Leadership

Why organisations work with Theresa Payton She has held the most accountable technology seat in the world – not as an adviser, but as the operator responsible for securing the Executive Office of the President. That is a different class of credential from the vendor or think-tank backgrounds most cybersecurity speakers bring. Her book Manipulated – on The Guardian’s Top 10 Books About Cybercrime list, maps the specific mechanics of AI-driven disinformation, deepfakes, and election interference; organisations working on trust, governance, or brand integrity get a strategic framework they can act on. As a patented inventor of security designs and co-founder of a cybersecurity product company (Dark3, acquired by Celerium), she brings the practitioner’s perspective, not the theorist’s: she has built the solutions, not just described the problem. She translates threat intelligence into board-level language. Her seventeen years across banking technology, government, and private advisory work means she can speak credibly to risk committees, technology leaders, and general business audiences in the same event. Biography highlights First female White House Chief Information Officer, serving under President George W. Bush, 2006–2008 Founder and CEO of Fortalice Solutions, ranked in the Global Cybersecurity Top 500 by Cybercrime Magazine Prior senior technology executive roles at Bank of America and Wells Fargo Author of Manipulated: Inside the Cyberwar to Hijack Elections and Distort the Truth, The Guardian Top 10 Books About Cybercrime list; revised edition published 2024 Co-inventor on an approved U.S. patent in security design Recipient of the FBI Director’s Award for Community Service; 2020 CISO MAG Cybersecurity Crusader of the Year; 2019 Woman Cybersecurity Leader of the Year Starred as Deputy Commander of Intelligence on the CBS reality series Hunted Regular security commentator on the Today Show, Good Morning America, CNN, CBS News, Fox News, and MSNBC Biography Theresa Payton ran cybersecurity for the White House. From 2006 to 2008, as Chief Information Officer for the Executive Office of the President under George W. Bush, she was accountable for the security of IT systems used by the President and 3,000 staff: not as an adviser, but as the person responsible. Before that, she spent sixteen years in senior technology roles at Bank of America and Wells Fargo. The combination is unusual: operational authority at the highest level of government, built on a banking technology foundation. That background shapes how she approaches cyber risk with corporate audiences. The question she puts to boards is not whether their organisation will face a breach, but whether their governance structures are designed to know about it, act on it, and contain it. As CEO of Fortalice Solutions, listed in the Global Cybersecurity Top 500, she has spent fifteen years working through exactly that question with Fortune 100 clients. Her book Manipulated, named one of The Guardian’s Top 10 Books About Cybercrime, examines how AI-generated deepfakes, self-replicating chatbots, and coordinated disinformation campaigns are used to compromise institutions from the outside in. A revised edition was published in 2024. She is also a co-inventor on an approved U.S. patent in security design, and previously co-founded Dark3, a cybersecurity product company later acquired by Celerium. Her profile extends beyond the conference circuit. She has testified before government bodies, served as Deputy Commander of Intelligence on the CBS series Hunted, and is a regular security analyst on networks including CNN, CBS News, and MSNBC. For organisations where the board genuinely needs to understand what it owns and what it is exposed to, she is one of the few speakers who has actually sat in that seat. Key speaking topics Cybersecurity governance and board-level risk AI-driven threats and deepfake manipulation Secured digital transformation Election security and information integrity Data privacy and digital identity Fraud and social engineering Cybersecurity leadership and workforce Ideal for Boards and non-executive directors navigating cyber and AI governance CISOs, CIOs, and CTOs developing organisation-wide security strategy Risk, compliance, and audit committees in regulated sectors Technology and transformation leaders in financial services, healthcare, and government-adjacent industries Audience outcomes A board-ready framework for assessing the gap between digital investment and security governance Practical understanding of how AI-driven threats – deepfakes, disinformation, autonomous attack tools – operate in practice, not just in theory Clearer accountability structures for cyber risk at executive level Awareness of the specific ways social engineering and fraud are evolving, with concrete defensive steps Language and framing to take cybersecurity from a technical department concern to a strategic leadership conversation

Why organisations work with Mallory Weggemann A first-person account of high-stakes performance after catastrophic setback, drawn from four Paralympic Games across sixteen years, not a single comeback story. A specific framework, Small Steps, Big Impact, that translates incremental progress into a leadership method teams can use the next week, including how to treat setbacks as team-building inputs rather than morale costs. Credibility on adaptation through repeated injury. The 2014 arm injury required two reconstructive surgeries and reshaped her training and competition method ahead of Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020. A media and production track record beyond athletics, including an Emmy-winning NBC Sports hosting role and co-leadership of TFA Group, which lends executive register to the resilience material. Author of Limitless (Nelson Books, 2021), which gives senior audiences a published, citable source for the ideas they will hear in the room. Biography highlights Four-time Paralympian for Team USA; seven-time Paralympic medallist across London 2012, Rio 2016, Tokyo 2020, and Paris 2024. Has held 15 world records and 34 American records in Para Swimming. Author of Limitless: The Power of Hope and Resilience to Overcome Circumstance (Nelson Books, 2021), with a film adaptation in development at Morning Moon Productions. Co-Founder