AG, 2018 to 2022, and member of the Alfa Romeo Racing F1 management board Global Head of Partnerships, PR and CSR at IWC Schaffhausen, leading the IWC partnership with the Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 team Global PR Manager for the Lucky Strike F1 programme with BAR Honda Six years at Rothmans managing the sponsorship of the Williams F1 team Ran an independent commercial and sponsorship consultancy serving OEM automotive clients including Toyota’s F1 team, sponsors, rights holders and F1 drivers Speaker, International Sports Convention, Geneva Biography When tobacco sponsorship was banned from Formula 1 in 2005, the sport lost the category that had paid most of its bills for thirty years. Teams, rights holders and agencies had to rebuild their commercial books from scratch. Yan Lefort had spent the previous decade inside that commercial machine, six years at Rothmans on the Williams F1 sponsorship and seven as Global PR Manager of the Lucky Strike F1 programme with BAR Honda. He set up his own consultancy and spent the next five years rewiring sponsorship strategies for OEM clients including Toyota’s F1 team, plus a range of sponsors, rights holders and drivers. In 2011 he joined IWC Schaffhausen as Global Head of Partnerships, PR and CSR, where he ran the luxury watchmaker’s partnership with the Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 team through the period of Lewis Hamilton’s dominance. That gave him the brand-side view of the most demanding partner relationship in motorsport. At the start of 2018 he moved to Sauber Motorsport as Commercial & Marketing Director and joined the team’s management board. The team had no title sponsor and a weak commercial position. By the time he left in 2022 he had landed the long-term Alfa Romeo partnership that rebranded the team and the title sponsorship from the Polish energy company Orlen. During those years he worked closely with World Champion Kimi Raikkonen and ten-time Grand Prix winner Valtteri Bottas. That sequence, rights-holder to sponsor to rights-holder, agency to brand to team, gives him a practical reading of how partnership revenue is actually built and defended. He speaks to that work directly, drawing on named deals and named counterparts rather than abstractions about engagement or storytelling. Key speaking topics Sponsorship and partnership strategy Commercial leadership in Formula 1 Sports marketing and brand activation Rebuilding revenue after category disruption Luxury brand partnerships in regulated environments High-performance team commercial operations Ideal for CCOs, CMOs and heads of partnerships at sponsors and rights holders Boards of sports properties, federations and motorsport teams Brand and partnership leaders inside luxury, automotive and energy companies Commercial leadership teams whose revenue model relies on long-cycle partner renewals Audience outcomes A working view of how a modern F1 team builds and defends its sponsorship book A specific account of how a banned-category sport rebuilt its commercial model, with lessons for any industry facing regulatory or reputational disruption to its revenue base The brand-side and rights-holder-side perspectives on the same partnership, drawn from IWC’s relationship with Mercedes-AMG F1 and Sauber’s relationship with Alfa Romeo and Orlen A clearer test for whether a partnership is commercial substance or marketing decoration

Why organisations work with Tima Deryan A first-person account of summiting Everest in one of the deadliest seasons on the mountain, used as concrete material for how leaders prepare for, recover from, and execute under conditions where mistakes cost lives. A track record of physical first-ever achievements, including Everest, the Seven Summits, the South Pole, and Ojos del Salado, that gives weight to her arguments on goal-setting and persistence beyond the usual motivational register. A working coaching practice, not a one-off speaking circuit; she runs Mountain Gipsy as an ongoing platform, which means content is sharpened by repeated client work rather than rehearsed from a single book. A founder track record alongside the mountaineering, including the sustainable fashion brand Feministiya and earlier ventures, which gives her credibility on women’s leadership and entrepreneurship topics where bureaus often field speakers with only one of those two profiles. Biography highlights First Lebanese woman and youngest Arab to summit Mount Everest, 22 May 2019, age 26. First Lebanese woman to ski the last degree to the South Pole, December 2022. Completed the Seven Summits; first Arab woman to summit Ojos del Salado, the world’s highest active volcano. Founder and CEO of Mountain Gipsy; founder of Feministiya, a sustainability-focused fashion brand. Author of Curly Adventures: Mount Everest, a children’s book on her ascent. Certified mindset coach with a corporate keynote client list spanning multinationals across consumer goods, energy, and pharmaceuticals. Biography The 2019 Everest season was one of the deadliest on record. On 22 May, Tima Deryan reached the summit at 7:21 am, becoming the first Lebanese woman and the youngest Arab to do so. The technical and psychological work that produced that morning is what she now teaches. Deryan has since added the South Pole, the Seven Summits, and Ojos del Salado to a sustained record of high-altitude