and Co-CEO of TFA Group, a social impact agency and production studio. Emmy Award-winning broadcast host for NBC Sports, with correspondent and host roles across the 2018, 2022, and 2024 Games. ESPY Award winner; three-time USA Swimming Disabled Swimmer of the Year. Biography In January 2008, an epidural injection administered for back pain left an eighteen-year-old competitive swimmer paralysed from the waist down. Three months later, she was back in the pool. Inside two years, she had broken eight world records. The story matters not because it is dramatic, but because it set the operating pattern for everything that followed: progress measured in small, repeatable steps under conditions that would justify stopping. By the London 2012 Paralympic Games, Mallory Weggemann held fifteen world records and thirty-four American records. A 2014 arm injury required two reconstructive surgeries and forced a rebuild of her stroke and her training method. She returned to competition, medalled at the 2019 World Para Swimming Championships, and went on to win two golds and a silver at Tokyo 2020 and a further gold and silver at Paris 2024. Across four Games, the through-line is sustained recovery, not a single comeback. Outside the pool, Weggemann is Co-Founder and Co-CEO of TFA Group, a social impact agency and production studio. She is an Emmy Award-winning NBC Sports broadcaster, with correspondent roles at the 2018 and 2022 Winter Paralympics and a hosting debut at the 2024 Paris Olympics. Her 2021 memoir, Limitless: The Power of Hope and Resilience to Overcome Circumstance, is in development as a film with Morning Moon Productions. Her speaking work translates that pattern into a leadership method. The argument is that resilience is not character. It is a sequence of small, deliberate decisions made consistently under pressure, and a discipline that teams can adopt rather than admire. Key speaking topics Resilience and recovery after shock Self-leadership under sustained pressure Incremental progress as a leadership discipline Team behaviour after setback Inclusive leadership and disability in the workplace Peak performance under constraint Ideal for Executive teams and boards working through restructure, market shock, or sustained operational stress. CHROs and chief people officers rebuilding engagement and team resilience after repeated change cycles. Leadership development programmes for newly senior leaders learning to operate under pressure. Annual conferences and sales kick-offs that need a substantive resilience anchor rather than a generic inspirational keynote. Audience outcomes A working method for breaking down stalled or overwhelming goals into a sequence of executable steps. A more useful definition of resilience that senior leaders can apply to their own decision-making, not just attribute to others. A reframe of setbacks as team-formation inputs, with examples of how that has worked under elite-performance conditions. A citable example, drawn from Paralympic competition and broadcast media, that audiences can take back into board and team conversations.

Why organisations work with Dominic Sandbrook Reach and recognition that few historians can match. The Rest is History, the podcast he co-hosts with Tom Holland, was named Apple Podcasts’ 2025 Global Show of the Year, the first UK-based show to take the award. A serious academic record behind the public profile: Oxford, St Andrews, Cambridge, a Sara Norton Prize PhD, a visiting professorship at King’s College London and a fellowship of the Royal Historical Society. A specific body of work on Britain since 1945, five volumes from Never Had It So Good to Who Dares Wins, that gives him an unusually deep evidence base for parallels between the post-war decades and the disruptions leaders are now navigating. Storytelling craft developed across BBC Two documentary series, a national newspaper column and one of the world’s most-listened-to podcasts. He briefs senior audiences without lecturing them. Biography highlights Co-host of The Rest is History with Tom Holland; Apple Podcasts’ 2025 Global Show of the Year. Visiting Professor at King’s College London; Fellow of the Royal Historical Society; trustee of the National Archives Trust. Author of five volumes on post-war Britain: Never Had It So Good, White Heat, State of Emergency, Seasons in the Sun, Who Dares Wins. Earlier US-history work: Eugene McCarthy and Mad as Hell, on American politics and the 1970s. Writer-presenter of BBC Two series The 70s, The 80s, Tomorrow’s Worlds, Strange Days: Cold War Britain, Let Us Entertain You, and Das Auto. Columnist for the Daily Mail and the Sunday Times. Nominated Critic of the Year (National Press Awards, 2018) and Comment Journalist of the Year (British Journalism Awards, 2021). Biography Britain since 1945 has lived through repeated cycles of inflation, energy crisis, industrial conflict, technological upheaval and political realignment. Dominic Sandbrook has spent two decades writing the definitive popular history of those decades, in five volumes running from Never Had It So Good to Who Dares Wins. That work gives senior audiences something rare: a careful, evidence-based account of how earlier generations of leaders, governments and companies handled the conditions that today’s executives often describe as unprecedented. The academic foundation is serious. Balliol College, Oxford for an undergraduate degree in history and French; an MLitt at St Andrews; a Sara Norton Prize PhD at Jesus College, Cambridge that became his first book, a biography of Senator Eugene McCarthy. A lectureship at Sheffield and a senior fellowship at Oxford’s Rothermere American Institute followed. Since 2012 he has been a Visiting Professor at King’s College London, and he is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a trustee of the National Archives Trust. What sets his work apart is the public reach. Since 2020, Sandbrook and his co-host Tom Holland have built The Rest is History into the world’s most listened-to history podcast, named Apple Podcasts’ 2025 Global Show of the Year. He writes columns for the Daily Mail and the Sunday Times, with award nominations from the National Press Awards and the British Journalism Awards, and he has written and presented major BBC Two series on the 1970s, the 1980s, Cold War Britain and the cultural history of science fiction. For a board or leadership audience, the appeal is the combination of scholarly authority and broadcast craft. Sandbrook makes the post-war record useable: how Heath, Callaghan, Thatcher and the country around them dealt with strikes, currency crises, energy shocks and rapid technological change, and what those episodes reveal about how senior decisions actually get made under pressure. He briefs the room without moralising or romanticising the past. Key speaking topics Post-war British political and economic history The 1970s and 1980s as a leadership case study Cold War culture, politics and global influence Historical parallels for present-day disruption Storytelling and narrative craft for senior communicators American politics and society in the post-war era Ideal for Boards and executive committees commissioning a long-view perspective on current economic and political volatility Annual partner conferences, leadership offsites and after-dinner events that want intellectual heft alongside broadcast-grade delivery Communications, public affairs and corporate-narrative teams interested in how serious storytelling holds an audience Member organisations and trade bodies marking anniversaries or commemorating institutional history Audience outcomes A sharper sense of how earlier decades of British and Western history rhyme with present conditions, and where they do not Specific case material on how political and business leaders handled inflation, industrial disputes, energy crises and technological change A more confident vocabulary for putting current events into historical perspective when briefing teams, clients or stakeholders A reminder of how narrative authority is built: through evidence, character and pace rather than slogans

Why organisations work with Rich Mulholland He runs a working AI agency, Too Many Robots, alongside a presentation business, so the advice on staying relevant in an AI-saturated market comes from someone deploying the tools, not commenting on them. Legacide gives him a precise argument that flips the standard innovation conversation: the constraint is not new ideas, it is the old behaviour that keeps surviving every restructure. Here Be Dragons codifies “storyselling” as a discipline for commercial teams, useful for sales leaders trying to move buyers without resorting to feature lists or discounting. Missing Link has shaped the presentation craft of corporate leaders across South Africa and beyond for over two decades, which means he speaks to senior executives about communication as someone who has trained the room rather than just spoken in it. Biography highlights Founder of Missing Link, described by multiple sources as South Africa’s largest presentation and communication training firm. Founder of Too Many Robots, an AI agency advising clients on practical AI deployment. Co-founder of 21Tanks, a problem-identification consultancy positioned as South Africa’s first perspective lab. Author of four books: Legacide, Boredom Slayer, Here Be Dragons, and Relentless Relevance. Guest lecturer at the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business and the Gordon Institute of Business Science. TEDx speaker at TEDxJohannesburg and TEDxCapeTown; has delivered keynotes in 50 countries across six continents. Biography Innovation programmes rarely fail at the idea stage. They fail at the legacy stage, where the existing way of doing things absorbs the new initiative and digests it back into business as usual. This is the territory Rich Mulholland has spent two decades working in, first through Missing Link, the South African presentation and communication firm he founded, and then through the writing that made Legacide a reference point for executives trying to understand why their change programmes keep stalling. His thesis is direct. Innovation does not happen when an organisation starts doing something new. It happens when it stops doing something old. That distinction reframes the senior team’s job from generating ideas to clearing space, and it is the spine that connects his work across innovation, sales, and communication. In Here Be Dragons he applies the same logic to commercial teams, treating storytelling not as a soft skill but as the operating discipline that decides whether a deal moves. The AI dimension is the more recent layer. Through Too Many Robots, the agency he founded to help clients deploy AI tactically rather than rhetorically, Mulholland has been working inside the question that most boards are still asking from the outside: what remains a human advantage when expectation, attention, and execution can all be automated. His answer, set out in the Humanity’s Unfair Advantage keynote, is that relevance is the perpetual play, not a position you achieve once. He is a guest lecturer at the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business and at GIBS, has spoken in 50 countries across six continents, and has appeared on TEDx stages including TEDxJohannesburg and TEDxCapeTown. Before any of this he was a touring roadie running lights for Iron Maiden, Def Leppard, and Bon Jovi, which is where the obsession with what makes a room respond actually started. Key speaking topics Relentless relevance and the discipline of staying useful to customers Legacy thinking as the silent constraint on innovation Storyselling and persuasion for commercial teams Humanity’s unfair advantage in an AI-driven market Leadership communication and executive presence Strategy for autonomous and purpose-driven organisations Ideal for Chief commercial officers, chief revenue officers, and sales leadership audiences working on storytelling and buyer persuasion Innovation leads, transformation heads, and strategy teams trying to dismantle legacy behaviour rather than add new initiatives Executive communicators and senior leaders preparing for high-stakes platforms, investor days, and town halls Boards and leadership teams scoping where AI substitutes human work and where human relevance still holds Audience outcomes A working definition of what legacy thinking looks like inside their own organisation, and where it is absorbing innovation effort A sharper framing for sales and commercial narratives that moves beyond feature lists into customer-centred story A clearer view of which parts of their work AI will eat and which parts depend on human relevance A practical standard for what a senior executive presentation should do, drawn from someone who has trained presenters for two decades