objectives. She is pursuing the Explorer Grand Slam, a list completed by fewer than 75 people globally and by only 15 women. The achievements matter for the keynote because the lessons are drawn from environments where decisions cannot be undone, not from a metaphor. Outside the mountains, she runs Mountain Gipsy as a coaching and speaking platform and founded Feministiya, a sustainable fashion brand focused on women’s rights and gender equality. That second track gives her substantive material on entrepreneurship and women’s leadership rather than the borrowed credibility some adventure speakers rely on. She is also a best-selling author of Curly Adventures: Mount Everest, a children’s book recounting her climb. Her corporate work includes keynotes and workshops for Procter & Gamble, Merck, Ford, Adidas, Henkel, Swarovski, Shell, and ADNOC. The repeated booking pattern across consumer goods, pharmaceuticals, and energy reflects what she is most often commissioned for: a high-stakes story used as working material on goal-setting, team dynamics, and composure under pressure. Key speaking topics Goal-setting in low-margin environments Mindset and self-leadership under pressure Decision-making in high-stakes uncertainty Team dynamics on extended expeditions Women’s leadership and breaking first-ever barriers Entrepreneurship and sustainability Resilience and recovery from setback Ideal for CHROs and L&D leaders commissioning a high-stakes keynote on resilience and goal-setting Sales and commercial leadership teams working through stretch targets Women’s leadership networks and ERGs inside large multinationals Off-site events for senior teams that need a working narrative on composure under pressure, not a generic motivational session Audience outcomes A working framework for setting and pursuing objectives where failure has real cost A first-person account of how preparation, composure, and team trust hold up in extreme conditions A clearer view of what self-leadership looks like in environments without external validation A direct argument for persistence in goals that look unreasonable from the starting line

Why organisations work with Philip Keil He brings the operating discipline of Crew Resource Management, the framework airlines use to prevent crew failure under pressure, into language a leadership team can actually apply on Monday morning. He has been the captain in command during a genuine in-flight emergency with nearly 200 passengers on board, so his content on composure and decision-making is grounded in a specific event, not a hypothetical. His books You are the pilot! and The inner compass give him a published position on intuition and self-leadership, which extends a keynote into a longer programme for executive development. He delivers in English and German at a senior corporate level across more than 20 countries, which suits multinational audiences without an interpreter compromise. He is an active TV aviation expert in Germany, which means he is fluent at explaining technical environments to non-technical audiences without losing the senior register. Biography highlights Qualified as a Lufthansa-trained airline pilot at 22, one of the youngest in Germany. Over 9,000 hours of commercial flying across four continents. Author of You are the pilot! (2019) and The inner compass (2022). Listed in Europe’s TOP 100 Excellent Keynote Speakers since 2017. Two-time nominee for the Red Fox Award, Germany’s Keynote Speaker of the Year (2019, 2020). Recurring aviation expert across ZDF, RTL, Pro 7, Sat.1, WELT, and ntv. Biography The aviation industry has spent four decades engineering away a single problem: capable people, working together, still making fatal decisions. The framework that emerged is called Crew Resource Management, and it is the operating discipline behind the modern cockpit. It assumes that a senior captain can be wrong, that a junior co-pilot must be heard, and that error must surface before it compounds. Philip Keil works inside that framework professionally. He qualified as an airline pilot at 22 after training at Lufthansa in Bremen, and has since logged more than 9,000 flying hours over four continents. On 24 February 2009 he was the captain in command when a routine flight with around 200 passengers became an emergency landing, an event he has used as the empirical anchor for his work on composure and decision-making ever since. His books extend the cockpit material into something more useful for a senior leader. You are the pilot! (2019) is a study in self-leadership and confidence under load. The inner compass (2022) addresses the role of intuition in high-stakes decisions, the part of judgement that does not appear on a spreadsheet. Both have given him a published intellectual position rather than a single-incident speaker hook. That position has been recognised commercially. Keil has been listed in Europe’s TOP 100 Excellent Keynote Speakers since 2017, was nominated as Germany’s Keynote Speaker of the Year in 2019 and 2020, and is the recurring aviation voice across the major German broadcasters. He works in English and German, which is what a multinational leadership audience actually needs. Key speaking topics Decision-making under pressure Crew Resource Management for executive teams Error culture and accountability Self-leadership and composure Crisis communication and command Team coordination across hierarchy Ideal for Executive committees and boards facing high-consequence decisions under time pressure COOs, CHROs, and operational leaders rebuilding accountability and error reporting culture Leadership development programmes for newly appointed senior managers Safety-critical, regulated, or operationally complex industries (aviation, energy, manufacturing, healthcare, financial services) Audience outcomes A working vocabulary from Crew Resource Management that they can apply to their own leadership meetings A specific model for how to surface bad news up a hierarchy before it becomes a crisis A clearer view of what composure looks like as an operational skill, not a personality trait A repeatable approach to making the next decision when the information is incomplete