Why organisations work with Martin Brooks He has taught body language to leaders at Henley Business School, London Business School and Judge Business School, giving the content a teaching-grade structure that most communication coaches lack. His sales-leadership background means the work lands with commercial audiences who tend to dismiss communication coaching as soft skills. His Body Language Decoder gives delegates a reference artefact that travels back into the business after the session, not just a one-day boost. Broadcasters book him to analyse political and corporate figures live on air (BBC2, LBC, Discovery, The Times), which is a useful proxy for how quickly he can read a room. Clients including IBM, PwC, KPMG, Procter & Gamble and the Financial Times have used him for executive coaching, pitch preparation, and leadership development. Biography highlights Author of Body Language Decoder (Laurence King / Hachette, 2021). Teaches “Body Language for Leaders” at Henley Business School. Course Director at the Chartered Institute of Marketing since 2008. Founder of his communications consultancy in 2002, after a career in sales and sales leadership. Media commentator on body language for BBC Radio, LBC, BBC2 election coverage, Discovery Channel and The Times. Clients include IBM, PwC, KPMG, Procter & Gamble and the Financial Times. Biography Most leaders prepare what they will say in a high-stakes meeting and almost nothing about how they will appear while saying it. The asymmetry shows. Boards, investors and senior peers form judgements on credibility within seconds, and the data they use is mostly nonverbal. Martin Brooks works in that gap. He has run his own communication consultancy since 2002, after a career in sales and sales leadership where the cost of looking uncertain in front of a buyer was immediate and personal. That commercial origin shapes how he teaches. The work is not theatre training and not motivational, it is operator instruction on what hands, eyes, voice, and posture are doing while a leader argues a point. The teaching has institutional weight behind it. Brooks delivers “Body Language for Leaders” at Henley Business School and has taught at London Business School and Judge Business School. He has been a Course Director at the Chartered Institute of Marketing since 2008. His Body Language Decoder, published in 2021 by Laurence King, sits as a 50-card field reference that delegates use after the session. Broadcasters use him as the in-studio analyst for politicians and corporate leaders under pressure. He provided live analysis on Discovery Channel of Mark Zuckerberg’s US Senate testimony, has covered UK general elections on BBC2, and contributes to BBC Radio, LBC and The Times. For a senior buyer, that body of live, on-record reading is the best available evidence that what he teaches in the room actually works under fire. Key speaking topics Body language for senior leaders Executive presence and credibility on stage Nonverbal communication in high-stakes meetings Pitch and presentation coaching Reading political and business figures in real time Ideal for Executive committees and senior leadership teams preparing for investor, board or town-hall communication CEOs and C-suite leaders stepping into more public-facing roles Sales leadership and pitch teams running competitive bids Leadership development and high-potential programmes Audience outcomes A vocabulary for what their own body is signalling while they speak The ability to read confidence, hesitation and disagreement in a room before words confirm it Concrete adjustments to posture, gesture and eye contact that they can use the same week A reference artefact (the Body Language Decoder cards) for ongoing use post-session Sharper judgement on how political and corporate figures are performing under pressure

Why organisations work with Nikki Bhamra Her frameworks for identifying blind spots and challenging assumptions come directly from twenty years of investigative work in human trafficking and serious organised crime – professional contexts where flawed judgement had irreversible consequences, not theoretical ones. She makes a specific, teachable argument: that most leadership failures are not information problems but reasoning problems caused by how leaders question, filter, and challenge what they already know. As a certified Insights Discovery psychometric practitioner, she combines forensic thinking with structured behavioural profiling, enabling her to work at depth on team dynamics and communication, not only from the keynote stage. Her work has been applied in regulated, high-accountability environments: the NHS, the Crown Prosecution Service, and financial services: organisations where decision quality and trust are operational risks, not soft skills. She has delivered sessions on the University of Cambridge Master’s in Leadership programme, applying her investigative-informed approach to decision quality and trust to senior leadership development. Biography highlights Senior Crime Investigator for over two decades, leading complex operations into human trafficking and serious organised crime in UK law enforcement Founder and CEO of Peak Potential Group, a bespoke leadership development company Certified Insights Discovery psychometric practitioner CIPD-qualified; member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development and the Professional Speaking Association Has delivered sessions on the University of Cambridge Master’s in Leadership programme TEDx speaker; Highly Commended, Speaker Bookers Choice, Speaker Awards Clients include Metro Bank, the NHS, and the Crown Prosecution Service Biography Nikki Bhamra spent over two decades as a Senior Crime Investigator in UK law enforcement, leading operations into human trafficking and serious organised crime. In that environment, an unchallenged assumption or a question left unasked could have irreversible consequences. The discipline required to surface the truth – not the convenient version – is the foundation of everything she now brings to organisations. Her central argument is precise and useful: most leadership errors are not caused by a lack of information. They are caused by how leaders question, filter, and challenge the information already in front of them. Blind spots, confirmation bias, and the absence of psychological safety allow flawed thinking to compound quietly, in everyday conversations, not only in moments of obvious crisis. The cost shows up in decisions, culture, and trust. Bhamra is a certified Insights Discovery psychometric practitioner and CIPD-qualified, which means she operates at both the conceptual and structural levels: forensic questioning frameworks alongside behavioural profiling, tailored to the specific dynamics of a leadership team. She is Founder and CEO of Peak Potential Group, through which she delivers bespoke leadership programmes as well as keynotes. Her work has been applied in regulated, high-accountability environments: the NHS, the Crown Prosecution Service, and financial services. She has delivered sessions on the University of Cambridge Master’s in Leadership programme. She is a TEDx speaker and was recognised as Highly Commended in the Speaker Bookers Choice category at the Speaker Awards. Key speaking topics Leadership decision-making under pressure Blind spots, bias, and judgement errors Forensic questioning and evidence-based reasoning Trust-building in high-stakes environments Psychological safety and speaking up High-performance team dynamics Communication in complex and regulated environments Ideal for Senior leadership teams and executive cohorts in high-pressure, complex, or regulated industries Risk, compliance, and governance functions where decision quality and trust are operationally critical CHROs and L&D leaders building leadership capability programmes with a behavioural science foundation Boards and transformation leads treating decision quality and leadership culture as measurable strategic risks Audience outcomes A practical framework for identifying blind spots and surfacing unchecked assumptions before they affect decisions or culture Structured questioning techniques drawn from investigative practice, applicable immediately to leadership conversations and team dynamics Greater understanding of how confirmation bias, selective attention, and faulty assumption affect judgement – and what to do about it Concrete approaches to building psychological safety and trust in teams, grounded in behavioural evidence rather than aspiration Increased awareness of the everyday communication patterns that either strengthen or erode credibility and leadership effectiveness under pressure

Why organisations work with Laura Muir A medal record across three Olympic cycles (Rio 2016, Tokyo 2020 silver, Paris 2024 fifth with a Scottish record) that demonstrates sustained performance rather than a single peak moment. The only British athlete to win five European Indoor Championship golds, evidence of a planning and preparation system that produces results year after year. Lived experience of running a parallel high-stakes track: completed her veterinary medicine degree at Glasgow while training at world-class level, a story of capacity management rather than balance. Direct access to the methods behind composure in finals where the British record, an Olympic medal, and global attention are decided inside four minutes. Biography highlights Olympic 1500m silver medallist, Tokyo 2020, in a British record 3:54.50. Two-time outdoor European 1500m champion (Berlin 2018, Munich 2022) and 2022 World Championships 1500m bronze medallist. Five European Indoor Championship gold medals, a British record, including a 1500m and 3000m double in Glasgow 2019. 2022 Commonwealth Games 1500m gold and 800m bronze for Team Scotland. Doctor of Veterinary Medicine, University of Glasgow, graduated 2018. MBE for services to athletics, 2019 New Year Honours. Biography The 1500 metres is decided in just under four minutes. There is no second leg, no team-mate to hand off to, and no plausible recovery from a poor tactical call inside the final lap. The athletes who medal repeatedly at that distance are the ones who have built a system that holds when the stakes are at their highest. Laura Muir has medalled at three Olympic cycles in that event, including silver at Tokyo 2020 in a British record of 3:54.50 and a fifth-place Scottish record in the Paris 2024 final. She holds five European Indoor Championship gold medals, the most of any British athlete, and is a two-time outdoor European champion. The 2022 World Championships in Eugene added a bronze, and the same year brought Commonwealth Games gold in the 1500m and bronze over 800m. That run of results comes from a planning culture more than from inspiration. The same period covered her veterinary medicine degree at the University of Glasgow, completed in 2018, and an MBE for services to athletics the following year. The discipline she describes when talking about competition is the discipline she used to run two careers in parallel. For senior audiences, the relevant content is not the medals themselves but the operating method behind them: how a small team builds a season around a single race, how composure is rehearsed rather than summoned, and how recovery from a disappointing championship becomes the input to the next cycle’s plan. Key speaking topics Performance under pressure Goal setting and long-range planning Resilience and recovery from setback Composure in high-stakes moments Capacity management across parallel commitments Team and coach relationships in individual sport Motivation and discipline over a long career Ideal for Senior leaders and executive teams under sustained performance scrutiny Sales, trading, and commercial functions where individual high-stakes moments determine results Talent and learning leaders designing development programmes for high-potential staff Conference audiences at annual kickoffs, partner meetings, and recognition events Audience outcomes A working picture of how elite performers plan and rehearse for moments that last minutes but define a year. Specific methods for managing composure when the audience and the cost of error are both large. A credible account of how to sustain output across multiple cycles, not a single peak. A clear view of what capacity management looks like when two demanding tracks are being run at once.