Why organisations work with Kian Gohar Brings primary research, not commentary. The Ferrazzi-Gohar study of 2,000 leaders during the pandemic and his Stanford-partnered four-company experiment on AI-assisted brainstorming give boards an evidence base for decisions, not anecdote. Co-author of a Wall Street Journal bestseller, “Competing in the New World of Work” (Harvard Business Review Press, translated into seven languages), with a working framework for high-return team practices that leaders can apply directly. Operational track record from inside XPRIZE Foundation and Singularity University, where he ran innovation programmes for Fortune 500s and helped design corporate moonshot work, so the advice connects to how large organisations actually execute. Published in Harvard Business Review on the failure modes of generative AI in team creativity, with specific guidance on how to redesign ideation workflows so AI raises output rather than flattening it. Speaks five languages and has built innovation programmes across the US, Europe, and China, which translates into sharper sessions for global leadership teams than a US-only perspective offers. Biography highlights Founder and CEO of Geolab, a research lab on Human-AI collaboration, future of work, and innovation. Co-author with Keith Ferrazzi of “Competing in the New World of Work” (Harvard Business Review Press, 2022), a Wall Street Journal bestseller in seven languages. Co-author of “Don’t Let Gen AI Limit Your Team’s Creativity,” Harvard Business Review, March-April 2024, with Jeremy Utley of Stanford. Former Executive Director, XPRIZE Foundation and Singularity University. Member, Council on Foreign Relations; Henry Luce Scholar in Shanghai; alumnus of Northwestern, London School of Economics, and Harvard Business School. Research and commentary featured in the Financial Times, NPR, and the Wall Street Journal. Biography Most teams adopted hybrid work and generative AI inside the same eighteen months, and most leaders are still guessing at what good looks like. Kian Gohar’s research sits in that gap. With Keith Ferrazzi he interviewed more than 2,000 leaders during the pandemic; the resulting book, “Competing in the New World of Work” (Harvard Business Review Press, 2022), became a Wall Street Journal bestseller and was translated into seven languages. His more recent work moves the same lens onto AI. With Jeremy Utley of Stanford, he ran a four-company experiment on AI-assisted brainstorming and published the findings in Harvard Business Review in 2024. The headline is uncomfortable for vendors: teams using generative AI produced only modestly more ideas, and several underperformed. The article gives leaders a specific diagnosis of why and what to change in the ideation workflow. Before Geolab, Gohar was Executive Director of the XPRIZE Foundation and Singularity University, where he built corporate moonshot and innovation programmes for Fortune 500 leadership teams. That operational background is why his keynotes carry weight in boardrooms; the advice is grounded in running real programmes, not modelling them. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a Henry Luce Scholar, and a graduate of Northwestern, the London School of Economics, and Harvard Business School. For a senior team trying to work out how to make hybrid actually productive and how to introduce AI without quietly degrading creativity, Gohar offers a rare combination of evidence and operating instinct. Key speaking topics Radical adaptability and high-return team practices Human-AI collaboration in knowledge work Generative AI and team creativity Hybrid and remote workplace design Innovation strategy and corporate moonshots Future of work and workforce transformation Leadership through structural change Ideal for CHROs and chief people officers redesigning hybrid operating models Chief strategy and chief innovation officers integrating generative AI into team workflows Executive teams running enterprise-wide transformation programmes Boards and senior leadership groups setting an AI and future-of-work agenda Audience outcomes A clear read on what 2,000 leaders learned about hybrid work that actually raises team performance. Specific reasons teams underperform with generative AI and the workflow changes that reverse it. A working vocabulary for radical adaptability that senior teams can use to evaluate their own practices. Concrete examples from XPRIZE moonshot work showing how ambitious goals get organised inside large companies. A sharper sense of which AI and future-of-work investments will compound, and which will not.

Why organisations work with Dr Helena Boschi She brings neuroscience into the room with the credibility of someone who has sat on the executive side of HR. Senior roles at Shire Pharmaceuticals and Serono SA mean she speaks to leadership problems from inside, not from a lab. Her book Why We Do What We Do (Wiley, 2020) gives leadership teams a shared vocabulary for why people behave as they do under pressure, which lasts beyond the event. She works at the intersection of chronic stress and cognitive performance, an area most leadership speakers skim and few treat as a board-level risk. She is a member of the British Psychological Society and has built Chequered Leopard Ltd since 2004 specifically to translate peer-reviewed research into operational practice, not keynote theatre. She is unusually sharp on the behavioural cost of hybrid working: trust erosion, risk attitudes, attention, empathy. Useful for any leadership team still making assumptions about what remote does to a workforce. Biography highlights Founder of Chequered Leopard Ltd (since 2004), a consultancy applying neuroscience to leadership, change and workplace behaviour. Author of Why We Do What We Do: Understanding Our Brain to Get the Best Out of Ourselves and Others (Wiley, 2020). Former Vice President of Talent Management at Shire Pharmaceuticals. Former Corporate Director and Head of Global Organisation Development at Serono SA (now part of Merck KGaA). Member of the British Psychological Society. Research interests include the impact of chronic, work-induced stress on cognitive ability in the workplace. Biography Most change programmes fail on the same fault line. Leaders model behaviour as a matter of willingness, when the brain is actually running on threat detection, bias and habit. Helena Boschi has built a twenty-year practice around closing that gap, translating applied neuroscience into the decisions senior teams actually have to make. Her consultancy, Chequered Leopard Ltd, was founded in 2004 after senior corporate roles inside Shire Pharmaceuticals, where she was Vice President of Talent Management, and Serono SA, where she led global organisation development. That sequence matters. She is not a researcher who later discovered business. She ran the people function at scale in listed multinationals and turned to neuroscience because the tools available to her were not explaining what she was seeing. Her book Why We Do What We Do, published by Wiley in 2020, sets out how the brain communicates, remembers, attends, leads and decides, and what organisations can do to stop working against it. The work that sits beneath it, including her interest in chronic work-induced stress and cognitive function, informs keynotes on change, cognitive bias, psychological safety, hybrid working and innovation. She is a member of the British Psychological Society. The argument she leaves in the room is specific. Most of what organisations call a culture problem is a biology problem being asked to behave. Once leaders see that, the interventions change. Key speaking topics Applied neuroscience at work The neuroscience of change Cognitive bias and decision-making Psychological safety and fear at work Trust, risk and hybrid working The neuroscience of innovation Chronic stress and cognitive performance Neuroplasticity and cognitive agility in an AI-driven world Ideal for CEOs, executive teams and boards working through sustained change or transformation programmes. CHROs, CPOs and senior HR, talent and organisation development leaders. Leadership development and learning teams designing programmes for senior cohorts. Cross-cultural and international leadership groups operating in hybrid conditions. Audience outcomes A clearer picture of why people resist, withdraw or underperform during change, grounded in how the brain responds to uncertainty. Named cognitive biases leaders can spot in their own decisions and in the decisions their teams make for them. A practical read on what hybrid working is doing to trust, empathy and risk appetite inside their organisation. Specific behavioural levers for psychological safety, rather than slogans. Language and evidence leaders can take back into their own teams without needing to cite academic research.