Why organisations work with Elena Boheme She has run the full development lifecycle, from hotel operator design management and fit-out contracting through to property M&A and family office advisory. That breadth is rare; most advisors sit on one side of the design, build, or operate split. She co-founded Metrix Projects and Metrix Advisory in the Kingdom, and sits on the advisory board of RED Summit KSA and the Modern Building Summit KSA. That places her inside the rooms where Saudi development decisions are made, not adjacent to them. She works credibly across the capital stack, advising AETOS MFO on luxury asset and yacht financing and Triversa Holding at executive board level. International family offices use her to translate Gulf real estate exposure into something they can actually govern. She operates in English, French, and Russian fluently, with working Arabic and Mandarin, and has executed projects in China, Macau, Korea, Monaco, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia. Cross-cultural deal structuring is a practised skill, not a claim. Biography highlights Co-founder and Development Director, Metrix Projects; co-founder, Metrix Advisory and AETOS MFO. Executive Board Member, Triversa Holding. Strategic Advisor on Project Management, Coldwell Banker Commercial Saudi Arabia. Advisory Board member, RED Summit KSA, and Advisory Board member plus moderator, Modern Building Summit KSA 2025. Speaker and moderator across AlMashtal Knowledge of Design 2024, Cityscape Saudi Arabia 2024, Hospitality Leadership and F&B Forum UAE 2025, Furtech Show Dubai 2025, and Women in Private Equity Forum London 2025. Host of LinkedIn Live series Development Dialogues and author of the LinkedIn newsletter Project Within. Biography Saudi Arabia’s development pipeline is the largest in the world and the least forgiving. International capital arrives expecting Dubai and discovers a market with its own regulatory architecture, its own localisation requirements, and its own definition of what delivered means. Elena Boheme’s work sits inside that translation problem. She co-founded Metrix Projects and Metrix Advisory in Riyadh to do one specific job: take hospitality and residential developments from concept through to operational handover without the gaps that quietly consume budget. Before that, she spent a decade on hotel operator design management, fit-out contracting, and property development across China, Macau, Korea, Monaco, and the UAE, including hospitality projects valued at over two billion US dollars in Korea and Macau. A second strand of her work runs through capital. She co-founded AETOS MFO, a multi-family office advising on luxury real estate and yacht financing, and sits as an executive board member at Triversa Holding and strategic advisor on project management to Coldwell Banker Commercial Saudi Arabia. The combination matters: developers usually understand bricks, family offices usually understand money, and Saudi-bound investors need someone who can hold both sides of the conversation at once. She moderates and chairs across the Kingdom’s main industry platforms, including the RED Summit KSA advisory board, the Modern Building Summit KSA, Cityscape Saudi Arabia, and AlMashtal Knowledge of Design, and hosts the LinkedIn Live series Development Dialogues. The track record is operational rather than academic. For a leadership team weighing a Vision 2030 entry, that is the more useful kind of credibility. Key speaking topics Project deliverability in Saudi Arabia Localisation and market entry strategy for the Kingdom Real estate development lifecycle, from design through operations Cross-cultural deal structuring in the Gulf Women in real estate development and leadership Family office exposure to Gulf real estate Ideal for International hospitality operators and developers planning entry into Saudi Arabia Family offices and private investors building Gulf real estate exposure Boards of project management, design, and construction firms expanding into the Kingdom C-suite teams at firms shifting from regional MENA presence to substantive KSA delivery Audience outcomes A clear-eyed view of what separates a signed Saudi deal from a delivered asset The localisation choices that decide whether a foreign operator can actually execute in the Kingdom A working map of how design, build, operate, and capital decisions interact across a Gulf development Specific failure modes she has seen at the hand-off between international design teams and local execution A perspective on Saudi development from someone embedded in it, not commenting from outside

Why organisations work with Ashwin Gulati A founder’s-eye view drawn from 100+ ventures in four countries, not a single startup story extrapolated into a thesis Hands-on experience as interim executive and Entrepreneur-in-Residence inside companies in crisis, not commentary from the sidelines Author of Soul Venture, a 16-year project that documents the human and psychological mechanics of startup failure that most business books edit out Comfortable in the room with boards, family offices and first-time founders, and switches register accordingly Bilingual operator across US and European venture cultures, useful when expansion crosses regulatory and capital-market boundaries Biography highlights 30+ years guiding founders, CEOs and boards across 100+ ventures in the US, UK, Spain and France Founder of Match Point Ventures, working with boards, family offices and executive teams as strategic advisor, interim executive and Entrepreneur-in-Residence Author of Soul Venture: A True Life and Death Journey Into the Startup Culture (Match Point Press) Featured at Claremont McKenna College’s Marian Miner Cook Athenaeum on the unspoken truths of entrepreneurship Quoted and published in Chief Executive, Authority Magazine, Grit Daily, StartupNation, CEO World and LeadershipNow BA in Economics and Mathematics from Claremont McKenna College, with study at King’s College London and the London School of Economics Biography Ninety-seven of every hundred startups fail. The interesting question is not why most fail, but what the survivors paid to get through, and why so little of that cost is ever named in public. Ashwin Gulati has spent three decades inside that question, working alongside founders, CEOs and boards through launches, pivots, expansions and exits in the US, UK, Spain and France. His work spans more than 100 ventures, from early-stage technology companies to family-office-backed operating businesses. Through Match Point Ventures he steps in as strategic