Chris Hirst is a change agent, widely recognised as an innovative and inspirational leader and speaker. He is the former Global CEO of Havas Creative Group and UK CEO of Grey (part of WPP). After more than a decade in CEO positions he has a proven track record of leading successful transformation programmes, guiding his businesses to record growth, product reinvention, reputational change and a culture of enduring success. He is founder of leadership consultancy Dogsbody Group, speaker, columnist and author. His first book, No Bullsh*t Leadership (Profile Books, 2019) has been a No.1 best-seller for over 36 months and is available around the world. It was named UK Business Book of the Year in March 2020. Based on his hard-won experience this smart, engaging book wipes away the bullshit that surrounds conventional leadership theory and is a proven step-by-step working manual on how to lead – for anyone. Full of universally applicable and direct advice, it demystifies an over-analysed subject to get to the heart of modern leadership: the life-changing, career-transforming power to get stuff done. A recommended essential read in the FT, it was described by Sir Clive Woodward as, ‘a brilliant set of leadership tools that will help you succeed, whatever your goals.’ As Global CEO, Havas Creative Group Chris led more than 10,000 people across all Havas’ global territories, taking the business from an ‘also ran’ to second place in Campaign Magazine’s global rankings in three short years. He oversaw two years of record growth and profits and was shortlisted as global CEO of the year in 2022. During his 5-year tenure as UK CEO of Grey (part of WPP), the agency more than tripled in size, and quadrupled its profit during its transformation into one of the hottest, fastest growing and most creatively respected agencies in the world. A graduate of Brasenose College Oxford (MEng Engineering Science) and Harvard Business School (Advanced Management Program), Chris writes a monthly column for Management Today, is the founder of leadership consultancy Dogsbody Group Ltd, has over ½ million listens for his No Bullsh*t Leadership podcast, and is a regular commentator in press and broadcast media.

Why organisations work with Steve Gaskin Direct senior operational experience at Scotland Yard. DCI rank with homicide and counter-terrorism case exposure is uncommon in the speaker market, where “former detective” often means a junior career repackaged. Pattern recognition that translates between domains. His sales-focused talk shows how the structure of a police suspect interview can be applied directly to a customer conversion conversation, as a working method. Current broadcast credibility. Contributions to Channel 5’s Wayne Couzens: Killer in Plain Sight and ITV’s Playboy Bunny Club Murders keep his analysis grounded in cases audiences may have followed. Decision-making content shaped by real consequences. The material is built from environments where wrong calls had immediate legal and human stakes, which gives it a weight classroom case studies cannot match. Biography highlights Former Detective Chief Inspector with the Metropolitan Police, based at New Scotland Yard, with more than 25 years of service. Case experience spans homicide, counter-terrorism-related operations and serious drug trafficking, including undercover deployment at New Scotland Yard. Contributor to UK true-crime documentary programming, including Channel 5’s Wayne Couzens: Killer in Plain Sight. Director of Huxley Events Ltd and The Crime Lab Ltd, both delivering corporate crime-themed events and consultancy. BSc in Psychology and Mathematics; executive programme at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford; Fellow of the Institute of Leadership and Management; Associate Tutor at Anglia Ruskin University. Biography Senior detectives at Scotland Yard make calls under pressure, where errors carry immediate legal and human stakes. Structured interviewing and evidence-led decision-making, the disciplines that hold up in those conditions, are learned by practice on real cases. Steve Gaskin spent more than 25 years in that environment and retired as a Detective Chief Inspector. His case experience runs from early 1980s work on the Hyde Park bombing investigation through to homicide and counter-terrorism-related operations. He also served in serious drug trafficking work at New Scotland Yard, including undercover deployment. The connecting thread is decision-making at the point where evidence is incomplete and the cost of waiting is real. That is the foundation of his corporate work. His talks draw structural parallels: police suspect interview frameworks mapped onto sales conversations, and murder squad management compared with leading teams under pressure. The result is applied technique an audience can use the next day. He contributes regularly to UK broadcast crime journalism, including Channel 5’s Wayne Couzens: Killer in Plain Sight and ITV’s Playboy Bunny Club Murders. The cases he discusses on screen are often the same ones that surface in his corporate keynotes. Key speaking topics Decision-making under pressure Investigative interviewing technique Leadership in high-stakes operational environments Workplace psychopathy and personality reading Sales conversation structure drawn from suspect interviewing Crime-based corporate storytelling Ideal for Sales leadership teams looking to apply structured suspect interviewing techniques to prospecting and conversion Senior leadership groups working on decision-making, team management and risk under pressure Corporate audiences seeking substantive after-dinner content with operational credibility Conferences in financial services, professional services and risk-focused sectors Audience outcomes A method for structuring interviews where information accuracy matters, applicable to either suspect interrogation or sales discovery Names and behavioural markers for the personality patterns most likely to disrupt a workplace, drawn from criminal psychology Concrete examples of how operational teams are led through high-pressure investigations Material drawn from recent high-profile cases he has analysed for UK broadcast

About John Ridding John Ridding is the Chief Executive Officer of the FT Group, one of the world’s leading news organisations recognised internationally for its authority, integrity and accuracy and for its global perspective. Under his stewardship, the FT has expanded its global operations and transformed itself into a digital business, pioneering the reader-revenue subscription model now widely-adopted across news media. Despite the disruption in the news media sector, the FT has reached record levels of readership, passing the milestone one million subscriber mark in 2019 and continuing robust growth since then. In his 35 years at the FT, John has held a wide range of roles on both the editorial and business side of the organisation. As an award-winning foreign correspondent, he was based in Hong Kong, Paris and Seoul and regularly reported from mainland China, Japan, India and Indonesia. He was managing editor, features editor and deputy editor before joining the business side of the organisation. He led the launch of the FT’s Asia edition in 2003, steering it to commercial and editorial success. John also led the development of the FT’s Chinese language website, which now has more than 2m users and is the leading international source of business news in China. John was appointed Chief Executive Officer of the FT Group in May 2006. He managed the acquisition of the FT by Nikkei of Japan in 2015 and serves as a Special Executive Director of Nikkei. He is co-chair of Nikkei’s Digital Strategy Committee and sits on Nikkei’s Global Investment Committee. The FT now attracts the largest paying readership in its 135-year history, with more than three quarters of its readers coming from digital channels. The FT is recognised as an industry leader in innovation and digital development and a champion of quality journalism. John has held a number of non-executive board positions, including the Economist, and FTSE (the joint venture between the FT and the London Stock Exchange). He currently sits on the board of Bonnier News, part of the international media conglomerate Bonnier AB and on the board of Wilshire, the US based investment and index company. In addition to his business roles, John is on the board of Room to Read, a San-Francisco based global charity that supports learning and literacy in low income countries – with a focus on girls’ education. He graduated from Oxford University with a first class honours degree in philosophy, politics and economics. John lives with his family in London. His other interests include music, running, surfing and scuba diving.