advisor, interim executive or Entrepreneur-in-Residence, running diagnostic assessments on capital structure, business model, leadership alignment and market position. The role is not theoretical. It usually begins when something is breaking. Soul Venture, his debut book, took 16 years to write because it does what most entrepreneurship literature avoids. It traces the psychological and human costs that sit alongside the spreadsheet view of company building. The book is part memoir, part field guide, drawn from his own ventures and from the founders he has worked beside. It has been featured by Chief Executive, Grit Daily and Authority Magazine, and anchors his speaking on what he calls the X-factors that separate real builders from the rest. He addresses three moments in venture life with equal seriousness. The take-off, where most founders mistake hustle for traction. The flight, where scaling exposes who can actually lead. And the landing, where exits, succession and legacy decide what the work was for. Key speaking topics Entrepreneurship and the founder journey Scale-up leadership across stages Venture launch and operational sustainability Exit, succession and founder legacy Self-leadership and founder resilience Cross-border venture building Ideal for Founder communities, incubators and accelerators briefing first-time and serial entrepreneurs Boards, family offices and investor networks evaluating venture portfolios Executive teams inside scale-ups confronting transition or crisis Business schools and entrepreneurship programmes building founder development tracks Audience outcomes A clearer map of the launch, scale and exit decisions that decide a venture’s outcome Specific failure mechanics drawn from 100+ companies, not founder mythology Language for the human cost of building, useful in boardrooms that usually avoid it A working frame for legacy and succession that goes beyond the financial exit

Why organisations work with Stefan Löfven Direct head-of-government experience of running a minority coalition through migration shock, terror response, the pandemic, and a vote of no confidence, useful for boards weighing political risk in their own operating geographies. Chair of SIPRI, the institute whose annual data on military expenditure, arms transfers and conflict is the reference set used by foreign ministries and defence analysts globally. Co-Chair of the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism, which produced the 2023 report A Breakthrough for People and Planet on reforming global governance. Co-led, with Cyril Ramaphosa, the ILO Global Commission on the Future of Work, the body whose 2019 report shaped the ILO Centenary Declaration on labour standards and social protection. Career rooted on the factory floor as a welder and union leader, which gives a credibility on labour, industrial policy and the social contract that very few former heads of state can claim. Biography highlights Prime Minister of Sweden, 2014 to 2021, across two coalition governments. Chair of the Governing Board, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), since 2022. Co-Chair, UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism, 2022 to 2023. Co-Chair, ILO Global Commission on the Future of Work, with President Cyril Ramaphosa. President, Party of European Socialists, elected 2022. Resident Fellow, Institute of Politics, Harvard Kennedy School, Fall 2022. Biography The seven years of Löfven’s premiership covered the European migration crisis, a fatal terror attack on central Stockholm, a vote of no confidence that briefly removed him from office, and the COVID-19 response in a country that diverged from most of its neighbours on lockdown policy. Few European leaders held office continuously across that span. Fewer still did so while running minority governments dependent on votes from across the political spectrum. That experience is the foundation of the international roles he now holds. As Chair of SIPRI’s Governing Board since 2022, he sits over the institute that produces the data foreign ministries rely on for arms transfers, military spending, and conflict trends. As Co-Chair, with Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, of the UN High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism, he led the 2023 report A Breakthrough for People and Planet, which set out concrete reforms to the global financial architecture and the UN system itself. The labour and industrial dimension of his work is harder to fake. Trained as a welder at Hagglunds and active in the Swedish Metalworkers’ Union from his twenties, he became the first president of IF Metall in 2006 before entering elected politics. That background is why the ILO chose him, with Cyril Ramaphosa, to co-chair its Global Commission on the Future of Work, and why the Global Deal he launched in 2016 with the OECD and ILO is built around social dialogue rather than purely fiscal levers. For audiences, what travels is the practical weight of having held the line on multilateral cooperation when the politics moved against it, and the clarity that comes from briefing other heads of state, not from observing them. Key speaking topics Geopolitical risk and the rules-based order Multilateral cooperation and UN reform Crisis leadership in coalition government Future of work and the social contract European political alignment and the rise of the populist right Industrial policy and the labour market Peace, security and disarmament Ideal for Boards and executive teams scoping geopolitical exposure, sanctions risk, and operating decisions in a fracturing global order. CHRO and policy leaders working on the social contract, labour standards, and the future of work agenda. Government affairs, sustainability, and ESG functions tracking multilateral reform and UN-level policy direction. Senior leadership audiences at financial institutions, defence and dual-use industries with direct exposure to peace, security and arms-control data. Audience outcomes A first-hand account of how a head of government weighs political risk, security, and economic exposure inside the same decision. A clearer reading of where multilateral institutions are likely to bend, break, or reform over the next cycle. A grounded view of the European political map, including the rise of the populist right and its operating consequences. An informed perspective on labour, social dialogue and the future of work from a leader who has lived both sides of the table. Confidence that the briefing reflects current institutional reality, not commentary from the outside.