Why organisations work with Nadira Tudor She moderates at the level of the World Economic Forum at Davos, IBC Amsterdam, GITEX Global Dubai and the Future Investment Initiative, which means clients commissioning her are buying the same on-stage standard those programmes demand. She runs Euronews’ Baku Bureau, anchoring and producing the network’s news output from the region, so her interviewing instincts are tested daily on live international news, not refreshed once a year on the speaker circuit. Her on-camera presenting for branded content is recognised at industry award level, including a Silver Telly Award for the Shell “Decarbonisation: From What to How” interview series with ReutersPlus and a Bronze Award for IDA Ireland’s film on the country’s semiconductors cluster, with regular further work for the Financial Times, ITN Business and Business Reporter. She trains military and government communicators, including NATO, UK MOD and the Royal Navy, which sharpens her judgement on stage when conversations turn to security, geopolitics or regulated industries. Her academic seat at Cardiff JOMEC and her master’s in intercultural communication from Birkbeck give her a working theory of cross-cultural audience response, which matters for global summits where the audience is not a single market. Biography highlights Bureau Chief, Baku, for Euronews, running the bureau and its sponsored programmes hub with editorial responsibility for the full news output. Broadcast career across BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio 1 and 1Xtra, BBC 5 Live, BBC News, BBC Wales and BBC Asian Network, with a further spell at BBC News and Programmes (2023 to 2025), launch-team roles at News UK across Times Radio and TalkTV (2020 to 2023), and international experience at ITN, Channel 5 and Al Arabiya English. Award-winning ReutersPlus branded-content presenter: Silver Telly Award (Shell “Decarbonisation: From What to How” interview series) and Bronze Award (IDA Ireland semiconductors film). Regular further branded-content work for the Financial Times, ITN Business and Business Reporter. Visiting Lecturer at Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Culture (JOMEC); master’s in Intercultural Communication for Business and Professions, Birkbeck, University of London. Moderation credits include the World Economic Forum (Davos 2023 and 2024), GITEX Global Dubai, GITEX Africa, IBC Amsterdam, Future Investment Initiative, GMIS and T20. Communications training for NATO, UK MOD, the Royal Navy and the Allied Rapid Reaction Corps; 2015 Asian Professional Award for Media and BBC Innovation Award. Biography Most leadership content fails on stage long before the strategy fails in the market. The interview misfires, the panel drifts, the senior voice in the room sounds defensive, and the audience remembers the discomfort, not the message. The person holding the microphone decides whether that happens. Her current post is Bureau Chief in Baku for Euronews, where she runs the bureau and its sponsored programmes hub, anchors and produces key programmes for the region, and is responsible for the full news output. She came up through the BBC across Radio 4, Radio 1 and 1Xtra, 5 Live, News, Wales and the Asian Network, with a further spell at BBC News and Programmes from 2023 to 2025, and was part of the launch teams for both Times Radio and TalkTV at News UK between 2020 and 2023. International newsroom experience runs through ITN, Channel 5 and Al Arabiya English. She moderates at the most senior end of the global conference circuit, including the World Economic Forum at Davos in 2023 and 2024, IBC Amsterdam, GITEX Global, the Future Investment Initiative, the Global Manufacturing and Industrialisation Summit and the T20. The same craft underpins her communications training for NATO, the UK MOD, the Royal Navy and the Allied Rapid Reaction Corps, where leadership communication is a security issue, not a presentation skill. The intellectual underpinning is her master’s in Intercultural Communication for Business and Professions from Birkbeck, University of London, and a Visiting Lecturer seat at the Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Culture. She also fronts award-winning branded content for ReutersPlus, the Financial Times, ITN Business and Business Reporter, with a Silver Telly Award for the Shell “Decarbonisation: From What to How” interview series and a Bronze Award for IDA Ireland’s film on the country’s semiconductors cluster. The 2015 Asian Professional Award for Media and an earlier BBC Innovation Award round out a record that rests on disciplined interviewing more than on stage presence. Key speaking topics Conference moderation and on-stage interviewing Executive communication for senior leaders Crisis and reputation communication Media and on-camera training Intercultural communication in global organisations Awards and gala hosting Panel and debate facilitation Ideal for Chief Communications Officers and Heads of Corporate Affairs commissioning a senior moderator for global summits, leadership offsites or investor days. Heads of Internal Communications running CEO town halls, all-hands and quarterly leadership broadcasts. Event directors at industry conferences who need an interviewer who can carry a multi-track programme across sectors in a single day. Public sector and defence communications leads briefing senior teams on media engagement under scrutiny. Audience outcomes A live demonstration of how a sharp interviewer turns a panel from a sequence of statements into a substantive conversation. Practical handles for senior leaders on how to answer hard questions on stage without retreating into corporate language. A clearer view of how cultural and audience context changes what counts as a strong answer, drawn from her global moderation work. For internal communications teams, a working sense of what good looks like when the CEO is in front of the room.