Why organisations work with Ellis Watson He has run a ten-year transformation of a family-owned media group, DC Thomson, including the digital reinvention of brands like The Beano, with full P&L accountability. Few keynote speakers can show that length of tenure inside a turnaround. He has held the top operating role in three different content businesses, newspapers, global TV formats and family-owned media, so the change playbook he offers is sector-tested, not theoretical. His current seat as Chief Business Advisor to the First Minister of Scotland gives him a live view of how policy, regulation and capital are shaping the conditions executive teams are actually working in. He is direct in a room. Boards and executive audiences book him when they want candour about cost, culture and pace, not a motivational set piece. Biography highlights Chief Business Advisor to the First Minister of Scotland, appointed January 2023. CEO and later Executive Chairman of DC Thomson, 2011 to 2020, leading the modernisation of titles including The Beano and The Press and Journal. Global CEO of Syco Entertainment under Simon Cowell in 2010, with responsibility for the X Factor and Got Talent franchises. CEO of Celador International from 2000, oversaw the international rollout of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? to around 100 territories. Managing Director of Mirror Group Newspapers from 2003 to 2005, accountable for five national and around 240 regional titles. Non-executive director of FirstGroup plc from 2009, with North American Greyhound responsibility, and a former Marketing Director of News International reporting to Rupert Murdoch. Biography DC Thomson is the kind of business that does not usually survive a digital decade. A family-owned publisher in Dundee, built on print titles like The Beano, The Sunday Post and The Press and Journal, it carried a cost base shaped by an industry that no longer existed. Between 2011 and 2020 it was rebuilt from the inside, with a third of the staff gone and the consumer brands repositioned for digital. Ellis Watson ran that decade as CEO and then Executive Chairman. That was not an unfamiliar problem to him. He had already taken Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? out to roughly 100 territories as CEO of Celador, run five national newspapers and around 240 regional titles at the Mirror Group, and spent 2010 as global CEO of Simon Cowell’s Syco Entertainment, holding the X Factor and Got Talent franchises. The earlier ground had been News International, as Marketing Director reporting to Rupert Murdoch. What that career produces, in a board context, is an unusually long lens on the same problem. Legacy businesses tend to be governed by people who have never personally rebuilt one. Ellis has, in three sectors, and he is now sitting inside Scottish Government as the First Minister’s Chief Business Advisor, a role created in January 2023 to bring private sector judgement into policy decisions. The result is a speaker who is most useful to executive teams in the middle of structural change, where the questions are about cost, talent and tempo, and where a generic transformation framework is not enough. Key speaking topics Leadership through structural change in legacy businesses Turnaround and brand revitalisation Building and holding high-performance cultures Engaging younger workforces inside traditional organisations Disruption as an operating discipline, not a slogan Governance and stakeholder trust during transformation Ideal for Boards and executive teams of legacy or family-owned businesses facing structural decline CEOs, COOs and transformation directors running cost and culture programmes in parallel CHROs and senior people leaders rebuilding engagement during restructure Senior leadership audiences in media, publishing, transport and consumer brands Audience outcomes A clear-eyed read on how long real turnaround actually takes inside a legacy business Specific operator decisions, on cost, talent and brand, drawn from DC Thomson, Mirror, Celador and Syco A working argument for why culture is the binding constraint in any transformation, not strategy A view from inside government on the conditions UK businesses are operating against A different vocabulary for talking about disruption with a board, less abstract, more accountable

Why organisations work with Kevin Green A career arc that has tested his own frameworks in three different operating environments: professional kitchens, classroom education and corporate keynote delivery. The 3P Framework (Purpose, Passion, Potential) gives audiences a single, repeatable structure for moving from feeling stuck to taking action, useful for leaders managing people through reinvention. A teaching style built on practical demonstration, not abstraction. He came up running real kitchens and competing on Food Network’s Chopped, and brings that operator instinct to the stage. Strong fit for student and early-career audiences as well as corporate teams, with documented work with the University of Tennessee, Tennessee Department of Education and Pellissippi State Community College. Biography highlights Founder of Kevin Green Elevates, a keynote and workshop practice focused on leadership alignment and personal execution. Competitor on Food Network’s Chopped. Degree in Nutrition and Dietetics from Lipscomb University, Nashville. Built and ran Chef Kevin Culinary, a personal chef business spanning private dinners, cooking classes and culinary education. Speaking clients and partners include the University of Tennessee, Tennessee Department of Education, Pellissippi State Community College and Toastmasters. Reported keynote speaker for the IASP 2026 Global Conference, with a talk titled “Do It Scared”. Biography Most teams do not lack effort. They lack alignment. Priorities pile up, ownership drifts, and people work hard on the wrong things. That is the problem Kevin Green built his keynote practice around, drawing on a career that has crossed kitchens, classrooms and corporate rooms. His operator background is unusual for a speaker on this topic. He trained as a chef, ran his own personal chef business in Knoxville, Tennessee, taught culinary arts to teenagers, and competed on Food Network’s Chopped. Each of those environments forced him to translate intent into clean, repeatable execution under pressure, and that is the frame he brings to leaders. His core teaching tool is the 3P Framework, Purpose, Passion, Potential. It gives audiences a simple structure for separating what they actually want from what they have inherited, and then for moving from clarity into action. He uses it with college students choosing direction, with early-career professionals at crossroads, and with corporate teams trying to get priorities, roles and expectations into the same shape. He is known for energy on stage and for breaking complex ideas into language a working audience can use the next morning. Clients include the University of Tennessee, the Tennessee Department of Education and Pellissippi State Community College, and he was named to open the IASP 2026 Global Conference with a keynote titled “Do It Scared”. Key speaking topics Purpose, passion and potential as a personal operating framework Leadership and team alignment Personal execution and follow-through Resilience and self-leadership at career crossroads Authentic working life and identity at work Presence, body language and vocal delivery Ideal for Corporate leadership offsites and all-hands events focused on execution and ownership Sales kick-offs and culture days where energy and clarity matter as much as content University and college audiences, including career services, student life and athletic departments Early-career and high-potential cohorts navigating career direction Audience outcomes A clearer personal answer to what they are working towards and why A simple framework, the 3P method, that survives the trip back to the desk A sharper read on where their own priorities, roles and expectations are out of alignment Renewed momentum, with concrete actions to take in the days after the event Practical language for talking about presence, voice and how they show up at work